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Posts from the LightHearted Musings Category
LightHearted Musings - Kindness in Another’s Trouble, Courage in Your Own
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on February 8th, 2009
Life is mostly froth and bubbles,
Two things stand like stone;
Kindness in another’s trouble,
Courage in your own.
–Adam Lindsay Gordon
Dr. Bruce and I often meet people who feel that they must have done something wrong to cause their life’s challenges. Particularly in this economic climate and with all the changes going on in the world right now, I would like to take a few moments to discuss causality.
It is true that you may have had a hand in your problems and in fact, we all do have a hand in our life circumstances to varying degrees. If you smoke, it is no secret that you are more likely to get lung cancer. If you live a stressful life, it is no secret that you are more likely to get ill. If you cheat on your spouse, there is likely to be a loss of intimacy and trust between you and your partner.
If this information is used to make a positive change for the future, than it is a highly valuable insight. Where this can create problems is when the blaming ends at the blaming itself and nothing constructive comes from the insight.
Since these issues are talked about at such great length, I would like to skip over that discussion for a moment. Instead, I would like to discuss the other side of this coin - that it’s not always your fault.
There are those times when shit just happens. You didn’t cause it, it doesn’t have anything to do with your strength of will or character…it just is.
Sometimes, your genetic make-up looks for any small infraction in your diet or lifestyle to lay down plaque in your arteries. Sometimes, a worldwide economic downturn is the catalyst for you losing your job. Sometimes, the tornado takes your home and leaves your neighbor’s home intact.
The New Age movement has done many good things, but one criticism I have is their insistence that all your problems are in your head, that if you just thought correctly, sent out the right vibes, or prayed in the right way, then you could get rid of all that ails you. There may be some kernel of truth to this, but I am sure we have all seen times when this has been taken to the point of blaming the one who is suffering. To me, this is unnecessarily hurtful and feels too much like kicking someone when they are down.
I do understand where this blame game comes from. Part of this stems from a fear reaction on the part of the person doing the blaming. “If my friend’s husband left her because of some fault in her, and if I don’t have that particular fault, then it is less likely to happen to me.” Or “there has to be a reason this person is suffering because if this were just a random event, I would have no protection from it.” People have to assign blame in order to distance themselves from the apparent randomness of bad fortune.
Of course, all our troubles have many components to them simply because you can’t separate mind, body, emotions and spirit. However, that’s not the whole picture. Sometimes, the broken bone has more to do with the tree you ran into while skiing than the problems in your marriage. Sometimes, the problems in your marriage have more to do with circumstances far outside your control.
Does that negate the fact that we all have some responsibility for how our lives turn out? Not at all. Certainly, if you keep running into those trees, it might be worth the effort to find a different route down that hill. It’s just that you are always a mixture of the controllable and the uncontrollable, and recognizing this can give you an opportunity to see yourself in the richness of your individual experience.
Another comment on this theme…It’s not always someone else’s fault either.
On the other end of this blame spectrum is the scenario where nothing is your fault. Instead, you place the blame squarely on someone else’s shoulders, sometimes your partner’s, sometimes your parents, and then there are all those others you could blame as well. Everything I just said to get you off the hook is equally relevant for these other people in your life.
We are all just trying to figure our lives out as well as we can with the challenges that are placed before us. In general, you (and they) are doing the best you can with the knowledge you have available to you at the time. Yes, certainly, I do want you to take a look at where you bear responsibility for your troubles, but also keep in mind that a lot of healing and love can come from simply cutting yourself and others some slack.
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - Cherish Your Visions and Your Dreams
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on February 1st, 2009
Cherish your visions and your dreams as they are the children of your soul, the blueprints of your ultimate accomplishments.
–Napoleon Hill
Here is a tip that will not only strengthen your relationships with your family but will also get you started toward stepping into the life you have been longing for. For the last couple of years, Bruce and I have been getting together every Wednesday at 1 pm for a Visioning Meeting.
In this Visioning Meeting, we ask the big questions about what’s important to us, what we value, what brings us joy, what we hate to do, whether we are heading in the direction we want to go, etc. The idea behind this is to continually fine-tune what our lives look like so that we can keep heading toward what brings us joy, a sense of purpose in our work, and a stronger relationship with each other. It is important to schedule this in on a regular basis so that the meeting actually takes place and so that everybody acknowledges the importance of the quest.
