Not Tree Gifts but Need Gifts

It’s not the most wonderful time of the year for everyone. For many if not the majority it’s a time of pain due to grief. Not just grief from empty chairs at the table but grief from not receiving the gifts we need. Instead of the gifts under the tree let’s give the gifts we need.

Let’s give the gift of love. Love people for who they are. Let them love who they wanna love, let them believe in what they want to believe in, and just let them be.

Let’s give the gift of compassion. Give compassion to those suffering. Maybe they are suffering in silence from something we know nothing about because it’s too painful to share or suffering from the loss of a child, parent, or spouse.

Let’s give the gift of forgiveness. Let’s forgive ourselves first for everything in our past. Write down every guilt, shame, and judgment and burn them into ashes. Forgive others for the apology we may never receive. Closure is never promised in life.

Let’s give the gift of gratitude. Thank people who came into our life and stayed during our worst of times. Thank those who gave us opportunities. Thank someone for sharing a story with us, a part of themselves. And don’t forget to thank yourself for every mountain you’ve climbed, and the storms you’ve survived. Last but not least thank God for living in you.

Let’s give our unique gifts. If you have the gift of peace, give it to someone who needs someone who needs some peace in their life. If you have the gift of helping, help someone who needs help. If you have the gift to lead, lead someone who needs to be led. If you have the gift to empower, empower someone who’s not able to empower themselves. Find your gift and give it to someone today for Christmas.

It was not the gifts brought to Jesus that were significant but what the gifts represented and what Jesus represented. Give your gift of what you want to represent today and every day.

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas!

Pain, Suffering & Death

Another shocking, heartbreaking, tragedy happened today when we learned of another nationally known talent that left us way too soon due to indescribable pain. Suffering that no amount of fame or fortune can subside the pain. No amount of love from family or friends can stop the suffering.

In 2011 my only nephew took his life. He was only 31 years old with a 5-year-old. He had a child that loved him, a mom, sister, and dad that loved him unconditionally. He had a great job and loved his occupation. But his pain was so great that he couldn’t even speak about it. He didn’t tell us that he was in so much pain that he wanted to end his life. His death changed our family dynamics forever.

I know that pain. The pain that you don’t want to wake up to face another day. In 2021, I suffered from so much pain and heartbreak from abandonment and grief from death that I asked God to let me die in my sleep. I knew how suicide affected those left behind and I didn’t want to leave that for my one and only adult child.

It was through suffering that I awakened. I awakened spiritually. I found out that my prayer to die in my sleep was not going to be answered because I had a purpose. I didn’t know what that purpose was but I started negotiating with God and demanding answers. There wasn’t a position, a dollar amount, or any amount of love from others that could save me but knowing that I had a purpose and it was to be shared to help others came to light through a stranger and confirmed through friends that knew nothing about my suffering.

My experience was so surreal that I couldn’t and still can’t put it into words. So I started reading books. I started researching to make sure I wasn’t crazier and I started wanting to know more. It’s taken me a long time but I finally get it. When suffering is so great due to pain and emptiness that nothing or nobody can stop it, there are only two things left and that’s to find God and surrender your soul.

When we surrender we stand spiritually naked. We stand with no judgment, forgiving ourselves, and we find love and compassion for ourselves, as we have given to others. We accept ourselves for exactly how we were created because we are created in God’s image so we come into the world perfectly. It’s only when our hearts, head, and body is closed and we have disconnected from our center of intelligence that our pain brings our suffering to death.

If you are suffering and in so much pain that you want to die. I pray you find a way to surrender your soul and find your spiritual healing. To open your heart and know you are here for a reason. You do have a purpose to be shared with others.

What is the Enneagram?

A tool that guides us to learn our authentic selves. We are not as we think we are not our traumas, childhood wounds, and our beliefs based on our parents’ and caretakers’ beliefs. We are not our generational curses. We are made in the image of God. If we are made in God’s image then that means we are light, we are energy, and we are better than what we believe.

It’s our ego personality that keeps us believing what we are not. The ego traps us into believing our fears, our insecurities, our power, and any part of ourselves that we are to the external world. The ego personality is made up of the following:

◦ Thoughts

◦ Emotions

◦ Fears

◦ Beliefs

◦ Personal history

◦ Self-concept

◦ Judgments

◦ Wounds

◦ Stories

◦ Opinions

◦ Reactions

The Enneagram helps us understand the following:

◦ External behaviors

◦ Underlying attitudes

◦ Characteristics sense of self

◦ Motivations conscious and unconscious

◦ Emotional reactions

◦ Defense mechanisms

◦ Object relations

◦ What we pay attention to

◦ Spiritual barriers and potentials

The Enneagram is not witchcraft, voodoo, Scientology, or affiliated with politics or religion. It has underpinnings of Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Judaism because it dates back to 2500 B. C.

