Did you know you can start a brand new chapter of your life at any age?

 

What do you do when life knocks you down? Did you know you can bounce back using these nine steps to reinvent yourself to create a life worth living.

 

Have you ever felt like you need to start again? Whether it was your choice or various factors forcing you to create massive changes in your life, through various life lessons we are given messages and if those messages are not heard, you get hit or knocked  to the ground to learn the lesson. The lessons range from serious issues with our health, bad relationships with family and/or friends, a failing business, challenges building wealth, or not living authentically. This can happen in one area or every area of your life.

 

So what do you do when starting again? You need to change your behaviour to get back in the game super-fast:

 

Re-evaluate you life:

This is enlightening yet simple.

 

Draw a circle and divide it into areas of your life:

1. Health
2. Wealth
3. Relationships
4. Education
5. Spirituality
6. Career

Give each area a score out of ten. 10 means excellent and 1 means needs improvement.

Add up the scores to get a total out of 60.

 

From there you can assess what area/s are the priority for you to work on. If every area of your life had a low score, obviously you have work to do so prioritize your life areas.

 

 

 

Get back in the game:

Create a brand new strategy to propel you forward. Know exactly what terms you will and won’t accept in life anymore. Ask yourself:

• What new standards do I choose to live by?
• List the behaviours you will stop tolerating

 

Start afresh:

There is nothing more powerful than who you are associated with. They determine the speed along with your level of growth for you to become the best version of yourself. It ranges from zero to full speed ahead.

 

Write down the most prominent people in your life to decide if they:

 

• Challenge you on your beliefs and views?
• Are by your side when you need them?
• Happy for you when you achieve amazing things in life?

 

 

 

Style it up:

Reinventing yourself can be crazy fun when you are experiencing a period of massive change.

 

How do you style it up? Get a new hairstyle or hair colour, lose or gain weight, improve your diet, buy new sunglasses or accessories, update your wardrobe, create a brand new style, or ditch the glasses and have eye laser surgery or wear contact lenses. Styling it up gives you an extra boost of confidence and energy.

 

Leave Fear Town behind forever:

Release the ghosts that are haunting you and keeping you awake at night by mastering your mind set. Avoid getting buried in the avalanche of other people’s fears. What other people say to you is a reflection of their own fears and beliefs.

 

Leave your apartment in Fear Town to live in a mansion in Love City. We have two choices in every moment:

 

1. To act from a place of fear or love (actions from fear: lying, cheating, stealing, bullying, blackmail, power, aggression, violence, revenge or mind games). Actions from love: compassion, understanding, problem-solving, producing, listening, kindness, creating and inspiring.
2. Put the lights back on – rediscover what you love and what feeds your soul.

• What activities do you get completely lost in?
• When do you forget about the time and light up inside?
• When was the last time you felt exceptionally amazing?

 

Dig deep:

This is the scariest step for most people. It involves hard work, searching deep within your soul to determine who you are, what you want and decide what living means to you.

 

Your most valuable relationship is the one with yourself. People go to great lengths to avoid it, by numbing emotions with drugs, sex, alcohol, eating and shopping, toxic relationships, a hyper-active social life and moving from relationship to relationship with no down-time in-between. We will do anything to avoid hearing the voices in our heads or listening to the messages from our bodies, despite all the aches and pains not to mention unprocessed emotions.

 

All these behaviours serve to do is delay the inevitable and ensure you fire up like a firecracker at some point or explode like an erupting volcano that hasn’t let loose for hundreds of years. By doing the work along the way, it is a much smoother road ahead.

 

 

 

Jump off the cliff:

Take a risk and do something you never in a million years thought you would do. Play underwater golf, go shark surfing, waterfall kayaking, heli-skiing or simply float in the dead sea.

 

Empty out the trash:

Stop living on auto-pilot and doing what you normally do. It’s clearly not working!

 

Now, is the time to get off the merry-go-round and empty out the trash. Decide what is serving you and what is not?

 

Think of new and innovative ways to change your life to create new patterns, habits and strategies and most importantly, fabulous new results.

 

When the jigsaw puzzle of life has turned upside down and falls into one big mess of tiny pieces on the floor pieces that were once your life as you knew it.

