Belief Makers

The western part of Europe has recently been influenced by the plume from a volcano in Iceland. The volcano is called Eyjafjallajökull, which seems to me more difficult to pronounce than Tuomenoksa! The power of this volcano is even more difficult to comprehend than its pronunciation. At this moment there is still more plume coming and we do not have the knowledge to stop it or to calculate the duration.

The last two days the sky has been blue, and every time I looked up in the sky, I could not detect the plume. It is hard to imagine that it is up there while I cannot see it, but I surely felt it because the temperature has dropped significantly.

The eruption of Eyjafjallajökull has given us, the western Europeans who are not used to tornados or earthquakes, a great opportunity to observe our reactions.

My first reaction:
My first reaction was fascination. I found this whole situation mind blowing (I mean this in a positive sense). I saw the pictures of the volcano and pictures of the plume and I was completely fascinated.

At the same time I felt at deep respect for these enormous powers. Mother Earth calling us.

My second reaction:
My second reaction was to be grateful for the opportunity for us to learn from this.

In the Danish news I watched a scientist explain how fabulous an opportunity this was: this plume is acting in similar ways to the reaction after an atomic bomb. It went higher and moved slower, but the patterns in which the particles moved were similar. This meant that the scientist, who is responsible for calculating the effects of an atomic bomb, had the possibility to test his models on questions like: What is the possibility that the plume reaches our country? If the plume reaches our country, when will this happen? How long will it take to pass the country? He creates projections for all the information you need in order to make and maintain evacuation plans.

How often do we judge events as bad when they can be seen as great learning opportunities? How can I ever judge an event as good or bad when I do not know the specifics of whom or what may benefit from this event?

My third reaction.
This reaction was the one, which surprised me the most. I realized that I have no idea of the greater impact my wishes have.

Today some people asked me to meditate on keeping the plume less than three kilometers high so that we could soon fly from Europe again. Earlier this weekend I heard that if it would start to rain then the plume would not raise as high and this would give us better chances of flying.

But what happens if the plume is low? What happens if it starts raining?

During the first days the volcano directly impacted only the people close to the volcano in Iceland. They have been keeping the animals indoor because there is too much powder on the ground and this can be harmful for the animals. When it has been raining people and animals stay inside since it could be harmful for the lungs. Now, if it starts raining here in Denmark, while the plume is above my country, we are also advised to stay indoors.

They say that Eyjafjallajökull is not very harmful, but it is close to the biggest volcano on Iceland and it seems possible that it can "wake up" this neighbor called Katla.

I don't know if the rain will have any influence on the possibility of waking up Katla, but I when I got the request of wishing for the plume to get lower my reaction was: how can I know if this will be more harmful, if it might influence the awakening of Katla?

My fourth reaction
My fourth reaction was how surprisingly calm I felt not knowing what would happen in the future.

Historically this volcano becomes active every 200 yrs. The last time it was active it lasted one and a half years (on and of). How long time will it last now?

Last time it was active no one bothered about airplanes! But if it stays active for that long this time, how would it influence our lives? No flights to the USA? Would we sail to Iceland to take a flight from there (in Iceland only eastbound flights are influenced)?

Will we start living with a different attitude? Like: if I can't fly today, then maybe tomorrow or next week? Will we invent aircrafts who are less sensitive to the plume or who can fly under it?

A short term effect has been friendly people offering people they don't know a long distance ride in their car, since trains and busses didn't have capacity to take all the people who missed their flights.

And there have been some beautiful sunsets...

I would love to hear your reaction to Eyjafjallajökull's activities or to experiences with earthquakes, tornados or....

Love Joy

Labels: all blogs, beliefs, joy vigh strand, mother nature, reactions

Wow, that race on Sunday was something! A gorgeous day, and more than 1700 people came out to run this beautiful trail along the coast. The 10 K was along a path that was a lot less flat than I had anticipated and the run was challenging for me.

Especially because in my enthusiasm I forgot to take my inhaler before the run and after the first 200 feet my muscles started screaming, "Where is the oxygen"?!

But I made it all the way till the end, and my lovely accompany too! Teflon decided to run the race with me. He is a biker and trains every day, so he is in good shape. But halfway the race his run muscles decided not to cooperate any longer, and the last part of the race he moved over the trail like a little penguin.

Congrats Tef, for going all the way till the end and thank you so much for supporting me!

