Count Your Blessings

Today I started a taking a water aerobic body flow class. The great thing about water aerobic exercise is that if you are overweight or recovering from an injury or illness that has left you very weak, it is very hard to hurt yourself doing them. The water is supporting your weight instead of your lower limbs so a workout is less painful. The aerobic water exercises are increase muscular stamina and improve cardiovascular fitness in general. It can also help build strength and increase your flexibility. It is the type of exercise where you can work at your own pace. It is also up to you how hard you will work out in the water making it difficult to overdo it. It is also difficult to get overheated as the water is always cooling you off.

After class, a lady started asking me questions about how she can rid herself of depression. After talking a while, I asked her if she knew it was her last day on earth could she count her blessings. This is what she came up with:

1. I would stress less about the little things.
2. I would categorize everything as little things.
3. I would do more to escape from the pain instead of complaining.
4. I would invest the time I lose in unproductive and dangerous thoughts into planning creative outings for myself and for the family.
5. I would worry less about what others think.
6. I would make more time for coffee or tea and phone calls with friends.
7. I would visit my mom and my sisters more.
8. I would eat more dessert and not care as much about my waist line.
9. I would laugh more - make a point to laugh every day.
10. I would publish my journal online every thought I have, no matter how stupid.
11. I would spend more time outdoors.
12. I would eat breakfast with my kids, lunch with husband, and dinner with my family.
13. I would keep a mood chart that would track how I feel from day to day.
14. I would identify some possible triggers for my bad days.
15. I would invest in some friends like a support group that won't tire of me talking.
16. I would say to myself, "There is a better way. Together we can make a difference."
17. I would learn to take baby steps one day at a time.
18. I would learn to live in an attitude of gratitude.
19. I would write a journal so that I could remember my good days and count my blessings more.
20. I would learn to distract myself more so I could turn myself around.
21. I would make a bucket list and do everything I wanted to do.
22. I would make sure I made a list of the reasons I want to live so when I get down, I can pick myself up again.
23. I would thank my Creator each day for another day to live.
24. I would dance to the music.

What would say to count your blessings?

Be Still And Accept The Quiet

Happiness is not a matter of events, it depends upon the tides of the mind. - Alice Meynell

Some people think that waiting is a waste of time. It's a total write-off if you have times of no activity, they feel. I know when I was young, my Mother said, "Idol hands are the devil's workshop." Did you hear that too? What I have learned, is that busying myself can be accepting the quietness. Quieting my mind so it can heal. I feel that quietness is the renewing of me that is needed or the quiet before the storm which enables me to strengthen and be prepared for what lies ahead. Learn to take time to quiet your mind for mind healing.

Whenever I find myself in the mist of peace and tranquility, which seems to be rare. I am thankful. Showing gratitude of small things comes back when I need it the most. There is a lesson to be learned up ahead. Are you willing to learn? What is it that must be learned?

We don't always have the answers. We learn that sometimes acting too fast is the wrong answer and can be worse than no answer. We learn to dance, sometimes following, sometimes leading but always in time with the music. When we wait for the right cue, it becomes beautiful. One, two, wait. One, two, wait. See the beauty of the dance. A storm can blow our way and because we listen and are patient, our quiet time has prepared us to build a sandcastle in the mist of the storm. We are surprised by the ease and grace which we emerge.

In the mist of the hustle and bustle of everyday life, you'll be glad that you opening accepted understanding, peace and tranquility. That the mind healing was begun in quietness and prepared for the storm. Be still and feel your Spirit. Drink in the renewing of your Spirit.

Have a good day! Empower yourself today!

Dancing To Your Heartbeat

Everyone has a little hero within them. How do you feel when a hero comes to town? Pick your favorite hero who was just crowned with their greatest achievement. What happens? Do they have a procession with people dancing and singing their praises. Can you imagine you having that triumph. Picture it in your mind. It is within you.

Don't just sit around acting pious. Don't let depression get you down. Fill your heart with joy and lead others to it. Everyone you meet is affected with what you have. Will you leave them with depression or inspiration. Don't fall into the trap of trying to act respectable. When you feel the strings of life playing your heartsong, I want you to dance to the music. I want you to have a parade and be at the front, with your head held high, dancing with all your might.

