I used to love Bugs Bunny. One of my favorites was Marvin the Martian. He had an Acme Ray Gun, with which he would vaporize Daffy Duck. A classic line from Marvin the Martian, “Resistance is futile, earthling.”

During Tuesday’s snowstorm, I thought of those words often. I dressed for spring on Tuesday, in sandals and a skirt. Wrong outfit, wrong day.

Of course, I was too busy to run home and change as the day grew colder and the drizzle turned to snow. I decided to accept the weather and be thankful for the moisture. Resistance to the weather, or to just about anything else, is futile.

It never ceases to amaze me, how people will complain about things that cannot be changed, such as the weather.

Complaining never changed anything for the better. In fact, it never changed anything at all. It is futile to resist those things we can’t change. I would include the weather in that category, as well as the past, other people, and dogs.

You can’t change anything by complaining, and resisting what you can’t change is a waste of time and energy.

I had a friend who used to say, “You can’t teach a pig to sing. You only waste your time and upset the pig.” Complaining about the weather, fretting over the past, or trying to change someone else’s behavior is a lot like trying to teach a pig to sing. You don’t achieve your goal, and you usually irritate somebody.

Why resist things? Life is too short to be frustrated and angry over things that can’t be changed. When I hear people griping about the weather, I wonder what they think it could possibly accomplish. Yes, it is snowing. Yes, it is cold. Yes, we all wish summer would hurry up and get here. Will complaining about the cold make the weather any warmer? Will Mother Nature suddenly say, “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize all of you Evanston residents were expecting sunshine and blue skies. Let me fix that.”

No. She will not bend to our will.

Rather than resist what is, I have found it is much easier to accept circumstances and make the best of them. Surrender to what is, rather than resist with futility.

Surrendering has such a negative connotation. It brings to mind weakness, giving up and giving in. In fact, I would argue that the opposite is true. It takes determination and strength to accept the things we cannot change. It takes character to submit our will to something greater. It takes humility and grace to be thankful for the snow, when you really wish to see the sun.

Most of our suffering has its roots in resistance. We suffer as we agonize over mistakes, misspoken words, and things we have done wrong. You can’t change the past. It has already happened. You can accept the past and move on, working to correct the mistakes of yesterday.

We suffer as we worry about what will happen tomorrow. We have no control over tomorrow. Of course, you can make plans, but as the good book says, we are not guaranteed tomorrow. It is foolish to say, “Tomorrow I will do this, and tomorrow I will do that.” We don’t know what will happen tomorrow. Worrying about it, resisting internally, will not change a moment. 

Busy as a Bee

Just a Thought

By Deborah Demander

Everyone I meet has a busy life. It seems like everyone is bustling around working, volunteering, and running non-stop.

Most days, I’m up by 5 a.m. and I don’t stop running until after 10 p.m. I’m not complaining, just noticing that everyone around me is as busy as I am.

At an early morning breakfast meeting, I asked a friend how he was doing.

“I’m really busy,” he replied. “Sometimes I wonder if every day is going to be a grind for the rest of my life.”

I agreed with him, but as I thought about it later, I realized that life doesn’t have to be a grind. We all have choices. We choose where to work, where to live, who to marry, what church to attend, what activities to be involved in.

Everything in your life is there as a result of choices you have made. If you don’t like where you are or what you’re doing, make a different decision. The effects of a decision stay in place until you make a different decision.

If you have made a decision and find that you don’t like where its taking you, perhaps it’s time to reevaluate.

I like having a busy life. I enjoy volunteering my time to make the community a better place, and I like my work, which generally casts me far and wide throughout the region. Last Wednesday found me driving to Kemmerer for an early morning meeting with the Governor,  attending the Kemmerer Rotary Club meeting, then driving like a crazy woman down the interstate in my Subaru (yes, the same pig-mobile) to attend another meeting with the Governor and Uinta County officials. Once that was finished, I took pictures of an event in town, then attended a parking meeting.

But I didn’t complain, because I like to be busy. Well. I may have complained a little the next morning when my alarm went off, but overall it was a fun day. If I didn’t like to be busy, I would do something else.

Many people, when I ask how they are doing, reply with a heavy sigh and a roll of the eyes, “I’m sooo busy.”

We are all busy. If you don’t like being busy, do something different. It is okay to say no to things you don’t want to do, or things that don’t match your priorities. We often loose sight of what is important in our lives, and fill our days with things we hate doing.

