TOUGHNESS

"Toughness is in the soul and the spirit, not in muscles."

~Alex Karras~

Real toughness is quiet and steadfast; not aggressive, and not belligerent. Real toughness does not advertise itself. It is confident in its own power and reliability. It waits and watches. It is not afraid to be tender and not afraid to be kind.
     More often, what we encounter is a façade of toughness, which is nothing more than a cover-story for fear; a veil of amped-up composure over a puddle of insecurity. This kind of toughness is brittle, and weak.
     When life requires endurance and strength from us, let's call on the reserves of love within us instead of the smoke of our fears.

Fear weakens me, but love makes me indestructible. I choose love. 

TOO LOOSE

"If it be a sin to covet honor, I am the most offending soul."

~William Shakespeare~

Too much familiarity too soon with people we are just meeting is uncomfortable. A certain level of propriety, at least for the first few minutes, is appropriate, and appreciated.
     I don't like my waiter to sit down at the table with me to take my order and then call me sweetie and act like we are best friends. And I don't want people to create nick-names for me, or to tease me, before they even know who I am. These types of liberties, though they reflect our increasingly casual culture, feel like violations of an unspoken social contract.

     Let's be respectful and proper and polite upon meeting people, and save our jibes and endearments for when we know each other better and have earned the right to be so familiar.

 

I am sensitive to personal boundaries and the dignity of unfamiliar people and maintain a level of decorum as we interact. I am not so casual that I forget to be respectful.

ALLOWING FOR DIGNITY

"I think most of us can remember without any difficulty and with a  flush of joy those extremely rare cases in our own childhood when some grown-up visitor treated us with real, instead of with mock, respect."

~William L Phelps~

 

It's possible to smoother people with our care and attention- to fuss and bother over them when they are perfectly capable beings in their own right. We tend to do this with old people and with young children. We insult their intelligence by being overly-protective and molly-codling, and by giving them the message that that they cannot function or succeed without us.
    Let's honor them instead. Let's treat all human beings, no matter their age or their situation, with dignity and respect.

I do not "talk down" to the very old and the very young. I treat them like the whole people that they are.

THE WASTE OF WORRY

"We are more disturbed by a calamity which threatens us than by one which has befallen us."

~John Lancaster Spalding~

Most of what we worry about doesn't happen. It dissolves in the mist of time and evaporates before it has come to fruition. Other things happen instead: the unanticipated and unforeseen.
     I have a tendency to consider the future with a certain amount of dread, as if I am guaranteed suffering and hardship. I fret over these things as possibilities, but in truth, I am blessed by life more than I am cursed. I am regularly surprised by the beauty of ordinary things, and the people I meet, and synchronicity.

    Let's leave worry by the wayside and trust in goodness. Let's believe that everything happens for a reason, and that ultimately, all that we experience is for our evolution and prosperity. When fear and stress come mongering around, let's move past our anxiety and choose instead to trust in the process of our lives.

 

When I catch myself being upset over potential future events, I take a deep breath and remember that everything plays out in the end.

DAYS THAT GO WELL

"There is no longer the need to have a sense of control... Things flow as they will..."

~Emmanuel~

 

Some days I am content to go along and get along. I enjoy the nuances of the day and the colors I see and the people I encounter. I am empty of fight and struggle and angst, which are the ruling factors of my life on other days.
     It's a blessing to feel this way whenever it happens, because it's guaranteed not to last. More often than not, I am full of resistance. I resist the way things are, and I resist the idea of changing. I get stuck emotionally. So when I feel peaceful and easy in my skin, it's a good day, and I embrace it with my whole heart.

I am grateful for days that pass without my resistance.

THE SCOPE OF THINGS

"The machine does not isolate man from the great problems of nature but plunges him more deeply into them."

~Antoine de Saint-Exupery~

We are tiny in the scope of things. The internet makes our world smaller in the sense that we can communicate with people all over the earth, but it also dwarfs us. Our inclinations and likes and follows and views are a mere blip in the sea of visual and conceptual possibility. Multitudes of people have a website and an angle and something to promote. And so much of it is interesting, valid, curious, and seemingly worth our time.
     People's lifework is available for our perusal and review, and we add ours to the mix. It's exciting and overwhelming at the same time, like the most extravagant buffet of global food. It's all prepared to please the eye and excite the palate .
     And plenty of it is less appealing in reality than it may initially seem, but plenty of it is delicious as well, and unique, and not-to-be-missed. It's a hard thing not to over-fill our plates, and super-easy to get personally lost in the mix.

I trust that I will encounter who I am supposed to encounter traveling the road of life and do not allow the sheer volume of possibility to overwhelm me.

CAUSE AND EFFECT

"Choices are the hinges of destiny."

~Pythagoras~

I believe that the condition of our lives is more the result of our repetitive choices than it is the result of luck, or destiny. If we habitually choose dysfunction, then dysfunction is what we experience. If we choose gratitude, we experience abundance. If we choose to be loving, we experience the energy of love.
     Free will is about cause and effect. We are responsible beings- not victims. What we choose determines the quality of our lives.

Understanding that the choices I make dictate my experience, I choose with care.