Saved by a Mirror

When was the last time you woke up 

and realized that today could be the best day of your life?

Steve Maraboli 
(Click to Tweet)

Someone I know is changing jobs to save her life. After years in a sales job in a rather lucrative field, she’s pulling the plug. She can no longer smile as she passes on promises that she knows her firm won’t be able to honour. She can’t look at some of her long-term clients and tell them one thing, knowing full well that next week it will change. She is running away to find herself and to reacquaint herself with her integrity.

When she was younger, she said, she bent a few rules. There were children to raise, a mortgage to pay and dollars to be socked away for down the road. Time went on, and she witnessed the slippery slide to full-on fabrication (or as grandmothers everywhere call it “lying”).

She began to eat to take away the pain of what she was doing. She became unhealthy and then she looked in the mirror and said WTF, who is this staring back at me? The years of accumulated pretending did not look good on her.

June Create - completed under the Wire

June Create somewhere in here

June Create somewhere in here

Such a good idea, it seemed at the time. Spread all the pieces and begin. How many times have you spread yourself too thin? Thought you could handle it, and then felt overwhelmed? Where to begin, how to begin? Scary isn't it?

June Create somewhere in here

If we look at all we want to accomplish and take a close look at all our skills (or beads as the case might be), how do we stop, to focus, to set a goal, to finish something? My dining room table was the canvas for my June Create. For ten days it held my various purchases, and plans, and ideas.

I moved things around, I researched, I Googled, and I got lost but was encouraged on Pinterest. And then I sat down, sometimes with a tea, sometimes with a wine and made these.

Beads from Mexico - some handpainted

Mauve Power

Flower Pendant - opens

Sea Glass Necklace

Soft Sky Wraparound

It's up to each of us to assess our skills, our timeline, our fears and our JOY. Do something because you want to Play, do something because it makes you happy. Do something because it makes you You! Find yourself, Find your Bliss.

O Canada

Happy Canada Day!

Five years after arriving in Montreal at the age of 6, I became a Canadian Citizen. There are still some things on my Canada-to-do-list: See the northern lights, experience daylight at midnight in Yellowknife, drive across the entire nation, walk the PEI bridge, oh and eat a pastrami sandwich in Old Montreal.

What Canadian adventures are in your future?

Canoe, Mountains, Canada!

What will it take to get started? Important stuff to contemplate on Canada Day over a barbecue, a hike, floating in a canoe, or sipping a brewski.

Flow the Love

Jimi Hendrix

Turn the other cheek today.

May the power of your love ripple through everyone you meet.

Epilogue or Beginning

And so each of our stories has a beginning and a conclusion and then the next story begins. Each phase of our Lives another chapter, another drama, a spell of comedies, recurring characters or the same old character with a different name. 

I have a photograph of a family of brothers, each raised in the same household by the same parents. But all turned out quite differently from each other; temperament, skills learned, character all showed up in unique ways. Because each was just different enough from the other, and each child changed their parent and their siblings and time went on. So actually, they weren’t raised by the same parent or in the same family at all, were they?

Pleasure and Pain, we receive it, we give it and most importantly we do it to ourselves.

There are Nanas everywhere, “haven’t decided what kind” of granddaughters and no-good disappearing sons, there are also firm-handed men who stop the scarring and smiling library workers and people who drive the bus back and forth. 

Which one are you, which one do you want to be?

Do you wish to be someone different? Look for good models, they can be found if you keep your eyes and your heart open.

Who in your past makes you want to be a better person? It could be because you admire the way they were in the world, or you wish with every fibre in your body to not be like them.

Who in your present makes you smile? Look towards these people because they keep you grounded, ask them questions, don’t be afraid to learn. They will be flattered because not long ago they were standing where you are today.

Who will you choose to be tomorrow? Maybe not in the next 24 hours, but you are choosing with each decision and each choice you make. What are you doing today, what can you do today towards  finding your true self.

Now please play along with me and Choose 4: Write Your Own Story. Comment back here if you like, I'd love to hear your Story.

My Story or Yours - Part 2

And then I grew up. The day that I held all those hard-earned dollar awards in my hand, I walked the dust road towards town and hopped on the bus that could connect me to my future.

