Lesson 91: Forgiveness

Forgiveness. It seems like I've been surrounded by it a lot lately. Why is it that we're so terrified of making mistakes, even when we'll be forgiven? I'm still in the process of learning that "the hardest part is forgiving yourself."

I sit back and think about someone who hurt me recently, and all I can think about is how he needs to forgive himself. I know he took it hard. He knows that he hurt me, and I know he didn't mean to. I still care about him a lot. I've forgiven him. I want him to forgive himself. In the process of all this, I realized that I was angrier at myself than I was at him. I hated my judgment and the way that I allowed myself to be vulnerable.

I guess that this means I'm harder on myself than I am on him. So, my initial assessment remains true: Sometimes the hardest part is forgiving yourself.

Lesson 90: Heart

I've been reflecting these past couple of days about heart, so although these thoughts came early this morning, I guess I'm cheating at my blog again.

People try to do the best they can. They try not to hurt others. But people make mistakes. They disappoint even the people they love and care about, but those disappointments are forgivable if the intentions in their heart are still good. As long as people don't purposely intend to make mistakes, things will be all right in the end.

Lesson 89: Trust

Today while playing with my 3-year old niece, I learned an important lesson in trust.

As an adult, I've never been one to trust people easily. I'm skeptical of people's intentions, and I find it hard to let go of suspicions and just believe them and what they're saying. Granted, this is probably due to the fact that I've had more life experiences and therefore more reasons not to trust people than a 3-year old would, but I was just amazed by how much this little one trusted me. We were playing a game that she appropriately called "fallin'" (she doesn't pronounce "-ing" so well) where she would just fall backwards and I would catch her. She eventually changed the rhythm of the game when she started to fall forward, and I never saw an ounce of fear in her eyes because she believed that much that I would catch her. She would instead just lean backwards (or forward) and laugh as I pretended to drop her but caught her at the last minute.

I'm wondering what it would take to be able to trust like that again. Even in my illogical mind, I can't reconcile trusting everyone all the time, but I would like to know how to trust the people who care about me. Maybe this fallin' business makes more sense than I realize. Maybe you just have to be willing to let go and believe that someone who cares enough will catch you.

Lesson 88: Imagine

According to my 5-year old nephew's knowledge, if you sneeze three times in a row, you'll wake up the giants and the only way to stop them is to burn their house down...but if you really want to escape from them, you have to steal all of their weapons first.

Today while I was playing with my nephew at the local playground, this is the story that he told me. Not only did I learn about what ruffles giants' feathers, I also learned that adults need to be able to imagine as well as kids do. It's not to say that I now believe that there are giants living at the playground or that they'll come after me if I sneeze three times.

I do believe, however, that if adults were willing to let go of the things that keep us from viewing the world through the hopeful eyes of a child, this world would be a lot less tense. Why is it that adults can't solve problems of world hunger, war and greed but a 5-year old can slay dragons and hunt giants? Granted, one is a reality and the other is not, but it seems like something goes away once we hit those rough spots in life. We become more skeptical, and we lose sight of what really matters as we're blinded by fame, and fortune. We stop asking "what if." We stop seeing possibilities in exchange for momentary instant gratification. Value becomes monetary and ceases being intangible.

I guess today was a lesson in humbling myself and just allowing my imagination to run free. Hopefully in the future, I'll get a lesson on where it will take me.

Lesson 87: Fix You

All relationships go through ups and downs. It doesn't matter how good they are. There will be challenges, and the survival of those relationships depends on the people involved.

I recently got hurt by a friend. The pain and the feelings that came with it were inevitable. Being miserable was optional. Today I learned that when it comes to a relationship between two people, outside factors don't matter nearly as  much as what's inside. When the ups come around, you celebrate them together. When the downs come around, you choose whether or not they are fixable and you choose whether or not you want to fix them. Today, against the advice of others, I chose to fix a friendship. There was more value in that then in keeping my pride or holding a grudge. I believe that I made the right decision, but if course, only time will tell. It will just be a matter of letting this journey run its course and making the decisions that feel right when there are forks in the road.

Lesson 86: Family Style

I read in the newspaper (I'm tellin' ya...it's full of new things to learn) that the Tri-Cities is one of the best places in the United States to raise a family. The study, conducted by www.kiplinger.com cited the area's economic growth, science and technology sector, low cost of living and access to parks and outdoor recreation.

I can see what they're saying. Nothing says family fun like Hanford, PNNL, sheep and the Columbia River.

Lesson 85: Pitney Bowes

Office equipment and I have never had a very good relationship, but today I learned how to operate the Pitney Bowes mailing scale at work, and I felt really accomplished. :-)

But even more importantly, I realized that I don't show enough appreciation for our administrative staff that keeps the gears turning in our office.I don't think I ever realized how much they do for us and for me until I actually started having to do some of these things myself. So hats off to all those men and women who do all those little jobs that are necessary but too often go unnoticed. Thanks for all that you do!