Gifts from Childhood

Our Life Mapping Activity this week involves remembering “a few of your favorite things” from Childhood.  Make your list. What are 10 or so people, places, activities or things you loved as a child? Then ask yourself, why? What qualities did these favorite things bring into your life; what were their gifts to you, both Then and even Now as you reflect upon them?

For example, here are some of my Favorite Things from childhood, listed below, along with some of their gifts that have enhanced my consciousness and continue to be a part of my awareness or interest ever since:

Gifts Gained from “A Few of My Favorite Things” of Childhood:

Friendships/ BF Karin     pure engagement, companionship, sharing, freedom, humor

Pets    unconditional love and joy, playfulness, comfort

Trips   exploration, beauty, freedom, sharing

Family   togetherness, mutual support, caring

Creative play   imagination, fun, sharing, freedom

Places: woods, horse farms, trees, secret forts   excitement, love of nature

Bicycling    adventure, freedom, creativity, openness, self-reliance

Reading    discovery, other worlds, voices, insights, expansion of ideas

Plays    creativity, expression, discovery, exploring archetypes (roles)

School   education, teachers, development of ideas, learning

Violin   beauty, form, love of music, orchestra, practice

There is a law of spiritual economy that says, “Nothing is ever wasted.” Nothing, not even a smile or a hug, is ever really forgotten, so it is there for us long after it was shared, when we really need it!

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THANK YOU ALL FOR READING AND FOLLOWING!! I am not so adept at navigating WordPress and Twitter to be able to thank you each sufficiently and individually, but it warms my heart to know that you are visiting and reading when you wish to!

I invite you especially to read to tomorrow’s post, “Trust in Your Own Childlike Nature”, which I hope might be helpful for you as you aim to include your own Inner Child archetype more in your conscious world! To prepare, I invite you to contemplate this phrase: the “Alchemy of Childhood”.

Together, We Are Love…Early Childhood Memories

Thursdays are Guest Blog days at Better Endings. On our weekly topic of Childhood Memories, I found a Daily Prompt set of posts from December 2012 all about peoples’ “Earliest Childhood Memories”. Reading through them I realized that the vast majority of early childhood memories, like the one I posted from my own life on Tuesday here, are about Best Friends or Best Pet Companions. Mandi’s comment Tuesday reinforces that (reposted as #1 below). And so I re-blog three “Early Childhood” memories.

(1) Comment from Mandi of Caged No More (on betterendingsnow.com, Jan. 27,2014):

I love your story of true friendship! It sparks many memories from days long ago, when Renee, my bff, and I met in 5th grade homeroom. I will never forget the first thing she said to me! “Do you want to arm wrestle?” I could not have found anyone more different than me to connect with, but we absolutely clicked! My best friend and I are still going strong, 18 years later! Wow…that seems like forever to me. There is no one else in my life outside my blood relatives that I have known for such a long time! I think its wonderful that we have these precious childhood memories of our dearest friends to reminisce upon in our lives today.

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(2) Re-blogged from Vandysnape (Daily Prompt on “Earliest Childhood Memory”, Dec. 9, 2012)

Thanks to The Daily Prompt‘s new blog post idea, I get to write about my earliest childhood memory.

Before I begin with my earliest memory, there is a bit of a family history that you should probably know. When I pose the same question to my sister about her earliest memory she’d tell me some stories about things that happened when she was just 6 months old. I think that’s an elaborate cock and bull story that she always pulls off on me. My father’s told me that his Uncle could remember things that happened when he was in his Mother’s womb. Well,…Let’s just say that I’m reserving my judgment on that. So, in a family with such ‘history’ of good memory I seem to lack that skill very much. See that little baby in the left side of blog’s banner [picture not uploaded-LW]? That’s me but I have no memory of that phase of my life.

My earliest childhood memory is in my kindergarten classroom. In the first few months of school I felt very homesick but was fortunate enough to have a sweet classteacher Mrs Ramathilakam who put with a whole class of cry babies. I was also quite lucky to have a kind girl for a classmate. I remember her face vividly. She was a very fair and chubby girl with a coconut tree hairstyle much like mine and she brought the coolest set of goggles to school everyday.

Every time I cried, she would put on the goggles and give me a big smile. Then, I would stop crying. If she put down the goggles, I would cry. This went on for sometime but never once did she stop being cheerful. I don’t remember how we both talked to each other. She spoke Malayalam and I spoke Tamil and neither of us knew much English to have a lively conversation. Yet, we both laughed and smiled at each other. She was also the first person to teach me a Malayalam word “Vellam”(Water). I don’t remember much of my kindergarten though. I think she left the school in UKG. It is all very vague right now. I try hard to recollect her name but I guess it has just left the realms of my memory.

Yeah.. Vague it may be but thinking about all those good memories brings some warmth to the heart and I hope the girl grew up to be a kind person as she was the day I met her. So, what’s your earliest childhood memory ?

About vandysnape Hi ! Welcome to my blog… I’m Vandhana. what about me? I’m a huge Beatles and Ilayaraja fan. As my friends say I’m always 15 – 30 years behind in music .. I love reading books ..Well,actually Harry Potter introduced me into reading ..So , I’m trying to catch up with as many novels as I can.. But non-fiction is a strict no-no for me 🙂 🙂 My blog is a reflection of a few strands of my thoughts.. Very random.. I don’t stick to a particular genre. But Hope you find it interesting 🙂

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(3) Re-blogged from keiththegreen on Daily Prompt (“Earliest Childhood Memory”, Dec. 9, 2012)

Childhood Revisited:

My first memory was my mom catching me sharing cookies with our dog. Truth betold it happened often enough, that it probably imprinted itself on my mind. Saturday mornings my parents would take me along, and do the rounds of Woodwards Department store, the buthcher and bakery. Upon getting home, Sargent our German Shepard would happily greet us with tail a wagging. While lunch was made, and dad did some of the outside chores, I would play with Sargent, who was my best buddy back then. Wherever I went, he was beside me, the faithful sidekick. After lunch I would take my Thimbul coookies, homemade by mom, and either eat them in the back yard, or some quiet spot in the house. Sargent of course was beside me, and what little super hero would deny his partner in keeping his world safe, a just share in the rewards. So it was a regular occurence, of my getting caught with my hands on the cookies, in the act of handing one to Sargent.

keiththegreen

The ‘Innocent’ of Childhood

The Innocent. As a character type—what Jung or Hillman call an Archetype—the Innocent is most often a child. Since we have all experienced, to a greater or lesser extent, the innocence of being a child, then we each carry this Archetype of the Innocent Child within us.

In Life Mapping I coach people to identify and name their Life Chapters leading up to the Present.  Almost always, people name their earliest Life Chapter as something on the order of “Innocence”: a time of relative calm and joy preceding the Storms of life.

By a random review of a set of 9 Life Maps, 7 of their first Life Chapter titles reflect an innocence theme: “Innocence”(2); “Childhood & Youth” (2); “”Well Loved/ Happy”; “Pure Joy”; and “Oblivion”. The other two, I should note, refer to situations involving childhood trauma or abuse.

