In this issue:

• A note from Beth and Neill

  - Caring

• Feature Article

  - Love and Respect Yourself First
    for Healthy, Happy Relationships

Caring

Hi there,

Our intention is to send out our eZine to you each month by the 28th at the very latest. So, before anything else we would like to apologize for not publishing our eZine last month.

As you may know, our life has had quite a few twists and turns of late. Since the last time we talked we've: flown to Florida, packed up Beth's mom's house, shipped much of her stuff back to San Diego, brought her back here with us, moved her into a rehab facility here, supervised construction at the new house - both inside and out, moved into our new house, unpacked most of our boxes, set up our new computers and our new network, and moved Mom from rehab into the new house. Then, right after Mom moved in she ended up back in the hospital for a couple of days. But she's back home now and is doing pretty well.

At last we are beginning to settle in.

We've come to realize something since asking Beth's mom to move in with us and taking on these new responsibilities of caring for her. We've recognized that staying very present to what is true for us is essential for maintaining our sanity.

What we mean by "staying present" is that everything we choose to do must be motivated by our values and to be careful that our motivation never comes from any sense of obligation or duty.

We've learned in the past that acting out of the ideas of obligation and duty almost always leads to some level of resentment and frustration - and that never creates a very satisfying outcome for anyone involved.

As we talked to Mom about all this we realized that sharing how we are responding to our situation here may support others in similar circumstances. So this month's eZine is focused on the practice of staying present and connected to what is true for us in each moment. This means acting only when we get connected to our values and do only what will bring the most love and joy into our lives.

We can assure you that it's not always easy to find that place of value based desire. Feelings like frustration, fear, or a sense of helplessness seem to be poking their heads up at every opportunity.

Thoughts jump into our heads like: "Are we good enough, strong enough, smart enough to take care of someone who is in a wheelchair full-time, on oxygen, and can only sometimes make it to the toilet?", "I would have become a nurse if this is how I wanted to spend my life.",

or "Are we really the best ones to be caring for her? Will we do more harm than good? Would she be better off in a facility where the people are trained for this kind of thing?" And on and on to it goes.

So, whenever we notice these thoughts creeping in we stop and get connected to what's important to us in the present circumstance - what actions would bring the most love into our lives. Then, in every moment we try to make conscious choices. It doesn't really help anyone if we do things that we don't feel good about.

Mom, Petra, and Beth say "Hi!"
from their new home.

Whenever we take the time to connect with all the thoughts and feelings happening within us, we have the ability to choose our actions from inner truth - from true integrity. We find that these are the actions that produce the most satisfying results for everyone involved.

If you have someone in your life that needs your help, whether they've asked for it or not, we suggest you take the time to connect with yourself and identify the actions that would bring the most love and happiness into your life. This may be helping the other person in that moment or it may be taking time to care for your needs first.

Either way, we guarantee that actions which come from conscious choice are the ones that will bring the most satisfying results - for you and the other person.

This month's article, Love and Respect Yourself First for Healthy, Happy Relationships, was stimulated by a question we received from a community member. It talks about some of the ideas that helped us develop our practice of staying present to what we value. We hope it will support you as well.

Until next month...

With love and respect,

Beth and Neill