I would like to thank those of you who have left kind and inspiring comments on my blog. I truly appreciate them and take them to heart. You are like the motiving family members that I wish I had around me all the time.
I am pushing hard towards fighting my procrastination and taking it day by day. But I have been trying so hard to fight against myself and the bad habits, that I have failed to realize I need to have peace within myself in order to overcome any obstacle I may tackle.
Peace within myself or around me is almost impossible to have in my life. Anyone that has an aging parent to take care of and juggle their own life knows that it can be draining on your inner spirits. Especially if the parent is harder to deal with than your own children. Life in itself is difficult without any extras that we are handed. We can choose to deal with our circumstances gracefully or fight them head on. I have done both and still question which method is proper.
Through the years of dealing with my father it has drained my emotionally and financially. It has effected my children, my marriage and my business. I have kept it all afloat only by the Grace of God. My happiness is out there lost somewhere with my cash flow. It is to the point where I am waiting on the power company to disconnect, my business to go under and who knows where the marriage stands since we no longer communicate on a regular basis.
In my world I have truly hit rock bottom. This is not me. I have asked myself over and over what could I have done different. I am not a shopper, credit card user, overspender, or live beyond my means person. I am a responsible child, parent, wife and business owner. What did I do to make all this happen?
In the midst of all this thinking and being on the verge of a pity party I received a phone call. It was my neice-in-law, newly married and new parent of a 5 month old little girl. My nephew was on call due to the weather and she was home alone with her baby. She was in a state of panic due to the furnace was not working and it was below freezing outside. Within seconds my mind shifted from me and went into full troubleshooting mode in order to help her. Thanks to my husband working in HVAC for many years I have learned more than I wanted to about heat pumps, furnaces and such.
To make a long story short she was merely out of oil. Now, common sense to most would be making sure you had heat in the house, especially with a new baby. You do not wait until 1:00 in the morning to realize you have no heating method for your house. But before I gave the motherly lecture I remembered back to when I was her age, newly married and starting out. I assume that everyone knows how to be proactive. I assume everyone knows how to check their furnace, change a filter or just use common sense. Quickly I realized that this was not the case. She was not brought up being shown or taught these things. Her parents always had taken care of these things and all this was new to her. If you are never shown or taught or told that you have the capability to learn these things it is a great possibility that you never will. It is possible that a person will always be depending on someone else to handle things for them.
After our phone call, my attitude totally changed from wallering in self pity to peacefullness and joy. I had taken time to help someone else and make a difference. By restoring her peace of mind I had restored my own. AHH HAA!! That my friend is the answer. I have spent so much time worrying about my situation in life that I have failed to see opportunities to help others.
Will helping others get my power bill current, I doubt it. But helping others will restore the faith I have lost in myself. It will bring back my resourcefullness, motivation and will power to get me back on track. I will also have the opportunity to share with others how to avoid getting to where I am now and possibly keep them on track.
We all need to be reminded from time to time that we have a lot to be thankful for. Thankfullness is a great motivator even when we feel as if there is nothing to be thankful for.
