Daily Gratitude: We all have stories but did you ever stop to think how much your stories rule your life. Your brain receives information and as it’s processing it, it’s trying to find a story in its database that it can compare the info too. That story depends on your childhood and all your experiences. Some of us have reactive stories. Some have loving stories. Some have both. The important thing is to realize that our reactions/responses to any single thing will be based on our history- our story! Once you recognize that, you can stop and think “whoa, what story am I telling myself here. After all it is just a story – it’s something from the past. So, I can change it if I need or want to”. There’s that awareness step again. Once you’re aware, you can now change it. You can give more – give what you didn’t get. Remember, though, that you have to be aware of what it is you didn’t get.

Daily Gratitude: So beautiful…and key – heart open, quiet mind! In my training at Abode and as a death doula, they teach the “don’t know mind”. To me, this is more than just an open mind. I see an open mind as one that has at least one opinion about something, but is willing to “listen and hear the facts” and possibly change that opinion. The “don’t know mind” has no opinions because it recognizes it doesn’t have enough knowledge (facts) to have an opinion. So it’s willing to just go in, look and listen and then maybe form a concept about what’s going on. Can you think of instances where you’ve had an open mind vs having a “don’t know mind?”

Daily Gratitude: This is why it takes awhile for the agitated appearance to dissipate when someone who says they’ve changed their mind and now agree with you. If you let yourself, you’ll find yourself questioning the validity of their statements and not believing them. You have to give their body time to metabolize and release those chemicals. Haven’t you ever noticed that you might be frightened of something, let’s say a loud noise in the house, and your heart rate skyrockets. Then you find out that the cat just knocked something off the counter and it wasn’t someone breaking in after all. Now your thought will be “dumb cat – scared the dickens out of me”. But your heart rate, although starting to slow, is still faster than normal. You’ve heard the expression- “just take a deep breath and relax” (while you’re thinking “yeah right, buddy, you can have my cat and then see how calm you are”). It isn’t just an expression- the deep breath will help to soothe your vagus nerve which then helps soothe all of you. Next time you are in a heated discussion just try to remember that thoughts are electricity and can change in the blink of an eye. But emotions are chemical reactions and they take time to change.