Are You Going Through Stress & Worry?

Posted in Depression, Financial Challenges, Hope, Managing Emotions, Relationships


Stress is no walk in the park! by Wendy Keller, occasional worry wart I’m going…


Stress is no walk in the park!

by Wendy Keller, occasional worry wart

I’m going through a stressful time in my life, which only makes my natural tendency to worry even more intense.

For the last several days, I haven’t been eating right, sleeping well nor thinking clearly. I’ve made mistakes at work and in my personal life.

Something has to change and only I can change it.

This morning I went out in nature to see if I could settle myself down.  I’m grateful to live at the edge of the Pacific.  As I left the house, I stuffed several tissues into my pocket because I had a feeling at some point I’d burst into tears and need them.

But as I walked, I got some distance between the negative inner chatter in my brain and the environment around me.  I couldn’t help but notice a peaceful flock of sea birds.  A profusion of bright yellow-flowered weeds.  A bevy of sand pipers pecking amongst the rocks.

The harridan in my head started to slow down a little.

There were gaps between her screaming dire predictions and the beauty around me.  The air felt fresh.  I felt the sweat form on my brow.  I saw two young Asian men struggling to get a big fish out of the water.  It was pulling hard against their hook, looking for a way to escape.

As I passed them, I thought about how I’m like that poor fish.  I’ve caught myself on a hook (very much of my own making!) and now I’m struggling to get away as hard as I can.  I’m fighting What Is with all my strength.  I remembered a saying I read once somewhere:  “Suffering is caused by my resistance to What Is.”

Suffering is caused by my resistance to What Is.

When I’m calm, I can usually find a solution.  When I’m calm, my brain relaxes and works much better.  When I’m calm, my heart isn’t racing, my blood pressure isn’t sky high and my body functions optimally.

I made a conscious decision to only focus on the beauty around me. 

It was an effort to push myself to be “in the moment,” experiencing the peace and wonder all around me.  But that’s when I felt the frenzied demons disperse.

I walked back to my house with more groundedness, peacefulness, confidence and strength than when I’d left.

 

P.S. – The fish got away.

 

When you’re ready, you will probably find this free eBook comforting.

Over 8,500 suffering people already have.

“The Top Ten Tips to Coping with Crisis”

 

 

Can You Let Go of Pain?

Posted in Depression, Divorce, Hope, Managing Emotions


Maybe You Can…Maybe You Won’t by Wendy Keller, author, blogger, workshop leader One of my…


Maybe You Can…Maybe You Won’t

by Wendy Keller, author, blogger, workshop leader

One of my lifelong best friends called me last night. She was sitting in her car in a parking lot a few blocks from her home, crying because two of the people she loves most were being unkind, disrespectful, even cruel to her.  It’s not the first time she’s called me in this situation over the last 30 years.

But she always goes back.

And I always wonder why.

Is it that she thinks she doesn’t deserve to be loved or treated with respect?

Is it that she believes if she just endures long enough, the situation will magically change?

Is it fear of the unknown – what her life would be like if she cut off those two transgressors and put a stake in the ground for her own happiness?

Maybe it’s all of those things – or none of them. How many times do YOU go back to something that causes you great pain…because you don’t know how to escape or are too scared to try?

I have some plants on my shady deck.  The deck never even gets partial sun, yet I continue to buy flowering plants that require full sun.  I know what will happen. The majority of them somehow manage to struggle along, although they quickly lose their vibrancy and drop their blooms.  Meanwhile, the ferns and the coleus (shade plants) take over with incredible, joyful energy.  They triple in size! They thrive. They love it! Why?  Because they are in the right environment for themselves.

The faltering plants are not in the right place. I give them water and fertilizer, but just the basics aren’t enough for them. Does that make them wrong?  Are they bad plants? No, it’s just that they are not in the optimal environment for themselves.  Since they can’t move to the sunshine, they just eke out an existence. But you and my friend don’t have to put up or shut up.  You can move.

Unlike the plants, you and my friend have the ability to make changes that would put you in an optimal environment, the one you naturally flourish in, the one that brings you exuberance, joie de vivre, growth.

Of course there’s a price to be paid for taking responsibility and deciding you will work in harmony with nature and find your own optimal environment.  But the price of not finding it is never knowing the fullness of your self, never allowing yourself to blossom with joy in your optimal habitat.  And after all, isn’t that what you are on this earth to do?

 

How to have a better week – 3 simple tips

Posted in Depression


If last week was a rough one, here’s how to make this one better It’s…


Wendy Keller Compassion SpeakerIf last week was a rough one, here’s how to make this one better

It’s Monday, whether you like it or not.  If the idea of getting back on your hamster wheel makes you feel blue, there are THREE important things you can do to make this week better. These things sound simple, but if you are not doing them, they apparently are not all that simple for you to incorporate into your life.

