Two days after the tremendous earthquake in Japan I was watching the news. I don’t actually watch the news that often, but I wanted to see what was happening in Japan and also how the tsunami had affected the California coastline. I had heard that Santa Cruz, just 20 minutes from where I live–had born a greater brunt of the tsunami than some other areas. I can see Santa Cruz and the coastline from my home in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

After the report on Japan,which was horrific, the reporter began to interview people in Santa Cruz. The damage there really was quite minor compared to Japan. A few overturned and submerged boats. Some damaged docks. Yet, I listed to people calling what had happened in Santa Cruz a “disaster.” They were talking about the loss of or damage to their boat as if it were a huge loss.

Taken 3/11/11, the top photo shows a tsunami flooding buildings in a street in Kesennuma, Mioyagi Prefecture, following the 8.9-magnitude earthquake that hit Japan. The bottom photo shows the same scene with buildings in the foreground washed away. (AP Photo/Kyodo News)

I sat open eyed and mouth agape. Had they not seen the pictures of houses floating away? Let’s see…house floating away compared to boat floating away? Which seems a bigger loss? Thousands of lives lost compared to a few docks and boats?  I have heard of just one death here in California–one person washed out to sea. I heard tell of a whole town washed out to sea in Japan.

So, let’s put things in perspective.

The ability to do that–to put what happens to us into perspective–is a lesson we can all use to learn and implement on a daily basis, not just when a disaster happens. When we feel upset that we don’t have enough money to pay all our bills or to purchase that new shirt we want we need only compare what’s in our bank account to what’s in the pocket of a homeless and jobless person sleeping on the street. When we complain about the ache in our back from working too hard or the pain in our shin from running to far we need only compare these ailments to the man at the corner who lost his leg (or legs) in an accident or the person in hospice care dying of cancer.

Everything is relative. Someone is always worse off than we are.

We need to put our own situation in perspective and feel gratitude for what we have or the situation in which we find ourselves–no matter how bad it seems. Yes, it may feel like your own personal disaster–and maybe it is a disaster. But compare it to something worse–like the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Is it still a disaster?

Indeed, what constitutes a disaster lies in the eyes of the beholder. As you behold what lies around you, consider if your disaster truly is a disaster by seeing beyond your immediate world.

Be not like a fly seeking sore spots.
Cover up your neighbor’s flaws, and reveal them not to the world.

This saying, which comes from a traditional Jewish ethical text, always conjures up somewhat nasty images in my head of wounds covered with flies. Yet, it’s a potent image–and effective.

I try to remember this advice in two types of situations: when I am focused on someone’s flaws rather than their positive attributes and when I am inclined to say negative things about someone or something to others.

In the first case, focusing on someone’s flaws only makes us see more flaws. This never helps a relationship. It’s best to try and focus on the positive when we find ourselves in the downwards spiral of negativity.

In the second case, speaking poorly of anyone or anything tends to come back to haunt us. It’s best to simply speak well of others or to not speak about them at all.

Interestingly, human nature seems to pull us towards negative speech and to focus on the negative qualities of others—especially when a relationship is going sour. And this holds true for all types of relationships—romantic, business, etc.

I wonder why that is, why we have such a need or desire to focus on the negative in others and to speak about it, to broadcast it to the world. The most obvious answer is that this makes us feel better about ourselves—less flawed. Another answer is that other people’s flaws mirror our own, so we point out theirs rather than look at ourselves in the mirror; we avoid our own reflection by only seeing them.

Whatever the reason, it’s best to remember not to seek out sore spots. Even if you can’t stop focusing on someone’s flaws (Of course, keep trying!), do them a favor and at least don’t “reveal them to the world.” Take a good look at yourself—in them—and imagine how you would feel if someone uncovered rather than covered up your flaws.

This video pretty much says it all…Human’s have a huge ability to survive even the worst situations–even concentration camps. Yet, many of us feel we can’t survive much less difficult situations in our lives. We need only look at the huge suicide rates in teens to know that this is true.

