| Elly's Gratitude Group
for those experiencing
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia, & Orthostatic Intolerance Encouraging, Supportive Body, Mind & Soul Discussion Cultivating Gratitude for Accelerated Healing Meets via Long Distance Teleconference Calls and in person in Northern Virginia (NOVA) and Near-by Areas This Page:
Gratitude is a heart healing
energy and one can
use it to reclaim space to work with gratitude before
one can
heal the wounds surrounding love.from anxiety, fear, grief, anger. Many times it is easier and a necessary step
Next EGG Meetings Long Distance Conference Calls
Thanks to the 15 who attended our last In-Person Meeting: Sat, March 21, 2009 Email Us with date and place suggestions. General Conference Call Information Dial our current number and code followed by the # sign. The number and codes delivered by CFSupport and EGGdish email or you can ask us directly for them. EGG calls are NOT recorded. If you arrive first, enjoy the hold music. If convenient and possible, please turn off call waiting (*70) before you dial. - Everytime someone arrives or leaves the conference, we hear a soft chime. - If we are in the middle of a story when you join, please just listen for a bit. - Usually, one or more of us asks if someone joined recently, wants to say hello. - You do not have to speak. - If you do speak, please say your name and something identifying. For example, "This is Maxine in Mississippi." or "This is Gentle Jenny." - Ask us in advance to call on you if you have something you want to make sure gets shared. It can be awkward without visual clues to know when to jump in to talk. We know. Just hang in there and keep trying! Interrupting is part of the process, part of our conditions. There are blessings in interruptions .... and we're the group that looks for the value them. We use"Free Conference" but individuals pay own long distance phone charges. With unlimited long distance service, it really feels like a "free conference" for some of us. Others use inexpensive phone cards, or call with unlimited mobile phone minutes for weekend or late meetings. Since there is no gas money needed for driving to meetings, no donation required, others consider even a $5 phone call worth it for the community experience. - Speaker phones -- If you need to use one, let's try it. But it often diminishes the sound quality for someone else on the phone and it could add some sound cutting in and out problems. - Headsets -- It can be so helpful in taking care of yourself and symptoms not have to bend your elbow when hold the receivering. Ear buds and headsets can be a great help. You may want to have one or two handy to use for the call. Some add a buzz or make caller sound far away. We are willing to help you evaluate yours for our call. - Please call from a quiet place to avoid noises which many of us find too distracting; - Make yourself comfortable, preferably with feet up and head supported; - Have water handy; - Maybe have paper and pen handy for info we often share information on calls And yes, it must be said: please go to the bathroom before the call, and press mute while you're in there during calls! Or hang up and call back. About EGG Elly's Gratitude Group is a discussion group for people with CFS/FM/OI who want to talk about the influence of our attitudes upon health. Finding the positive in devastating illness is challenging, but can be so worthwhile. We help each other realize the power of what we notice in our daily lives, the kinds of thoughts for which we spend our attention and our precious energy. We encourage each other to be mindful of what works in addition to inevitable problems we encounter living with chronic illness. We do not diminish the severity or number or complexity of members' problems. Instead, we've found it useful to seek more information, creating a new, balanced, bigger picture view of our lives where possible. Our minds' focus is important, especially on rough/ relapse days. EGG may be helpful for people having a difficult illness experience /life to learn about and practice expressing gratitude when things are tough. Because we are among peers who accept and understand CFS, FM, and OI, we can skip explanations and definitions of our conditions, using the shorthand of our understandings of common themes, allowing more time for new topics of mind-body healing. EGG is a place where you can say "I can be grateful I had only 9 weird symptoms today, when my average is 15 symptoms a day " and people will know what that's like, finding you only as odd as the rest of us! Join your peers with chronic illness for an encouraging discussion of how to develop gratitude and appreciation in the face of adversity. Learn to spend less energy on the inevitable annoyances in our lives. Read more about EGG!
