Good Friends Are Hard To Find

Courtesy Van Archiquette

As a child, did you have a best friend? Some came ready made, such as close siblings or next door neighbors. All the books, movies, television programs showed happy children with best friends like Puppy and Kitty or Peas in a Pod. Life was okay with your partner in crime. You had time, inclination and setup for closeness.

As an adult, do you have one of those best friends? I mean, someone with whom you share ALL your secrets and talk to pretty often; maybe your spouse or childhood friend or family member. They've seen you at your worst and still generally like you. If you do or did, you're the minority and already feel secure because of those close friends. If you don't, here are the secrets best friends teach.

Meaningful relationships matter more than status, things, accomplishments, money...everything. If you have an intimate relationship, you will risk everything to keep it. Relationships are very, very hard and require opening to life in all it's shapes and colors. They require sacrifice, hurt, anger, irritation, love, loss and jealousy; and the relationship merits all those feelings and more. They push you to the edge and make you want to walk away, but you don't. Similar to parenting, except you're equal and it's easier to walk away.

Under it all and in return, you feel eternally connected and live courageously, usually succeeding because of the courage to fail. Like being in love, colors have depth, people have personality and humanity is frustratingly but delightfully human. You don't just think, you KNOW you will make it through living, dying and whatever comes next.

I didn't learn Intimate Relationship 101 as a child. Did you? We live disconnected and sheltered, touching deep emotions only in tragic circumstances.  We bump along, avoiding painful encounters and insulating ourselves in golden bubbles; looking for soul-mates that inevitably turns back into a frog. Does this feel familiar?

As a culture, it's time to start over and be in relationships that last lifetimes. But where do you find someone to take that intimacy journey with you? It's pretty simple, actually, and one of the hardest things to do.  

Pick someone. Pick someone and be their friend. Share your thoughts. Invite them over. Listen to their challenges. Remind them to listen to yours. Give them gifts. Work hard at understanding where they are coming from. Ask questions. Wait for years while they work through their fears about intimacy. Dare to think new thoughts. Wait for years while you work through your fears about intimacy. Get frustrated and sometimes let them know it, sometimes hide it. Choose love and sometimes let them know it and sometimes hide it. Call, text, email them or even better, go see them. Show up.

Intimacy sprouts all around you. Potential soul-mates sit in your coffee shop, live next door, work in the next cubicle or write the next email; they're waiting for someone to look through their behavior and into their humanity. How do I know all this? Someone, equally scared and lonely, picked me.

Where To Find Gratitude

Courtesy Van Archiquette

Mystics have told us, especially within the last ten years, that an "attitude of gratitude" attracts physical and spiritual treasures beyond measure. I'm sure you've seen it yourself, gratitude towards something or someone inspires more of what we're appreciating. Some days though, the gratitude fairy leaves a dirty sock instead of a shiny quarter. Now what?

Raise your hand if you've pretended gratitude and it's backfired on you and when everyone left, irritation and depression set in again. Or our gratitude produced mistrust, accusations of sucking up and fake appreciation in return. So, how DO we find genuine gratitude when we're feeling ungracious and alone?

Gratitude comes from re-living hard experiences. When we bury our pain, exploit it for personal gain or focus only on the silver lining, we miss gratitude and all the gifts that come with it. Only by comparing our past and present, do most of us find perspective and graciousness.  Think about where you came from, what you know, where your family came from. Reflect on your heartbreaks, your suffering, your ignorance. I keep mementos around, reminding me of the struggles I've overcome and compare it to the life I have now. We have all won the lottery, simply surviving this long. If you'd like to feel gratitude, purposefully remember when you've felt your worst.

When we aren't feeling gracious, it's also no big deal. Ingratitude, frustration, depression make up the process of gratitude. We probably have a good, and mysterious, reason for feeling lousy. When we get tired of it, we'll feel gratitude again. Every time we let ourselves cycle around, we learn a little bit more about the process and know how to sincerely create gratitude.

So take a chance, let yourself feel life- the good and the hard. After all, you can never completely repeat your mistakes, you know more than you did the last time around.

Easing The Price of Emotions

Emotions overtake, drive, heal and destroy us. At times, they speak so loudly they consume us. When we've experienced loss, nothing pretties it up. We hurt for a good reason buried under layers of sleeplessness, poor nutrition, illness, physical pain and boredom. When we address these symptoms of emotional pain, we start to heal.

Sleeplessness- Anxiety and depression keeps our mind racing throughout the night. -Keep a worry bowl or box next to your bed. When you're ready to sleep, metaphorically put your thoughts inside for tomorrow, when you are better prepared to think about them.

-Eat a high protein breakfast and a complex carb at bedtime; in a pinch, cookies and milk.. It not only gives symbolic comfort, protein helps with melatonin production and the dairy and carbs calm your mind. If you wake at 2am, keep multi-grain crackers handy to help you fall back asleep.
-Put a token under your pillow to touch and hold, reminding you of good things in your life.
- Sleep somewhere else. Changing your environment distracts and quiets the mind.
- Avoid alcohol before bedtime. The sugar crash will wake you up in the middle of the night. 