Here we have a Holocaust survivor and his grandchildren dancing to Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” at each Holocaust-related site they visit together. What a wonderful reminder that we can survive almost anything if we we have the desire to live. It’s also a reminder to celebrate life.

[]

Is there something about yourself that you consider a “negative,” something you think of as a detriment to your career or resume? Maybe you didn’t graduate from college or you’ve changed jobs often or English isn’t your first language.

Today, figure out how to turn that so-called negative into a positive. Make it an attribute. That’s right. Find some way t0 make that aspect of yourself or your life work for you in such a way that it enhances your career or resume. Show people how it makes you better at your job, more able to help others, an expert in your field.

Then hold your head up and feel proud of who you are and your life experiences.

Think about Oprah Winfrey and her weight issues. She’s struggled with her weight in the public eye for years. Her failure to lose weight could be seen as a detriment; instead it makes her an expert at why diets don’t work, weight loss issues, what diets work and which ones don’t, what stops women from losing weight, and the issues that go with the inability to achieve perfect weight. She’s an “Everywoman” to a lot of women all over the world.

Of course, you also can choose to take the path of personal growth and human potential. You can choose to change things about yourself or about your life–if this is possible. If it’s not, then turn your negatives into positives. Do it now. Don’t wait another day to feel better about yourself and to start seeing the difference this will make in your life and in your career or business.

Everyone’s talking about U2 front man Bono, who was saved from possible paralysis by emergency back surgery this past Friday. His rehab program requires an eight week recuperation necessitating postponing the North American leg of the band’s U2 360 Tour and canceling next month’s Glastonbury, England, appearance.

What happens to you when you have a setback like Bono? Do you let it get you down? Does your energy become negative, causing a downward spiral? Do you let “bad” events become free falls or do you work to make them chances to rise up to new heights?

Rabbi Nachum Ish Gam, one of our Talmudic rabbis, might have responded to such an event by saying, “Gam zu l’tovah. This also is for good.” This is one of my favorite sayings and teachings from Judaism. However, some people have a hard time seeing an injury or other “negative” event as “for the good.”

I’ve recently learned that Rabbi Nachman of Breslov, my Jewish life coach, discussed these types of “negative” occurrences in our lives as “falls and rises.” He said falls were inevitable and even necessary for the next rise to happen. While we may not find it possible to avoid a fall—just like Bono might not have been able to avoid the injury that caused him to need surgery, we can decide how low we fall and how we transform it into a new rise. Seeing a setback in this light then becomes not an obstacle but an opportunity.

Of course, we might simply allow ourselves to become negative and depressed and fall lower and lower, deeper and deeper until, as they say, we hit rock bottom. At that point, we likely will begin to rise back up anyway. We can avoid this scenario, though, by consciously choosing to see what has happened to us as an opportunity to use our mind—our thoughts—to create a positive situation. Gam zu l’tovah. We make the situation work for us with positive thinking. This creates positive energy that helps us begin climbing upward, creating a rise that hopefully brings us to a higher peak than before.

I can imagine that all the people who didn’t bother to get tickets to U2’s upcoming concerts might actually run out to buy tickets…or that after Bono’s recuperation the band could add shows and make more money because of the publicity Bono’s surgery provided—a rise out of a fall. In any event, the band is getting lots of publicity. This could be construed as “for the good,” no? At least these thoughts generate more positive energy than just focusing on money and time lost.

We need to learn not to fight against what happens to us. You can see this as paddling upstream or fighting the rapids when white water rafting. Instead, you want to go with the flow or paddle with the current. That doesn’t mean that when something bad happens you want to to see that event as a path of negativity to follow downward. That can actually feel easier sometimes. Instead, see it as one patch of white water to maneuver through, one current that sets you spinning for a moment. Then you guide your raft toward the current that allows you to flow freely and easily down the river of positivity.

Or see this like mountain climbing. You might slip and loose your footing, sliding downward a bit only to be caught by your belay. The rope stops you from continuing your fall. The fall represents just one moment, one event, during the whole climb. Then you gather your energy and begin your upward climb once again continuing until you reach the top of the mountain.

