Positive forms of resistance are when we get that feeling of dread in our stomach or when we hear a voice in our head telling us �No, don�t do that.� Resistance can then protect us from situations we are better left not experiencing. For example, we might feel resistance about loaning money to someone we don�t really know well and whom we suspect will not pay us back.

But sometimes, we find that we resist things we would do better just to let go of rather than allowing them to cause us anxiety and pain. In the above example, we might resist giving the money, but we also might resist saying �No.� We come up with excuses, and we dance around the subject. We are afraid of being seen as �not a nice person� if we say, �No,� so we resist saying it. Just saying it will be a relief. Better to cut to the chase.

Other times, we feel resistance about something where it would just be better if we quit resisting and gave in. For example, a friend of mine suffers from acid reflux. His doctor told him he would have to take a prescription medication for the rest of his life. He was not happy with that response. At the time, he had insurance so he started to take the medication but continued to look for alternatives. When he left his job, he no longer had insurance to cover the prescription costs, and he was astounded at the astronomical cost of the pills, but he realized when he didn�t take them, he suffered. He resisted paying for them without insurance. In this case, he did some research and found he could buy a generic brand that worked just as well and cost only about 5% of what he paid for the prescription brand. He made the switch to the generic brand, but he still resisted having to take pills. He explored natural remedies for acid reflux, and while he found that some of them helped a little, none helped as much as the pills. Over time, he found that taking just one rather than two pills a day, and changes in his diet and using some natural remedies balanced out so that he felt much better. Then he tried to go off the pills completely, but after a couple of weeks, he was suffering again. Finally, he realized he was resisting taking the pills, and considering how little they cost and how much better they made him feel, it was no longer worth the struggle to resist. Now he takes them and doesn�t give them another thought. His resistance is gone and no longer saps energy he can use in other areas.

Relationships are a big place where we have resistance. We resist giving up our time. We resist spending time with family members we don�t enjoy. Sometimes, we find if we do spend an afternoon with family, it wasn�t as bad as we expected. Once we let go of the resistance, we can enjoy ourselves and feel better.

Think of resistance as like a dam along a river. The dam is there to stop the water from flowing. Too much water is a bad thing�it can cause flooding�so some resistance, to what isn�t healthy, is good. But if the dam holds back too much water, if we resist too much, the river dries up. If we quit resisting, it�s much easier to float down the river. Finding the balance so we can float downriver on an inner tube, rather than pushing a canoe through shallow waters, or taking a wild rapids raft ride, is the key to dealing with resistance. With balance, resistance is a great guide down the river.

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

Recently, one of my friends told me about a family discovery he made that changed how he viewed a lot of things. This friend grew up in a family that had a lot of sexual hang-ups. Premarital sex was frowned on. People needed to be morally responsible. His family, in a sense, sort of thought of itself as better than others because it was more moral. There was clearly a right and a wrong way to behave in relationships and especially in regards to sex.

Then one day, while doing some genealogy research, he happened to find out, not only that his great-grandparents had gotten married because his great-grandfather had gotten his great-grandmother pregnant, but that the man involved had not wanted to marry her and she had consequently had him arrested and a judge and sheriff coerced the man into marrying her�this was back in the late 1800s of course. The couple stayed married for the rest of their lives.

My friend had to laugh about the situation. His mother had always been very prudish, as a direct result of her mother being so over-protective. And his grandmother had equally been over-protected as a young girl, so much so that the night her future husband proposed to her, she had a friend with her because she was not allowed to go out on a date alone with a man.

And now it was revealed that that grandmother�s mother had gotten herself pregnant out of wedlock. Had the family always then been prudish, or had prudery developed from prudence? Doubtless, the great-grandmother had not wanted to see her daughter caught in the same situation she had been caught in. She may have been over-protective, but she been strict with her daughter out of love. Only, over-protectiveness resulted in what eventually became an unhealthy attitude about sex in the family.

That�s how many codependent and dysfunctional behaviors happen in our families. Someone tries to compensate for something that went wrong�he or she tries to protect or control out of fear based on personal experience, and ultimately, the result is that codependent behaviors get passed down in the family.

