Life Lessons
     Sent 6/24/2003

Sharing Creative Energy Newsletter
By Darla Arni
May/June Edition

To simplify my life and yours, my e-newsletter will only be sent twice during the summer and will return to regular monthly editions in September. Until then, enjoy your summer and have some much deserved fun!

Life Lessons
I have always known that life is made up of lessons we need to learn, but sometimes I get so busy living that I forget to pay attention to the lessons that are staring me in the face. Perhaps I should say that I get so busy grumbling, whining, feeling sorry for myself, feeling frustrated, feeling overwhelmed, or being selfish that I don’t pay attention to the lessons. For in truth, when I am living live mindfully, paying attention in a healthy way, I see the lessons, I learn from the lessons and I change my life accordingly.

We all interpret our life with the filters we see it through. No one sees, feels, or reacts to events the way we do because we each have our own unique vision that is filtered by our experiences, our family, our successes, our failures, and our previous lessons learned. In the words of Dr. Phil McGraw, “There is no reality; only perception.”

I am reminded of a childhood, singsong game called ‘Going on a Bear Hunt’. It begins with, “We’re going on a bear hunt, I’m not afraid.” If you ever played it as a child then you recall that everyone participates in choosing obstacles along the bear hunt path. After the obstacle is chosen then it is determined how to handle it. For instance, if the obstacle is a river, you can’t go under it, can’t go around it, if there is no bridge you can’t go over it, so you have to swim through it.

Sometimes we believe certain obstacles/challenges in life can be sidestepped or gone around, but in truth they can only be sidestepped for so long. Those challenges that aren’t faced head on with a clear mind and responsible manner have a tendency to come around again and again, until we learn the life lesson we were meant to learn.

Often it is not the actual obstacle/challenge that is important, but how you handled it. Did you take responsibility? Did you learn from it? Did you bury your head in the sand and hope it would go away? Did you blame someone else for your dilemma? Did you raise your eyes to the sky and lament “Why me?” These are questions only you can answer and only you can answer to.

We are all works in progress and there is much to do. We can learn from ourselves, our experiences, our colleagues, and most importantly from our failures. It’s time to clean out the ‘filters’ we view life through and see our challenges for what they are-another life lesson to be learned.

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May/June Brainteaser-Win a Cool Prize!
The answer for April was; neither man died because they weren’t dueling each other. Congratulations to Luanne Wymore for having the correct answer! In fact we had several correct answers on the first day and had to have a drawing to determine the winner. Since last months brainteaser was way too easy, this month I’ve tried to crank it up a notch! Now here’s your chance to win.

You have an empty wine bottle. A dime is placed inside the bottle and the cork is inserted in the neck. Your job is to get the dime out without removing the cork or damaging the bottle. How will you do it?

Email me your answer and on July 1st a winner will be drawn from all the correct answers received.

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October Brainteaser-Win A Cool Prize

Can you figure out a way to hold a piece of rope or string, one end in each hand, and tie a knot in the string without letting go of either end?

Email me your answer by November 7th and a winner will be drawn from all the correct answers received.

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Darla Arni is a Professional Speaker, Consultant and Author of Sharing Creative Energy at Home, Life Compass for Women, and the Sharing Creative Energy Newsletter.

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