Truth or Dare with Social Distancing

In the long ago Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In TV series (1967-1973), actress Lily Tomlin portrayed Edith Ann, a five-year old with outlandish truths about life. Edith Ann sat in a huge rocking chair and recounted strange adventures from her childish point of view. Each segment ended with her looking directly into the camera and boldly proclaiming, “And that’s the truth!”

Life tickles your funny bones. The audience saw comedy in Edith Ann’s truth because it emphasized how we, too, may see things askew. You find humor in situations with which you identify. And sometimes it’s good to laugh at ourselves. To see our foibles. To recognize our shadow side.

Sometimes life breaks your hearts. The heart ache is not from seeing truth, but from refusing to be set free by the truth we see. Truth hurts only when it is supposed to. Allow the sting to take you to self-evaluation for loving adjustment or forgiveness.

Feelings don’t tell you the truth; they just emphasize how you feel. Beliefs are not necessarily truth, they are just what you tell yourself you believe. What you believe is your best guess in the moment at what is real. Your best guess at reality is conditioned by the society in which you live.

Society doesn’t tell you the truth; society goes with fads, trends or the in-thing. Your thoughts don’t tell you the truth; they just try to tell how you measure up to society’s dictates. Or not. Circumstances don’t tell you the truth. No matter how real they seem to be they are really your thoughts trying to prove to you that your beliefs and that your feelings and your viewpoints are truth.

What does tell you the truth? Life.

Life demonstrates truth. Truth is universal and applies to everyone equally. Life speaks truth whether we believe it or not, whether we can handle it or not. Rain or drought, hurricanes or tsunamis falls equally on the just and on the unjust.

Life reveals when actions are plume. It matters not if one is a skilled iron worker or a nuclear scientist or an adventurous roof-scaling child, the truthful law of gravity shows itself to always be accurate. Whether gravity works for us or against us depends on our respect for its truth.

Don’t Cope, Overcome. There is a big difference in thinking you are a fool and in thinking you did a foolish thing. When your thoughts bring increased frustration, anger, sadness or instability, then maybe it is time to challenge your truth. Does what you believe hold water? Is your attitude working for you or not?

When circumstances are less than ideal, look deep inside to see what lesson life is teaching you. Obey the rules of the road and the chances of a speeding ticket, wreck or traffic violation are greatly diminished. Listen to your internal moral compass. NOTE: it speaks quietly, softly and gently. It must be tuned into to be heard. It must be given space to grow. It must be proven to stand firm.

Need a Life Coach? Contact Mona at 254-749-6594 or monadunkin@gmail.com

Happy Relationship Day

Happy Relationship Day!

Only most people call it Valentine’s Day. Valentine’s is a nice tradition with lovely sentiments. and I’m certainly okay with that. My stance is that Valentine’s Day - or at least TV and media ads - seem to isolate it to romantic love. And love is so much wider, deeper, higher, greater, funner and a bunch of other fulfilling descriptive words.

A Course if Miracles states that anything that draws love from you is of Divine origin. Which gives me pause when the neighborhood feral cat beats up on my kitten and I have equal compassion for the scruffy castaway.

Dr. William Glasser suggests that love and belonging is a basic genetic need of every living creature. And that all human misery, with the exception of abject poverty, living under tyranny and debilitating disease, is the result of unhappy relationships.

My definition of relationship is the ability to relate to and to relate with another, even if another is an other. As in other color, other class, other personality, other belief, other opinion. Since all eight-plus billion of us others are on this Planet-Earth Spaceship together, we might as well get along. After all, we are more alike than we are different.

I teach a class entitled “Getting Along With Difficult People, Whether You Know One or Are One”. It can be quite humbling to recognize our contribution to a miserable, difficult relationship. I had a gentleman tell me, “After taking this class, I need to apologize to everyone I have ever met.”

The bottom line is, we are all flawed and fabulous, which renders each difficult and wonderful.

A little compassion oils the get-along gear.

Even if you can’t reason with the feral bully. (Cat that is) The disagreeable one is still one of us others. The disagreeable one still has infinite worth and value as a human being, created in God’s image, a work of art with a Designer label.

Relating to and with another is found in common ground as well as uncommon ground. Every one has a story. Be open to sharing yours and listening to theirs. Ask relationship building questions; not to grill but to understand the sameness and differences. How monotone life would be if we all sang the same note. It’s the cacophony that makes music.

Who do you love this relationship month? Make it easy on yourself by starting with you and expand out. Remember the holy instructions to “love yourself as your neighbor.” That’s a like-to-like descriptive statement; as you love you, you are freed to love others.

Regardless of any dark circumstances surrounding one’s conception and upbringing, I suggest the union has a holiness to it. The office is untarnished. The child is innocent and came from the original system of divine love.

Whether the home produces benevolent leaders or malevolent dictators, all of us share in the propagation of love, light and darkness. The human condition is a complicated mix of good and not so good. Climbing to a higher plane is all ‘Thanks Be To God’. Relationship Day is a good place to start.

Mona's Timely Tips for Efficiency

There is no more time to be made. Everyone is allotted twenty-four hours in a day. At one time or another, everyone has felt like the Egyptian mummy - pressed for time. How you invest in time is up to you. Here are a few suggestions for making the most of your time.


1. Find the freedom of a schedule. "Finding" time produces anxiety and guilt; making time results in success,relaxation and fulfillment. What is important is scheduled; what is scheduled, gets done.

2. Keep a calendar. Before going to bed write down "The Six Most Important Things I Must Do Tomorrow"

3. Write it down - in a planner, not on scraps of paper to be lost. The faintest ink is worth more than the most retentive memory.

4. Record ideas. Everything that has ever been accomplished was once an idea. If not written down, it will be forgotten and therefore, not done.

5. Use wait time productively. Book, pad, pencil, calendar - don't leave home without them.

6. Organize your work area and keep it neat. Have proper equipment within your reach.

7. Handle it once.

8. Do one job at a time and give it your full attention. This one thing I do...

9. Say "No" without feeling guilty. Never say "Yes" just to be liked.

10. Develop your listening skills. Ask pertinent questions. Think about and picture the results.

11. Bunch tasks together.

12. Can you give it fifteen minutes?

13. Effectively use "think" time.

14. Work on your dream every day without exception. "What did I do today to make my dreams come true?"

15. Set limits on how long a task will take.

16. Learn the joy of a job well done. Give up perfectionism.

17. TNT - today not tomorrow

18. Do it right the first time. If you are expending energy on a project, do it with excellence.

19. Cooperate with others. Work together.

20. Know the limits of "your job".

21. Determine the difference between urgent and important. "What would happen if I don't do this?"

22. Focus on priorities daily, weekly, monthly and yearly.

23. Do not become involved in problems others can handle without your input. Determine who owns the problem.

24. Make a commitment to someone else of what you are going to do.

25. The best minute spent is the one invested in people. People are our greatest assets.