Pain and Illness- When depressed, our bodies suppress our natural pain killers- beta-endorphins.

-Watch funny movies and walk 15 min. or more. Laughter and/or exercise release beta-endorphins.

-Move like 'Pretty Woman'. The looser you move, the better your circulation with less pain.

-Eat spinach and take epsom salt baths. Magnesium relieves pain as well as boosts your mood.

Low Energy and Boredom- Over and under sleeping, depression and pain contribute to low energy.

- Set goals for yourself for the next few months. It's easy to feel worthless and lost when you're suffering. Making a thoughtful list and timeline helps motivate you to live.

- Spend time with people you like. Research shows happiness comes from spending time with sincerely happy people. You find a space to express your emotions and guidance from people who understand navigating pain.

-Eat a high protein breakfast, take your vitamins and cut back on simple carbs like pasta, bread and alcohol. Adding more whole grains, flax seed, chia seed and raw nuts also help maintain your energy.

- Surround yourself with anchors of life, love and hope. Music, photos and essential oils remind you of happier times and help you shift your energy.

- Let yourself grieve. You ease pain and depression by expressing it- art, music, writing, dance,emails, dialogue, running, boxing... anything creative that helps you connect and find yourself again. Ignore perfection.

Finding Clarity Within Emotions

In everyone's life, change will someday surprise us. No matter how prepared, the emotions still grab us and take control. Maybe it's anger or depression or shock but either way we feel like someone turned our world upside down. How do you find light when the sun has disappeared?

We get glimpses into our psyche every day, in the form of emotions. Emotions mirror the beliefs we've gathered since conception. By reflecting on these everyday frustrations, hurts and sadness, we better navigate life-altering events. These mild emotions school us in healing our past hurts and creating more graceful world views. Facing and reflecting on our temporary emotions help us find solace within the permanent ones and strengthens us during life crises.

With an expressive and open attitude, some people reflect by writing, drawing, talking, listening or feeling with the intention of moving through the emotion and finding wisdom- the process and results are rarely pretty. During self-expression, catharsis is more important than product. When you let yourself feel, the emotions move through you and when you safely express the emotion, you maintain good relationships. When you investigate new ideas, you widen your options and when you apply this new information to your life, you live more gracefully. Regular, open self-reflection strengthens us for life's troubles.

How do we remember this wisdom when life changes dramatically? When I'm lost, I hold onto anchors. Like souvenirs, anchors remind us what we believe, who we want to be and transport us to a different state of mind. I surround myself with anchors that personally represent love, success and happiness. Whether a smell, sound, word, token or picture, I create anchors for memorable experiences and carefully place them everywhere in my life.

When emotions hit us hard, how can help others or find our own clarity? The same way we prepare: expression, self-reflection and anchoring.

1. Find a safe way to express the emotions, without judgementalism; choosing to deal with the emotions rather than arguing, over-eating, drugs, alcohol or other unsafe behavior.

2. In calm moments, talk to the emotion like an adult to a child. Find out what it's saying and answer as you would a wise friend. Bringing deep-seated beliefs and memories to the light helps them metamorphose.

3. Place positive, life-affirming anchors everywhere. Engage all the senses to remember that all is not lost. Wonderful, meaningful experiences have happened and they will again. Visiting natural areas, reading stories and visiting wise souls will gentle the emotions.

Everyone goes through hard changes in their lives; it's inevitable. Learning how to find clarity in the midst of our overwhelming emotions will help us move forward to our next chapter.

Investing Versus Economizing

Photo courtesy of Van Archiquette

How do you invest? More a philosophical question than a financial one; we believe we invest in what matters most to us. Then why are our relationships, families, communities, economies and lives crumbling around us? Is everyone else a bunch of morons? In our secret fears, are we?

I’d like to introduce a different idea. We’ve been duped. At some time, we mistook the finger pointing at the moon for the moon and life became “fight or submit” instead of “stay open and question”. We handed our truths to corporations, religions, popular opinion and our ancestors who formed them out of an array of circumstances and motives.  We learned that good people sacrifice their most precious gifts- love, life, intimacy, for a higher cause.

What have you sacrificed? Why? Did you economize your treasures or invest? In the laws of reality, the further your pendulum swings in one direction, the further you must swing in the other. How many of us indulge chemical, emotional, physical and financial addictions to survive the sacrifice of our humanness? Would we need such excess if we didn’t give up so much of our humanity?

We substitute presents for our time and care. We substitute status for our health. We substitute validation for meaningful dialogue. We substitute acceptance for wisdom. We substitute safety for our most precious gifts, love and emotional intimacy. And now, we have gifts, status, validation, acceptance and safety beyond anything our ancestors had. What’s missing is what makes life precious…time, care, health, dialogue, wisdom, love and intimacy. This Valentine’s Day and as often as you can, I’d like to suggest that you invest in life, humanity and love.