What was your earliest Life Chapter? To identify it, first think about your earliest major, pivotal life event, before and after which you feel that you were “not the same person”. Then think about the time of your life BEFORE that, between your birth and that first major turning point. As the author of your own Life Story, what title would you use to describe your early childhood?

If your first Life Chapter was not so bright and Innocent, how did that eventually get resolved, if it has been? Is there an Innocent you that was suppressed then?

If your early childhood was a time of relative Innocence (or if you can identify within yourself that archetype-Child who was suppressed), can you feel that Child archetype within you Now? What is she or he like? What does s/he–that part of you–love? How do you like to play, as your Innocent Child? Who is/was your BFF?

How can you best listen to, hear, and nurture your Innocent Child archetype today? Let him or her be a part of your conscious persona, because s/he is there regardless.

To be in better contact with your Innocent Child part-of-self, you might try DOING something you enjoyed most as that Child. Climb a tree? Go to a petting zoo? Sing a lullaby that your Mom or Grandmother once sang to you?

You can even write a dialogue in your journal—or have an active imagination encounter—between your Adult self today and your Innocent Child within you. I invite you to open your Heart to this inner part of yourself. You might be amazed—and even amused—by all s/he can show you!

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I invite you–as Innocent Child or adult!–to share your insights or story.

And always, Better Endings to You!

Friends, For Ever!

In Pennsylvania, between 2nd grade and 7th, my very best friend was Karin Moody. We learned and played violin together, played outside as being horses, cowboys & Indians, WWII Germans & Americans, Barbie & Ken. We would use ‘golden books’ as walls to build a mansion for our Ken and Barbie dolls on top of and beneath our family’s ping-pong table, then we would play-fantasy in that space for weeks. I was Ken: a secret agent like Napoleon Solo, a millionaire horse rancher, world adventurer, astronaut, teacher, or soldier. Barbie and Ken were best buds. We had plastic horses to ride, and ceramic dogs and cats that turned out to look just like several pet friends I have had in my life later on.

Living in Pennsylvania, we didn’t only have to imagine. There were horse farms all around that we would ride our bikes to. Two ranchers let us kids from the neighborhood clean out stalls, pitch hay, and brush & water the horses. In return we could ride–often bareback–especially the young colts that needed us ‘wee’ riders to break them in for riding.

And there were WOODS–amazing woods, deep woods, with huge boulders, trails and creeks winding through them. In summers we kids nearly lived in those woods. We would pack bag lunches and hike off to our favorite boulders by the creek, clambering on top to have our picnic, then play. We played Star Trek and all sorts of adventure roles. We knew the trees, the plants, how and where to ford the raging creek. We discovered our freedom there, and created a space for childhood solace. Pennsylvania–Penn’s Woods–was a great place to be a kid.

Karin moved to Florida while we were in 6th grade. After 7th grade, I moved with my family to near Niagara Falls. I saved babysitting money all year in 8th grade so I could visit Karin in Ft. Lauderdale, the summer that Neil Armstrong walked on the Moon! Karin visited me once in Niagara Falls, too, but after that, we lost contact and drifted into late teen years and after.

I remember Karin–and her wonderfully supportive, also adventuresome mother, Doris–AS my Childhood. Our friendship was a time for play, a space for dreaming, with limitless hope and imagining. We experienced and envisioned so much together: took trains to downtown movies or to go to the Philadelphia Philharmonic together, just us. We learned to be responsible travelers that way, and stoked our love of freedom and adventure that has never left me, ever since.

No matter what else might have been happening around us while we were ‘growing up’, Karin and I had each other to rely on. I’ll never forget being in my family’s kitchen on the phone with Karin when she had to tell me her father had committed suicide that day; he turned on the exhaust in the garage. He had lost his job and couldn’t bear to tell his wife, Karin’s mom. But we endured. Then a neighbor woman, next door to my family, also committed suicide, with a rifle her son had taught her how to use. Obviously, the adult world was fraught with tensions and hardship. But, at that time, as long as we had our friendship–and, for me, my sisters and brother; Karin herself was an only child–life would go on with relative surety into a future when we would eventually need to become adults, ourselves. But we would hold onto our childhood awareness, creativity, appreciation of Nature and animals and friendship itself, always.

Even now at 59, when I come home from work to contemplate or to walk my dog and be with my cats, and write, I am “Little Linda” still; Karin’s–and since then, also some other buddies’–Friend.

A Few of Your Favorite Things

This week I’m inviting EVERYONE to “lighten up” a bit with Better Endings. Our topic is CHILDHOOD MEMORIES.  Let’s use this week for us to review and recover some of the happier moments of childhood. That’s not to say that children’s lives are always happy, of course. But “to look through the eyes of a child” is to discover …well… IS TO DISCOVER!!

I’m going to jump-start this week by posting what is normally a Tuesday’s writers’ prompts list today. I invite you to remember this week, whenever you can, to look at life through the eyes of a child—your own Inner Child, or if you prefer, one of your own or known children.  How would a situation look differently to you as a Child? What would matter, more or less?

So, here’s a list of topics that you can write about, talk about, or use for active contemplation/ imagination. Poems, artwork, photographs and music are also very welcome! I invite all comments or insights, and I will publish your stories or artistic expressions if you’d like to send one in! With my own childhood heart and eyes “Wide open”, I’ll share EVERYTHING (within polite reason) that you would like to pass along!

• Friendships
• Pets
• Trips
• Family
• Creative play
• Places:  woods, derbies, horse farms,  trees
• Bicycling    (or: tricycles, pogo sticks, go-carts, stilts, skateboards…)
• Reading (favorite characters, favorite series)
• Writing (diaries, poems, Mother’s Day cards)
• Movies
• Plays
• School
• Scouts
• Music
• Sports
• Clubs
• Treehouses
• Horses
• ANYTHING ELSE that comes to you!

Since those of us now adults sometimes are forgetful of what we knew so much better as a child—how to exercise the Imagination with Freedom and how to Explore EVERYTHING–then remembering our Child’s viewpoint can definitely bring Better Endings to us Now!

Have FUN!

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I offer my deep gratitude to Brenda Davis Harsham for yesterday’s stellar story that I simply re-blogged here, Choices for the Soul. This site reached a record of Likes yesterday due to Brenda’s generosity. Thanks to her and to everyone who has chimed in! I hope you might enjoy the focus here with our theme of Better Endings!

CHOICES FOR THE SOUL HAĪBUN, by Brenda Davis Harsham

The church is near but the road is all ice;

the tavern is far but I’ll walk very carefully.

Russian Proverb

Years ago, I was working for a minimal salary. My net pay barely covered the expenses of professional clothing, commuting, food and rent. I worked very hard the first year, trying to be the perfect employee, working quickly, seeking extra work, hoping I would earn a big raise. I slid sideways into debt when my car was totaled in an accident and my cat needed expensive medicine.

