Our Journey Through Health and Knowledge
enhancing, exploring and expanding our health and lifestyle togetherArchive for September, 2008
stacy–fruit inspector
When did the word judgment become bad? Can one ever be judgmental and still be a good, accepting, loving person? These questions have been flitting through my brain like little lightening bugs—especially after the Palin nom and the dinner with Barbie Doll. I have decided that I do have the right to judge—I just have to answer two questions first.
Question number one: which house am I living in? I, and most everybody, make judgments from two houses: the house of love or the house of fear. When I see something that makes me uncomfortable, am I reacting from fear or love? Usually I’ve noticed, judgment lives in the house of fear. For example, the fake boobs set off a maelstrom of questions for me. I figured out that while I ultimately pitied the woman, I also feared her. I feared that she is a college professor and she is shaping the minds of both young men and women. I feared that she, enhanced, may be better than me, natural. I also loved her though. My desire to try to figure her out made me see what I am, and am not comfortable with in my own life. It helped me clarify how far I can and will go to conform to external ideology of what defines beauty. Therefore, it became a type of self-love and self-actualization.
Likewise with Palin. I am firmly planted in both houses. She scares me but I love this country and even more importantly, I love the people that make up this country. The decision I make in November will reflect the judgment I have gleaned from camping in both houses.
Question number two: what kind of fruit is it? My mother and I were talking about judgment this weekend and she told me: “I say what Memaw used to tell us kids. We may not have a right to judge, but we do have the right to be a fruit inspector. What kind of fruit do you see?” My Mother—the voice of reason. I do, and I must, inspect the fruit a person brings to my proverbial table. In Christianity there are fruits of the spirit and they make a lovely fruit salad. Those are the fruits I want to grace my home, my table. If rankle, ire, unhappiness, evil, war, disease, famine, corporate buy outs, and greed are the fruits, then I think I’ll use my better judgment and pass.
After applying my two questions, I see that the intent of judgment should not be the infliction of harm. It is actually to weigh the evidence and make a thought-out decision—an informed, educated, and hopefully loving decision. But there again, judgment is a matter of perspective, and I know judgment feels a lot different depending on whether you are sitting in the jury box or in the defendant’s chair. I’ve decided to see judgment as a process—one that evaluates the ends, the means and the fruits of a said person or process. I will not rush to judgment, for in rushing I will miss the essence, the Divine whisper and the knowledge that is the present of every situation. And..I will be a fruit inspector—no wonder I love the farmer’s market!
hermanafestations
I think God is smiling at me right now. She has a wicked sense of timing.
About fifteen years ago, my ex-husband and I sold our car. The buyer, Tina, was a single mother who had a large down payment, and an even bigger sob story. Because we were young, strapped for cash, and idealistic, we floated the rest of the loan for her. She took the car, and promptly left town. Soon after, a different lady contacted us about the car and informed us that she would be making the car payments. The car payments came in like clockwork for about six months at which point the second woman explained why she had been making payments, and why she would not be anymore.
Unbeknownst to us, Tina was pregnant and she planned to put the baby up for adoption. The second woman was making her car payments as a “favor” so that Tina would choose her and allow her to adopt the baby. Once the baby was born and the papers signed, the woman discontinued making payments. We tried to work with Tina, but she couldn’t afford the car and we had to reclaim it as we still owed money on it ourselves.
I had not seen Tina since this incident. Until today.
I received a beautiful bouquet of flowers from a dear friend, and who else but Tina arrived on my doorstep to deliver them. I recognized her, but she did not recognize me. I realized the Universe was laughing with me, lovingly calling me on whether I am practicing what I preach.
Just yesterday I stood at that same front door and told one of my dearest friends that I loved her. That is something I normally wouldn’t do. I was raised that the “L” word is to be reserved for your spouse and a few close family members. It is not a word to throw around willy-nilly. Here lately, though, I’ve decided that I am going to cover my world in love. I am going to take a power sprayer of love and douse everything and everyone that stands near me.
Then today I sat in traffic, again pondering love. I believe that love IS. But I also believe that I make myself and others more aware of love when I manifest it in my life. MySisters have manifested love in my life. Then, being that I love words, I decided to play with the notion even more and create a word for the manifestation of sister love: hermanafestation.
So when I opened the door today and a ghost of my past stood there, I laughed. She took it as happiness for the flowers, which it partially was, but it was more. The sister that sent the flowers is all-ways hermanafesting love and she did it even in the delivery of the gift. But the gift was actually the experience—the chance to look at my past, see that it doesn’t hold power over me, and to rejoice in the knowledge that there are manifestations of love everywhere—I just need to keep my eyes and heart open so that I see them.
Love you guys…happy weekend!