Stop. Don’t fill your life with things you don’t like. Life is too short to be dismal. Your day ought to be an outward expression of who you really are. If your activities don’t accurately reflect who you are, then do something different. Life is a series of choices. Choose who you will be and how you will represent yourself by the activities you participate in and the people you surround yourself with.

If those things aren’t an accurate representation, then change them.

I know. Change is hard. We all have decisions to make about the kind of life we want to have. You can decide today who you want to be, what you want to do, and what you want to have.

If you don’t want to be busy, then do something else. Say no. Stay home. Relax. There are lots of people out there willing to step in and fill the void. Although change is difficult, it’s not as hard as living a disingenuous life.

Any decision you made can be changed. You don’t have to do something drastic, such as quit your job, but you can look first for smaller changes that feel better, and more in line with your priorities. Sometimes a small shift is all it takes to feel better about life.

Deborah, in Hebrew, means bee. I like to stay busy, like the bees in the garden working. But bees still take time to smell the flowers.

When you are inundated with work and activity, don’t get frustrated. Enjoy. And if you don’t enjoy, then stop and do something else. And whatever you are doing, wherever you are, take a hint from the bees, and pause in your busyness to smell the flowers.

Namaste friends

My good friend and I were recently discussing the value of the middle of the road. He had just returned from a trip to Florida, where the politics, like the weather, can be heated and extreme.

The middle of the road is the place for me. You can see both directions pretty clearly, and there’s plenty of time to get out of the way when something big comes hurtling toward you.

Extremism in politics, religion, weight loss philosophy and just about anything else, is disruptive and causes a lot of unnecessary anger, angst and frustration. When I was a homeschool mom, I saw many extremes.

One group I discovered early on called themselves “HELM”, Home Educators Like Me. This group believed in an unschooled approach, in which they trusted that their kids would naturally pick up whatever knowledge they needed in their lives, without formal instruction.

When I realized that some of the teenage boys in the group couldn’t read, but could play video games for hours at a time, I decided the group wasn’t for me.

Then I discovered “HUG”, which sounded nice. Who doesn’t like a hug? Hugs are good, especially when you are trying to teach a houseful of kids how to read. In this instance, HUG stood for Homeschoolers Under God.

Don’t get me wrong, I like God. And I believe a strong spiritual background is important for everyone. But this group went to the opposite extreme. Those kids had to call their parent’s ma’am and sir. I think they wore hand made uniforms, too. They spent a lot of time on rote memorization of everything from the U,S. Constitution, to the Bill of Rights, to the multiplication tables (all the way up to 20x20) and bible verses in the original Hebrew.

Out of the frying pan and into the fire. I’m sure both groups had a lot to offer, but their extremism was a turn-off for the average Joe. Back in the day before computers, I opted for a mix of educational materials from a variety of sources. And I’m glad to say that four of my eight children are in college, while the other four are still finishing various levels of elementary, middle and high school. The middle of the road served us well, in a number of aspects.

I consider myself a pretty average Joe. The middle ground offers compromise, negotiation and cooperation. These are all things I can get behind, and they are all skills I want my children to learn. Extremism from either end of the spectrum rarely produces tangible results. Instead, it is often divisive, disruptive and contentious. Life is too short for so much anger.

I understand that many may view the middle of the road as a cowardly place, where wishy-washy new age thinkers hang out — and maybe it is. But, the good news is, we have chocolate here, and coffee and wine. And we have conversations in which both sides of an argument are evaluated for their validity.

Here in the middle of the road, you will find a compromising group of people who may not believe as you do, but who will defend your right to believe as you wish.

And here in the middle of the road, we let the voices of the masses be heard, not drowned out by anger. In the middle of the road, you are free to speak without fear of being drowned out by an angry mob.

Wyoming is the perfect place to be in the middle of the road. There isn’t too much traffic here, so you can see for miles. And as the Equality State, people are theoretically inclined to engage in intelligent discourse.  I think we ought to start a middle of the road political movement. We could call it common sense.

Common sense works for Wyoming and it could work for the rest of the country too. And if you’d like to join me for some chocolate and a glass of wine, I’ll meet you in the middle of the road.

