love

“You’re More Than You Believe You Are”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

You go through life as a wife, a mother, a husband, lover, and the title of the career you have, yet sometimes we forget who we are. I’m not one to “label” myself or anyone else, but the truth of the matter is: we are who we are.

And we shouldn’t limit ourselves to being just one thing; we should embrace all that we are.

And we are so much more than we believe we are.

And a few days ago I was reminded of the person I love to be: a writer.

Life can get busy and as you know, I’ve spent much of the last month on vacation, on location, and spending time with my kids. I’ve done some writing but not as much as I would have liked.

I’m still in the throws of cleaning my flooded basement and getting some rest from endless weeks of traveling. Laundry is getting behind the eight ball and dishes are piling in the sink. The refrigerator needs to be refilled and doctors appointments need to made.

And then something important happened…

I had a lunch meeting with a client I’m ghostwriting for.

And I was reminded of something I love to be: a writer.

And it was an incredible feeling.

I felt reborn and back on track. I felt energized and ready to create and write.

Throughout our meeting of note taking, working, talking, and organizing, he said one thing to me that made all the difference in the world: “I leave this all up to you, after all, you’re the writer.”

Really? I am? I know I’m a mom, a significant other, a friend, daughter and sister, but a writer?

Well, sir, yes I am!

It’s not that I forget that I’m a writer but I forget how it FEELS to be a writer and that feeling is one of passion. I forgot how the passion feels, how incredible it feels, and how awesome it is to be doing what I love to do every single day of my life: WRITE!

I was exhausted after all the traveling and cleaning in the last few weeks, but today I felt rejuvenated. All that tired energy left my body and I felt as though a very high energy replaced it…and I’m so grateful that it did.

Sometimes we all need a reminder of that feeling of doing what we’re passionate about.

Sometimes we need to be reminded that we’re so much more than we believe we are.

I’m grateful for that meeting.

I’m grateful to be able to write every day.

And I’m grateful to remember what it feels like to be a WRITER!

Take a moment today to remember all that you are…because you are so much more than you believe you are!

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

much more

Photo courtesy of Rob Contreras

 

“One Day It Just Clicks”

/ Anne Dennish / 3 Comments

“It takes but one moment in your life that you find yourself waking up.” ~Anne Dennish~

And that’s the day that it all just clicks…you see things differently, change your perspective and begin to move forward.

Life is a series of many “waking up moments” and “just clicks days.” It’s part of the journey and those moments are filled with valuable lessons for us to live the best life we can.

Some of those moments are wonderful and some not so wonderful, but they are important moments to have because it pushes us to change for the better, to grow as a person, and to open our eyes to the truths that lie in front of us.

I’ve had quite a few “waking up” moments in the last few weeks and while they weren’t all that pleasant, I learned some valuable lessons from them. I also was reminded of the lessons I have learned in the past that I had forgotten in the present.

Life is a series of “waking up moments” and “just clicks days,” both good and bad, yet how we handle them, how we see them, and how we react to them determines how we get through them.

Love yourself enough to value those moments and embrace the lessons that they give to you.

After all…

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

clicks

“Show Me Your Soul”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

The older I get, the better choices I make in who I allow into my tribe.

It’s true…so many people wear a mask and none of us ever know who someone really is until a situation occurs in which they show their true colors.

I want to surround myself with people who aren’t afraid to be who they are. I don’t want to spend my precious time with people who wear a mask just to be someone they’re not; with people who tell me what I want to hear instead of telling me the truth; with people who place more value on the attention they receive rather than the attention they give to others.

I want to surround myself with people who are true blue, who let the person they are shine through; with people who aren’t afraid to show me their flaws; with people who speak their truth to themselves and to others.

I want to see the heart and soul of another.

I want to see who they are.

I want to see their truth.

It’s only when we can see the heart and soul of another that we can see the truth of who someone truly is.

And it’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

see a soul

 

 

“Kindness Counts”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

I’d be lying to you if I said the recent suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain didn’t still upset me, because they do. Even more so than those two suicides are countless social media posts about the number of people who take their own lives, of the importance of understanding mental illness, and the faces of those who suffer and have suffered from these illnesses.

