Ruffling Feathers

We often hear that we are “ruffling someone’s feathers” when we organize change.

What we don’t realize is that we “ruffle our own feathers” when we try to change something in our own life.

We create resistance to our own desire for change.

Until we can listen to what our old behavior is telling us, we will not know how to change it.

Once we substitute language for the life we desire, we can begin to look for results.

The result will be a feeling that change is possible.

Once we realize that it depends on us, and not on outside factors, we can become an effective advocate for ourselves.

That old habit is not doing us any good.

It is keeping us in a place we wish to improve upon.

The new language we use to describe ourselves can lift us out of our old place.

The new habit of accepting an improved view, brings us into that view.

While the new language is becoming a habit, we may find ourselves slipping back and forth between our old results and some new results.

The happiness we are feeling because of the new results motivates us to continue replacing our old language with our new language.

This becomes so habitual that we start spending more time doing what we love in a place we have defined for ourselves.

Then the old “ruffled feathers” no longer concern us.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.lovedcherishedadored.blogspot.com 

Living With Gentleness and Certainty

It is possible to live gently on the earth.

We can become good stewards of the earth’s resources in many little ways within our own households.

We can encourage and join community efforts to be inclusive and to recycle.

The certainty of taking these small good steps will lead to larger ones.

As we all become more conscious of our duty and self-interest to be more caring for the earth, we will join together in more sound practices.

Although at this point, it seems impossible to predict how much good can be done, it is still important to start improving our habits.

On a grand scale, it will raise consciousness and allow us to live more harmoniously.

We will discover that we have much in common with the rest of the world.

We will seek out and find practical ways of expanding our good practices.

We can join with other communities and make sure that no one is neglected or left out.

One of our most precious resources is the presence of all the people around us.

Until we provide certain resources to include them, we will never know how much they have to offer and what they are willing to learn.

The gentleness of inclusion takes away harsh conditions of isolation and uplifts the attitude of everyone.

As we take our own steps, we can begin to look at other opportunities to be more inclusive.

We can face the awkwardness and discomfort and continue to take tiny steps in the directions which open up for us. 

Our gentle approach will help approach situations which have not been addressed so that permanent solutions can be found.

There are certainly ways to do this, and they can be discovered and implemented.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.pebblesofpeace.blogspot.com 

Active Care

Spiritual self-government activates the spiritual law of care.

By living according to the law of unselfishness and generosity, we will receive what we need.

We give from the flow of abundance into our lives.

Our first gift starts the flow.

As more ideas come to us and we carry them out, the flow continues.

Giving ourselves the care of organic food circulates health throughout  our bodies.

We are able to work strongly and alertly.

Giving ourselves fulfilling and meaningful work puts satisfaction into our lives.

Living with courtesy creates considerate relationships at home and in public settings.

Seeing the best in people, even if they are in reduced circumstances, uplifts our attitude toward them.

Beautifying the yard with one perennial plant at a time fills up the landscape permanently with flowers and even perennial vegetables.

This reduces water usage and stops adding to the pollution of lawn mowing.

Our attitude and our practices expand our self-care into our communities.

We are able to reach out from our foundation of practice and demonstrate our results.

Community wide care will steward local resources and utilize and develop the skills which can best serve the community.

A harmonious community results from protection from chemicals, a pure food and water source, and valuing the people who live there.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.pebblesofpeace.blogspot.com

Try Forgiveness

You can restore your balance through forgiveness.

Starting with yourself, look at the influences you were dealing with and forgive yourself.

As you take off the pressure from yourself reacting to those circumstances, you allow a little more light into you life.

With the light, send a message of love to yourself.

You can shift the balance of painful reaction when you start sending a difference message to yourself.

Every time you feel pain, restore your balance with forgiveness, and then send in a message of light.

On the beam of light, you can add patience.

On another beam of light, you can add understanding.

On a third beam of light, you can add acknowledgement.

