Staying in Kindness - Week One - January 22 - January 28

Keep Smiling!

Four days into the first week.  Trusty car has broken down again with a strange aliment (Which I found out later was the cable/pulley snapping from the steering column.)  I personally believe that it is the service departments fault when they fixed my suspension the previous Friday; yet they say "no, this was an anomaly".  Certainly NOT very reassuring.

Yet I smiled.  OK OK.  No I did not smile but I TRIED!   I remained calm though and thought of smiling.    Here is where my kindness test really kicked in.   

1. This second breakdown happened on a Monday night as I was attempting to bring my twelve year old to basketball practice at 6:15 pm. 
2. I immediately called the Volvo dealerships and told them I couldn't steer my car.  They asked me to call AAA and have it towed. (I calm down a bit and even crack a smile.  OK good.  I have AAA.
3. AAA representative tells me I DO NOT have AAA but can get it reinstated for $110.00  (lose the smile)
4. Call the father of my children to let him know I have no car in which he calls the dealerships and tells them to get me a rental and that I cannot be without a car.  I would also like to point out, I had done the very same thing with no results.  (Three steps back for woman kind).

I stayed in kindness.  I smiled whenever I sensed my world crumbling around me through this mini crisis.  I began to fill my head with gratitude lists. 

• I was not driving when the cable snapped
• I have a rental car
• I am still able to purchase the groceries and cook at the soup kitchen where I volunteer
• I have friends that supported me and was there for me; drove my kids to school; listened to me vent.

Through my smiling and gratitude list - strange thing started to happen - I felt better.  My situations hadn't changed one bit, but you know what?   I really did feel better.

When my kids came out of school - I smiled at them even though I did not feel like it.  When I dropped my son off at the Malden Catholic basketball game, I smiled before he left the car.  When I went to my daughters Malden High School basketball game, I smiled at her from across the way.  I smiled and waved to people I knew.  I was exhausted mentally and physically and quite frankly it hurt to smile but dog gone it I persevered and SMILED.

And you know what? I no longer was PRETENDING to feel better - I actually was better.

I googled smiling and I liked this page the best on About.com  http://longevity.about.com/od/lifelongbeauty/tp/smiling.htm    In particular #2 and #6:

2.  Smiling Changes Our Mood

Next time you are feeling down, try putting on a smile. There's a good chance you mood will change for the better. Smiling can trick the body into helping you change your mood.

6. Smiling Lowers Your Blood Pressure

When you smile, there is a measurable reduction in your blood pressure. Give it a try if you have a blood pressure monitor at home. Sit for a few minutes, take a reading. Then smile for a minute and take another reading while still smiling. Do you notice a difference?

Courtesy of www.about.com

What does this have to do with kindness?  Being in a foul mood is only going to make you and everyone around you more foul.  The situation is what it is.   Some of it completely out of your control.  So, make the decision to change what YOU can change and let the rest take care of itself.

Big Smile to YOU!!!

Kelly

49 Weeks of Kindness - THE BEGINNING....

It has been a bad week all around with the car breaking down, money drained and the dog having the runs after snagging a fiber bar from the 14 year old's backpack *gagging while I am writing this at the memories*.    The kids seemed to suck up every negative energy cell from me; and then they began morphing into 3 balls of darkness as they started to plot each others deaths as only children can while asking me why they could not have been the only child.  After 48 hours of hearing them nit picking and screaming at each other, I found myself plotting their deaths also and everyone else’s for that matter, around me.   Asking the question to myself "WHY did I have children?"

“WOW!!!” a good friend of mine stated as I glared at her during my rant and tales of woe over coffee.  “Aren’t you the person of kindness…the seer of seeing the light through the darkness?”  For a split second I wanted to dope slap her.  Even as my hand itched to do so, I had to admit that she was right.  What was happening to me?

Thus begins Week one of trying to stay in Kindness.

Kelly

Thanksgiving Reflection

It is no secret that I speak much about kindness and while it is a virtue that I myself have to work on everyday to maintain, (sometimes without success) I encourage you all to reflect on the words of Bo Lozoff, from the Human Kindness Foundation as we celebrate this Thanksgiving Holiday.

In the midst of global crises such as pollution, wars and famine, kindness may be too easily dismissed as a "soft" issue, or a luxury to be addressed after the urgent problems are solved. But kindness is the greatest need in all those areas -- kindness toward the environment, toward other nations, toward the needs of people who are suffering. Until we reflect basic kindness in everything we do, our political gestures will be fleeting and fragile.

Simple kindness may be the most vital key to the riddle of how human beings can live with each other in peace, and care properly for this planet we all share.

- Bo Lozoff

When it all started to make sense…..

"When the world says, "Give up,"Hope whispers, "Try it one more time."