When I got my review, it was lukewarm, with no acknowledgement of my efforts and a minimal raise, not even keeping pace with inflation. I had a meeting with my boss, and I asked him if he was unhappy with my work. He said no.

“Did I forget any tasks you gave me or do them wrong? Was I too slow?”

Again, “No and no.”

“Then why are you giving me such a small raise?”

“Do you think you deserve the same raise as Monica who has been here nearly twenty years?”

“Are you saying I won’t get a good raise unless I work here twenty years?”

“You have to understand that we all have wives and children to support, and they come first. Why would I give you money that I could give to my wife and kids?”

I didn’t have any answer for that, and I got depressed. I had always believed that hard work was rewarded.     I worked quickly, efficiently, but when I finished my work, I no longer sought extra. I started doing my own writing in the office, which angered him and eventually he fired me. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.

I realize now that I chose to stay despite my unhappiness. Instead of leaving, I acted less than professionally and ended up deeply unhappy with him, but more importantly, with myself.

When I was fired, at first my self-esteem sank even lower, but financial desperation pushed me into following up every lead for new job. I found a great job where I relearned to value myself. I felt freer than I had in years. I changed careers and cities, which were great decisions. Being fired was a pivot point for me, and I learned something invaluable.

If I make bad choices, I only hurt myself, and I must make better choices. It sounds so simple, and maybe it is to some people. For me, it’s a daily effort. Some days I fail. Other days, it feels like climbing Mount Everest. But I am worth that effort.

dark clouds blow in fast
ice wolves wail and circle
curl up warm inside

These days, I don’t have every answer, and I’m not perfect. That is no longer even my goal. Each day I try to make good decisions. I try to respect myself, to find ways of seeking joy, and, as a result, I occasionally even find it.

green shoots reach skyward
gray ice mountains collapse
heart and soul quicken

Copyright 2014 Brenda Davis Harsham

Note: Inspired by the weekly Līgo Haībun challenge and the Russian Proverb above.

Brenda Davis Harsham is an author, photographer and artist, currently publishing fairy tales, photography and poems celebrating magic and nature for kids of all ages. She teaches writing and is a member of the Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators.

 Website: Friendlyfairytales.com, http://friendlyfairytales.com/

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I want to thank you, Brenda, and all who have chimed in today to like or follow this site. You have brightened my life. This week, I invite all of your insights and stories of any length (or poetry, art or photos) about CHILDHOOD MEMORIES. I will be using a Mary Poppins theme (love Saving Mr. Banks!) with daily blog titles based on the music. I am interested in insights and stories that remind us to look through a child’s eyes at the world. Please share with anyone. Of course you retain copyright and I will publish an author’s byline, bio, and contact info.- Better Endings to You! Linda

Up From the Ashes… A Black Forest Fire Survivor’s Story, by Debra J. Breazzano, MA, LPC

Better Endings readers: We have two brilliant stories to share this week about surviving disasters and hardship. Here is the first, and tomorrow I’ll post the second Story of the Week. Surviving is a process that cannot be forced. Sometimes the Dark–the vital pathway through Descent–is of as much value as the Light it precedes.-L

This is an Inipi (sweat lodge), the symbol of Hope…unbelievable that even the tobacco ties remained unburnt.  You can see where the fire took out all the grass/trees/shrubs in the drainage; as well as the emergency vehicles passing through…but left the Inipi unscorched.- DB

It began like any other ordinary day; and little did I know that only a few short hours  after  looking around in appreciation thinking, “how wonderful it is to be settled here in Black Forest, with our dream home and sanctuary for our wolf, dogs, horses and humans finally completed after 3 years of ongoing effort” that my world as I knew it, would literally go up in flames.  June 11, 2013.  The date forever etched in my mind, launching me and my community into the frightening world of the displaced; remaining unsettled even 6 months later, after Colorado’s most devastating wildfire consumed our neighborhood.  500 properties torched beyond recognition; leaving an aftermath of despair and anguish as we know our beloved Forest will never regenerate to its former beauty of Ponderosa pines during our lifetime. Then, less than 3 months later, my former community of Lyons ravished by unprecedented floods; ironically the safe refuge area my family had sought shelter at during our fire evacuation, now also destroyed.  Fire, flood…but wait, where are the locusts?  Yes, biblical humor to see me through these very challenging times as I walk with determination to rise from the ashes and welcome a future that offers hope.  However, one thing I know for certain: unless you have ever been victimized by catastrophe there is no way to understand the magnitude—and levels of disturbance–even with the most empathetic mindset.   I have survived many dark life tragedies prior, and lost loved ones; but still, could not anticipate the consequences that this summer’s catastrophes would have on my psyche.   It’s not about the house or things that were lost;  it’s the core sense of not being safe or settled on any level regardless of “home is where the heart is” platitudes or faith in God to see us through.  I wish I could fast forward to the time when this is just a memory and the “silver lining” or the ability I have, for example, to now work more effectively as a counselor with others who have experienced such tragedies  as the new reality, but I can’t.  Each day still remains exhausting.  Time hasn’t made it simpler yet.  In fact, it’s even more difficult now than the moment we saw the flames bursting apart the trees on our road as we frantically scrambled to some sense of safety.   I get impatient with my own sense of not managing life as well as “I should.”  Yet, I do know, that day will come when I can look back and appreciate how “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”  But for now, I remain “in it”—the emotional roller coaster– 24/7 as we try our best to recover and rebuild.  We all remain as optimistic as we can while hugging onto each other—and to our faith– for support, visualizing as best we can, the new life chapter that will unfold with the mantra:  Out of the Ashes, We will rise.
Biography for Debra J. Breazzano:  Educator and Counselor; Wilderness Instructor and Course Director; Gifted Ed Program Facilitator for Monument, CO high schools; Researcher and Writer; (&Partner with Linda Watts for applying archetypal and therapeutic themes  to the Life Path Mapping Process); Personally:  Enjoying time with my husband, family and friends; riding my horse and working with wolves; having outdoor adventures and multi-cultural experiences; all with the intention of remaining in service to others and to our earth.

Turning Points and ‘Combustibility’

Our Better Endings Life Mapping activity for this week allows you to focus on what sorts of Life Lessons you are learning through the most critical, pivotal events of your life. See if you can list one or more events in your life that have been of such magnitude in terms of their impact on who you have become that you feel you were not quite the same person before and after this or these events occurred. These are your Turning Points.

Take some time to reflect on these ‘chapter turner’ events in your life. For each one, what did you learn because this event transpired in your life? Did it have a positive or a negative (or, both?) impact on you, in retrospect? Why? How? If you could go back, would you change anything about this event or situation? If so, what might have gone differently then?

One basic way to explore a Turning Point is to write or journal about it, talk about it with someone you trust, and actively contemplate its role or effect on your life. What LIFE LESSON have you learned because of this experience?

I welcome any insights you would like to share!

