TEA WITH LINDA – ASSERTIVENESS

TEA WITH LINDA – ASSERTIVENESS

Selected from  VPIA Newsletter TEA WITH THE FOUNDERS (2012) 

RIDING THE WAVES 

Experts say that our character is formed by the age of six. The implication is that we are irretrievably stuck in our original story, unable to change as we go through life. Once a pouter or a bully, always destined to repeat the pattern. Once abandoned, we can never trust in love. I have seen too many miracles to believe that now. Over the years, many people have told me that the virtues have re-parented them, and the Five Strategies have given them new hope, new tools for life. 

Our purpose in the brief span of life is growth itself. When we raise children to know who they really are, we are adding to the kindness, the courage, the integrity, the love in this world. And it is never too late to change. Why have we been given free will, if not to choose at every moment?

So, I have a question for you. Do you choose joy? Amidst the storms as well as the calmer seas

of your life, do you practice gratitude? Are you open to Grace? Do you embrace change? Are you willing to be a strong ship, riding the waves, trusting the sea, or do you keep drowning in old pain?

As I deepen into elderhood, I am clearing out everything that no longer belongs in my grace-filled life. I saw a T-shirt on a beach in Australia last year and have made one of my own. It says, "I just realized... I don’t care.” It sent me into gales of laughter. As an over-doer, over-responsible from an early age, it’s time to let go. And so I choose my yeses very

carefully these days. Small kindnesses loom large. And there is joy on the crest of every wave.

All the best, Linda