Jeanne H Barnett's Blog

IF I had a billion US dollars, how would I spend it?
there was a time I would have answered that pretty quickly
with an endless list of items I thought would make me “happy.”
Age 25 List (only partial list):
– a British Morgan, a 1957 Thunderbird, a Porsche
(those would get me around nicely)
– a beautiful house in the mountains, self-sustaining,
(that would give me a place to live and be eco-friendly)
– with a home for my parents next door
– an income stream
(so I could try to become an author)
– and a special home for women who needed a place to live
with no cost to them, no restrictions and no “move out” time . . .
ah, the dreams of youthful innocence!

Now, after many decades, my ”wants” list is short and simple –
Age 75 List:
• a home filled with love and laughter
• a kitchen overflowing with aromas of comfort food
• a “living” room streaming music, family, and friends
• a way to get to the store occasionally
• enough money to eat at Olive Garden sometimes

There is another BILLION that is much more important to me –
—ONE BILLION SECONDS is equivalent to 31.70979198376 YEARS –
really? so I had “spent” a BILLION seconds when I reached 31-32—
I wonder if I would be happy reviewing how I spent that BILLION –
I ask myself in the here and now:
DO I take time to think about how I will spend even just the next
86,400 seconds (that’s 24 hours) – how am I SPENDING my BILLIONS
of seconds that turn into hours that turn into days that turn into months
that turn into years, that turn into decades . . .
what do I do with my seconds and hours every day that are part of
my BILLIONS of seconds I have to spend—it sounds like a lot!
Perhaps now is the time to stop and check on how I am using
the BILLIONS I have – time like money seems to just fly away
if attention is not paid to the small “expenditures” and
my time is much more valuable than money,
so I will pay attention – I will stop, look, listen and
savor my BILLIONS . . . that is how I will spend my next billion!

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tag: bloganuary
#bloganuary

This is about “household” chores—there are other chores,
of course, but I think many of the struggles are the same.
—-
“I challenge you to a duel,” I said to the dirty floor
I saw in my kitchen. It stubbornly glared back at me –
spots, crumbs, sticky places all laughing at me.
BUT, I WON! I was motivated by that challenge
to make that floor look like it should – clean and unspotted!

The real challenge in that chore and any other chore for me
is that the sense of “victory” is a short-lived good feeling—
a sense of accomplishment that only lasts until it rears its
ugly, dirty self and has to be cleaned again, and cleaned
again, and cleaned again . . .

To me, most chores are not challenging in themselves,
the challenging part is – chores are defined as:
“minor domestic work of regular or frequent recurrence”
and that means they are not normally “one and done”
activities. And I guess the fact that they have to be done
over and over again makes them boring as well – no new
territory to explore, just cover the same area again and
again and again. Then there is the part of others who may
“help” with making the area “unclean” again, sometimes just
after you’ve finished cleaning it! Arrrrr!!!

OR, what about the chore of buying groceries? You make
that tiring trip to the store, carry all the bags into the house,
put away all that stuff and then you and others just consume it
or use it so another trip to the store is required and on and
on it goes.

What chore do I find most challenging to do?
To maintain my sense of accomplishment, my motivation,
my joy in doing each chore every time—again,
checking an item off my list of things to do for the day,
even if it does keep appearing on my list every day or so.

SO, the most challenging chore is ME!
I choose to accept the challenge of making my chores
an adventure and giving myself a “gold star” for every one
and that gives me a sense of accomplishment each time!!!

—-
tag: bloganuary
#bloganuary

How do I define success?
My definition of “success” has been changing since my first of
many “failures.” When I failed to do or be what I expected at the time,
I usually spent my time condemning myself and feeling down,
unable to find a way to see me as anything but a “failure.”

A butterfly trapped in a caterpillar life, crawling along the ground,
never realizing that within me was the ability to fly, to spread my wings,
to find the “freedom” I was longing for by letting go of the perceived
safety of my caterpillar persona, releasing all the baggage of wrong
thinking and wrong words, accepting myself as an imperfect person
who sometimes failed but remembering that that did not make me
a failure, it confirmed that I was imperfect . . . but trying!

This change was slow in coming, but I met a group of people who
accepted me as I was, warts and all, and never mentioned my warts.
They drew me into friendships with no conditions and I read a small,
but important book “Hinds’ Feet on High Places” by Hannah Hurnard
and began a journey of healing, of finding me buried beneath all
those layers of caterpillar thinking, and that took me beyond the me I
thought I was to the place where I could confront my fear of “success”
and of transformation and slowly remove the masks to reveal ME!

