The Best Holiday Diet

By Julia Griffin

The Best Holiday Diet isn't about food. It's about thoughts. I like to call it the "Positive Thought Diet."

Years ago, I worked at a small library in a small, lovely town. The town — as my neighbor Valerie was fond of saying -- was a wonderful "time warp." There was no crime. A park like a green postage stamp lay in its center, surrounded by large trees. The back of the library opened into the park, and I could watch children as they played in the park. It was safe at night. No one locked their doors or cars. Neighbors left gifts on the kitchen counters, and cats wandered from house to house to be fed.

I liked the library. It was a wonderful place to recuperate from a difficult divorce, and my children were allowed to stay with me in the afternoons. I had one problem -- when the library was quiet, patrons often sat and shared their thoughts about the world and other people in the town. Many of their thoughts were negative. At night, I would often hear their voices and reflect on the difficulties of life. I tried to study and meditate but I felt as if I could not stop hearing the negative thoughts of the news, newspapers and others.

On a dark day in November, I happened to open a book that said, "If you let others tell you their negative thoughts, you will never have a happy life. You will be pulled down into lower thoughts by their energy fields. Practice focusing on only the beautiful, good and happy in life. Allow the higher vibrations to permeate your field, and you will truly see a change in all of life. Desirable manifestation is created through positive vibrations."

"Oh, no!" I thought. "Then it will never happen for me. I'll never manifest a better life. Just think about the conversations that I listen to daily. Everyone talks about operations and sicknesses. They share the failings of everyone's character. And that doesn't even include the repetition of the bad events on the news."

But then I thought some more. The writer of the book encouraged the reader to change the subject, to suggest that others change the topic. "Just simply refuse to partake in negative conversation," the writer continued.

I decided to try a "Positive Thought Diet." I told the patrons about my plan, and I was careful to point out that if I was on a physical diet that they would be supportive. After all, they were good, caring people. I wrote the words, "Positive Thoughts", on small pieces of paper that I would hand to patrons if our discussions slipped into negative thoughts.

For a few weeks, the patrons had little to say. They selected books and left quickly. I could see that they were uncomfortable so I researched happy facts about their favorite subjects for discussion during their next visit.

Agnes, who was a devout Catholic, no longer told stories of parishioners with terrible problems who needed healing. She told of those who had been healed. The brilliant retiree who had worked for a stock company, no longer spoke of problems with the economy. He rallied about the stocks that were soaring. The housewives went on diets; they decided it was just as easy to walk and eat less than to complain.

Not everyone was easy to convince. One patron stopped speaking to me altogether until I whispered to her among the reference books, "Did you know that everyone in this town is related?"

"Of course," Doris whispered back, pulling her sweater close and shrugging away from me.

"The most terrible thing happened," I whispered back.

Now she was all "ears." "What was it?" She whispered back, taking a step closer.

"Everyone told me terrible things about everyone who lives here. Then I found out that everyone in this town is related, and I don't know who is related to whom. What if I repeated what someone said to a cousin? Can you imagine how many people I might offend? That's one of the reasons that I started the Positive Thought Diet."

Doris wasn't stupid. She got it right away, "You're right," she whispered, "that's quite a problem. I can see why you did it now. I guess I can help too."

She didn't join in right away, but two weeks later she came into the library wearing a red sweater. I had never seen her before in anything but dull colors.

"I love your sweater," I said.

"I thought you would," she said, actually smiling, "See I thought of something that was positive. I guess can do it, too."

Then there was the attractive, older couple who always shared what was wrong about one another. Both were hard of hearing and couldn't hear one another. She heard high pitches, and he heard low pitches — it wasn't hard to guess why. But both of them could hear me -- so they discussed their problems with me.

One afternoon I read books to the fourth grade at a local elementary school. Predictably, many children visited the library to receive library cards or check out books. My supervisor was helping in the back of the library in the children's section, and this older couple arrived in the midst of the chaos.

Fortunately, they began to browse the shelves, but the quiet didn't last long. In no time, Sylvia was standing at the front of the line.

"George didn't close the gate completely, and we spent all morning chasing cows." She said in a loud voice.

Her husband joined her, saying, "Sylvia burned lunch. We were outside all morning and have barely eaten all day."