Create a new masterpiece of your life and yourself  – a much more glorious, dazzling and intoxicating version.

Source:

 

Mindfulness: What it means to be free

Road in a beautiful forest in the morning

Freedom is the will to be responsible to ourselves.
– Friedrich Nietzsche

• When you choose to forgive instead of seeing the world through bitter eyes, you are free

• When you learn from your mistakes instead of letting them define or cripple you, you are free

• When you love yourself regardless of what other people think, you are free

• When you accept uncertainty instead of stressing about what you don’t know, you are free

• When you embrace chaos, instead of struggling for control, you are free

• When you recognise that we all all imperfect, and then resist the urge to fight that, you are free

• When you choose to appreciate what you have instead of crying over what you have lost, you are free

• When you plant yourself in this moment, and do what you can to make the most of it, you are free

Mindfulness: Somewhere out there . . .

Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it.
Always work with it, not against it.
– Eckhart Tolle

• Somewhere out there, someone feels exactly like you do.

• Someone is thinking that things could be better and wondering if they will ever “arrive”

• Someone is remembering how things were before and wondering if they’ll ever let go. Someone is missing someone they love and wondering why they had to know loss.

• Someone is radiating with hope and joy and wondering if it will last.

• Somewhere right now, someone is struggling in much the same way as you.

• Someone is out of work and cash and wondering what might be next.

• Someone is waiting for an important call and wondering if it’s best not to know.

• Someone is walking away from no good and wondering if they can go on. Someone is walking toward something new and wondering if they should turn back.

• Somewhere right now, someone is transforming in much the same way as you.

• Someone is stretching into a new role and wondering if it feels right.

• Someone is reaching for a new goal and wondering who they can become.

• Someone is trying their hardest to create change and wondering if they are making strides.

• Someone is getting ready to take a leap and wondering if they will feel more alive

In spite of all our differences, we all deal with the same things, in different times and in different ways. We are all striving and struggling, learning and growing, and sometimes it can feel like we should be somewhere else – like we should be smarter, wiser, further along or closer to having an answer.

Right now, in the middle, in the messiness and uncertainty, this is where we all live. No one has it all figured out – and maybe that’s the point. When we’re finished, we’re finished. Is that really a choice we’d make?

Somewhere right now, someone is deciding it’s okay to be right where they are.

Take a deep breath, look around, and let that person be you!

Source: Tiny Wisdom on Mindfulness (Simple tips for living in the now) by Lori Deschene

In Memory of Mom: Life is a Journey

Life is a journey

Life is a journey through many terrain
From gardens of pleasure to deserts of pain

From an ocean of love to a jungle of hate
From mountains of glory to canyons of fate.

There’s a highway for joy and a highway for sorrow
A road for today and a road for tomorrow.

So choose your path wisely and walk with care
If you follow your heart, you’ll find your way there.

I’ve been to the garden and planted seeds there.

I’ve been to the desert and felt the despair.

I’ve swam in the ocean and drank of it’s wine
I climbed up the mountain to touch the sky.

I went to the canyon and started to cry
I’ve traveled both highways, both today and tomorrow.

I’ve basked in the joy and wallowed in sorrow.

My Path has been chosen and I’ve walked it with care.

I followed my heart and I’m on my way there
So I’ll just keep walking till I find what I’m after.

To mountains and oceans and gardens of laughter.

Poem written and copyrighted by Angelkat50

ONE YEAR DOWN THE ROAD LESS TRAVELLED . . .

October 2014:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2014/10/05/tapestry/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2014/10/31/to-each-life-there-is-a-season/

November 2014:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2014/11/19/warning-emotional-volcano-about-to-erupt/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2014/11/27/dear-mom/

December 2014:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2014/12/14/why-the-obsession-with-loneliness/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2014/12/24/christmas-and-new-year-blessings/

January 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/01/21/grief-mourning-and-bereavement-what-is-the-difference/

February 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/02/03/woman-heal-thyself/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/02/08/self-care-sunday-hard-questions-weightless/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/02/13/re-investing-in-life-moving-on/

March 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/03/02/how-to-help-a-grieving-friend/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/03/19/how-to-find-the-balance-between-work-and-home-life/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/03/30/what-life-has-taught-me/