Recovery
Now we are three days after the run and I already did one following up run of 5.5 miles and I am following my schedule working towards my next goal: half a marathon. I have not had a set back from the race (in opposite: I feel great) and Mark also has recovered properly! Isn't that fabulous?

It makes me think about recovery times. The whole running experience gives me a new insight in recovery times after you really challenge your body and what a difference that makes if the body is trained or not. And I can feel the difference for me. It's not that long ago that after a two-mile run I had to do a nap, before I could start the rest of the day, and now I need water and food and then I can go on.

So, seeing that this is the way it works with running, I want to pull this knowledge into other an area: working to become happier. Last week I was going to do a dialogue with a new person and we discussed beforehand what a dialogue is, how it works, how it would help her. And when we talked about finding and changing beliefs I told her that the more she practices, the faster she starts to see which beliefs she has in place that lead to unhappiness, and can then start changing them. I told her that the more you do it, the shorter the time frame of unhappiness will be. On a given moment you will say: "oh no, that thought will lead me to unhappiness, let me make another decision instead".

If you train your body and mind to be in excellent shape, you can experience very short recovery times and you will have a lot more time to spend in the way you would like.

Do you recover easily? Or do you hold on? In which areas do you recover fastest? In which areas do you recover very slow?

Labels: beliefs, iris tuomenoksa, marathon

Labels: beliefs, kathy decastro, travel

Last week I walked into the bridal shop to try a dress for my girlfriend's wedding in the summer.  This particular shop seems to have the market share for brides, bridesmaids and prom going teens in the area.  Everyone went there.  I walked in, told the customer service rep. the bride's name, and was encouraged to browse because 'Susan' (name changed to protect the guilty) was going to serve me.

I have to admit a few things.  My heart dropped when I recognised Susan to be a Jamaican woman.  My belief that customer service from Jamaicans is less than desirable immediately came to the surface.  I ought to know.  I'm Jamaican.  It's not that all Jamaicans give poor service, but let's say that the reputation exisits (See Misery's West Indian Restaurant).  This is not a sociological treatment of the whys and where-with-alls of the situation.  This is just me exploring the effects of my belief.


Enough said about that.  By the time I left the store, I was mad at the owners for treating their monopoly with little care, mad at the customer service person for putting me, a Jamaican woman, to be served by the other Jamaican woman in the store, mad at Susan for being inatttentive.... With the uncomfortable irritation present, I started to ask mysefl the questions.  Why was I so mad?  Several thoughts came to mind, but the thought path I was most attracted to was this one:

• I expected Susan to give poor service
• Susan treated me as I expected
• I didn't get what I wanted (which I didn't expect...hmmm)
• I judged her for not giving me what I wanted
• I compared myself with her, and determined that my customer service is not like hers! (so I need to judge something as bad to see what I do as useful and beneficial?)
• My negative judgement of her justified my anger
• If I got angry enough, it would give me courage to say something to someone about the service

Just looking at it, I saw how not helpful, even tedious, most of those responses were.  First, by expecting the service to be poor, I set the stage for the judgement.  I didn't position myself as a loving, accepting presence.  As I think about it now, what if I had put Susan in my mental playroom?  How would I have responded to her?  What if I engaged her with the thought that she is doing the best she can given whatever she is believing right now, and I can just cheer her on, celebrate (internally) the 70% of her service that was useful and be grateful?

As I write this, I realize that Susan is just an example of my response when I don't get my way.  I have also been getting pretty angry with the children, too.  Their explorations and enthusiasm to act out whatever comes to mind has not been met with much celebration by me.  Dog-gone-it! They should just do things my way! Forget the lofty ideals. My conversation to them sounds very similar to the tantrums they throw...

Yet, as I reposition mysslf mentally, they are such wonderful kids, eager to learn and explore.  I can lose grumpy and take gratitude!  It's just a switch of the gears.

Labels: angry, beliefs, faith clarke, grateful

Labels: autism, beliefs, crying, dying, emotions, games, jeannene christie

Continuing on this theme of Jaedon's teachings....


Today, one of our new volunteers went into the playroom with Jaedon.  Jaedon had just asked me for nuts and I shared with him that we didn't have any, but that I would get him some grapes.  While in the kitchen, I could hear Jay in the playroom protesting vehemently, sometimes screaming, sometimes crying.  As I brought the grapes up to the volunteer, I did a quick check in with her.  She had not experienced Jay crying before and we hadn't yet talked about strategies to deal with crying.  She shared that she felt somehow the crying was her fault.  I quickly encouraged her to see crying in some different ways, told her Jay wanted nuts and we had none, gave her the grapes and left.  They were together for about 45 minutes before I called her for some feedback.


