Susan, I too live and travel with three autoimmune conditions, one of which has multiple facets. Some people want to know after surgery or a flare up, if I have that behind me now. No, and I never will. But I too like you work to manage, hid, and minimize my conditions. I will travel to Cuba this May with college students accompanying their university's study abroad program. I'm so worried I'll seem like an old lady to them. Of course, I will, I'm 71. I will not try to keep up or do everything they do, but travel at my own pace to follow my own needs. Still I want to spend as much time as possible with the students to absorb their energy and enthusiasm about Cuba and Hemingway, whom they'll be studying. Thanks, Susan for your thoughtful musings. You have helped me be honest with myself about this trip.
Rhonda, I hear you! I share your frustration with people not recognizing that "chronic" means "always." I think it's because people hate to see us hurting and want so much for our health challenges to be solvable, a natural human instinct, even if it is frustrating. As for your trip to Cuba with the students from the study-abroad program, I hope you are able to just be you, in all of the manifestations of that, and absorb the students' energy and enthusiasm without hurting yourself. Maybe they can learn from knowing whatever you would want to share about your challenges along the way. Many blessings to you!
I am staring at my 80th birthday and have renewed focus on making the most of my time here on this blessed esrth. Just read world Enough and Time which you recommended!
Bette, I am so glad you read World Enough and Time--such a thoughtful and inspiring look at giving ourselves what we need to be here, now, with all that means. And 80 is quite an achievement--celebrate yourself and your life!
BTW, I do miss the Bighorn Basin immensely, but it's just not possible for me to live there anymore. C'est la vie, and I am fortunate to be where I am.
I have been open with all about my chronic fatigue syndrome, but i also have a sensory processing disorder that predated the CFS (or maybe is one aspect of it?) that it may be time to claim more boldly, and thereby release it’s hold on me…I am remembering a time forty years ago when out of the blue someone blurted, “maybe you are autistic!”. It startled and muted me completely . I have a grandson who makes people wonder if he is “on the spectrum “ …I have things to explore! Thank you for this encouragement!
Kathryn, One of my great-nephews has a sensory processing disorder that is considered on the spectrum. Seeing him as he has grown from a baby who was very cranky about every-day things to a teenager who is artistic and has learned to manage sensory stimulation so that he doesn't get overwhelmed and fall apart has been useful to me in understanding my own limitations. Even though we are not biologically related, I see myself in some of his sensitivity. It makes me wonder if many of those of us who are introverted are also very sensitive to sensory stimulation. I say all of that as additional encouragement to you to explore your own condition without judgment or fear. Many blessings!
I have to say, I wonder if the CFS is an expression of your body's total exhaustion with all the years of trying to be normal, but in reality, being way too over-stimulated. Adrenal exhaustion might figure in. I don't know that there's any research about that connection, but you know your body and your life better than anyone, so I'd say it's worth pondering.
Thanks for the mention, Susan! It has already led to some new connections, so I'm grateful. And, Kathryn, I had a postviral CFS some decades ago, so my heart goes out to you as you live with it. I remember how unhelpful friends and relatives could be at that time with their comments. Everybody had a suggestion for something to try. My favorite: "Have you tried a support group? You know, there are groups for people like you, who are allergic to groups." (!) She was pointing to my social (and sensory) limits, but neither of us knew at the time that they were part of a larger picture that had a name. It was a comfort, in my sixties, to finally learn the name. I wish you all the best as you navigate your path!
I think that is Iris reticulata, which is widely available as a specialty bulb and very easy to grow. You can even force it in a pot inside. It's a lovely sign of spring before much else is blooming.
i was widowed 4 years ago and left Cody to make a new life in New Jersey near my daughter. I too miss Wyoming -- the wide open spaces, Sunlight Basin where we had a small cabin, and the aroma of SAGE. we did a lit if packing w the Dominicks; am sure you know them. I believe Jane was the first who told me about you.
life is good even after loss -- I am headed to France for the 80th... live traveling alone.
Ah. A big change, but it sounds like you've embraced it wholly. I do know the Dominicks, and I know Sunlight Basin well (I worked for the Shoshone NF decades ago when I was a young botanist). Enjoy your trip to France for your 80th--have a spectacularly wonderful time! Blessings, S
I really understand where you are, especially now that I am an old man and struggling sometimes to walk, but I have a sort of connection that is not related to a real condition. Through much of my young life I was treated as if I had a invisible infirmity by my mother, who had fabricated in her mind a throat condition because I was in the hospital when I was one year old (I have not been admitted to a hospital for 80 years!). I was homeschooled because of it and, well I really was no more ill than any other child to twenty-year old, it affected me as if I really did have the problem. I'm still dealing with that crippling image of myself at 81!