April 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/04/09/i-am-a-sensitive-child/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/04/14/me-the-budding-entrepreneur/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/04/26/green-is-the-colour-of-my-life/

May 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/05/11/in-the-midst-of-movement-and-chaos-becoming-the-new-me/

June 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/06/07/i-am-capable/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/06/22/the-pain-of-watching-a-parent-age/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/06/25/stop-the-bus-i-want-to-get-off/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/06/25/what-happens-during-a-colonoscopy/

July 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/07/11/me-the-budding-voice-over-artiste/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/07/22/what-im-learning-on-my-journey-to-wealth-creation/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/07/26/what-im-learning-on-my-journey-to-wealth-creation-part-two/

August 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/08/02/how-to-increase-your-financial-iq/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/08/11/river-of-life-a-time-for-reflection/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/08/18/finding-your-why/
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/08/23/wild-geese/

September 2015:
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/09/01/im-not-extraordinary-enough-the-power-of-vulnerability/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/09/12/how-do-i-start-a-blog/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/09/21/my-life-as-an-introvert/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/09/28/dont-resist-change-let-things-flow-naturally-forward/

October 2015 (One year down the road less travelled):
https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/10/13/dear-trauma-counsellor-i-have-ongoing-flashbacks-and-voices-in-my-head-that-just-wont-shut-up/

https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/10/20/journaling-as-a-mindfulness-practice-for-thoughts-and-emotions/

Wild Geese

“WILD GEESE”
by Mary Oliver

“Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination…”

You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting – over and over announcing your place in the family of things.

Reflection:
Maybe, we don’t always have to be good. Whatever guilt, shame or confessions we hold inside, can be let go.

Maybe we don’t always have to repent because we, too, are animals like the wild geese. Instead of suffering, or spending our lives trying to find forgiveness, we only have to do what we love to do.

Everybody has his or her own despair, everybody needs to be told we do not always have to be good, everybody would have a reason to repent.

Talking about our troubles can help us heal from the, and hearing other people’s pain can create a primal connection between two people, loyal and deep like the bond between birds.

“Meanwhile the world goes on.” The repetition of the word “meanwhile” is soothing and is, in the poem, cyclical like rainfall in nature. Like humans and wild geese, the rain also travels.

Table Mountain, Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa

The geese are travelling home again, but where is home? Are they flying “home” South for the Winter, or “home” back North?

“Whoever you are, no matter how lonely . . .” it does not matter where you call home.

Listen to what the world tells you – look at the wild geese. They fly alone yet in an inclusive form, honking to keep in contact with each other in flight, connected in the “family of things”.

River of Life – A Time for Reflection . . .

The river is a meaningful symbol for many people.

The flowing element of a river symbolises purity, healing and cleansing. Rivers also symbolise irreversible passage of time, going with the flow, indicates the need to take some important decisions to shape your life, represent pleasures, peace and riches and flow of energy.

The source of the river (where the river starts) can be seen as the symbol for the early years of life.

The twists and turns in the river as it flows away from its source can be seen as the different periods of life (the wild and stormy times, sometimes murky, turbulent and fast flowing). Then there are the peaceful times (where the river runs gently and is cool and refreshing).

Various tributaries branching off from the river represents the major influences in life.

The twists and turns in the river are shaped by the various people, experiences and events which have been important influences in our lives.

Have you ever taken some time out to reflect on your life?

Would you consider using the River of Life exercise to do this? Allow me to explain how the River of Life exercise works:

1. Take a sheet of paper (as big as you need it to be)
2. Get some coloured pens, pencils or wax crayons – as many colours as you need
3. Draw a river – showing the source (this represents your birth – where your life started)
4. Show the flow of the river indicating the different periods of your life (the wild and stormy times, the murky, turbulent and fast flowing times). Show the peaceful times (where the river runs gently and is cool and refreshing). Examples: the teenage years, your 20’s, 30’s and any other milestones in your life, rites of passage etc
5. Show the different tributaries (name each tributary) indicating the major influences in your life.
6. Draw pictures around the river to show the people, experiences and events which have been important in your life (and helped shape you into the person you are now).
Use as many colours as you need. Make your river as large as you need. Reflect on each stage as you do your drawing.