We all see the world through our own lens, through the filters we have created based on our life experience. And this is where we will take different paths in our story.

Choose A: if you feel that Nana and I were more similar than not.     "Two peas in a Pod."

Choose B: if you think that I turned out just like my no-good father.  "The apple doesn’t Fall far from the tree."

Choose C: if you hope that I had a better life.                                       "Sunshine days Ahead."

Choose D: and write your own ending to the story                               "Your Story is your Own."

My Story - The Pencil stub that started it All - Part 1

She gave me the stub of a HB yellow pencil and told me to get to it. My Nana was a miserable old broad and not too many people liked her. She didn’t care whom she offended, condemned and stared at. What the hell, she’d say when she saw a fat woman wearing a too short dress. Or, wipe that kid’s snotty nose, will you? at some negligent mama.

She didn’t like me either, and told me so several times a day. But she couldn’t expect much being as her no good son had spawned me. She’d sit me down at her kitchen table, which was carved with her anger. Thrown plates, scorches from a pan, even a carved in you’re an assh. I was sitting there just minding my own business, eating macaroni and cheese that day. The word was stopped by a firm hand by the nice man she was married to at the time. I thought he must be some kind of saint to stay, because he’s the one I remembered the most. But she eventually ran him off too. Lucky bastard.

She kept the pencil sharpener on a high shelf like it was some kind of special precious diamond. I wasn’t allowed to get it myself, but I was allowed to ask for it each time my pencil needed sharpening. I sat there every day, and wrote and wrote. Once I’d worn down the lead twice, and sharpened my pencil twice with Nana’s okay, it was okay to stop. She was that kind of miserable. Sit until you’re done, she’d say. I wrote a lot of stories in those days.

Of course, she took full credit when I won all the writing contests I sent away for. It’s all because of me girl, you just say so, cause you know it’s true, she’d say.


Part 2 - tomorrow...

Moving through the Rapids

When I think of flexible, I think of being relaxed in my yoga class. Of being able to bend, after hours of practise not only in to a posture, but also in life. Of going with the flow, knowing that there are many ways to Strength in the world. And also to Resilience. Using our core to keep us upright, to keep us balanced as we move through the flow of our class and our days.

Pliable on the other hand, takes away from your personal control. A pliable person may appear to be flexible, but they are really looking to decide which side to choose, to see where the benefits lie.  Most often they don’t want to make a decision that will be unfavourable to the masses. 

They will blow like the wind, will not charter their own course but are usually most charming and amiable. They can come across as relaxed and easy going, but guess what, they have no opinion! They will sit on the fence until their backsides are numb and everyone else has decided, then they will go with the majority even when the majority is wrong or choosing foolishly.

Banff, AB

Don’t confuse the Flexible with the Pliable. They might both create a vision of floating down the river but watch out for when the rapids arrive. The Flexible will be prepared and go to their core, using the momentum as a new adventure, the Pliable will be grabbing for the nearest life jacket or the closest shore.


Don't confuse the Flexible with the Pliable. (Click to Tweet)

Seeing the Cloud in every Silver Lining

Sally is rarely happy. She just can’t tolerate it when things are going well. She needs something to worry, complain and imagine will go wrong.

We all know a Sally. She will whine that this good weather won’t last and that it is sure to be miserable the day of her family barbecue. She hears of the illness of a colleague, and proceeds to list the family members she has had with a similar (or worse) illness over her lifetime.

She is looking older and more unhappy with each passing day. But she won’t stop.

Sally’s behaviour is unhealthy for herself and unsafe for you. You can sympathize and empathize only so far. We all have our worries, and most people deal with them quietly and thoroughly. We don’t need as many pats on the back, waving of flags or telling of stories.

Always remember, that Sally is not really your friend. You will not be able to count on her when things do not go smoothly in your life. She will not be able to support you or lift your spirits because she is addicted to her own unhappiness. The world is not a good place for Sally.

The weight of Sally’s cloud can bring you down. It can make you angry and resentful and in spite of your good efforts, it is probably best to let Sally continue to be unhappy. Because otherwise, she will add you to her on-going list of reasons that is misunderstood.

Keep your distance from Sally, because she prefers clouds to silver linings.

(Click to Tweet): ...she is addicted to her own happiness.