Mad Men and Magnifying Glasses

Last night Hubs and I were enjoying another episode of the TV show Mad Men. We never saw this show when it aired and it is now available on Netflix so it has been totally entrancing us every evening as we watch one or two episodes of the first three seasons. It is set in the sixties and encompasses the lives of the men and women who work in an advertising agency. There is a lot of smoking and sleeping around to the point of silliness but we are looking forward to the latest installment each night nevertheless.

The theme last night was wrapped around the shooting death of President Kennedy and where each character was when it happened. The small children of the main family were about the age (8 yrs) we were at the time and it brought back many memories of our own response and sense of that time.

I remember that Martin Luther King was killed not long after the Kennedy assassination, ...............................Actually I just looked up the dates of both shooting deaths and they were not really close at all! They occurred in 1963 and 1968.

I was going to say that I remember that the second assassination marked me with a sense of danger and foreboding about the world around me. I recall thinking that '"No one is really safe! They were both out in the sunshine surrounded by people!" 


This week as we are nearing the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy and the recent craziness of natural disasters, along with the sad happenings in my family life have brought that sense of impending doom back to me and I am ready to say that enough is enough. I am done carrying this negative garbage and fear around with me.

Done!

We can focus on the bad and get all worked up and tied in knots or we can train our eyes on the good around us and take a deep breath of rest.  Neither response to our surroundings will change what happens.

But my response INSIDE will help my outside response be a better one.

Staying up all night with worry will not change my circumstances or make my family safer. It will not add anything good at all to me. The only thing it may add is more wrinkly worry lines to my face. No thank you!

A magnifying glass expands and enlarges what it is pointed at. I can magnify the bad or the good. This should not be a tough choice to make.

My focus and amy magnifying glass is hovering over all the amazing goodness in my life and in the world. I will be thankful for the beauty around me and the loving people in my life.

I am feeling better already! Aahh!