On one of the beams of light, you can add more love.

Along with forgiveness, the most radical thing you can do is to love yourself.

Keep sending the messages you want on each beam of light you shine into your circumstances.

You will shift the balance in your life.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.inspiredpractices.blogspot.com 

Moving Out From Tunnel Vision

I found myself irritated at a conversation I heard while I was working on a project.

Increasingly, I also found myself reacting to the fluorescent lighting.

As I took steps to mitigate the lighting by putting on a hat I wear for protection from the sun, I found that I could no longer concentrate on my project.

I moved into a room with natural lighting and sat down to calm down.

A friend joined me to converse and to ease the situation.

Not until I got home and talked with my husband did I realize that I had been in the middle of a full-blown panic attack.

I realized that the irritating conversation I heard was a trigger for a feeling of extreme frustration from the past.

Since it was not directed at me, I had not caught it.

I am grateful to realize another example so that I can redirect myself.

I am grateful for the friend who helped me calm down with supportive conversation.

I will now be more aware when a combination of factors causes me to react with irritation and sensitivity.

I will act as quickly as I can to restore myself to my new standard of safety and harmony.

Fortunately, I am farther and farther away from the past causes of my symptoms.

 I have  acquired effective tools and techniques to deal with such situations.

I am around forgiving and understanding people, and I will ask for their patience once again.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.lovedcherishedadored.blogspot.com 

Fulfilling My Promise

I am grateful to fulfill my promise to myself.

Everyone I know is grateful to fulfill a promise to themselves.

Everyone I don’t even know, all over the planet, is grateful to fulfill a promise to themselves.

——————

When I moved into my present location, my goal was to establish a tiny food forest in the yard.

The beginning of the first year, in the winter, I laid down cardboard with straw and soil over it to establish a couple of raised beds.

That same year in the spring, my husband bought in a couple of loads of mushroom compost and we unloaded it to make a couple more raised beds.

I grew tomatoes and peppers and flowers.

They did very well.  I was so surprised and happy.

The second year, I brought in a garden soil mix and made more raised beds with compost, covered by egg crates and straw.

I also planted almost two dozen grapevines and berry bushes in the late fall.

Most of them survived the winter and began bearing tiny fruits.

In the spring, I planted a fig, elderberries, and a large tansy plant, in addition to tomatoes, peppers, celery, and onions and potatoes.

In this late summer, I am planting herbs and flowering shrubs.

In the fall, I will add fruit trees.

I am researching perennial vegetables.

Each step fills up my garden a little bit more.

I can see it filling in with color and edibles.

Even though this is a long-term project, I can see the fulfillment of my promise to myself.

I am learning a little more with each step, and I am so satisfied to see this tiny food forest taking shape.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.takethreedeepbreaths.blogspot.com 

The Peace of Meditation

Last night, I slept well and truly very soundly.

Previous nights have found me wakeful.

I have learned to use the wakeful times for meditation.

I used to keep checking the clock and worrying about how much sleep I was losing.

Now, I simply consider what idea to meditate on and just keep doing it, however long it takes, until I am done.

I do not check the clock or worry about my sleep.

I wake up at an appropriate time the next day to do whatever I need to do.

I may catch a nap later in the day or go to bed a couple of hours earlier.

I am really enjoying the ideas which come to me for meditation.

One time it was to infuse the neighborhood with love.

Every time I thought about the neighborhood, I just infused more love into it.

I was very satisfied when I awoke the next morning.

Sometimes, I meditate on an idea from my inspirational study.

It may be a quote from a book of daily readings.

It may be a phrase, or a word.

I continue to think about it, and to let it take me deeper into meditation.

I have discovered that I am okay with the amount of sleep that I get, a lot or a little.

I am glad that I can contribute to my own peace and reassure myself about whatever else comes to mind through my periods of meditation whoever they occur.

© 2018 Kathryn Hardage

www.pebblesofpeace.blogspot.com