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Because a very special story has come through about our weekly topic of surviving disasters that I will share with you tomorrow (and another story also, for Sunday), I will add a second piece today about a Principle of Better Endings that I’ve been learning about this week:

Combustibility : a Better Endings principle?

I was having some difficulty early this week finding just the right principle of Better Endings to account for how disasters or personal hardships result so often in major Life Changes and Lessons. I awoke then Wednesday night at around 2 AM from a series of dream images: rocket ships! So the first word that came to mind was propulsion; that such heavy impact events propel us forward at great speed; they launch us into another level of awareness or situation or or purpose. Applying that metaphor to what happens within us that allows this launching to occur, I find the word combustibility!

A few weeks ago I shared the life metaphor from Will of a golden spiral. Will said the spiral he imagined had “launch pads” along it that would propel him to a higher level of awareness. Again then, we must have the capacity for ‘combustion’ to allow this to occur.

Or, are we the astronaut within the combustible rocket? Then we must be willing to be launched! And the ship must have enough fuel to propel us upwards at great speed.

Interesting how some natural disasters themselves exhibit combustibility—a wildfire, hurricane or tornado, for instance, all are very highly charged phenomena. Do these impart their intrinsic quality of combustibility upon those that they impact? Perhaps we either combust into an accelerated change in our lives and/or the experience burns us?

Heavy impact events in our lives have the capacity to propel us forward, upward, or downward at great speed!

PTSD Can Affect Survivors Of Natural Disasters, by Cristina Goyanes (Men’s Health)

All,

I found this article that is very relevant for our weekly theme of Surviving Disasters. I repost it here in lieu of our usual Thursday Guest Blog:.

Do You Have PTSD And Not Know It?  How Hurricane Sandy put you at risk

By Cristina Goyanes for Men’s Health (Prevention News / control/click to access original article, or http://www.menshealth.com/health/do-you-have-ptsd )

The phrase “post-traumatic stress disorder,” or PTSD, usually conjures images of combat zones and car accidents—not Frankenstorm-smashed communities.

But the truth is, any life-threatening event, including natural disasters, can trigger the condition. Evidence of this dates as far back as the Great London Fire in 1666. And in the wake of Hurricane Sandy’s destructive impact across the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic in late October, many people, especially those who are still displaced or living without heat or electricity, may be showing symptoms of the disorder.

Stress

“Regardless of the type of traumatic event—be it a rape or a hurricane—the symptoms that follow are similar,” says Spencer Eth, MD, a psychiatry professor at the University of Miami and associate chief of staff of mental health at the Miami Veterans Affairs Healthcare System. “Feeling bad after a natural disaster is called being human; it’s normal to be angry, irritable, and anxious. But if you start to feel worse over a certain period of time, don’t ignore it.” (To learn more about different types of anxiety disorders, check out our helpful guide.)

Take Hurricane Katrina survivors, for example. “Research shows that people who waited a long time to feel relatively safe again—meaning they had more difficulty finding refuge and taking care of their basic needs—tended to develop PTSD,” Dr. Eth says.

Your move: Keep track of how you feel for one month in the aftermath. If each day starts to feel a little better, you may be in the clear, says Robin Kerner, PhD, a psychologist who is trained in psychological first aid response to disasters and works at Manhattan’s St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital. The likelihood of developing PTSD is not high (about 30%), unless you’ve experienced previous trauma in your life (i.e., child abuse, war tours) or have a history of mental illness.

There’s also a slight chance you might have a delayed reaction, not expressing symptoms until months or years later. Kerner’s best advice: Practice what she calls the Grandma Cure. “Eat right, exercise, get a good night’s sleep—all those things our grandma and mother told us to do are good for our mental health,” she says. “Also, focus on creating new traditions and new routines to help cope over the holidays.”

Sandy survivors: If by late November or early December you’re experiencing any of the symptoms described by Dr. Eth and Dr. Kerner, talk to your doctor.

You can’t turn off instant replay It’s normal to re-hash a horrific event (like watching your things float away in water) in nightmares or flashbacks. But when you’re constantly seeing, hearing, and smelling frightening things as if they were happening all over again, you might have a problem. It doesn’t help that your TV keeps showing devastating footage of the event. Do yourself a favor: Change the channel, both on the tube and in your mind.

You refuse to return to the scene of the crime After 9/11, lots of people stopped flying. The same reaction applies for Sandy victims: You may not want to return to where your house once stood or rebuild your home to make it habitable again. Sure, it’s easy to want to pick up and start fresh somewhere else and never set foot on the beach or boardwalk that reminds you of the catastrophe. But emotional numbness and avoidance will not help you cope with the situation, or truly move on. Face the facts, and if you can’t, don’t isolate yourself—try to stay as socially connected as possible.

You feel ready to blow a fuse You’re not sleeping well. You can’t concentrate. You’re feeling extra jumpy and on-edge. It’s normal to feel these things if you’re tired, hungry, have no heat or power, and can’t fill your gas tank without waiting in a ridiculous 2-hour line. But if you continue to feel bad and pessimistic about your future, talk to your doc.

Life’s Glitches

June 26, 2012 was a birthday I will never forget.  It was in the midst of Colorado Springs residents’ encounter with a major firestorm, the Waldo Canyon fire. I had seen the bare wisp of smoke curling up from behind beautiful Pikes Peak the day before; but within two days the fire had spread to become a raging monster. Federal crack fire teams were on the scene, while we all watched the news with a mixture of awe at the massive smoke plumes shooting up into the high atmosphere and hope that the fire crews would soon gain control.  But on June 26, my birthday, I went to see a movie with a friend. We had checked the radio and TV news before leaving, and the fire seemed to be held at bay. We watched the movie; I don’t even remember what it was. When we came out of the theater and turned on the radio out of vigilant curiosity, all Hell had broken loose! The dragon fire had swept up and over a ridge, right into a major residential neighborhood!

My friend and I left for our homes. The day before, I had been driving toward Pikes Peak and imagined the fire coming down into the city. On my way home on the 26^th I was at the exact same location and saw, yes, the flames racing down the mountain into the Mountain Shadows neighborhood. The déjà vu sort of vision brought deep foreboding. I felt the whole town was in danger. Although my house was far enough away that I was in no immediate danger, I gathered my pets and fled to Denver, where I stayed with a friend that night, and the next. I couldn’t take my eyes away from the news reports.

The crack fire crews took a new tactic after 360 homes were destroyed on the June 26 rampage. They managed controlled burns to remove fuel from the possible directions the fire might take. Within another 3-4 days they had the fire under much better control. Thousands of people who were evacuated from their homes gradually were allowed to return.

Incidents like this or similar disasters reveal the unpredictability of natural forces or human aberrations: mass shootings, drunk drivers, terminal illnesses, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods. These are among the imponderabilities of life; things we cannot directly control but somehow must deal with anyway. They bring forth our fears, our survival instinct, and our desire to help others in our community.

