"You've got a champagne appetite on a beer pocketbook". That was one of my mother's favorite sayings to me over the years. Depending on the mood I was in at the time, it was met with mild irritation or outright self-righteous anger.
Who the hell was she?! (to comment on me). This is MY life, and my decision, and DAMMIT, I have the right to have something nice. I earned the money. I deserve quality. I've had enough of going without or having only the cut-rate, 2nd rate knockoffs that are cheesy and cheap in quality and price. And then because they are cheap, that don't last or don't work, and you end up spending three times as much to not even get close to what quality would give you in the first place!
So, yes. We bought quality, and paid more, and had nicer, better, more pleasing to the eye in everything we could. Then sometimes over these years, life came in and took those things from me. Sometimes I voluntarily gave them up.
It was the paying more and the giving up that my mother couldn't abide. It was the paying more that she derided whenever we were in financial straights and I was crying. "Your mother has always got to have the best", she said to my daughter one day. Boy, did that piss me off.
Recently Spirit sent me the thought of 'self indulgent' to work with and mull over. What I love about ideas from Spirit is there is no judgment attached to them, just love, just saying 'take a look at this'. So I have been.
I realized I have been self-indulgent all my life. I have been especially self-indulgent over the last few years when it comes to soothing my pain. I chose the worst things to comfort myself with - cigarettes, fats and sweets, lazy attitudes and actions - and moved into them with a vengeance, believing that life was knocking me down, there was no one to comfort me, and I might as well comfort myself, in whatever way I chose.
Patrick and I were discussing the other night how little any of us really appreciate all we have in our society; how we are not seeing the extremes of consumerism to which we are moving. Do we really need a $300 coffee maker that will make a single cup of unlimited flavors 'just for us'? Do we really envision ourselves enjoying that cup wearing only a towel?
If that is what we want for Christmas, then we have really moved a long way away from what is important, and what we need versus what we've 'got to have'. I'm not looking to knock anyone or knock Christmas. I'm still mulling over what Christmas will mean to me this year. I already know it will be a year of very little or no money to spend on gifts. We've had those years before, more times than I want to say.
I'm thinking that this year will be a little different. I sincerely hope so. In those prior years I cried because I wasn't able to buy that coffee maker if I chose. (Well, I probably would never buy that coffee maker, but at least buy a good measure of 'quality' gifts for those I loved; be a part of our society's measure of the 'Christmas Season'.) In those years I grieved and was embarrassed that I couldn't be a part of Christmas the way 'everyone else was'.
As Patrick and I talked, of course we spoke about how much marketing and consumerism has led to not only our, by our society's indulgent attitudes. We have been told for years we could and should have it. If we didn't think we could, financially or emotionally, it was pressed upon us how they (marketers) would 'find the way' for us to have it.
In the years of losing all the wonderful things I had gained, it was that last thought that has left me so angry and bitter; feeling used by others for their gain, both before and after the purchase.
This year is different for me. In looking at my self-indulgence and pain, I of course realize how much I am only hurting myself by the choices I made/make. I realize that the person I have become because of those choices is the greatest source of my pain. Angrily blaming the world only leaves me angry and bitter.
A few months ago when my Guides spoke to me of their presence around me and their assistance in my life, they said that my life 'might not change' because of it. The last few months have been about remembering that no outside assistance, human or etheral, can take over your life and make it a miracle. Your life is the result of what you have built, continue to build, and the attitudes you take as you walk through life.
I have been especially reminded to look to myself, not with criticism, not with pity, and not with expectation or pleading for special gifts, favors, or more of everything; but with a clear understanding of Who I chose to be.
Along with that, over and over Spirit has guided me to people, places, and themes of love and forgiveness, for myself and the world at large. The theme of this last six months has been that of returning to love, living from the heart, giving and receiving love as the answer to my own and the world's ills.
In looking at my self-indulgence and what is has brought me to, I remember the person that I always intended myself to be, but somehow lost or misunderstood how to make along the way. I have never been about the world view or how others do. I always intended to live from my convictions, to live with love, to be the best I could be, and offer that to others and the world.
Somehow along the way I bought into the hypnotism of society's view and marketing. Somehow I came to believe that I was powerless under the mountain of attitudes, ideas, and false beliefs to which we are all exposed and bombarded with every day, from those close to us as well as the 'global' community. I came to believe that 'they' out there with their attitudes and actions were greatly responsible for the results of certain circumstances and my pain.
I still believe that we all affect our world, are responsible to each other, and that what we do has impact on the other. But Spirit has reminded me that when it comes to Me and my world, it is my attitudes, my decisions, my thoughts and actions that create it and make it painful or beautiful. Those same ideals affect the world at large. If I would have love and beauty I must Be love and beauty. I must give those things to myself as well as the world.
And so I have returned to love and heart-centered living, for myself and the world. This is Who I am, Who I always intended to be, and the person I will once again become. Love for myself allows me to give up the self-indulgence. Love for others allows me to give up the hateful attitudes.
The world may not change. Nothing anyone does needs to affect me and cannot, unless I forget to live with love. It is not my place to make them change or scorn them for anything they are or are not. It is my place to Love them and Myself to make this Christmas and every Christmas to come blessed.
