Enthusiasm

I am learning to cultivate enthusiasm with the help of the second book on my list. I am learning a host of other things to go with it, but I want to bring forward how delight for the small stuff contributes to general happiness, contentment with things as they are.  Please don't confuse enthusiasm with acceptance because of what I am about to say. The two positions don't relate in this model.

Acceptance says, merely, "Yes."  Enthusiasm leaves an thumbprint, a feeling, "Yes!" that needs no voice.

I've experienced enthusiasm enough to know what it feels like.  Is there a way I can feel it ...most of the time? Yes!

In this book of several steps aimed at parents of children with special needs I am absorbing the importance of a slower pace, of varying procedure, of employing subtlety, finesse, creating much more flexible goals, and actively noticing neat things that contribute to my enthusiasm.

This is not a new concept in my bloodline. "Find the Good." is a family phrase we often tease each other with, but we do mean it and we do try to see silver linings even in the midst of anxiety and chaos. ...but enthusiasm differs from finding the good.

Bolstering enthusiasm is not a means to an end (or a safe place) like "Find the Good" can be. Enthusiasm is the feeling that remains one moment into the next because I have noticed good. I have not found good. I have noticed it - and I haven't got to spark a doob or drop a tab to notice.

Think of the how we notice and think of how we find. Doesn't noticing feel more gentle?

So when I gently notice things like.... well, I'll share my list of "neat things I notice" from two days ago:


Sheldon loves to cuddle with me in the morning.
I like making Hopper breakfast.
Hopper answered her phone this morning - she even lingered to talk and joke a tiny bit before hanging up on me (I gave her permission to because I snuck in a pretty horrible pun.)
Both my husband and my BFE were interested to know what I planned to do today.
April is back. (She is someone in my community who makes me smile, she just returned from a month's hiatus.)
Frank is really nice. He told me about coming to America after fleeing his communist country of Vietnam. Really interesting. It took him jail time, torture and a number of years to be free but he kept on.
Found out Joshua Radin is performing tonight with A Fine Frenzy!!! <3
It was easy to say when I'm going on vacation and won't be available to work.

There have been more things since...all these situational smiles that pile into the day which I could, and often do, forget about by the time I go to sleep at night, but because I noticed them and took a moment to enjoy them, and write them down, I've given myself the opportunity to feel that soft, internal, "Yes!" with each and every one.

This may look like a list of things I'm grateful for. It's not. It's just a collection of neat things I notice. Again, do you feel the difference?  I am....so in love with having learned this. It is going to take a heck of a lot of practice for this kind of noticing to become natural for me to do. So be it. :)

All I Really Needed to Know

... I Learned from My Dogs.

The saying "to every season its turn" is staring me in the face tonight. You know I have been in a state of transition for awhile now. Years. Change, GOOD change, is taking place even when I can't feel it. I've had a tough time feeling or seeing any progress/good change since the summer full of suck.

But I'm being gentle to my spirit tonight because I've learned a lesson from my dogs. Two of my dogs are house-trained, well-integrated parts of my family. Two of my dogs haven't had a chance to be. The two who have been crated while indoors and running amok in the fenced yard while outdoors have been mostly segregated from us even though we love them, feed them, spend time with them, socialize with them.

We have been so busy and tired and bothered that we didn't work to get them acquainted with life outside the box (while indoors, mind.) They are very healthy, happy dogs and get lots of love and run time, they're just not sitting by us while we watch TV. I want to change that. I want them to be as part of us as the other two are.

But they've been boxed for so long and there are behavioral issues between the pairs of dogs to sort out and there's so much work to do, so much work, to get everybody to where we can be in peace together.

I hired a trainer today. It is such a relief to say that. I hired a trainer to show me how to be with all four of my dogs so we can be the family I hope in my heart we will be. It is going to be a long haul. It is going to take patience. It is somewhat overwhelming....or, okay really overwhelming....!! But I'm committed to this and to them.

My homework is to spend a few minutes a day, a few times a day, while they are indoors and ply them with bits of food to do fun things like come when they are called....and sit....and make eye contact...and calmly hang out with us.

I accept that it is going to take us and them a few months, if not more than that, to establish a relationship that is more than, "Hi, I love you, good dog, let's go outside. Good boy. Good girl! Yay, outside!" patting and rubbing and kisses. Exciting, yeah, but hardly fulfilling for me, and I'm guessing them, too.

So, I have patience for them and their training. ...and I suppose I can have a little for my own, too. This "read one book at a time, eat a healthy breakfast each morning, soon to work from home" practice I started for myself is going to take time, too.

Tonight, when I called Dru over, I was able to give her a treat and say YES! because she heard her name and, more and more, kept coming back.  Spike got the hang of doing so after a good five minutes of trying to get his attention away from EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD. I don't even think he realized his name is Spike. It makes me sad/guilty that all this is so surreal to him...but I am committed. Yes. I am. To them and to me.

After an eternity, Spike finally learned he is called Spike and if he shows up when he hears that word he gets bits of food. And he learned that SPIKE! isn't a shortened way of saying "QUIT BARKING!"

Spike and Dru moved mountains with me today. I have to remember that my own small changes consist of getting over some pretty big hills, too. Even the ones I've climbed before and have to (sigh) climb again. And while I won't give myself kibble for it, I ought to give myself a YES!

And I am really grateful for Spike and Dru tonight. They prove that we can learn all new behavior. Even me.