Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving a month earlier than their American cousins. Sitting at the computer screen realizing I hadn’t posted anything for a couple of days, I figured I better find something to say. Being single, the holidays don’t mean that much to me and they sort of sneak up unnoticed, and thankfully, will often slip past unnoticed as well. I keep myself busy in many other ways.

As I recalled Thanksgiving, I wondered about the month separating the Canadian and American thanksgiving holiday. Not one to obsess over such trivial matters, a thought occurred that seemed to fit. Up here in the north of the Americas, our winter comes sooner, as does our fall, as does our harvest, and hence, our Thanksgiving. Seems plausible.

This isn’t the theme though is it? Just a curious side-note. Thanks for humouring me.

Thanksgiving is a time to express gratitude. There are so many things, even in spite of the hardships and difficulties I may be experiencing, or have experienced.

After a serious accident, while I may never be the same solid structural human I once was, I am solid and fit and the injured joint is recovering well with good mobility and strength. I suspect this trend will continue.

Here is one that is big and juicy for my world. I love people, and I love to be connected to some friends. What have I got to be Thankful for? This year has seen incredibly wonderful people show up in my social circles. I’m talking about people who inspire and bring out the best in me, people who support the me that I am and encourage the gift of my life to be realized for the benefit of everyone. What a supercharged gift of gratitude that brings to my heart.

With all the struggles of the past years, the broken shoulder of last fall, and the potential outcomes, I’m pretty glad I’m here writing this to you today. Things can happen that will leave you wondering, worrying, and fearful. These things can be an undoing. Somehow, I found the light and kept going to the light (bad metaphor but hey). The worst fears were parked and put away. The faith muscle grew.

How about a little gratitude for sitting there reading this right now. What do you want to be grateful for this Thanksgiving?

Denial: I have to wonder what this is really all about.

Over the decades, as psychology has gone more mainstream, it has infiltrated every aspect of our lives culturally and socially. It’s in our health coverage plans, employee benefits, in the movies, sitcoms, and even more in the advertisements. I’d say they’re having an influence upon our self and group consciousness.

Earlier, I caught myself asking a question to seek the opinion of someone else about my skill, rather than just toot my horn which was what I was inspired to do in the first place. I had just finished work on a project that made me feel pretty good, and true to joy, a little cocky swaggering was called for. Instead, I censored myself and tried soliciting accolades rather than be boastful. I puzzled over this turn-about and what influenced this censoring.

As I have studied and observed the human condition over the years, it has been noted that a steady surge has broken down communion among people by placing more emphasis upon personal satisfaction and fulfillment. With so much individuality pushed in the marketplace, advertising relationships, etc., the subliminal influences shift our value-base unconsciously. With there being so much negative media created to ‘sell’ to consumers, the personal identity and place of the individual in context to family and community becomes obscured, questionable, and finally, burdensome, to many.

On yet another side, the self-help industry is so full of individual band-aid stories, that the people seeking solutions typically find themselves discovering more personal problems than they bargained for. It’s like reading the horoscope. There are enough generalities and commonalities among people that we can buy into a prognosis which we then make more real through our own belief. In addition, rational and healthy human behavior ends up falling under close scrutiny while answers are sought amongs all the expert opinions, programs, and books.

As I found myself concluding these thoughts, only one question remained. When will simply being a joyful and sharing human being be okay again?

People who liked this article liked the following:

The 11 Forgotten Laws That Make The Law of Attraction An Unbreakable Force

Dr. Anthony’s Self-Confidence Creator!

by echiner1

February 2005 I sat down at my computer and wrote my own Eulogy. It was an exercise from the Career Counselling days, to draw upon the imagination and inner spirit to describe the life well-lived we want to be remembered. I stumbled upon it today and went, “Wow!”

One Man Can make a difference was a deep belief that propelled Lee through the arduous journey to creating a powerful future for himself and those whose lives he touched. Initially, there was a great deal of struggle as he broke down the structures and limiting beliefs that had defined his life experiences. As he worked through these issues, an awakening to his truest self took root and put him directly into the path of adversity and growth. The lessons he experienced, combined with the wisdom of masters, made him available to the larger community to serve as a guide, a teacher, and a loving mentor on their individual journeys.