Much of my journey with Jay feels like a cycle of him doing something, I get uncomfortable, I explore, I get comfortable, he does something else.... Well, I don't get uncomfortable about everything he does.  Things fall in categories and I become comfortable about much of the variations within the category... but there are always variations I don't expect and of course, new categories.  Some days, I just want it all to stop.  Enough with the new things!  Haven't I grown and questioned enough?  Apparently not.


Iris commented on last week's post: 


Being a student about beliefs, I want to point out something you wrote above: "Initially, Jaedon seems to interact with them strongly, almost showing them how much fun their time could be. At some point, they will each get to see the powerful reflecting image too". Do you see the words "initially, almost, could, at some point". What are the beliefs that you are selling here? How come? How useful is it for you, Jeadon and your team?


As I think about the questions, the first set of thoughts are disorganized around the theme of fear.  I'm no longer afraid of Jaedon's future.  I am afraid that the volunteers will not continue to move themselves from discomfort to comfort as they encounter various behaviors.  Jaedon is a charmer. Hardly anyone meets him without falling in love.  I feel like falling in love is fleeting and I don't know if they have the stamina to stay in love.  Seems like I think loving takes stamina...hmmm.  I still find some behaviors challenging (like the new behavior of collecting spit in his mouth until his cheeks puff out ... followed by bursting into giggles) and am constantly reformulating the beliefs I have (he's not regressing, he's finding a way to strengthen the muscle tone in his mouth area). I am constantly widening my Platform of Acceptance. I'm afraid they won't stick with the challenge, to figure it out.


It's funny, I spent maybe 20 minutes talking with this volunteer, helping her explore some of her discomfort.  After 2 sessions with Jay, she was both eager and unsure.  A younger relative of hers has autism and her interactions with him are different from what I'm teaching her to do with Jay.  She was uncertain of her ability to 'get it'.  I think she was ready to pack it in.


Amidst the beliefs about volunteers and their tenacity, I have clarified a few anchoring beliefs.  They help keep me sane while I work on everything.  This idea of Jaedon being the teacher is one of those.  I am definitely in the classroom.  I encouraged her that if she wanted to get it, we would both take it a step at a time, and that Jaedon would help her.


Today, I worked with 4 of our 5 new volunteers at different times. I had many opportunities to worry about them and all their possible stuff.  Instead I decided that they were all learning, as am I.  Everything is part of the learning. I have learned to feel comfortable with Jay running out of the playroom, or down the stairs or screaming or poop accidents. Today I was learning to be comfortable with someone else learning.  I was learning to let go of my desire to script another person's learning process to ensure that the outcome is what I want.  After all is said, either a volunteer becomes comfortable with something or they don't, but I don't have to stand at this point, projecting to their discomfort and choosing discomfort.


Iris, I'm sure there is more here, but this is my brain dump of today.  By next week, I should have taken some time to talk about/explore my spit issues and why the dickens it should be more significant to me than poop!  I'll tell you what I discover!

Labels: autism, beliefs, faith clarke, parenting

Every Friday until November 7, 2010 you will find entries from a series written by Iris about her training to run the New York marathon in 2010. It is something she never aspired to do; she has never run a distance of more than two kilometers in her life. In this series she describes her adventures and how she works on her beliefs to transform her challenges and successes into one great experience.

Running
It’s the end of week two of the inflammation injury. I've run a total of five minutes (!) over the last week and have been doing strengthening exercises. This seems to me a slow, slow recovery! I am registered for a 10K in three weeks and I wonder how I will be doing by then. Ahh, well... that’s the future. I'd rather come back to the present moment and take it one day at the time. The strengthening exercises, the stretching and cross training will do their work.

This afternoon I heard that my friend Jonathan knows about this diet that in his opinion works really well to eliminate inflammation. This weekend I will hear all about it and change my diet to help my body. By Friday I will give you an update about this all. No beliefs to explore this week. Everything feels peaceful in this area, and I want to leave this subject to go back to the article that I wrote yesterday.

Chew on This!

Labels: beliefs, iris tuomenoksa

In January, the children and I were thrown in to a world of horses and royalty and dressage and Austrian culture by the book, White Stallion of Lipizza.  It is a beautiful story of dreaming, persevering and accomplishing.  It introduced me to this idea of the stallion being the teacher.  Borina, the Lipizzaner stallion teaches Hans, the young austrian boy, the ins and outs of dressage.  There were times when the stallion did all the movements perfectly, independent of input from the young Hans, almost as if to show him how the movement should actually be done. Then, Borina would more accurately respond to Hans' less than correct input (throwing Hans off or dragging his hind quarters in an undignified fashion) helping in the potential riding master's learning process.