I am now trying to work with this, along with Lynda's absence (she had now been in a care facility for 2 and a fourth years). I need to alter my thinking significantly. Your writings are a help for sure. The natural world has always been my refuge. I am never disappointed by it. Thank you!
Dave, I am sorry that your mother "endowed" you with a throat condition when you were young, and that shaped your sense of yourself. I wonder if she needed you to be ill for some reason, like the mental illness we used to call Munchausen's symptom by proxy. I feel great sympathy for her disturbed needs and for the fact that she imposed them on you. I hope you can find a way to forgive your mom and let go of that false image of yourself. You have accomplished so much in your life, and you and Lynda raised three girls who are forging good paths of their own!
Susan, Thanks. Even though my mother dropped that burden on me I do sympathize with her condition. At the time women were just chattel and she was stifled when she tried to change that. She had lost her father when she was nine years old and lost my sister to SIDS. She had reason to be as disturbed as she was, but there was a time when I had to break free of that nihilistic dream of hers and Lynda helped to give me the strength to do just that. I really owe her big time. However, the echos live on and I have been getting help with that.
I wish you well with your struggle and hold you in the light.
I'm glad you were able to break free of your mother's embittered view of life, and glad that Lynda came along when you needed her. I think of you two as helping each other become the people you were meant to be, and I'm glad you had each other for that!
Words are interesting symbols and I am very aware of being careful which ones I use, especially about myself. I don't see my life as a struggle, rather as an opportunity to learn and grow, not always an easy thing to do. But I am grateful for the opportunity to be here to do just that! Blessings, Susan
I keep myself sane by realizing what a privilege it is to walk this earth. Sometimes, however, it really is a struggle, for me.
I have, in many ways, had a good life. Lynda and the girls, including Christina, are great blessings in my life. I would have not had those blessings if certain happenings had not allowed me to get an education and I well know how many people helped in that endeavor. Being a field biologist was only a dream when I was twenty, but in fourteen years it was accomplished! I worked for over thirty years before I became a professor, but it happened. I really cannot complain.
Julia, her husband James, and our grandson, Drake, recently visited The Dominican Republic on a mission project and I am blessed by the essay Drake wrote acknowledging his own appreciation for his life and how he needs to view the world. I've been a little afraid that he would grow up without realizing his debt for the things he has and his debt to the earth, including other people. I should not have worried because I know Julia would not allow him to become a spoiled kid.
You are welcome, Sue! Anytime you find these essays useful or inspiring, consider sharing them with others. I put a lot of time and creativity into this work, and the more eyes who see it means more subscribers, and hopefully, more financial support. :)
I live with mental illness as my invisible (generally) companion and have done so most of my life. I can say that I do not believe I would have worked so hard to be healthy in all ways, if my mental illness and sensitivity hadn’t made my daily life pretty painful, although complex trauma, which I also have (as do so many others) also does that. In my Spiritual Companioning practice, I watch my clients struggle with some aspect of themselves that they’ve tried to avoid, eliminate, ignore, or beat into submission for years. There’s often an awful lot of shame attached to their particular characteristic and also the failed attempts to manage or get rid of it. When people begin to accept the presence of this aspect in themselves, and possibly welcome it or be compassionate toward it, then they begin to see its other qualities. Without fail, what has caused them so much pain becomes a source of gift. It often also continues to be a source of pain, but the balance has shifted. And this creates healing. Thanks for this Susan. I enjoyed reading the other comments about this journey as well.
Emily, What an eloquent response--thank you! I admire your courage and creativity in dealing with your companions/conditions. Your point that you wouldn't have worked so hard to be healthy at all levels if your daily life hadn't been so painful is true for a lot of us, at least in my experience and those I hear from whenever I write about this sort of thing. I love your wording about "welcoming" and "being compassionate" toward that which we feel shame or struggle with in ourselves, and I agree that when we can shift our perspective, we can see that those same qualities or conditions also bring insights and gifts. It's such a miracle when we can begin to see that way! Your Spiritual Companioning clients are very fortunate to find someone as compassionate and intuitive as you clearly are. Thank you for being you and doing that work. Many blessings to you!