Kate and Anthony were public figures, yet to see just how many people actually do take their own lives is unbelievable. There are no pictures for the world to see on social media of these people; they were living their life just as we all do.

Yet there’s so much more to each and every story of suicide.

And I, for one, can’t even begin to know how to understand them all, except to say that they’re all tragic, sad, and heartbreaking.

What I can do is keep writing words of encouragement and inspiration to all of you; I can keep writing stories to share with you in the hopes that it may touch the heart of someone who needed to read it; and I can keep doing something every day of my life to make a difference in the world and in the life of another.

Let’s do this together.

Let’s start today.

One act of kindness can change the day or even the life of another human being. We don’t always know what someone else is going through, so be kind to each other with both your words and your actions.

Kindness counts.

We all count.

Remember that.

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

be kind ellen

“Time To Shift”

/ Anne Dennish / 7 Comments

When you replace “why is this happening to me” with “what is this trying to teach me?” everything shifts.

And that’s truth.

So often we find ourselves in situations that upset us and our first thought is always “why is this happening to me?”

And the answer is always the same: “Life is trying to teach you something about yourself.”

Now the work begins. You need to look long and hard at the situation and think about how and why it happened.

Did someone say something hurtful to you? Did someone make you cry? Did someone point a finger of blame at your for being who you are?

If the answer to any of these questions is “yes” then you need to still your mind, take a deep breath and ask yourself “why?”

And the answer to this is always the same: “Because you let them.”

You let them treat you less than your worth.

And what you allow will continue.

It always does.

And that’s what the situation is about. It’s not randomly happening TO YOU, it’s happening FOR YOU…the Universe is trying to teach you a life lesson. It’s asking you the tough questions: “Why would you let someone treat you like that?”

Most of us don’t know how to answer that except to make excuses for their bad behavior. It’s having a false hope that it won’t happen again and that they really didn’t mean it. It’s a false hope of believing that the person will change. It’s a false hope that they’ll say they’re sorry and mean it.

I’ve been in that position more times in this lifetime than I can count but I’ve grown as a person, become stronger, and believe that those moments of pain and heartache aren’t my fault. After all, no one does anything intentionally to another human being in the hopes that they’ll hurt you. Yet, it happens and I’ve learned that it’s happened because of their feelings, not mine. It could be their insecurities coming through, or it could simply be that they truly meant what they said. Only that person can answer that question.

And only you can answer the question of why you let it happen.

And only you can figure out the lesson it was trying to teach you.

Most often times those situations happen to remind us that we’re important, that we count, and that we are valuable.

They happen to remind us to love ourselves more, to be kind to ourselves and respect ourselves.

And they happen to remind us that we should always be kind, and if we can’t then we should be quiet. They remind us that no one should treat another human being badly, not matter the excuse or reason for the bad behavior. They remind us that we all have a heart and soul that can be easily broken, and when another human being breaks them it takes time and effort for the healing to begin.

And the healing begins with YOU when you understand the lesson that life hit you with.

And only you can change the situation.

And only you can stop allowing those experience to happen.

Forget about “why this is happening to you” and shift your focus and energy to “what is this trying to teach me?”

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

what is this trying to teach me

“Life As A Writer”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

I’ve been writing all of my life, since the day I could hold a pencil in my hand and learn to spell. It’s something as natural to me as breathing. When I was a young child my stories were nothing more than a few sentences and a crayon drawing at the bottom of the page.

Through high school and college I could be found sitting on the beach like a Bohemian hippie, writing lyrics and poetry. There were nights you would find me in the hallway of my dorm, hot pot of instant coffee and me sitting against the wall with a notebook writing through the middle of the night while all the other college students were asleep.

During my marriage and raising children I began keeping a journal about my feelings of being a wife and mom. I wrote poetry and journal entries which would become short stories.

I was always writing something.