I was a lucky one during the Waldo Canyon fire. My home was not threatened. Many people lost their homes or were evacuated for weeks. For many of these, this event was a life changer, a chapter turner. Much of daily life—its materiality and entertainment routines, even its workaday responsibilities—pale in significance when such an event transpires. These critical events cut to the depths of our human and spiritual existence. Like people who have Near Death experiences, many who survive—or endure–a disaster of this magnitude often alter their life course to accommodate new layers of meaning, purpose, or urgency.

Survivors of Heroic Trials: Prompts for Reflection

As I sit down to generate a Tuesday list of writing prompts for this week’s topic of Surviving Disasters, guess what’s on TV: the movie “Poseidon” (the remake of “The Poseidon Adventure”); to be followed by “Twister”. I will watch them then, while contemplating this week’s topic of surviving disasters from a Better Endings perspective.

Disaster films and novels are a very popular genre. Even Classical mythology and Greek (and later) tragic dramas often center around tales of surviving either natural or supernaturally induced disasters.  In the mythic story of “Theseus and the Minotaur,” for example, Theseus—as part of his trials by the Gods to replace his father as King–sails to the island of Crete to free Athenian brethren taken prisoner there who are being fed to the monstrous half bull/ half human Minotaur. Theseus must use his warrior instincts and creativity and he must be receptive to Ariadne’s suggestion to unroll a ball of string as he descends into the depths of the Labyrinth where the monster lives. This way, after defeating the Minotaur in combat, Theseus is able to lead the freed captives back out from the Labyrinth to safety. Theseus displays heroism: he sacrifices his own safety to rescue others in a selfless act.  He is aided by the Gods in this worthy venture, and with a bit more mythic story twisting (his father dies in a battle that ensues when Theseus’ own boat is mistaken as an enemy ship from Crete), he returns to assume his throne.

Disaster survivors have much of value to teach us. Their stories often reflect the sort of spiritual or divine intervention underlying mythic tales of obstacles and triumph. A student whose parents lost their homes to the Colorado Springs wildfire in the Mountain Shadows neighborhood two years ago shared that when she and her family sifted through the ashes of their family home, nothing at all remained, EXCEPT an unframed, paper photograph of my student (the homeowners’ daughter) when she was an infant. How could that be? Also this past year, a good friend who is a therapist lost her home and her beloved wolf hybrid pet to the raging Black Forest wildfire. She showed me a picture of the only surviving structure on her property: a limb-framed Sweat Lodge she used for therapy retreats! This structure was only some 30 yards or so away from the house, forest trees and garage that burned to the ground. How and why would this structure be saved?

The stories above—and the countless others I am sure you can think of—are food for thought. May the following list of disaster topics inspire you to write, or talk about, or actively contemplate what we can learn from surviving disasters.

• Triumph
• Surviving Disasters  (student: baby photo; friend: twig frame sweat lodge)
• Fires
• Floods
• Hurricanes (Katrina, Sandy)
• Earthquakes
• Fear
• Terrorist attacks/ (including mass shootings)
• PTSD
• War
• Car accidents
• Airplane crashes

I welcome your insights via the Comments box below. You may share your stories by sending them as either a Guest Blog or for Sunday’s Story of the Week.

Surviving Disasters — Better Endings Perspectives

I live in Colorado Springs. Within the past two years this area has been beset by two major wildfires and a 100 year flood. Over 500 homes in Black Forest and 360 the year before in the Mountain Shadows neighborhood were burned to the ground. The flooding in the Boulder area destroyed many hundreds of family homes. Pets died, trees were destroyed, and thousands of  families’ lives were disrupted from being evacuated or from losing nearly all of their possessions. Other regions are familiar with hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes. Losing a loved one due to illness or accidents can devastate one’s life. Losing a job is also a personal disaster for many, especially in this climate of structural unemployment which means many people, especially over 40, may never reenter the workforce.

Personal disasters are clearly a part of life that can happen to anyone.  How we survive—when we do—can mean so many things and takes different forms with different people. Whole generations may become ‘defined’ by a a tragic disaster, like the Holocaust or the Great Depression in my parents’ generations. I remember walking into a class I was to teach in Colorado Springs one fateful Tuesday afternoon.  Only half the students were present; the rest were in shock. The Columbine shootings in Littleton, Colorado, had just transpired that day. Pivotal moments like this or like the 2001 terrorist attack can warp or bend the very fabric of our collective reality.

This week’s blog topic is Surviving Disasters. I invite and welcome all of your insights and stories. If you have a reflective poem or an idea or feeling you have written on a napkin, feel free to share it here as a guest blog or as a Story of the Week. Please let others in your circles know they are welcome to share their stories or insights, too.

Better Endings with regard to surviving disasters might remain bitter endings, of course. Different people approach these experiences in their own ways. An author, Gay Becker, wrote a book called Disrupted Lives, based on interviewing many disaster survivors. Becker found that however we do respond when we face or survive a disaster, we do so in a meaningful way, as humans. We construct meaning from our experiences; we learn valuable Life Lessons. What we take away and take forward we can use to help others or to redirect our own lives.

Thanks for reading Better Endings. I do hope you feel free to participate and communicate in any manner here, if you might feel moved to share your own perspective or experience. Or if not, I hope you might benefit from the stories shared in your own way.

Better Endings to You! — Linda

Tell Your Story Video (2012), by Christopher Hollander (with the TYS Team)

You may click on the link below, or cut and paste this address into your browser, to watch a video by Chris Hollander, the main videographer for the 2010-2012 Tell Your Story interview project. The TYS team interviewed jobless and underemployed persons in Colorado Springs.

https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=159764824095272&comments

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Coming Up: This next week’s Better Endings topic is Surviving Disasters. Please send me your insights as a Guest Blog or for Story of the Week (with your author’s byline, bio and website info included). Any form of expression is welcome, from your journal thoughts to poems, photos, artwork or a short story. I would love to tell YOUR story!

Mazeway Resynthesis? Fortitude as a Better Endings Practice

for·ti·tude   fôrtəˌto͞od/

noun

1.

courage in pain or adversity.

“she endured her illness with great fortitude”

synonyms: courage, bravery, endurance, resilience,

mettle, moral fiber,

strength of mind, strength of character, strong-mindedness,

backbone, spirit, grit, true grit, doughtiness, steadfastness;informal guts

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This week at Better Endings we have been focusing on the difficult “rite of passage” of unemployment. People often feel “locked out” from the Doors of opportunity when they try to re-enter the workforce.

On Monday I shared how the anthropologist Victor Turner would describe the experience of being un- or underemployed as a “Liminal” condition, a feeling of being between and betwixt a job identity one has had stripped away and a new identity someone is trying to achieve. Turner also said that when a group of people experience this “marginal” feeling of liminality together over a prolonged time period, at some point they might group together to share empathy and to try to develop common strategies to regain a stable place in society.

Turner found that many historical ‘cultural renewal’ movements have come about because a group of marginalized individuals came together to collectively forge a new pathway. Such cultural renewal movements can result in a whole new way of thinking—for example, about the value of work or identity—that Turner called a ‘mazeway resynthesis’.

