Jennifer 
The holidays can be a time of great celebration, get togethers, parties, family reunions and more. Sometimes it can be a bit overwhelming and at other times it can be a joyful blessing that feels wonderful. Holidays bring people together and with this comes more interactions, more opportunities for things to go wrong and more misunderstandings all in a time that is suppose to be joyful and meaningful to our core beliefs and traditions. Let’s face it, things can go wrong sometimes with our relationships. Isn’t it just one long life lesson of learning how to interact with another and get it right. It is human nature to want people to like you. However, when they don’t like you, it just makes us feel like it is us that needs improvement. We feel that it can be something wrong with us and we try to adapt and change to meet another person’s acceptance or expectations. This is a wrong formula for life. When we look towards others for something we are missing or feel a lack of what we really need to do is find that within ourselves. We can spend time trying to “work things out” for the sake of “saving” a relationship but what we should do in my opinion is stop focusing time on those who don’t like you. Instead, spend your time on ones who like you and give back love to you. It is an interesting dynamic that we choose to focus on the lack of something instead of the abundance of another thing. When we give our attention to a reciprocal relationship then we are creating a “win-win” formula for happiness and joy which benefits both parties. If we choose to focus on a particular relationship that doesn’t give us anything back and especially only grief, misery or sorrow than we feel that we need to “try harder” or “change” but that steers us away from our true nature. Being true to yourself is the key to all happiness and allowing others to love you and being open to receive love is a beautiful gift in life. Isn’t it odd that when we find someone who loves us, something inside of us starts to think that there must be something wrong with them because they like me so much. What a very upside down way to look at things. We should instead embrace the people in our lives that give us so much and release the ones that only take and cause misery. It will free us up from the time of trying to impress or create something that is not meant to be and we can redirect our love and attention to the ones that want it and give it back to us. Instead of being hard on ourselves and asking why do people not like me or why do they like me, just allow them to give love and allow yourself to receive it too. For the people who just don’t see things the way you do, wish them well and cut the ties that bind you to something that is going nowhere.
Much love, Jennifer
