Character!
Morning,
Today I debated about taking my kids to the movies, and learned that a 3-D Beowulf was in the theaters.
But is it appropriate for kids?
According to many of the sites I found, errrrr…..the answer is NO WAY!
If you’re a parent, checking out what’s good for kids is always a wise thing before spending money on the tickets. Here are some resources you can utilize:
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – truly, however, the best movies are Star Wars like so:
“This is madness! You must give her sanctuary!”
Ramis was silent a beat too long, as if to give Auriane time to listen to herself. There was no flicker of emotion in that enigmatic face. Then she whispered, “I won’t tear the fair web spun by one far greater than I.”
“You care naught for any of us! Of what use are you!”
“Your true enemy, Auriane, is the part of you that you fancy is most reasonable – that’s so certain it knows what’s right. You’re disappointing me. How, by the powers, did you lull yourself into thinking the world wouldn’t fall apart?
Didn’t it….before?
Doesn’t it….always?”
Lady of the Light by Donna Gillespie
Such a super book that is!!!
Barbara
ps – see it here:
Morning,
Well.
Well well.
Well.
I’m due for surgery now in 12 days (that’s the good news!).
The bad news is that my leg problems are increasing daily. I started my beloved circle walk….and after 100 feet, realized…it would be utter insanity to continue it.
So I came back home.
I’m at a crossroads yet again in my life. I want to continue exercising…and at the same time, I know I must give my leg a rest. Thus, perhaps I’ll simply lift weights later on today. But what a personal shock it was for me to realize my current state.
In the interim, I reviewed our dojo’s sword demo, and was able to transcribe all 106 moves. I will bring this paper with me to the hospital; might as well teach myself something while I’m in recovery.
I find myself wanting to be several people at once. I want to run away and hide…yet I want to continue with my karate/self defense until the last possible moment. I want to be by myself so I can drop the confident facade….and at the same time, I want to be in front of my colleagues and conquer all my fear and pain and overcome my current worries. I want to prove to myself that no matter what happens in my life, I will not only survive…but thrive.
12 more days and counting.
And life goes on,
Barbara
ps – Pedometers are great for walking, did you know that?
Morning,
About 1.5 months ago or so, I experienced an amazing array of emotions during one of my Kendo (Japanese swords) classes. It was the first time I had really sparred, and I had been put face to face with utter, blinding fear. You can read about it over at this post.
Well…yesterday I had my beloved kendo practice again, and I was debating about taking it easy (what with surgery scheduled in 12 or 5 days). But hey, knowing me, I threw myself into it with quite a lot of enjoyment…and then it happened.
I realized something most neat!
I have no fear anymore when doing kendo sparring.
True, I’m still quite incompetent in it (although I am learning to block vaguely decently!!). But when I faced off against my opponent, all of that “eeek I’m gonna DIE!” feelings….were simply not in existence.
This experience has shown me that life is never static…what you fear today might be conquered by tomorrow. You should never give into the little voice that bleats, you will fail, you cannot do this, you’re better off not even trying….instead, you should honor your inherent greatness.
It was a very good class indeed. 
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – a good award for breaking past fear can be:
Morning,
I’m a firm believer that everything in life happens for a reason. You might not know at that very moment just why things are occurring, you might not understand it for another week or year or decade or even three decades….but sometime in the future, the light is going to go zingo! in your head, and you’ll realize the true gifts that your otherwise agonizing problems had given you, ‘way back when.
I was reminded of this yesterday when one of my kids was at aikido. You see, there’s a slight issue of self-confidence involved; like me when I was that age, this particular child finds it difficult to be assertive and push back when necessary. So! I asked the sensei to get in her face and let her deal with the situation.
Now, this was very difficult for her to endure. As a matter of fact, she started crying even though she didn’t want to (again like me, she can’t stop such things – it just happens. She’s learning to work thru that). But the sensei gave her some extraordinarily good wisdom about standing up for herself and never letting herself get pushed around. It was a very draining experience…but one that really made my kid happy at the end.
I was witnessing this as it was happening, and I realized…gee, most other parents would say, leave my kid alone, she can’t handle it. But oh, how I wished when I was that age…that someone had taught me self-respect and reliance!! But instead, I was one of the most pathetic kids around back then….and it took me decades to turn into the wondrous person I am today.
Ever since becoming a parent, I made a promise to myself that my children would surpass me in every way, including self-confidence. I never want my kids to be a loser like I was!
