Day 58 of Your Year to Wellness: Encouragement

Through my window

Encouragement and Enlightenment

Last night I couldn’t sleep, which is big for me because I can sleep standing up. When I hit my wall, I’m like a two year old who declares she’s not sleepy and then passes right out. That’s because I get up extremely early and I go to bed that way too. When I woke up with no need to do so, I decided to sit and pay attention. Nothing came, so I thought about making jewelry which I do at night before going to bed but I figured I’d read instead.

 I’ve got so many books on my waiting list that I can’t always decide what to read next. I read from paper books and from an electronic book as well because with all of the traveling I do, I needed to lighten my travel load. My home is filled with books. Everyone in the family reads and so we often struggle between our love for art and the need for wall space for books.

I try to keep my bedroom as feng shui as possible, which means not too many books in the bedroom. I had that “I don’t want to get up thing” going which happens when you’re all cozy in bed so I reached for my note pad to read a book from it. When I did I noticed that I had a lot more email than I had before going to sleep so I went to my email account and found it filled with encouragement from readers of this post.

 One said that my mother’s wisdom reminded the reader of an aunt whose memory brought them back to a peaceful place. Another email told of how my writing had answered a questioned the reader had the day before and someone else spoke of finding peace from years of holding onto childhood memories filled with pain. There were more encouraging me to continue on this journey and I understood why I was up.

Last week, people kept telling me how young I looked. It happened all week long and it was coming from people I didn’t know. Somehow, age would come up and I would say that I was 51 adding that I usually say 60 because it gets me more compliments. Each time, the other person would tell me that they would have guessed 30. This happened over and over again and I began to wonder why. I didn’t think I was looking younger but then last night when I woke up and read the emails I burrowed out of my winter habitat and looked in the mirror.

 Here’s what I think is happening and I want you to pay close attention to this and to your own life as well; I think that when we work through our judgment of others, especially those who we feel have wronged us and we learn to encourage instead, it enlightens us and takes us to a place of peace. This peace truly surpasses understanding and we are able to forgive and forgo the need for revenge or restitution.

Today encourage at least 5 people. I’m not talking about false praise; there is a fine line between the two. Find the beauty in someone and tell them. Your encouragement will take the person off balance at first simply because we are not used to getting or receiving compliments. Then your compliment will do exactly what the word encouragement means, it will hearten the recipient with courage. Your encouragement for others will illuminate you.

You will begin to see more clearly and understand the pain of another which will in turn humble you.

And the meek will be beautified.

Be well, be you, be illuminated.

Bertice Berry, PhD.

Order the book a Year to Wellness and start your beautiful journey today

Special thank you to Janet Hill Talbert http://onthisrocknyc.com/my editor and sister who helped me to become a better writer and who taught me to make jewlery.