Why Would I want to Live in the Now?

I always loved to listen to this song as a young teacher in Kamloops. It was a favorite and still is. But. To the question: Why Would I want to Live in the Now?

Because the Now may be all I have.

Living in the past stagnates us. We cannot live in the past as if the things that have already happened will happen over and over. Why revisit all the hurts and deceptions? Why revisit the bad times? Then again, we have had good times too. So, why not revisit them? It is good to remember them, but we cannot relive them. Embrace the good memories and enjoy the good feelings they bring back. But don't live there either.

Just think about the things happening in our lives now. So much excitement, so much progress. If we stay in the past, then what are we gaining from Now? Nothing. There is so much out there to experience, make new memories with and have a wonderful time living and learning.

So what's wrong with living in the future? Apart from the fact that if it has not yet happened, it may never happen. We can look ahead to the future. I am not saying that we cannot have one. Far from it! We will all have a future. What it will be we will know when it becomes the Now! Sure, we make plans. Sure, we decide what we want from life and make all sorts of decisions on how we are getting there. Now is when we are making all these choices and decisions. Not in the Future. We live Now. We have a vision for our future. We make plans on how to get there. We make the decisions and choices Now that will get us to our future. Live in the Now with vision. Live in the Now with enjoyment. Live in the Now for life!

The deeper reason for me is actually somewhat traumatic. My family doctor confirmed that I have early onset dementia. It is a result of the same medical issue that has been the cause behind my heart troubles too. My vein and artery walls are weak. They collapse and sometimes stick shut. When that happens around my heart, I get angina pain or a heart attack. When that happens in my brain, I lose a little bit of myself. That is what is making it so much more important to live in the NOW.

I am missing some memories. Nothing really important as far as I can remember. But I know the others might go sometime too. There is no good reason to remain living in my past watching the memories maybe disappear, maybe change as the old pathways in my brain start to shut down.

I would rather enjoy what is left of my time here in this life. So, ... I live in the Now. Making new pathways in my brain by learning new things. Making new memories in different sections of my brain. Using creativity skills that I did not know I had to beautify my surroundings. Not giving in to living in the past or trying to live in a future that is not yet here. I will enjoy my grandchildren as much as possible Now. I am taking lots of pictures for NOW. I am not dwelling on what could happen tomorrow. Living in the NOW makes life fun again. I love life in the Now. Enjoy it with me.

When you are troubled, that is when you really need your friends and family. I have mine. It amazes me more everyday how my friends accept me today for who I am Now. Not who I was 10 years ago. Not who I might be 10 years into my future. NOW.

Living and loving life

Elouise

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FORGIVE

We mostly think of forgiveness as something that we do when the person doing the wrong asks of US. Instead let us offer to forgive the person who has done wrong to us.

To not forgive them is like taking the poison suffering for what they did or didn't do to us and expecting THEM to die.

Forgiveness is a gift we give to our-self. It is not something we do to someone else. It's really that simple. Simply identify the situation where you need to forgive and ask yourself: "Am I willing to waste my energy further on this matter?" If the answer is "No," then that's it! All is forgiven.

Forgiving is allowing another person to be human for faults, mistakes or misdeeds.letting them know that there is no grudge, hard feelings or animosity for any wrongdoing.Forgiving is giving a sign that a person's explanation or acceptance of blame for a destructive, hurtful or painful act is fully accepted.Forgiving is the highest form of human behavior that can be shown to another person.



The Amish School Tragedy

On Monday morning, October 2, 2006, a gunman entered a one-room Amish school in Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania. In front of twenty-five horrified pupils, thirty-two-year-old Charles Roberts ordered the boys and the teacher to leave. After tying the legs of the ten remaining girls, Roberts prepared to shoot them execution with an automatic rifle and four hundred rounds of ammunition that he brought for the task. The oldest hostage, a thirteen-year-old, begged Roberts to “shoot me first and let the little ones go.” Refusing her offer, he opened fire on all of them, killing five and leaving the others critically wounded. He then shot himself as police stormed the building. His motivation? “I’m angry at God for taking my little daughter,” he told the children before the massacre.