His belief that we are all incredible spirits, here to manifest some form of greatness in our lives, was the most inspiring quality that he brought forth in his daily walk through life. His understanding of human nature, our propensity for fear, enabled him to offer compassion and forgiveness, both to himself and for others, further empowering everyone to embrace the journey, the setbacks and failures, and further enabling the forward motion the desire for a well-lived life created. No well-lived life is without mistakes, setbacks, and pain. It is through these experiences that he discovered the richness that lives within us all and has the power and potential to create community, abundance, and great joy.

by h.koppdelaney

His legacy has helped to define a shift in human-consciousness that has created space in western thought to realize our spirituality in a cosmic web of cause and effect. This understanding further instructs us to the power of choice in our lives and the power of intent in mind, body, and spirit that creates our future. What we believe we are, we choose to be. What we wish to see changed in life, we BE that change.

Lee will be missed and he will be remembered as he lives on in each of our lives, while we too create the legacy in our lives that he began for his own life; a life representative of the human spirit and human experience.

Hey Dood…
It’s just past midnight
My brother said, “Later”
As he walked out the door

Finally, the night silence
greets my space and I sit
at my throned interface
to my online world

Innovate the click of the eye
Weaving the web divine
To experience possibilities
In the surreal Internet mind

© 2008 Lee Down

Reflecting upon experiences recently, I wondered at my steadiness. I didn’t feel it. I felt shaken, maybe even stirred. I just wasn’t sure. So you see? I wasn’t rock solid, and I’d have to confess that I may not yet be rock solid. I certainly don’t feel it. And yet…

The other week I was speaking with an old friend of mine and he reminded me of sage advice I’d meted out to him a few years earlier. “Sometimes we just feel beaten, but we know it isn’t true. The trouble we have is shaking that feeling, and to be true to who and what we are. I understood finally, after years of not understanding, ‘fake it till you make it.’ It means to really feel it, that juice that you felt when you were having a peak experience. The only way there was to recall the memory, to pull that memory so fully into the present that you remember what it felt like. Now hang onto that feeling, because it is you too. Fake it till you make it.” And he did.

Still wondering, I realized that even though I feel shaky, I also feel a certain confidence. This confidence is in something larger than myself, and I can’t quite explain that to you. I think it is something we each have to come to on our own. Even so, another thought also expressed itself in those wondering moments that held a great deal of promise for the future, and yielded beautiful insight to the past: I’m not rock solid.

Like Stanley Park after the wind-storms ravaged her forests, the man that I was has been stripped bare. What once stood mighty and strong is now exposed and vulnerable. It remains that way as the new growth, young saplings, define the character of the new tomorrow. Relying fully on the anchor that remained through it all, that barrenness greets the hardships honing and shaping with the friction of life that bears fruit.

Vulnerable, I remain…. maybe

Sometimes there is so much to say that the stories jumble into a colourful paint-splatter that is meaningless, though beautiful with vibrant life. Focus, focus, focus. This has been the theme for a time now, and in tandem I’m tackling many other areas of my life. Don’t you just hate the stop-go-wait-trip-go-stop cycle of making positive changes in your life? It’s exasperating at times!

It’s quite remarkable how many areas of life are impacted as a major transition is underway. Career, finances, people, friends, social activities, schedule, organization, communication, creativity, and maybe something else I missed. All of these areas are experiencing change simultaneously. For myself, I find the people are the anchors that offer a buffer from the battering winds.

Love is the thing: I’ve been on this kick for years. It’s kind of exasperating too, particularly when it creeps people out. But what are you gonna do? I’ve tried to run and hide from this thing that keeps urging it upon me. Why do any of us do some of the things we do? Isn’t there a sense of purpose behind your choices, actions, particularly with the big decisions? I really know this is true.

Recent experiences have aided in building great momentum – not so much an in my life thing, rather an in my being thing. Again, it is through the connection with people; the stuff (people) that really makes life worthwhile. These connections are what offer opportunities for challenge and growth, and the connections stir things up inside as I see the reflections from within myself. I’m challenged to confront the block and push through it rather than ignore it.

Love is it. That force that emanates from within, that creates the fire-in-the-belly, and the drive in our loins. It is purpose, and when it is clicking, I know my life is demanding nothing less than the best. And again, love is it. Relationship to myself saw remarkable changes and improvements as I regained my footing. This enabled others to come into my life to further support and challenge merely through their presence. We do attract what we need, when we’re ready and put it out there.

This journey isn’t over, it is just reaching toward the beginning. If you’re challenged by change, overcoming negative thinking, or going through any difficult transitions, I think you’ll find these continuing entries useful in their sharing. I’ve found the journey very rewarding, and re-learned that it does not come without effort, pain, or struggle. This is part of the journey from one state to another, as layers of an old-self are stripped away to allow room for the fullest growth of the new being emerging from within. Let’s grow!