Questions:
1. Has this exercise been helpful?
2. How did you feel while doing this exercise? What emotions were evoked during this exercise?
3. What did you learn about yourself during this exercise?

Me . . . The budding Entrepreneur . . .

If you are one of my regular followers you will know that I am working on a plan to start working from home in 2016. If you are new to this blog – WELCOME! Hope you will enjoy the journey with me.

My plan as a budding entrepreneur is to have multiple sources of income so I have a constant flow of income throughout the month and I’m not relying on income coming from one source. The reason for my decision is that I’ve become tired (and bored) of building someone else’s empire. I want to wake up each morning knowing that I am going to thoroughly love what I do for the day, however, Rome was not built in a day and I need loads of patience, faith and hope in order to realise my dream.

This journey requires me to have mental stamina because entrepreneurship is a marathon, not a sprint and in order to keep going, I need to have mental strength. I’m learning that success begins with ME. It’s an inside job and it’s something I have to do on purpose, day in and day out.

I’m learning that when you’re trying to achieve something you’ve never achieved before it often brings up lots of fear, and with fear comes excuses . . .

“I don’t have the time, the money, the knowledge, I’m not ready yet, etc, etc.”

I have to condition myself daily to overcome the fear, to tell the excuses to go away and to allow myself to step up and be the person I need to be in order to make it happen. When the challenges arise, when things go wrong, when everything feels like it’s taking forever, I have to have the right mind-set to be able to deal with it and keep moving forward. This will be my biggest asset in life because with the right attitude I will eventually manifest a life I love.

“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” is how the saying goes. This means that I need to make friends with like-minded people, who get me and who will want to help me along my journey. This takes time – lots of time. I need to have people by my side who I can turn to to talk about my experiences and challenges and who will help me get perspective on things and give me advice, people who will be there to celebrate my “wins” with me. This will make a huge difference.

Entrepreneurship can be so lonely, if you let it be . . . I’m planning for it not to be.

There are so many people out there who are just like me, and when I find those people and connect with them it will help inspire, motivate and support me. I’m spending a huge chunk of my time starting to get better connected by reaching out to people who I can resonate with. I’m sending e-mails, joining Facebook groups, going to networking events (when time permits) and attending conferences, seminars and workshops. I’m trying to hang out where other like-minded people hang out to start building friendships.

I need to be consistent and focussed: This is something I learned very early in life when I learned to play the organ (keyboard) and piano as a child. I was reminded of this again not too long ago when I learned Sign Language as my third language and I am currently being reminded of the need to be consistent and focused on my Voice Coaching lessons (thanks to my wonderful Voice Coach, Barbara).

Sadly, I’m not as good at playing my instruments as I could have or should have been because “work” and “life” got in the way and I was not able to put in the required number of hours of consistent practice. My exposure to Deaf people is limited to a small group who come to our church on Sundays so I’m struggling to practice and improve my vocabulary. The Voice Coaching is meant to be used as another source of income so I’m planning to be more consistent and focused and to keep at it (thanks to my wonderful Coach, Barbara).

What all of this has taught me is that if you want to be great at something, you have to practice being great at it consistently and you have to stay focussed on it.

Setting up a new business is exactly the same, if you want to be great, you have to practice being great every day . . . even when you have nobody visiting your website, nobody phoning to ask you for a quote, nobody phoning to hire you – even when you feel like you keep doing things wrong.

I’ve learned that hopping from one idea/strategy to the next leads to inconsistency. You start doing something and before long, you’ve moved on to something else . . . never really allowing yourself the opportunity to be really great at what you do. Instead of doing a million things all at once, I need to focus on being consistent at one thing (or a few). Once I am great at it, I need to keep up the practice and then move on.

While planning my business, I need to keep it simple: I’m learning fast that starting a business can become overwhelming and chaotic because there is just so much that needs to be done. I’m spending so much time doing e-learning (teaching myself new skills via the internet, looking at websites and watching videos on YouTube to see how other like-minded people are working), it’s exhausting! I find the only way I can stay focussed is to work with a To Do List. I’m totally lost without my To Do List. When I know what I need to do and by when, I don’t feel so overwhelmed. When I am intentional about what I want to achieve for the day, keep things simple and plan my day I feel so much happier and make lots more progress. I am also able to prioritise the things that are REALLY important and meaningful to me.

