Just breathe

Inspiration hit, you type out this amazing blurb. You thank your muse. And go back to read it and it is gone. Not saved... That was the first paragraph of this blog. I am in research mode and not for anything in particular but synchronicity will peak my interest in a topic then due to Youtube and algorithms that I would rather no nothing about. I start seeing certain topics in my life more and more so I must consume all I can on that topic until I have a general idea on the said topic. Particularly Nikola Tesla, dreams, alternate universes, and philosophy.

I will try to create some of the thoughts and ideas in the lost paragraph, but it will never be the same.

I am a social worker and many times I am dealing with children, parents and even coworkers that are upset and what seems inconsolable. I have been learning about meditation and yoga lightly for years but I know I am an amateur so I do not speak up about it very often. But a few times this year in my job I saw places that just some deep breathing could possibly solve an issue if not give the person a moment of calm to get a fresh perspective. One was a child crying and agitated. I asked the child to do a three-step breathing exercise that I do with my son, where we stretch our arms to the sky greeting the sun inhaling through the nose, holding the breath as we bring the hands to our center solar plexus for a second to hold the breath and then releasing the breath and we reach to the ground to touch our toes. And repeat. I did this with a screaming crying child and within a minute he was fine. The sobs stopped and he finished a round of 10.



Another time a co-worker was agitated with parents and just a few weeks ago. He knew about the three-step breathing I had done with the upset child. It was the first thing out of his mouth-- he refused, thinking he would look silly. So I asked him to just breathe in through his nose holds it then exhale the negative thoughts out through his mouth. Repeating it a few times. Which he was willing to do. He only did about three but his shoulders relaxed and a smile came to his lips. Even he was a little surprised that just a few breaths brought him back to a calm he thought was gone for the day.

Our bodies do so much automatically without our knowledge, the brain, all our organs, and systems are working day and night to keep us alive. But when we can override the computer and take back some control, we can learn to be in control of our bodies even in the most stressful and what may seem overwhelming. And the easiest and healthiest way seems to be with the breath. Our lungs will breathe without our help. But when we control the air as it comes through the nostrils and hold it for a count of x. Then exhale for a count of four, the I that isn't our mind or our body is in control. Because we are not our bodies and we are not our brains. But through the overriding of these systems, we are taking back control but also letting go of that freedom of thought that many times accompanies the breathing focus.

Then feelings and emotions are no longer in control, we are. And that is the real power, the real goal of this life. Learning to control our inside leads to not allowing the outside (People and situations) to control us.

Thank You Dave Chappelle-- Synchronicity Part 3 aka my 250th BLOG!!!

Every day we have the opportunity to make a change we think and talk about without procrastination. Sounds cliche but these last few days and weeks I have been analyzing my life, not it in a whole but all aspects. Particularly thinking about the memories I make with my kids and the lessons I need them to take away from their time with me, which in turn makes me look back to my time with my own parents. I probably reflect on parenting more than most people because I am a social worker and I see how parental action affects children daily and in the long term. It actually is the main reason I started looking for other fields to work in. The stress is too much for my soul to bear.

Watching new Dave Chappelle comedy special he brings up Sunday Dinner, a whole spread of food almost like a small Thanksgiving or Easter.I instantly pictured a table covered with dishes of veggies, steaming mashed potatoes, meat as the centerpiece, and everyone passing this and that around while talking about this and that. So I did. I went to the grocery the next day bought a turkey and had a mini Thanksgiving invited my Cousin, daughter's boyfriend, a family friend and we had a great First Sunday meal. Since starting this blog, we have done a second one-- taco and fajitas dinner with another cousin's boys as the guests of honor along with my immediate family. Two weeks of success!

Dave Chappelle lives in Yellow Springs-- which is where I am applying to work. The only job I really want, Admission Counselor at Antioch College. On Saturday, I was cleaning out one of my sheds part of my lent/spring cleaning/minimalizing our junk from our lives that we don't need and I came across a postcard sent to me from the Assistant Director of Admissions when I was in High School. This is the position I am applying for. This could be something I do in my dream duties. Sending out positive vibes, I put the postcard in my wallet. The week before the Sunday dinner revolution, I had found one of my Antioch School Ids. Meaningful coincidences? I hope so.

Silly Dany, you didn't tell your readers how all this really ties together. My fourth year (senior) at Antioch either during finals or while I was finishing my Senior project on the Creation and Childhood of Serial Killers, Dave Chappelle came to visit on campus where he was friends with one of the dudes on my dorm. He had just released Half Baked and the grandness of it all had most people running to kiss some ass. I was the one trying to finish my thesis and was bothered by the "star's" dog running up and down the halls.I was unimpressed and may have been a little vocal about it. It was straight out of a movie like PCU. Overworked college student losing their mind over a dog barking trying to finish their senior thesis! So, my first meeting of Dave Chappelle was in 1999 at Antioch College when I yelled about his dog not being controlled...