-Stacy
yet again… a choice.
so i missed last week’s class at church. one of my dearest friends just needed to talk, so i was with her. i have to admit i missed carol and beverly tremendously. i didn’t realize how much until tonight. seriously, i have such a good time learning about the science behind healthy choices. one thing i noticed tonight, that there is an abundance of negativity in this room. it saddens me. truly i am saddened because most of these steps are such small things to do to make your life healthier and more fulfilling. steps such as wearing a pedometer to measure how close you are to the goal of 10K steps per day. steps such as using as virgin of an olive oil as possible instead of vegetable oil. steps such as filtering your water. none of these things require huge sacrifices on anyone’s part. in fact, they are not sacrifices at all. it is a choice. i wrote a post the other night about choosing to love, how love or loving is a choice… this too is a choice. it is a choice very simply to love yourself more. the facilitators are providing knowledge. you can choose to use this knowledge or you can choose to ignore it. i am choosing to use this knowledge. no, i do not always do it. i am a creature of our society. when life is too busy, like last night, dinner was picked up from mcdonald’s on the way home. that is ridiculously stupid in light of all i am learning and all i know. no one is perfect, god knows this, we know this… you choose to make decisions that are doable in the moment. sometimes there are things that cannot be done… and although it is not ideal, it is okay. you just make better choices, organize your life more so that wiser and healthier choices are easier to complete. for example, we as a group are going to order nuts and seeds as a group and divvy them up amongst us. the shelf life and expense of eating healthy are ridiculous in today’s world. so you do what you can to help combat these deterrents.
anyway, tonight we discussed several things that cause the metabolism and various physiological tendencies about our bodies to slow or halt to a point of detrimental effect on our health. i will have to ruminate on these things before i can knowledgably post anything about them without sounding completely ridiculous – that post will be coming in the next few days. tonight i really want to focus on the aspect of attitude. truly, i think this all boils down to attitude, as i alluded in the previous paragraph. when you wake in the morning, do you choose to have a good day or do you choose to let life’s interferences intrude to the point of causing havock on your day, which effects your life, which then in turn effects your health. when faced with cancer, do you decide to face life each day head on with vim and vigor, or do you choose to wallow in self-despair and self-loathing for where you find yourself? a dear friend of mine who has just made it through her fourth battle with cancer… the first of which was stage four, an almost certain death sentence. she refuses to hear negative. her attitude has always been, ‘okay, what can we do? what is positive in this situation?’ she is so incredibly strong and i admire her and her love for life.
so where do you find yourself on a daily basis… are you looking at the negative? are you looking at all that is wrong with your life, your body, your health? or do you look at where you can arrive through determination and self-love? i truly think if we all love ourselves, more than any other, we will see the positives. my partner is not only in another city, she is in another state. 13 hours away from me. there is not daily physical contact. there is not bringing over of chicken soup if i am sick or visa versa. there are no dates on the weekends. it is hard, excrutiatingly at times… but i choose to revel in the connection we have with each other spiritually, mentally and emotionally. we truly have learned to communicate. there is not the distraction of things, we have to communicate or we could not be where we are. i feel god has truly blessed us with this relationship and our willingness to look at the positive and the uplifting nature of our relationship while working through the things that are ‘not so good’ (i.e. the distance).
again, i seem to have vented on choice. i choose happiness. i choose self-love. i choose positivity. i choose to see life with all its beautiful colors and timbres. it truly is a blessed existence and i am blessed to be here and in it.
-tiffany
A Day in Life of Our Infertility Challenges
As I sit here watching Kyndall playing and talking with her imaginary friend (really her cousin, Kameron, who is not currently here), I daydream of giving her the sibling(s) that she asks for on a daily basis. I say to myself, “If only it were that easy.”……
We were advised back in 1999 that I would I would need several surgeries and the help of infertility drugs in order to have children. Honestly, this did not seem like such a big blow to me. I had friends that had MAJOR infertility issues, and knowing that my issues were so minor, I was not distraught or worried. So fast forward to 2003…we are finally ready to begin the drug therapy part of our treatment. We were so excited to begin the process of becoming parents. After 3 unsuccesful cycles, I really started to get discouraged. Thankfully, I have an amazing husband who remained hopeful and encouraging throughout the entire process. He picked me up when I was feeling low, and gave me the love and support that I needed to move on. Finally, the day came….May 5 2003, I got the call that I was pregnant. Honestly, I think I went into shock. I just sat there and eventually heard the nurse on the other end of the phone repeating my name. I hated that Reggie was not with me when I got the news, but this allowed me start thinking of how I wanted to share our great news. I decided to have a cookie bouquet delivered to him the next day at work. It had huge congrats balloons and a variety of blue, pink and yellow baby themed cookies. He called me crying…..
So, now let’s come back to 2008. We are so ready to start our journey again. Sometimes I find myself wondering, Why me? I have been extremely blessed with an amazing husband that loves me unconditionally. He is an awesome provider. We have a beautiful home, and a very comfortable life. Our daughter, Kyndall, is truly a blessing from God (even with her attitude). However, the one thing that we lack is the ability to have kids on our own terms. Kyndall will be 5 soon, and by this time, we had hoped to have at least 2 kids and working on #3.
Early on in this process, Reggie made an awesome suggestion…for the both of us. He suggested that we, as a couple, sit down and thoroughly research our issue, PCOS, instead of focusing on Infertility as a whole. There are so many aspects of infertility, and it can get quite overwhelming and discouraging. So, together, we learned about PCOS. It just amazes me that a “little” thing known as PCOS (poly-cystic ovary syndrome) can create so many issues in women. It can cause irregular periods, infertility, difficulty in losing weight, unwanted facial and body hair…and the list goes on.
So once again, we are about to start down this long and winding road to parenthood. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. I will be keeping an on-line journal of our treatment here in wordpress. I welcome all thoughts of encouragement and prayers.
It is times like this that I am truly grateful for friends such as yourselves. I love you all.
Blessings,
Charity