One of the most important things on my To Do List and scheduled into my diary is “ME TIME” which is not negotiable. Something new I’ve just learned is that when setting up a business, one should also schedule time for monthly reflection and planning time and weekly business development time.

Something new which I am trying to teach myself is to allow myself to receive and enjoy what I want and to allow myself to enjoy where I am at right now. I don’t know about you, but I have a habit of saying “when I achieve X I’ll be able to enjoy things more”, or I end up feeling guilty for allowing myself to do things that are important to me, like taking time off to just go for a drive, spend time with family or friends, work out at the gym or even just to sit and read a book.

We tend to put off doing the little (and big) things which would actually create more happiness in our lives. When you improve the quality of your life (and make time to do the things you want to do), you also improve your business (or work if you are employed somewhere), because when you’re at your best, your business (or work) will thrive (Rachael Cook).

I’m on a journey to open myself up to receiving the abundance I want, to being happy right now to enjoy the journey I am on right now. It’s a conscious decision I have to make to feel these things and to welcome these things into my life with open arms.

Life’s a journey – enjoy the ride!

Life’s a journey – not a destination!

How to help a grieving friend

I recently wrote a post about grief, mourning and bereavement and the difference between them. You will find the post here:https://africandream01.wordpress.com/2015/02/13/re-investing-in-life-moving-on/

I am finding my experience of grief and mourning very strange. To allow myself time to grieve and mourn I have pushed those closest to me away to give myself the space to grieve and mourn without having the pressure of “getting on with life” from others. Generally people (society in general) have the perception that now that the funeral/memorial service is over, you should be okay and ready to “get on with life”.

I have now reached the stage where I’m missing that contact with my friends and family and want them to “come back” to me but at the same time I’m not ready to have people sitting in my lounge drinking tea and coffee for hours. I’m at the stage where a quick pop-in visit or quick telephone call to say “how are you doing?” or “is there anything I can do for you?” would be welcome but it seems like people are waiting for me to make the first move.

Ocassionally, especially after a busy week, I sometimes wish I can get a call from someone asking if they can bring me a meal or a sweet treat, but at the same time not expect to be invited in to sit and talk for hours. The idea of calling first before coming is also good because I may not be in the mood to see people. I may want to just walk around in my pyjamas (or even naked for that matter).

My best friend of more than 30 years has not even tried to make contact with me since the end of January. She did not even make contact to wish me for my birthday. I had a missed call on my phone from her on 6 February and I have deliberately not called her back to see how long it would take for her to try again. At the time of writing this post, there’s still been no contact. I do understand that it is probably difficult to wish someone a “happy birthday” when you know they are grieving/mourning. There is nothing wrong with changing that to “Hi, thinking of you on your birthday. Hope you manage/managed to enjoy the day?” An alternative to this would be “hi, can we come around to bring you your gift?” and then surprise me by insisting I sit down and making me a cup of tea instead of expecting me to make you a cup just because you are visiting?

Today while writing this post I was watching a movie on television about the life of actress (who also married a Prince and became a Princess) Grace Kelly. There was a scene in the movie, just before Grace Kelly was going to board the ship to leave her family home, where her father told her he loved her. This brought me to tears again. I am obviously still very volatile emotionally and is probably why I’m having this want/don’t want relationship with contact with the outside world. One minute I want people to come visit but within a few minutes I wish they don’t come.

What I’m also experiencing at the moment is that my attention span is very short. I find that I can’t focus on one particular thing for longer than five or ten minutes then I move on to do something else. I also lose my train of thought in mid sentence and forget what I wanted to say. My mind just goes blank all of a sudden and I cannot remember what I wanted to say. Maybe that’s also why I’m reluctant to have visitors at this stage? Maybe I’m scared that I will be bored with their conversation after five or ten minutes and that they will misunderstand or misinterpret my behaviour and think that I’m being rude?

Will my visitors understand when I suddenly burst into tears for no apparent reason? Will they panic and try to make me feel better by saying “don’t worry everything will be alright”? or “it’s ok. Mom is in a better place now”? when all I need is a loving hug or someone to hold my hand, without saying anything at all.