Big words for a blog post, maybe, but I believe it might help people to hear what Victor Turner might have to say about our structural unemployment situation if he were alive today.

The US Great Recession hit in 2008. In 2010, it blossomed for many liminal people into the Occupy Wall street movement. Turner would likely view this as a predictable, cultural revitalization movement that could result, over time, in a new way of framing values and thinking about work and social identities.

This leads me to recognize the Better Endings principle and practice of FORTITUDE; something we might well learn more about from listening to the voices of today’s underemployed.

Fortitude. Check out its definition at the top of this post. You endure what must be endured, while never losing sight of your deepest goals. Your goals might shift, from being external goals—like getting a specific job you are qualified for—more to internal goals, like expressing your personal integrity and creativity or redefining yourself in ways that are meaningful and fulfilling to you. Fortitude could involve joining with other people who are also feeling locked out from opportunities, to forge a new pathway forward, together.

Do you know full the story of Hiawatha? During a time of social disruption with a vicious blood feud going on among tribes, Hiawatha’s wife and three daughters were murdered by a chief from his own Onondaga village. Hiawatha wandered alone and bereft in the woods, nearly driven to madness by his grief. Then he had a Vision of a godlike figure, Deganawida, who told Hiawatha what the Iroquois peoples needed to do collectively to restore peace and balance to their society and to resolve the blood feud.

Hiawatha delivered Deganawida’s message. This led to the formation of the League of the Iroquois, which developed into a harmonious confederation of six Iroquois speaking tribes who agreed to share a council-based, democratic form of government. This resulted in what Turner would describe as a mazeway resynthesis for Hiawatha, and one could say eventually for the Iroquois people overall. The League of the Iroquois was so successful that Benjamin Franklin used it as an example of democracy in the Articles of Confederation that formed the basis of the US Constitution.

Out of the forge of Fortitude, new forms emerge; a new Season, new Hope.

Realize Your Goals!

Connecting with this week’s Better Endings focus on joblessness or underemployment, our Life Mapping tool for this week can be used to envision a pathway to manifest a desired goal. As you engage with this GOAL-CLUSTER mind-mapping activity, I invite you to approach it with a childlike perspective, allowing “playful” ideas to emerge from your unconscious sandbox.

Using the template shown above, you can start by placing either a word, a phrase, or an image icon that represents a meaningful, desired goal (with perhaps a photo of yourself, smiling!) into the center of a page, with an X that segments the page into 4 quadrants around this GOAL-center.

Next, starting with the top/RESULTS quadrant, you can use free association to place words or phrases that represent what you will gain or how you will benefit  with your goal ACHIEVED. Where these benefits or positive outcomes are meaningfully interconnected for you, you can draw lines or off-shooting branches showing these connections.

Next you can start filling in any of the other three quadrant sections, again using playful free association to ‘draw connections’ between ideas either within a quadrant or migrating across them.

For example, let’s say your goal is to take a trip to visit Ireland. RESULTS might include: “touching base with my heritage”; “expanding my horizons”; or “slowing down for awhile/ getting away”. Then branching off from one of these you might add, “gold at the end of the rainbow”, and off from that: “retire there?” [okay, now I am getting my own ideas; I love Ireland!].  Now under OBSTACLES, maybe you would write: “Money?” That may lead you to the RESOURCES space, where you can brainstorm how you might afford the trip; if so, you can connect this resource to the obstacle statement. Envisioning Resources might lead you also to think of some very real Solutions, see?

After filling in this GOAL-cluster mind-map so that you feel you have fleshed out all four quadrants with meaningful and helpful ideas,   I invite you to go back and circle or use color to highlight those specific Resources and Solutions that can help you to actualize the RESULTS you desire to create in your life. You can also start a new page, placing any of the specific Results or Resources or Solutions (or Obstacles) you generated with the GOAL cluster into the center, and explore that aspect with its own, freestyle cluster mind-map.

Approaching this technique as a playful game will facilitate emergence of a mindful awareness that can stimulate “out of the box” solutions.  Remember from Denise’s Guest Blog two weeks ago: “There IS NO BOX!”

Advice and Insights from Mainstreet, by Tell Your Story participants

“Most people feel the system is out of whack. To get into place today, it seems knowing the right people and networking is vital. Competition for jobs is fierce. I would tell people to never give up and never settle. Life is too short to be depressed about an economic crisis.”

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“It’s all about your attitude. If you have a good attitude, it will take you far; but if you have a bad attitude it will take you just as far the other way. I know, I’ve had bad attitudes within this stretch. I try to keep it positive as much as I can. But you can’t do it all the time.”

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“My general comment would be for people to not give up. It’s so easy to just sink into depression, but if you just get up every morning and just come determined, and have courage, then it will eventually work out. Just live day by day and have courage.”

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“One way I try to look at this is, What can I learn? What kind of lessons can I have come from this? What’s good about this? What’s the benefit? Can I look at it from that perspective? Otherwise you’re just gonna be frustrated, be angry. ..And then you’re miserable. I mean, I’m unemployed, but that doesn’t mean I’m miserable.”

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“When you first get unemployed it has a social pariah attached to it. So people tend to withdraw and not tell anybody, they try to mask the fact that they’re unemployed. But that’s the exact wrong strategy that they should be pursuing. The right course of action is to let everybody you know, know that you’re unemployed because they all understand that. A lot of people are well-meaning and they’ll try to hook you up with jobs that don’t match your qualifications or interests, but they do get the word out.”

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“I think in a sense that there is a higher power, and that I can look at the bigger picture and this is just a circumstance. This is not who I am, it’s just a circumstance of my life, and separating the two is important because sometimes you start to identify with being unemployed and labeling yourself: you know, ‘I’m unemployed, there’s something wrong with me, the world is against me.’…But if you say, ok, this is a circumstance, this will pass, what can I do to change it… Otherwise, you lose control and you can think…’I’m a victim’, your power’s gone. And when you give up your personal power, then there’s no more options.”

******

“It’s just real. It’s not positive, it’s not negative, it just sort of is. You just have to go with it and keep going.”

These statements are from people who shared their voices for the 2010 -2012 Tell Your Story project in Colorado Springs. Interviewers included Lindsey Raymond, Ivy Tyson, Christopher Hollander, Julie Weinheimer, Matthew Shell, John Palka, Rebecca Cornell, Rebekka Grainer, Sabrina Flugrath, along with 10 additional TYS team researchers.

We Are Not Lazy! Stories of ‘New Hope’ Beyond Unemployment

This week’s Better Endings principle that we will discuss on Saturday is “Fortitude,” in relation to our weekly topic of Unemployment. The fiery forge of experience that joblessness or underemployment plunges people into can lead to either despair or ‘New Hope’, and often both at the same time. The following voices and brief stories celebrate the adaptive strategies of four people who have told their stories to help others.

Kelly, Age 58, over 5 years un- and underemployed

      “You have to stay positive because it’s going to work out, it really is.”