This was the last person I ever expected to bring a family tradition back to my life. But Dave, Yellow Springs and Antioch are all saying yes. So thanks, Dave. We are enjoying Sunday Dinner and maybe we will meet for times two, three and four in Yellow Springs some day after I have published my books and have been hired by Antioch.

Do you experience Synchronicity in your life? Comment below I would love to hear from you. I would love to know how others experience this.

Synchronicity

Synchronicity
"Synchronicity is a concept, first explained by psychiatrist Carl Jung, which holds that events are "meaningful coincidences" if they occur with no causal relationship, yet seem to be meaningfully related."

I love finding Synchronicity in my life. The lightning bugs of life, as soon as the glow is close enough for your to grasp it then its gone but you go on and you step another way and there is another firefly. Sometimes these "meaningful coincidences" are the things that help us make a change in our life, calm our fears when anxiety may be overwhelming our souls. Other times these coincidences can be eerie or scary making a mind paranoid if they are already prone to think those things. I think they are my easter eggs or puzzle pieces of life showing me the way to the big picture of where I need to be heading.

Within a week, I did a Facebook quiz (I know, it's a FB quiz) about which Carl Jung Archetype I was? http://mydailyquizz.com/which-carl-jung-archetype-best-describes-you/
It chose Sage--
"You're the sage! According to Carl Jung, the sage represents wisdom and the search for truth. You are wise beyond your years, patient and a deep thinker. You're driven by a thirst for knowledge. One of your greatest fears is being ignorant, misled, or duped. You're incredibly intelligent but you risk over analyzing until you're incapable of actually making a decision. You're an old soul and wise beyond your years, but Jung would tell you don't get lost in the clouds!"

Then a day later, I was talking to a friend online and needed to spell Synchronicity and I didn't want to look like a tool. And when I looked up the word, it was a "meaningful coincidence" that the person that first explained the concept was Carl Jung. And if anyone is unclear who Carl Jung is, he was a super famous psychologist probably second only to Freud.

Again three or four times since I have started this article on Synchronicity I have come across quotes in books, facebook or just online by Carl Jung. Meaningful coincidences? Or is it my brain is now looking for Carl Jung the same as when I bought my Red Nissan and now I see Red Nissan Sentras everywhere I go.

I prefer to think of my seeing Carl Jung as meaningful coincidence and take it as a hint from the universe to study this theory further. It is deep and involved. I will report more on Jung's Synchronicity and Archetypes in the coming weeks and their roles in my changing life.

What am I worth? (Synchronicity preview)

Many places in my life in the last few weeks someone has put some kind of value or asked me to put a number value on me as a person. It shook me to the core every time it happened. I am not something to be put into a numeric value. Maybe it scares me to think of myself as a cash cow. Put to slaughter for a price. One was for life insurance and disability insurance our yearly meeting with the same smiling face. She loves me I add more every year paranoid that someone will get hurt or goddess forbid die. I with having Epilepsy I constantly worry about my long term health. It's under control now, but I was told as a child I would outgrow it too. So here was the first place someone asked me to pick my big worth.

As I am applying for jobs or more like browsing the job market. I cannot say there has been much that screams LEAVE WHAT YOU HAVE! yet. But here is another place where they want you to say what you are worth. And it's some weird pissing game, that I don't understand. You don't want to put a salary too low and look desperate but you don't want to put too high either. But some people say over confident does win because it sells a demeanor that the upper management wants in an employee. I am just honest and put the amount I need to leave my current position for that position. I am not a good liar or negotiator. I am better to just put it out there and if you dig my vibe then we can work together. That is how I am playing this, I am looking for my bliss work related and I think it will find me when I find it.

My husband asked me what I thought I was worth for all the thoughts, ideas, jobs, all the potential in me what I could be worth. He had a number for himself and I waited and spit out some random number like $50,000 and I really have no idea where I came up with this number because I was just so taken back by the thought of quantifying my creativity and productivity into a number. Sometime since the birth of my kids, I had the revelation that the real currency in life was time. If we were to give people real gifts, it should be vouchers for our time and we should hold fast to meet face to face with people. Time is our most precious gift; One I have tried to give to my kids as often as they have allowed me. There have been people in my life I have been shamefully selfish with my time and my belly aches over those losses. But I have today. And I have time. I have no other value to speak of but I have time.