YOUR HUT IS ON FIRE

Do you ever feel like your life is in shambles? Me too.

Tonight on the PBS station Dr. Daniel Amen--book: Magnificent Mind at Any Age--is talking about depression, anxiety disorders, ADD, ADHD, changing your perception of a problem--just about everything that might be stressful in your life (except a non-functioning computer--I hope Santa reads this blog). I think I need to read his book--he is giving lots of help to overcome the negative and encourage the positive. He says these things will be life changing. he has a weekly email. Click here to subscribe.

Also, today I got the following email in the mail. You probably have seen it yourself. It comes around every so often. (Thank you, Terri). See what you think. I'm picturing my computer on fire along with other things on fire, too. My fatness, perhaps. Man, that fire should burn for years!

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IS YOUR HUT ON FIRE?

The only survivor of a shipwreck was washed up on a small, uninhabited island. He prayed feverishly for God to rescue him. Every day he scanned the horizon for help, but none seemed forthcoming.

Exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to protect him from the elements, and to store his few possessions.

One day, after scavenging for food, he arrived home to find his little hut in flames, with smoke rolling up to the sky. He felt the worst had happened, and everything was lost. He was stunned with disbelief, grief, and anger. He cried out, 'God! How could you do this to me?'

Early the next day, he was awakened by the sound of a ship approaching the island! It had come to rescue him! 'How did you know I was here?' asked the weary man of his rescuers. 'We saw your smoke signal,' they replied.

The Moral of This Story:

It's easy to get discouraged when things are going badly, but we shouldn't lose heart, because God is at work in our lives, even in the midst of our pain and suffering... Remember that the next time your little hut seems to be burning to the ground, it just may be a smoke signal that summons the Grace of God.

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If you hut is on fire I hope the ship is just beyond the horizon and chugging toward your island at this very moment.

PS Here's just one of his suggestions: Write down five things you are grateful for. Meditate about them during the day--every day. This will increase your level of happiness in just three weeks. What have you got to loose? Make your list today. I'm going to do it, too.

THE COMPLICATED LIFE

Today I did not have a personal history story written for group. This is almost the first time in two years that I have not been prepared.

The women in the group let me talk after everyone else had read and I talked about the book. The book. The book where I am exorcising my ghosts. One ghost. The loss of my birth dad.

I am beginning to realize this book cannot be about my loss alone. My sisters lost too, especially Julie--who will be referred to as the troll occasionally in the book. Poor Julie to be portrayed in such a way--she hardly resembles a troll at all. Anyway, I have a hot tempered scene in my head between me and the troll, who, I will have to call something nicer because she put up with "the brat" all those years and has never been properly thanked for it.

Mom had the biggest loss of all. Julie told me some of the details of what happened after my dad's death. Mom tried to hold the business together but the physical work was overwhelming.

I have another scene with her and Aunt Dee trying to make mattresses but their strength just wasn't enough. It will have to be a dialogue scene, painted by the speaker--haven't decided who that will be yet--who watched and participated more than I did. I just ate dirt, probably, and peed my pants.

So, the book is getting more complicated. Life is complicated. We don't know what someone else is going through while we merrily waltz Matilda--that is if we know how to waltz and we know Matilda and if she doesn't want to lead. We should always be on the lookout for subtle signs that someone else is in distress--that someone is suffering, is sad, is grieving or even is angry.

I told one of my son's once to, "Watch for the signs." (This was after he teased Gilmore Girl to the edge of insanity and she broke down and cried.) He said, "What signs?" He honestly didn't know. Some of us are more in tune that others but it's a skill that can be taught. Sadly, sufferers aren't likely to say, "Hey listen. I'm having a crappy life. Could you cut me a little slack here?" So we go on our merry way, not helping, not loving or being compassionate. Judging. Often judging.

Life is complicated. We don't know what someone else is dealing with. I wonder if we could be a little more careful. Watch for the subtleties. The sighs. The forced laughter. The silences. The countenance that is devoid of joy. The heavy hands that hang down.

I wonder if a word of kindness would help. A hand on the shoulder. An "I'm sorry." Hardly ever can we change things, but we can listen. We can let the other know, maybe even just by a look, that we might understand, maybe only 10% but that's better than nothing. Maybe even if they see us eat some dirt and pee our pants they could say to themselves, "Well, at least I'm not that bad." Maybe it would help.

I don't think it helped my Mom or my sisters. I was just one more detail that had to be taken care of but maybe it did help. Maybe it gave them something to take their mind off their loss. There is nothing so delightful as a two year old and maybe I was there, at that time for a reason, more than I know.