As for my friend, he is still laughing about what he learned regarding his great-grandparents. �They were human!� he told me. They are more real to him now than ever before considering they had both died long before he ever knew them. This little tidbit of information about an event that happened over a century ago has made him realize how much our family stories, or what we think are our family stories, shape our identities. It also shows that the family story we tell ourselves may not be completely accurate depending on what information our older family members tell us and what they leave out for their own reasons.

What family stories could you unearth that would help you to put you and your family into perspective? Sometimes, the smallest piece of information about a person can help us to see him or her in a totally different light, and by extension, we come better to understand our own relationships with family members.

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

We all know the phrase, �I saw my life flash before my eyes.� We hear it in regards to someone who has experienced a dangerous situation where his or her life was threatened. Several people who have claimed to have near-death experiences explain that what this really means is that when we die, we get to review our lives to see what we did or did not learn. In other words, our lives were planned out before we came, and after life ends, we get to analyze our lives to see how well we did in terms of what we intended to do.

Stay with me here. You may not believe in life after death, or reincarnation or any of these things, but just consider for a minute what it would mean if this belief were true.

Is it possible that our lives and the roles we play are no different than being in a giant play with each of us as an actor following a script, or perhaps more accurately ad-libbing our speeches based on some basic parameters we�ve set before we entered these lives?

Spiritual teachers suggest that we make contracts with one another before this life. We agree to be mother, brother, friend, spouse, enemy to someone. We believe that by doing so, we will learn more in these experiences. Consider the less desirable relation roles, such as an enemy, or at least, a difficult sibling, or a friend who rejects us. Some spiritual teachers have surmised that the people who hurt us in this life are the ones who love us the most because they are willing to sacrifice themselves in that way to make us learn and become stronger.

Rewriting the Script is not only about changing our mindsets; it�s about understanding those mindsets and why certain roles, people, experiences come into our lives.

Perhaps we have a falling out with a loved one, a drag down fight with that person and we never speak to her again.

When this life has ended and we meet that person on the other side, what�s the chance that we might pat each other on the back and have a conversation that reads something like:

            �How did I do? Was I mean enough to you?�

            �You were wonderful. You�re breaking up with me really made me reprioritize my life. All the good that followed I can attribute to the mean words you said when you dumped me.�

            �That�s great. I�m glad I helped so much.�

            �You did. You played the part great. I can�t thank you enough.�

            �It was my pleasure. I love you and I wanted to help you in the best way possible, no matter how difficult it might have been for you during your life.�

Could such conversations happen in the next life after death? No one truly knows, but it�s nice to consider the possibility. After all, how often do we find that the worst moments in our lives led us to the best results?

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

People go on vacation to get away, but we don�t always have that luxury. And while going on vacation can be a lot of fun, it can also be a lot of work arranging flights and hotels, and just lugging the luggage everywhere. Sometimes a quiet day or just a few minutes of quiet will do wonders to restore our spirits and energy.

So take a mini-vacation. Perhaps you can�t sunbathe on a Caribbean Island, but you can spend fifteen minutes lying on your bed, imagining yourself on the beach. Try to smell the salty waves, listen for their roar. Feel the sun warming your skin. Breathe it all in, relax, and enjoy yourself.

If you�re not imaginative enough to picture yourself on that beach or anywhere else you want to be, find other ways to escape.

Put down your work and pick up a book�find something fun and exotic�a lot of mystery novels will fulfill that need for you. Spend fifteen minutes reading about being lost in a bazaar in Morocco, or on a Caribbean mystery, or wherever your favorite detective might travel to solve a crime.

If you�re not a reader, escape from the house or office into your own backyard�if not literally your backyard, then your neighborhood. Is there a restaurant you�ve never tried, a store you�ve never visited that might brighten up your day a bit. Visiting restaurants with foreign food�Chinese, Thai, Mexican, French�can give you that feeling of escape and the exotic, a little adventure to brighten your day.

Sometimes just a little thing can cheer us up�a piece of candy, a favorite TV show, a walk around the block looking for things we never noticed before. Let your mind escape by finding something new.