Much Love,
Pam
Who the hell was she?! (to comment on me). This is MY life, and my decision, and DAMMIT, I have the right to have something nice. I earned the money. I deserve quality. I've had enough of going without or having only the cut-rate, 2nd rate knockoffs that are cheesy and cheap in quality and price. And then because they are cheap, that don't last or don't work, and you end up spending three times as much to not even get close to what quality would give you in the first place!
So, yes. We bought quality, and paid more, and had nicer, better, more pleasing to the eye in everything we could. Then sometimes over these years, life came in and took those things from me. Sometimes I voluntarily gave them up.
It was the paying more and the giving up that my mother couldn't abide. It was the paying more that she derided whenever we were in financial straights and I was crying. "Your mother has always got to have the best", she said to my daughter one day. Boy, did that piss me off.
Recently Spirit sent me the thought of 'self indulgent' to work with and mull over. What I love about ideas from Spirit is there is no judgment attached to them, just love, just saying 'take a look at this'. So I have been.
I realized I have been self-indulgent all my life. I have been especially self-indulgent over the last few years when it comes to soothing my pain. I chose the worst things to comfort myself with - cigarettes, fats and sweets, lazy attitudes and actions - and moved into them with a vengeance, believing that life was knocking me down, there was no one to comfort me, and I might as well comfort myself, in whatever way I chose.
Patrick and I were discussing the other night how little any of us really appreciate all we have in our society; how we are not seeing the extremes of consumerism to which we are moving. Do we really need a $300 coffee maker that will make a single cup of unlimited flavors 'just for us'? Do we really envision ourselves enjoying that cup wearing only a towel?
If that is what we want for Christmas, then we have really moved a long way away from what is important, and what we need versus what we've 'got to have'. I'm not looking to knock anyone or knock Christmas. I'm still mulling over what Christmas will mean to me this year. I already know it will be a year of very little or no money to spend on gifts. We've had those years before, more times than I want to say.
I'm thinking that this year will be a little different. I sincerely hope so. In those prior years I cried because I wasn't able to buy that coffee maker if I chose. (Well, I probably would never buy that coffee maker, but at least buy a good measure of 'quality' gifts for those I loved; be a part of our society's measure of the 'Christmas Season'.) In those years I grieved and was embarrassed that I couldn't be a part of Christmas the way 'everyone else was'.
As Patrick and I talked, of course we spoke about how much marketing and consumerism has led to not only our, by our society's indulgent attitudes. We have been told for years we could and should have it. If we didn't think we could, financially or emotionally, it was pressed upon us how they (marketers) would 'find the way' for us to have it.
In the years of losing all the wonderful things I had gained, it was that last thought that has left me so angry and bitter; feeling used by others for their gain, both before and after the purchase.
This year is different for me. In looking at my self-indulgence and pain, I of course realize how much I am only hurting myself by the choices I made/make. I realize that the person I have become because of those choices is the greatest source of my pain. Angrily blaming the world only leaves me angry and bitter.
A few months ago when my Guides spoke to me of their presence around me and their assistance in my life, they said that my life 'might not change' because of it. The last few months have been about remembering that no outside assistance, human or etheral, can take over your life and make it a miracle. Your life is the result of what you have built, continue to build, and the attitudes you take as you walk through life.
I have been especially reminded to look to myself, not with criticism, not with pity, and not with expectation or pleading for special gifts, favors, or more of everything; but with a clear understanding of Who I chose to be.
Along with that, over and over Spirit has guided me to people, places, and themes of love and forgiveness, for myself and the world at large. The theme of this last six months has been that of returning to love, living from the heart, giving and receiving love as the answer to my own and the world's ills.
In looking at my self-indulgence and what is has brought me to, I remember the person that I always intended myself to be, but somehow lost or misunderstood how to make along the way. I have never been about the world view or how others do. I always intended to live from my convictions, to live with love, to be the best I could be, and offer that to others and the world.
Somehow along the way I bought into the hypnotism of society's view and marketing. Somehow I came to believe that I was powerless under the mountain of attitudes, ideas, and false beliefs to which we are all exposed and bombarded with every day, from those close to us as well as the 'global' community. I came to believe that 'they' out there with their attitudes and actions were greatly responsible for the results of certain circumstances and my pain.
I still believe that we all affect our world, are responsible to each other, and that what we do has impact on the other. But Spirit has reminded me that when it comes to Me and my world, it is my attitudes, my decisions, my thoughts and actions that create it and make it painful or beautiful. Those same ideals affect the world at large. If I would have love and beauty I must Be love and beauty. I must give those things to myself as well as the world.
And so I have returned to love and heart-centered living, for myself and the world. This is Who I am, Who I always intended to be, and the person I will once again become. Love for myself allows me to give up the self-indulgence. Love for others allows me to give up the hateful attitudes.
The world may not change. Nothing anyone does needs to affect me and cannot, unless I forget to live with love. It is not my place to make them change or scorn them for anything they are or are not. It is my place to Love them and Myself to make this Christmas and every Christmas to come blessed.
Much Love,
Pam
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