Seeing our lives as falls and rises, learning to say, “This too is for the good,” allows us to reach our goals, to achieve our full potential and to pursue personal growth on all levels. It helps us make the best of any situation, and that helps us live our lives with more acceptance–and peace.

I’ve written several posts lately on similar topics. There were great comments, which I learned a lot from (some of which I shared here), that you can read here.

Lots of human potential and personal growth experts will tell you that everything happens for a reason. I often say the same thing. This means there must be some good in every event.

This teaching can also be found in Judaism. In fact, we have a famous saying that comes from one of our Talmudic rabbis,  Rabbi Nachum Ish Gamzu. Many Jews have heard it: Gam zu l’tovah. This also is for good. This is one of my favorite sayings and teachings from Judaism.

The Gamara, which is part of the Talmud (a central text of mainstream Judaism), explains that Rabbi Nachum’s nickname came from the fact that his reaction to anything that happened to him was always, “Gam zu l’tovah,” or “And that is also for the good.”

What’s the lesson we can learn from Rabbi Nachum and his saying? We can learn that, indeed, everything that happens is “for the good.” Yes…even the “bad stuff.”

Today, think about what happens to you in a positive manner–even if initially it doesn’t look like it is “for the good.” Or simply accept what happens knowing that at some point you’ll understand why the experience was “for the good.”

You don’t have to understand why something is “for the good” right this moment. Just know that it is. One day, you’ll understand. That’s why we say “hindsight is 20-20.”

I know some people are going to jump up and down and yell, “But the earthquake in Haiti couldn’t have been for the good! 9-11 couldn’t have been for the good! The Holocaust couldn’t have been for the good!”

We also don’t always see the reasons; God has better vision than we do. I do think, however, a reason exists. I have faith. I trust. I agree with Rabbi Nachum.

And you know what? Believing that on some level–even a level I may not understand–everything is for the good makes it easier to deal with disasters and tragedies. It doesn’t make them less horrible; it makes them easier to accept.

I suggest you read a bit more about Rabbi Nachum’s views on this here.

And try his words out. You might find you them.

I’ve been thinking today about the benefits of speaking no evil. You see, I was writing a post for my Examiner column on the topic, and, as often happens, that got me thinking in much more general terms. Let me back track a bit.

How often do we each speak badly of others–which basically constitutes speaking evil? How often do we gossip and, in the process, slander those about whom we speak? How often do we criticize or judge without a second thought to what we are doing?

Most of us do this a lot…every day…some people every hour. In Judaism, we call this lashon hara, or the evil tongue.

I know I’m at fault. I’ll say something bad about a person I know while telling someone else about my day. I’ll relate a story about their behavior, which I didn’t like. I’ll talk about how someone cut me off in traffic. I’ll discuss some one’s work practices with which I don’t agree. I’ll criticize the government. I’ll complain that the waiter moves too slowly. I’ll tell my husband that our kids are lazy because they leave dishes all over the house.

What about you? How often and when do you commit lashon hara or speak evil of others? Be honest now…

Here’s the problem with doing so: Our words have a creative energy. What we focus on expands. If we focus upon all those things we don’t like, if we judge and criticize, we’ll create more of all those things. Yuck! What a horrible fact of life! None of us want more of the things we complain about. So we must stop complaining, judging, criticizing.

And we must stop talking about other people. This negativity just begets more negativity. It doesn’t help us in any way. It simply makes us and our lives feel dark and heavy, because the energy around this type of language is just that, dark and heavy.

Instead, we need to speak using positive words. These will create light and uplifting energy patterns in our lives. They will help us focus on the things we want and help us create them.

I took a metaphysical class recently, and we told to put money in the jar each week for our negative thoughts and words–a dollar for each one! We were told to add money for negative attitudes in general. We ended up with a lot of money in that jar. We then donated it to charity.

Get a jar and put a penny, a dime, or a dollar in there every time you catch yourself speaking badly about someone. See if you can break the habit of lashon hara. Commit to speaking no evil.

Remember, speaking evil is a habit. Habits can be broken.