Here are a few more suggestions for your mini-escape:

Watch a sitcom in the middle of the day.

Go for a walk.

Go for a bike ride, but take a path you normally don�t take.

Visit a new restaurant.

Take a day trip.

Take off a day to lie on the beach.

Move your laptop to a different room�if you usually sit at your desk or table, sit on your bed today.

Find some exotic music to listen to while you work.

Spend fifteen minutes online learning about a place you want to visit.

Take short one chapter reading breaks every 2-3 hours.

Send a postcard to a friend�even if it�s a postcard of your town, it will feel like a vacation, and your friend will love to hear from you, so you�ll brighten two people�s days.

Just fifteen or twenty minutes away from our daily tasks can be a big boost to our energy and restore us. We will be more productive, more relaxed, and more in touch with enjoying life by just allowing ourselves to escape now and then.

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

�Pursue experiences because no one wants to hear stories about all the money you made.� � Simon Sinek

It�s a good quote to remember when we set a goal. Too often we get caught up in what we have to do each day�the daily grind, the chores, the work, the activities, our schedule. We have to work to put food on the table and pay the bills. We have to run the kids to soccer so we appear to be a good mom. We have to give the dog a bath so the house will not stink. We have to be in long boring meetings and on conference calls and often do work we don�t enjoy to make a living. Sometimes we work harder than we need to so we can �get ahead� or put money away �for a rainy day.�

Are our lives frenzied because we don�t know how to say �No� to meaningless activities, or are we too busy pursuing the almighty dollar? Are we doing things we feel we have to do, or are we taking time to enjoy what we do?

I daresay we would all like to be rich�some of us might say that money doesn�t mean anything to us. In truth, for most of us it is not money we want. I doubt many of us want to be like Scrooge McDuck and have a vault of money in which to go swimming. But we want money so we can live; we want enough money that eventually we can have freedom to do what we want. But how much money is enough? How often do we think once we have $X we will be able to enjoy ourselves. Once we have the mortgage paid off becomes once we put the kids through college and then once we have $X in our retirement fund we can be free to do what we want.

We can�t spend our lives waiting. Yes, I know that $3,000 you spend to go to France for a week, if you let it sit in your retirement fund, might be $9,000 in twenty years when you retire, and maybe you will need that $9,000 in twenty years, but in twenty years, do you want to be telling people you have $9,000 or about your trip to France, how you saw the Mona Lisa, how you stood at the top of the Eiffel tower, how you visited a winery, indulged in incredible French pastries, toured a chateau, and sunbathed on the Riviera. �I have $9,000 in my retirement account� isn�t much of a story by comparison�it�s certainly not much of an experience.

I�m not saying not to save for your retirement, and yes, I know you will need far more than $9,000, but I�m also saying that you need to invest in yourself. Invest in your experiences, in experiences that educate you, bring you pleasure, knowledge, joy, and moments that money cannot buy. It�s only money�it comes and goes�but an experience once enjoyed can never be taken from you.

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

And then we often repeat those various stages again and again. Sometimes we don�t know how to let go. We think we are finally past the situation, and then hearing a song, seeing a photo of the former loved one, hearing his or her name, can trigger old feelings, old memories that can make depression and tears return.

Sometimes we try too hard to let go�maybe we try to make amends with the person even though no amends will help to restore the relationship. Sometimes we simply replay the final conversation in our heads, trying to think how we could have said things differently. Perhaps we see the person in public, and although we want to speak to him or her, we walk away. Perhaps we acknowledge the other person with a smile or a wave; certain situations might even mean a handshake, polite conversation in a public place that makes our hearts quake inside. But we do not speak the words we are longing to speak. We realize it is pointless.

We need to move on. It can take weeks, months, years, but we need to move on. We need to realize that person is part of our former life now. We can remember the good times, and we can be grateful for the experience, but if the relationship has ended, we need to accept it and move on. Some people are only in our lives for a short while�often, these are the people who have the greatest impact on us�our relationships with them can lead us to making difficult choices we might not otherwise have done had the relationship gone well.

