Who are we to judge?

Hi All

Well I have been reasonably busy writing for my book. The response hasn't been great to my request for inspirational stories but you know I've found that my own experiences have a heck of a lot people who have inspired me. However trying not to concentrate only on myself I have a few contributions which will hopefully add some weight to this endeavour.

Anyway I have been doing some research and on Youtube there are videos from people all over the world on any subject you could think of.  As you all know I believe in the law of attraction, well youtube has millions of videos from people, celebrities etc.

My blog today is written because you cannot believe how judgmental people, or some people especially those who consider themselves Christians are. The comments that these Christians leave are shameful, they hide behind fake names and literally stand in judgement of other peoples' beliefs. Why do they think this? and Why do they think it's ok to do this?

For the 1st time I am ashamed to consider myself a Christian, I am continually learning and keeping my mind open to anything new. If I'd closed my mind off to ideas that are in conflict with the lessons in the Bible, I would not have learned many of the lessons that have brought me to where I am now. That would be terrible.

I have grown so much from the events in my life. Let's face it if I had believed ONLY in what the Bible tells us, my life would be pretty boring, because although I receive some of the messages I need at church, I can pick up any of my "New Age" books and receive a message often times even more powerful.

Does this make me judgemental or just concerned that we are allowed to be?

In love and light
Tracey

What is my purpose?

Hi All

I saw this quote and I started thinking, (my husband says I think too much). "You are here to enable the divine purpose of the universe to unfold. That is how important you are!" ~Eckhart Tolle

One problem, I do not know what my purpose is, yet.

I know I want to help people but how? I know I want to give back and I do, by helping out at church and working in a school.  I have said many times that I wish I had a passion, and if only that passion was linked to my life purpose everything would fall into place.

I have been through so much and a number of very successful people have overcome adversity of some kind and helped thousands of people if not millions. I am reading Jack Canfields Chicken Soup for the Soul and it's full of stories of real people who have inspired others to do, be and have everything they want. It''s an awesome book and well worth the time it takes to read it.

Oh by the way I learnt something recently about myself and it's this. I am not and have never been a failure. What I am is a quitter. When things get tough I quit. I have never stuck with anything long enough to even risk failing. Instead I give up and walk away, it's been easier for me to quit than to risk failing.

The only problem with quitting is you never see the end result. I get really annoyed when celebrity role-models are idolised for drug abuse and other addictions. I always wonder what lessons our children are learning from them. Why then have I allowed my children to witness that I cannot see a project through to the end?

It's the same old double-standard at work isn't it? So today I am quitting for the last time. I am quitting being a quitter. I am going to re-read all my books and listen to all my CD's and I am going to talk the talk and walk the walk of someone who succeeds at whatever she does. I am going to risk failure rather than be a parent who shows her children that when the going gets tough, it's okay to walk away.

Having said that though I must admit my beautiful children are so resilient and have never shied away from a challenge. I know that by breaking this bad habit, I can only be a better parent, and saying that maybe my life purpose is only to ensure these two amazing souls achieve all their dreams and goals. But hey I am not about to quit trying to find out if this my only purpose in life.

So watch this space...

In love and light
Tracey

Let's learn to respond instead of react.

Hi All

Saw this quote on Twitter today it come from Oprah I think as it was from her as no one else was credited with saying it so...

"It is not what happens to you but how you respond to what happens to you. " I am a big one for reacting, I'm loud, I scream, I shout and I have been known to completely over-react to a small thing. Often leaving the situation more embarrassed by my reaction than the initial incident.

Ever feel like that?

So the one thing I often meditate on is being able to control my temper, I have to consciously make a decision not to react to a situation. The few times that I have managed to control this instinctive reaction is to think about how I would feel if I was on the other side of my mouth, listening to what's being said.

When you react to a situation it's often an immediate and personal response to the person and not the situation. Learning to respond rather than react is learning how to approach the situation from an objective perspective rather than a personal one.

Once you have had a chance to think about what is being said/ done and why it's being said and done in this manner, you can clearly formulate a response that will not leave you totally an utterly ashamed of yourself.

So if only for the sake of saving yourself loads of embarrassment (as it is for me), it's also actually very rewarding to come up with a reasonable response especially when you think the other person is being totally unreasonable.

Hey just a thought - use it, don't use it. At the end of the day it's about consciously controlling your voice in conjuction with the mind. Rather than your voice in conjuction with your foot.

In love and light
Tracey

Just one day at a time

It's 3.50 am on the 5th of May 2012, on this day 10 years ago Rob and I lost our son. We don't know why. It has been 10 years and every day we take it one day at a time. We have been blessed with 2 more children, but every mother will tell you that each one is loved with all her heart. So even though our lives are full and rewarding, there is always something missing.

When it happened, I did not want to carry on, I could very easily have joined him. However eventually the pain of a broken heart goes away and you get up out of bed, have a bath, have a cry, get dressed and start facing the world. A world that is forever changed because there is such a fundamental part of your being missing.

One day you wake up and it seems that the pain is as fresh as it was on the very day we lost him, yet it's a year later and you have survived. Hey, and life has gone on.

Then one day you wake up and it's 10 years and the pain is fresh and the tears still flow. I know that Jonathan David is experiencing a new journey, he has visited me on occasion and I have had signs that he is with my granny.

I also know that he is waiting for me and I'll tell you why.

