We all go through rough times in life. It is easy to want to blame others for our situation, but it is not about others, but ourselves. I keep learning and relearning that when I blame others, it just keeps the sadness and negativity in control of my life. The longer I hold on to my negativity and sadness, the more of my joy and wealth I give away. Sometimes we just need someone to help us refocus.
Decades ago, I worked in a summer camp and had a little boy named Mikey. He was learning how to be away from his mom for the first time in his life. He would come in crying and I began playing this game with him to redirect his energy. I would say can you make a monster face and he would. How about a sad face and he would and before you knew it he was okay and then we could go play with the other kids.
One day we were playing the water when I realized I had lost a piece of jewelry that I never took off. It brought tears to my face and no matter how hard I tried I could not stop the tears from rolling down my face, and then this little boy gave me a gift I will never forget. I tried to capture this in a poem about us and this experience.
Read moreDear God,
As I finished reading Doreen Virtue’s book, Assertiveness for Earth Angels, I found myself thinking back to the day I was born. It was, as you know, not an easy time for my birth mother or me as we both almost died in childbirth. For the longest time I blamed myself at some level for the challenges she went through. At the same time, I missed the experience of feeling welcomed into the world and spent a good bit of time in my life feeling as if I just was not good enough. It was as if I blamed myself for not being Jewish enough for my birth mother and her family to keep me, not being black enough for my birth family and his father to take me. Then when I was finally adopted, I battled to feel Jacobson enough next to my brothers who were biologically my parent’s children. I remember my brother once telling me I was not a real Jacobson. I have had to work at releasing those feelings and realize that the near death experience I had as an infant was a central and key part of my life and of who I am today.
Read more
