THIS IS MY LIFE
Thursday, 6/21/2001
Copyright (c) 2001, Michael Dickerson. All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction or quotation is strictly prohibited without
permission.

Hi, you (if you aren�t you, please disregard) ~

Happy summer! Memories of being a kid and school vacations, 3&2 League baseball (the NE Johnson County, KS, version of Little League, but not Little League), early morning dew, the berry tree, fire flies, YMCA kids� activities, A�s games, tornadoes, and so much more. There are lots of stories in those memories.

Okay, I�ve moved my stuff into storage � all that would fit, anyway. Diana has come home, and I�m out of her house. And I�ve found a temporary place to live until I take off for San Diego. Those are the headlines, now for the news:

Someone who hasn�t been around too long asked me who Diana is and why I�m moving out of her house. Ah, the mystery of it all. Diana is a friend of mine, and I was housesitting and petsitting for her while she was in Maui for the winter. (She doesn�t like the winters here, so she goes somewhere warm and sunny every year for about 6 months.) So, June 19 was the big day of her return and the day for me to go somewhere else.

I�m going to complain for a few moments. For the last couple of months I had had a job lined up for the time between Diana�s and San Diego. About a month ago I got another offer for those same days from people I had worked for a couple of times before that would have paid me $25 a day more, but I turned it down because I was already committed. Can you guess what�s coming? They cancelled the day before I was supposed to start the job. So, not only did I lose money, I also lost the place I was going to be living until I left for San Diego. In other words, it was a major inconvenience. Then, to make it even worse, I didn�t find out about it until I called them. They contacted the woman who referred the job to me, but not me.

Finished complaining now. From a spiritual perspective, I know that there is benefit for me in this. It�s giving me another opportunity to flow with change, with the unexpected, to have faith that all will work out for the highest, no matter how it appears to my ego. And that is an important experience. Part of my work here is to learn to trust the process of life. All is well. I am guided and supported by a consciousness far greater than my own. I may not know why this is for the best, but I have faith that it is.

Anyway, suddenly not having a place to live for 5 days gave me another opportunity either to panic or else to have faith. I remained surprisingly peaceful about it. I just began putting it out to people that I urgently needed a place to stay. That�s also a challenge for me. I hate being needy, and I hate asking for help from a place that makes me look that way. (I guess I only want to ask for help if I don�t really need it!) But I wnet ahead and did it anyway.

Interesting (to me, at least) digression: There�s a very loud voice in me that insists that ever needing help totally undermines my status as a teacher/counselor/minister. It insists that there are helpers and helpees, and never the twain shall meet. By needing help, I�ve determined which I am exclusively and permanently. Pretty harsh, isn�t it?

For those of you who don�t understand voices (or sub-personalities or selves), I (the part of me who observes and chooses) don�t believe what that voice says. I don�t need anyone to argue with it. But I don�t think it helps me at all to deny that the voice is there. What we deny tends to reach out subconsciously and bite us in the netherparts.

So, anywya, as I said, I let a lot of people know that I needed a place to stay. I got several offers, and ended up finding a perfect situation. I�m staying with a woman�s 2 cats, who would otherwise have been alone. It�s working out for the best for all 3 of us.

I also put it out to people that I need a place to park my car while I�m in San Diego and someone to drive me to the airport. Both of those have come to me, too. Now all I need is a place to live from July 5 to August 28 (when I leave for Santa Fe). Then, of course, I�ll start facing another whole set of needs. But I�m beginning to really trust that it will all work out for the best.

As if I ahven�t already been dealing with enough change, there�s also been a change in when I�m leaving for San Diego. Originally I thought I was going donw on Sunday afternoon. But now it�s changed to Monday morning. I need to get to the airport by about 7 am. You know about me and mornings, don�t you? That�s very early for me.

The good news about the change, though, is that it means I can go to Mary O�Malley�s pond party Sunday evening. I don�t think I told you about working on her pond. For those of you who don�t know, Mary is my friend, meditation teacher, and facilitator of my Thursday morning group. She decided that she wanted a pond and waterfall in her yard, and asked for any of us who would to help her create it. So I went over a couple of times and dug, moved rocks, and (my specialty) cut out the roots we uncovered. Now the pond is finished, and the party is a dedication. I�m glad I don�t have to miss the party since I put work into building the pond.

I notice that I don�t have judgments about Mary needing help with her pond. I think I just have them about myself needing something from other people.

Do you know that Hondas have a lifetime warranty on their seatbelts? I didn�t. Now I do, though. Mine broke, and it turned out that it didn�t cost anything to replace it. Good policy, I think.

An eventful few days, huh?

May you, too, find peace in faith that all is working for the best.

