For all you Glee fans, here are two hilarious vids of Brittany S. Pierce's funniest moments. Some clips are repeated in each video but there are different ones in each too, so worth watching both. Too funny.....!
Friday, November 25, 2011
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Thursday Thoughts: Shifting Perspectives...
I needed to have a second post today because I was itching to share something that I had read from "The Art of Happiness - A Handbook for Living" by The Dalai Lama and Howard Cutler, that is very relevant to a conversation I recently had with my friend Ange. In the book, His Holiness discusses how shifting your perspective can help you deal with tragedy or anger, particularly in regards to people who may have hurt us. He says:
"The ability to look at events from different perspectives can be very helpful. Then, practicing this, one can use certain experiences, certain tragedies to develop a calmness of mind. One must realise that every phenomena, every event, has different aspects. Everything is of a relative nature. "
"If you look from a different angle.... then surely the person who caused this anger in you will have a lot of other positive aspects, positive qualities. If you look carefully, you will also find that the act which has made you angry has also given you certain opportunities, something which otherwise would not have been possible, even from your point of view. So with effort you will be able to see many different angles to a single event. This will help."
"You need to use all your powers of reasoning and look at the situation as objectively as possible. For instance, you might reflect on the fact that when you are really angry at someone you tend to perceive them as having 100 percent negative qualities. Just as when you are strongly attracted to someone the tendency is to see them as having 100 percent positive qualities. But this perception does not correspond with reality...... So, even though when you are angry at someone you might feel that the person has no positive qualities, the reality is that nobody is 100 percent bad. They must have some good qualities if you search hard enough. So, the tendency to see someone as completely negative is due to your own perception based on your own mental projection, rather than the true nature of that individual."
"For a spiritual practitioner, one's enemies play a crucial role. As I see it, compassion is the essence of a spiritual life. And in order for you to become fully successful in practicing love and compassion, the practice of patience and tolerance is indispensable."
My dear friend Ange, based on our conversation on the weekend, you had figured this lesson out all by yourself. These words from the Dalai Lama can just re-emphasise to you how enlightened you actually are....So apt that I happened to be up to this part of my book now.
P.S. I chose this picture because it reminds me of you and I trying to figure out all these life lessons - in essence, we are having to turn upside down in order to change our perspective of the world so that we can grow and move forward. x
Thursday Thoughts: A Change Is A Comin'...
There are so many thoughts brewing in my head that I could discuss today. All swirling around, fighting for attention and answers. There is a definite feeling within that some kind of strange, strong and shifting energy is around me. That change is coming my way again. And I'm in that phase where you don't quite know with certainty what is coming or how its going to pan out. I have inklings that it has to do with my living environment (my lease is up in less than a month and I'm fairly certain I will be leaving), connections on new levels with particular family members, and breakthroughs for me on a soul or personal growth level. Those things are all coming, but currently I'm in the phase of break down that often comes prior to break throughs. Not necessarily an all consuming, bring you to your knees break down, but the struggle that comes with being presented with lessons you need to learn and things to resolve before you can move onto the next phase of your life.
The hardest aspect for me is to not drop into fear and the tendency to resort to the default ways of dealing with challenge and stress that I have used all my life but that clearly don't serve me. Fear, worry and anxiety are huge for me. But I know that these challenges are being presented to me so that I can practise a new way of being and reacting. So in moments of fear, I am doing my best to stop and change my perspective. To remove myself from the situation, take the emotion away and look from the outside in. When I feel overwhelmed I reassure myself that if my heart is open and I am willing to listen, the universe and my own intuition will guide me - that my worst fears will not become reality (which really, they never do).
So even though I'm having, and I'm sure will continue to have, many a day and/or night where I feel like I'm being twisted in knots with the frustration and lack of understanding of what's going on in my world, where I am scared shitless (excuse the French) and where I want to just curl up in a ball and escape the learning and challenges - I will choose not to run away and will meet them head on because I have faith that something beautiful lies beyond the breakthrough......
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Monday, November 21, 2011
Monday Musings: To Be Hopeful...
"To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasise in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember these times and places - and there are so many - where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however a small way, we don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory."
Howard Zinn (via terramantra)
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