And then it hit me with the force of an earthquake as I was standing there. This is one reason why I had the utter hell of school life that I did….it was so I’d have the knowledge to recognize potential problems in my own children…and take steps to resolve them before they got out of control.
32 years ago…that was. 32 years. 3+ decades. Wow. But with this experience of yesterday, I can honestly say….I’d go thru twice the agony again if I knew the benefits my own family would reap from it.
Gotta love guardian angels sometime.
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – want some great aikido stuff? Consider:
You know, I really adore my martial arts and self defense classes – the information and knowledge I’m learning there is just plain gold.
I had a very interesting discussion with a sensei yesterday about fighting and how not to panic when the stress levels are high. When you’re in the heat of the moment, it’s natural to let emotions overcome you…but that’s the path to utter conquest and failure to boot.
A knife or a stick by itself is of no threat to you. It’s the opponent’s skill level/commitment that makes them dangerous…but it’s also much more than that as well.
Disagreements, fights, etc., take place between two people…and it’s often the mental outlook that will tip the scales over in one direction or another. You need to refuse to give over control of yourself to another person…you need to proactively CHOOSE NOT to be passive victim.
This means…when you’re in a stressful situation, you have to mentally distance yourself and say, okay, here’s what’s happening, I will remain calm and in control and I will deal with it to the best of my abilities. Verbalize! This helps you breathe and keeps panic down – tell the other person they will NOT do whatever and this problem ends NOW. True, that might not halt the escalation, but you’re already gaining an edge by showing you’re not a passive victim, you’re not going down without a fight.
I want to urge all readers to look up self-defense online…and contact your police department and see if any self-defense/womens self defense classes are offered. Getting stressed out and experiencing danger in a controlled situation is extremely useful in helping you internalize how you can retain control during altercations and confrontations…and it might give you the skills you’ll need to survive and escape.
Here are some great resources:
The truth is, we do live in a scary world sometimes…and it’s up to each person to learn techniques for dealing with scary situations. When you’re in a life/death situation, the only person upon whom you can count…is yourself. So make it worth counting.
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – Some great self-defense resources are:
Parenting. It’s the ultimate of a hero’s journey.
Okay, true, I suppose one’s own personal growing-up time is really the most soul-searing adventure one can undertake. After all, to first be a parent, you should first have passed all of the life’s lessons that have been thrown at you! You should have internalized that your job as a mom or dad is NOT to be your child’s friend…instead, it is to be ‘way above and beyond anything a mere friend can be!
You simply have to internalize that your roll is to raise your children to be the best possible person imaginable. And that means setting up boundaries and inflicting consequences when kids dare to push past them.
Kids need to know where they stand in the scheme of things. They need the security of boundaries so they can rely upon their parents when the going gets tough. Our society tries to make children grow up ‘way ahead of their time…it’s only natural that kids will want more and more security when confronted with these challenges.
I see this all the time at the karate dojo I attend. Some moms (not all, of course, not by a long shot) are ruled by their children…and will scamper to meet their every insane need. These kids are the ones who whine about not doing the workout, who can turn on the waterworks at the drop of a hat…and cause mom to come running. It makes you want to scream at the parents and ask, my gosh, how on earth do you think your child will mainstream into middle school later on if all you do is cater cater cater?
Sigh.
Parents need to be firm. They must not be afraid to mete out punishment when required, nor be afraid to fall onto their knees to comfort their children when its needed.
So why are so many parents doormats these days? I truly have no clue. I’m known as Mean Mommy Ling by my kids’ friends (and also known as Mama Bear by my kids’ teachers)…yet in all cases, kids flock to me whenever I show up at class.
Boundaries work. Plain and simple, boundaries work. So do your children a favor and give them that security…you might be surprised at how much they end up calming down.
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – Need some parenting resources? Consider:
You know, you can choose to view everything in life as a hero’s journey. It makes the pain and difficulties much easier to bear.
My right femur is getting worse and worse. While I can still walk and karate-ize and sparrize and what have you…when it’s all done, I’m constantly reminded that hey! If I’m consciously aware of it, my physical condition is simply deteriorating. Not while I’m active, mind you….I take great care to ensure I don’t aggravate my condition. But when all is said and done, I’m made aware of the fact that gee, surgery will be a very welcome event.
Put simply, I refuse to accept my limitations. Yes, I’m handicapped. And yes, if I’m at the bottom of a staircase, I’ll look to the top, sigh, and then start pulling myself up via the railing to get there.
