When my youngest was very little, she had this habit of 'criss crossing' family members when she was upset with them.

Imagine if you will...

a fiery little three year old

red faced with fury

foaming at the mouth

staring you down

with steely blue eyes...

and then

methodically

yet dramatically

jabbing her little finger in the air

at YOU

followed immediately by the execution of an exaggerated 'X' sign.

That, my friend,

is a 'criss cross' - a not infrequently used gesture which succinctly and symbolically indicated my daughter's anger and disapproval...of whomever she deemed worthy of said gesture.

While we recognized that, 

in that moment in time,

my daughter was very serious about her feelings...

it was nigh impossible for us to take any of it either too seriously or too personally.

You see,

in the midst of her demonstrative displeasure, we understood something that perhaps she did not.

We understood that...

in that moment

she was simply caught up in her own little thought storm...

one that seemed very real to her...

and one that filled her with a tremendous amount of emotion.

We also understood that, 

like all storms...

it would pass.

And so, we waited them out

firm in the knowledge that her newest storm would pass

and any perceived infraction would be forgiven

as new thought and new emotion emerged.

What is fascinating to me is how effortlessly and intuitively we trusted that her thinking and her mood would shift.

We saw so clearly that she was simply experiencing a mood

brought on by her thinking

come to life by her emotion

in a moment in time.

As a result, none of her actions, in that moment, were taken too seriously or too personally.

We knew she would return to 'home base'...

a place of well-being, love and irrepressible joy for life...

a place that resides within all of us.

And yet...

as adults,

how often do we forget that...

we are only ever feeling our thinking...

each moment in time

and perhaps it does not need to be taken

so seriously

or

so personally

since

moods shift and lift

allowing

new thought to emerge

returning us 

again and again

to 

'home base'

our natural state of

love and well-being and joy for life.

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