The Garden of the Heart

The Garden of the Heart

                 

I was recently reminded of the term ‘festive season blues’.  For many this time of year brings feelings of melancholy, missing loved ones, disappointment of the year’s intended goals and also financial pressure.

   We all have challenges to do with not being good enough or the lack of self-worth.  This can be highlighted when we think that we don’t have enough – feelings of poverty (each in his/her own experience) – overwhelming requirements of the ‘season for giving’ or the expected family holiday or expense of long distance travel.  The perception that ‘others’ have such an easy life, because they have so much more materialistically speaking, invites the envy creeping into our heart.  Responsibility to provide and give our loved ones all they wish for, can be a heavy burden.

   As we near the end of 2012 with all the different predictions, it  is obvious that the world as we know it is changing.  Putting aside that this time has long been predicted – the reality is that mother earth is under severe pressure and change needs to happen sooner rather than later.  We need to reassess our values and what it is that we are really pursuing and to comprehend our individual impact on the earth.  We will all need to adapt, change and take responsibility to do our part in uplifting and contributing, no matter how insignificant it may seem.  This time of year is the perfect opportunity to re-evaluate ourselves and our lives. What are we pursuing?  Is this what we really want?  Is the chase really worth it?  Do you want to do the same again next year?

   In our re-evaluation, we need to deepen our relationship with God and find the trust and realisation that ultimately we are not in control.  We need to do what is required of us to the best of our ability and then allow God…  Create a space of peace within the Garden of your Heart.  It is only from this place of quietness that we know what we need to know so that we can do what we need to do.

   May I take this opportunity to thank you, the reader, for taking the time to read this column and for your kind words of encouragement, and wish you all a blessed Festive Holiday Season.  It is my wish and hope for each one to be able to look back on 2012 and find much to be grateful for and to find that which you deserve a pat on the back for what you did achieve and that which you are proud of!

Karin Engman, Life Coach and Motivational Speaker, 072 189 6951, thehummingbird@vodamail.co.za, www.karin-engman.blogspot.com

A Plus inside a circle of brotherhood

A Plus inside a circle of brotherhood

 

During my recent visit to a local hair dressing salon, part of the conversation was related to a daughter’s impending marriage to an English speaking, much liked and also approved of, young man.  A comment by the mother of the bride, gave me some food for thought.  She was of the opinion that the English had far less ‘baggage’ than the Afrikaners.  Hence this groom to be seemed so ‘easy going and uncomplicated’.  Be that as it may – it got me thinking…       Culturally you could probably find reasons for ‘baggage’ if you went back far enough in history, with every nation under the sun.  I myself, being of German heritage, was taught at the German High School I attended (strictly one teacher related), that it was expected of us to feel guilt (for the rest of our lives) about the crimes committed against humanity by the Germans, in the second world war.  To aggravate matters my ‘clan’ (South African German Speaking) supported Hitler’s efforts.  As though this burden was not enough, I also am a white South African born in the early sixties.  Once I grasped the horrors of apartheid, I should as a white person, carry guilt towards the wrong doings of this regime?  My burden of guilt simply by birth, was getting to back breaking proportions.  Hence, for many years, I adopted the, “I could care less about the sins of my father’s and my father’s father’s,” attitude, which needless to say, is of course impossible!

   I back packed through Europe in the mid-eighties and noticed very soon how unpopular a South African pink skin was.  So much so, that a rather large intimidating African American scared the living daylights out of me in Pamplona, yelling unprintable abuse at me and then spitting a spectacular specimen at my feet.  In self-preservation, I adopted an Australian accent and repertoire post haste, until I met a ‘pack’ of big South Africans and attached myself to them as travel companions.

   Simply by factor of heritage – much of any history has the makings of baggage.  Mostly this heavy sack ends up being filled with anger towards a perceived perpetrator.  To flounder around in a mud pool of accusations brings nothing worthwhile except perhaps the mineral benefits for your complexion.  There comes a time when you need to step out of that mess, clean yourself up, take responsibility for your part in it and start contributing instead of waiting for the pay-out for all the wrongs committed against you.  “Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred,” Martin Luther King Jr.  A recent gift I received epitomizes this gesture of making peace with the past and also embracing life now - it is large plate with writing in a plus sign format (vertical and horizontal), it reads: “This plate symbolises an offering or a gift.  It holds the food, love, protection, nourishment, sacrifices and care a parent, leader, host or lover offers another.  The even-sided cross symbolises a meeting place, a crossing of paths or a sacred gathering, an event or location where people feast, celebrate, mourn, reminisce or worship together.  A ‘CROSS INSIDE A CIRCLE’ symbolises prosperity and a long life.  It is also the traditional and scientific symbol for Planet Earth.  The Gift of the connection from God to earth and then across human to human is a requirement of survival.  Without the ‘above to below’ it would only be a minus sign – let us all try to rather be a plus factor in our life/society/earth.  “We have learned to fly the air like birds and swim the sea like fish, but we have not learned the simple art of living together as brothers,” Martin Luther King Jr.

Karin Engman, Life Coach and Motivational Speaker Ermelo, 072 1896951, 

thehummingbird@vodamail.co.za,  www.karin-engman.blogspot.com