Namaste,
Michael

[If you don�t already and would like to receive my letters
directly via e-mail, send an e-mail (no message needed) to either
ThisIsMyLife-subscribe@yahoogroups.com or
ThisIsMyLife-subscribe@igc.topica.com.]

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ABOUT THIS IS MY LIFE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This Is My Life is my letters to my family, friends, and whoever
else may be interested about whatever is meaningful to me in
my life. I don't guarantee anything about content or frequency.
The letters will be whatever they turn out to be. If you want
the best option available for keeping up with what�s happening
with me, though, this is it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
COPIES AND FORWARDING
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You�re welcome to freely redistribute This Is My Life (my
letters) if you think someone might be interested in reading it.
Please don�t use any of it for profit, though.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ARCHIVES OF MY LETTERS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you would like to read the archives of my letters and/or
holiday letters and travel reports I've written since 1977, visit
the This Is My Life Delphi Forum at
http://www.delphi.com/ThisIsMyLife.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MY COMMUNITY
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another excellent way to know what�s going on with me is to join
the Heart Song Community e-mail list. That�s an e-mail
community that provides opportunity for discussing a variety of
topics and sharing about our personal lives. You can get more
information and join at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HeartSongCommunity.

~~~~~~~~~
MY WORK
~~~~~~~~~

If you�re interested in my work, I invite you to take a look at
the Heart Song Schedule. That provides information about the
e-zines, classes, workshops, retreats, ministry, web sites, and
other programs offered by the various people and projects of
Heart Song Projects. HSP is an affiliation of people and
projects tied together by shared psychospiritual foundations
and purposes � to contribute to healing, growth, expansion, and
spiritual awakening and to serve Spirit in all life. You can see
the most recent schedules at either
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HeartSongSchedule/messages
or http://igc.topica.com/lists/hsschedule/read.

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THIS IS MY LIFE
Monday, 6/18/2001
Copyright (c) 2001, Michael Dickerson. All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction or quotation is strictly prohibited without
permission.

Hi, all ~

Just a short one to let you know what�s going on. I�m BUSY sorting and packing stuff and moving it from Diana�s house to storage. I�m not going to get it all sorted before I store it, so I�ll have to sort from storage before I take off for Santa Fe. What I�ve learned from this so far, though, is that I now own about 3 carloads of stuff. That means I only have about a third of my stuff to get rid of. That isn�t as much as I thought. And since more than that much of it is boxes of paper (everything from articles I�ve cut out of magazines or newspapers to entire issues of old magazines or newspapers to notes I took in workshops to old flyers for workshops to bills that I paid years ago to just about anything else you can think of that�s made of paper), I think that�s quite doable. We shall see when I determine how much of all that paper I want to keep.

I can�t think of anything else that�s happened in the past week that�s worthy of reporting. More accurately, I can�t think of anything else that was important enough to me that I want to take the time to report it. I suspect that will change once I get moved.

Think a few positive thoughts for me, please.

Namaste,
Michael

[If you don�t already and would like to receive my letters
directly via e-mail, send an e-mail (no message needed) to either
ThisIsMyLife-subscribe@yahoogroups.com or
ThisIsMyLife-subscribe@igc.topica.com.]

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ABOUT THIS IS MY LIFE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This Is My Life is my letters to my family, friends, and whoever
else may be interested about whatever is meaningful to me in
my life. I don't guarantee anything about content or frequency.
The letters will be whatever they turn out to be. If you want
the best option available for keeping up with what�s happening
with me, though, this is it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
COPIES AND FORWARDING
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You�re welcome to freely redistribute This Is My Life (my
letters) if you think someone might be interested in reading it.
Please don�t use any of it for profit, though.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ARCHIVES OF MY LETTERS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you would like to read the archives of my letters and/or
holiday letters and travel reports I've written since 1977, visit
the This Is My Life Delphi Forum at
http://www.delphi.com/ThisIsMyLife.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MY COMMUNITY
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another excellent way to know what�s going on with me is to join
the Heart Song Community e-mail list. That�s an e-mail
community that provides opportunity for discussing a variety of
topics and sharing about our personal lives. You can get more
information and join at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HeartSongCommunity.

~~~~~~~~~
MY WORK
~~~~~~~~~

If you�re interested in my work, I invite you to take a look at
the Heart Song Schedule. That provides information about the
e-zines, classes, workshops, retreats, ministry, web sites, and
other programs offered by the various people and projects of
Heart Song Projects. HSP is an affiliation of people and
projects tied together by shared psychospiritual foundations
and purposes � to contribute to healing, growth, expansion, and
spiritual awakening and to serve Spirit in all life. You can see
the most recent schedules at either
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HeartSongSchedule/messages
or http://igc.topica.com/lists/hsschedule/read.

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