Don't Keep Feeding the Fear

The news has not been good this week. Financial experts on Wall Street are predicting it will get worse before it gets better.

In the meantime, our federal government is attempting to pass a bailout package that will get this country's financial life recusitated, but that's only if they can AGREE on a package. Once the cameras were off, the gloves were off and it broke down into a shouting match. This is not good news for any of us.

Today, they are looking at all the options, trying to figure out a solution to this problem, to keep us from this country's worst financial disaster since the crash of 1929. With all the political backlashing and finger pointing going on, I don't have high hopes that they will come to a speedy and agreeable solution. In the end, we the people will be screwed royally, once again.

Aren't you all getting tired of this? On the media, there is never any good news. I am getting to the point I can't watch television anymore. If there isn't gloom and doom of the economy going in the toilet, then there is the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the disasters from the hurricanes this year, etc.

I am not suggesting we all stick our heads in the sand and hope it goes away. That doesn't solve anything, and that manner of dealing with the problems our country is facing is how we all got in this mess in the first place! We can't look backwards and say, "Oh, it was this and this that caused this to happen." Sure, we might want to learn from this experience, but now is not the time to analyze who or what is responsible for this mess.

We all need to stop feeding the fear. The more we listen to this crap, all this negativity, all the fear, all the panic, the sky is falling, blah, blah, blah, the more this will continue. We need to stop and look at what is working. We need to take inventory of what we DO HAVE, not what we lost. We need to help each other through this, or we will never get past this.

But most of all, we need to shut off the television. Be informed, yes, but don't keep listening to the point you think the end of the world is coming and you start boarding up your windows and doors. If you need to find some way to ease the panic, here are a few suggestions:

*Be grateful. List all the things you have and all the people in your life you are grateful for. List your health, if you are in decent health, the fact you woke up this morning is a gift in itself. Start from there.

*Stock up on provisions, if you can. If you feel stocking up on canned goods and non-perishable items in your pantry will ease your anxiety, go ahead. Sometimes feeling prepared for any disaster will ease that feeling of no control.

*Find some "good news" to read or listen to each day. Check out Happy News Headlines, a newsletter that gives you only "happy news". Find articles and movies that inspire you. Watch "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch, or "The Secret". Find ways to make you feel more positive and enlightened.

*Pray. I don't go to church, but I believe in God. With God all things are possible. I pray all the time, and ask him to help all of us through this. If you aren't religious, then meditate and let go all the negative feelings and visualize the positive feelings and events you want to see happen.

*Help someone else. If you can, find ways to help someone who is in a worse spot than you are. Volunteer. Give a dollar or two to your favorite charity. Donate blood. Clean out your closets and give the stuff you don't need or use anymore to GoodWill or the Salvation Army. When you give, you get so much in return. And it just feels good.

My way of dealing with crisis is to cook. I made tacos, and tater tot casserole, and apple crisp. I also went to the meat market and stocked our freezer with meat. I got the laundry done, and will be cleaning my house, my closets, and my garage and purging out the stuff I don't need or use so someone else can use it.

I also write. Writing has been my salvation through all the good times and the hard times I have been through in my life. I pour out my heart on the page or the screen and it lifts a huge weight from my shoulders. Therapy in a notebook that cost me $1.00 at Wal-Mart. That's affordable. And the pay off I get is priceless.

I also watch a lot of movies. Funny movies, or inspirational movies (Rudy, Rocky, Lord of the Rings), and lose myself in a few hours from what's going on. I also get good ideas from them that helps feed my creativity and my imagination.

But most of all, I remember that "This too, shall pass."

How do you deal with hard times? What works for you? Comment and share. Who knows, you might help someone else, but most importantly, you will be helping yourself.

And remember we can get through this together.

Getting your house in order

Today was not a glamorous day, by any means. We awoke early to get my son, Alex, off to the airport. We awoke at 5:00 am and had to make to the airport 2 hours early so he could get checked in before his flight. By some miracle, there was NO LINE!!! He got checked in and he gave me one of those quick, one-armed hugs and a kiss on the cheek, and he was off to spend a week at the home of my brother, Andy and his wife, Lisa, in Oklahoma City. We left the airport and we were home around 8:30 am. I resisted the urge to go back to bed and catch a few more hours of sleep, and instead, began working on cleaning the closet, my bookcase and the ...GARAGE!!

I am a master (or mistress?) at procrastination, and I have put this off so long that it was actually making me physically ill! I couldn't take it anymore, it was driving me crazy! I couldn't write, because I kept thinking about all of the crap I needed to sort through and organize and I know that is why there was nothing but crap coming into my life. I had NO ROOM for anything good to come through! Time to silence my inner packrat who has had full reign for too long!

I was ruthless. I tackled my closet. Yuck! The first thing I went through was my clothes. Anything that was ripped, torn, or beyond repair, went into the rag pile. Next were the clothes I wear all the time. Those were sorted into piles. One for the clothes I have NOT worn in a year or more. Gone. Either going to Goodwill or Salvation Army. The rest was separated into work and dress up. Not much on either side, but that's ok, I have hangers now! Yippee!

Next was the bookcase. It had morphed into a giant sponge, sucking up energy and life because it was collecting crap all over it. It's the "catch-all" of the house. But the kitchen table is usually worse. I pulled everything off the shelves and dusted them (or plowed, if you prefer), and once they were all polished, I set about sorting the books and stuff that had accumulated there. Books I wanted to keep, I put back on the shelf. The rest went into a box for me to take to the bookstore to cash in for money. Felt like I lost 5 pounds just doing that!

The Garage. Did I mention it was almost 90 degrees today? By the time I was out there starting to sort through stuff around the door and the shelves, it was around 1:00 pm. Hot is not the word for it. I was practically melting, but I was driven to get 'er done! I was on a roll and the heat actually helped me do it a lot faster than I would have, because I didn't stand there looking at all my magazines, books, and junk and think, "Oh, I'll just keep that around, I might need it." Nope. I silenced that pack rat right away by saying the same thing in the closet. "If I haven't touched it in a year or more, out it goes!"

Unfortunately, I did lose a lot of books that would have been good to sell at the bookstore to mold and mildew. They got wet somehow and the box and everything in it had to go. I was sad for a second, but then realized that if I had done this sooner, I could have saved them. I didn't want to stand there and keep kicking myself in the pants for my procrastination. It doesn't do any good.

After I sorted what was going to Goodwill or Salvation Army and what was trash and going in the dumpster, the rest was easy to sort through. It was the giveaway pile to family and friends I know who can benefit from some of my junk. Then the smallest pile of all was the pile of what I really wanted to keep. Not a whole lot, which is good, because I don't want to do this any time soon, but I do want to schedule and organize things to the point that once a month, at least, I am sorting, donating or throwing out the junk I don't need. I have too much to do. I have writing to do, a writing business to run, and most importantly, a family to take care of, and now that I have this off my mind, I feel like a huge load has been lifted and the energy can flow in, with all the good we can stand!

So, if you think the world has it out for you, or you are so frustrated at how things are going, take a good, hard, honest look around and "clean out the corners." You will feel so much better!

Just for the record, this was brought on by my friend and fellow writer, Jen Nipps who is in the process of moving and posted to our online writing group that she is cleaning out all the clutter from her life right now. Thanks, Jen! :)