Bruce and I often don’t come up with the answers during this meeting, and in fact, we often have more questions than answers right after the meeting is done. Instead, getting together weekly keeps the conversation in our minds throughout the week. Some of my best ah-ha! moments have been in the shower a day or two after the Visioning Meeting, when the answers to my questions seem to get downloaded into my head all at once. This is a wonderful way for couples to reconnect and to feel like they are working together to create the vibrant and loving lives together that they have always dreamed of.
You can also bring your children, especially your teenagers, into your Visioning Meetings so that they can learn these skills as well. This will let your children know that you care about what their dreams are for themselves. You would be amazed at how much harmony there is in a home where everyone is steadily and cooperatively working toward bettering their lives and where everyone’s wishes and needs are really heard. Give Visioning Meetings a try for a couple of months and let us know how it goes!
LightHearted Musings - Only One of You is Allowed to Be Crazy At Any One Time
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on January 25th, 2009
A question that sometimes drives me hazy: Am I or are the others crazy?
–Albert Einstein
Here is a relationship tidbit that Bruce and I have used as gospel in our marriage to good effect:
Only one of you is allowed to be crazy at any one time
and its correlate:
You are both encouraged to be crazy sometimes
Sanity isn’t all it’s cracked up to be! Sometimes it takes you stepping out of your sane life in order to go outside the box and find your joy. If one of you can act as the lifeline while the other one steps off that proverbial cliff (and then change places with each other periodically) you may find that you both discover your wings.
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - We’re In the Same Boat Now
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on January 18th, 2009
We may have all come on different ships, but we’re in the same boat now.
–Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.
A long time ago in a land not so far away, a whole village found themselves at the bottom of a very deep well. Now, each of them had their own unique story for how they got down in that well. Some had been pushed by either seen or unseen forces to make this descent. Others had not noticed the well in their path and had simply fallen in. Some had been reckless, testing how close to falling they could get before taking the plunge themselves. The final group were simply pulled down with the crowd.
There were still some people at the top of the well, but not enough to make a concerted rescue effort. The well itself was too deep to climb out of, though there were plenty of individuals who tried with all their might to do so. Panic was setting in, as the well was quickly filling with water. Some were crying. Others were trying to climb the walls of the well without success, often falling on top of their fellow villagers when they lost their grip.
It was at the moment of greatest despair that one little girl kneeled down quietly. With her back bowed over as it was, the others thought she was either praying or crying. Some thought that she might be trying to hasten her own end, as the water was all the way up to her chin in this position.
With a calm, quiet voice that nevertheless retained the sweet tenor of her youth, she said to the person next to her, “Use my back as your footstool and reach up.” The others stopped and stared - maybe there was another way out of this mess.
This one little girl was not big enough to raise that person to their salvation, but she was big enough to start something. With her as their inspiration, the villagers worked together to create a human ladder, with one person on top of another and continuing upward. Each person gravitated to their natural position in the chain. Those with the strongest backs formed the foundation, those who were the most agile went toward the top, and everyone else found their place in between, until finally they reached their goal. Then the human ladder became a human rope so that those who had made it out could pull up the rest of their fellow villagers.
By offering herself in service, this little girl had shown the way. By heeding that call both to service and to action, by coming together as a community of individuals dedicated to a common goal, the villagers had found all that they needed to restore both their hope and their salvation.
Today, we as a world village are down in that well, with the water quickly rising. We are being called both to service and to action, and it is now our time to come together as a community of individuals dedicated to a common goal. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, we are all most definitely in the same boat now, and we each have a role we can play in our mutual survival. My father called this being “smart selfish, ” as our willingness to help each other is truly the only way we are each going to get ourselves out of this well. Find your place of service and then, most importantly, step up and take part in your own rescue.
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - Bidden or Not Bidden, God is Present
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on January 11th, 2009
Vocatvs atque non vocatvs Deus aderit
Bidden or not bidden, God is present.
