I was meeting up with a friend recently and met his wife. “And how are you keeping?” says I. “Getting older,” she replied.
And, I’m sorry to say, this theme was revisited time and again during my visit. Everything was framed as what she couldn’t do because of her age. Sadly, I think that joining a group of older people - who seem to be preoccupied with their health and what they are unable to do - had emphasised her feelings of gloom and despondency.
But you know me! I was not long about filling her mind with more positive thoughts, ways to move forward, make exciting plans, realise what she could do with her life with what she already had.
And she was a very different person when I left, thanking me for what I’d done for her, already full of ideas and making plans for her next project.
Why am I telling you this?
It’s about LABELS.
You may know that I have a bee in my bonnet about how people label themselves, their family and friends, and their dog!
Here are a couple of posts on the subject:
Hooray for change for your dog! Discard the old labels
Labelling your dog and yourself
Labels are limiting!
The thing is, applying a label to something is so limiting. It means it can never be anything else.
This is fine if it’s a table, or a car, that you’re labelling.
But when it comes to sentient beings, creatures interacting with each other, creatures who are growing and developing (or should be!), it is totally inappropriate.
Saying “I’m too old,” is going to prevent you from doing all the things you’re well able to do.
Things that will make your mark on the world, help society, move the world forward.
And saying, “My dog is … stubborn/stupid/untrainable/a rescue” is preventing you seeing your dog as a creature capable of huge learning and growth!
Blanket statements
Making blanket statements tends to be limiting.
“I’m no good at …”
“He always …”
“My dog never …”
We hear these all the time, and it’s equivalent to throwing out the anchor and parking yourself exactly where you are.
No possibility of change!
Replacement thoughts
How about replacing these thoughts in your mind with more enlightening ones:
“I’m open to trying new things.”
“I’d love my dog to … walk nicely on lead/retrieve/calm down ..”
“I have plenty of time left to me - I’m going to …”
“The only constant is change.” Heraclitus
And as Maria Popova says so well,
“A person is not a potted plant of predetermined personality but a garden abloom with the consequences of chance and choice that have made them who they are, resting upon an immense seed vault of dormant potentialities. At any given moment, any seed can sprout — whether by conscious cultivation or the tectonic tilling of some great upheaval or the composting of old habits and patterns of behavior that fertilize a new way of being. Nothing saves us from the tragedy of ossifying more surely than a devotion to regularly turning over the soil of personhood so that new expressions of the soul can come abloom.”
https://www.themarginalian.org/2024/05/15/gardner-self-renewal-meaning/
Budget mentality
Folk sometimes get stuck in limiting themselves to what they think they can afford.
Oh, what a bad road to go down!
You are only limited by your imagination.
If you decide you are going to do anything at all - move house, write a book, start a project - the last thing you should worry about is your budget.
If you leave that out of your calculations entirely, opportunities will present themselves which you would never have seen if you were focussing on what you could afford.
And - here’s the exciting part! These opportunities can bring rewards you could never have expected. Results that far outweigh any investment you made.
Students in the Brilliant Family Dog Academy, for instance, tell me they enrolled in the program because their dog was difficult, or pulling on the lead, or whatever, and what they discovered is a new way of being with their formerly challenging dog that has opened up a new life for both of them.
Here’s what Carol R had to say:
“We have both come a long way, and it is no exaggeration when I say she is a transformed dog 😊. Although we have now worked our way through the whole of the course, we are continually going back to work again through modules, and dipping into Beverley’s books as and when we need to. Our learning will be ongoing for life, but we don’t mind, we are really enjoying it. I’ve found it’s really strengthened our bond, and most of all, it’s fun!!“
We’re exactly halfway through the year - tell me in the comments what you’re going to do with the second half!