In the words of George Ichazo, who brought the Enneagram to America “ We had to distinguish between a man as he is in essence, and as he is an ego or personality. In essence, every person is perfect, fearless, and in a loving unity, with the entire cosmos, there is no conflict within the person between head, heart, and stomach are between the person and others. Then something happens, the ego begins to develop karma accumulates, there is a transition from objectivity to subjectivity; man falls from essence into personality.”

I hope this helps those who are not familiar with the Enneagram.

Me vs Me in 2023

I spent over 50 years trying to fix things, people, and situations around me for me. I put a lot of energy and time into a lot of people. If you glanced at my resume of helping people and fixing situations it would be deserving of an award.

When I stayed isolated for months grieving my pain of abandonment, rejection, and death, it was not those I had helped that came to my rescue. It was through my suffering that I got the lesson. The lesson of working on me for me. And that was the real award!

Working on me for me is what’s brought me one of the best years of my life if not the best year of my life. And I’m claiming next year to be even better. Better because I’m better.

And when we are better because we are working on ourselves we are not concerned about who is doing better than us. We don’t have time or energy to look around to see if anyone is trying to one-up us. We are not in competition with anyone because nobody competes with us.

I encourage you today to stop putting energy into people and situations that you are not going to fix or change. Stop expecting people to return the same energy. It will save a lot of heartbreak and pain. Focus on you! What do you want to do more of, less of, and differently next year? Have a mindset of me vs me for 2023!

Presence for Presents

I want to start by saying “Thank you” to each one who has supported me through my shared purpose of Dealing to Healing. I appreciate everyone who takes the time to read in a microwave culture. We are looking for quick flicks and one-liners because there’s so much to see on all social media platforms that we can’t spend too much time on any one page or we might miss something. Bravo! to those who can slow down to get the message.

I’ve been on a rant for a few weeks because the same thing keeps showing up in my life and it irritates me. What’s irritating me is the spirit of being ungrateful. It keeps showing up in my relationships. I keep hearing complaints about the “have not” instead of being thankful for the “haves”. This feels exhausting to me.

Along with the complaints is the spirit of greed. You know ungratefulness and greed are cousins. If one is ungrateful they will take advantage of any situation. It’s like when we say “I’m buying” and now they’ve gone from a burger to a steak. Y’all know what I’m talking about with folks who want to take full-blown opportunities.

Because it keeps showing up I am now beginning to question it. What’s the lesson? What trigger is this that irritates me to the bone? As I sit in silence I’m beginning to understand why those with an ungrateful spirit irritate me. I will share my conclusion later.

All I know and I will guarantee this to you. If we are grateful for every gift, every opportunity, every breathe we take it will change our life.

The real gift of gratitude is that the more grateful you are, the more present you become. Robert Holden

And if we make a conscious effort to be present in every moment and not get distracted then we will find moments of gratitude. If we live each day as if it were our last, we will find gratitude. If we are grateful we are going to bring more to us. Every single time!

The Helper

To know an Enneagram type two is to love them. If you know a “Helper”, then you know, you always have somebody in your corner to empathetically listen, help you with projects, and always be willing to go out of their way.

Living in an average healthy range we will find type two people becoming overly friendly. They attempt to win others by giving attention, approval, and flattery. They often cannot do enough for others. Wearing themselves out for everyone. They will create needs for themselves to fill so others can depend on them.

When under stress or moving to more unhealthy levels they will become resentful and complain bitterly. They do this because they feel unappreciated and unwanted. They fear losing others and play on their guilt and weaknesses. They may stuff their feelings by abusing food and medications.

Their basic desire is to be loved so naturally their basic fear is not being loved or wanted. And their hidden complaint is: I am always loving, although people don’t love me as much as I love them. I am taken for granted and unappreciated.

Does this describe someone you know? Someone in your family, coworker, friend, or you? Learn more about types by reaching out to me via social media or dealingtohealing@gmail.com

Reasons to Let Them Go

It seems I’ve fallen off blogging regularly this week but I’m super focused on a multitude of personal things including my son’s wedding. I’m also putting a lot of time and attention into my Enneagram sessions. The same item that seems to come up is toxic relationships and/or relationship changes.

It’s not surprising to learn that it’s a hot topic. We are more concerned about our relationships with our friends and family than any other piece of our lives. My most shared posts on social media has to do with toxic relationships and abandoned relationships.

There are a few reasons that relationships change. BOUNDARIES – if we hold our boundary which must be verbally said or it’s not a boundary and our boundary is not received, respected, and honored then the other person does not love us as we need to be loved. We have permission to let them go.

