It's really not about me.

I have to remind myself of that. Sometimes when I watch myself, interact with the world, I cringe and scream wildly in my mind.."STOP BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!"...but that point inevitably comes. I just....ugh. When my beloved spouse sends me flowers, and they are the only flowers in the world I actually dislike...I start to have an internal meltdown because how could he not know that I hate them!? I feel happy and butthurt at the same time.  Or how my kids were completed assholes and chose to stay home when I went to my birthday dinner alone. It quickly became all about my expectation and disappointment. As a wise woman I know tells me semi-regularly, expectations are but premeditated resentments. Let that one sink in...

But all that ^ afforded me the opportunity to be with my Mom as a person, not as a mom or daughter. What a rare gift, to see her as she is, not as I perceive her to be.  I think about all the people I've met who only get to know their loved ones, truly know them, while the loved one is dying. If there is one thing I know, it's that this is all so temporary. How often do I forget to honor others just by listening? Just by being present to witness their happiness, excitement, worry, pain, elation or jealousy? My defects surface daily under stress, and while I am devastatingly aware, they cannot disappear fast enough. One comforting thought to me is that while I tend to think that my family and my life are the center of some psychotic universal joke, I remember the planetarium show. It is my go-to when I am stressed to the max and need some perspective. Every small kindness we offer does have a ripple effect in the Universe, but we are insignificant on a Universal scale. Hard to believe sometimes, but that thought often derails my panic train.