This behaviour is all new to me and I’m finding it very strange. Is this a temporary change in my behaviour or is this taking me to another level of maturity i.e. where trivial things no longer matter to me?

As a child I’ve always heard adults say “you are never really grown up until you have lost both your parents”. Is that what’s happening to me now? Am I now finally becoming a “grown up”/an adult?

. . . but I still like Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse? Just saying . . .

Grief, Mourning and Bereavement – what is the difference?

Hello everyone!

Welcome to my “journey called life” and welcome to 2015. Can you believe we are already in the 21st day of January? Where has the time gone?

To all my loyal followers and to the new ones who have joined along the way, as the New Year begins, let us pray that it will be a year with new Peace, new Happiness and Abundance of new friends. May God bless you throughout the New Year.

Please accept my sincere apologies for the long break since my last post on 24 December 2014. My regular followers would know that I lost my mom to Cancer on 27 October 2014 so my sister and I have had to face our first Christmas and New Year without our mom.

Then on 8 January 2015 we received the news that our dad had died which had a whole host of emotions of its own attached (we’ve had no contact since my parents divorce) and he died a day before the 13th anniversary of their divorce.

The 18th January 2015 would have been mom’s birthday and it was our first one without her so more emotional stuff to deal with here.

In between all of this, I was kept busy with the Administration of my Late mom’s Estate – if any of you have ever been an Executor of an Estate you will know how much paperwork this all entails.

Amidst all the emotional turmoil and administrative paperwork, I am also trying to set up a home-based business which needs to be up and running by June 2015 so I can be earning a steady income by January 2016.

So much thought needs to go into setting up a website (what I want it to look like), content (what I want to say on the website), what services I will be offering etc. This actually takes up a lot of time (mentally) and physically sitting behind a computer.

While going through all the emotional turmoil of what I’ve mentioned above, I’ve been wondering about the difference between grief, mourning and bereavement.

People generally use these words interchangeably but what do they really mean?

Is there a difference between grief, mourning and bereavement?

I tried doing a Google search and this is what I found:
Grief, Mourning and Bereavement – what is the difference?

• Grief is the response or reaction to a loss
• Bereavement refers to the state of the loss
• Mourning is the action you take following a loss

God knew we would mourn our losses because He said:
“Blessed are they that mourn:
for they shall be comforted. (Matthew 5:4)

Read the rest here : http://www.examiner.com/article/the-difference-between-grieving-mourning-and-bereavement

Other sources say:
Grief is what you think and feel inside when someone you loves dies. It’s the numbness, sadness, anger, regret, all rolled up into one. It’s the pain in your gut and a hole in your chest.

Mourning is expressing your grief, letting it out somehow. You mourn when you cry, talk about the death, write about it, or punch something.
Read the rest here: http://www.pastoralcareinc.com/counseling/difference-between-grief-mourning/

More links on the subject of Grief, Mourning and Bereavement:
http://griefandmourning.com/grief-and-mourning-distinguishe#comment-2510

http://www.thecarecommunity.com/GriefSafePlace/DougsBlog/tabid/63/mid/385/newsid385/210/Default.aspx

http://www.cancer.org/treatment/treatmentsandsideeffects/emotionalsideeffects/griefandloss/coping-with-the-loss-of-a-loved-one-intro-to-grief-mourning-bereavement

I hope you have found this post inspirational and the links useful.

Please let me know if you have any questions on other topics you would like me to do some research on. It’s an opportunity for us to learn together.

Till next time.

Why the obsession with loneliness?

The face of loneliness . . .
• The old man reading yesterdays paper telling yesterday’s news
• The old girl with dirty hair and tattered clothes carrying everything she owns in two carrier bags
• The old war hero with all his medals. One more forgotten hero in a world that doesn’t care

Why are we, as a society, so obsessed with loneliness and being alone? I know that mankind (humankind) was created to be social beings and that women were created as a companion for man not to live alone, however, through the centuries that have passed since Biblical times, many men and women have lived comfortably on their own.

