I just received an email from my daughter's school district. It turns out there that has been one or two cases of the "swine" flu in the district. Of course, upon reading this message the first feeling that kicked in for me was fear. I started to wonder if it was safe for my daughter to attend school tomorrow or take her to her gymnastics class this coming Tuesday. I got a bit freaked out and my world became about what I would do if something happened to her. Sure, this is a normal human reaction for any parent. Then I began to think about a lesson I learned about a year ago. A lecturer wrote two words on a board:
Illness and
Wellness
So the first thing she did was take off the "ness". What do you get? Ill and Well...and then she decided to take off the double ll's and what do you get? I and We. It seems, by this statement, when we are focused on the "I" part of our lives it could mean that we bring more illness to ourselves. I also noticed how when I read that email from the school district it became about ME and how would I handle it? I quickly recognized that and when I turned to the "WE" I was able to take a deep breath, pray for all those who have been infected and pray that the spreading of the disease pasts quickly. When I shifted from a place of fear and being in "I" mode and went into the "WE" mode, the fear dissipated and I was more at ease. My own fear made it all about "me" in that moment and not about anyone else.
Don't mistake ME moments as wrong or shameful. I think we all need our ME moments and let's be loud and proud about them. However, when the ME moment is driven by fear, I think that something else is going on besides acknowledging ourselves and what we've accomplished. The fear in us leads us to illness and vice versa and back again. Here are a few other thoughts on how illness and fear can go hand in hand.
Illness and fear can both lay you flat and create you to stop in your tracks and live your life. If you become ill, of course you aren't able to function at the level that you are used to. And if you live in fear, you are so worried and stressed about life in general it brings on illness.
A good example of this happened to me on Friday night. I was going to treat myself to a movie and then I started thinking things like "what if someone in the theatre coughs or sneezes while I'm in there?" "What if the guy serving my popcorn and giving me my soda has been infected"? It caused enough concern in me that I ended up staying home.
Don't get me wrong I think that caution, especially in this day and age is mandatory and we need to be cognizant of our surroundings and the people around us. However, I don't believe that we should fear going outside because we might become ill or bring the bug home to our families.
When fear takes over, we worry more and have less joy in our lives. We worry if we are going to get laid off, if we'll be in an accident, if our kids and family are ok. We worry about our spouse or or partner or lover being unfaithful. The list can go on and on. I grew up with alot of worry and in the last few years, especially the last few months have learned to let go of the worry and focus more on joy and living every day present and aware.
An author by the name of Mike Dooley has a website (www.tut.com) and has written a few books. His basis of his books is that Thoughts Become Things. If this in case is the truth, which I believe it is, and we are in a constant state of worry and fear, what do you think will become of our situations in life? What we worried about will come to fruition which will bring us more grief, fear and worry. It's a vicious cycle.
Now, just imagine if your thought was something like "I know that there is sickness out in the world, but I know that I am happy and healthy and will continue to live that way". Sure, we've all done our share of affirmations and I think that affirmations are an excellent tool because eventually if you hear a statement enough times, for better or for worse it does become your reality. It is time for us to all to be present and aware of what our thoughts are at any given time a day. This week, I'm going to keep a thought journal and write down as many thoughts as I can remember as they happen. This seems like a daunting task, but often I have the same thought over and over so it shouldn't be that hard and my thought about this is that it will be fun and interesting to see how they affect my day.
I would like to invite you to do the same and see if anything surprises you. Go ahead make a list of your thoughts and outcomes during the week and see if they correlate in any way. I would love for you to share your results with me and I promise to share mine with you as well.
Here is to your week having many thoughts of abundance, beauty, peace and lots and lots of lots of joy!
Mary