Yesterday many Jews observed Holocaust Memorial Day. Yom Hashoah Ve-Hagevurah, literally the “Day of (remembrance of) the Holocaust and the Heroism,” is celebrated on the 27th day in the month of Nisan, a week after  the seventh day of Passover, and a week before Yom Hazikaron (Memorial Day for Israel’s fallen soldiers). It marks the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising as well.

For me, this day feels quite personal. My family is quite small because of the Holocaust. My mother, her sister and her parents escaped Czechoslovakia and went to Israel. One or two other relatives went to Peru. That’s it. (My father was already in Israel with his mother.) Everyone else was killed by the Nazis.

My mother’s grandmother gave her a ring just before the train left Prague for Trieste, Italy. She handed it to her through the window. My mother never saw her again. I now wear that ring.

My mother took me to the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem when it still had a room with six million black tiles and an eternal flame for every concentration camp. She told me who in her family died in each of the camps. I’m still moved to tears when I think about that day.

Since the Holocaust, my mother no longer believes in God. She, like many Jews, suffers from what I call the real Shoah. Shoah means catastrophe. Yes, it’s a catastrophe that so many people died during the Holocaust, but to me the greater catastrophe lies in the fact that so many Jews lost faith in God.

Some say many Jews had already lost faith in God. So, the fact that Jews were being killed in gas chambers and burned or shot and buried in mass graves simply confirmed what they already believed: God did not exist. If he did, he wouldn’t have let such a thing happen to his Chosen People.

Only the faithful…those observant Jews who retained a strong belief in God…remained faithful throughout and after the Holocaust. Their belief in God and their faith was sorely tested, but it kept them going. It gave them hope. It gave life meaning despite the meaningless death they saw around them.

Their faith allowed them to believe that God’s hand must be in their lives in some way, shape or form. They might not see it or understand the events around them, but they had faith that one day they might understand.

Today, like the less observant Jews during the and after the Holocaust, many people suffer from a shoah of faith. We saw this after 9/11, for example. Most American’s could not grasp why God would let this terrorist act happen.

However, everyday people suffer crisis of faith. I have seen it in those closest to me. Falling into debt, death of loved ones, loss of jobs, feeling burned out make them feel hopeless. Then they get angry at God. They think God is doing this “to them.”

After they are done feeling like the victim, they decide God doesn’t exist. “If there is a God,” they say, “why would he allow such things to happen. Why doesn’t he hear my prayers? Why doesn’t he see the good things I do and reward me?”

Like the Jews during the Holocaust, however, they don’t really believe any longer in Divine retribution.

They also can’t see beyond the moment. They don’t believe anything happens for a reason…at least not the terrible things happening to them. “What reason could there be for those things to happen?” they ask.

They can’t see that the loss of the job they hated allows them to find a new one they enjoy. They can’t see that their spending habits or choices about where to live allowed them to get into debt; they are not being victimized. They can’t see that their unresolved issues with their dead loved ones cause them to feel depressed.

They lose faith. And then they cycle downward. Things get worse. Their life, their work, has no meaning. They experience a shoah of faith.

As Rabbi Wayne Dosick says, “The way to faith is through faith. The way to faith is though doing faith.” We must, “Do faith,” he says.

How do we do faith? Just as the Jews swore, “Never Forget,” we never forget…God. We place God before us always. Shiviti Adonai l’negde tamid (I place God before me always). We pray ceaselessly, as Jesus taught. We look for the signs of God’s hand in our lives…both in the good and in what we judge as bad.

And we try to look backward with 20-20 vision. As a Jew, I can look back and say that possibly without the Holocaust my people might never have mustered the energy to create the state of Israel. They might never have changed their mentality…their nature…so that they would say, “Never again…never again will we let such a thing happen.”

Someone else might say, “If I hadn’t have lost that job, I wouldn’t have gotten out of the terrible situation I hated and changed careers….or found a new job…or moved.”

We must learn to do faith, to have faith, to see God’s hand in our lives, indeed, to see and feel God every day…no matter what happens in our lives and in the world. Without that, indeed, we are alone in a meaningless world.

And that is a shoah….a catastrophe.