Susan, I'm so glad you're writing more here in your newsletter about the physical challenges you live with. They are a part of you I wasn't very familiar with, so I'm glad to get to know you better. And what beautiful things you have learned from them!—listening, compassion, love. No better collection of blessings, is there? Fresh as those spring buds! Thanks for being you.
Thank you for the encouragement, Priscilla. I wrote a memoir about learning to be myself in my particular body (Walking Nature Home), and I thought that was all I had to say. But hah! Things change, and we change, and there is more to interpret. Always. Blessings!
So grateful to have been prompted to consider how much energy I put into maintaining the appearance of health...what a thing, I can't help but wonder how much the need relates to my internalised death phobia, and fear of rejection, of course. I'm in a deep process of radical acceptance of my entire self at the moment, it's wildly uncomfortable but so liberating. Thank you, Susan.
Chloe, It takes courage to go deeply into radical acceptance of ourselves, and I salute you for your work and your commitment to that kind of wholeness. May it liberate you to be more yourself in public and to free that energy we all put into maintaining our exterior images of self. I think part of why I want to appear something I am not (healthy) is about wanting to just be normal, for once in my life, to blend in. Which I will never do or be, so it's long past time to accept myself as I am!
Mmm, so true. It's amusing how I think normalcy is totally overrated, while simultaneously wanting to appear normal, too! Blessings on your path, Susan
Here's what I wrote about "normal" in my most recent book, Bless the Birds: "'Normal' is a hypothetical construct, not reality. It’s what we expect or hope to happen—like people being more civil and less hateful, or the oceans not heating up. It’s the familiar we crave. Normal is self-defined, a fiction that our minds edit to suit our preferred narrative." I re-read this from time to time to remind myself to let go of the craving to be "normal," whatever that means! Blessings to you, too, Chloe.
My baggage is rage. I try to live in the here and now, but sometimes it just creeps up, without warning. And i must go find a quiet place and try to calm.
Rage is tough, hard baggage to deal with. I take mine outside into the nearby wild, and let it out. When the wind howls, I scream into it. I also scream in the shower. I wonder if it would help to give your rage voice somehow? Keeping it contained could be harmful. Blessings to you.
"The truth is, the effort I put into maintaining a healthy-looking exterior self is energy I can’t use to do other things, including practicing my terraphilia...." This reminds me of the concept of thinking of our limited energy as "spoons," which I imagine you know all about. It takes so much bravery to reveal what we perceive of as our frailties, and I admire yours. I give too much energy away to worry, negative self-talk, catastrophising, and the like. At least a slightly more philosophical attitude is developing with age...either that or I'm bored with worrying that same old bone. :)
That spoon concept for energy is a really useful one. As for worry, negative self-talk and catastrophising, I have done that all my life, only I called it "planning for eventualities." I have learned to do less, in part because I lived through the worst I could imagine--losing my spouse/partner/love of my life and my mother in the same year--and here I am, solo at 67 years old and happy in the life I never thought I could live. So while I may not worry less, I take the worries less seriously. Maybe that's age, maybe the searing experience of loss--who knows. Regardless, I am grateful.
Sorry, I am behind in my reading. This Spring is for me to get rid of the toxic people in my life. Of course, literally not figuratively. I plan to tackle the people I know and those on social media who have crept into my daily life. If I am usually irritated, in a bad way, after engagement I am going to just not engage anymore.
Linda, That sounds like a really useful practice. I especially like your metric and plan of action: "If I am irritated, in a bad way, after engagement I am going to just not engage anymore." Noticing that irritation and deciding to simply let it go is a very kind way to handle those people who are toxic. May this practice bring you ease and lightness. :)
Thank you for these words. I am right there with you. What a beautiful picture.
Thank you for reading! The photos are both from my rock garden: The first is dwarf iris and the second is native Physaria or bladder pod.
Susan, I too live and travel with three autoimmune conditions, one of which has multiple facets. Some people want to know after surgery or a flare up, if I have that behind me now. No, and I never will. But I too like you work to manage, hid, and minimize my conditions. I will travel to Cuba this May with college students accompanying their university's study abroad program. I'm so worried I'll seem like an old lady to them. Of course, I will, I'm 71. I will not try to keep up or do everything they do, but travel at my own pace to follow my own needs. Still I want to spend as much time as possible with the students to absorb their energy and enthusiasm about Cuba and Hemingway, whom they'll be studying. Thanks, Susan for your thoughtful musings. You have helped me be honest with myself about this trip.
