Release, resolutions and resolve

I love this time of year.

Befitting the season, it's when those things that must - leaves, hard times, things that create misery - fall away, allowing a quiet snowfall of life to cover us, giving way to a touch of demi-dormancy so we can reflect on what worked and what did not over the past twelve months.

Sort of like emotional and mental assessment and house cleaning, which in turn opens up all sorts of room to prepare for what we know is ahead; tuning up a welcoming attitude for everything in store that's unexpected. Limiting expectations is the best way I know to keep maintain that attitude of gratitude for everything life hands us.

I have big goals, but keep the expectation low of knowing exactly how something should happen - or how it will look in the end. I set and keep goals - it's fun for me - but sometimes the way an accomplished goal appears is not exactly what I had in mind when I started.

Greeting unplanned events and experiences with open arms - especially those that initially feel so painful - is probably the most challenging.

Especially when, so often, the occurrences that feel the worst can actually turn out to be the best, most positive turn of events - or set up a situation that creates a much better outcome than anything we could have perceived in our unrecognized ignorance at the time we got zapped!

I think awareness and action are the best tools to deal with life.

When I've just let life happen without taking any responsibility for initiating what I want or what I want/need to do, I've run into some unexpected and rocky walls because I wasn't paying attention.

Not paying attention to how poorly someone treats us can result in being unnecessarily hurt; not paying attention to those we cherish or relationships we treasure can cause us to lose them - and never see it coming because our focus was somewhere else.

I try to keep an ear and eye out for both sides so I can take action either way.

Walking on eggs around someone, never knowing what will set him or her off - is no way to live. People - even disagreeable people - are free to be who they are, but for me? Without anger or rancor after trying to deal with the situation, I need to extract myself from the situation in order to protect myself from what I perceive to be an unsafe environment. Fortunately, these are almost non-existent in my life these days.

On the flip side, to maintain valued friendships and relationships, they need to be stoked and stroked with affection and attention with relish and often - something I find incredibly fun. I believe the more love there is, the more love there is!

So it's time to take stock of everything going on in and around me - so I can see where I need to bring my game up, and where I need to streamline or alter what I'm doing to make it all work. Make my life feel like I spend more energy moving forward rather than treading water or being swept away by circumstances I could have influenced - actually changed - if I had been paying attention and taking action.

Every day life issues like work, health and my new vegetarian lifestyle are part of this equation.

I guess my goal in life is more than just to learn everything - it's also to be the best me, the best person I can be. Which to me means being true to myself and my values, being as kind as possible to others (honesty without brutality is kinder than patronizing someone), as well as taking the best care of myself, those I love and those for whom I am responsible.

So I guess my resolution this year, simply put, would be: to pay attention and take action on what I can.

There's something called a "broken window policy" and it helps keep us on track to where we want to go. It's used in neighborhoods where problems have previously festered. After an area is cleaned and fixed up? Every single broken window is tended to - mended and fixed - immediately upon its discovery, preventing more of them from popping up along with the onslaught of attending problems.

I'll put signs around the house - PAY ATTENTION! ACTION! - to remind me of my resolution. They'll also help me make sure to immediately mend every emotional or experiential broken window that appears along the way.

LOVE: Personal Health Care Policy Boost

I'm audio "reading" LOVE AND SURVIVAL, a book by Dr. Dean Ornish - a medical doctor specializing in preventive medicine who has performed extensive research on the effect of love and affection on our health.

Basically, he says if you have all the precursors of certain conditions, the difference between an earlier demise and longer healthier survival is how much love and affection you have in your life.



















Not just receiving love and affection, but giving it.

He says if you have high cholesterol, high blood pressure, etc., but you have affection in your life - chances of you excreting healing endorphins and therefore having a better chance at living longer and feeling good while you do it are greatly increased.
























The scientific research he quotes involves primarily human relationships, particularly emphasizing the support of partners, friends, family and community.
I also believe the same is true of living with pets we love deeply and - without becoming completely anthropomorphic - who appear to love us. I believe my animals love, even adore, me. But that's an emotion I attribute to them based upon their behavior, I don't know that for a fact.

Medical studies show the interaction - verbal and petting - between humans and dogs has noticeable effects on the cardiovascular system (mostly lowering blood pressure). Interestingly, it is the tactile action that makes the greatest difference. While the verbal impact was noticed statistically, it is not nearly as great as the effect of petting - of touch. Perhaps this is because our skin is the largest organ in the body.



















I think this can extrapolate to other affectionate animals as well - and even those who are not considered affectionate but who elicit the emotion of love and affection from us, toward whom we feel loving, caring and compassion. Imagining love coming from them still produces endorphins.

I've even seen this effect on those who cherish a stuffed toy, imagining it has a soul.

Of course there's the valuable side effect of walking a dog or other ambulatory pet - moderate exercise is always recommended for all creatures. There might even be some social benefit if you do it with other dog owners or people alone or with other pets who want to accompany you.

"Therapy animals" are actually medically approved - trained and certified - who are brought to visit children and adults who are ill, lonely, mentally challenged or confined.



With permission, my now deceased wee pup Oscar - himself challenged with many health issues during his life (the picture is of Oscar wrapped in a towel, recovering after suffering a grand mal seizure) - and I visited a friend's mom at her assisted living quarters; she was in the later stages of dementia so she was not responding to or recognizing people she had known previously.

She lit up when she saw my little guy and responded near gleefully as she spoke with him, of him, and petted him.

Another patient I sat next to in the waiting room slowly lifted a stiff arm to pet him awkwardly. I was told she had not moved her arm for a very long time. They didn't know she could.

















The point of Dr. Ornish's book is that the more touch - affectionate touch, caressing, hugging, cuddling, embracing, massage - we enjoy in our lives, the more positively it affects not only our minds but our emotions and stimulating those loving emotions helps heal bodies. The mind-emotion-body connection.

He also notes spirituality, including prayer, can ignite loving feelings toward ourselves and others, but the vast majority of empirical touch/emotion healing evidence he presents relates to the power of tactile contact, what we can physically feel.

I know some believe it's strange to be so close to pets, that it's more important to give and receive from humans. But I believe it's also important to share a special physical and emotional bond with pets, and not just because they share the planet with us, but because they are salient beings capable of feeling. Although - LOL - an actor I coached once told me, "In my next life I want to come back as one of your pets."

We humans decided to purposely domesticate them. We removed them from their natural habitats, in which they learned to live and thrive naturally. We took them away from the communities of other animals who socialized and trained them to live in the wild.

Because of that, I believe we have a special responsibility to care for them - training, socializing, providing them with safe and clean environments as well as affection and care they no longer understand how to obtain for themselves on their own - away from packs, herds, clutters, troops, flocks, strings, rags or flanges that previously did all that for and with them.

Not to the exclusion of humans, but I believe as much as we need affection - so do they. Even fish, believe it or not. Here's a young deer massaging her cat pal:




And here's an even more touching video of animals treating one another affectionately.


Thanks to funnyanimals.com for the monkey hugging his pup photo.