–Carl Jung
God is present. God is present. I said this phrase over and over to myself to see if it fit for me, to see if God really does feel present to me at all times, whether or not I bid his/her/its presence. I find it very easy to feel God in my life when things are going well. During good times, it feels like there is a friendly hand at my back, gently guiding me in the directions that are the most favorable for me, creating synchronicities that flow opportunities my way. God is my loving pal during those times, quietly stacking the deck in my favor. Basically, it’s easy to feel God’s presence when good things are happening to me.
But what about the bad times? Can I feel God when my finances are tight, when my computer has crashed, when I’ve got the flu, or when I am seriously struggling? If God has a hand in my misfortunes, then what does that say about both God and my relationship to God? Am I being punished? Is there a lesson I’m supposed to be learning? Since bad things happen to good people all the time, it is natural to question whether there really is a God who is a loving presence through the good times and the bad. It is also natural to question whether God really has a hand in our fate. Am I on my own out here in the world?
A couple of days ago, these very thoughts were running around in my head as Bruce and I were talking about how this economic downturn was affecting us. If the two of us just simply took on regular jobs as doctors, we would have no insecurities with our finances. Instead, we have put a lot of blood, sweat, tears, and money into our dream of creating a holistic healing center that steps outside the box of medicine, to go for more deep and meaningful healing for people. It is a gamble of the heart that may or may not end up succeeding as a business though we are well aware of how well it has succeeded on a personal level for our patients.
Bruce and I agreed that we were comfortable with however this turned out. We both feel a moral, intellectual, and spiritual pull to practice medicine in a way that fosters the healing of mind, body and spirit. Not following our hearts with this would be more detrimental to our own health and well-being than taking the financially easier way out. Besides, no matter what happened, we would be falling or flying together.
We both agreed that we would rather follow our dreams and have them fail than to let our dreams be unexpressed. I did say, though, that I could sure use a big glaring synchronicity right around now to let me know that we are on the right track, something that I wouldn’t be able to mistake, as a sign that there is a bigger Presence out there who has our best interests at heart. And while I was at it, I asked that the synchronicity come as soon as possible.
The next day, I got my synchronicity with the added reminder that God has a sense of humor. Our youngest daughter, Rebecca, started a conversation out of the blue about God and the presence of spirit in our lives. Before I had a chance to comment that her Daddy and I were just talking about that the night before, Rebecca stated that she could sure use a big glaring synchronicity right about now to let her know that she was on the right track, something that she wouldn’t be able to mistake, as a sign that there was a bigger Presence out there who had her best interests at heart!
OK, so I must admit that I was hoping for a more financially driven synchronicity, but I did recognize this one for what it was and I appreciated the efficiency with which Spirit took care of both of us in one fell swoop! It gave us all a good laugh, something money would not have done. It reminded me to be in awe of the workings of the world, and I’ll take it as the sign of God’s presence that it seemed to be. Yes, I do believe that God is present with us in good times and bad, and if you are struggling with a need to feel that, go ahead and ask for a big glaring synchronicity of your own. Bid God’s presence in your life, but do be prepared to have a sense of humor about it!
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - I Hope You Dance
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on January 4th, 2009
And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance. I hope you dance!
–Lee Ann Womack
This week’s LightHearted Musing comes to you courtesy of our daughter, Rebecca. All of our kids are amazing writers. They each bring a unique voice and style to their writing, and when we see a particularly good one, we will share their version of LightHearted Musings with you. Rebecca wrote this one on a night when there was a dance at school that she wasn’t attending. We thought it was beautiful, and we hope you agree.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
You don’t need a pretty venue to dance and have fun!!!!
The most fun you can ever have dancing are the spontaneous moments when you hear music and are so compelled by the sounds that you feel as though, if you don’t dance that second, you might explode.
The pure joys in life erupt from those few moments of utter freedom when nothing matters but you, the music, and the heart and soul that is poured into just moving and feeling and dancing- enjoying yourself, life and the freedoms that allow for such spontaneity!
I just had one of those moments, and I probably looked like an idiot to Jake (Rebecca’s brother) and Sam (their friend) who bore witness to it, but none of that mattered!!!!