Rhonda, I hear you! I share your frustration with people not recognizing that "chronic" means "always." I think it's because people hate to see us hurting and want so much for our health challenges to be solvable, a natural human instinct, even if it is frustrating. As for your trip to Cuba with the students from the study-abroad program, I hope you are able to just be you, in all of the manifestations of that, and absorb the students' energy and enthusiasm without hurting yourself. Maybe they can learn from knowing whatever you would want to share about your challenges along the way. Many blessings to you!
I am staring at my 80th birthday and have renewed focus on making the most of my time here on this blessed esrth. Just read world Enough and Time which you recommended!
Bette ( originally from Basin/ Cody)
Bette, I am so glad you read World Enough and Time--such a thoughtful and inspiring look at giving ourselves what we need to be here, now, with all that means. And 80 is quite an achievement--celebrate yourself and your life!
BTW, I do miss the Bighorn Basin immensely, but it's just not possible for me to live there anymore. C'est la vie, and I am fortunate to be where I am.
I have been open with all about my chronic fatigue syndrome, but i also have a sensory processing disorder that predated the CFS (or maybe is one aspect of it?) that it may be time to claim more boldly, and thereby release it’s hold on me…I am remembering a time forty years ago when out of the blue someone blurted, “maybe you are autistic!”. It startled and muted me completely . I have a grandson who makes people wonder if he is “on the spectrum “ …I have things to explore! Thank you for this encouragement!
Kathryn, One of my great-nephews has a sensory processing disorder that is considered on the spectrum. Seeing him as he has grown from a baby who was very cranky about every-day things to a teenager who is artistic and has learned to manage sensory stimulation so that he doesn't get overwhelmed and fall apart has been useful to me in understanding my own limitations. Even though we are not biologically related, I see myself in some of his sensitivity. It makes me wonder if many of those of us who are introverted are also very sensitive to sensory stimulation. I say all of that as additional encouragement to you to explore your own condition without judgment or fear. Many blessings!
Thank you! That all sounds so plausible.
I have to say, I wonder if the CFS is an expression of your body's total exhaustion with all the years of trying to be normal, but in reality, being way too over-stimulated. Adrenal exhaustion might figure in. I don't know that there's any research about that connection, but you know your body and your life better than anyone, so I'd say it's worth pondering.
Also, this podcast from my friend Priscilla Stuckey might be useful. She realized quite late in life that she is on the spectrum, and this episode is about what that meant to her. https://priscillastuckey.substack.com/p/38-with-autism-it-all-made-sense
Thanks for the mention, Susan! It has already led to some new connections, so I'm grateful. And, Kathryn, I had a postviral CFS some decades ago, so my heart goes out to you as you live with it. I remember how unhelpful friends and relatives could be at that time with their comments. Everybody had a suggestion for something to try. My favorite: "Have you tried a support group? You know, there are groups for people like you, who are allergic to groups." (!) She was pointing to my social (and sensory) limits, but neither of us knew at the time that they were part of a larger picture that had a name. It was a comfort, in my sixties, to finally learn the name. I wish you all the best as you navigate your path!
I especially like the dwarf iris!
I think that is Iris reticulata, which is widely available as a specialty bulb and very easy to grow. You can even force it in a pot inside. It's a lovely sign of spring before much else is blooming.
Will check it out. Thanks!
i was widowed 4 years ago and left Cody to make a new life in New Jersey near my daughter. I too miss Wyoming -- the wide open spaces, Sunlight Basin where we had a small cabin, and the aroma of SAGE. we did a lit if packing w the Dominicks; am sure you know them. I believe Jane was the first who told me about you.
life is good even after loss -- I am headed to France for the 80th... live traveling alone.
thanks for this site. it nurtures me
Bette
Ah. A big change, but it sounds like you've embraced it wholly. I do know the Dominicks, and I know Sunlight Basin well (I worked for the Shoshone NF decades ago when I was a young botanist). Enjoy your trip to France for your 80th--have a spectacularly wonderful time! Blessings, S
The blue and yellow iris represent this feeling of the "springtime of the soul." Lovely essay.
Thank you! That's the dwarf iris called Iris reticulata. It's a favorite of mine for rock gardens.