Hugs in an attitude of gratitude,

Let Your Heart Dance

Someone once defined joy as peace dancing. Can you relate to that? Imagin a joyful child. See how they dance for joy. Hear the sounds of laughter.

Unlike happiness, joy is not influenced by what 's happening around you. It's an inner assurance that you are the blessed controller of all things. It's a grateful realization that you were given by your Creator . . . an unbounded love that can never be taken away.

When you are dwelling in joy, there will be no room for fear or depression. Your face will wear a new expression. Your head and your heart will know a new serenity. Let go of anger, anxiety, panic and fear. Cultivate a new feeling of joy. Let your peace rise up in joyful dance. Dance to the music you hear in your heart. Let the abundance of joy flow through you.

Laughter Is The Best Medicine

Laughter is the best medicine. It is free...readily available to us whenever we remember a funny story or act in a silly way. Or maybe we see something in life, on TV or at the movies that is magnified in are own lives. Just watch our children or grandchildren. Like the time, my granddaughter hit the aquarium with her head and she said, "The fish bit me." If we are lucky, we continue to share our laughter with our family, friends and those we come in contact.

We talk about fun things or going somewhere that is fun for us. How many of us actual take the time to find humor in each day or laugh about anything? How many of us schedule into our today list a time for fun. It's important to work, but don't forget to play. We feel less stressed and feel more at eased when we laugh. Laughter is contagious. Don't think so? Try laughing and see what happens. It is like a drop of water that causes a ripple effect that courses through the depth and breath of water. Just as our words positive or negative can makes such an impact on the people around us. Our laughter can plow a course through the universal depression. It can inspire hope and reduce the number of suicides.

Of course, it is also important to allow ourselves to stay balanced. My motto is work hard, play hard.

Living a life of positive thinking and laughter is bound to have you feeling happier and more successful throughout your day-to-day routine. In fact, those that make positive thinking and laughter a key goal in their lives tend to experience more daily success and more happiness than anyone else. Visualizing goals and going after them are a key component to positive thinking. Keeping a light attitude towards life is a great way to keep laughter as the soundtrack to your life and have things looking a little bit brighter. When it comes to a healthy state of mind and body, positive thinking and laughter work hand in hand.

Having daily happiness and success are all about developing a habit. You'll need to start making a few changes in your life if you want to experience positive thinking and laughter on a regular basis, and you'll want to create an environment that encourages both those qualities, too. This may sound like work, but don't worry; it can actually be a lot of fun! One of the first things you'll want to do in developing your "happy habit" is to change the way you look at things in your life. Keep the focus on the bright side and think of the good side all the time. You may find that your mind will try to drag you down and look at the negative things in life more often than you'd like, but you have the power to change that focus and keep it on positive aspects. If you try to make your first thoughts about the bright side of the situation, you'll find yourself well on your way to developing your "happy habit". I'm checking on you and I'm gonna tell Santa!



Live, love and laugh!

Hugs in an attitude of gratitude

Dance To the Music

Some days are good days, some days are bad... sometimes we can be so busy that we forget moving our body is even an option. Some of us remain seated at our computer for hours every day, sit in a chair for hours in pain or rush from task to task with robotic precision. When we are caught up in crossing items off our to-do lists, we tend to neglect all the opportunities there are to enjoy our lives in the process of living. If this is true for you, begin looking for opportunities to move.

Bad days. . . just go for a walk even if it is just indoors and turn yourself around. Put on some music that your heart can't help but jump for joy. It is healing the heart. You might try dancing or moving about freely as you clean your home or in the garden or with your children. Children love to play this! Sorry no country music for this. In dancing, even slow dancing, our bodies adjust, realign and start to become fluid with the rhythm of life. Our mood lifts and we feel more connected with the world around us. Every nerve in our body flows through our neck. So if, we're rigid our bodies become rigid. If we are fluid, we are in a tune with life.

So come on and dance like no one is watching!

Today is tomorrow's opportunity

The dreams of yesterday are the hope of today and the reality of tomorrow. With each step we take we move forward to our dream of yesterday. Without that movement we cannot have hope and the reality of our dream will not come to pass. The movement however small the progress is most important for it is the key that we are alive and are progressing. As long as we keep moving we will reach our destiny. It's not how fast we accomplish our task but that we keep moving toward our goal as long as it takes. Do whatever it takes and our dreams become our reality.

