“Now it seems to me that love of some kind is the only possible explanation of the extraordinary amount of suffering that there is in the world.” Oscar Wilde

Is there any other area of life that has produced as much worry and suffering as love? Must love produce suffering, or is the suffering a product of a combination of love with something else . . . like fear of loss and / or regret?

If so – if suffering is unnecessary with pure love – it’s because love is unconditional and to create suffering because of what one “feels” is love is to create needless suffering.

Have you ever worried over love and turned the experience into suffering? How did you transcend it? What role, if any, did fear play in your experience of suffering? Wilde says “love of some kind” plays a role in all suffering. What other kinds of love besides romantic love, if any, have contributed to your suffering in your life?

No discussion of poetry would be even remotely complete without mention of love poems. Most likely, all of us have at least one favorite. Whether or not we can recite it, there’s usually something that we have heard that has touched our hearts.

Here’s my favorite – and it’s best read aloud. I invite you to think about your favorite and to share it with someone you love today. Poetry can connect our hearts.

i carry your heart with me i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)

i fear
no fate (for you are my fate,my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

~ e. e. cummings

Please write me and tell me your favorite love poems. You can also post (so everyone can share) on the Study Hall blog beta site at:

http://www.coachingforresults.com/studyhall

A focus on renewal in key relationships can be fruitful. Psychologist Ken Dychtwal discussed in a recent article how he and his wife (married in 1983) renew their vows every year on their wedding anniversary . . . . in a different place and set of circumstances each year. They view it as an annual remarriage where they evaluate their needs and commitments.

Revisiting original agreements to renew them is an enormously powerful antidote to the inertia that relationships of any kind can take on as years pass.

Think about your key romantic and business partnerships. Could you be well-served by an annual renewal of the principles of partnership? What kind of magic might that produce? How else can you access the power of renewal? Can this kind of renewal be useful and practical even in client and vendor relationships?

Here’s the link to Dr. Dychtwald’s post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ken-dychtwald/the-miracle-cure-for-what_b_183685.html

Copyright 2009. E. B. Hutt Bush and Coaching for Results, Inc.

This is Valentine’s Week, and we are drawn to thinking about hearts and chocolates and romance. A good time to consider our topic for this week: LOVING YOURSELF.

It’s been said that you can’t truly love another until you love yourself. We live in a culture that constantly engages us in comparison to images of perfect people living perfect lives. In a way, self-loathing is an integral part of consumer marketing.

The message is something like: “You can only be loved / lovable if you are like these perfect people . . . and you can fix what’s wrong with you and your life by buying our products.”

Living in that environment of conditional love, we have found it tough to be tender, kind and forgiving to ourselves. We often hear people say that they are extremely hard on themselves.

Karl Jung said, “The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.”
This year, how about a Valentine’s Day for you, too, as well as your loved ones?

What would that day look like? How could you make a clear expression of love for yourself this February 14th? What would you do? What would you not do?

Copyright 2009. E. B. Hutt Bush and Coaching for Results, Inc.

So far this week, we’ve focused on our own starting over. Today, consider the wisdom of allowing others to start over with you.

Everyone has made mistakes in life. It’s just a matter of degree, but . . . face it, no one escapes doing some really dumb things.

We can assist others in their journeys by losing the attachment to past wrongs and saying, “The rest of my relationship with this person begins now.”

Imagine what a difference that would make in business, family friend and romantic situations.

Allowing others to start over means that you don’t hold their past performance against them. By giving them a clean slate:
* Grudges disappear

* Wounds heal

* Harmony expands

* Freedom grows

This is not a “touchy-feely,” “lah-lah” strategy. Rather, it has highly practical outcomes. Life gets better! Results improve!

Please think of some people whose conduct you can reframe in your mind as only in the past . . . and consciously allow them to start over. Breathe and observe the way you feel as you release the past and allow the present with nothing but possibilities.