Soulmate

Most people think their spouse is supposed to be their soulmate.

I know I did.

I think this belief is propagated in Disney Princess movies. Our Prince Charming, Aladdin, Eric, or Flynn is supposed to be perfect and someone we can live happily ever after with.



Did you know that you can have more than one soulmate?

I'm not talking about polygamy, polyamory, adultery, or any of that stuff.

I'm talking about redefining the term Soulmate.


Sounds right. Thanks Dawson's Creek.

But no where does it say that this person has to be your spouse, the opposite gender, or the same age. No where does it say that this person remains in your life forever. No where does it say that this isn't several people, who may or may not be in your life at the same time.

At different times of our lives we will need and want different types of relationships.

How do you know if you have found a soulmate?

1. Indescribable Connection

Firstly, you will feel a sense of having known this person for all of your life. They will 'get' you. You will 'get' them. 

• You may experience HUGE changes when you meet. You may shift directions entirely. You may experience emotions you never knew you could feel - extreme highs and lows.

2. Intertwining passions 

This is probably how you will meet. You both will love the same things. When you get together and work on those things, you will challenge and inspire each other to greater heights than ever before. You feel the need to team up and conquer something.

When we get together we pop off like Fourth of July - Hollyn

3. Complete Ease

There is no guilt, no nerves, no shame when you are around your soul mate. Despite what society, religion, culture, has to say, when you two are together, everything is perfect. No one has to understand you, but you.

• You will know what the other person is thinking or feeling intuitively.

4. Mutual Growth

Lastly, you both will grow together. You learn from each other's failures and when you are apart, you still grow and learn. You bring out the best in each other.

The hard part:

Sometimes, once the lesson is learned, the person will drift away, having completed their mission. You will never forget them.

Here's the part you need to understand.

This is not the same as a Life Partner.

Soulmates can be your Life Partner, but they don't have to be. It's only in recent times that we expect our spouses to be in tune to us. Think about it.

(Or read here.)

Your spouse is your Life Partner.

What is a Life Partner?

• Your relationship is based on being physically present and creating new memories.
• You both feel a sense of financial and emotional stability by being together.
• You resonate with each others beliefs, ideas or religion/philosophy.
• Your relationship is based on logical or intellectual decisions.
• You get along like best friends- your relationship does not suffer from extremes.
• You enjoy getting to know each other and learn about your differences and similarities- everything about each other feels new and exciting.
• You feel attracted to each other physically and resonate with each others values.

http://foreverconscious.com/the-difference-between-soulmates-and-life-partners

This distinction has helped me greatly and I hope it helps you, too.

Forgiveness

I've known a piece of the puzzle was missing for a while.

When these words were spoken, they hit me in the heart. They even left me with an action step.

"Just as we exercise and eat well for the health of our body, we practice forgiveness for the health of our soul."

Three things I have to say.

1. Forgiving yourself is the first step to loving yourself and having happiness.

Oh man. This one is tough. Not forgiving yourself is a surefire way to fall back into your old ways, your old hurts, your old habits. I've been dealing with a cycle of depression and pain, and while it is not clinically bad, at the heart of it is this inability to forgive myself for the hurt I caused myself and for the guilt. I chose to stay in a state of wallowing in heartache. I did not accept the truth. I chose to blame others for my feelings. That doesn't make any sense! And it doesn't solve any problems. The answer is Forgiveness.


2. Just as there are no levels of love, there are no levels of forgiveness. It's a sliding scale.

I have done research on the types of love. The problem all researchers get into is how to define and classify love. They break things down into 3-6 categories, then when two of them interact, they call that another form of love. It's all true and well and good, but just as the eyes can see variations in colors into the millions, so love feels and is different in variations outside of those combinations. There are more intense colors and more intense feelings of connectedness than can be classified.

3. You have to PRACTICE.



Love in a marriage is hard to maintain. You have to work at it. That's because it is beyond the emotional highs that got you there. The love changes. It becomes something more comfortable and less exciting. Forgiveness requires that you practice it to do it. It is beyond the emotional lows that got you there. Forgiveness is more than the quick "I'm sorry" that slips out when you break someone's prized vase. It requires that you choose to actively not remember, yet still learn from it. It requires that you not hold something over another. You let it go. Don't hold grudges.

That being said, I find it easier to forgive others than myself. It's easier when the hurt you feel is caused by some small infraction.


The same holds true for yourself.

Never are my students more mad than when they are mad at themselves. That disappointment shatters your world. The fact that you are less than you thought you were, when your self-esteem crumbles, it breaks you. But you have to forgive yourself. Sometimes that means talking to others that you were angry at. You might see the folly of your feelings.