The story reminds me of Jaedon's teachings.  Now that I'm clear on the fact that he is teaching and I am positioning myself as his student.  Many of his responses mirror my internal thoughts and feelings, and give me the opportunity to explore them more deeply.  As he reflects my discomfort to me, I see it more clearly.

I'm also his manager, helping other willing students have access to his lessons.  This week, I had the pleasure of adding 5 new students to Jaedon's classroom.  Read about my journey here.  Their first goal learning to let go of any need to 'fix' Jay and to really have fun being a loving, peaceful presence in his life.  Initially, Jaedon seems to interact with them strongly, almost showing them how much fun their time could be. At some point, they will each get to see the powerful reflecting image too.  How will they respond?  I really want to help them, guide them in this process.  Yet, I feel myself go tense at the ensuing thoughts: 5 new volunteers!  How will I manage? Can I teach them all?  I'm realizing that these thoughts add to my confusion (some days yes! some days no!) about having a large team of volunteers working with Jay.

Reframing all that in my head is such a relief.  I live with the master teacher! I'm just a facilitator, a midwife in my volunteer's process.  Every volunteer will go as far and connect as deeply as they each want to.  While I hope they do, and I continue to look for ways to inspire them, I can take myself off the hook.  I'm not making them.

I'm hopeful and excited, anticipating the next few weeks for all of us.   I'm getting to practice this new way of being with Jaedon and they are getting to learn from him more directly.... I keep refining this whole volunteer training thing.  Who knows what it will become next?

Labels: autism, beliefs, faith clarke, volunteers

Every Friday until November 7, 2010 you will find entries from a series written by Iris about her training to run the New York marathon in 2010. It is something she never aspired to do; she has never run a distance of more than two kilometers in her life. In this series she describes her adventures and how she works on her beliefs to transform her challenges and successes into one great experience.

The other day I received an email that contained the following sentence...

I realize that I forgot to mention your taking up running. I haven't been able to relate to this yet, because running is not my thing, but it has been great to see your handling of all your issues around it. Thanks for sharing that!

This sweet comment has kept me thoughtful ever since I read it. I think it has to do with the words "not my thing". It tickles me, because until January, I would have been the first to agree that "running is not my thing", or more generally, any activity that gets your heart rate over 120 and has nothing to do with dancing, is not my thing!

However, over the last two months I have proven to myself that running is my thing! I can enjoy and be passionate about something I always said I hated. And I can deal with set backs without going back to hating it.

Inflamed and Happy About It
Last week I had a great, great running week. On Sunday running home, I pushed myself to go a little faster than before. Three quarters of the way home, this feeling came up just above my ankle. I had never felt it before. It was not really painful, but something was clearly a little irritating. I told myself, "hmmm... maybe an extra rest day between now and my next run."

The next morning though, it was clearly pain.

The weirdest pain in the weirdest place! No idea why it happened, so I did a little research and determined that it was an inflammation due to the unevenness of the road surface. So I have to deal with it. I didn't do a lot of running this week; I only did some biking on a stationary bike. I also didn't do unhappiness around it. After my first surprised reaction, I learned a lot about inflammation and now I’m just eager to go back on the road when the inflammation is gone.

Running as a Tool for Personal Growth
So why do I tell you all this running stuff in the Belief Makers blog, every week, over and over. Because for me, it is not about the running, but instead, the power that we give to our beliefs and how beliefs can make or break what we do. By exploring our beliefs with something real and tangible, we can build endurance and strength in ways previously unknown to us. I am not only talking about our bodies but also about our minds.

For example, let's say that your biggest dream has always been to create your own company, but you also believe creating a company is just "not your thing". You might believe that you don't have the skills, the knowledge, or the attitude to be a leader. Perhaps you believe that you do not have the support you need from the people around you. Maybe you're just scared generally of not having a job.

If this is the case, then I promise you that you'll never create this business you are dreaming about. You are holding yourself back and you don't need anyone or anything else in your way to make it hard or challenging.

Until you make starting a business "your thing", you'll never start. You might even come to hate the idea of starting a business just as I hated the idea of starting to run.

