Junk Mail, Acceptance, and Electricity

We have a different sort of prompt today. Very clever idea, Linda! Our prompt is:

“…the last piece of mail you received.” Talk about the subject of the last piece of physical mail you received, i.e. a gas bill–talk about gas, not the bill itself. Have fun!

Hmmmm. First, I want to say I almost thought about not doing SoCS this week because I’m going to our church yard sale, and since we’re still living an hour away from our regular home and church, I won’t have a lot of time to do the community thing until later. But I just couldn’t NOT do SoCS! It’s not really an addiction. It’s… an obsession? No. Part of my routine. Yes. That’s it. Every Friday, when I go to Linda’s prompt page and look for the prompt, there’s a drum roll in my head. But I guess I should get to the prompt.

The last two pieces of mail I got (at the same time) were the electric bill and some “junk” mail for my father which is the more interesting topic. When my father died, or shortly thereafter which was just over two years ago, I filled out a change of address card to get his mail and started receiving a LOT of mail from organizations he has donated to. My dad’s “junk” mail was more prominent than my regular mail. After a year, I filled out another card to stop his mail. But it just keeps coming. A lot of times, I write a little message on the donation card that he was deceased and please stop sending mail. Very slowly the mail addressed to my dad has decreased but it still comes, even after more than two years. The mail I got yesterday was from one organization I’ve actually written three separate notes to, asking them to PLEASE stop sending mail to my deceased father. It used to really bother me. Now, it’s starting to bother me less. I’m on the verge of just accepting it. With every piece of mail like that, no matter who it’s for, if it comes to my house and I get my hands on it, I magic marker out the name and address before I put it in recycling. So I think I might just give up. Surrender. Black out the name and address and put it in recycling without getting irritated about it. Who knows, that might work! Maybe acceptance is the lesson that will stop the junk mail for my father! We shall see.

The electric bill reminds me of something I will not accept: that electricity is the only power there is. So I will continue to call it electricity and not “power.” Electricity is nice to have – especially in the winter and summer – but when we don’t have it, we still have power. That’s my story, and I’m sticking go it!

…

If you’d like to learn more about the SoCS and get a drum roll going in your head every Friday, or just read more takes on the prompt, visit Linda G. Hill at:

https://lindaghill.com/2019/03/22/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-march-23-19/

Here are the rules:

1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing (typos can be fixed), and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.

2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.

3. I will post the prompt here on my blog every Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The,’” or will simply be a single word to get you started.

4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours. Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top. NOTE: Pingbacks only work from WordPress sites. If you’re self-hosted or are participating from another host, such as Blogger, please leave a link to your post in the comments below.

5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read all of them! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later or go to the previous week by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find below the “Like” button on my post.

6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!

7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.

8. Have fun!

Gratitude Makes Sense of our Past

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow.”

Melody Beattie

 Twenty years of Holy Matrimony

Tossed out like old shoes.

What happened to the promise?

To the dream?

To the love?

Change ran them off

Down divergent paths.

Years

of

Confusion

and

Loneliness

Finally passed as

 Acceptance

Seeped into the empty space

 Making room for new possibilities.

 I found my self again.

And loved me for my soul.

And  when the time was right,

Everything made sense.

Now I’m thankful that he made that space

and found a better fit,

Thankful for the time to heal

and learning to let go,

Thankful for the lessons learned

on long and winding roads,

Thankful for convergent paths

That brought my true love home.

© 2016 JoAnne Macco.

Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends and followers for whom I am very thankful! 

A Closer Look at The Serenity Prayer

Last week, in “How to Help an Addict (or Alcoholic)” I mentioned using the Serenity Prayer as a tool  that can apply to just about any situation. It occurred to me that some people might not be familiar with the Serenity Prayer:

“God grant me the Serenity

to accept the things I cannot change,

Courage to change the things I can,

And wisdom to know the difference.”

