Donnalynn Civello - Life Lessons: Everything You Ever Wished You Had Learned in Kindergarten

Copyright 2015 by Donnalynn Civello

All rights reserved.

Cover image: istockphoto.com; contributor: benoitb

ISBN: 9781483552279

Dedication

To Heidger Marx

For being my greatest teacher in this life. Thank you for being part of my journey.

Contents

Introduction

Nobody ever said life was going to be easy, but then again, no one ever prepared us for it either. At age five we begin school - kindergarten through University - where we are expected to learn intellectually through mental constructs. As life goes on, we find that the real learning happens through life experience in which we learn the wisdom of our actions and the consequences of them. They say that is something you can never teach. I disagree with that.

Life doesnt have to be difficult; we are the ones who complicate it for ourselves. We are all here to learn certain life lessons lessons we have chosen for ourselves. Wouldnt it be easier if we were told that information upfront? Wouldnt it be easier if we were told, Hey, remember you are here to learn self-esteem. Throughout your life, you are going to attract people who are going to take advantage of you, take you for granted, make you feel not worthy. When this happens, dont feed the lesson; face it, overcome it and make your life better because of it. When you get the lesson, it stops. Why dont they tell us that in kindergarten?

Life lessons are not complicated; they are actually very easy, but when we dont get the lesson, the lesson repeats, which is extremely arduous and painful. These lessons are extremely simple concepts but extremely powerful in their healing ability. Had we learned these concepts early in life, we would all be much more consciously aware of our lives as adults.

My role is to help people find their life lessons and address them so they can move on with their lives. That is my work, but it wasnt always that way

I never set out to be a life coach or anything close, but life clearly had other plans for me. I should start out by saying that I am a New Yorker, through and through. I am also a classic over-achiever (guess that is pretty much the same thing!). I collect degrees, maybe because Ive always been under the impression that they were necessary and that they somehow determined how intelligent and successful one would be in life. Wow, was I wrong! I have since learned that education is extremely limited in its ability to teach us about life. Conversely, I have learned that experience is our greatest teacher. And when lifes experiences beckon, its time for that life-altering wake-up call. I know, because I got mine six years ago.

In 2009, I had it all. It was almost as if my life were sourced out of a page of New York Magazine. I was stylish, social, an advertising/publishing executive and a designer. I had my MBA and was a graduate student of interior design working as a Creative Services Director at a national design magazine. I was living on Madison Avenue directly across from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Central Park, spending summers in Fire Island and the Hamptons, traveling to Europe for long weekends and holidays and enjoying the hottest new restaurants, champagne brunches and parties with my Euro friends.

I had also just moved in with the man of my dreams whom I believed I was marrying. He was two years older, European, 66 and extremely good looking with piercing blue eyes that could look right through you. He was a perfect gentleman; always opening doors for me and pulling back seat chairs. I always thanked him for every small gesture of kindness and attentiveness he gave me because they made me feel safe and loved. He was a beautiful man; a kind soul, extremely refined with high social graces and good manners. He was highly intelligent; he had a PhD in organic chemistry and had a great job in high tech. He was very charming and always drew people to him with his beautiful, warm smile. His energy was magnetic. He was so knowledgeable about everything very much on top of all current events in any part of the world. He also had the most impressive love of history and could recite any historical event and the impact it had on todays modern world. Even more impressive, he could discuss the politics and socio-economic standing of any country. To me, he was a walking encyclopedia of knowledge and not a day went by that I wasnt impressed with him. I always told him that he was amazing. That used to upset him because he never wanted to be put on a pedestal.

He balanced me. I know I am very intelligent, but my knowledge is much more emotional and grounded in wisdom and spirit. Even though I am an MBA, read like a fiend and am very up to date with current events and such, I felt like he grounded me because he was very good in dealing with the material world (finances, taxes, investing, real estate; all things that dont really interest me). For him, I brought to the table a new perspective on life; a higher spiritual perspective that he hadnt thought about and a real emotional intelligence that he was impressed and inspired by. He wanted that wisdom and used to ask many questions about it. We were able to share our lives and our gifts with each other and grow with/learn from each other. It was a perfect union for us.

We were also very social; we had lots of friends and did the New York City thing parties, restaurants and exploring new areas of the city on our weekend journeys together. We loved getting lost in random neighborhoods of Brooklyn, Bronx or Lower East Side taking in the micro-cultures and documenting it through photography (one of his passions). We also liked to escape by taking weekend trips out of town to go hiking or to the ocean. We both loved walking by the ocean and promised ourselves we would one day move to California. We both have a passion for travel and took many trips together; many to Europe to visit with friends and family. We also had a summer home with friends in Fire Island. Basically, we spent all of our time together but our happiest times were spent on a weekend afternoon as bed slugs; cuddling in bed and talking/laughing for hours about anything and everything while taking intermittent catnaps in each others arms. We connected on such a deep level through our interests and our yearning to know one another. We would joke that if we talked on the phone, four hours would pass before we even blinked an eye. Who talks for four hours? This was my perfect relationship and it matched my correspondingly perfect life.

Well, little did I know that my seemingly perfect life was about to unravel right before my eyes. They say that in life you dont get dealt any hand that youre not able to play. I am glad that someone up there thought I was ready to play this one because at the time, I wasnt so sure.

Let me start by saying that life can change on a dime, and it usually does. I moved in with my boyfriend to start a new life on March 1st of 2009. On March 15th, just two short weeks later, I went in to work on a Monday morning to find out that the magazine I worked for had closed its doors overnight. Clearly, I had missed the late night memo that had gone out. Within a couple months, this man who was my world, the love of my life and the one I thought I was marrying left me for another woman whom I had met at an Oktoberfest party two weeks earlier. She was really beautiful, really sweet, and really smarts I guess I should have seen that coming, but I didnt. Nor did he. He worked at the same company with her, never really interacting, but knew of each other. That afternoon, he very impulsively decided to pursue her for two weeks behind my back, then chose to be with her. Shocked and heartbroken, I then faced the harsh reality of losing my home that we shared together a beautiful, pre-war-style apartment on Madison Avenue across from the MET and Central Park. Devastated, it was all I could do to just catch my breath and think, What just happened?