Life is amazing! If you don’t grab at those moments, and if you forget to really experience the music, than you will forget why you are even alive to begin with! Grab these moments! Remember them! And whatever you do, never stop dancing!
Rebecca Roberts
LightHearted Musings - Where the Dance of Life Really Takes Place
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on December 28th, 2008
The moment in between what you once were, and who you are now becoming, is where the dance of life really takes place.
–Barbara De Angelis
Change. The word itself is enough to send a chill through the heart. We talk hopefully of embracing change, but for most people, avoiding change is the real order of the day. Saying that change is to be expected does not really do much good in easing your anxiety about it, does it? As the old year dies off and the new year begins, I thought I would take a moment to talk about change.
It might help to know that there is a rhythm to change. In fact, our lives are perpetually in one stage or another of this cycle, and knowing where you are in the process can be very helpful.
Change is a lot like birth, with all its ups and downs, excitements and challenges. For the concepts I am about to describe, I would like to thank Linda Star Wolf who first introduced me to what she calls “The Cycles of Change.” My description is slightly different - where Star Wolf describes 5 cycles, I have 7 cycles - but the concepts are basically the same and I thank her for imparting her wisdom. So come along on this journey and see where you are on the Cycles of Change.
Stage 1 is the womb where you are very comfortable. All your needs for food and oxygen are being met before you even have to think about it. There is plenty of room to move about, and life is pretty uneventful. It is really fairly ideal in the womb. When people abuse drugs, particularly downers, they are trying to artificially get back to this womb-like feeling. Stage 1 corresponds to the infancy time of life, or any time in your life when you are happy with the status quo and want to turn inward and “hole up” for a while. Peace is the prevailing feeling.
Stage 2 is the time when the womb is starting to get fairly tight. You are growing and your womb no longer fits you like it did before. Every direction in which you try to stretch results in constriction. You know you want things to change, but you don’t yet know how to go about it. You sense change is on the horizon and at this point, that sounds pretty good because it’s still just a concept, not yet a reality. Drug abuse using uppers is more common during this and the next stage in an attempt to get revved up. Stage 2 corresponds to childhood and adolescence or to any time when you start to sense that changes are needed. Frustration is the prevailing feeling.
Stage 3 starts at the point that you enter the birth canal. You are initially excited that you are finally on your way, but the forces pushing on you are pretty strong and even painful. These forces are shaping your head in ways that you didn’t expect and that you are not at all sure you want. At this point, you can’t yet see the light at the end of the tunnel, so it all feels like more work than it may be worth. This corresponds to adolescence and adulthood or to any time when the drudgery of your daily life obscures the goal that you are trying to reach. Excitement and then possibly depression are the prevailing feelings.
Stage 4 is further along the birth canal. Now you can see the light at the end of the tunnel and it’s starting to infuse you again with hope that you will reach your goal. However, you are still in the birth canal and still getting pushed around by the strong forces of which you have no control. If you could just reach out and touch the light…but it’s still out of your reach. It feels like it is never going to end. This corresponds to the middle years of your adulthood or anytime you are close but not yet holding onto that cigar. The prevailing feelings of this time are hope, exasperation and possibly despair.
Stage 5 is right at the opening to the birth canal. It is then, just as you can literally touch the light, that your head gets stuck in the opening. It has to mold itself even more to find its final way out and this last pressure is the worst of all the other pressures you have been through before. All of a sudden, you are questioning whether the light is everything you made it out to be. What if the light is worse than your current reality? After all, it is an unknown. Why can’t you just go back to the womb where it was all safe and comfortable? The womb is looking really good right now! Even if you have to go back to the pressures of the birth canal, at least you are familiar with that kind of hurt. You have no idea what new hurts await you on the outside. This stage relates to later adulthood, the time of midlife crises, where men may find younger women and women may go back to old comforts like food or even a wish to have another child as the last child prepares to leave the nest. This is anytime in your life when you are about to break through to a major change and you hesitate, considering the option of turning back. The prevailing emotion during this time is fear.