We can still love these people even if they are not in our lives any longer. We can be grateful for the roles they played, the lessons they taught us, whether or not they meant to aid us, and then we can close that chapter and move to the next. No one said it is easy, but our lives are so rich and so full, comprised of so many years and so many experiences. No one experience, no one former relationship should define us or make us stagnant. We have a lot of living yet to do.

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

We realized our relationships were driving us crazy and we got help, through counseling or maybe a Twelve-Step program. We came to understand how codependency works, how it had affected our behavior, and also how it may have affected the people with whom we had relationships. We promised ourselves that next time we would do better. Maybe we spent time alone, not entering a relationship because we were busy taking care of ourselves, but finally, the day came when we felt we were healthy and prepared to share our lives with someone again.

We entered into a new relationship. The other person appeared to be everything we wanted in a life-mate. But we remained careful�we watched for warning signs of our codependency resurfacing�we watched for problematic behavior in the other person as well. We were amazed by the change in ourselves�we felt calm in the relationship. We talked to the other person about our past and learned about that person�s past also. We felt we had so much in common with the other person�perhaps we had too much in common and did not realize it. We realized certain situations that arose we were able to let go or handle calmly, not feeling the fear, anxiety, or anger we had expressed during such situations in past relationships. We were doing everything right, or at least, far better than we had done before. Could it be possible that finally we had found the right relationship?

And then one day we sensed that something was wrong. We couldn�t quite say what. The other person became withdrawn�there was no shouting or blaming. We tried to talk to the other person to understand, but it did no good. �I just don�t feel the same way anymore,� we were told. And the relationship ended. What did we do wrong? We didn�t understand what had happened.

Perhaps we did nothing wrong. Perhaps the other person was not able to handle that we were doing things right. We are not to blame. When people are so used to crazy codependent relationships, a healthy relationship is frightening. It is easier to return to a codependent relationship than to work on a healthy one. We do not have to blame ourselves if someone else cannot love us. We are not at fault if the other person sabotages the relationship because he or she is scared. We can express our feelings for that person, we can explain to him or her that there is nothing to fear, but then we have to let go of the situation�we have learned we cannot control relationships. If the other person wants to leave, we have to let him or her go with love.

We are not at fault. The other person isn�t really at fault either. He or she simply was not at the same place we are, ready to have a healthy relationship. We can take stock of what happened�we can learn from the situation and see the warning signs earlier next time or be better at choosing someone ready for a healthy relationship.

We can also pat ourselves on the back for not being afraid of trying again, for having done so much better this time. We are one step closer now to the relationship we want�the healthy relationship waiting for us. It is a long journey, but a happy ending is still possible. Don�t give up.

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

�But Irene,� you�re saying, �I can�t go fight Osama bin Laden, and I can�t go and feed children in Africa, and I don�t have time or I�m afraid to go and lobby to support gay marriage, or end animal cruelty, or any of a million causes that I think can make the world better. I�m just one person. What can I do?�

Let�s start with Osama bin Laden. During the holidays I went to see the new 3-D film of �A Christmas Carol.� I enjoyed it immensely�the animation was spectacular�but had I seen an old black and white film of the story, I would have enjoyed it anyway. Why? Because deep in my heart not only do I believe, but I solemnly know, that like Ebenezer Scrooge, people are capable of change, and that a little love can change the world. When I expressed to people how much I enjoyed the film, one negative person replied that he had nothing good to say about �A Christmas Carol.� In fact, he said it was �dangerous� and when I pressed him why he thought so, he said that it creates the illusion that evil people can change on their own without us having to fight them.

Fight? It�s almost a word vanished from my vocabulary. I don�t fight bad people. I�m not going to go fight Osama. Nor am I likely to go find him in his cave and preach love and kindness to him. But what I can do is give love to the people around me. Look at all the Muslims in our culture who suffered after 9/11 because of his actions�or did they suffer because of how we chose to react? Many people chose instead to protect and look out for their Muslim friends and neighbors. Rather than let Osama think white Christian Americans are evil, we can fight that viewpoint by loving our Muslim neighbors.

