Optimists' Club

It's been a LONG while since I've been on this blog.  It took me a while today to figure out my password and finally log on.  I wasn't even sure I would ever be back after the year I had last year, but as the cliche goes, 'time heals all wounds', and I am surprised to be feeling a lot like my old, happy self again.  

I had a major trauma at the beginning of last year that left me very depressed.  I couldn't function normally for many months.  All I felt like doing was hiding under the covers and crying.  Every time I woke up, my problems were still there, and weren't a dream as I'd hoped they would be.  I stopped blogging and writing, of course, and many other normal things I liked to do, like read or exercise.  I did only what I had to do, such as going to work, but I did it with no passion, as if I were an automaton.  At home, my husband picked up the slack.  My friends and family stopped getting calls from me.  They called and I ignored.  I hid from the world and slept as much as I could to hide even from myself (though that didn't work because there were also the nightmares that haunted me and made me re-live the experience again).  

Finally, at my lowest point, when I became scared that I was beginning to think that living was too hard, I sought outside help.  I didn't relish the idea of living the whole thing over again when all I wanted was for it to go away, but I have to admit now that I had to do that and have a kind-hearted person (that was not someone who loved me) say to me that it was going to be OK.  Her kindness made me start listening to the other voices in my life, my friends, my family--especially my father--who helped me to feel finally that what happened, happened, and could not be undone, and could not be viewed as a karmic punishment but a lesson and a call to become a better, stronger and wiser person.  Thanks to them, I don't look at what happened with bitterness, but with gratitude that it was not worse, and that I am still here and have things that I can still be grateful for.  

I've started doing all the little things that I stopped doing last year.  I'm exercising, I'm reading, I'm enjoying work, I'm enjoying my family, and here I am, last but not least, writing. *big smile*  I thought today I'd share an inspiring piece of writing that the Optimists' Club uses as it's motto.  I read it recently in the book Awaken the Giant Within by Anthony Robbins, which I would highly recommend to anyone who hasn't heard of it before.  It's a set of rules that I hope I never, ever again forget.  

OPTIMISTS' CLUB CREED

To be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet.

To make all your friends feel that there is something in them.

To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.

To think only of the best, to work only for the best, and to expect only the best.

To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.

To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.

To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.

To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.

To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

I hope you enjoyed...