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$0.79 Therapy: Growth in New Spaces

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Growth is knowing when to shut the door and keep moving forward. We’ve all had our aha moments! Some things and some people were not meant to exist your current space. It’s okay to start with a clean slate! That’s why it’s called change. #amen

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My 2012 Twitter Book: 101 Ways to Happy: Expressive Therapy Come True

Get Grateful, Not Green!

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The term “green with envy” has been a well known phrase on the market for years. A search back to the origin proved to originate back in biblical times when Cain killed his brother Abel over their birthright which created the first murder in the history of the Earth house.

When we deal with situations in life where we believe that someone should not have what we want. For those of you who have had a strong desire to have something, there often was nothing that we would not do in order to obtain that thing. Sure, we may not have thought about the extremes of murder and bodily harm; but the issues of motive, consequences, and confrontation all come into play because the end result is having that “thing” in your possession even if it means leaving the possession of someone else.

Let’s look at a practical definition of jealousy: The fears and anxieties a person hoards due to the attention being given to or by someone special to them or the possessions a person has which create threats to self-esteem and resentment.

Motive plays a major part in creating an obstacle to being grateful for what we have and not resorting to the intense feelings of jealousy which cause us to covet another’s possessions. When you were growing up, do you remember being deprived of many things that it created an enormous feeling of anger and the desire to want to accumulate whatever you could. Do you remember having the mindset that by any means necessary you would obtain what you wanted? It could be attention, clothing, praise, information, or whatever the sort. Motives are the drivers to why we do the things that we do…..in essence, the human behavior that we exhibit on a regular basis which are comprised of our thoughts, actions, and habits.

Once you walk out the gestures of ungratefulness and head to jealously and being envious, consequences will follow. Just as the wages of drinking too much alcohol lead to a massive hangover, the result of being envious create a hostile never ending environment with tension within yourself. A daily assessment of self will prove to never be enough to make the bar of approval simply because there is an irresistible resentment and lingering lack of self-esteem to grab your net and fish for the purpose, passion, or things that create a sense of inner peace. Envy turns your motivated grateful eyes to green!

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Selah…….take a coffee or a tea and marinate on this topic because it’s sometimes subtle and if not dealt with can create some immense gravity issues that manipulate your equilibrium.

Having taken the time to evaluate yourself–maybe you find yourself in a fragile state and are ready to confront your truth that you are not as strong as you think and despite your efforts, you still have hang-ups that you were not chosen to be Charlie’s girl or Becky did not ask you out coffee. Perhaps you realize that our front is up and you are on to yourself recognizing that you have gotten surfed up into the tides of envy and jealousy and want to come back to your senses of gratefulness, that space where you are so in tune with your storehouse of blessings from God himself and the perpetual thought track that a continual supply will always flow for you.

Let’s conquer, or at least begin to conquer the envy through confrontation with the following reflections:

  1. Go to the ROOT- Are you aware of what emotions and thoughts that you go through when that feeling? Do you find yourself being overdosed with constant episodes of the Kafashians or the Reeking Housewives of Refuse? Is a picture being painted before you where you are inundated with what you believe is an unattainable lifestyle causing you to consistently believe that you have absolutely nothing going for yourself? Well, simply get up out of your seat and turn the TV. Turn it off! The Jones’s have been replaced on the Plasma and the new kids on the block have hefty sponsors who ensure that followers crave for the vision they are telling on the tel-e-vision. 
  2. Call it out– NO, I am not saying have “laying on the hands experience” necessarily, but locate yourself. Truth in the inward parts is so essential for obtaining your healing so start with truth. If you must journal it, scream it, speak it, or whatever, get it out and do not allow these harmful emotions to rot your spirit, soul, and mind. Tell it all to God because he knows anyway. Once your establish and commit to truth, the process for healing has begun and you open yourself up to be ready to take the necessary steps to healing from this vile emotion.
  3. Build a Fortress of Security- Create the time to do things that affirm your identity in being the most authentic you that you can be. Building your worth and setting personal goals ensure your focus on a more positive direction than consistently reminding you of what you do not have. Reminding yourself that you are unique and loved by God makes all of the difference. In addition, filling yourself up with scriptures which complement what God says about you can assist you on those days that you wish to compare yourself to others and desire to walk in their shoes. A couple of my favorite scrips are 1 Corinthians 3:3, Psalm 73:3, and Galatians 5:25-26

Getting free takes one step at a time. God is your source of strength and He will assist you in seeking truth. Being grateful is such an awesome experience because you always create a window of opportunities that can be available to you. God can work with that, so get grateful, not green!

This article is copyrighted by DanitaOgandaga.com.

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Symptomatology of Grief & Loss

Image Kubler-Ross five stages of grief are often sporadic reactions to a person receiving tragic news or experiencing a traumatic event. The defense mechanisms create opportunities for a person to cope through the stages of grief such as bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

 Bargaining is a postponement of the inevitable situation that the person is facing. The stage is brief yet potent as it attempts to create a system of rewards for behavior in exchange for longer life or time to settle differences or spend time with loved ones. Through the process of this stage, a person seeks to enter into a trance state of mind, absent from the pain of their illness or the shopping cart filled with prescription medications that they must take on a daily basis.

 Depression is the process of acceptance in the realization that the bargaining will no longer suffice and a person’s reality must prevail (Kubler-Ross, 1997). In this mindset, anger is turned inward and the person makes a decision to remove themselves from the participatory factor of their life.

 Acceptance is a state of looking to what is ahead in expectation that it is better than the trials or issues they are currently facing. It is a peace that surpassed all of the understanding that they hold and in some cases an inner knowing that all will be well.

 My mother, Talmer Joyce Solomon experienced these stages of a regular basis as she courageously faced her battle with advanced stage cancer. The news came at a time inconvenient for our family of course, having just loss a cousin to murder and a grandfather to illness. Having just lost my father to a massive heart attack 1 month before, my mother confidently planned my 21st birthday party at my aunt’s house. Not really in a mood to celebrate, our family collectively mustard courage to do so. At this stage, my mother was quite frail and had begun to weaken yet she still attended and actively participated in my birthday festivities.

 From the planning of my sister-in-law’s bridal shower, preaching at her church, to attending my birthday party, my mother did not have to cut deals with God because she was a woman of faith and I believe, bargain, or no bargain, she was blessed with “stronger” days than “weaker” days so that she could enjoy her children and assist us in our grief from my dad’s death. I believe that her seeing us laughing and carrying on gave her a peace in knowing that we could continue to function with time and have parties to celebrate our birthdays with the absence of her and our father.

 The bargaining and depression stage for my mother was short-lived because while at my party, her breathing began to slow and she grew tired quicker so she needed to lie down and rest. I remember leaving my party and going home with my mom and laying down next to her on the bed listening to her breath with great effort. It was apparent that her lungs were filling with fluids but she did not complain. I remember just laying next to her as she slept asking God to heal her.

 The acceptance for my mom came in the form of asking God for “divine healing”. Although I was at an age to understand what this meant and not being able to speak for my siblings, I believe that my mother had accepted that the doctors could do all that they could having accepted that long life with no hurt, for her, meant relocation to a space that was out of this world. So far away and unable to call collect, I eventually accepted her desire and supported her decision to make preparations to join my father, her husband in heaven. Her acceptance was letting us go and as was ours to let her go. With much courage as acceptance requires, we let go (Kubler- Ross, 1997).

 Danita Akendengue-Ogandaga

 References

Kubler-Ross, E. (1997). On death and dying. New York: Scribner.