     Before I got into recovery from co-dependency and compulsive overeating, I’d see this prayer hanging on someone’s wall, and think, Yeah okay, that’s nice. But I didn’t pay much attention to it. Maybe it seemed too simple.

I’ve said the Serenity Prayer hundreds of times by now, with varying levels of awareness of its meaning.  Lately, I’ve been taking a closer look at the long version, which can be found here, and just realized the connection with mindfulness in the line, “enjoying one moment at a time.”

The Serenity Prayer was written by Reinhold Niebuhr, probably in the mid 1930’s, according to this Wikipedia article. The prayer was included in a book for army chaplains and service people in 1944.

Applying the Serenity Prayer, like most things in recovery, is easier said than done.

One way to work the short version of the Serenity Prayer is to clarify what I can and cannot change.

If I draw a line down the center of a piece of paper (sometimes I still like to use old fashioned paper and pen), I can put the things I cannot change, the things I need to accept, on one side of the paper.

On the other side, I can write what I can change.

For example:

I cannot change the past……………………………………I can change my actions now.

I cannot change my mistakes……………………………..I can learn from my mistakes.

I cannot change my childhood……………………………I can change my perspective.

I cannot erase the memory of big hurts………………………….I can forgive and let go.

When I can’t seem to forgive and let go…………..I can turn it over to God.

I cannot change other people’s illnesses………….I can love them and pray for them.

I cannot change that addiction causes irrational behavior…….I can present options.

I cannot make some one get sober………………………I can set boundaries for me.

I can’t keep people from being mean…………….I can try to understand or walk away.

…..

I need to remember that acceptance doesn’t mean I have to like what I’m accepting.

Acceptance frees me to focus on what I can change: me, my thoughts, and my actions.

I can change my attitude. I can focus more on what’s right than what’s wrong. I can cultivate an attitude of gratitude.

People may decide to change as a result of my actions, but that is not up to me.

So, how does this fit in with Anything Is Possible?

Change usually takes more time than I want it to.

God can change things we can’t.

There is usually something we can change about any situation.

(More on that later.)

Take a step toward opportunity.

     I was thinking about acceptance and the Serenity Prayer this morning right before I came upon a news story about a “fast food worker” telling the CEO of McDonald’s she can’t feed her kids on the $8.25 an hour she makes after 10 years with his company.  She had accepted this job for 10 years. Now apparently her hours have been cut since she made the public statement. The article did not say anything about whether she had asked for a raise previously or about her performance. The CEO’s response, that he had been with the company for 40 years, was not only dismissive, but rude. He didn’t say how much he made. He should have taken her name and said, “We’ll look into your history and work performance and get back to you.”

     My recommendation to the employee would be to ask this question: “What do I need to do to get a raise?” The employee needs to sit down with any supervisor who will give her some time (by asking, when is a good time to talk?) and ask if it’s possible to get a raise and how can she do it. If she is told “it’s not possible,” (which I wouldn’t believe) then it’s time to find another job. It’s human to want to share that you are struggling to feed your two kids, but the focus needs to be on: How can I change this? instead of “I can’t….”

Acceptance doesn’t mean we have to like it. But when we  catch ourselves thinking, “I can’t…,” we need to focus on changing the things we can. What are the small steps you can take to improve on a situation you don’t like? Small steps can add up to big changes. The things we can change fall under two categories: our thoughts and our actions. Thoughts make up our attitudes and beliefs. We can always tweak our thoughts for the better.  Our actions include changing our clothes, our our tone of voice and how we breathe. In any situation, we can always take a deeper or longer breath, well unless we’re under water, then we can kick our feet and swim to the surface. (That’s what I get for questioning my “always.”)  Taking a deeper or longer breath can help  calm us into wiser decisions or give us strength to face a challenge. But we can always pray and we can ask for help when we need it. How we ask for help makes a big difference.  If we only criticize what’s wrong, we are less likely to get help.  If we ask, “How can we make this better?” we move toward a solution.

Have Courage and ask the right questions!

God, grand me the Serenity to Accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and the Wisdom to know the difference…..Amen.