Kelly is homeless.  She is 58 and has been alternately un- and underemployed for over five years.  Kelly has a part-time job working a few hours a week at a Taco Bell.  However, since in order to afford an apartment Kelly would need a full-time job, she lives at a Salvation Army shelter.

What has helped Kelly to establish ‘new hope’ is her living situation and supportive family ties.  The Salvation Army shelter has a program such that Kelly gives 70% of her weekly Taco Bell paycheck to the shelter staff, who deposit that into a savings account for her. This way, since her room and board are provided for free at the shelter, Kelly has thousands of dollars saved. In return, Kelly volunteers several hours every week at the shelter and she also volunteers at a local history museum. She uses some financial aid to attend classes at a community college.  Kelly says that the Salvation Army shelter empowers her to maintain hope because she can sleep in a clean, healthy place.  She visits her daughter who is in the military, and she provides free childcare for her grandchildren.  Kelly told us that her self-esteem is very high and, despite being ‘homeless’, Kelly is very hopeful and upbeat.  She says, “I don’t know how to explain it, but I know it’s going to be okay.”

 Susan, Age 48, over 4 years un- and underemployed

“I was doing a lot for Habitat for Humanity. I really enjoyed doing that. And I started volunteering for my church group. We sell things at Broncos games to raise money…I’ve put a lot of hours into that.”

Susan, 48 and unemployed in the traditional sense for now over 4 years, engaged for her first two years of unemployment working independently with an entrepreneurial, multilevel-marketing program. She relied on collaborative friendship networks and attended conferences to learn about how to sell products and develop subordinate agents. She saw this program as a way that not just herself but a wide network of people could all achieve financial freedom from traditional work and its capricious nature today. Susan was receiving unemployment benefits plus she relied on prior savings to make ends meet for as long as she could. She said she used to dread going to a traditional industry job every day.  Since the time of her Tell Your Story interviews, Susan has drifted away from the multi-marketing scheme; she is now managing rental homes for one of the friends from her spiritual group. She has moved to live with a boyfriend who is also her management business partner. Although their income is still quite low and most of her savings have now been expended, Susan continues to be very active with her volunteer work and she says she is happy to never have to return to an “industry” based, “9 to 5 job”.

Goddrick and Sybil, Ages 52 and 56 over, 6 years un- and underemployed

“And so he’s not sleeping and I’m not sleeping because he’s not sleeping and we’re both angry and frustrated and so everything else bothers you; the kids leaving their socks on the floor and not picking up you know and every little thing is heightened because of that stress and  it’s the money.  It’s just horrible. And it’s like he would do any job. Even if he got like me; an eight dollar an hour job, that would be twenty four hundred dollars a month and it’s like – I was telling him, and I may do this, but the Broadmoor is hiring housekeeping tomorrow and  it’s ten dollars an hour and I’m  like, you know, for as hard as I’m working at 7-11 loading the cooler and standing on my feet doing all this other hard work cleaning, changing the trash outside, maybe I should go because for ten dollars an hour, that’s four hundred dollars more a month  which would really make a difference in our life right now. So if I’m going to be not respected and belittled and the fact that I went to school and got all these degrees and did all these things I thought to prepare myself to have a better life and it’s just gonna be crap anyway, maybe I should just do another job that’s at least gonna pay more because I’m not happy in what I’m doing and so maybe cleaning up somebody else’s pubic hair for two dollars more an hour is what I need to do. And it’s hard, it’s a self-esteem and pride issue and it’s hard.” 

That about says it all, doesn’t it? Sybil and Goddrick have three boys who are active in Boy Scouts, wrestling, and their spiritual group. Goddrick coaches wrestling for one of the boy’s schools and has been a Scouts leader for many years. Since returning to play saxophone for a local band, Goddrick’s focus has returned after many back and forth stints with jobs. He has finally become a regular high school substitute teacher (despite a head injury that has made any work difficult). Most recently, he has discovered a new calling as Santa for a good-sized mall in California.  Meanwhile, Sybil has been able to maintain a series of part-time jobs (now full-time and permanent) that has allowed the family to achieve stability although their accumulated debt remains a constant cloud dodging their forward moving steps. She too relies on her talent as a singer and actress to elevate herself and her family. Both Goddrick and Sybil have strong identities apart from traditional jobs. The whole family works every summer now at a local Renaissance Festival; where Sybil is a primary singing character, Goddrick runs the sound system for the joust, and their boys act as squires for the jousting with one who wears a costume as a 10 foot tall, smiling King!

These stories, to me, make one thing very clear about the un- and underemployed. As they might proclaim collectively, “We Are Not Lazy!”

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Please feel free to share your insights and responses to these stories in the Comments box below. To share YOUR story, please submit it any time!

Sources of ‘New Hope’ with Unemployment

The image above showing the word UNEMPLOYMENT “between the cracks” or in the margins between torn pages is quite appropriate to the experience of joblessness and underemployment. Unemployment involves a “rite of passage” in the sense of losing an identity and needing to construct or achieve a new one. The transitional ‘passage’ people must undergo with this life crisis event involves what anthropologists or sociologists would call LIMINALITY, which is simply the feeling of being “betwixt and between” (in Victor Turner’s terms): no longer in your original status or role (or, job), but in a sort of limbo zone of adjusting and trying to form a new social identity, and/or obtain a new job.

Today I will list some writing or reflection prompts that can relate to a Better Endings approach to this week’s topic of Unemployment. I do not mean to express any denial regarding the dire situation, frustrations, and anxiety; the ‘down’ side of this difficult passage affecting so many people in the world today. Better Endings as a universal, hopeful principle suggests we can still find or look for silver linings, even in the heaviest of clouds, and this is what we discovered most of the people who shared their unemployment stories with us for the Colorado Springs Tell Your Story project were often able and wanting to do. They told us of their plight and concerns, but many also shared their STRATEGIES for coping, for seeking new positions, and for thriving while outside the workforce. Many pointed out how unfortunate it is that when we first meet someone in today’s urbane society, our introductory query is likely to be, “What do you DO?”; as though what we do to earn an income defines who we ARE as a human being. Many people who are un- or underemployed must learn adaptive and often very creative ways to REDEFINE themselves while they are ‘between and betwixt’ more structured roles in society. So yes, even unemployment can have a positive, fruitful aspect; it can present a time of adjustment that is ripe with possibilities.

The Tell Your Story participants shared the following ideas and strategies as ways they have coped with or adapted to being jobless or underemployed. I invite you to share YOUR story, too, either in the Comments box below, or you can submit your story to share with readers. Or, you might wish to journal, talk about, or actively contemplate one or more of these adaptive ideas. Even if you are NOT un- or underemployed yourself, some of these strategies might still inspire or be of benefit to you. How so?