Looking down the long line of children with books in hand, I said more loudly than I meant, "Could you two just say something nice about one another for once?"

To my horror, the children repeated the phrase, "Just say something nice for once."

And as I listened, my words traveled down the long line of children. Then the library was silent. The line of children parted like the red sea, and George and Sylvia stepped in front, checked out their books and left. My supervisor, kindly, did not comment.

The next day, Sylvia returned to the library with a bright smile on her face. She pulled up a chair and sat near my desk.

"You were right yesterday." She said, "I met George just after I was divorced with two children. I had been educated in exclusive schools and had no skills. I was working as a secretary and he saved my life. He was a banker in Florida and met me at an investment firm. I fell in love with him as soon as I met him. He's a marvelous person."

George traveled into the library later that afternoon. He told me that Sylvia was the most resourceful, creative woman that he had ever met. Later, I heard more of their story. Sylvia was born into the royal Spanish family, lived in Cuba and had left during Castro's reign. George had been a fighter pilot and hero during World War II.

After a few months of speaking nicely about one another, George and Sylvia remembered the excitement of loving one another. And — you guessed it — enough of their hearing returned so that they could hear one another. The point is that I began to learn the most fascinating facts about these people who had appeared to be boring or "normal" before I began the Diet.

In our effort to create positive thoughts, a strange event occurred. My patrons began to relate the times in their lives when they had given up happiness or positive thoughts. I learned then that no matter how "easy" the tragedy might seem to me that everyone had been touched by life in a place that was vulnerable and painful. This was my lesson of compassion.

As I felt more compassion, our Diet became more successful. In a few months, the patrons became good at thinking and sharing positive thoughts. If someone shared an unhappy thought, they assumed the person was not on our "Diet."

Everyone in the small town heard about it, and almost everyone began to practice it. The City Council decided that it was in the town's best interest to make their staff available to anyone in town who needed help. On the icy mornings, the staff drove me to work. They changed tires, fixed shutters and helped the elderly.

Most amazingly, we all became happier. When spring came with her life giving light, everyone had experiences of small unexpected happy events, and life was much better for all of us. All of the children at the elementary scored incredible scores on their state exams. By mid-summer, we experienced the phenomenon of having more money though most of us made the same amount. Life just became better and better.

I stayed at the library for three more years, and a couple of years later, I moved into my present career. I tend to remember my diet around Thanksgiving and Christmas every year and to think lovingly about those who helped with my success with it.

On reflection, I realized that when we focused on the good in life, the goodness of life found us. And when we saw the goodness in one another, it grew until the town itself changed.

And the library? I visited the library a few months ago.

Pretty Peggy Monday, with her soft brown eyes and hair, was the Branch Manager. When I saw her, I said, "Peggy, I thought that you resigned from the library. Are you working now?"

"Well," she said, in her cultured Southern voice, "I started substituting here because I was bored. And I fell in love with it. So I took the job. You know how it is here. It's sort of like Mayberry. It's beautiful here. Everyone is kind and helpful. No one ever says a bad word about anyone. I've never known a place like this."

I nodded. How well I knew the feeling! I started to tell her that I remembered when it all began. But I didn't. I just said, "The library is lucky is have you, and so is the town."

This year I think that I will work with my unspoken thoughts as well as the words that I might say aloud. I hope that you join my "Diet" club too. (Think what might happen if the Diet "went global!"

Julia Griffin is an intuitive healer who has successfully transformed the lives of thousands of people through her manifestation and meditative techniques. She teaches these techniques in her group classes, one-on-one sessions, and e-courses. Julia has been a contributing writer for Spirit of Maat. She has a deep understanding of energetics based on extensive studies. She is an alchemist, astrologer, herbalist and Reiki master. She has the ability to communicate with plants and animals. She lived with wolves for nine years, while developing her intuitive abilities.

She recently launched the Julia Mystery School e-course; these workshops embody advanced teachings for those who want to deepen their understanding of how we create our personal "reality". Julia offers a free monthly newsletter that includes manifestation, meditation and energetic techniques, the One True Self enewsletter at www.onetrueself.com

Julia Griffin, PO Box 920, Hiawassee, GA 30546

Telephone: 706-896-7744

Email: info@onetrueself.com