 Years ago I heard a story about an executive who was called into the human resources department and invited to find success elsewhere. The executive commented, “I have been on your side of the table and fired many people in my career. What I have learned is that there are two sides to the table…. Today it is my turn to be on the other side.” There are many tables in life. We often forget there are two sides to each table. During our happiest experiences do we realize that at the exact same time it could be one of those moments of desperation for someone else? A young couple I know brought a baby girl into the world a year ago. They were ecstatic to add the curly headed beauty to their family. They were on the right side of the table. Unfortunately, their sweet baby lived less than a month and they were forced to the other side of the table in the most devastating way. Happily, this week my young friends rejoiced at the birth of a baby girl who shares the same curly black hair as her sister before her. I join their friends and family surrounding them with love and well wishes. At the same time a longtime friend of mine passed away due to cancer. I join her friends and family clinging to the circle of support and love which surrounds them. I received emails and phone calls from one family sharing joyous news, while at the same time I received the most devastating messages of grief and sadness from the other. The table stood large before me as I saw the experiences of both sides. Pain and grief on one side. Joy and gratitude on the other. How often do we forget that while we sit on one side of the table that there is always someone on the other side? My young friends today hold their new daughter marveling at her perfection while the soreness of missing their first daughter lives in their hearts. They know what it’s like to be on both sides of the table. The ebb and flow, the natural order, the balance of good verses bad is part of our daily lives. It takes the ebb to feel the flow. It takes the bad to know the good. It takes a backdrop of the darkness of night to see the sunrise in the morning. Be sensitive. Be grateful. Be aware. We never know when it will be our turn to sit at the other side of the table. Pennie’s Life Lesson ~ “There's always two sides to the table. Be grateful when you sit on the sunny side and strong when you find yourself on the shadowed side.” ************* Special thanks to Ms. Amara Beatrix Mitchell for allowing me to use her beauty shot in this post! ************* YOUR TURN...
I shared this with you to encourage you look at both sides of events in life- we will all be on both sides. Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below. And please feel free to email me at: [email protected]. Thank you! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ All Rights Reserved Copyright © 2013-2019 Pennie Hunt This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt. Feel free to forward and share this post. Please keep the entire message intact, including contact, logo, and copyright information.
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 “How are you?” – “Oh, I’m so BUSY!” “Hello there, how ya doin?” – “I am swamped, I’m too BUSY!” “What are you up too, want to ….. "No, no, no, I can’t I have too much going on- I’m too BUSY!” “I’m busy” has become our response to any greeting. Busy has become our natural state. Busy has become a thing- a noun – like a dark shadow that circles our lives. Do you see what we are doing to ourselves? When did we begin equating being busy with success? Maybe it began as an attempt to seem important by verbally listing the engagements, meetings and commitments we have on our to-do-list…and ending with a sigh. Always a sigh. At some point we began believing our own self talk. After all, our mind and brain will believe our own voice more than any other voice. And we were very convincing. We began to believe that we had to have a list to keep up with everyone else. We had to be busy! We began to believe that the level of busy-ness was the measure of our own self-worth. So the list became longer. We foolishly became filled with distracting details of our activities. The exchanged expression of ALL we have to do became expected. And exhausting. But, we didn’t stop there. We began adding things to our lives. Remember being busy = success! Yes, life moves fast. New age electronics have increased this speed at an astounding pace. It is frightening to ponder. We all have work, families, responsibilities and commitments. Do we have to make ourselves even more overwhelmed with the continual documenting of our busy-ness to everyone we interact with? Secretly we just want to scream! What if we began answering greetings with, “I’m well, I’m happy and I am thrilled to see you today!” What if we greeted others with, “What is making you happy today?” And then, shut up and smile. Possibly, just possibly, the response may be more engaging than the level of overloaded activities filling the pack on their back. They may just share a joyful story or expression of happiness. The way greetings are meant to be. Here is mine to you: “Hello there, how are you? What brings you joy today?” And your response is??? ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Pennie’s Life Lesson: “Stop telling yourself and others how busy you are. Instead speak of the joy and happiness that fills your life!” ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ YOUR TURN...