Stage 6 is when you break through your barriers, internal and external, and find yourself on the other side. This can be the birth, the graduation ceremony, the wedding ceremony, the promotion, the retirement party. This is your time to appreciate your accomplishments and to look back with a recognition of the hard work that got you here. Your journey has changed you, molded you in ways you never could have anticipated, and you realize that you could not have been the person you are now without the forces you worked through to get here. You have wisdom wrought from first-hand experience, a level of understanding that you could never have gleaned from reading about it in a book or by having a figurative C-section to shorten the journey. This is the time of old age and the prevailing feeling is the joy of accomplishment and excitement for this next stage of the journey.
Stage 7 is the culmination of your cycling. This is when you are able to rest on your laurels a bit before you start the cycles all over again. You are active during this stage, happy with the culmination of your efforts, sharing what you have learned and acting on your own wisdom. This is a time of mentorship and “knowing what you know.” This time of life corresponds with the crone and the sage, the priest and the priestess. The prevailing feeling of this stage is contentment.
This last stage is very important because you then end up back in the womb of your new home where it all feels comfortable again…for a while. These cycles are continually going on, not just over a lifetime but throughout all the individual phases of your life. With each cycle, you grow a little more as a human being, and so each new womb will be more advanced than the previous one was. In this way, change acts as a catalyst for an upward spiral, twisting and turning continually as you make your way in the world. You may be in differing stages at the same time for various aspects of your life. Identifying where you are in these cycles is an exercise in understanding and accepting your continually changing self.
There is a great quote from the show The Wonder Years - “Change is never easy. You fight to hold on. You fight to let go.” Allow yourself to dance and roll with the cycles of change, and who knows, you may just get the ride of your life!
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - You Wander from Room to Room
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on December 21st, 2008
You wander from room to room
Hunting for the diamond necklace
That is already around your neck!
During this holiday season, I’d like to take a moment to put your health into a larger perspective, because Bruce and I have a bigger message for you than just “eat healthy and take your pills on time.” To do this, I’d like to have some fun with you and take you on a mystical journey - a journey to your inner castle. Each of us has one, a quiet place within ourselves with great treasures, with a deep wisdom that is meant to show us our higher purpose. And what a beautiful and magical place it is!
Feel free to close your eyes for a moment in order to better see your castle. As you approach, you may notice how it shimmers like a jewel, promising…what?
The door opens easily and you step into the foyer. Inside is a great hall, surprisingly more solid-looking than the outside had appeared. Something is wrong, though. You were hoping to actually be walking inside your castle, touching, hearing and seeing everything as if your body was actually there. Instead, you feel like you are floating above the scene, like you are outside your body, looking on. You feel detached somehow and want to feel more grounded. Just then, you hear, “This is Lesson Number 1.” How many of us go about our days, not really present in our own lives? It is as if we are watching ourselves from above, focusing on the past or on the future, critiquing our bodies, our thoughts, our emotions or our place in the world. We seldom just live within our own skin. Being totally present in your own life is called mindfulness. How much of your time is spent in mindfulness? What are the forces that are pulling you away from yourself, making you an observer instead of an active participant in your own life?
Next, you climb the main staircase and find the master bedroom. It is a very romantic room with a four poster bed, lush carpet and curtains, and a fire in the fireplace. Something is slightly off about this room too. Everything is too neat, the bed is perfectly made up and there is nobody else in the room. You hear, “This is Lesson Number 2.” This room symbolizes physical and emotional intimacy, love, companionship and rest. With those elements in the room, the bed sheets should have been mussed up, lived in. Close your eyes for a moment and look at your master bedroom. Is it filled with love, companionship, intimacy, and sexual fulfillment? Are you giving yourself that same love and intimacy that you want from another, being your own best companion in life? Are you your own best friend? Are you spending enough time in your bedroom to get the rest, quiet time, and rejuvenation that you need?
You pass a number of other bedrooms and notice that these are both family and guest bedrooms. This is Lesson Number 3, a sense of community, of family and friends, of love and acceptance going in both directions. Is there a group of people that loves and takes care of you when you are down, and do you love and take care of them in return? Have you worked out old hurts and misunderstandings so that you can get to the point of assuming each other’s good intentions? There is a beautiful point in between dependence and independence - often overlooked in our busy lives when we either want it all done for us or we want to do it all ourselves - where interdependence can enrich life tremendously. Are you able to embrace the interdependence in your life?
