Lessons From A Shoe Company?

Today seems to be a good day to revisit and update this post from 14 years ago. 

The origin of the post was a Sunday newspaper ad for Naturalizer shoes, from the days when I subscribed to the local California newspaper. The bottom the ad included the following five phrases: 

Be flexible.
Go lightly.
Find balance.
Move softly.
Breathe easy.

So, with apologies to Naturalizer, I present once more these thoughts courtesy of a shoe company.

Be flexible. Flexibility can refer to so many things, from being physically flexible (something I struggle with) to being mentally flexible. I see it as a reminder not to become rigid in our thinking and outlook. Be open to new possibilities and to new ways of seeing the world. Be flexible and willing to change your opinion about something or someone. Be willing to consider opinions other than your own. This is quite difficult in today's very polarized political reality.

Go lightly. The possibilities are many. Go lightly in the world. Don't use more than you need, whether it's water, energy or food. Recycle and reuse. Minimize your impact on the Earth. See the humor in things, and don't take yourself too seriously. Find your own 'lightness of being.' I recently joined my local Buy Nothing group and have found new homes for some gift bags and an ironing board I no longer need. My garage is a bit less cluttered, and nothing ended up in the landfill.

Find balance. This is a wonderful life lesson. We should all strive for balance in our lives. Balance work with play, activity with rest, crying with laughing, social time with personal time. This lesson is a difficult one for me, as for so many people. Life in 21st century America doesn't lend itself to balance, so it requires a real effort to find and maintain a balance in life.

Move softly. Move softly through the world. Treat others with respect. Minimize your negative impact on the world. Be firm when necessary, yet gentle. Think of the great people who have moved softly yet had tremendous impact: Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Rev. Martin Luther King.

Breathe easy. This is another dictum that is difficult for me. It is difficult to breathe easy, but oh so easy to become caught up in worry, fear and the 'what ifs' of life. But as I have learned during the past couple of challenging years, "Nothing gets done until we feel the peace inside," to quote a friend of mine. Things will happen as they are meant to. Sometimes those things are positive, and sometimes they are negative. But our worrying and fretting about them won't change the outcome. Trust in your higher power, Mother Nature, or whatever your source of strength.

So, here are today's life lessons, courtesy of an ad for shoes in the local newspaper. more than a dozen years ago. It always amazes me where I will find the inspiration or the kernel of an idea for a blog post. Yet these ideas offer timeless reminders of small things we can do to make this world a better place.