Are you one of those people who spend your present dwelling on the past? The past is becoming too important to you. You're avoiding the present, emphasizing past failures, indulge in guilt. None of this living with past hurts or what you perceive to be an insult is helpful. Evening the score isn't helpful either, because it is permitting the past to dictate the future.

The present, the now, the in-the-moment, gets lost. The present is mostly used as a reminder of past injuries or failures. You then react to things that occur to you in the present as if you were in the past. If you're thinking about things "past" in your mind, that past can then dictate your reactions here in the present.

When your thinking is about the past, that is your point of reference, and whoever you're dealing with has a big problem because you're not seeing or hearing him accurately. Instead, you're hearing echoes from the past. Those echoes carry pain in your mind and justify your attacks in the present in return for a past no one else sees and for whom it doesn't exist. Do you see how the past can dictate your future? Think of all the opportunities you could be missing out on.

Here's an example of something that happened to me just a few months ago. My family decided to meet at a small, local Chinese restaurant to eat dinner. We went in separate cars and my younger daughter was in my car with me.

Just as each of you has done hundreds of times, we were making small talk, and were pretty much oblivious to everything around us. As we parked the car, a minivan zoomed into the parking space next to mine, slammed on his brakes, got out and started walking toward the restaurant. He parked so close to my car I literally could not get out of the car. I quickly asked him to move the car before he went into the restaurant since I couldn't get out the driver's door. I said it nice, honest. (I remember I wanted to be a smart aleck about it, but I held back).

He walked back to his car, yelled something to me about it wouldn't have been so tight if I had parked in the space correctly then, as he pulled away his side view mirror hit my mirror and he zoomed back into the parking spot. Now I wanted to knock him out. My daughter, sweet little thing that she is, was encouraging me to knock him out. But I'm too old to be fighting. I'm a lover, not a fighter, or at least I hope so. We walked into the restaurant and, of course, we told the rest of the family what happened. Ironically, they knew who we were talking about because they saw him storm into the restaurant and, in their words "He was nasty to his wife."

It's a harmless example, but the point is that he was obviously living in the past. I'm not sure what had caused him to become angry. His past almost dictated an ass whipping. (I am smaller than he was. Dynamite comes in small packages! )

That's just an example to get you to look at your own situation so you don't make mistakes like that. Think of the times when you overreacted because your son left dirty underwear on the floor or your daughter left wet towels on the bathroom floor. You are reacting to something he's done in the past perhaps dozens of times and that something was upsetting to you.

If he had left his underwear on the floor dozens of times before, then you have to improve your parenting skills. You might be yelling at him about it, but there have obviously not been any consequences for it. Kids respond marvelously to consequences.

Let me give you another perspective. There's a company called Centerpointe Research which does a wonderful job of teaching people different techniques for avoiding problems like this. They will tell you that when you have a conversation with someone, you should come from nothing.

When I first heard them talking about communicating from nothing I thought, "Whoa, I'm paying for this?" Then I started to get it and I hope, in light of the above discussion, it makes sense to you. Come from nothing. In other words, don't assume anything and don't bring past history into this current episode. This is not easy to do, but once you get the hang of it, you'd be amazed at how much you were missing. We usually go into conversations with an agenda or a prejudice - some point we want to make, or information we want to get.

Try having a conversation with someone without trying to be right, without an agenda, without assuming you know what they want. In the beginning, you won't be able to do this easily, but if you'll just try it in one conversation, you'll sense the difference immediately as something very positive. And then you can do it more and more often. Once you get it, it's the beginning of listening. It's also a big step toward giving up living in the past and living in the present. Once you can let go of perceived insults, when you live in the present, you get to create your future. The past no longer dictating your future.

Being happy is a choice. Today is yesterday's problem. We can't dwell on yesterday. There is nothing we can do to change it. So I do not need to worry about it. The only choice I have is to live one day at a time and that gives me my future. Today is tomorrow's opportunity. If I choose to be happy now, then I must do the thing that makes me happy. Choose to be happy, find inner peace and happiness and you will have a better tomorrow.