Roadblocks
Let's say you get past the starting challenge and you do start your company. You believe you have skills and knowledge and, with the help of others, you have been able to open your own little shop. But then things happen. Customers don't show up as quickly as you would have liked... People whom you thought would support you don't... Maybe someone offers you a job in which you would make much more money than you could ever make in this little business of yours.

What do you do? If you are still holding on to unhappiness fueling beliefs, you probably start to struggle with all the choices you have to make. However, if you have trained your beliefs with strength and endurance training, you will glide through these waters easily and safely. You'll know what you know, you'll know what to do, and you'll know that wherever you end up it will be OK.

It will be OK
I am not talking about unrealistic, pie-in-the-sky, artificial projections where you sit as a king on his thrown and everything in the world goes as you want it. I am talking about standing with two feet solidly on the ground, pursuing the fundamentals of your business in the present moment, and being the boss you want to be.

Maybe your goal is to see your product sold all over the world. Maybe your goal is to simply be a business owner who treats all the employees with respect and provides them the compensation they earn. Maybe you want to want to provide accessible and affordable support to people who otherwise would not be able to get it.

People who stay focused on their original intentions when starting their business can create the business they had in mind and grow it while navigating all the unforeseen challenges that come along the way. Your business can stand tall like a blooming flower in a summer garden as long as you decide that it's all OK.

What's Your Motivation?
Remember that it is easy to be distracted along the way. After running your business for a bit, your original intentions may have changed. Over the years, Mark has worked in many situations where he was brought in as a change agent. In some cases, the companies were heading down the road to closing their doors; in others, they simply wanted to make their business better.

Sometimes the business leaders would openly engage in new ways to approach their businesses. At other times, their actual motivations and intentions would get in the way of their stated intentions and motivations; making the business better was not always the highest priority.

Some people would be motivated by saving face and not want to acknowledge that they'd made mistakes. Others would be motivated by being in control and they wouldn't want to give up the control required to make the business more successful. Sometimes, people were simply motivated by cash and would prefer to sell the business rather than fixing the business.

While many business leaders will say that they want to run a successful company, one in which the employees shout from the rooftops, "come work here, this is the best job ever!", not everyone does.

As you operate your business, it's important to stay in touch with your intentions and motivations. Have they shifted over time? If they have, do you want to reinvigorate your original mission, or do you want to change it? Is everything still OK?

Back to Running
To me, running seems to be a little micro business on its own. Things go well. Things are challenging. I make progress quickly. I encounter challenges that slow me down. But as long as I hold on to my main intention to work towards the marathon in November, while being healthy and while working on my strength and endurance skills, no one and nothing can stop me!

Labels: beliefs, iris tuomenoksa, marathon

This is but one in countless examples of me being late.  Pre-children, getting somewhere on time was challenging for me.  I recall numerous detentions for lateness from Sr. James Vincent, as I was dropped to school by my father.  Maybe he had problems with lateness.  I only got to school on time when I travelled with Desiree, the girl up the hill from me who also went to my school.  Her father insisted that she got to school by 7:20am.  They often met me huffing and puffing as I ran up the hill to their house.

I had probably just gotten it all sorted out during early adulthood.  I got to work on time while teaching.  I think this was primarily because I made sure my classes started at a reasonable time: 10:00 am.  Routines, structure, predictability and knowing my own inner rhythms help me to get where I'm going punctually.

Then came kids!  What inner rhythms?  What routines?  I noticed that with each child, I have to add 30 minutes to what I would consider 'normal' preparation time.  So, if I am to pay attention to that bit of information, I should have started kid preparation at 9:30 for the 11:00 appointment this morning.  That means other prep would need to have happened before 9:30.  I feel nauseous thinking about that.  I'm definitely not a morning person, so early morning prep as the sole adult can be a daunting task.

I think it comes back to my planning strategies.  I need more of them.  I have noticed that I do 2 things that increase the likelihood of my being late:

1. I overestimate what can be done in 5 minutes.  There is always this huge list of things I think I need to do.  So I'm leaving the house and I notice that I can't find my notebook.  I check behind the couch, the new spot for lost things (a.k.a. things swiped by Jaedon for hoarding) and indeed, there it is!  I also notice that several items of silverware, some bowls, open markers, lipstick and other odds and ends are also stashed.  Aware that I wasn't late, I call for a broom and set to clearing out behind the couch.... 10 minutes later, I'm frantic.  Another scenario is my noticing that I'm 5 minutes ahead and decide that I should have my smoothie, instead of the nothing I was planning to eat before I left.  After all, isn't this better for my body?  Then, since there is no point making just mine, I make for everyone, then call them, distribute the smoothies, change my sweater because of the spilled smoothie on it, clean smoothie off the floor,....  You get the idea.
2. I don't plan for the things I can't control.  This is a big one for me.  Why not say something like 'Smoothie prep - 30 mins'?  My time slots are always done based on best case scenarios.  It's like I think best case is 'normal' and unplanned happenings are anomolies.  Yet I experience many unplanned happenings daily.  Perhaps is would be easier to plan for them if I even acknowledged that they were possible.  As I stood in traffic on the I-87 because of an accident, I thought "Traffic on the 87 is quite normal.  How come I don't expect it?"

Reframing
I'm going to think about this some more...

• Not allotting enough prep time seems to be an efficiency issue for me.  If I give too much time, I will get less done.  If I'm not hurrying, I could have gotten more done.  I can't just say to myself 'Smoothie Prep - 30 mins' because there is another part of me that's saying 'that's ridiculous! You know it doesn't take you that long to make a smoothie'.  So I'm going to continue thinking about my beliefs around what is efficient and what isn't.  
• I would like to reframe my thoughts on normal vs anomalous happenings. I plan for normal.   I usually have enough information to decide that something is normal.  Jaedon has been throwing stuff downstairs for a few days, Zachary's sense of appropriate clothing choices isn't fully developed yet, there is usually traffic on the 87.  Like the child with autism, I can be inflexible.  I resist adjusting my mental pictures to integrate my 'don't wants'.  So, I continue to be startled.

Out of the Closet
My strategy for dealing with lateness is very different from my typical strategy for personal growth.  Usually, I talk about anything I'm thinking about.  I read about it, I write about it, and share what I'm learning with others and get their thoughts.  Lateness has such a bad rap in this part of the world (it's seen differently in Jamaica, where typically weddings start 2 hours after the stated time) that I hide from it and prefer to pretend that I'm late just this once.  That has to do with what I think people may think about me.   They are probably thinking it anyway, and my thinking about it in secret hasn't been helping me, so I'm outing myself.  I tend to be late and I'd like to spend the next couple of weeks allowing myself to really be curious about this.  I'd love to hear your thoughts.  How do you figure this out?

Next week:  I do actually get to some places on time.  I wonder what I'm thinking about and believing in those situations?

Labels: beliefs, faith clarke, late

Do our beliefs create our future?

This world is a fantastic place and I always wanted to figure it out completely. I remember being sixteen and having these long conversations with my high school friends about how life works. I used to search and search for answers and finally I started feeling that I found my path when I found Option.

Later on I got into spirituality, learnt other perspectives and realized the basics are all the same. What I read in spiritual books I find in Option books. Some of the thoughts might be written a bit differently, but seem to have the same meaning. I guess we all head towards the same understandings, but we get there walking different paths.

As we are all different, we all have preferences to different philosophies and religions. A very popular topic right now seems to be to manifest, and attract things into our lives. Lots of spiritual teachers sell the belief that holding positive thoughts about a future event will draw that situation into our lives. When I first explored this process, I made myself scared by thinking "Oh I am attracting all these negative things because I have fearful thoughts regularly".

When I started working through my fears, I opened myself up to a more positive view. I started reading again about manifesting and realized it is an amazing concept. After I discovered the beliefs that did not result in positive thoughts and feelings, and changed them into beliefs that made me feel great, I actually I got myself to a place where I could start attract positive things into my life.

I started to realize that by spending time on discovering and changing my beliefs to become more positive, I create a solid space from which I can live positively naturally and which results in more creativity in my live.

Labels: all blogs, barbara balla, beliefs, law of attraction

My flight to Orlando leaves 6:25 am 2/11/2010. Isaiah and I are going to have a much needed weekend break. I planned to attend a conference in Orlando and I convinced him to come with me. We booked our trip almost 2 days earlier than needed and I am really excited to be away, in a warm spot (NO SNOW), sitting in a hot tub, relaxing, with my honey! The Ultimate!

That was how I was thinking yesterday. Today,I face the cancellations of all the flights in our area due to the 12 inches of snow on the ground and winds at 30 mph. There are no available flights to Orlando until sunday. Am I disappointed to be missing the conference? Somewhat. But I can find another one. So why this deep sadness about no trip to Florida this weekend? It's as if I believe the opportunity won't come again for a long time....

