15 Apr FIRST NEWSLETTER – DEALING WITH THE UNEXPECTED

Hello, and welcome to the first installment of my newsletter!

Each month I will be sharing my tips for living your life in the deepest, fullest way, to help you create your version of happiness and satisfaction.  It will also be a place where I share upcoming offerings for you to consider for yourself and others whom you think would be interested.

My family recently received some very hard news regarding my mother’s health.  While the initial reaction was extreme shock and sadness, something else has arisen from this most challenging experience…I’ve been thrust back into the power of living in the here-and-now and the importance of loving freely with an open heart.

There are very few things in life that shake us out of the automatic way we live…the habitual rut we can find ourselves in.  Life from this place tends to take on less of a sense of aliveness and we can slowly try to replenish this with consumption of all manner of things, all in the attempt to feel alive again.  Often, the very opposite happens and we find ourselves feeling even more numb and detached from ourselves, our loved ones, and life in general.

What challenge and painful experiences can provide is a reminder to continue to engage with life.  We can use sadness and pain to break through the wall of distraction and detachment, finding ourselves back in the moment, connected to that aliveness.  This is perhaps one of the most unique opportunities of being human – to be conscious of pain, sorrow, and loss and have a choice with what to do with that. 

I would like to continue to choose life, to experience life with all of the pain and pleasure.  Perhaps that is one of the only choices we really have – to be with life fully or to turn from it.

I encourage you to find the challenging places in your life and explore what gift may be on the other side of the pain.  It is hard to see but perhaps it is there just waiting to be discovered.

Yours in Warmth,

Tony