Soon after we lost him, I had fallen asleep on the couch in our house in Kensington, I awoke to find him next to me, he was laughing and playing a game of hide and seek, my boy went behind the curtains (I remember they were green with thin yellow and red stripes). Before I could go and find him I regained full consciousness and there he is waiting behind the curtain for me to find him. You see where he is, there is no sense of time as we experience it here. so he will wait a moment for me to find him, but I unfortunately have to wait the rest of my physical life. I have always said that I imagine the transition from this life to the next as being met at the arrivals hall of an international airport, but my transition will begin with a laugh and a smile as I pull the curtain away and grab my child and hold him so close to my heart and in that instant all the pain and all the tears that have shed and will continue to shed for the rest of my life will be forgotten and I will finally be at peace.

AND THAT DEAR FRIENDS IS WHAT I'D CALL HEAVEN.

In love and light.
Tracey

The way I want to be

Lau Tzu "The way to do is to be."

I saw this quote on Twitter today and it made me think about my life and how I've lived it. The first thought that comes to mind is that I am not passionate about anything and therefore have no true goal. The honest truth is that I have spent my whole life hiding away, being a large person you'd think it's hard to hide but believe me it's easier than you think.

Most people are so hung up on themselves that they fail to notice how they affect anyone else. It's also true to say that the most defining moments of my life have been forged by pain. I could list some of the most pertinent events, but you all know those, because they were the most visible. There are several events that I have failed to share with anyone because they just hurt so much and account for so much of how I've lived my life.

However, I have always tried to be fair and just, I have always tried to think of others before myself and I have always tried to love the way I believe I should be loved.

And that dear friends is what is wrong with my life. So I will no longer try to be fair and just. I AM fair and just. I will no longer try to think of others. I DO think of others, and I have always tried to love, well I DO love deeply and will No Longer think of the pain but of the lessons I have learnt.

Thinking about it now, "tried" is a cop out, you either are or you aren't, does this make me a failure. NO if anything it has opened my eyes to being honest if not with anyone else then with myself. After all I have to live with myself. I have to look at myself in the mirror and when all is said and done I am the only when who has to live with me.

I love my children and am grateful everyday for them. I love my husband and am grateful for his love and support. I have often wondered what he fell in love with, and now I hope I know, and can accept that all the things I've tried to be, he knows I really am.

So to heck with trying and let's raise a toast to DOING.

In love and light
Tracey

100 Years and Counting

Gosh, I can't tell you how many times I have started writing and then decided that what I had to say sounded rubbish (even to me), anyway living down here in the South of England we have been bombarded by the centenary of the sinking of the Titanic and more importantly her launch from Southampton, and taking a drive to Southampton yesterday with the kids and parking at the now obsolete Maritime museum (as they have moved the exhibition to another site for the centenary). We noticed a huge passenger liner and it looks like a block of flats on the water enormous and awe inspiring but not pretty not at all, but big is what we have come to expect, big and luxurious and isn't that the true legacy of the Titanic.

Kieran asked me the other day why, why was there all this hullabaloo over a boat that sank 100 years ago and the I told him the usual stories, the orchestra playing all the while, the acts of bravery by the stewards and staff, the thousands of passengers found frozen in the icy water. As I related these facts to him I had tears running down my face and as I told him about the orchestra, so did he.

It was amazing to me that my 8 year old son had so much empathy that he cried at possibly the most heroic and legendary of Titanic stories.
On the news people were being interviewed, mostly those with a family connection and since most of the staff were local to Southampton, so many lives were affected by the loss. He asked if we knew anyone and well not personally but my dad's sister Mavis was married to a wonderful man affectionately known as Ginger, aka Felix Fagan and his father  apparently was on the Titanic and thanks to being a 1st Class passenger survived.

I have however been thinking and I think there is a song lyric "History repeats itself trying to succeed", and really the only way we can stop these tragedies from happening is to keep them fresh in our minds, it's also why we need to have 18 hours a day on the TV of the atrocities of Nazi Germany and Hitler. The world can never be allowed to forget these past events, because if we do, we allow them to happen again and again. What would the world have been like had Nazi Germany prevailed? Well I probably would not be here.

Anyone with a hint of Jewish blood or a black, brown or yellow skin, would be non-existent, put into death camps and killed or worse - survive. Yet here again my mind is puzzled because are we not programmed to survive? I have studied amazing stories of survivors of the death camps and the power of the mind is so undisputed that some where able to withstand enormous amounts of pain and suffering by simply shutting down their brains, mentally removing themselves from the physical world and overcoming the physical pain of the body, this is something I think I will write about later.

So a toast to all those souls whose voyage to The New World landed them at the Pearly Gates.

In love and light
Tracey

Day 14 Month 9

I must admit that not working is taking it's toll on me. I don't know where I am from minute to minute, I have spent the last year rushing around from home to work (which I loved very much as you all know) and then rushing home, getting kids, rushing off to take kids to ballet, tap, rainbows, and beavers, all being home in time for other things like guitar lessons etc.
Now I just feel like I'm floating in limbo, I walk Kieran to school (loving it) and then walking back home and driving Cheyenne to school, (because she doesn't like walking and I can't have her getting to school with both of us totally stressed out)! BUT what am I doing the rest of the time? Let's see cleaning toilets, washing (lots of bloody washing!) and ironing. Putting out bins and vacuuming the carpets, making the beds doing the dishes etc etc and so forth.

Let me just recap I used to do all this before I lost my job but now it's kind of like I am losing myself in housework and to top it all off I haven't been sleeping and 200 people were made redundant yesterday at Rob's place of work (thank God his job is safe) and because I am not rushing all over the place my sense of timing is absolute shite, I waited 15 minutes in the car park for Cheyenne because I just didn't have anything better todo. And this paragraph is an example of how mushy my mind is.

One thing's for certain all the time in the world doesn't make you happy if you can't go out and enjoy a steaming hot latte at the local Cafe Nero or Costa coffee.

In love and light