Dog No Bark

This LWA September Newsletter is brought to you by Dr. Waxman.  It’s all about being present.   Have you ever noticed a child or grandchild saying something you can’t make sense of and slough it off as, “Kids say crazy things?”  Maybe we are the ones not “with it”. 

I still marvel at an experience our son Bart shared with us when he was only two years old.  We were working in our front yard, and he came up to me and Patsy looking worried and said, “Dog no bark. Dog no bark.”  We couldn’t make any sense out of this comment, especially since we didn’t own a dog at the time.  We asked him to explain, and he just looked at us dumbfounded, like we were not too smart.  It bothered us a bit because of his seriousness about, “Dog no bark,” but we still couldn’t understand his concern.  

Later that day, we saw our neighbor who lived across the street.  He was an attorney who ran his business out of his home. He informed us that his dog was very sick with heart worms and had to be hospitalized.  We were then able to put the story together.  When a client would drive up to his house, Bart noticed that the dog always barked.  When we were in the yard that day, a car entered his driveway and Bart noticed the dog did not bark.  

Now why would I share a child’s experience with our Living Well Aware readers? My son, like all children, was living in the present moment. He was not in the front yard ruminating about the past and wishing he could undo all his prior missteps, blaming himself or the world because things were not going his way.  I did not hear him say, “Why is all this stuff happening to me?” He was not worried about the future. He was not creating a movie in his mind, imagining the worst things that could possibly be happening to him and cringing at the thought that he would have to deal with all the obstacles that go along with day-to-day existence.

No! He was absorbed with what was happening in the Right Now, noting the sights and sounds. There was no judgment about whether the weather was good or bad, whether the scene was beautiful or ugly, whether the sounds outside were too loud or too quiet. There was a nonjudgmental appreciation for what he saw and experienced.

All too often, we adults fail to take the lessons we learned as kids into our older years. It’s not our fault!  Over the millennia, we have been programmed for survival, to look out for dangers, to be prepared for what could go wrong. The adults who raised us, as well as our culture, gave us information which programmed us to think and feel in certain ways. Unfortunately, even though we are human, we can even burden ourselves with the expectation that we should not make mistakes. I don’t have to tell you the result of that line of thinking! We buy stuff we don’t need. We drink liquids and eat food that harm our bodies. We quit playing and moving! We feel ashamed of our actions because we didn’t always say or do the right thing. Sometimes, we hang out with people we don’t care about or join groups that don’t interest us, just because an internal voice is telling us, “This is what you need to do!”

But we can reignite that childhood curiosity and appreciate what is happening in the Right Now. We did it before, and we can do it again. We can start by just taking a few moments to observe our breathing. We can meditate for a few minutes. We can look around us and spend some time noticing things that previously had escaped our glance. We can use our ears to tune into all the sounds in our environment. By repetitively doing this, we begin to return to enjoying the present moment, which is the only moment there truly is.  The past and the future exist only in our minds, and we can all find ourselves creating “bad movies” that get replayed over and over.

Let’s all make it a point today to STOP and BE PRESENT.  There are many useful techniques to help us rewire our confused minds to worry less about the future. We can learn to question the meaning of past events and reframe our perspective.   When it comes to negative thoughts, we have a choice of two options:  BELIEVE OR QUESTION. This new way of thinking is the first step towards Living WELL Aware!  QUESTION negative thinking!

We hope many of you will join us for our next webinar series beginning October 4.  We’re taking wellness to a “Higher” level.  MORE INFORMATION We will discuss many techniques to elevate our well-being, shedding illusions which keep us from fulfilling our life’s purpose and utilizing the gifts we have received from our Creator.  Remember: Dog No Bark!!  ONWARD!

THANKS to HighCare Health, Healthcare Highways, CT4C, EOAC of Waco, numerous school districts and YOU for traveling the LWA journey with us.  

Upcoming Events:  

• September 15 at the CAC:  Living Well in Bell Lecture Series.  Join us as Dr. Waxman and a panel of fitness experts discuss Fitness for Everyone: It’s About Survival.  MORE INFORMATION
• September 19 at St Luke Catholic Church:  Dr. Sulak will be the monthly speaker for Church Women of Temple.
• We look forward to speaking to healthcare professionals in Dana Point, CA at the NPACE conference and in Asheville NC for the American College of OBGYN. 

CONTACT US!  We would be honored to speak to your business, organization, or school assisting you in elevating the well-being of your members.