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Oxfam Canada
Oxfam Canada and Donate a Car Canada are in it together. Donate your car and change the world! Is Oxfam Canada new to you? Learn more... Continue reading "Oxfam Canada" →
Tag: Pandemic
Children’s Charities
What strange times for our kids to be growing up in! Children's charities creatively and courageously support little ones across Canada. Donate a Car Canada serves these charities by processing your vehicles for donation.
Continue reading "Children’s Charities" →Peace in a Pandemic
Finding peace in a disrupted time is tough. For many of our receiving charities, that's they're work-a-day gig. They companion people in disrupted life circumstances.
What is peace, anyway?
The word peace may mean something different to you than it does to me. For some, peace is a feeling of calm, or the absence of conflict. Some people experience peace as the lack of any emotion at all. Others feel at peace when they have a sense of control in their lives.
I've come to identify peace as a quiet heart. Sometimes that means a feeling of spaciousness in my mind, heart, or even body. Another way of describing that is the ability to take a deep, deep breath -- a feeling of relaxation and permission even when circumstances are very difficult.
That seems to be an important thing about peace? It is a sense of rightness, quiet, or well-being even when things all around are wobbling. Maybe even downright awful.
Can I find calm...even now?
What has the COVID-19 Pandemic been like for you? Are you having difficult finding peace in the midst of global fear? There are resources near you that can give you a little back-up if that's what you need. Seek them out. Your mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical health are worth the effort.
You may be someone who has had a gentle experience of this unprecedented upheaval. If so, might you be one who offers peace to others? You may be one of the helpers. If so, thank you! Please take care of your Self while you're reaching out to others. And if you're having moments when a quiet heart is illusive, reach out for your own supports, ok? We need you to keep getting your own cup filled up so that you can continue to share with others.
What DACC is doing to help
Here at Donate a Car Canada we continue to work through this crisis time to aid Canadian charities in their ongoing work. Sometimes cool cash is the best way to bring calm into the midst of a storm. Part of our role in all of this is to keep right on processing vehicle donations. Those donations result in the much-needed dollars our charities depend on to keep purveying goodness in our hurting world. Thank you for considering how you might be a part of that!
Peaceful Parenting
Parenting in an a new normal
What has this past month been like for you? If you're the parent of school-aged children you may be feeling a lot of pressure these days. Some of you are working from home while hands-on parenting. Home schooling used to be the practice of a minority (myself included), and is now the norm. If you have a child with special needs or learning challenges, you may have added complications.
Are you finding support in all of that? There are resources available to you. Do seek them out. This is a time for asking for what we need, and leaning into available resources.
Kim Golding on peaceful parenting
My colleague forwarded this on to me just yesterday. It's from Kim S. Golding, 2015, with an added acknowledgement of Clover Childcare, Norfolk.
This gentle 7-step guide may be a helpful resource for all of us as parents? First, it offers a reminder for us to take a minute to check in with our self when facing into a parenting conundrum. "Calm begets calm; peace begets peace." So say parenting specialists. That calm begins with us as parents. Take a look at this:
That trusty oxygen mask
The well-worn metaphor of the oxygen mask on the airplane applies here: Mom? Dad? Take your own deep breaths first. Then tend to your kiddo.
One of my practice instructors has patiently reminded me, "When we change the dialogue with which we speak to our self, we'll change the way we speak to others. As we transform inwardly, we'll change outwardly." What does she mean by that? Be nice!
This is the time to be "excessively gentle" (John O'Donohue) with ourselves. And as we turn compassion inward, we'll find ourselves more able to be patient and understanding outwardly.
May peaceful parenting bring about peaceful kiddos in a decidedly un-peaceful time in history. You've got this! And where you need back-up? Reach out. You are not alone.