TOXIC – the friend or family member is toxic. They gaslight us, give us silent treatment as a form of punishment, emotionally abuse us, or physically abuse us, we have permission to let them go. We are not here to fix others but to fix ourselves and part of fixing ourselves is removing ourselves from toxic relationships and environments.

And this one is the hardest. What if they are respecting our boundaries and what if they are not toxic but we outgrow the relationship? And what I’m about to say is not to be interpreted as a hard cut but as a suggestion to move on. We can still have a relationship but maybe not as tightly woven.

OUTGROW – If we are working on ourselves as a daily practice and our friends and family are not then it’s no different than working on ourselves physically. If one goes out every day to train for a marathon and the other is satisfied to do a daily walk then it’s inevitable that the runner is always going to be ahead of the walker.

Outgrowing relationships is going to happen if others are not working on themselves. And even if they are sometimes it’s necessary not to have all the winners together. At the end of every Super Bowl and World Series game, the winners are disbursed to other teams so they can teach others to be winners. Hard to digest if we think why would we want to break up such a perfect group. Because our responsibilities are to help others and shine our light on the world therefore the winners must move on.

I don’t want to be the “smartest” one in the room. If I’m the one that has all the answers because I’ve done the work or I’m the fastest runner because I’ve been training then who do I look to within my relationships to grow myself? Note to self…never be the smartest one in the room. Find the people who will guide you to be better, to do better for yourself and others.

Thankful for You

Thanksgiving Eve, I was communicating with one of my cousins on social media. It was during our communication that I realized my mom had been gone for 3 years on Thanksgiving day. When I realized it, my heart sank and I suddenly felt sad. I was already feeling off balance due to the holiday season and this seemed to worsen it.

I woke up at 5:30 am Thanksgiving morning. Sometimes God wakes us up when he needs time with us. I used to get frustrated but now I know there’s a reason. I woke up and started my morning routine. My devotion, prayer, and meditation. Then I started reading my current book Higher Purpose until I fell back to sleep.

When I woke up the second time at 8:30 am, I had such peace that I wanted to take my 3-mile walk. As I was walking I started thanking God for people. I started thanking him for my tribe, then I started thanking him for those that have been there for me, that had given me opportunities, and who supported me. As each one of my friends and contacts entered my mind, I sent them a “Happy Thanksgiving” text just to let them know I was thinking of them. I lost count of how many texts I sent but I walked almost 2 miles before I finished.

When I finished with my walk and texts, I felt 100 percent better than I did the night before Thanksgiving. It’s proof that we are as we think. When we start being thankful for the “haves” and not the “have-nots” it is a game changer. Having a spirit of gratitude is life-changing.

I share this with you today because I know we are in a season of being thankful for our food and as we enter the season of gift giving we are thankful for our gifts but let’s be thankful for the people in our lives. Those that share space with us, that give us opportunities, that share their love language with us. Let’s continue to be thankful for God protecting us from the those that are not for us but against us so they left us. And give God thanks for sending those to us right when we need them. Who are you thankful for today?

That Didn’t Feel Good

While I was in Enneagram school, I learned that I am I “think and do” type and I suppress my feelings. That was hard for me to digest because I thought that I was a “feeler and doer” more than a thinker. So I bought another Enneagram book to understand this challenge.

Fast forward I now understand it and acknowledge it to be true. When we get our feelings hurt, or feel pain from an experience with friends, family, or coworkers some of us tend to say hurtful things because we are hurt. Saying our thoughts from our pain does not heal our feelings. The only thing to heal our feelings is compassion.

When we respond to a hurtful experience with “that didn’t feel good” or “that hurt my feelings” it brings a different response to the table. We are more than likely going to get an apology with compassion and understanding. If we act on our hurt feelings with a hurtful thought that we speak such as “kiss my ass” then we are not saying how we feel, we are reacting by retaliating.

It is a conscious thought that we might need to take a breath before responding. The unconscious is responding to our trauma and our old programming. When we respond unconsciously we might fight by facing the threat aggressively, flight (flee) by running away, freeze by not being able to respond against the threat, or fawn which is immediately acting to please to avoid a conflict.

I know it’s hard because most of us have not been programmed to say how we feel, especially men. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard a man say “that hurt my feelings”. It’s perceived as a sign for the weak but it’s a characteristic for the strong, that we can speak on how we feel and how other’s actions affect us.

Let’s make a conscious effort to not fight, flee, freeze, or fawn when we feel pain from others. Let’s dismiss saying how we feel as a sign for the weak and encourage others to speak on their feelings when we hurt them.