Inspirational Quotes, Continued

• The first question I ask myself when something doesn’t seem to be beautiful is why do I think it’s not beautiful. And very shortly you discover that there is no reason. ~ John Cage
• The earth laughs in flowers. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Take the attitude of a student. Never be too big to ask questions. Never know too much to learn something new. ~ Og Mandino
• Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance. ~ Eckhart Tolle
• Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. ~ Theodore Roosevelt
• Freedom is not overcoming what you think stands in your way. It’s understanding that what is in your way is part of the way. ~ Guy Finley
• Appreciate everything, even the ordinary. Especially the ordinary. ~ Pema Chodron
• Very little grows on jagged rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up where you are. ~ Rumi
• Millions long for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon. ~ Susan Ertz

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Quotation Inspiration

This is one of the writing prompts for the WEGO Health Activist Writer’s Month Challenge. This challenge is to take a quote that inspires you (either positively or negatively) and free write about it for 15 minutes. I was a bit intrigued about this, since when I think “inspire” I usually assume something positive, but we can be inspired by negative things, especially if we are inspired to act against them.

I frequently post quotations here (I have a backlog waiting to be added!), but they are mostly of the positive type- sayings intended to guide or remind me. After looking through my “not-yet-posted” list, I chose this one:

In anyone’s life, there are going to be times of not-knowing. And that has to be OK. ~ Zen Moments

I am having a really hard time with not-knowing right now. What’s wrong with my left foot? Did I sprain something? Is it arthritis? Do I have a nodule forming, forcing the bones apart? Would this have happened if I hadn’t changed my treatment? Is it too soon to call my doctor? How long should I wait? What should I do?

It’s things like this that keep my brain in overdrive and make it hard to sleep at night. And I bet a few of you are nodding your heads, because you’ve been in the same boat. However, you may also be saying, “But, Elisabeth, that’s something that you NEED to know about! It’s important!”

But is it? Now, don’t get me wrong- my health is very important to me, and I do need to figure out what’s going on. But worrying myself into a frazzle isn’t going to help. In another day or three it will either A) clear up on its own, B) respond to one of my treatments, or C) still be present, in which case I’ll call the doctor. And you know what? That’s okay.

If there is one thing I have learned about this disease (and it’s a lesson I get to learn over and over again), is that it is weird.

Shooting pains in the ball of my thumb? Check. Hand tremors? Check. Muscle cramps? Check (check, check, and check.)

And nine times out of ten these things are very transitory. A few seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks and they’re gone, never to be seen again. (Or reappear at the strangest moments with absolutely no rhyme, reason, or obvious cause.) If I spazzed out and called my doctor for every weird thing that happens, she’d be on speed-dial and I’d probably have a different doctor already.

So it’s a game of deduction that I play. Is this is the same pain of yesterday? Is it in the same place? Is it more intense, less intense, or the same? How much of an impact does it have? Is it similar to another symptom that I have now, or have had in the past? What treatments have I tried? For how long? How much, if any, impact did each treatment have?

And I go through this process of elimination for every. Darn. Thing. to determine how serious it is and whether to act or not. It’s very easy to fall into a “worst-case-scenario” mindset with some of these things (a little knowledge is a VERY dangerous thing). And you know what? So far, it has NEVER been the worst-case-scenario *knock on wood*.

Of course, sometimes there are unpleasant surprises (my RA diagnosis was one), and sometimes it’s something mild, or even benign.

But sometimes, there’s just no sure answer. And that has to be okay.

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Mindful Quotations

• The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem. ~ Theodore I. Rubin
• Have nothing…that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. ~ William Morris
• Zazen is the self being itself by itself. ~ Kodo Sawaki Roshi
• I cannot make my days longer so I strive to make them better. ~ Henry David Thoreau
• As you breathe in cherish yourself. As you breathe out cherish all beings. ~ Dalai Lama
• Every day is a new chance to be our very best. ~ Bryan Elliott

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More Inspirational Quotes

• If you do not change direction, you might end up where you’re going. ~ Lao Tzu
• There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle, or you can live as if everything is a miracle. ~ Albert Einstein
• The great essentials for happiness in this life are something to do, something to love and something to hope for. ~ Joseph Addison
• Our life is always all right. There’s nothing wrong with it. Even if we have horrendous problems, it’s just our life. ~ Charlotte Joko Beck
• The bad news is time flies. The good news is you’re the pilot. ~ Michael Altshuler
• The things that one most wants to do are the things that are probably most worth doing. ~ Winifred Holtby
• We must free ourselves of the hope that the sea will ever rest. We must learn to sail in high winds. ~ Aristotle Onassis
• A good traveller has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving. ~ Lao Tzu
• Besides the noble art of getting things done, there’s a nobler art of leaving things undone. ~ Lin Yutang
• Not appreciating what we have now, robs us of our abundance even when it exists. ~ Marshall Sylver
• If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete. ~ Buddha

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Inspirations

I haven’t shared any quotes from my collection in a  long while, so here’s a few:

• A great task is accomplished by a series of small acts. ~ Lao Tzu
• The best thing one can do when it’s raining is to let it rain. ~ Henry W. Longfellow
• Happiness is simple. Everything we do to find it is complicated. ~ Karen Maezen Miller
• Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall. ~ Confucius
• Freedom is not overcoming what you think stands in your way. It’s understanding that what is in your way is part of the way. ~ Guy Finley
• Share everything. Play fair. Don’t hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. ~ R. Fulghum
• When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude. ~ G.K. Chesterton
• Mindfulness helps you fall in love with the ordinary. ~ Thich Nhat Hanh
• Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? ~ Mary Oliver
• You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf. ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn

My goodness, I had no idea I had such a backlog- I still have twice as many tucked away. I should do this more often!

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