Anyway, life is complicated, isn't it? I wish we could have a visual image that shows how we are all connected and then a visual image that shows how we have helped one another. I'll bet we would even be connected to Kevin Bacon somehow. Maybe in as little as four steps.

DO IT NOW

“We must lengthen our stride and must do it now.” President Spencer W. Kimball 12th President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Today, two friends and I went to the opening of Kohl's and then to lunch where we all ate too much, I'm sure.

On the way we stopped at a stoplight behind this car. I am dying to know the owners. What do they do that I don't? Do they ski all winter? Have they started their own company? Do they go to Egypt and ride camels? --I have an insane fondness for camels, I don't know why. They look so regal. Yes, I know they spit.-- Do they go up into the mountains, lie on a blanket and count stars and coyote barks at 2:00 AM? Do they stop at Denny's on the way home and have breakfast at 5:00 AM?What do they do?

I am going to get fit and buy a mountain bike and go to Sundance and ride the ski lift and then bike down. With exuberance. Maybe I will buy a season pass. I will take a notebook and ride to the end of the little road on top of the mountain and write for fifteen minutes before every insanely fast downward journey. Then, perhaps, in the winter I will ski the bike trail that is covered up so I won't be lonesome of it. That's what I think I will do. If I don't do that I am going to do something else courageous.

What do you think you will do? Will it be a courageous thing or a fun thing? Will it be a humanitarian thing or a family thing? Will it be an insanely risky thing or a safe thing? What will you do?

I found two quotes by Eleanor Roosevelt that seemed to fit:

"You must do the things you think you cannot do." Eleanor Roosevelt

"The purpose of life it to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience." Eleanor Roosevelt

PS On the way home--why, oh why didn't I stop and take a picture?-- we saw a little grey haired lady with--I'm not making this up--a dog on a leash, a chain saw and an untidy 100 foot-long, orange extension cord. What on earth had she been doing? Something courageous? Or, something illegal? Or something that would benefit mankind, like saw off an overhanging branch from a vacant lot, that threatened to sweep bicyclists off their bikes as they pedaled by?

Whatever it was, she did it.

THE JOURNEY by LISA SOUTH

This is a poem, published in the July Ensign. In the Ensign it is hand written over a lovely photo of covered wagons descending into a valley. I wanted to print that painting with the poem, actually I wanted the poem to show up as it was printed, hand written. So, please imagine this in cursive, over a golden painting with a cluster of wagons descending into a valley.

Our Mormon pioneers entered the Salt Lake valley on July 24th, 1847. July 24th has been celebrated as pioneer Day ever since. They had been driven out of their homes, again and again. This was to be their sanctuary, a place they could live without persecution. And so it has been--this valley, this Utah. Now our modern day pioneers live all over the world, each facing challenges, daily, weekly, yearly, like all people everywhere, and when they take a second or third breath, regroup and remember the promise of the Savior, they rejoice.

Lisa South, “The Journey,” Ensign, Jul 2008, pg. 27

They began
And rejoiced—
Buried tiny bodies in shallow graves,
Wept, and began again.

They entered the valley
With joy—
Beat crickets off their vanishing crops,
Starved, wept, and began again.

They built their homes
With gladness—
Prepared them for burning against an approaching army,
Wept, and began again.

They endured to the end.
They set the example.
Fighting our own crickets and armies,
We weep, remember, begin again—

And rejoice.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PAM

It's my friend's birthday. What is she doing to celebrate? Tending her grandchildren. Not for a couple of hours but for three days! Holy Moley. Three days. She's..."a better man than I am, Gunga Din!" She and her husband are making an impact on those kids lives. Their grandchildren are going to grow up knowing exactly what their grandparents stand for. They will be better people because they have such dedicated grandparents in their lives. Happy Birthday, Pam--who never stops, never takes a day off from being a good example, from trying--and succeeding--to be a better person.

So, I'm taking stock of my what-am-I-trying-to-be life. And you know what? I'm not sure. Oh, now if you really ask me I can give you the answers. What I'm wondering is what does my day-to-day life show that I am trying to be. I think it's not a pretty answer.

1. I must be trying to be a magician--I think I can pull dinner out of thin air.
2. I must be trying to live on charity--if I wait long enough the laundry will get folded--by someone else.
3. I must be conducting a scientific experinment--I'm trying to see what happens when I'm sleep deprived.
4. I must be trying to be a mind reader--or letting other people have the privledge of reading my mind--I don't return phone calls/emails when I should. I mean to, time just gets away from me.

And because of number three I must not try to figure anything more out tonight. It will all be gibberish.

Happy Birthday, Pam who has it all figured out even though she is also operating under the influence of number three, AND is tending her grandchildren.