Meeting Facilitator: Elly Brosius, 703-968-9818, eggdish-owner AT yahoogroups.com Dates/times and locations vary. Monthly. Check the Events Page or the Next EGG Meetings section on this page. Locations include virtual meetings via toll conference calls, Northern Virginia restaurants and libraries, and the reception area and conference room of the The Gilbert Clinic. Elly is also facilitator and webmaster of The NOVA Chronic Fatigue Syndrome / FM Support Group - the main subject of this CFSupport/CFSnova website. "Concerning all acts of initiative
and creation, Gratitude Journalsthere is one elementary truth – that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too." Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe A gratitude jounal is place where you can write 5 things a day for which you are grateful. It could be in a book, on the computer, on scrap paper. It isn't the specific thing or things that you write so much as the feeling you get while writing it. Committing to paper gives it strength. Why try one when you are already overwhelmed? People who do it faithfully swear that it makes life less overwhelming! Not up to it yet? That's fine! Toss the word gratitude around in your head a bit more if you want to. Share in reading what others post about it. Enjoy the EGG meeting summaries posted. It all helps. Like others, I have found writing "gratitudes" to be a very successful medicine. You know how people say that laughter is the best medicine, I couldn't really laugh all that sincerely or deeply until after I worked on a gratitude attitude. Now I feel that famous medicine from laughter. I am very motivated to make more space in the world for both gratitude and laughter, especially for those living with CFS and FM and related disorders. To read further about my experience, see EGGing each other on - Incitement to Insight, published in Pain Connection, Summer/Fall 2006. "If
we take the time, no matter how crazy and troubled we feel, we can find something to be thankful for." Terry
Lynn Taylor New in 2008! Journal with us online .... join The EGG Dish. EGGdish was created in March 2008 to provide a place to journal as a group, to inspire ourselves and other members with our creativity for noticing something fun, uplifting, surprising, or just new in the day, not as an excercise in only noticing the positive. It is for balancing what might be the opposite of that to our days which are likely filled with same old same old, dull, and/or down-ness. The goal is to notice all that is for us, not getting stuck in only seeing the same things over and over. This group dynamic helps broaden our vision and add more laughter, wonder, and awe, even in the presense of illness and difficulty. To receive an invitation to join EGGdish, send an email to CFSupport-owner with your name, telephone number, and email address and a brief note about how you'd like to experiment and practice with a more up attitude as a way to influence your health with other people who understand and speak fluent chronic fatigue syndrome, orthostatic intolerance, and similar syndromes (IBS, FMS, POTS, NMH, MVPS/D, Chronic Lyme, vulvodynia, ....). Participants are asked to post something at least once a month to declare their continuing interest. Tips for facing the blank paper journal page What to do when you want to write something in a gratitude journal and nothing comes to mind? If words are failing me and it is a paper journal, sometimes I put pretty stickers or cut outs of nice words or pictures from junk mail ads. When I can't think of what to write, sometimes, I look at short emails from friends. I paste them in my journal with a scribble on top such as "thank you for this friend"or "it was nice to receive these kind words this week." At the Jan 06 EGG meeting, M, though very enthusiatic about keeping the journal and the gratitude group and emails, still has trouble writing in her journal. That's okay. Really. We came up with a few together, but it was such a struggle for her. And she is not alone. Its okay. That experiece has value, too. It lets you know where you are and leads you to ask questions like "why is it hard?" Try to write one a day, or one a week. Try. Even if nothing comes to you, its okay. Sometimes, the feelings that come up just because we are trying are the things we need to recognize first. One of my techniques when I feel just plain stumped is to look around and ask, "how much harder would my life be if ______ didn't exist?" The phone for communication, the tv for company and information, the telephone directory to find others, blankets for warmth, walls to keep the wind out, ceilings to keep the rain and sun out, other people even with thier flaws, etc. Give this technique a whirl if you feel stuck. How about writing 'easy access to water" so you don't have to carry it from the river and boil it every day. If the words still do not come, doodle a flower or smiley face. The bottom line is you are putting something in the journal that implies, "I like this. This pleases me." Gratitude is then implied. Here's a website with free Art Posters 5x7 for your journal, or perhaps, the bathroom wall. Specific ones I printed to show gratitude groupies...
"Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all
the others." Cicero
"Attitude" Poster Just for Today.... I will be grateful Let us be Grateful If you want to feel rich, count all the things you have money can't buy. Top
Something Was OK Today by Elly Brosius, 08/28/2008 That very long list of what was hard and what went wrong that repeats in the head... that is what depletes a heart When overwhelmed when overtired when wrung out and feeling dead.... it is vital for vitality begin anew, to start Balancing the list believing in benefits of finding and noting to self, maybe others today Something was OK maybe even beautiful maybe even art Top The Joy of Thanks by Robert A. Emmons Shifting into Gratitude Not Only Feels Great, New Research Shows That It Is Powerfully Healing From Spirituality and Heath Magazine, Winter 2002 Excerpts: "And
yet nowadays we tend to dismiss gratitude as merely a polite social
convention or an occasional warm feeling. Modern psychologists have to
take much of the blame, I'm afraid. We've spent too many years focusing
on negative emotions — such as depression, anxiety, and
hostility. Now that we’re finally paying serious attention to
positive states — and are gathering solid data on their
profound
effect on mental, physical, and spiritual well-being — it's
time
to get out the word that it's good to feel good."
&"In
one study at the University of California, Davis, where I teach, we
examined the effect of counting your blessings regularly. We recruited
three groups. One kept gratitude journals. One recorded daily hassles.