Namaste, friends

It’s easy to be optimistic when life runs smoothly.  When things flow, everything seems to work together. Stressors come along, but you handle them calmly. Problems arise, but you work through them. Conflicts seem to dissipate fairly, when life is in the flow.

But what about when everything falls apart? How do you handle your life then? The philosophical answer is that you remain in the moment, unperturbed. You remember to breathe deeply and calmly. You focus on only the things you can change in the moment. The spiritual answer: you ask God for strength. You focus on God as the source of your comfort, and of all things in your life. On a physical level, when things around you fall apart, you maintain your disciplined schedule of rising early, studying and meditating, exercising, strict eating. You avoid those foods that are known to increase your anxiety, and you eschew alcohol.

All of those answers exist in an ideal world. But what about in real life, when things fall apart? What about when you can’t make it through the day without a glass of wine or two, and before bedtime you realize the bottle is empty again? What about when you lose your job? Even though it was a stressful job that didn’t pay nearly enough, and you never felt acknowledged for your work, it was still a job. It still gave some purpose to your day.  What about when someone you love leaves you? Although you fought a lot, and were getting tired of them anyway, you still miss the idea of being in a relationship.

When things fall apart in real life, what does a normal person do? We aren’t all spiritual gurus or disciplined yogis, or fit athletes, able to roll with the punches, no matter the circumstance. In real life, real people handle stress in a myriad of ways. When life caves in all around you, there are some things you can do, that don’t require you to be enormously disciplined, that will help shore up the walls of your sanity.

When things fall apart, the first step is to ask for help. You don’t have to ask anyone specifically. The Universe will hear your request, whether it is out loud or just in your heart. Ask for help and believe that it is on its way. When you ask the universe for help, remember to release the form it takes. When help comes your way, be sure to take advantage of it, rather than reject it based on looks alone. Just because your help doesn’t come packaged the way you’d expected, don’t dismiss it out of hand.

After asking for help, it is important to remember to breath. Often when you are in the midst of mind numbing crisis, one of the things you forget to do is breathe. Of course, you are breathing. It’s an automatic function. But during crisis or panic mode, the breathing often becomes rapid and shallow. You forget to breathe deeply, and you neglect a full exhale. Breathing properly is an extremely important part of healing. Breathe in deeply, fully oxygenating your blood, filling your lungs to capacity. Hold it for a moment, and then breathe out fully, cleansing your lungs and your body of stale air. A few deep breaths will help clear and calm your mind, and will release some of the stress you’ve been carrying.

The main thing to keep in mind when things fall apart is this: everything always changes. Regardless of the situation you are in now, this too shall pass. Everything is in a constant state of change. The good times will pass into hard times. The hard times will flow into good times. The cycle will continue throughout your life. So even when things fall apart, the best thing you can do for yourself is to realize that things will come together, and they will fall apart again.

I have always expressed a fondness for the quiet spaces between the notes. The interlude. Not only in music, but also in life the calm between moments of frenzied activity offers a chance to breathe and take in the beauty of life.

And now, I am enjoying an interlude of my own. Some of you may have noticed that I am no longer with Evanston’s radio station, Cook Brother’s Broadcasting. And some of you may have never noticed that I left the Uinta County Herald. Let me bring you up to date, and share a little of what’s happening in my life.

I enjoyed working at the Herald for nearly two years. Then, an exciting opportunity opened up for me at K-9 and KADQ radio stations. While working at the newspaper offered me a chance to hone my writing skills, and meet many wonderful community members, the radio station offered a chance to develop some different skill sets. Both environments were fun, challenging, and not without their own different stresses.

I have always been a writer. From my youngest days as a middle school student, the burning desire to create with the written word has always been with me. About ten years ago, I felt inspired to write a book about marriage. The actual writing of the book took only about a month of concerted effort. And then, like many other well-intentioned ideas, it sat on the wayside while life interrupted my plans.

Following many life changes, including moving to Evanston and working at the aforementioned jobs, I felt the time had come for me to complete that long ago abandoned project. I decided at the end of April that to really finish my book and get started on other books that have been churning in my head, I would need to focus my attention and intention on that goal.

After leaving the radio station at the end of April, I completed the long-delayed process of writing my first book. On May 10, 2013, The Married Girls Guide to Great Sex was published on Amazon.

Don’t get too bent out of shape now. It is a book about marriage, with a catchy title. Books live and die by their covers and by their titles. The Married Girls Guide to Great Sex is not of the 50 Shades of Gray genre of books. Rather, it is designed to improve your marriage, no matter how long you’ve been married.

