Being Gentle

Have you ever encountered stray dogs?  In Türkiye, stray dogs and cats are part of every day life.  Cats are more approachable while dogs are big and ragged looking.  When I was a kid I remember being slightly scared of the stray dogs.  Luckily my fear didn’t last too long because I quickly learned that those dogs were more gentle than some of the domestic ones.

This summer my kids created strong bonds with the dogs and cats in the neighborhood.  They learned to be gentle towards these animals.  And they quickly realized that gentler they were, the animals responded to them the same gentle way.  It was simple: what you gave ended up being what you got.  The beauty behind this exchange was that my kids didn’t care how the dogs looked.  They focused on being very delicate with them no matter how rugged they looked.

Towards the end of our trip, I kept thinking of those moments of being gentle.  The “gentle” exchange wasn’t just with the stray dogs, it was all around us, including within ourselves.  It was a month filled with being gentle: recognizing others’ feelings, listening to our own body, being delicate both physically and emotionally.  It was definitely not easy to say “see you next summer” but we all manage to do that as delicately as possible.  And amazingly enough the tears were less.

Just like those stray dogs, our bodies also deserve a gentle approach.  Once we got back from Türkiye, I dedicated a week of Train and Smile to the “Be Gentle” theme and we used pair of tongs as our tool.  Check out how we can be gentle with our bodies and still get a good workout!

High Five to you for every gentle exchange you experience in our day!

My Daughter with my grandma - can it get any gentler between them?

Kaya’s love of cats despite of his allergy

I was extra gentle with my parents during one of our train and smile sessions