So what's my action step?

Well, I need to stop blaming my feelings on a sweet, innocent person who has no idea that I am projecting my feelings onto them. See, I assume they would feel and react as I would if our roles were reversed. I admit that I would act terribly and feel some negative things. But without asking or talking to them, I'm left with speculation and assumption. That's foolish. People are all different. I might find it easier to forgive myself if I am absolved from my thoughts that this other person would react negatively to me.

Your action step is to Extend Forgiveness, not when you feel like it, or when you feel like they deserve it, or even wait until they ask for it. Extend it now!

Night to Shine

I've had a couple weeks of being down in the dumps. Many things conspire and unite to bring me down. It's a bad time of year. I find myself needing to work on the Spiritual leg of my wellness triangle in order to improve the emotional/mental leg. In order to support myself emotionally, I need my friends to help my soul find its center.

So, I reached out to a couple people for chit chat and I went to church, where I reconnect with my Spiritual center. I also volunteered at Night to Shine which was awesome. What a great way to forget about your troubles, help others, have fun, make new friends, and be awesome!

What I did:

Set up, with help, the sensory room. A Sensory room is a quiet(er) space with less light, noise, and lots of HUGE pillows and a few chairs or bouncy workout balls for people to get a break from the dancing and eating and push of people.

In my room there was a special guest: Hawkeye the therapy dog!

Immediately after this event Hawkeye was featured in the local paper.

My picture during Night to Shine is not in the photo album, so you can't see me. The album does not come close to depicting all the fun that was had. My tutoring student went and his mother asked if they were going to do it again next year. I said they want to. It was an amazing event!

Then it was my parent's 40th wedding anniversary. 40 years, people! The hubby and I decided that we needed to take them out to a fancy place for early dinner and it had to be some place new. We picked the Hibachi grill here in town, called Tokyo. It's kinda like this:



We prepped them, because they do not eat food like this, that they could order steak and chicken and it comes with one little shrimp. My father asked if he needed to bring his own fork. No, Dad, you don't have to eat with chopsticks.

My mother tried shrimp for the first time. It was seasoned with the sauce that they put on everything, but she tried it! I mean, she wouldn't even eat the soup made of chicken broth...

They didn't quite get the whole show, because we were seated to the side, and they refused to allow the man to fling zucchini into their mouths, but they got out of the house and had a little dinner and a show and they didn't hate it. That's a win. You need some wins in your 40 years of marriage, don't ya think??


Well, I must go now to do other things to keep my wellness triangle balanced.

Physical: I have been consistently hitting 5.25 miles on the elliptical. If I go for a walk with the dog we go about 2.25 and he makes me jog sometimes. I still can't jog or run for more than a sprint. It hurts my knees and shins. But I am working on it.

Emotional/Mental: I will work on maintaining connections to friends. I will try to lift them up when they need me so that perhaps they will lift me up when I need them.

I also have been writing more and felt the desire to write more. This is a good thing. I've been keeping up on learning about building my author platform. It's time to begin to flesh out the framework.

I'm taking care of my pets. Let's face it, petting the cat or dog is soothing. And with the weather (winter here) being so mild, I've been able to walk the dog and get some extra physical health in.

Spiritual: It is high time I started highlighting or underlining scriptures in my ne Bible, transferring them from my old Bible. It's a good way to refresh what I know. Plus, the new Bible has study helps so I can learn more.

New Year Reflection and Words on Budgeting

It's a few days into the new year, so I'm late in wishing everyone a Happy New Year. I usually do a resolutions post, and I have certainly been reviewing my goals and deciding what steps to take next in my life.

Most of the goals I had written for this year two years ago in my 5 year plan are still right on track. There are a couple surprises, though. Life is like that.

For example just yesterday my car broke, I was late to work, I'm fighting off an illness, and this freak storm took out one of our lamps and the screen door and a few more shingles off the roof.

Where was I? Oh, yes, goals.
I usually focus on all the areas of well-being when I make these kinds of plans. I like to be balanced. When things get off-balance, I am no longer healthy and happy.

The three parts to well-being are physical, emotional, and spiritual.

1. Physically, I always set some sort of health goal. 2016 was about health. All the goals I had about my body and those of my family were met. 2017 is going to be about exercise and staying healthy. While on break from work for the holidays it was easy to get a workout in. Now that I am back to work, I am fighting some days to get a workout. Things have happened that also have prevented me from doing one, like vehicular trouble so I don't get home until bedtime. This is an area where I have the tools and knowledge, I just need to use them.

