Use What You Have
Welcome
Heart Tales is a monthly newsletter for people on an adventure toward wholeness. It is published by Jim Cyr, storyteller, author, and crisis intervention specialist.
**********
Use What You Have
Therapist and author George W. Burns, in his book, 101 Healing Stories, tells of the time he and his friend, Tom, traveled to Mt. Everest by yak. The story shows us that no matter what life has given us we can use it for our good.
In the small Tibetan town of Tingri, Tom and I had hired yaks and yak handlers for our journey to Mt. Everest. Chomolongma, of Mother Goddess, (as the world’s highest mountain is known to the Tibetans) lies several days trek across the stony and arid Tibetan plateau. To the south of us lay the snowy white peaks of the Himalaya, stretching high into clear and rich blue skies. Like a tall fence, these mountains that border the plateau shelter it from the moisture-laden clouds of the Indian monsoons and thus form the world’s highest desert. Not a tree or bush can be seen. The only vegetation is low, coarse tufts of occasional grass that fight for survival on the rocky terrain. The only animal that seems to survive is the yak, and only the yak’s capacity to manage these desolate, high-altitude areas enables humans to survive alongside them.
For the Tibetans, yaks are transport, clothing, food, fuel, and, indeed, life itself. Their wool is knitted into apparel and tents to stave off the bitter cold. Their hides make jackets, boots, and bed-clothes. Their meat, combined with ground, roasted barley, called tsampa, provides Tibetan’ staple diet. Yak milk churns into a rancid-tasting bitter which, when blended with tea and salt, makes a nutritious, cold-climate beverage. No product of the yak is wasted. Even its dung is used. On the treeless plateau there is no wood to burn for heating or cooking–and both are essential at these chilly altitudes. The Tibetans found an innovative solution. They gather the yak dung, mix it into watery pats, throw it onto the walls of their stone homes, and leave it to dry. These dung discs are subsequently stacked on the flat roofs of the houses, awaiting their use as fuel to warm the home and cook the food.
As Tom and I share the hospitality of a yak herder on the plateau one evening, we sat in his yak wool tent, sipped yak butter tea and choked on the smoke of a somewhat green yak dung fire. Despite the smoke we huddled close to it for the warmth. It was better than no fire, and as I sat there, I was filled with admiration. “What a resourceful people,” I thought to myself.” When life gives them nothing but shit, they can turn even that into something useful!”
Thought to Ponder
**********
How are you using what life has given you?
Your Comments Welcome
Post your comments in the comment box or email them to me at jim@hearttales.net
**********
Heart Tales Happenings
Book
My book, The Cracked Pot: Finding Grace in the Cracks of Child Abuse is available at Amazon.com
“This is one man’s true story of the unspeakable things that were done to him as a child and his rocky journey through adulthood to find God, peace AND his true self.”
Blog
If you enjoy this newsletter, check out The Heart Tales Blog at http://hearttales.net/blog. The blog is published every Monday and Thursday. Check out the current series about Ho-ichi the storyteller.
About Jim & Heart Tales
The true spirit of my work is to lead people on a life-changing adventure toward wholeness by connecting their hearts to their true selves, to others, and to God, through stories of healing, wisdom, and faith. My life-changing adventure toward wholeness includes performances of folk and fairy tales, sacred stories, and personal stories, and workshops on how to tell stories in therapeutic settings.
Feedback
”Jim’s storytelling spoke to many of the problems our women face on the road to recovery from addiction and gave them options for handling those problems they had not considered before.”
Helen Raytek, Program Director, Crawford House
“Jim, I want to thank you for your time, efforts, and talents in presenting your Clinical Benefits of Storytelling Workshop. I was very impressed with your professional and fun deliverance of the material and many useful resources and examples. I felt I benefited from it both personally and professionally, and will use what I learned…”
John J. D. Schweska, L.P.C. Assistant Program Director, Mobile Response and Stabilization Services, Catholic Charities, Diocese of Metuchen
“…your newsletter is a wonderful resource, and I hope that many will subscribe to it.”
Dr. Robert Bela Wilhelm, Storyfest Ministry
“…Thank you once again, Jim, for sharing your stories/your story and influencing my healing.”
Eileen
January 7th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
Jim, your stories always give me a lot to think about; I love that. And, they are encouraging to me as you are.
January 23rd, 2009 at 1:11 pm
So many people feel that they have nothing to offer (low self-esteem)so they make up things or exaggerate. Not realizing that we are all special in Gods eyes with unique qualities and tatents all our own. So just be who you are (use what God gave us). We are all special and need to learn more self worth.