Why is it so difficult to understand that some people (like me) are comfortable enough with themselves to live alone? When people hear that my mom has died the first question they ask (with a very petrified look on their face) is: “are you living alone now?” followed by: “why don’t you get someone to move in with you or move in with someone?”

My question to them is: “why?” The assumption made about my life now is “you must be so lonely without your mom”.

Why do I have to live with someone? Why do I have to share my space with someone? Surely if I was not comfortable with living on my own, in my own space, by myself, I would think of getting someone to live with me or I will move in with someone? Do I really need others to tell me this?

Their argument usually is: “but don’t you get lonely?” or “are you ok living all by yourself?” Really? What’s wrong with living all by myself in my own space? I can do as I please, when I please, how I please. I don’t have to dress up for anyone. If I choose to sleep all day or watch TV or read a book all day or walk around in my pyjamas all day, I can do just that. I don’t need anybody’s permission. I don’t always have to “look decent” to respect others who are in my space.

People often confuse loneliness and being alone. You don’t need to live alone to be lonely. You can have a crowd of people around you and feel like you are totally “alone”. On the other hand, you could be quite comfortable living alone without feeling “lonely and alone”.

So what is this loneliness or being alone everyone is talking about? Why is this so scary for many people? I love silence. I am comfortable in silence. I love my own company. Silence gives me the space to be more mindful, to be at one with my thoughts, to make sense of the noise inside my head. Silence gives me the space to get organised – organise my thoughts, my space, my “to do” list for the next day/week/month.

If the physical silence around me gets too much, I can turn on the television, the radio, listen to music but I can also choose not to have any gadgets on. I cannot wait to leave the noise of the office and the commute to and from work to get home where I can have as much silence and solitude as I need.

When I have the need for human contact, I have the freedom to phone someone and ask them to come around for a visit, or I could visit them or invite them for coffee. Sometimes I treat myself to coffee at a coffee shop to be surrounded by humans. I have an obsession with observing human behaviour so I find immense pleasure in sitting in a coffee shop or at a mall just observing people as they come and go.

Lonely? No, I don’t have time to get lonely. I’m always busy doing something – I can always find something to do. What do I do when I’m alone I hear you asking.

I read and respond to e-mails or catch up with what’s happening on social media. I have a pile of books I’ve been buying (and keep adding new ones) ever so often in the hopes of reading them one day. I am trying to set up my own “work from home” business so I can stop this daily commute to a noisy office. I so badly want to get back to my crafts I used to do (I used to do fabric painting, I love making my own cards, I used to play piano – all things I’ve not had the time to do for a very long time.

Socially I have friends and family who want me to visit or have coffee or want to visit me. I’m studying part time (BA Criminology degree) so all in all, I don’t really have much time on my hands to even think about being lonely.

I hope this answers your questions?

What do you do to stop yourself from feeling lonely?

Do we place too much emphasis on being alone and loneliness?

I would like to end this post with a song sung by Roger Whittaker which, for me, perfectly sums up what it must feel like to be lonely. Reading the words to this song makes me realise that life is not so bad after all. If we spend less time focusing on ourselves and on what we don’t have, we will see how truly blessed we really are.

Streets of London
By: Roger Whittaker

Have you seen the old man
In the closed-down market
Kicking up the paper,
with his worn out shoes?
In his eyes you see no pride
hands held loosely at his side
Reading yesterday’s paper telling yesterday’s news

(Chorus)
So how can you tell me you’re lonely,
And say for you that the sun don’t shine?
Let me take you by the hand and lead you through the streets of London
I’ll show you something to make you change your mind

Have you seen the old girl
Who walks the streets of London
Dirt in her hair and her clothes in rags?
She’s no time for talking,
She just keeps right on walking
Carrying her home in two carrier bags.

Chorus

In the all night cafe
At a quarter past eleven,
Same old man is sitting there on his own
Looking at the world
Over the rim of his tea-cup,
Each tea last an hour
Then he wanders home alone

Chorus

And have you seen the old man
Outside the seaman’s mission
Memory fading with
The medal ribbons that he wears.
In our winter city,
The rain cries a little pity
For one more forgotten hero
And a world that doesn’t care

Chorus
Music: “Streets of London” by Roger Whittaker (iTunes)
Artist: Roger Whittaker
Category: Music
License: Standard YouTube License