~Author Unknown

Photography All rights Kelly Ilebode Titled "Busy Bee"

Today. Kind of.  This journey of figuring it all out I mean.  You know, what I want to be when I grow up.  When you speak to people they tell you to do what you love; follow your passion.   Blah, blah, blah.  That’s great and all, but I do have a family to feed and a mortgage to pay.   Following my passion, so far, hasn’t been paying too well. 

But, I am ahead of the game I guess.  I know what I like to do.  There are three things actually and it has only taken me about 40 years to figure it out.

1. I like to write.  I like to write poetry, speeches, short stories, long stories (currently finishing up a long one, novel in length), I even like to write proposals, grants, letters, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera
2. I like to lecture and speak in front of people.  (I like this a lot) It could be as a lectionary at my church, reading a poem, giving directions, it doesn’t matter.  My voice is loud and people like to hear it.
3. I love photography – mostly nature, prayer beads and animals, (weird combo I know)

 To completely let go of the fear and transition to complete surrender is weird.  I feel as if I have been asleep my whole life, watching as if in a dream; each dream bringing me closer and closer to this awakening.

 Ok, still not making money, the difference is, I no longer care.  Why?  Because I have wasted so much time and money on figuring out how to make money that I figured maybe I have it all backwards.

When I quit my professional job to stay home with the kids eleven years ago, I have done so many things through the years for the all mighty dollar (not placed in any particular order).

• Sold Gift Baskets
• Staged Homes
• De-Cluttered Homes
• Tutored
• Catered
• Opened a gift store

 And I was good at all of it…..but I wasn’t passionate about it.  I did all of these things to make money and I still wasn’t happy.

 So here I am talking to you, (and right now there are not a lot of you who read my blog), but you know what the difference is….I am smiling and getting ready to copy and paste, and that makes me happy!  I will figure out the money later.

Peace be with you!

Kelly

The Holidays' are coming - Are you a hope giver?

Have you ever heard God speaking to you?  Have you heard a silent voice echo within your body?  At first you think you are imagining it, and then there is that moment, that hesitation, where you say within yourself “is that you Father?”  Then you feel a warmth spread through you from an ember you had long thought was dead.  His breath fanning the fire inside until you feel every part of its heat envelope you.  With gratitude, you realize that He has not left you alone in this harsh, sometimes cold world.  Once again, you have hope.”   - Kelly Ilebode (Miracles of Faith)

Many times as a child, this experience happened to me.   I lived in a world where I would slowly loose hope simply because of my hunger.   A hunger that would hurt so deeply, that my stomach would cry out with pain.   Before I even knew about “God”, I knew that there was someone….there had to be.  I knew, because whenever I would talk to “Him”  as a young child asking for food, a neighbor would then magically show up at my mother’s door with a casserole, or a bag of groceries.   Sometimes, I even thought He would deliver it himself, because the door bell would ring and no one would be there.  But a box would.  A box filled with wonderful silver cans of pure heaven.   I tried to tell people about my “gift”.  How I could just speak to the “nice man” and food would come.    Of course no one believed me but I knew He was real and eventually I would stop telling people; but….every time, after my little belly was full, I would run to my room and thank him for feeding me.  I learned several years later, this was called prayer.

My second foster home was that of a Baptist Minister.  Entering that little Church in Jackman, Maine for the first time, I felt the same feeling I had when I was hungry and then fed; the warmth spreading from my heart, through my veins causing the goose flesh to hit every inch of my skin.  I turned and I asked the Minister who’s house this was (not knowing what a Church was, never having been in one) – and he said “This is God’s house”.  I smiled – I finally knew the name of my friend.

 I was seven at the time yet the memories of these events changed my world and live with me to this day.  My experiences of hunger as a child are a blessing to me.   I couldn’t see it then, but I see it now.  I could not be an advocate for the poor without having been poor myself.  I would not be able to speak about the despair hunger causes, if I had never been hungry or felt that despair myself.

 Each neighbor that left food at my mothers' house listened to their inner voice.  (Which I believe is the voice of God.)   Their heart filled with the heat of compassion, empathy and love.  These people filled the void in my body left by hunger, which led me to God, who filled the void in my heart.

 We all have the opportunity to show God’s love each and every day.   What an impact you can make just by giving hope through the feeding ministry.    With your generosity, we can show others that people still care and there are good people out there; but even more importantly, we are saying to God, our Father, that we are truly grateful for each and every blessing he has given us – by giving some back.  Through all of this, we are telling him  we love You!

 Matthew 25:35-40

³⁵ For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, ³⁶ I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

   ³⁷ “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? ³⁸ When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? ³⁹ When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

   ⁴⁰ “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

Peace be with you all!

Kelly Ilebode