The third wrote down neutral events. We found that the gratitude group
exercised more regularly, reported fewer physical symptoms, felt better
about their lives as a whole, and were more optimistic about the
upcoming week than the other groups. They were also more likely to
report helping someone with a personal problem or offering emotional
support to another. A second study found that the gratitude group
enjoyed higher levels of alertness and energy than the others."
Quotes (New quotes added at the top of this list.) Thanksgiving comes to us out of the prehistoric dimness, universal to all ages and all faiths. At whatever straws we must grasp, there is always a time for gratitude and new beginnings. -- J.
Robert Moskin Faith is the courageous confidence that
trusts in the Source of all gifts. -- David Steindl-RastIf
we begin to get in touch with whatever we feel with some kind of
kindness, our protective shells will melt, and we'll find that more
areas of our lives are workable. -- Pema Chodron, When Things Fall ApartOn this day of your life, I believe God wants you to know... the best things in life are free. That is just about the oldest, most trite, most hackneyed "saying" you could come across today. But it is so, so true. And it is important never to lose sight of that. So look around you. Wherever you see friendship, loyalty, laugher, love...there is your treasure. -- Neale
Donald Walsch We need a renaissance of wonder. We need to renew, in our hearts and in our souls, the deathless dream, the eternal poetry, the perennial sense that life is miracle and magic. -- E.
Merrill Root (1895-1973) American Writer Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents which, in prosperous circumstances, would have lain dormant. -- Horace (65-8 BC) Roman Poet "The vision must be followed by the venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps - we must step up the stairs." -- Vance Havner Happiness is not what makes us grateful. It is gratefulness that makes us happy. -- David
Steindl-Rast, A Listening Heart A desire to kneel down sometimes pulses through my body, or rather it is as if my body has been meant and made for the act of kneeling. Sometimes, in moments of deep gratitude, kneeling down becomes an overwhelming urge, head deeply bowed, hands before my face. -- Etty
Hillesum, An Interrupted Life "The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem." -- Theodore Rubin I am, therefore I thank. -- Cindy
Lubar Bishop Only gratefulness, in the form of limitless openness for surprise, lays hold of the fullness of life in hope. -- David
Steindl-Rast, Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer Even if our efforts of attention seem for years to be producing no result, one day a light that is in exact proportion to them will flood the soul. -- Simone
Weil Outwardly one's life may suffer every kind of limitation, from bodily paralysis to miserable surroundings, but inwardly it is free in meditation to reach out to a sphere of light, beauty, truth, love, and power. -- Paul Brunton, Meditations for People in Crisis I've learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances. -- Martha
Washington Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. Carl Jung I had to relinquish all the powers I normally command. I had to relinquish, above all, the sense and affect of activity. I had to allow – and this seemed horrible – the sense and feeling of passivity. Oliver Sacks, Neurologist I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable...but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing. Agatha Christi Take full account of the excellencies which you possess, and in gratitude remember how you would hanker after them, if you had them not. Marcus
Aurelius All respectability, all honor is meaningless if it drives you against your nature. What can you do if you are not a lotus flower, but just a marigold? Enjoy being a marigold. Chandan Always be on the lookout for the presence of
wonder.E.B. White Charlotte's Web People call me an optimist, but I'm really an appreciator....When I was six years old and had scarlet fever, the first of the miracle drugs, sulfanilamide, saved my life. I'm grateful for computers and photocopiers...I appreciate where we've come from.
Julian Simon
(1933-1998) American
Academic Rise above the dumbosity of others. Bill Allin Dag
Hammarskjold Gratitude is so close to the bone of life, pure and true, that it instantly stops the rational mind, and all its planning and plotting. Regina Sara
Ryan Praying Dangerously Flow with whatever is happening and let your mind be free. Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate. Chuang Tzu The most beautiful people are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen. Elisabeth
Kübler-Ross Grateful living: an alchemic operation of converting "disgraceful" things into grateful events. --Raimundo
Panikkar Nothing is a waste of time if you use your experience wisely. --Auguste
Rodin, 1840-1917 Gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder. --G.K.