I shared this with you to encourage you think about how many times you tell others how busy you are. Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below. And please feel free to email me at: [email protected]. Thank you! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ All Rights Reserved Copyright © 2013-2019 Pennie Hunt This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt. Feel free to forward and share this post. Please keep the entire message intact, including contact, logo, and copyright information.  Are you letting stories that you repeat over and over again define who you are? Do you allow them to drive your life? If you don’t know what I mean read: WHO IS CHAUFFEURING YOUR LIFE? Maybe you have your stories under control but have another problem… other PEOPLE who want to (or you allow to) chauffeur your life. You know, that back seat driver that is always telling you where your life should go at every turn. As you read that, did someone immediately come to mind? Did you see their face and hear their voice? If so, you know what I am talking about. Humans need human contact to survive. People need people. We need time. We need touch. We need connection. What we don’t need is to feel like we are powerless or controlled. We don’t need to feel like our emotions and happiness are totally dependent on pleasing someone else. We don’t need to feel like our actions are being controlled by the demands of another person. I do have a caveat here -- I am not talking about a mutually loving relationship where there is reciprocity of respect, kindness and love. It is healthy when we give of our self and do acts of love and kindness for others and in return receive feelings of love and self-satisfaction. I am talking about the sponges that soak up all of our good intentions and acts of kindness without returning any level of thoughtfulness. Oh, occasionally they may throw a sweet gesture your way, but for the most part, they hold an expectation that you will always be there, always support them and always give, give, give. We believe the control is created by the other person, but the reality is – WE create the situation by giving away our control. We allow the back seat driver to steer our life and control our actions. Let me say that again- WE create the situation by giving away our control. By doing this we give away our happiness. We cheapen our value by letting others push our buttons. We feel tied like a puppet with no way to cut the strings. And yet, we are the only ones who can. It is even possible that the other person is not aware of this situation, but it has been going on for so long that it has become a habit that holds no consequences or responsibility on their side. After all, they are in the cushy seat, the comfortable place, the receiving end. We must create boundaries. Boundaries around what we will or won’t do. Boundaries around our self-inflicted guilt when we believe we are responsible for the other person. Boundaries around our hearts as a protection from the invisible force of expectation we feel from the other person. And boundaries around our minds that have been trained to create the illusion of obligation to this person. Isn’t it time to put the brakes on? If you are always giving family members or friends money to get them back on their feet, but never see them grow up and take control of their own life --Stop writing checks expecting this to change. If someone is always late, wait an appropriate 10-15 minutes and then leave- they obviously feel their time is more important than yours. Don’t cheapen your value. If you are the one who tries to make everything perfect for others in hopes of making them happy, but it is never enough-- it probably never will be enough and they will probably never be happy… and while doing this, neither will you. If you are under obligation to continually take care of or give to a person, evaluate if the obligation is real or is it just your perception that you “owe” someone your time and talent. Evaluate the situation for codependency. Are you getting something from being a martyr? Even if you feel like you are being used and taken advantage of, have you become dependent on being needed? If you are continually trying to stop giving your resources of time, finances, energy and control of your emotions and life to someone else, but only break free for short periods of time. Then you slip back into the old pattern again of one-way giving. Chart how long you have been doing this pattern. Where has it gotten you? If you are following a life path because someone told you it was the road you should take, but you hate the scenery, you feel lost, or you know in your heart it isn’t the way you should be going, it is never too late to stop, make a U-turn and let your soul’s GPS recalculate to guide you on YOUR path. There isn’t time to be controlled by a backseat driver. Be your own navigator on this road of life. Take control of your own steering wheel. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Pennie’s Life Lesson: “Take control of your own thoughts, time and talent. Don’t allow a back seat driver to steer your life.” ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Pennie Heart to Heart WHO IS YOUR BACKSEAT DRIVER? All Rights Reserved
Copyright © 2013-2019 Pennie Hunt This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt. Feel free to forward and share this post. Please keep the entire message intact, including contact, logo, and copyright information.  I’m a natural smiler. I smile all the time. Some people don’t. At 6’5” my husband’s size is intimidating. His natural serious expression adds to this intimidating appearance and can unintentionally make him appear angry, annoyed or uninterested. Recently, when I was encouraging him to SMILE, he responded with, “I am smiling on the inside. No one ever taught me how to smile on the outside.” As babies, we are taught to walk by repeatedly being stood in front of open arms and encouraged to move our feet in clumsy toddler fashion until we move across the room. If we don’t succeed, we fall and are reinforced that it “feels better” to walk than to fall. Were you taught to smile in the same way? Were you taught how to raise the corners of your mouth to form one smile after another like putting one foot in front of the other to walk? We aren’t taught that even the slightest lift of the corners of our mouths lessens the creases in our foreheads, removes the heaviness on our face, and allows our eyes to sparkle. We aren’t taught that a smile is a gift we give ourselves and the easiest gift to give to others --It is almost guaranteed that if you give one you will receive one in return. We aren’t taught that smiles have the power to change someone’s day; to lift a heart; and to share love in a spontaneous way. We aren’t taught that a pleasant resting face with the hint of a smile creates a welcoming persona when others see you and a full out smile when you meet people makes them feel important and ‘seen.” We aren’t taught that a smile opens doors, opens opportunities and opens hearts.” We aren’t taught that it “feels better” to smile. I am giving you the SMILE CHALLENGE. For one week practice smiling like you do any other health routine like exercise, brushing your teeth or sleeping. Three times a day stand in front of a mirror and lift the corners of your mouth. At first you may have to use your two index fingers to push those corners up, but I promise you they WILL move! Try variations of how you smile. A pleasant grin. A happy beam. A full out show-all-your-teeth smile. Then throughout the day, let yourself smile. Smile at strangers as you pass them. Smile at the sunshine. Smile to and for yourself when you are alone. It just Feels Better to smile! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Pennie’s Life Lesson: “A smile opens doors, opens opportunities and opens hearts.” ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ YOUR TURN...
I shared this with you to encourage you share your smile with yourself and others. It really does FEEL better to smile! Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below. And please feel free to email me at: [email protected]. Thank you! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ All Rights Reserved Copyright © 2013-2019 Pennie Hunt This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt. Feel free to forward and share this post. Please keep the entire message intact, including contact, logo, and copyright information. |
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PLEASE NOTE: This page does not provide medical or legal advice, professional diagnosis, opinion, treatment or services to you or to any other individual. Through this site and links to other sites, Pennie Hunt provides general information for inspiration, encouragement and educational purposes only. The information provided in this site, or through links to other sites, is not a substitute for legal, medical, or professional care, and you should not use the information in place of a visit, call or the advice of your lawyer, physician or other healthcare provider. |