6-18-11 grateful for today

1. Tai chi
2. Breathing
3. My adorable dog
4. Time to spend at home
5. Taking care of myself
6. New connections and being open
7. My family
8. My community
9. A place of my own
10. Unconditional love

I am at peace today. I receive all that is given to me. I realized over the last weekend that everything that happens to me in my life is a gift. Every experience is deep and full of feeling and meaning. Every experience is what's given to me. Even painful experiences, being harmed or violated is giving me an experience deep and full. When material things are lost or taken away, I still receive an experience. I am given that.
Another way to look at it is a story of myself as an 8 year old girl. We lived in farm country and Hogan's Heroes was the popular show then. One day in the summer, I took a shovel and a pick axe and went about 100 yards into the back yard where it was more field than yard and I started digging. I had a lot of energy all bottled up, a lot of emotion bottled up. I was digging a tunnel. An escape tunnel. I spent my days devising escape routes and plans. My childhood had terror and abuse in it, and I kept looking for ways to escape. Now as an adult looking back, I can see how my looking for escape only showed me how trapped I was. I was a little kid, I wasn't able to fully process or feel what was happening to me at the time. Over last weekend I was able to fully feel and receive my painful childhood abuse. And in receiving I find peace.
I am excited for all the millions of experiences I have yet to experience, painful, joyful, everything full of life. I receive and I am at peace.
Love and Light.