The story captured the attention of broadcast and print media in the United States and around the world. By Tuesday morning some fifty television crews had clogged the small village of Nickel Mines, staying for five days until the killer and the killed were buried. The blood was barely dry on the schoolhouse floor when Amish parents brought words of forgiveness to the family of the one who had slain their children.

The outside world was incredulous that such forgiveness could be offered so quickly for such a heinous crime. Of the hundreds of media queries that the authors received about the shooting, questions about forgiveness rose to the top. Forgiveness, in fact, eclipsed the tragic story, trumping the violence and arresting the world’s attention.

Within a week of the murders, Amish forgiveness was a central theme in more than 2,400 news stories around the world. The Washington Post, The New York Times, USA Today, Newsweek, NBC Nightly News, CBS Morning News, Larry King Live, Fox News, Oprah, and dozens of other media outlets heralded the forgiving Amish. From the Khaleej Times (United Arab Emirates) to Australian television, international media were opining on Amish forgiveness. Three weeks after the shooting, “Amish forgiveness” had appeared in 2,900 news stories worldwide and on 534,000 web sites.

Fresh from the funerals where they had buried their own children, grieving Amish families accounted for half of the seventy-five people who attended the killer’s burial. Roberts’ widow was deeply moved by their presence as Amish families greeted her and her three children. The forgiveness went beyond talk and graveside presence: the Amish also supported a fund for the shooter’s family.


CAN WE LEARN SOMETHING FROM THIS INCIDENT?

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Unethical About Ethics

Ethics is defined as the moral principles one possess. The principles, the morality and inner wisdom that specifies the approach to life is what we call component of ethics. The basic attitude towards one's profession, reaction and behavior is well capable of deciding the consequence one can face at the fag end of his professional life.

A child afraid of darkness is probably wiser than a man afraid of light. Here is there a element of fear that resides in everyone. If a person claims to be brave then he too has the element of fear -- the fear of not being afraid. One can wonder that how fear is related with ethical values? In my opinion the element of fear is one of the integral part of a person. A person refrains from doing wrong only if he is afraid of the consequences. Here it can be laid emphasis on the existence of fear that restores ethical values that is entirely responsible for a person's being different from beasts.


There is a shear and bare exhibition of law that some times results to be brutal in courts, the so called place of lawful people. Is punishing somebody a ethical act? If yes, then what is ethical about this act, and if no then how a convict should be treated? Ethics is not a law, not a rule or not a premise that constraints one's act, it's all about the value that lets its bearer to be within the fence of values that count.

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT... Does not the phrase itself dread even a beast? Is it really a ethical act for a person, probably who is not ethical to sound capital punishment? who is more ethical, the judge who echoed the capital punishment or the convict who accepts the punishment because he had no other punishment because he had no other option to opt. I really wonder about it and feel that we are probably the innocent pawn who move according to the orders, which is probably sometimes unethical.


Ethics are perhaps set of unethical values that probably says absorb me to be apparently ethical !!!These are the ideas that crept into me when I had lent my patient but restless ear to pre-programmed chirping LADIES...

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Fear: False Evidence Appearing Real.

I think the title is self explanatory. We live all our life in one form or the other of this fear. A few years ago during a casual discussion with a professor in sociology I was asked to define FEAR. I was not able to define it, then I was asked to define FAITH. Again I found it very difficult. The professor explained that FEAR is something unknown that takes over your feeling and FAITH also is something unknown that takes over your feeling. Both Fear and Faith are feelings and opposite to each other.

Both these are unknown and grow with the help of your imagination or creativity. If you feed your Faith then your Fears starve and vice versa. Fear cripples our thinking and damages our personality. It makes us inferior. Fear is such a powerful feeling that it has been classified into so many types like phobias, Fear of Speaking, Fear of Writing, Fear of Crime etc. Though we all talk so much about positive thinking, we are unable to get rid of Fear why?


Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you NOT to be? Our lives are controlled by the fear of failure.Trial and error are usually the prime means of solving life’s problems. Yet many people are afraid to undertake the trial because they’re too afraid of experiencing the error. They make the mistake of believing that all error is wrong and harmful, when most of it is both helpful and necessary.


Success and Failure are two sides of a coin and are required in a balanced way for a person to grow for better.A little selfishness is valuable even in the most caring person. And a little failure is essential to preserve everyone’s perspective on success.We talk a lot about being positive. Maybe we also need to recognize that the negative parts of our lives and experience are just as important a play a very important role in finding success, both in our work and life.




We must develop our faith which will make things possible but not necessarily easy.As your faith is strengthened you will find that there is no longer the need to have a sense of control, that things will flow as they will.


Who is more foolish, the child afraid of the dark or the man afraid of the light? ~Maurice Freehill

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What is Love?

So. The questions we all ask ourselves. What is Love? How do we know it is Love? will Love live forever? ...

No one person can answer all of those. But if we look within, we find what Love is for us. I have been thinking on this topic for a while now. How can one come to grips with it all? There are so many facets; it is like a very large diamond. Or maybe a million smaller ones. Where do I start?

I start with the love I married over 40 years ago. That was special at the start. It has changed over the years, but not by becoming bad, just by becoming different. I would not trade those 40 years for anything else. I have 3 beautiful children because of that love. I have 2 grandchildren (so far) because of that precious love. I am settled in that love. I am in love with love.

Soulmates. Recently I met a soulmate. That Love is different. It has a passion unlike any other I have ever felt. It has intertwinings of thoughts that do not exist anywhere else. I don't know how many soulmates we can find in this vast world of ours, but, for me, one great soul mate is all I need. We fulfil each other in ways no one else can. We understand each others feelings with a depth no one else has. We understand our moods, our thoughts in harmony. We can feel what each other is feeling without even being in the same country. There are no bounds. Everyone needs a soulmate. I am extremely happy that I found mine.

Then there is Love we, as parents, have for our children. We find we want to protect them, help them to avoid the same pitfalls of life that we have ourselves fallen into. We want them to be happier than we were through all the different stages of our lives. We want only the best for them. We want to protect them. We want to stop anyone else from hurting them. We want to fight all their battles to save them from harm. We know, deep down, that we cannot do it all for them. We have to allow them to try, to get hurt, to laugh, to meet people, to attempt their own lives. They have to learn to live, to love and to be happy on their own. We can always be there when they need us. But above all else, Love can not be used to smother! That is the most important lesson that parents can learn. And the hardest too.

Then we have special friends. Yes, I love many people, in many different ways. My special friends are the ones that I can lean on. They are the ones I can say anything to without fear of being ridiculed. They are not afraid to hurt my feelings by telling me the truth. But they know how to cushion it so I can learn from what they say. They will not order me to do things I feel are not right. They will offer great suggestions when I reach a crossroads and don't know where to turn. They are the ones I can laugh with and cry with. They hold me up when I can't, but they let me down gently when it is time to go on my own. They are my greatest support.

So. Are there any more kinds of Love? Yes. Each friend we meet, each person we wrong, everyone who touches our lives we love in some way. It does not always feel like love, but if we are taking the time to interact with them, then there is a type of love there. We all have within ourselves the ability to love. It is ours to use and to spread. We have a need to use this love. The more we do so, the better our lives get. I am not saying bad things don't happen. What I am saying is when bad things happen the Love of our families, our special friends, even our acquaintances helps us to overcome.

To me, Love is a many faceted jewel. One that will shine on forever, no matter what happens. Full of different colours! Lights up our lives and makes it more lovable. Where would we be without love? I don't know. And I don't want to find out.

Let the rainbows shine on forever!

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