I make and sometimes break New Years resolutions...so

Okay, moving right along here. Went out and bought yet another bathing suit today. I have several in increasing sizes in a bottom drawer so this isn't a new idea. What is new I just put the suit, a towel, the never worn years old thongs, and soap into a duffle bag. That's never happened before. Chatting with the delightful clerk about my yearly bathing suit purchase and how I never actually get to the pool she said something about it being hard sometimes to make the effort in winter driving conditions. I could have kept my big mouth shut but no, I admitted I live 2 blocks from the pool. She has a wonderful laugh :)

Let it be, let it be, let it be, let it be...

I think we can have awesome, life changing days and with a little effort we can ignore their wonder and carry on as if nothing has changed and consequently, it doesn't.

Then there's that other hand. And on the other hand, I'm pretty sure this is one of those awesome, life changing days and it's, outwardly at least, nothing special. I'm not willing to ignore the wonder. Not willing to carry on as if nothing has changed. I've changed and I doubt that anyone but you and me will ever know a thing about it. 

That's the thing about life changing moments, eh. They happen whenever we decide, in this moment, to change our lives. It's not necessarily some external happening of momentous consequence, the lottery win or the big promotion, it can be a thought that pops into our minds when we're not doing much else with our minds at that moment. The frost on the pumpkin made glistening by the days first rays. The random drop of dew that picks up the colours of an early rising butterfly. It a 'just'. Just a thought. Just an earth shattering, mind blowing realization that the person you imagine you could be you can just let be.

Kick it up a notch

I've been using a brain training site ( www.lumosity.com ) for a couple of years. This morning I'd completed the days exercises and clicked on the link to see see what (how) I'd been doing at the beginning of this adventure. It's shown as a kinky line. It started out really low. No surprise there. But after a year, last summer about this time actually, it rose dramatically. Really dramatically. I mean suddenly it appears I was three times smarter than I had been a while before. So I was knocked back on my heels and sat in that akward position trying to remember what the hell happened last summer.

Okay, here's the thing. I did remember. I do remember. Remember, I've been doing exercises to aid in, among other things, memory, for a couple of years or more.

I remember doing the Penguin maze puzzle thing one day and thinking, 'wait a minute. I'm not doing the best I can do. I'm just trying to do better than I have previously.' I decided to really invest in this thing. To REALLY do my best. That's when the line took a leap skyward.

Now a year has passed and it's finally hit me. I do that thing--that simply trying to not do worse--in a lot of aspects, perhaps most aspects, of my life. I'm going to stop doing that. I'm going to kick it up a notch.

My safe place, at last...

I just figured out why I find it so hard to leave home. I'll find any excuse not to actually head down the road. It's not that I don't want to travel around a bit more than I do. It's simply a matter of finally, finally, feeling fairly safe and unpressed right where I am.
     When I was a kid home was a scarey, unsafe place. I married people who were scarey, unsupportive and demanding as hell. (my choices, granted) and right now, aside from the fact that the area is rampant with thieves and vandals, I feel safer here in this little house than I ever have anywhere else.
     So, when a friend suggests a visit, as much as I'd love to go, I tend to find many things that suddenly need to be done around here. There's always many things to be done around here. Good grief. What's my problem.
     Maybe it won't be a problem now that I've figured out the big, fat why. I LOVE those big, fat whys.

A new affirmation for you

Here's an affirmation for you. Bury your little bundle of index cards in the back yard and get out a blank card, put your favorite butterfly sticker on it, get out your strawberry scented, lavender coloured felt pen and write "DO LIFE" across that sucker in your best handwriting.
Now roll it up and stick it up....

Well, you get the idea.

Gambling had me by the … ovum?

Well, who would have ever thought it. I have a gambling problem. Me. It happened so fast and I can’t believe how insidious it is. I was listening to CBC radio one day and a broadcaster did a bit about a promotion that BC Lottery was doing on their on-line website. You deposit a hundred dollars, make a hundred dollar bet on a certain game, and you win a hundred dollars. Well, I did it and it worked. I was up a hundred dollars. But it worked for them, not for me. I don’t dare even think about how much I’ve pumped into that stupid thing since then. It isn’t desperate or ruinous or compared to a lot of folks, significant. Thing is, I don’t like it.

I started getting on there three times a day. I’d sign in and sit with my first coffee. And what I find really creepy is, it’s in the house. MY house. 24/7.

Today I was having lunch with a friend and she had just lost a whack of money and had decided she was going to go to the local casino and opt out. That’s where she has a problem. After lunch I went online and spent a mindless hour or so watching fruit flash by my bleary eyes. That’s where I have a problem. I realized this used to be fun, and now it isn’t. I ran it down to zero balance and opted out for six months. It feels good.

I'd highly recommend it. 

Thinking it through. In the midst of the flurry. . .

With so many things coming at us from every direction, it's harder to find time to think. Think about it. When's the last time you really took a good chunk of time just to ponder an immediate situation. Everything needs an immediate answer, right? Wrong.

One of the best things most of us can do for ourselves is to learn (relearn) the simple phrase, "Let me think about that." Second only to, "I'll sleep on it and get back to you."