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Creating Bridges: Spirituality & Philosophy:
Water For The Dry Sponge
Chronicles and Essays
By Shaun Brown:
Showing Grace
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by Shaun Brown |
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Definition of A Friend
A friend is someone you would trust to pick up the wedding cake.
Showing Grace
GRACE-The freely given, unmerited favor and love of God~Dictionary.com
Looking back on a pattern of many years I realized that part of my job, this lifetime, is learning lessons and experiences to share with others. Making life choices, that sent me to the bottom of the well, gave me the ability to relate to most folks. Not only did I make it back but I made it back to tell the story. Some of this exposure to the risk of harm and loss gave me a strong-grounded foundation that I needed to build on my own. It also gave me the passion to become a coach and teacher.
Teaching the textural and sometimes perilous journey, to becoming a whole individual, is more real when the teacher has been there. I have also learned that people can become enriched, prosperous and successful without having to fall down the well. Helping and sharing information where it was hard earned, but given freely, is my definition of showing Grace.
Because of these hard knocks, as an alcoholic not in recovery and then finally getting sober, I was inspired to become a mentor. If I had to share two nuggets of wisdom that I brought back from the bottom of the well, they would be the elements of humility and gratitude. There is a Great Power greater than my self that is beyond my wildest understanding and what I know for sure is~ if these two actions are practiced the palace doors are always opened. We are safe and taken care of.
As an example, my trip to SF was awesome! Just crossing over the Golden Gate and entering fairyland is an automatic plus for me anyway. I had come into town to meet up with Kim Le. She is the owner and manager of a place called The Nurturing Salon on Lombard St. Her beginning origin and travels that led her here from Viet Nam had given her the gratitude and insight to teach others about how to do a successful life from scratch. I could relate to her on many levels. She has a large Soul presence even though she stands 5 feet tall at most. The gift of ambition and quest moves her forward eager to listen to her teachers and always wanting to learn more. Kim has already established her grounding and is already doing a lot of the inner work: mediation, affirmations, etc.
She found me advertised in a Bay Area magazine. We talked a few times on the phone, so when she asked me for business help I was honored and willing to do so. I am making her blank contracts and will teach a workshop at her business. She doesn’t do computer yet and needs a hand with some skills. But remembering the days when I was really green on the computer and struggling in business I felt the tug to step in and support her. In the beginning of any venture there is such a feeling of being lost. Through my trial and error parts I had learned humility and the ability to show Grace~ to give fairly, when I had not experienced fairness. With the action of showing up for Kim I know Grace will be returned to me.
Being ignorant, when I first started out as a blank slate, looking for help like all of us, there was a lot of research learning about how some people do not walk their talk or play fair on the business playground. I was overcharged a lot of money and a lot of life force. I remember begging people to do my marketing materials on their computer in exchange for massage. A lot of my skills and time were given so cheaply because I didn’t have enough self-esteem to ask for fair trades. In those days there never was one person that said: hey let’s be fair you are worth more. I know what it feels like to be at the mercy of more informed or fortunate. That’s called research. When it comes to raising your self-esteem ~sometimes you have to build your backbone one vertebra at a time.
One time a student of mine had a computer savvy husband who said he would build my website at a reasonable rate. He said not to worry about the cost because he would give me a deal. I had asked several times for a quote and he said not to worry. Being naive and having fewer boundaries, at that time, I was just happy for the help. When it was time to preview the site to be launched, they invited me over for dinner; I was so greatful for this wonderful couple. When dessert was served the web builder handed me a huge bill for his services! All I could think of was, “ET tu Brute?” Could you get this shiv out of my back please? He knew he was taking advantage of me.
After getting the guts to ask the guru many times about the devil in the details, he said he charged by the hour ~that being $70 per hour. My gut was screaming so loud about getting screwed but also owning that I didn’t insist on something in writing. Finally, in the next several days, I just kept relentlessly questioning his bill and he finally got so bothered that he dumped the site and called it a wash. He also kept a third of the fee I had already paid him. That ordeal was the cost of another vertebra.
THAT one, big, last, experience lodged deep into my interior and from then on I decided to learn to do as much of my own work as possible. I think the reason I didn’t start with that tack was based on the old voice that kept saying you can’t do that on your own. This was a voice reverberated through my childhood. It was a tribal safety mantra. This obsolete tool was finally discarded then and there.
I purchased my own computer and banged around the learning curve. Also, I paid another Webmaster to give me the SECRET of what program to buy to build it myself. I bit the dust and bought the program for building and plugging in my own website. That was the last time I ever paid for computer consultation~ I was on my way. Oh my God after all of the fears, once I settled in, I found out how easy it was to do! Talk about paper dragons!
I look back and see the people that were more than willing to over charge me and remember very little fair exchange of kindness in those early days. Those were the glory days when webmasters and tech supports were royalty in the Internet pageant. Ha! We as artists will only take so much opposition before we stand on our own. I now thank them for all of the lessons learned on how to build a backbone!
When looking at the past, even though my unfamiliarity with doing life successfully was apparent, God always leveled the playing field for me. And to this day it still seems like whatever I buy is always half off or buy one get one free. As you learn your lessons and pick up new tools along the way your persona becomes wholer. Try not to be so hard on yourself or others for perceived missteps and mishaps. You are learning how to understand the frailties in others by experiencing it in yourself so that you can have compassion. Hopefully you will learn from me. It is not necessary to go to the lengths I did ~just fast forward to being compassionate.
I believe we can make a difference and that we are placed in the path of others to be of service. We, as emotional artistic types, can save the world one action at a time as long as it is a choice of discernment between Grace ~as a verb and co-dependency ~that which has attachments. Being the creative type that you are, finding that balance will be up to trusting your gut.
For me, when it comes to business, I wait for people to ask for help because then I don’t get a resentment for being a co-dependent when they don’t take my advice. But when I am in the store and I see someone struggling to reach something on the top shelf~ I help. It’s those actions. As a business consultant I am paid well for services but there are times when it’s just the right thing to do to by giving a simple caveat to someone when they are stuck.
I am probably preaching to the choir but, the next time an individual approaches you that just needs a few words, a point in the right direction, a good job you can do this, remember we have all been zygotes at one time. This is your opportunity to show Grace~ AND just know that you will receive that gift back many times over.
Until next time my Peeps~
Love, shaun
BeWellPublications.com |
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Shaun Brown,
Author, Speaker,
Columnist
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Shaun Brown has been self employed most of her adult life. She has an AA degree in General Business and a Bachelor of Arts Degree from California State University, Sacramento, in Communications.
Her main focus of education is in advertising, promotion and production. Ms. Brown began writing music 1971 and has continued to unfold as a writer in many other directions since that time.
Her best selling book is based on the course: "Create A Successful Holistic Business." She has authored two books on the subject and is actively involved in teaching workshops in N. California. Her holistic business articles are published in several national holistic magazines, and she has a successful holistic practice in Orangevale, California.
To find out more about Shaun’s books and workshops visit her on-line at
www.BeWellPublicatons.
com.
BeWell!
Shaun Brown
BeWellPublications.com
916) 988-4322
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