Do you need to go to India and become the next Mother Teresa? No. If you want to, I�ll support you 110%, but you can do Mother Teresa�s work right here at home. Just visit your local soup kitchen or homeless shelter or simply say a kind word to someone. People might be starving in India, but they are starving in the U.S. too. Don�t forget that Mother Teresa famously said that the Western World is most starved for love. When people offered her money, she told them instead to go out and find someone who felt he was alone and show that person he was not.

My point�if you don�t like the world you see, change it. If you want to be an activist, go for it. But maybe all it takes is smiling at people. When people walk past you with their eyes to the ground, make a point of saying, �Hello. How are you?�

I had a friend who told me about his experience when he first moved away from home and to a bigger city where he didn�t know anyone. He said it was three weeks before a cashier in a store actually said, �How are you today?� to him. He remembers how his heart leapt up within him that someone actually cared enough to ask. It had been a lonely hard three weeks in a new place. That right there proves to me that Mother Teresa was right.

We don�t have to do giant things. We can start with simple things�a kind word, a compliment, a helping hand. Don�t be a victim of others� negativity. Instead help others cease from being victims of negativity and fear simply by reaching out with a little love. It will make a difference.

�Be the change you want to see in the world.� � Mahatma Gandhi

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.

At New Year�s I wished �Happy New Year� to the members of an online group to which I belong. One of the members responded that while she wished everyone a Happy New Year as well, she thought 2010 had all of the signs that we were headed into a dark time in human history.

Sounds to me like someone is spending too much time watching the news. I�m not denying there�s a war in Iraq, that recently there was an earthquake in Haiti, or that people are dying of AIDS in Africa, but are things really that dark? I hear people bemoaning all the time that things are worse now than when they were younger. Is that really true?

I admit that I do miss the twentieth century. Life was slower, but maybe also a bit duller. Still, I�m not sure all advancements are for the better. Perhaps before technology spread so rapidly, we appreciated things more. One of my friends was recalling the other day how it used to feel like a big event when �The Wizard of Oz� came on TV once a year. Children would wait all year for that night, and they would be glued to the television through that program. Then came the VCR and now we can all watch �The Wizard of Oz� six times a day everyday if we really want. We have less excitement perhaps because we have less delayed-gratification, and I do think we�ve become more impatient as a result. But overall, is that really worse when we can enjoy any movie we want at any time?

What about bigger issues? Yes, there is a war in Iraq and Afghanistan. It�s terrible, but is it comparable to the horrors of World War II? The earthquake in Haiti is horrible, but so was the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire. Do we think our politicians are corrupt? I guess we�ve forgotten the graft and corruption and �boss� control of city politics that marked the early twentieth century.

I don�t think things are worse. In fact, in many ways they are better. Our processed food may not be as wholesome, but yet we are still living longer. In the old days, if a loved one went down the Oregon Trail, you�d likely never see him again. Now you can hop on a plane and be in Oregon in a few hours. Remember when we had to write a letter, mail it, and then wait at least a week for a response? Now email gives us communication with anyone in the world in just a few minutes. And how anyone composed a novel on a typewriter�all the frustration of correcting typos�what a nightmare to think of compared to our wonderful laptops today. How about how people used to have to move away to find a job�today more and more people work from home. You can send an email from the Himalayas, or have a business call on a boat in Hawaii. If you�re an author you know publishing and promoting your book is ten times easier due to new technology and the Internet. My company, Reader Views, never could have existed twenty years ago�technology made it happen. So are things really worse?

If anything, things are about even, but I sincerely think the world is better than it was. We will always have naysayers. Rather than listen to them, turn the channel. We have something like 400 cable channels to watch. We don�t need to hold onto doom and gloom. How many times have we heard the sky is falling, and how many times has it really fallen?

�I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.� � Mark Twain

Irene Watson, MA,  is author of The Sitting Swing: Finding Wisdom to Know the Difference, and co-editor of The Story that Must Be Told: True Tales of Transformation, and Authors Access: 30 Success Secrets for Authors and Publishers. She is a workshop leader, managing editor of Reader Views, and president of a non-profit Higher Power Foundation. Irene lives next to Barton Creek in Austin, TX, with her husband Robert.