 

Why not make a fresh start right now?

Get enough sleep

Yeah, it sounds dumb.  But no matter what, commit to getting in bed, turning out the light and lying there with your eyes shut and your brain off for 7 or 8 hours tonight and every other night this week that it is humanly possible.  Stop making excuses for why you can’t get all your stuff done in 24 hours. (I’m guilty of that myself!)  You may well be heading for a health crisis unless you follow this one simple tip.  Lack of sleep is a major – MAJOR – contributor to depression, overwhelm and mental fog.  Next…
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Are you a compassionate person? Find out below!

Posted in Chronic Pain and Illness, Depression, Divorce, Financial Challenges, Grief & Death, Hope, Managing Emotions, Relationships


What is compassion and why do you need it? by Wendy Keller, blogger, ruminator Who…


What is compassion and why do you need it?

by Wendy Keller, blogger, ruminator

Who is the #1 person you probably forget to be compassionate with? Yourself.

The Dalai Lama wrote:

“The foundation of the Buddha’s teachings lies in compassion, and the reason for practicing the teachings is to wipe out the persistence of the ego, the number one enemy of compassion.”

When your ego tells you that you “should” be richer, happier, healthier, thinner, more peaceful, more or less of anything, you are lacking in compassion for yourself.

When your ego tells you that someone else should or shouldn’t be something, you are lacking in compassion for others.

Even in the case of our closest friends and family, we really don’t fully know what they’re going through nor how they’re handling things we ourselves may be going through, too. I noticed when my children died in a car accident that the way my then-husband grieved was completely different than the way I was handling the same tragedy.

Let other people be &  love yourself.

That’s all there is to it.

You can tell how compassionate you are by listening to your inner voice.  If you run a constant string of criticism with the rest of the world, or yourself, you are lacking in compassion.

So how do you CREATE compassion?

Increasing your compassion can start with three simple (but not easy) steps:

1) Decide to be more compassionate with yourself and all other beings – people and animals

2) Notice your inner and outer words

3) If you say something unkind in your head or aloud to yourself or another person, immediately change it – retract it, apologize, stop talking.

In these ways, you will increase your compassion and with it your own inner peace of mind.

If you’re going through a painful time in your life, please help yourself to a copy of my free eBook “The Top Ten Tips to Coping With Crisis”

 

Are YOU a problem in your relationship?

Posted in Depression, Divorce, Relationships


 A Point to Ponder by Wendy Keller, blogger, mother, daughter, friend My elderly friend Daphne…


 A Point to Ponder

by Wendy Keller, blogger, mother, daughter, friend

My elderly friend Daphne died a few years back.  She was a feisty woman with a big heart.  Daphne had been a single mother and a real estate agent for decades. In fact, her 40-something-year old daughter was living with her when I met her.  “Mooching” off her, as Daphne used to say.

They apparently didn’t get along, yet to help her always-unemployable daughter, Daphne let the ungrateful woman take the only bedroom in her tiny apartment…and pay no rent.  I never met the daughter and didn’t want to.

I guess that’s why Daphne had been dead for months before I found out what had happened.

Most mornings when I make my bed, I think about Daphne and her troubled relationship with her daughter.  Daphne was British and had lived through the tail end of the war. One of her biggest pet peeves with her daughter was that she didn’t make the bed properly.  Daphne believed you had to remove all the covers and let the mattress air out in the mornings.  That meant opening the windows, and setting the pillows on end, too.

I can just imagine her daughter, raised in an era when mattresses weren’t stuffed with straw or whatever, rolling her eyes over Daphne’s insistence.

Yet Daphne complained about the bed-making pretty much every single time I took her out for a meal.  She was as certain she was right as her daughter was certain it didn’t matter.

Sometimes, people in my life do things that make no sense to me, either. Sometimes, I want to call them out for acting the way they do, or not doing something the way I know it should be done.

Seems to me like a lot of human relationships would go a lot smoother if we all paused to take into consideration that other people might have equally valid reasons for doing things the way they do, and then just let them be.

“Pick your battles” I always wanted to say to dear Daphne.  I miss her now.  I wonder if the nagging Daphne did and the defiance her daughter exhibited was worth the wear and tear it caused in their relationship?  How does the daughter feel now that her mother is gone?  Would it have been easier to just air out the bed?  Should Daphne have just let things be?

More importantly:  do we ever damage our own relationships by making mountains out of molehills?

 

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