I was leaving an event the other night when I noticed someone with a T-shirt I thought was quite funny. It said: “The best revenge is living long enough to annoy your children.” I laughed at the time.

The next day I got on a bus and went to visit my elderly mother. After I arrived I began to think twice about the humor of that shirt.

My mother has become harder and harder to be around. She sees the world in a very different manner than do I. She deals with the world and with people in a very different manner than do I. I find it very annoying. I find her energy hard to be around. In fact, I often get quite aggravated and angry when I am with her.

My eldest sister is better at being around her. She is able to get to a place of compassion and understanding for my mother’s emotional state. I can do that when I’m not with her, when I’m removed from her energy. When I’m with her, I get pulled in and reactive. I don’t respond thoughtfully.

Going back to the saying on the shirt, I think as our parents get older and begin to annoy us, it’s not about revenge but about learning – our learning, that is. Just as children teach parents so many things, elderly parents teach their children one last lesson. It’s a lesson about putting ourselves in a parental role with them. We do this with our own children when they annoy us. We find a way, like my sister does, to be understanding and compassionate, to remove ourselves, disentangle ourselves, and step back. We need to see our parents not as parents but simply as people. We need to cut the final apron string. We need to be the adults in the relationship as our parents become more childlike.

I suppose we simply need to grow up – the rest of the way. Maybe the fact that we don’t want to take that last developmental stage constitutes the element that makes the whole situation so difficult.  Maybe that’s why we don’t want to reach within and find the compassion and understanding and patience. We just want our parents to be our parents. We want them to take care of us – to understand us and be patient and compassionate with us. We see that as their job with us, not ours with them.

Possibly, that’s the final lesson they have to teach us: That it’s our job as well. If we can learn to be understanding, patient, compassionate and loving even when our aging parent isn’t being nice, doesn’t see the world our way, doesn’t behave in a way we enjoy or like, doesn’t treat us well, doesn’t have anything nice to say, is disinterested – or whatever, we can find it within our hearts to do this for other people we encounter who behave this way as well.

When you think about aging this way, you might just find your annoying parents a bit less annoying. I did.

I’m a firm believer that things happen for a reason. That’s a hard concept to get your mind around when something bad happens just when thins are gong well, like when my son’s friend has graduated from high school and then has a long board accident that causes her to end up in a coma just as she should be getting ready to go off to college. Or when after just one week in New York City with my son, who is attending a summer ballet intensive for six weeks, I slip and fall on the steps outside our apartment and twist my knee making it hard for me to walk — which is what I do most in the city.

Usually I look for symbolism first: Hmmm. Left knee. Knees, or joints, are about willingness to move forward and flexible attitudes. The left side is the feminine side. This makes me wonder if I’m afraid to make the decision to go with a new agent who has agreed to represent me. This means change and the possibility of actually getting to write my books — to use my creative nature — and to succeed.

Or maybe it’s about anger. I was angry when I fell. Maybe I have to learn not to be so angry. And I need to learn to accept my situation, one with which I’m not so happy at the moment. (My son and I were arguing about our living arrangements.) I need to appreciate what we do have — an affordable place to say, good health, each other, the chance for him to dance and learn and grow.

Maybe, if I haven’t done any major damage to my knee, I’ll be forced to go to a gym and work out to strengthen my legs and the rest of my body. I had started to work out last week, but I didn’t really want to continue. I was balking…and I really do need to get in shape. Maybe this will force me to do so, create a great opportunity to do so.

Some might say I just simply got hurt. It’s possible, that something just happened…no rhym or reason. What can I learn from the experience, though? Not to storm off angry. Not to let things get to me. To be more accepting.  To be more appreciative.

No matter what happens to us, even when things are going well and they take a turn for the worse for seemingly no reason, we can always learn something, we can always find an opportunity in diversity. If that is true, than there really is a reason behind every event. Without it, we might not grow and develop and get to the next place we find ourselves. Everything benefits us in some way. The old adage says, “That which doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.” And we’re told that God only never gives us more than we can handle in any one life time. I believe we are given those issues and circumsances and exeriences for some reason.

So, even this must have a reason…must offer me some way to grow.