While we can’t avoid our lessons in life, we can live in such a way that when challenges arise, we have plenty of support at the time we need to go through them.

Our personal reality is always changing because it changes to reflect our shifts in consciousness.  We see the world around us change as we change.  As the Talmud and Anais Nin said, “We do not see the world as it is, we see it as we are.

Put it there, pardner

I read an article today Project Husband – She’s Got the Gown, Now She Needs the Groom. Silly me, but I thought getting married was about finding someone to love, not just having vacant slots that any possible partner could fill.  I wrote a year ago that I’d been talking to a male friend who is on the single and dating circuit.  I’d written earlier at Online Dating Scams and Online dating: E-Harmony vs. Match.com about the insincere types who are on the dating scene simply looking for a meal ticket.  Dave is a handsome, successful guy and the situation he encounters often is that after two dates, all the gals want him to meet their folks.  Dave is the complete package.  I told him I guess these gals are so darned smart that they figure that out by the second date. I am always surprised at the number of women I speak with, friends and clients I counsel, who still seek a man to support them.  It’s like when most chicks are kids they are trained to play games where they are the bride and they plan their wedding, and they spend the next 18 years doing just that. They go over every single detail in their mind, the dress, their bridesmaids, all that stuff. That’s why they look at every date as a prospective groom.  They’ve been playing that game all their life, and the next step is a face to paste into the groom’s photo.  It doesn’t matter what face gets pasted in for the groom, that can be just about anyone.  The important thing is the wedding itself.  That’s what they grow up dreaming about and planning on.  So if the men feel targeted, that’s because they are.

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Talk about a rough night. A British tourist was seriously injured when he fell off a hotel balcony on the Spanish island of Majorca while sleepwalking, falling 35 feet from a third floor window, suffering serious head and facial injuries and a broken leg, according to the UK’s Daily Telegraph newspaper.  His girlfriend tells police he regularly sleepwalks.   Original article at Tourist Seriously Injured After Sleepwalking off Hotel Balcony by Fran Golden.  As a sleepwalker, I’ve learned to place wind chimes at each doorway and door, so I have a series of chimes to gently wake me up if I try to walk out. My sleepwear is always something I wouldn’t mind showing up wearing in a neighbor’s headlights. It hasn’t happened yet. The most drastic thing I’ve done is load a shelf of books into the washing machine (glad I didn’t turn it on) and once I put my pillow in the refrigerator.

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I have friends who are writers, artists, teachers, musicians.  With rare exception, they all say “I can’t promote myself,  I can’t review my own work.” I’ve learned that’s a cop out since all it takes is a little serious consideration, and you can’t expect anyone to be more excited about your work than you are.  If you’re not excited enough about it to review yourself, you may want to work on that first.  I learned early on with Horizons Magazine that (1) it takes a lot of work to write a review and (2) I don’t have time to get good at it; and (3) printing a book review is giving free ad space, so I instead creating a monthly Suggested Reading and Listening column. Continue reading →

This morning was like many other mornings.  I woke up with an idea in mind that I wanted to write about, and by the time I got the computer turned on, other thoughts came to mind.  Then I took a quick look at email to make sure nothing was urgent; it was downhill from there.  By the time I quickly answered a couple of emails, my other thoughts had flown the coop.  It was just as well, since the main computer was acting up.  This would be the perfect week for computer whiz Chuck to take a look, so I sent him an email.  I came into the living room and, as the laptop booted, I pondered how often I allow my morning to begin like this.

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I wrote on Facebook this week: “A friend is complaining to me that she did someone a favor and they didn’t acknowledge it or thank her for it. I told her if she did it for acknowledgment or thanks, she might wanna check her agenda. Either do it happily as a gift, or don’t do it at all. That way it won’t eat you up inside.”  One friend commented” “Would you do the favor if you didn’t like them?  This is hard to do if they are mean and spiteful too”  I replied, “I’d do the favor especially if I didn’t like them.  It’s only hard to do if you keep reminding yourself of the mean and spiteful things they do. Where your focus goes is what you keep reacting to.”  Don’t expect to be repaid a favor by the one you did the favor for. If you really knew how it worked, you’d just do favors all over the place and not care who they went to or who they came from.  To paraphrase Mother Teresa, and Kent M. Keith People can be thankless and unappreciative, help them anyway.

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