Posted on

Treat Your Life Like Your Phone

by

Take some time today to reflect on those who have lost their life in service to their country. Be grateful they have kept you safe

Terrie’s Tip – Treat your phone like your life. Most people spend a great deal of their life on their phone and it is an extension of them. So keep it neat and uncluttered. Then do the same for your life. Make one mirror the other.

You’ve heard people laud the idea of an empty email inbox. The same can be applied to your phone’s storage size. How much clutter is on your phone, How much in your life?

I have to spend some time over many days to delete the thousands of pictures on my phone. Do I have do? Not yet but I am probably pretty close to full even though I haven’t checked it lately. I just know it’s time to discard so many of them.
But I’m not going to just randomly delete. I’ve spent the past few days backing them all up to multiple external hard drives so that they aren’t totally lost. They are just out of my “brain”. I don’t need all these photos cluttering up my “brain”.

I’m also going to delete many many many apps – I’m an app junkie. Do I need all these things I’ve tried (just like all the things I’ve tried in my life)? Heck no. But instead of taking action and deleting them when I realize that, i just ignore them and they sit there taking up space. What is taking up space in your life that you can get rid of? Things that were useful once may no longer even be necessary so they don’t need to be on the phone (in your life). If there’s data you don’t want to lose, find out how to keep it if you can.

Beliefs are like our apps – it’s time to re-evaluate your beliefs and see if they are still valid and appropriate for your current life. Many are embedded in childhood and we rarely take stock of our beliefs. We should do periodic reviews and see if they are still what you want in your life.

We have so much clutter on our phone and in our lives and not just in the house.

Take some time to declutter your phone and as you’re doing it think about how you can declutter your life as well.

Remember the fallen today!

Posted on

Everyone is Just As Important As You

by

Terrie’s Tip – It’s always wise to remember that everyone is just as important as you…and wants to be treated as such.

This is so key to existing well in our day and age especially. Everyone else is a human. You are a human. Everyone has a past that has influenced them. You have a past that has influenced you. Everyone has a variety of feelings. You have a variety of feelings. Everyone has basic human emotions. You have basic human emotions. Everyone has different ways of responding and reacting to events or triggers. You have different ways of responding and reacting to events or triggers. Everyone has fears. You have fears. Everyone want to be liked and feel important. You want to be liked and feel important.

Your job and your accomplishments don’t really make you important. They may make you stand out so others see you but you are not more important than the person who cleans the hospital rooms or picks up your garbage. Those are labels, they are just jobs. They are not really YOU and they don’t make you more important than anyone else.

Everything you have or want is exactly what other humans have or want. It’s just a matter of what color or texture the gift wrapping is that makes us “look” different.

What you want to find out is what’s underneath that gift wrapping. Just know that it’s more valuable than any present you could imagine. The gift just may surprise you. If you can look past the poorly taped paper, the lopsided bow and the spilled coffee and just be grateful for what’s inside, you will view people much differently than ever before – and you will have a much richer and more fulfilled life.

Enjoy the gift of what’s inside that other human!

Posted on

“What Happened To You?

by 






Terrie’s Tip – Instead of asking “What’s wrong with you (or he/she)?” you should be asking “What happened to them (or you)?”

Thanks to Oprah Winfrey and Dr. Bruce Perry for this. They have published a book with that title “What Happened to You?” If you know someone with “issues” or problems or who has had a difficult childhood or if it’s you, read this book. Given the statistics for how many people in the country (and probably the world) have had this kind of issue I would just recommend that everyone read it..haha..yes, I know there are normal people out there but even if that’s you, you are dealing with so many others in the world that have been exposed to adverse childhood events (ACE).

What these two have put together is brilliant and tells us that even though you think Joe is a real jerk and you just can’t understand why he’s so immature and always blowing up for ‘no good reason’, if you asked the right question (even if it’s just of yourself because you don’t want to risk asking him), you might be able to accept him a bit better and even have some compassion for him. Poor Joe doesn’t even know why he does what he does. He doesn’t remember that no one ever came to care for him when his diaper was dirty or wet when he was 1 month old. He doesn’t know that he interpreted that as him not being good enough or that he was unloved but that’s what happened.

The things that happen to (or don’t happen to) us when we’re children have so much of an impact on us that comes along on the whole “getting older” journey. Every day it seems, scientists are finding out how much of an impact that is.

This applies this weekend to many of your friends and family members who are vets. Those who have had a traumatic childhood (absence of love, experiencing constant chaos and uncertainty, etc) and then have been exposed to trauma of war will have a greater negative outcome. Be more understanding when you see someone with PTSD.

I have learned that when we are “triggered” and get angry, we are responding to something that happened to us in the past NOT to the person or even that is happening now. Becoming aware of this is the first important step in the whole process. Anger can be considered “temporary insanity” (thanks Dr. David Hanscom) because you are incapable of thinking since the blow flow to the thinking part of your brain is cut off when you’re angry.

The non-scientific point here is that instead of being judgmental about people perhaps it would serve us better if we’d step back and show compassion and simply wonder “what happened to Joe”….that made him behave like this. If we realize it’s not his choice, we can reach out with greater love and understanding – maybe even greater than he has for himself.

To learn more, get the book – I am listening to the audiobook and Oprah feels so strongly about this (as you would know if you were addicted to her show apparently – I was not so I wasn’t aware she was such an advocate for helping abused children), she narrates half – it’s like a conversation between her and Dr. Perry.

Let’s try to understand and care about others knowing that the way they are acting is most likely because of the stuff that happened to them when they were so very little.