2. Emotional/mental health for me is tied to social goals. Happiness is found in friendship, fun, and maintaining my hobbies. I have ideas for vacations or day trips written down as well as goals for writing, blogging, and editing.

3. Spiritual health for me comes from my religion. While I know my readers are diverse and I have diverse friends as far as spiritual matters are concerned, I do believe that no matter what you believe, time needs to be taken to contemplate life; to slow down and think. I really feel that these times of self-reflection are at the heart of great ideas, focus, and calming a raging storm, especially if you feel that storm is inside you.


Where do finances come into play? They certainly are stressful and affect all aspects of your life.

You have to find balance here, too. Making a budget and sticking to it increases your peace of mind. Not being stressed increases your physical health. Spiritually, you may decide to make a tithe or a donation to the charity of your choice.

Fixing things like broken lamps and faucets

(See the crack in the middle?)

certainly takes money and can set you back. This is why a budget is important. Pull up a spreadsheet and start typing categories, amounts, and dates into its little organized squares. Print a template and fill it in. Somehow take a look at your spending and income and figure it out. If you have a goal in mind, like a cruise (I wish), then figure it up and start saving towards it. Sure, pennies in a jar can work if you have plenty of them, but deciding on an amount to set aside every paycheck works faster.

If it seems money is disappearing faster than you can make it, a budget sheet will prove to you whether it really is or not. It may also help you make tough decisions.

In My Dreams This Week

I've had some really insane dreams lately.

The other night I dreamed that my car had broken down and I somehow had gotten a man to help and was riding with the driver in his pickup truck down a back road with plowed fields on either side.

The man was older, gray, balding, and heavy set. Not long after we set off, police cars raced past us. This is unusual in any rural area. Then I look out the window and there is a man running down the field with a big gun. He is wearing all black.

The truck dissipates and we are running from the man as the police run in. He shoots at the driver-man but the big ol' guy keeps running without a scratch. I hardly heard the shot, so I decide the shooter has a silencer on his gun. Somehow this is scarier.

We end up in a sort of diner/bar. The gunman comes in and tries to blend in at the bar. He's really good at evading police, I guess.

http://www.betterbeerblog.com/index.php/2009/04/04/the-session-26-smoke-em-if-you-got-em/

The police come searching. I point at the man behind his back. When the officer calmly, but abruptly, approaches him, the gunman whips out his weapon and shoots. People dive to the floor. He escapes, police in hot pursuit. They close in. 

He runs behind a barn and I am scrambling to see if they get him, but also to stay out of range of his fire. The old man is still running with me. He's got some endurance! I assume they got the bad guy because I woke up.

                            *             *               *              *
The following night I tossed and turned and remembered many dreams every time I rolled over. However, by morning, I only remember one long dream sequence. 

I was in my classroom, with all my students and my two aides. (For those who don't know I work in a special needs classroom in a middle school.) We seem to be coming back from a lunch break of some sort. Everyone is at their desks and there is an air of expectation. I'm supposed to DO something, but these boxes of items I haven't seen all year appear before me, on my desk, on the tables.

http://www.triblocal.com/wheaton/community/stories/2011/07/learning-resources-donates-more-than-250000-in-educational-tools-and-materials-to-joplin-missouri-schools/

Suddenly, I have to deal with them. I begin to sort one and my aide says something about going outside. "Yes, yes, go on outside," I agree. The class leaves, all but one. He hovers over my shoulder. "You are supposed to go with them!" Now I have to take him. I check the closest door, but they are not seen through the glass. I go to the next door around the corner. This next hallway transforms from my middle school to the high school I went to. They are all lined up waiting, one of my aides pushing the wheelchair and the other in line between students. "Well, push the light switch!" one of aides tells a student. He seems confused as to what light switch. I walk up and show him a switch that activates the door.(It wasn't a normal looking switch, it was yellow and round. This picture is close enough.)

http://www.uncommongoods.com/product/toggle-switch-plate

We exit the building. Instead of seeing the parking lot, we now see rows of one-story brick apartments. As we pass them, two boys of middle school age appear and begin to entice my students to get out of line and play among the saplings. I tell them not to.

http://dornob.com/concrete-cantilever-small-brick-home-second-story-box/

Then a white convertible appears, top down, to take us across the parking lot to the grassy area. (As if the wheelchair can get in there!!)

We ride to the yard and Senior class members appear and begin to set up carnival style games. There appears a baseball throwing game, a bowling game, and others.