Yet until a few years ago whenever someone asked what I did I would say I’m a mom. I was a Sunday School teacher, a soccer mom, PTA mom, Cub Scout leader and a Brownie leader. There was never a mention of “I’m a writer.”

It’s funny how you can write and write your whole life and never say you were a writer.

Until my first book was published.

Well, even when it was published I still would say “I write books.”

It was my close high school friend, Rich, that said to me one day: “Why don’t you say what you are? You’re a writer. You’re a published author. You’re exactly what you wanted to be.”

Wow…I never thought of myself as that.

And why?

There’s really no definitive answer “why” I never said it or thought it; I spent most of my life raising my kids, so to think of myself as someone other than that seemed like a foreign concept to me.

Yet the truth of the matter is that I AM a writer. I AM a published author. I AM a lyricist.

And I’m even more than that.

I’m a writer who uses her words to heal and help others and try and make a difference in the world.

Writing is a part of my everyday life and as much a part of me as breathing is.

And as I’ve gotten older I’ve realized that I can use my writing to share my experiences with others; to help them through a difficult time; to let them know they’re not alone.

Writing is my voice that I want to be heard.

Writing is my heart reaching out to love the world.

Writing is my soul that shares it passion.

Writing is my passion and my dream come true.

Writing is the one way I know to reach out to people. It’s my way of helping, sharing and making a difference in one life and one day, I hope, the world.

My name is Anne Dennish.

And I’m a writer.

And it’s a very good thing…for me.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

meee1

 

 

“Be That Person”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

We’ve all gone through tough times in our lives.

Some people let those difficult situations make them a better person; they learn the lessons, heal themselves, and get back up on their feet even stronger.

Then there are those people that let those difficult situations make them a bitter person; they can’t see that there was a lesson to learn through the experience, they don’t or won’t heal from it, and they’d rather stay down than pick themselves up.

The better person learns to forgive and let it go; they continue moving forward, no matter what life hands them. They use their experiences to help others and love the world.

The bitter person holds onto the anger and refuses to forgive; they stay stuck in the negative emotions of the experience and can’t see all the endless possibilities that are outside of that time. They’re unable to love the world because their bitterness prevents them from loving themselves.

Which person are you?

Be that person that learns from the tough times and embraces the lessons learned from it; be that person who continues to love the world even if the world isn’t loving you back the way you want; be that person who keeps moving forward and uses the difficult times and the triumph of overcoming them to share with others.

Be that person.

I know that you can.

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

be that person

“Strength And Weakness”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

I wrote this quote many years ago near the end of my 20 year marriage. As I began to heal physically and emotionally from all the turmoil of that, I realized that it was at my moments of anxiety, sadness or depression that he became strong. At first I thought he was showing true signs of kindness, yet in time I realized what was really happening: I was feeding his ego and he was starving my self-esteem. He felt like “the big man” helping the poor, defenseless, broken woman. The woman HE broke. The woman he was abusive to; the woman he told over and over again was stupid and ugly; the woman he told would never be loved by anyone.

And I believed him…until I stopped believing him.

Are you wondering how I stopped believing all that negative stuff he had embedded into my brain? I woke up. I realized that I had allowed him the freedom to treat me that way. I allowed him to speak down to me and allowed him to be disrespectful to me. So, one day I woke up and stopped allowing it, and when I did that the marriage was done and over with.

I went through years of healing myself mentally and emotionally, and of course it was with the help of many spiritual teachers and a wonderful tribe of true friends that I was able to. I’m grateful for each and every one of them.

I learned so much about myself and that loving myself first was the answer to preventing anyone anyone from treating me that way. You’d think it would never happen again, yet I’m human; we’re all human. Sometimes life brings you back to an experience that you thought you had learned the lessons from, yet life knows when you forget the lesson. And the Universe will put a similar experience back into your way until you wake up and realize that what you stopped allowing years ago, you’re allowing once again.

Even after that divorce I would find myself meeting someone whose ego was strengthened by my weakness, and for those that know me, they know I’m anything but weak. It would sporadically happen here and there throughout the years, yet now I’m much more able to recognize it when it’s happening. I’ve learned that those people lack control of their own life so they try and control mine; they lack self-respect and are unable to respect anyone else; they don’t feel strong unless they’re paired up with someone weak.