A favorite of mine too!
Dear Susan,
I really understand where you are, especially now that I am an old man and struggling sometimes to walk, but I have a sort of connection that is not related to a real condition. Through much of my young life I was treated as if I had a invisible infirmity by my mother, who had fabricated in her mind a throat condition because I was in the hospital when I was one year old (I have not been admitted to a hospital for 80 years!). I was homeschooled because of it and, well I really was no more ill than any other child to twenty-year old, it affected me as if I really did have the problem. I'm still dealing with that crippling image of myself at 81!
I am now trying to work with this, along with Lynda's absence (she had now been in a care facility for 2 and a fourth years). I need to alter my thinking significantly. Your writings are a help for sure. The natural world has always been my refuge. I am never disappointed by it. Thank you!
Dave, I am sorry that your mother "endowed" you with a throat condition when you were young, and that shaped your sense of yourself. I wonder if she needed you to be ill for some reason, like the mental illness we used to call Munchausen's symptom by proxy. I feel great sympathy for her disturbed needs and for the fact that she imposed them on you. I hope you can find a way to forgive your mom and let go of that false image of yourself. You have accomplished so much in your life, and you and Lynda raised three girls who are forging good paths of their own!
Susan, Thanks. Even though my mother dropped that burden on me I do sympathize with her condition. At the time women were just chattel and she was stifled when she tried to change that. She had lost her father when she was nine years old and lost my sister to SIDS. She had reason to be as disturbed as she was, but there was a time when I had to break free of that nihilistic dream of hers and Lynda helped to give me the strength to do just that. I really owe her big time. However, the echos live on and I have been getting help with that.
I wish you well with your struggle and hold you in the light.
I'm glad you were able to break free of your mother's embittered view of life, and glad that Lynda came along when you needed her. I think of you two as helping each other become the people you were meant to be, and I'm glad you had each other for that!
Words are interesting symbols and I am very aware of being careful which ones I use, especially about myself. I don't see my life as a struggle, rather as an opportunity to learn and grow, not always an easy thing to do. But I am grateful for the opportunity to be here to do just that! Blessings, Susan
Susan,
I keep myself sane by realizing what a privilege it is to walk this earth. Sometimes, however, it really is a struggle, for me.
I have, in many ways, had a good life. Lynda and the girls, including Christina, are great blessings in my life. I would have not had those blessings if certain happenings had not allowed me to get an education and I well know how many people helped in that endeavor. Being a field biologist was only a dream when I was twenty, but in fourteen years it was accomplished! I worked for over thirty years before I became a professor, but it happened. I really cannot complain.
Julia, her husband James, and our grandson, Drake, recently visited The Dominican Republic on a mission project and I am blessed by the essay Drake wrote acknowledging his own appreciation for his life and how he needs to view the world. I've been a little afraid that he would grow up without realizing his debt for the things he has and his debt to the earth, including other people. I should not have worried because I know Julia would not allow him to become a spoiled kid.
Had to chuckle when your subject today was a list of all the dichotomies we face! I certainly spend a great deal of time thinking about them!
Oh how often changing one's perspective can change the value of an experience! Thanks once again for your writings Susan!
You are welcome, Sue! Anytime you find these essays useful or inspiring, consider sharing them with others. I put a lot of time and creativity into this work, and the more eyes who see it means more subscribers, and hopefully, more financial support. :)
I live with mental illness as my invisible (generally) companion and have done so most of my life. I can say that I do not believe I would have worked so hard to be healthy in all ways, if my mental illness and sensitivity hadn’t made my daily life pretty painful, although complex trauma, which I also have (as do so many others) also does that. In my Spiritual Companioning practice, I watch my clients struggle with some aspect of themselves that they’ve tried to avoid, eliminate, ignore, or beat into submission for years. There’s often an awful lot of shame attached to their particular characteristic and also the failed attempts to manage or get rid of it. When people begin to accept the presence of this aspect in themselves, and possibly welcome it or be compassionate toward it, then they begin to see its other qualities. Without fail, what has caused them so much pain becomes a source of gift. It often also continues to be a source of pain, but the balance has shifted. And this creates healing. Thanks for this Susan. I enjoyed reading the other comments about this journey as well.