I came out of a dark world of perfectionism, of material goods
defining me and “success,” and traded a life in a chrysalis
(the hard outer shell left behind after the caterpillar is transformed
into a butterfly) for an often challenging life of growing more fully
to be me . . . still happening.

My definition of success is: choosing my perspective (how I look at
me and life) to be all God wants me to be in whatever capacity He
places me, to be who I am created to be as He leads me which means
rejecting my old caterpillar perspective and accepting my butterfly
status . . . beautiful colors and exploring the sky!
My journey to success . . .
—-
tag: bloganuary
#bloganuary

I learned to read before I started school and
I have been a voracious reader all my life.

MANY BOOKS have CHANGED my life, SAVED my life,
INFUSED hope in my struggles, GUIDED me to look more
deeply into my heart and to continually be open to grow,
LIGHTED a dark path, MOTIVATED me to take a step,
and here are just a few . . .

• vocation—ballerina (first memorable book – still have it)
after I read “Tina, the Ballerina,” I knew I wanted to be a ballerina.
My grandmother got me a Tina, the Ballerina doll and made
matching clothes for me and Tina and I started ballet lessons –
health issues stopped my pursuit of that goal at age 7

• basic philosophy—one person in a world
“Foundation Trilogy” by Isaac Asimov was key to an early piece
of my belief system showing how one man with a different perspective
did seemingly small things that made huge differences to a world

• personal power—responses
“Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl brought me to
a vital key for survival—as a holocaust survivor, a psychiatrist,
he led me to see the value of meaning in life and the fact
that there is only one thing I can control and no one
can take it away from me—my inner response to everything

• personal business practices—relationships
“Hope for the Flowers” by Trina Paulus, the story of moving through
seeming death to a new and more beautiful life and life choices
made along the way, showing a path to transformation

• struggles in life—darkness to light
“Jonathan Livingston Seagull” (Richard Bach), This Present Darkness/Piercing
the Darkness (Frank E Peretti), The Hobbit (Toilken), Divine and Human (Leo Tolstoy),
Purity of Heart (Soren Kierkegaard), The Cloud of Unknowing (anonymous),
The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Joseph Campbell), everything by Thomas Merton,
Divine Milieu (Pierre Teilhard de Chardin), writings by the Desert Fathers/Mothers,
Morality (Jonathan Sacks), studies by Richard Rohr, and many more . . .

books are still changing me . . .
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tag: bloganuary
#bloganuary

memorable means: easily remembered . . . noteworthy—YES!

Many years ago, I had a cat named “Tipsy”
(as a kitten he staggered as he learned to walk, hence the name).
We were bonded over the years. Whenever I sat down, he sat with me –
I petted him, he purred, and he slept right next to me at night laying against my arm
and awakening me each morning with paw taps to my face and louder and louder
“meows” until I responded, petted him, and got up.

One evening, as we approached the bed to retire, he kept meowing and
when I looked at the pillow, I understood why.
There, laying dead on my pillow was a MOUSE!
Tipsy had apparently dispatched the mouse to its final reward and
gave me the “gift” of his trophy. REALLY???

As you can imagine, my first reaction was over the top!
I love animals, but mice are not my favorite and I was totally freaked out!

Gifts are sometimes given out of a feeling of obligation
or for some special occasion, but when a gift is given of
something that means a lot to the giver,
it carries a special meaning – it is noteworthy –
and this gift meant something special to Tipsy,
so it spoke of his love for me and I have never forgotten his gift from the heart.

Over the decades, I have received many memorable gifts –
time spent with family and friends,
special moments,
shared heart times, and
serious and “fun” presents
that are all beyond value –
I am so blessed and so thankful for all of them
that are stored in my heart,
but that mouse from Tipsy with his one-word vocabulary
is easily remembered and for sure noteworthy!
A Memorable Gift – REALLY!
—-
tag: bloganuary
#bloganuary

family tree . . . family . . .

RAIN IS . . .

—just water
falling from the sky
—bringing life
and death below
created to fall, created to fly

—puddles
feeding all of life
—floods
overwhelming all
bringing calm, bringing strife

—storms
darkness swirls ‘round
—heavy clouds
seen everywhere
hiding much, much is found

—water falls
without, within
—water forms
softly changing
opens ways, clears past’s bin

Rain is . . . I am . . .

—-
thoughts – JeanneM Hicks Barnett
Saturday – January 7, 2023
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bloganuary
#bloganuary

Why do you write?
That is the question for today and my answer is
“because super heroes fail.”

All though my life, I have believed in “super heroes.”
I believed there was always going to be someone
who would “rescue” me, save me
from whatever was happening in my world,
take me away from whatever was hurting me . . .
but that did not happen—ever.