And I am no longer that girl.

I want to be treated the way I deserve and the way that I treat others: with love, kindness, compassion, consideration and loyalty, and I won’t settle for anything less. I want to be loved for the person I am, quirks and all, because I love the person that I’ve become.

We all have moments of feeling weak and that’s okay; it’s those moments that help us to find our strength again and stand back up on our feet even stronger.

We all have moments of finding ourselves back in a situation that we thought would never return and that’s okay; you’re given that situation to remind you of the lesson you forgot.

And we all find ourselves staring into the mirror, looking at ourselves and wondering how we got here and what happened to us, and that’s okay; keep looking in that mirror long enough and you’ll once again see the person you thought was lost.

It’s those moments of feeling lost that we’re actually finding ourselves again, and we’re finding an even better and stronger version of the person we once were.

Life is about balance and we all fall out of balance every so often. It’s when the world around us is spinning out of control that we see the truth of everything, and it’s in those moments that we find our balance again.

Don’t let anyone make you feel weak; surround yourself with people that make you feel strong.

Don’t spend your precious time feeding someone’s ego; spend your time feeding your self-esteem.

And don’t rely on anyone loving you the way you want to be loved; love yourself that way first and the rest will fall into place.

Everything in your life begins with YOU.

Stop allowing what you don’t want to continue.

Forgive yourself when you forgot a lesson you learned and continue moving forward.

And love yourself.

If you do nothing else, love yourself.

Anything and everything is possible if you begin with love.

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~strength and weakness

 

“Keep Looking Up”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

I’m a big believer in always “looking up,” and not “looking down.” One seems to be positive and the other is negative.

Think about it…what do you see when you look up? The sky, the sun, the mountains, the stars, the moon, the clouds…the list goes on. And when you “look up” it’s as if you’re seeing the endless possibilities that life has to offer you. You’re seeing the vastness of the Universe with no limitations.

Now, about that “looking down.” When we look down it’s at the ground or more often than not these days, most people “looking down” are looking at their phones, at their computers, at their social media…and that list goes on as well. Yet looking down is restricting you from seeing the beauty around you; it prevents you from seeing the people that love you; it steals precious time with the world around you that you’ll never get back.

How many times have you found yourself “looking down” only to find that when you looked up you missed something amazing? You missed the sunrise or the sunset, you missed the one you love smiling at you, you missed an opportunity to communicate with another human, or you simply missed something that you’ll never have a chance to see again.

I know there are times we have to “look down” but don’t let that become your priority. Make that “looking down” thing but a brief moment in your day…make that “looking up” thing a priority of your day.

Trust me, more negative experiences and situations happen when you’re looking down all the time…

And trust me when I say that more positive experiences come from looking up…

And looking around…

And looking forward.

It’s a good thing.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

look up

 

“Never Forget How Far You’ve Come”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

The older we get the more experiences we have under our belt, yet there are times we forget how far we’ve come on this life journey.

We all go through rough days and tough times, no matter our age. It’s in those moments that we wonder how in the world we’re going to make it through, how we’re going to get past this difficult experience, how we’re going to find strength in a soul that is exhausted.

Yet we do.

And do you know how to do that?

You need to remember what you’ve already gone through and that you made it through…and sometimes by the skin of your teeth, but you made it through. And you made it through stronger, different, and better.

Never forget how far you’ve come…never forget the lessons you learned, and some you learned through the worst of times.

And never forget that you never thought you’d make it through, but you did.

You got through a day, slept through a night, and woke up to a new day in the morning.

A new day with no mistakes in it.

A new day to do it all differently than the day before.

A new day to change your life.

And that day is a very good day.

Life will always throw a challenge or two your way, yet it’s so important to remember that we’ve been through difficult times before and we made it through.

“Never forget how far you’ve come.”

Remember that…

Always remember that…

It’s a good thing. 

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

never forget