In addition, I am currently working on two more non-fiction books, The Married Girls Guide to Daily Devotion, and The Married Girls Guide to Practical Spirituality. I anticipate both of those books will be available by the end of the year. I am also writing a fictitious work, which seems to grow by the day and take on a life of its own.

While I’m not on the radio, nor in the newspaper, you can still find my work in the Market Mailer, on my website, deborahdemander.com, and of course on Amazon.

In addition, I offer motivational seminars, not only on my book, but on a variety of other topics.

I look forward to seeing or hearing from you.

Namaste Friends.

What am I doing here? Here, in Evanston. Here, at this radio station. Here, as a mom. What is the point? As long as man has walked the planet, he has wondered abut a purpose.

Purpose was easy to find, in the cave man days. Eat or be eaten. Hunt or be hunted. When struggling for survival, the meaning of life takes on a different feeling. Survival imbues life with its own meaning. Staying warm, fed, clothed. These are the tasks of life.

But once those questions have been answered, and survival is assured, then once again we turn inward or outward or upward and wonder what the purpose is. Great thinkers have posed the question, and answered. Joseph Campbell said, “Life has no meaning. Each of us has meaning and we bring it to ife. It is a waste to be asking the question when you are the answer.” So is the meaning of life to give your own life meaning?

Some Christian scholars believe the meaning of life is to love God and serve according to his purpose. What then is God's purpose? Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love God with all you heart soul and mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself. So if we are loving God, and loving our neighbors, what does that look like?

For someone who studies the Tao, the meaning of life is to understand the profound unity of the universe and study a path that joins that unity rather than disturbing it.

Even those who follow no religious pursuit, who claim no ties to God, or Buddha, or Tao, even they search for a meaning to why we are here. Charles Darwin said simply, “We are here because we evolved.”

That simplistic answer leaves us feeling empty and unfulfilled. Darwin may be right about evolution, but he missed the mark on purpose. Not purposefully. He missed failed to consider the purpose behind our evolution.

Which brings me back to my question. What am I doing here? How can any one of us get through our life, without some idea of what we'd like to accomplish? I set out, early on, to be a doctor. I wanted to help people feel better, to help them be well. And somewhere along the way, I had eight children, and I lost sight of medical school.

For a long time I drifted. Basic survival became a necessity, and I put behind me those lofty goals of medical school, of changing the world, and of helping people feel better. I couldn't help myself. How could I possibly help anyone else? After spending many years in a fog of poverty and abuse, I awakened one day to realize that I could make life better for my children, and that became my purpose. Make life better for my kids.

Along the way, I made life better for myself. As I came out of my shell and emerged into the world, I realized that life can be better for everyone. We can each make life better for ourselves, and for those around us. We don't have to discover great meaning and purpose to our being here. We can start where we are and create purpose for our lives right here.

Wherever you are today, you can ascribe meaning to your life. Begin by forgiving yourself for whatever mistakes, faults, and shortcomings you perceive. Then, think about the people in your life. Your children, your spouse, your boss. And as you think of them, send thoughts of love, acceptance and forgiveness. Surround them with love. After you finish sending love to the people in your life, take a moment to think of the people in your life you don't particularly like. You're ex-husband, ex-wife, ex-friend, ex-boss. All those people who cause you to grind your teeth, clench your jaw and who cause anxiety to well up like acid from the pit of your stomach. Think of people who hurt you, whether intentionally or not. Think of the ones you dislike, distrust, and abhorr. Before you let the anxiety, fear and frustration overtake you, pause for just a moment. Under your breath say the words, “I forgive you.” Take a deep breath and let the forgiveness wash over you. This is not easy, but you will be okay.

Letting go of resentment is one of the hardest and best things we can do for ourselves. The only thing harder is to forgive yourself. The meaning I give to my life is to share love, peace and forgiveness with the people around me. We are all surrounded with people, whether we like it or not. We have families, work, friends. For me, I will share love and forgiveness with my husband, with my kids. With my friends, and with you.

The reason I am here is because I am exactly where I need to be. The reason you are there is because you are exactly where you need to be. Whatever challenges you face, whatever struggles you endure, these are the lessons for you today. Embrace them. Learn from them. And share love with the people you meet.

Namaste friends