Some Better Endings Prompts for Unemployment or Underemployment:

• Redefining yourself
• Entrepreneurial opportunities
• Community non-profit support programs
• Volunteering
• Returning to or learning new hobbies, arts, musical instruments, sports, or exercise programs
• Education grants/ retraining programs
• Living with and providing household services for friends or extended family
• Workforce center services and programs
• Social Security Disability qualification
• Early retirement or pension programs
• Community Bartering or self-help networks (e.g. Family Independence Initiative; Fixing the Future programs)
• Shelters & Food banks
• Creative activities
• Networking

Unemployment Better Endings

The numbers of unemployed people around the world today is unprecedented in modern Western society. Official joblessness rates are just part of the real statistics. In the US since the 2008 Great Recession, many tens of thousands who lost jobs due to workforce downsizing and outsourcing have never recovered the jobs they were in and they have either had to go back to school for new jobs, often less desirable ones or part-time work, or they have left the workforce altogether so that they no longer show up on the unemployment records.

In 2009-2010, I formed a team of anthropology students to conduct an interview study in Colorado Springs, Colorado that we called the Tell Your Story project. We talked with people at the local workforce center and other people we knew, about their life experiences dealing with unemployment. We were not surprised to hear of much of their frustration and, for too many, despair. We were somewhat surprised to learn, though, that about a third of the people we talked with who had been out of work or underemployed for over a year and a half already had been finding new sources of support and what we came to call ‘New Hope’ even apart from the workplace. Many of these people were reinventing themselves in some very adaptive, meaningful ways. At the same time there were at least an equal number of people who had fallen into hopelessness, and for some of these persons, foreclosure or even  homelessness.

This week, Better Endings is dedicated to those who are still or have been jobless or underemployed. I will post some of what people shared in the Tell Your Story project which they were hoping would be heard by others. Certainly, many unemployed persons would not claim “better endings” as they are struggling day to day to survive and to adapt. Our hearts go out to those who might feel invisible. When we asked people how they felt people in society overall think about those who are unemployed, almost to a person the answer we received was: “That We Are Lazy”. Yet that was far from the truth. Most people we talked with were investing more than full-time hours seeking new jobs, retraining, or working part-time jobs while retooling to re-enter the workplace. And some were developing entrepreneurial approaches, or returning to arts and hobbies.

If you have a story you would like to share on the topic of unemployment or underemployment this week, please do! You can send your insights and stories via the Comments box below or submit your stories to me directly and I will certainly share them. (See the Better Endings Quotes below (bottom panel) all week for some Tell Your Story voices.)

Better Endings to You! – Linda

Better Choices—A Lucid Dream (by Linda K. Watts)

I am sometimes blessed to be a lucid dreamer. About a year ago, I “received” a dream that unfolded as a full story, in three separate acts! It was an unusual dream. It does not seem to have much to do with my own personal life or psychology, although it could pertain to an archetypal aspect of myself that I am not always aware of. Since the dream unfolded in three distinct act sequences, that is how I’ll tell it. Maybe this dream was meant for this blog or for some readers of this post, though at the time of the dream I had not yet even developed the idea of hosting this Better Endings blog.

ACT I

I see a business man walking along a sidewalk in a city environment. He is apparently quite successful. He is wearing an expensive looking grey suit and tie, he is obviously well fed, and he is a bit overweight. He has achieved a degree of comfortable repute with his business. Let’s call him Howard. Another man approaches him, stops him on the street and introduces himself. (Let’s call him, Jack.) As the Dreamer I know that Jack is a Mob Boss. Jack has heard of Howard’s success and he feels threatened by it, so he has approached Howard to offer him a deal.

“Join my team,” Jack invites Howard. “You will share in my success. We stay at the finest hotels and have all of the good things of life. You will merge your business with mine and be on my team.”

Thinking that joining Jack’s team could lead to “the good life” with little effort on his own part, Howard complies. He becomes a constant member of Jack’s entourage (read, mob gang). They travel together 24/7. But after a few months have gone by, Howard approaches Jack at a hotel they are staying at, in Chicago.

“Would it be okay with you if I sometimes do things just on my own, Jack? Like eating alone or sometimes spending a few days away from the team?”

Jack looks Howard up and down, sizing him up before he answers point-blank, “No, Howard. That would not be okay.”

Now Howard realizes he is, in a very real sense, Jack’s prisoner. He has been under Jack’s control, not an equal business team member with him.

The dream next shows Howard in a hotel bathroom. He looks out a small window onto a snowy rooftop in Chicago. He longs for his freedom. So, he climbs up onto the toilet, opens the window, squeezes himself through to the rooftop, and runs! He leaps from the rooftop into a snow drift below. Then he runs in leaps and bounds away from the hotel and Jack’s control, free!

ACT II/ Part A

Free from the Mob Boss Jack’s control, Howard gets a shrewd business idea. He figures he can do business with Jack’s own clients and offer them to pay a little less to him for the same services; so he will benefit at Jack’s unknowing expense. He walks into a shop which has a front business area and a back office and he offers his deal to one of Jack’s customers. The store owner pretends to appreciate the offer and says he needs to check something first in the back office.  As the Dreamer I understand immediately what is really going on. The store owner has called Jack and reported Howard’s offer! He has agreed to keep Howard occupied until Jack and his gang will arrive. Though the dream doesn’t show the final conclusion of this ‘act’, as the Dreamer it is clear that Howard will turn to leave the shop just as Jack and his gang close in on him, guns drawn. He will be toast!

ACT II/ Part B

Here’s where it becomes very interesting as a dream! I am now shown an ALTERNATE dream scenario, a different way that Howard could experience his Freedom. This act picks up again from the same scene of Howard having jumped from the hotel roof, skipping away happily to enjoy his escape from Jack’s control. This time, however, he does not revert to his old business ways. We see Howard exploring his newfound freedom, staying in the cover of night to avoid being recaptured. He comes to a remote, natural enclave area, like a small, recessed canyon with Red Rock cliff walls.  Howard looks UP. He sees, looking back down at him from their comfortable perch near the top of the cliffs overhead, two otherworldly Beings, one of them holding a flute. They are Guardian Spirits of some nondescript sort. They have been watching Howard.

“Can I climb out this way?” Howard asks the two gentle Beings who use no words but smile openly when he sees them and asks them this question. One of the two beckons a way that Howard can climb up the cliff. He does so. Howard climbs up and then crosses over the lip of the red canyon cliff wall.

ACT III

Still in this extended, lucid story-dream, I am shown that Howard has been experiencing a wholly new and different life situation since his choice to climb out of his old life to Freedom. Now Howard lives in a small, rural sort of community. He lives an average life, one of service to his village. Everybody knows him, and he them. He does good deeds whenever he can, always being willing to lend a helping hand to a neighbor or to give from his own meager resources to anyone in need. He has lost weight and he wears common work clothes, not a business suit.

As I wake from the dream, I am given a title for it: “The True Meaning of Spiritual Freedom”. As I open my eyes I have the distinct awareness that if Jack were ever to be face to face with Howard now, he would not even recognize him at all!

So, that’s the dream. I share it with you now as a story for this week’s topic of Better Choices. I will let the story’s message speak for Itself to you, as it may hold different meanings for different readers.

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