What I love…

I love this – in spite of the fact that I have moved so fast I couldn’t catch myself most of my life, I value the simple life. I love home and my dog and music and books and quiet time. For so many years I have been devoid of true quiet time… only those moments stolen in the still of the wee morning hours were truly mine.

I love community; I love helping others and knowing who my neighbors are, but after losing my mother and father, I find that I must claim some of the hours that were normally slated for everything else, for me – to drink in the memories of my 70 years on this planet and all I have done and learned and un-learned.

Reflection gives way to a better today and tomorrow, allowing me to share, hopefully from my experiences to help people avoid the pitfalls I myself have encountered, as well as the joys and successes. 

We all have a book inside of us…mine has been being crafted for years…it is actually on my bucket list is to bring it to fruition before my time on Earth expires.

My favorite book in the world, as I have said many times, is “Simple Abundance.” It saved me at a very dark time in my life. Once I discovered it, I read it daily for five years. That daybook of simplicity, joy, balance, order and harmony suggested tools that I did my best to apply to my life. I did and the dedication to those 5 principles birthed wonderful results, even with the ups and downs of life that we all experience.

I commit to re-visiting that life-jacket of a book in 2019. Simplicity – as I learned from that wonderful book – is indeed simple, for it taught me that “All you have is all you truly need.”

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Thoughts are THINGS

Many, many years ago I was introduced to a book, “You Can Heal Your Life” by Louise Hay. The book tells of Hay’s journey in life and her battle with cancer to her healing. She did work on herself and guarded her thoughts to help her achieve a cancer free status. The book details in a dictionary like form the mental causation of the physical manifestation of illness. I have often consulted that book to see if there were actual parallels to whatever ailment I was experiencing.

If I were totally honest with myself, I could see that my thoughts or belief about something, especially when my emotions were super-charged over some issue going on in my life, truly provided some insight into what I needed to do to change my health and ultimately the way I life my life. It also made me examine my belief system – was it something I really believed or was it someone else’s belief system I was exposed to and accepted as truth because it was someone I loved or was an authority figure. The bottom line is that I do believe that “thoughts are things,” and that whatever we dwell on or believe is true for us. Some may say this is new age mumbo-jumbo but the truth is that it parallels many passages in the Holy Bible:

-Proverbs 23:7 – As someone thinks within himself, so he is.

-Proverbs 4:23 – Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it; comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”

2 Corinthians 10:5 – We demolish arguments and every pretentious that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ; each me, God, and know my heart; Psalm 139:23-24 – Test me and know my anxious thoughts.

See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. And, there are so many more.

The great philosophers, great statesmen such as Benjamin Franklin, great leaders and even many closer to our lives today remind us that what we think about we bring about. Anyone struggling with an addiction or trying to eliminate a habit knows that their thoughts affect their actions. It is a minute by minute job to guard our thoughts from negativity. We hear it over and over, “Is the glass half empty, or half full?” Henry Ford said, “Think you can; think you can’t; either way, you’ll be right.”

Vision Boards, affirmations, prayer and meditation all assist us on our journey and, if it is our desire, helps us to change our lives for the better. I BELIEVE that my thoughts affect my actions!

This memory post is for me – not posted for debate – for we all have our own thoughts and beliefs and should respect those of each other. I write this as a reminder for myself that “Thoughts are things” – powerful things – and that I must choose the good ones for my life to flow in the direction I want it to flow.

Love & Longevity – My return to the work I love

In 2014 I did an interview on a book called, “Younger Next Year.” It was written by a doctor of internal medicine, Henry S. Lodge, and an athlete, Chris Crowley. The overall premise of the book was “how to live optimally well into your 80s and beyond.” The book illustrated three major precepts:

The first, passion – it is what gets us going each day – makes us want to get out of bed; second, exercise – which is more important than what you eat because it nullifies some of things we do to ourselves with our food choices, and third, an intimate relationship – not necessarily sex, though it could be, but definitely someone you can trust to share your deepest, darkest secrets with, and who has your back.

I see many people retire to travel and live life – I truly have already lived an adventurous life – and retirement is not a thought for me right now. I still want to work. Though I may not completely have all three requirements, the job thing is so important because it does consume such a large part of our lives. I know that writing exercises my brain, interviews excite me, and chasing down the facts of a story causes my blood to circulate without interruption of flow. Steve Jobs seems to have possessed a lot of wisdom about the “job” you are in, and his thoughts on this resonate with my own.

I BELIEVE if you are lucky enough to find and get to do what you love, life will drop you a life jacket that keeps you afloat even though your body, and sometimes your mind, exhibit the effects of aging…but, it does so with grace. As to exercise, my four-legged companion, The Doggie Lama, is not happy if he does not get to walk each day and see another human being or pet on the walk – so I do get exercise, though not cardio, with him. As for an intimate relationship, I have not found that person of the opposite sex that “lights my fire,” yet, but I have a couple of female friends with whom I am able to share ANY thing and feel confident they have my back.

So… I think I am set to make it well into my 80s and beyond, if the authors of “Younger Next Year,” are correct. If not, you will know it and say, “Well, that didn’t work for Barbara,” but either way, those three precepts from the book give me the motivation to do my best to make each day matter towards the goal of “living optimally well into my 80s and beyond,” because I only want to be here if I am making a difference.

In my mind, what I can share from the reporting and interviewing I do can make a difference, because I get to search and deliver all sides of an issue or recount someone’s own story about their life with others.

The three precepts from “Younger Next Year” reminded me of keeping the inner fires of my soul ignited.

My Sunday musings for MYSELF.