I created this entire trip for us. I organized childcare and negotiated with Isaiah, who has taken no vacation in 5 years. I scraped money from odd places. I looked forward to it like a marathon runner looks forward to the spot where they get the much needed sip of water (I think...I have never done a marathon).

Why sadness? I think I'm sulking. I want accolades for the level of detail in the arrangements I made. I want Isaiah to pick up the vacation planning baton and run with it. I don't think he will and I don't want to restart all the planning.

I'm sulking because I didn't get what I want. It reminds me of an episode of The Practice that I watched: A doctor's 15 year old daughter is pregnant and wants to get married to her boyfriend: a chaotic situation at best. The doctor is struggling to even talk to her daughter,and is talking with her friend,a psychologist. At the end of the conversation, the psychologist said 'You want to check out because you didn't get what you want'

Is that what I'm doing? Instead of engagement and moving forward,I want to sit in my corner and feel bad? To what end?

Sulking comes from a place of believing that a positive,upbeat attitude will not get me what I want. I would like external resources (people around to say and do particular things to feed me emotionally and help me to plan the vacation!) and I think sulking will draw attention to my need. Sulking is useful if it energizes the people around you to give you what you want.

I have done it for 4 hours or so now and I'm not finding much value in it. It may get me some sympathy. Girlfriends are full of 'hush' and 'hugs'. My mom said "Great,so you can do my hair tomorrow!" So much for sympathy. Isaiah isn't a girlfriend, so no 'hush' and 'hugs' there. Though acts of sympathy from him would be superficially satisfying, the primary desire is for some time away. The idea of no vacation is downright reprehensible right now. So what will I do? To sulk or not to sulk,that is the question.

OK. Let's pretend. What would it be like if I believed I could go after and get what I want ?

I would:

• energetically negotiate with the hotel in Orlando for a refund or useful credit and if that fails, call the people who want us to look at a time share in Orlando and reactivate that.
• find another free weekend that the babysitters would be available (cross referencing my calendar, Isaiah's calendar and the baby-sitters' calenders)
• use the credit from the airlines to book another flight

That's the plan! Pretending really works! Thanks for listening, Remind me to tell you about my vacation plans next time! After all, I was the one that created the vacation plan in the first place. I'll just do it again!

P.S. I just got an email from a dear friend who said "I guess the universe has another grand plan" Wow! What if I held that belief firm and acted on that? I would excitedly go in search of the new grand plan, the next adventure. I will take that attitude into my re-arrangements tomorrow.

Labels: beliefs, faith clarke, vacation

I was wondering the other day about things that happened in my past. While studying psychology I learned that we can suppress things that continue bubbling in the deep and then break out one day making a big bang.

Labels: all blogs, barbara balla, beliefs

Recently I have thought about what loyalty means to me and I want to share with you some thoughts based on the definitions from Wikipedia:

Loyalty and Marketing
The practice of providing discounts, prizes, or other incentives to encourage continued patronage of a business. Generally, loyalty programs are considered less expensive to maintain than allowing customer defection or 'churn'.

In most of my work life I have been working in what we call "Customer Relationship Management" (CRM), or Customer Relationship Management Analysis.

To manage your customer relationship means among other things that you want to decide which customers you want to keep and which you do not want to keep, and how much you are willing to pay to keep your customers.

You might think that it is a simple calculation: money in - money out, by watching the balance. It's not that simple. I used to work for a phone company, and I can tell you: there isn't a simple relation between what the company earns per customer and size of their bills! It's a calculation of the amount of in going and out going calls and where there are directed to and from. What time were the calls, did we get the information on the call or were there delays? How much time did we spend on the customer, what price the phones were that we gave them. And last but not least: who is his network? If we loose one will we then loose others, because they are used to call each other at a cheap rates?

We did not want to keep all our customers, or we did not want to keep them all on similar terms. We wanted to keep the customers who paid well for the services we provided. Among those customers we looked for the loyal customers and we looked on how we could increase their loyalty.

• Step one is purchasing and re-purchasing (what we call having a long lifetime)
• Step two is having them not use our competitors’ products
• Step three is advocating for us

On the other hand: having a large number of customers was important at the stock exchange, regardless of the value of each customer. So we also wanted the not-loyal customers, but at what prize?

Loyalty and ethics
The concept of loyalty is an important part of ethics. Plato originally said that "only a man who is just could be loyal", and that loyalty "is a condition of genuine philosophy". The philosopher Josiah Royce said it was "the supreme moral good", and that one's devotion to an object mattered more than the merits of the object itself. Loyalty is a quality you look for in a friend.