You get to the end of the hallway and instead of stairs, there is a slide. As you hop on and go down, you feel a great sense of joy, like a kid at play. I think I even hear a “Whee” come out of you! This is Lesson Number 4. In your castle of life, where is the joy, the play? If you can’t find it around the main staircase, try looking for it at the end of the hallway. Without that slide, your castle would have seemed darker, less loving and nurturing. The slide is a gift. Give yourself a chance to let your joy come flooding out.
At the bottom of the slide is the kitchen and next to that is the bathroom. How’s that for breaking the mood of your castle! But this is Lesson Number 5, that even in this mythical, mystical castle, we have to take care of our bodily needs. It’s a matter of ins and outs. What you put in is what you will get out. If you take care of your body with good food, exercise, and responding to your bodily needs (not just the bathroom variety), your outs will more likely take the form of freedom from illness, fewer aches and pains, or maybe just the ability to walk up a few flights of stairs without being winded.
Then you come upon the office, and “Lesson Number 6″ is whispered in your ear. Are you spending your time in meaningful activity? Are you doing your part to make the world a better place? How are you spending the majority of your waking hours, and does your life feel good to you? If you are not in right relationship with your job or your other daily activities, then it is difficult to feel in alignment with yourself. There is no one life purpose that is right for everybody, but finding the one that fits for you is worth the effort. Is there a well-stocked bookshelf in your office, where you can satisfy your perpetual curiosity about the various wonders of the world? Do you feel perpetual curiosity and wonder, or have you stopped searching for your answers?
Next, you find an enormous room with beautiful wood walls and a high ceiling. In the middle of the ceiling, there is a round skylight, and the sun’s rays cascade to the floor in a brilliant puddle. You walk over to the light and stand within its embrace, arms outstretched, receiving the warmth in all its glory. You feel transformed. Ah, Lesson Number 7, the connection to a spiritual power, a force so much grander than ourselves and yet lovingly embracing us in its light, melding with our own light into a feeling of being one with all that is. This doesn’t have to have a name or even a structure - it is more a sense of being at peace, of being connected to all that is around you. This is the center of the castle, around which all else is built.
As you walk around, you realize that your castle is much more real-appearing than you could have imagined. You had known that it was filled with wisdom and transcendence from its outside appearance. The inside did have wisdom and transcendence, and yet the lessons were embedded in fairly ordinary earth-like architecture. It was a home! Our wisdom is always like that, far simpler than we think. Maybe that’s the key to the castle, that all the wisdom of the universe is to be found within your own simple abode.
How does Holistic Medicine fit into all of this? That question is answered differently depending on the holistic practitioner you talk to. The answer for Bruce and me is that we help you to keep your lovely, shimmering castle in your consciousness, so that you will remember to access its wisdom whenever you need to. It is an acknowledgment that true health is health in all of its manifestations. Freedom from illness is one important part of this castle, but it certainly isn’t the whole structure.
Just one missing room would create a gaping hole in the castle, as mind, body and spirit are all essential aspects of health. You can think of the various holistic medicine modalities as bricks in the wall or better yet, as mortar to connect the bricks together. They all give great value to your structure but ultimately, the healing comes from within.
We help you to explore the rooms of your castle so that it becomes your everyday home, a place of sustenance, wisdom and love. We help you to recognize the sacred within the mundane and the mundane within the sacred.
Search outside of yourself as you please, but know that the jewels of your life are within your internal castle. As Rumi says, the diamond necklace is already around your neck. What a treasure your life is!
May you have a blissful Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa - whatever form of celebration you call your own, and we wish you every happiness!
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - Reframe the Canvas of Your Life
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on December 14th, 2008
The Gem cannot be polished without friction, nor Man perfected without trials.
–Chinese Proverb
How do you handle all the problems in your life when they seem so overwhelming? How do you let go of a past that has pummeled you? We talked last week about your life in words, so now let’s switch art forms and think about your life in pictures.
In reviewing our lives, after all, we seldom see them as words on a page - we see a series of images. When you think about your childhood relationship to your parents, words are often not what come to mind. Instead, you most likely replay mini movies in your mind, episodes of your childhood in which you see the scene both from within the picture and as an observer standing outside the scene.