Emily, What an eloquent response--thank you! I admire your courage and creativity in dealing with your companions/conditions. Your point that you wouldn't have worked so hard to be healthy at all levels if your daily life hadn't been so painful is true for a lot of us, at least in my experience and those I hear from whenever I write about this sort of thing. I love your wording about "welcoming" and "being compassionate" toward that which we feel shame or struggle with in ourselves, and I agree that when we can shift our perspective, we can see that those same qualities or conditions also bring insights and gifts. It's such a miracle when we can begin to see that way! Your Spiritual Companioning clients are very fortunate to find someone as compassionate and intuitive as you clearly are. Thank you for being you and doing that work. Many blessings to you!
Thank you Susan! I love the space your create here and that I get to be in it!
I am honored by your presence and your thoughts, Emily. Truly.
😊
Susan, I'm so glad you're writing more here in your newsletter about the physical challenges you live with. They are a part of you I wasn't very familiar with, so I'm glad to get to know you better. And what beautiful things you have learned from them!—listening, compassion, love. No better collection of blessings, is there? Fresh as those spring buds! Thanks for being you.
Thank you for the encouragement, Priscilla. I wrote a memoir about learning to be myself in my particular body (Walking Nature Home), and I thought that was all I had to say. But hah! Things change, and we change, and there is more to interpret. Always. Blessings!
So grateful to have been prompted to consider how much energy I put into maintaining the appearance of health...what a thing, I can't help but wonder how much the need relates to my internalised death phobia, and fear of rejection, of course. I'm in a deep process of radical acceptance of my entire self at the moment, it's wildly uncomfortable but so liberating. Thank you, Susan.
Chloe, It takes courage to go deeply into radical acceptance of ourselves, and I salute you for your work and your commitment to that kind of wholeness. May it liberate you to be more yourself in public and to free that energy we all put into maintaining our exterior images of self. I think part of why I want to appear something I am not (healthy) is about wanting to just be normal, for once in my life, to blend in. Which I will never do or be, so it's long past time to accept myself as I am!
Mmm, so true. It's amusing how I think normalcy is totally overrated, while simultaneously wanting to appear normal, too! Blessings on your path, Susan
Here's what I wrote about "normal" in my most recent book, Bless the Birds: "'Normal' is a hypothetical construct, not reality. It’s what we expect or hope to happen—like people being more civil and less hateful, or the oceans not heating up. It’s the familiar we crave. Normal is self-defined, a fiction that our minds edit to suit our preferred narrative." I re-read this from time to time to remind myself to let go of the craving to be "normal," whatever that means! Blessings to you, too, Chloe.
Brilliant. Sincerest thanks for sharing 🙏
My baggage is rage. I try to live in the here and now, but sometimes it just creeps up, without warning. And i must go find a quiet place and try to calm.
Rage is tough, hard baggage to deal with. I take mine outside into the nearby wild, and let it out. When the wind howls, I scream into it. I also scream in the shower. I wonder if it would help to give your rage voice somehow? Keeping it contained could be harmful. Blessings to you.
"The truth is, the effort I put into maintaining a healthy-looking exterior self is energy I can’t use to do other things, including practicing my terraphilia...." This reminds me of the concept of thinking of our limited energy as "spoons," which I imagine you know all about. It takes so much bravery to reveal what we perceive of as our frailties, and I admire yours. I give too much energy away to worry, negative self-talk, catastrophising, and the like. At least a slightly more philosophical attitude is developing with age...either that or I'm bored with worrying that same old bone. :)
That spoon concept for energy is a really useful one. As for worry, negative self-talk and catastrophising, I have done that all my life, only I called it "planning for eventualities." I have learned to do less, in part because I lived through the worst I could imagine--losing my spouse/partner/love of my life and my mother in the same year--and here I am, solo at 67 years old and happy in the life I never thought I could live. So while I may not worry less, I take the worries less seriously. Maybe that's age, maybe the searing experience of loss--who knows. Regardless, I am grateful.
Sorry, I am behind in my reading. This Spring is for me to get rid of the toxic people in my life. Of course, literally not figuratively. I plan to tackle the people I know and those on social media who have crept into my daily life. If I am usually irritated, in a bad way, after engagement I am going to just not engage anymore.
Linda, That sounds like a really useful practice. I especially like your metric and plan of action: "If I am irritated, in a bad way, after engagement I am going to just not engage anymore." Noticing that irritation and deciding to simply let it go is a very kind way to handle those people who are toxic. May this practice bring you ease and lightness. :)