One student sets up a table with popsicles on it. I go over to help him because the sun suddenly is too hot and the popsicles will melt. We move the table into the shade, but I suddenly realize I am topless. There is a huge crowd of people playing games now. My building principal stands tall in the crowd and I am grateful he doesn't see me. Where is my shirt!? I duck into a sort of wooden shed to look for something to clothe my top half with. I dig and dig in piles of stuff. I never seem to find anything, but the dream presses on.

Next, I am running out the back. I jump a low white picket fence and knock on the back door of a house.

A young couple are watching TV. I say, "I'm not gonna hurt you, but please can I call 911? I've been kidnapped!" Confused, they let me use their house phone (who has one of those anymore?!)

I must have called, because next I am waiting for the police while looking at their laptop. I find a YouTube video of myself speaking to Oprah on her show and I point. "See? I am famous. That's why I was kidnapped!" I am suddenly a black woman with a gorgeous head of fluffy hair.

Then I wake up.

I've never dreamed I changed race before. I've dreamed about school before, and being topless, and fleeing situations, even of gunmen as in the previous night's dream, but never have I changed races. That was very unique. Is it a sign of the times?

Dreams are all about emotions. What I felt more than what was going on is what is most significant. There was a sense of helplessness in each dream. I tried to interact, in many instances, with others in the dream. My role constantly changed as I felt new emotions. In both dreams, I woke up still looking for a hero, that moment when things were solved. I was close to an ending, but not quite.

I guess life feels like that a lot. We can't have a good ending because there is always something next on our agendas. We just hope that our schedules include good things.

Top 3 Goals for the Summer

Summer Break is basically a long stay-cation. While I do have two tutoring jobs and I am playing chauffeur for the oldest's summer police camp, the rest of my days are free to plan as I see fit. Speaking of fit, that brings me to some summer goals I have because while I may have 8 weeks until I go back to work, those 8 weeks will fly by! I want to have something to show for it.

Goal #1:  Physical Health - Exercise

I need to remember to keep exercising this summer. I have 8 weeks to new habits. What could you do with 8 weeks?

Some tips for adding healthful choices to your summer:

1. Get active! - Make a point to do something physical every day; a Hiit workout, a long walk, pull ups on the playground, a game of soccer with your kids. Do something every day to get your heart rate up.

2. Meal choices - Sometimes it is way too hot to cook! Make a point, however, to get plenty of vegetables, even on vacation.

3. Snack choices - If you decide to have a picnic, take a day trip, or even while on a traditional vacation, pack healthy snacks. I love granola bars, fresh fruit, and raw veggies. Raisins, trail mix, or some dry cereal (not the sugary kind), are good, too.

4. Drink choices - Drink lots of water. If you eat out, dine in, take a hike, or wake up, drink water. Not only does it fight heat exhaustion and do wonders for your health, it is cheaper than sodas in restaurants. I'm all about saving money!

Besides, American Ninja Warrior looks so fun!

Goal #2: Emotional Health - Planning

I already mentioned that I have lots of time to fill. There will be hot days with lots of down time. The month of July is pretty wide open as of this point. So, to avoid depression, doldrums, or lack of motivation, the key for me is to plan out projects, fun times, and things to look forward to all summer long.

One great project idea is to make things with the kids. I love looking up ideas for summer fun play, like these that include water bombs from sponges, pool noodle croquet,  making a fairy garden cheaply, giant bubbles, and sun ovens.

I also look for educational activities like teaching my kids to cook, exploring nature, photography and scrapbooking, arts and crafts, and science experiments (like this).While they are not looking forward to 'school with Mom', I would be remiss if I did not keep their brains engaged.

Planning is also the key to tackling the major house cleaning I need to do, like purging items for a yard sale, deep cleaning areas rarely touched, and re-organizing or re-purposing items for a fresh feel.

Meanwhile, I am keeping my classroom in the back of my mind, because I need to make huge changes in there for the fall.


Goal #3: Mental Health - Have fun!

Boy do I need to unwind! I like to have fun. I might dance, do some fun crafts, write the next greatest novel, or sit by my new fire bowl at night and watch the boys catch fireflies. I might read, or go for a picnic, or bike ride. I can unwind in a calm or active way. Sometimes exercise relieves stress better than a relaxing bath.

Whatever you need to do to clear your head, do it! I find that if I do a monotonous or repetitive task, like vacuuming, counted cross stitch, or am in a place where I can't get distracted from my thoughts, like the bathroom or the car without music, then I begin to muddle through life's issues and problem solve, or have creative ideas. (caffeine also works, but not recommended :D)

Make time to make memories!