Those are facts of my reality…but it does NOT have to be the defining aspect of my abilities!!
Lately I find myself wanting to push myself to the breaking point…simply to assert to the universe, hell, I might be in lousy physical shape bone-wise, but that doesn’t stop me! I shall compensate and I shall overcome. Do you hear me? I will prevail!
And yes, I told the stars in the early morning sky that this morning. The winds were whipping about and the leaves were rustling fiercely and there was Barbara Ling, the tiny speck of humanity standing on on her house deck, shaking her first and declaring to the cosmos in no uncertain terms…you cannot stop me.
And you can’t. From the bottom of my heart, I know this…. in particular…. to be true.
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – The universe is huge! Consider:
Choices.
It’s a great concept.
Yesterday my overly-angsted kid told me, Mom, stop saying I’m making choices in regards to my actions!
?
You know, just think about it. Who controls your mind? Who controls your body? Who holds the knife to your throat and says, okay, go jump into the pool with all your clothing on while the Halloween party is going on in another area….you know, that party you’re supposed to chaperone?
Well?
Methinks the answer is obviously. You do! It’s your choices, your actions, your consequences that you experience. Nobody else’s.
You own your own behavior. And that goes for dieting and weight loss as well.
One of the reasons why I’ve been so successful in my weight loss journey (and life in general!) is that I choose to own all my own decisions, be they bad, good, magnificent, idiotic, etc. This way I am assured that I have only myself to blame (and myself to praise) when my get up and go, got up and went, and was last seen heading towards Nebraska.
It’s tough sometimes to admit to yourself you’ve made lousy decisions in the past. You have to deal with personal embarrassment, with feelings of letting yourself down….it can be very painful to witness and confront.
But you know….I firmly believe everything in life happens for a reason. And some things happen because your guardian angel is telling you, okay, buckle down now and listen….there’s a level of your personal inner strength that you do NOT know you possess. So I’m going to make darned sure you come into contact with it right now!!
After all, that’s what happens when you confront painful issues, right? You have to rally your own inner strength to say, okay, I was an absolute idjut…I admit it….but it’s not going to derail my future steps! Remember, you cannot change the past whatsoever…but you can always influence how the future unfolds.
Like dieting. And losing weight. And getting on your journey to better health.
Accept ownership and responsibility for all of your choices in the past. Those choices are what led you to being the person you are today. And if you’re not satisfied with that….honor your grief. Give yourself a few minutes to feel self-pity and cry it out (I truly believe crying is a catharsis – it gets rid of negative excess energies and frees you to move on).
Then imagine a biiiig suitcase and put all your negative feelings and regrets and embarrassment in it. Walk in your mind over to the top of a huge cliff that towers in your mind and….
Chuck that suitcase over!
Discard and throw away all your pain from before. Give yourself permission to say:
Okay, I’ve made some pathetic choices in the past – that’s okay now. I’ve accepted my responsibility for them…and I’m now moving on to a better and healthier me! Got that?? Nobody but NOBODY will stop my future success!!
You’d be surprised how much more in control you’ll feel when you take responsibility for all of your choices, the actions that resulted from those choices, and the future paths that are waiting for you.
It’s truly a hero’s journey.
Enjoy,
Barbara
ps – speaking of choices, here’s some dandy ones for Weight Watchers!
Morning,
I think that being a firm parent is one of the toughest things a mom has to do.
Today one of my kids made some very ill-considered choices…so I chose to inflict specific consequences geared towards driving the point home.
The good news is that was certainly achieved…the not-so-thrilling news is that it resulted in major angst…..angst against which I had to stand firm.
Argh. It would be so much easier to simply let things slide….and not form good habits. Argh!
I had to reiterate several times that I’m not your friend, I’m ‘way above and beyond that, I’m your mom and no, I don’t particularly care if you choose to hate me for this fact. Oh, and never try the test of wills; it’s impossible to break me.
“But mom, what if I’m kidnapped and die and these were your last words to me? You’re being sooooo unfair! You’ll feel soooooo guilty!”
‘Tis amazing the guilt trips children will try to harass their parents with. Sigh.
So….the point has been made, and my kid is currently snarling to herself. Ah well. I know she will emerge stronger for this difficulty…and I also know she will learn better choices for the future. But wow, it’s still just plain hell to watch one’s children choose to be miserable. Sigh sigh sigh.
Kids should come with reboot mechanisms.
And so the night falls,
Barbara
ps – I wonder if the following are easier to raise?