First, there was disappointment when no super hero
appeared during my childhood illness requiring hospital
stays and treatments disrupting my life, my activities,
my school . . . no super hero to make me like “normal” kids.

Then, there was the time of abuse by a trusted adult
continued by threats to destroy the family if it was revealed
requiring eventual removal from all friends and family at a
young age . . . no super hero showed up.

Without going through all the gory details of bad choices
leading to life with those who dealt out extreme “punishments”
to one who believed it was deserved, no super hero showed up
in any of the multiple times of such deep agony that it led to the
choice to end it all . . . no super hero came.

SO, WHY DO I WRITE?
#1 – as a catharsis, a way to discharge pent-up emotions
to try to find relief from the pain which also often leads me
to a different perspective on my times of pain from choices
made by me and by others – gaining understanding and insights
with no need to assign blame and looking back on writings
from the darkest times reminds me of what I came through
giving me hope for the future, future healing, finding more of me.

#2 – no one should face pain alone
altruism, unselfish concern for the welfare of others
has grown out of my path through darkness
I want to offer others HOPE –
the belief that, if I can make it
through the messes I came through,
they can make it through, too!

Bottom line:
I write to share that,
while “super heros fail,”
there is healing and hope
as we are all in this together
and there are many like me
who willingly expose their failures
to encourage others to hope
which is really the one point of light
that can guide us through all perceived “failures”

Super Heroes fail – we ALL fail . . .
BUT each of us who
walk through the darkness
prove that
hope keeps “failure” from being fatal –
let’s keeping holding up that light of hope
in a world that often seems so dark
and never let anyone face pain alone!

#bloganuary

Bah! Humbug!!! YAY, Scrooge!
I cannot tell you how many times I have felt like
saying that over the last few years of constant chaos and turmoil,
as I see the apparent loss of accurate knowledge of history
or the Bible or the teachings of the life of Jesus
with a YouTube channel making “experts” of charismatic,
authoritative-sounding persons who sell hate and violence—
SAD! Where’s the JOY?

BUT . . . with a Judeo-Christian background,
experiences in the world of the occult, studies in many
philosophies (Hinduism, Buddhism, Zen, transcendental meditation,
New Age, various “religious” new believer classes, and more),
I have concluded that my belief system is a combination of “truths”
I found in each of those experiences leading me to believe—

MY JOY IS MY CHOICE of combos:
• I choose my “filters” that determine how I see everything
• I choose my “focus” each moment
• I choose my “responses” to everything, good and bad
• I choose my “acceptance” of whatever is presented
• I choose my “memories” to hold onto
• I choose my “priorities”
• I choose my “commitments”
MY JOY COMBO is MY CHOICE

My past is littered with traumas, some to levels of deepest agony,
some that robbed me of non-recoverable “things,”
some that led me to the end of myself and the choice to live or die –
I chose to die, which obviously did not happen, but that is another story.
The point is: at the point I decided to end it all, people and events
had brought me to believe there was nothing I had left to value
or appreciate, not even myself–I was past depression into total acceptance of defeat.

After much time spent healing (an ongoing process still today),
I realized the most important TRUTH . . . I have a choice.
It has taken many years to reach the above list of a “combo” and
it will probably continue to change as life goes on—
and even that is my choice!
I can choose to “become,” to change as I live,
to embrace life as I see it and adjust as I think best FOR ME,
and to feel JOY in knowing . . . MY JOY IS MY CHOICE –
even Scrooge found that out!

===
tag: bloganuary
bloganuary

a treasure, prized highly as valuable, rare, or costly . . .
“treasure” comes from a word meaning “hoarded” which could
show as admirable or extreme in the negative and can mean loss
of some material good(s) or relationship(s) or bellief system(s)

BUT- what if “treasure lost” could be viewed
through its impact on me . . . as G.O.-L.D.?

• material good(s)
losing this “treasure(s)” brought me to see the fleeting nature
of material good(s) and, after time spent grieving the loss,
I was less inclined to be driven by my desire to obtain and
hold onto any material good(s)

• relationship(s)
losing more than one, some deep trauma led me through
extremely difficult dark times that resulted in my realizing
I must be “whole” myself before I can be a “part” of any
relationship

• belief system(s)
losing, or rather, transitioning into and out of several belief
systems over the years, has drawn me to examine and
choose from them what is still my inner compass of Life

SO – a “treasure lost” for me brought me
to seeing “G.O.-L.D.” was what I gained from losing
—sometimes
Going On-Living Daily
—or
Going On-Looking Deeper
G.O.-L.D.
for a treasure lost

—-
tag: bloganuary
#bloganuary