Chesterton The day I acquired the habit of consciously pronouncing the words "thank you", I felt I had gained possession of a magic wand capable of transforming everything. --Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will. --Epictetus Gratitude is twofold - love coming to visit us and love running out to greet a welcome guest. --
Henry Van Dyke Nothing is more honorable than a grateful heart. --
Lucius Annaeus Seneca A
smooth sea never made a skilled mariner. -- English proverbInstead of always harping on a man's faults, tell him of his virtues. Try to pull him out of his rut of bad habits. Hold up to him his better self, his real self that can dare and do and win out. --
Eleanor Porter (1868-1920) American Novelist Even
if you have a lot of work to do, if you think of it as wonderful, and
if you feel it as wonderful, it will transform into the energy of joy
and fire, -- Tulku Thondup Rinpocheinstead of becoming a burden. The Practice of Dzogchen Beauty
seen makes the one who sees it more beautiful. David Steindl-Rast A Listening Heart In the continuous flow of blessing our heart finds meaning and rest. David
Steindl-Rast A Listening Heart Gratefulness is the gallantry of a heart ready to rise to the opportunity a given moment offers. -- David Steindl-Rast Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer Real life isn't always going to be perfect or go our way, but the recurring acknowledgement of what is working in our lives can help us not only to survive but surmount our difficulties. --
Sara Ban Breathnach Thankfulness brings you to
the place where the Beloved lives.--
Jalaluddin Rumi Camille
and Kabir Helminski's RUMI: JEWELS OF REMEMBRANCE Sometimes our light goes out, but is blown again into instant flame by an encounter with another human being. Each of us owes the deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this inner light. --
Albert Schweitzer The same pain that can
blemish our personality can act as a creative force, -- Pir Vilayat Inayat Khanburnishing it into an object of delight. Alchemical Wisdom The breezes at dawn have
secrets to tell you. Don't go back to sleep. -- Jalaluddin RumiThere's a self expansive aspect of gratitude. Very possibly it's a little known law of nature: the more gratitude you have, the more you have to be grateful for. -- Elaine St. James What brings fulfillment is gratefulness, the simple response of our heart to this life in all its fullness. --
David Steindl-Rast Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer Heaven and earth are threads from one loom. -- Shaker proverb Some people are always grumbling because roses have thorns. I am thankful that thorns have roses. -- Allophones Karr A
thankful person is thankful under all circumstances. -- Baha'u'llahA complaining soul complains even in paradise. To think bad thoughts is really the easiest thing in the world. If you leave your mind to itself it will spiral down into ever increasing unhappiness. To think good thoughts, however, requires effort. This is one of the things that discipline - training - is about. -- James Clavell, in
"Shogun"
If you concentrate on finding whatever is good in every situation, you will discover that your life will suddenly be filled with gratitude, a feeling that nurtures the soul. --Rabbi Harold Kushner How can this suffering be? How can this suffering be a gift? How can this suffering be a gift? Rip it open. How can this suffering be a gift? Rip it open, and the heart floods with compassion. and We are all one. We are all one step from the edge. We are all one step from the edge of the annihilation. We are all one step from the edge of the annihilation of all hatred. Katrina Meditations Spirituality and Health Magazine Sept/Oct 2006 See also, from his book, Divinity in Disguise The Practice of Nested Meditations "The spiritual practice of gratitude has been called a state of mind and a way of life. But we prefer to think of it as a grammar — an underlying structure that helps us construct and make sense out of our lives. The rules of this grammar cover all our activities. Its syntax reveals a system of relationships linking us to the divine and to every other part of the creation. To learn the grammar of gratitude, practice saying "thank you" for happy and challenging experiences, for people, animals, things, art, memories, dreams. Count your blessings, and praise God. Utter blessings, and express your appreciation to everything and everyone you encounter. By blessing, we are blessed." Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow. -- Melody Beattie Remember that not to be happy
is not to be grateful. -- Elizabeth CarterIf a fellow isn't thankful
for what he's got,
-- Frank A. Clarkhe isn't likely to be thankful for what he's going to get. Gratitude is the inward
feeling of kindness received.
-- Henry Van DykeThankfulness is the natural impulse to express that feeling. Thanksgiving is the following of that impulse. To speak gratitude is
courteous and pleasant, -- Johannes A. Gaertnerto enact gratitude is generous and noble, but to live gratitude is to touch Heaven Do you realize what this
means?
-- Christopher LeachThe fact of being alive... I still find it staggering that I am here at all. Never
lose a holy curiosity. -- Albert EinsteinGratitude is the heart's
memory.
-- French ProverbTurn
your face to the sun, and the shadows fall behind you. -- Maori proverbI
will love the light for it shows me the way, -- Og Mandinoyet I will endure the darkness for it shows me the stars. I
will make love my greatest weapon and none on who I call can defend against its force.... -- Og MandinoMy love will melt all hearts liken to the sun whose rays soften the coldest day. If you pick up a starving dog
and make him prosperous, he will not bite you;
-- Mark Twainthat is the principal difference between a dog and a man. The
sages do not consider that making no mistakes is a blessing. -- Wang Yang-Ming (1472-1529)They believe, rather, that the great virtue of man lies in his ability to correct his mistakes and continually make a new man of himself. Chinese Philosopher The gem cannot be polished
without friction, nor man perfected without trials. -- Chinese proverbYour
task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the
barriers within yourself that you have built against it. -- Jalaluddin RumiOur
walls of division do not rise all the way to heaven. -- Metropolitan Philaret of
MoscowForgiveness does not change
the past, but it does enlarge the future. - Paul BoeseTop
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