How you frame that image determines its meaning and significance to you.
For instance, if you replay an argument you had with your mother at the age of eight, you may remember how you felt at the time and can take yourself right back into that moment. Many of us are stuck in this position, reliving our eight-year-old feelings as if they were happening right now.
However, there is another part of you that is observing the scene as if from above, with possibly an entirely different orientation. You may, from that vantage point, understand your mother’s perspective more clearly than you did at the tender age of eight. The framing of the picture is different from a child’s perspective than it is as an adult. This additional viewpoint doesn’t in any way negate your eight-year-old’s feelings, it just adds another layer to them, puts them in a different frame of reference. It doesn’t say that your mother was right either. It just adds depth to your picture.
In any good portrait, there is so much more there than what is happening center stage.
Each object on the canvas is filled with meaning, depth and symbolism for the enrichment of the whole. Discovering the many layers adds challenge but also joy to the scene, with a better appreciation for how complex and rich your life is.
When you reframe the canvas of your life, you make a choice.
You can decide, with every picture you have created in your mind, what the framing will be. You don’t change the scene itself, because those are the paint strokes that have created your own personal work of art. With each image, though, you can delve deeper while at the same time standing back and observing, to decide if the framing you have given each of them is still helpful now. If not, look to refurbishing.
Your life is a work of art
Your life is a beautiful work of art, an adventure portrait in which you are the primary character. And yes, that statement holds true whether you are experiencing light or dark days right now.
Ultimately, we are all parts of the same story, the same work of art.
Although we each have our own stories, there are common themes that occur throughout history to which we can all relate on some level. These stories become archetypes, or symbolic frames, for our individual portraits. This is where the hero, the villain and the victim from last week come back into the picture, and these are only three in a vast array of possible frames that can surround your personal portrait. It is these themes that give us a shared language about our individual struggles and triumphs. In this way, we can see that we are more alike than different, that you are not alone. Let me say that again - you are not alone and if you feel that you are, then please, reframe the canvas of your life.
Dr. Molly
LightHearted Musings - Great Necessities Call Out Great Virtues
Posted by Dr. Molly Roberts on December 7th, 2008
These are the times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life or in the repose of a pacific station that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised and animated by scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lay dormant wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman.
–Abigail Adams
I love history!
Now, before you are able to form the word, “Ugh!” on your lips, let me explain why. History is so much more than memorizing dates. To me, every history lesson was a story of adventure or drama or comedy or tragedy. I would put myself in the story, wondering how I would have reacted under those circumstances. Would I have been the hero, the villain, the victim or, God forbid, not significant enough for history to record?
I would wonder what thoughts were thought during those episodes. What childhood or other influences were instrumental in swaying a person to one action or another? How does someone become either a Hitler or a Gandhi?
History is the story of people like you and me.
The obstacles they faced and how they faced them were what put them into the history books. When these heroes and heroines faced their obstacles, I’m sure they felt just as badly as when you and I face ours. But the heroes rose above them and the villains as well as the victims did not.
If someone were to write my history (complete with scholastic interpretations), what would they write? And what about you?
What would you want them to write about you?
History is a series of interconnected pictures, moments in time captured by someone who took the time to record it. How that storyteller framed the events often determined the parts each character played. Many of us grew up with the early American pioneers being heroes in our history books only to find out later that their methods of conquering the land from the Native Americans were anything but heroic. Which version was right? Interestingly, the answer is…both. Depending on how the scene was framed, both perspectives are correct. This is not a contradiction, just an understanding that the perspective can completely change the story.
In a perfect world, everyone ought to be a hero in their own life story.
Sorry to break the news, but this is not a perfect world. However, we’re not talking about the whole world - we’re just talking about you. Can you be your own hero? The beautiful and sometimes difficult part about history is that you can’t fall back on the excuse of, “But my obstacles are so much bigger…” No matter where you look, you will find people whose problems were far larger than your own but who became better human beings precisely because of their obstacles.
That’s what I want for myself - to be better because of my obstacles, not despite them. I want to be my own hero. And, I would guess, so would you.
Dr. Molly
