""Normal" is just a setting on the dryer". Barbara Johnson

But everyone thinks they are when, really, there's no such thing as normal unless you learn normal is as normal does, meaning, one person's "normal" is not another person's "normal". While there may be some similarities in how we live our lives - how we're effected by what goes on in and around our lives - our lives are vastly different, because their unique to who and what we are. Unique in our upbringing, unique in our choices, unique in our minds and hearts.

The confusion about what is "normal" happens, because when we look at our immediate life and surroundings; on the surface, everything looks similar to what other people are doing. Paying rent, owning a home, going to work, grocery shopping, taking a vacation, celebrating holidays, etc... There are usually a fair amount of similarities we can point out in others that help make sense of our own lifestyle leading us to believe we're "normal" but that's "our" normal and like I said, what's normal for us is not necessarily normal for someone else.

Consider this. For many of us, "normal" meant learning how to ride a tricycle before moving on to a two-wheeler or maybe we went on family vacations and had Sunday, night, family dinners and who knows, maybe we can't cook but now that we're adults we've found some way to carry on some type of Sunday, night family tradition. We learned by way of example - our environment provided a part of our education by what we observed, and we carry them forward in our own lives.

Others, though, may not have been so fortunate; their environment may have taught them how to be abused and potentially, how to be an abuser; it may also have taught them how to be a victim or fearful of life or how to be an alcoholic or drug addict.

In my life, where I begin to see a strong disconnect in what people accept and realize as "normal" occurs when people judge the actions or lives of others without realizing for that person, what they're doing in their life IS "normal" based on who they are and how they were raised. Coming to understand what's normal for us may not be normal for another person and opening our hearts and minds to the vast differences between we humans, is compassionate and loving and, really, the only way I've found to get there, is to be compassionate and loving of one's self first.

Fortunate for me, in life, I've had many, excellent teachers, and I don't necessarily mean those in a classroom setting but those who have lead by example or who took time out of their own lives to listen to me and share their experiences providing me with insight and awareness as to how "normal" I am and how my past relates to my future. In other words, they've been understanding, compassionate and loving. I, in turn, hope to give back and do the same for those who cross my path; to do so is really, quite normal.

Better go turn on the dryer.