I agree: Loyalty is definitely what I look for in a friend. I see loyalty in a friend as someone who is true to their word, who'll do what they said they would do. Who will say the same things to my face as they would say behind my back.

I find it interesting that Plato relates justice and loyalty. To be just means to have the "right" morals, but according to whom or what? Does it mean that I can only be loyal to someone or something who is sharing my perception of what the right morals are?

I guess: Yes!

Let me give you an conversation I had with an ex: If I believed that one should never lie and you believed that it was ok to lie but that one should never say something bad about another person. And then you would ask me about your haircut and I didn't like it. Saying that I didn't like it would then be disloyal to you, saying I liked it would be disloyal to me.

What I take from Plato is that loyalty is subjective and that we will always see loyalty according to our own ethics. Even if we see ourselves as loyal, people with different ethics might see us as disloyal.

Loyalty is an illusion
If I get Josiah Royce right then being a loyal friend means that the value of being a friend means more than the value the person you befriend has (according to whatever standards).

So maybe loyalty is an illusion, or loyalty is based on an illusion. It is not based on values or facts but just a decision: this is what I make up that loyalty is and these are the people or causes I want to be loyal to. And no one can prove that I am loyal.

Loyalty within Hierarchy
Within hierarchies loyalty usually has to be given to authority.

This is one of my favorites, because I know that when it comes to authorities I have a different way of showing loyalty than most others: I am authentic! I believe that being honest is one of the biggest signs of authenticity and loyalty I can give. Some people believe that obeying or pretending to agree is the biggest signs of loyalty.

Loyalty in the Bible
Jesus said, "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other." (Matthew 6:24 NIV)
Attempting to serve two masters leads to "double-mindedness" (James 4:8), undermining loyalty to a cause.

James 5:2. The Bible also speaks of loyal ones, which would be those who follow the Bible with absolute loyalty, as in "Precious in the eyes of Jehovah, is the death of his loyal ones", (Psalms 116:15)

I used to believe that I had made up my own religion. I wasn't brought up in a religious home but as a kid I learned a lot about the bible. And what I understood was that "God will always forgive you", "There are no sins" and "Thou shall love thou brother". What I got was: we are all doing our best and God loves all of us. I really meant ALL OF US. So you can imagine I got confused when I heard people condemn gays or people of other religions. First I thought that they just hadn't read the bible yet. Later I thought that I had just made up my own religion since I seemed to get something different from the same book.

I believe in Jesus saying that you cannot have two masters. You have one or none. But this also means to me that if God exists, them I am one with God. Because if I am loyal to God I cannot be loyal to anyone else unless they have the exact same morals as I have. I can only be loyal to God if we share the same morals. If not there will be times where I will be disloyal to him or to myself. I believe that I am always doing exactly what I want to be doing so I cannot really break my own moral standards, I can only change them. So if I am loyal to God then my moral and my ethics are the same as God's morals.

If I am God I guess that everyone who believes in God is God. But in my thought process this leads to God is everyone, and this means we are all the same, which really confuses me because I experience that we are not always loyal to each other. I have had friends who would one day say that they would help me, and the next day they would say that helping me would mean being disloyal to someone else.

I just want to be loyal in my own way, to my own standards, and I am blessed with the knowing that my loyalty is the same as being God.

So maybe loyalty is one big illusion based on an illusion. Maybe that's why Wikipedia writes that:

Loyalty plays an important rule in Literature.

Labels: all blogs, beliefs, choices, empowerment, joy vigh strand, Loyalty

"Call me by my true name" is the title of a collection of poems written by Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk who has been a great inspiration to me. Whenever I see the title of the book I ask myself the question: Who am I? What is the name I want to use for myself? I want to be Joy, and sometimes Joyce.

Create more Joy
Four years ago during my first program at the Option Institute I started to call myself Joy. This because I wanted to invite more joy in my life. And it worked! Somehow it became easier for me to change my thoughts and behaviors when I changed my name. I started to meet new people with personal qualities I really, really appreciate. And I can say that it's been a great journey, and I am so excited about where I am today.

New people I meet know me as Joy, and I have created lots of new friends whom automatically call me Joy. Kids normally also call me Joy. It might be that they are used to take names in their games or maybe they are just used to respect other people’s requests. It is my experience is that kids are great advocates: they'll keep correcting their parents and grandparents if needed!

Labels: all blogs, beliefs, joy vigh strand, philosophy

Labels: actions, beliefs, faith clarke