Finding Joy In Your Pain

My dear sweet mother passed away this past week at age 94 after a long battle with cancer. It was a bitter sweet moment for me. Part of me rejoiced because death freed her from a crippled aged body. Sadness also washed over me, knowing she wouldn't be there to visit with each day.

Then the whirlwind began with family driving and flying in from distant places. We had the burial to plan, a memorial program to put together, meals to organize, beds to make, and on and on.

Now the family is gone, and I have some time to grieve. Can I find joy in my grief? 

Oh yes. Joy comes with the happy memories.

Joy in discussing each day's events with my mom.

Joy in rubbing her face with lotion each night.

Joy in spooning ice chips into her mouth.

Joy in watching her reminisce with elderly colleagues. 

Joy in seeing her hold her great grandchildren.

Joy in reading her scriptures daily.

Joy in our good night kiss and our 'I love you's.' 

I will have sad days and happy ones. But underneath it all is my joy because of her love for me.  

 

Find a place inside where there's joy, and the joy will burn out the pain. Joseph Campbell

Contest Winner

Kat is our winner. I'll mail Becoming Free tomorrow.
My mother just passed away this week. She was a widow for 65 years. I know the path you are walking. My love and prayers are with you for your life to be filled with blessings.
Congratulations, Christy

Create Your Own Inner Beauty - Blog Hop

To win a book in the LDS Blog Hop, leave a comment saying how you create peace and inner beauty in your life. Designate which book your want to win: Love, Hugs, and Hope or Becoming Free.

We have a cabin near the Grand Tetons in Idaho, and we spent a few days there this past week. The weather was rainy and cold. Snow covered the mountain tops. The chill of winter was in the air.

Our granddaughters had just watched The Sound of Music, and loved singing the songs and pretending that they were Maria.

I looked out the window one dismal afternoon, while mopping the floor, and noticed them twirling in the harvested wheat field, singing, "The hills are alive with the sound of music." Now I have a pretty good imagination, but there was no Swiss mountain meadow grass out there. There was only the wheat stubble, and it wasn't soft and green, it was stiff and prickly. There was no sunny bright sky. The chilly fall day was overcast and rainy.

The children didn't care about any of that. They were singing their hearts out and enjoying themselves.

The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives. Albert Einstein.

Sometimes we get bogged down in the reality of the moment, as I did that rainy day, only seeing the negative. Do you find yourself feeling rushed, over worked and full of anxiety about getting your 'to do' list completed? When I find myself in that state of mind, I begin to snap at people--usually the people I love the most. I don't like that exhausted, burned out, irritable feeling.

Take a mental break for a moment and fill your mind with beauty. Enjoy a "Sound of Music" interlude in your busy day. I put down my mop, sat on the step watching them, and let their view of the day seep into my own life.

1.         Look for the beauty around you.

2.         Compose your own splendor from within as our granddaughters did.

3.         Visualize being in your favorite place.

4.         Breathe deeply and fill yourself with light.

In just a moment you have created your own inner beauty--your own mini vacation, if you will. Can you feel yourself more relaxed? More peaceful? More positive?

I can.

Enjoy your own inner beauty.

Let us live for the beauty of our own reality. Charles Lamb

Christy Monson's book, Love Hugs and Hope is available at:

http://www.familius.com/love-hugs-and-hope#.UgKh4m2tdco

Becoming Free can be purchased:

http://www.familius.com/becoming-free#.UgKiLG2tdco

Childhood Memories, Good or Bad?

I am temporarily living in the childhood home I grew up in because I'm caring for my mother who is ill. Every night when I go for a walk, I pass the park where we used to play ball when it was an old vacant lot. There is a beautiful new house on a site that used to have a deep dirt depression in it where my cousins and I would to ride our bikes--our own dirt bike trail with jumps.

I traverse the jagged old brick wall next door to my house where my cousins lived. We spent hours playing on that wall, seeing who could make the loudest sound with a leaf whistle.

Blowing a leaf whistle

Some of my childhood memories are pleasant, some are not. What I choose to remember is important. If I remember only the sad or hard times, I'm cheating myself of the positive energy that can surround me. I'm denying myself the love and goodness that is part of my life.

I am grateful for the tough times when I got my finger caught in a do-it-yourself cement mixer, skinned my knees on my roller skates, and knocked my permanent front teeth, trying out my new bike. I gained character from those events, and they will always be part of my life. 

Is it possible for me to live through the dark times, learn the lessons they present me, and move on to the light? The answer for me is yes.

Here's how:

1.         Remember the good in your life.

2.         Add the depth of character that comes from the hard times.  
3.          Look inside yourself for the wisdom you've gained from living.

4.         Take time for reflection.

Each day as I meditate in the early morning hours before my mind is cluttered with the day, I spend a few minutes remembering positive childhood memories like sitting on the bank of the river fishing, watching the river float lazily by, or hanging over the old tree swing, just thinking. Spending a little time with my memories gives that child that I was happiness and peace before I begin my day.

Fishing on the Teton River

Hanging over the old tree swing

'No' Only Means 'Next'

I just returned from a wonderful writing conference where bestselling author, Dian Thomas, and another well-published friend, Carolyn Campbell, conducted a workshop. Their motivational theme was, "'No' Only Means 'Next.'" Their premise was that if you receive a rejection for a manuscript, you don't spend time feeling discouraged or sorry for yourself, you just send it off to the next place.

I love this positive attitude and I think it applies to all of life. Sometimes our dreams and goals are not possible to fulfill, so rather than being discouraged, we just go on to the next dream or goal we have.

Sometimes the 'No' comes from outside us, like a rejected manuscript. But other times it comes from within us as we set our priorities.

A dear friend has a goal to finish a manuscript about historic Spain. But life has gotten in her way. Her husband has a pressing project that he needs her help with. She has chosen to work with him right now, putting a 'No' on her writing project for now. She told me, "Sometimes I just ache inside to write my story. My characters keep calling to me, and it's hard to put them off." 

I have a goal to give service to my church, but right now my mother is ill with cancer, and I have chosen to spend these last days with her. What a blessing this is in my life. My service goal is not forgotten, and some days I long to fill it, but my time right now belongs to my mother. 

As parents, we have all put a 'No' on some of our own goals to enjoy our children while they are young.

When you bump up against the 'No's in your life, don't let them discourage you. Look for the 'Next's. They will always appear and bless your life with the gifts you need right now.

Blog Tour Winners

Congratulations to Joan Gore who won the Becoming Free Blog Tour.
Congratulations to Vesper Meikle who won the Love, Hugs, and Hope Blog Tour.