Being self employed and making my own hours in my own business is a real freedom.  That means if I don’t feel like going to work, I don’t have to.  If I want to take off early, I can do it.  since I’;ve been doing it since 1992, I’ve learned what my deadlines really are, and when I really have to work.  Usually, though, I work about 8-12 hours each day simply because I dig the work.  With my paws on the mend from final layout over-doing last week, I took the weekend off from the office altogether, for the first time in a long while.  I simply did not go in at all.  I checked email from my laptop and simply put off anything that required typing.  I didn’t even check voice mail.  Then when I went into the office before 8:00am today, I felt completely refreshed, since I’d had a break from it. Continue reading →

I’ve been having a bout with the old carpal tunnel syndrome, so have been re-posting writing that I did in 1997 to keep the typing and mousing to a minimum.  I am glad I never had the surgery, and found there are fairly easy ways to keep the carpal tunnel under control without surgery or medication.  I see Dr. David Rindge, my acupuncture physician, for laser therapy when it acts up every few years, and it was his initial treatment after a car accident in 2000 that made me decide to not go the surgery route.  Several months of twice weekly treatments and I felt good as new.  Now, when I overuse them, I know to put my wrist splints on and get off the keyboard.  I don’t grip or hold anything I don’t have to.  I don’t lift anything heavier than a glass of water and I ice my wrists down a few times a day.  The splints stay on all day and all night.  A week or two of this and I’m good as new again.  I also have a violet ray enhancer that I use on it, and it helps free the blocked chi right up.  When this bout is over, I believe my new practice will be to wear the splints every time I am at the keyboard (since I do so many hours of it), and at night as well. I am used to them and they are comfortable enough to ignore.  I also do regular arm and hand exercises, and some light (3 and 8 pounds) hand weight work to stay strong.  No hand weights during the rehab/resting period! Continue reading →

In April, I began keeping track of what I eat and the time I eat it.  Not the calories or the fat grams or the portion size, just a simple list of what went into my mouth when.  Over the past several years, my eating habits have drastically changed.  I keep my fat grams under 40-50 a day.  That way I never have to count a calorie or portion size, ever.  I eat a lot of salads and vegetables to get nutrition from them.  The only processed food I eat is some bread, some pasta and the occasional canned soup.  No cookies or crackers or chips or cakes or donuts or candy bars or that type of thing.  My weight has stayed the same the past 4 years with no effort.  But it wasn’t until I began keeping the food diary that I realized the keeping of it unconsciously programmed me to eat the foods and at the times that I wanted to commit to writing.  I found that interesting. Continue reading →

It’s nice sometimes to just sit in the dim light and reflect on the things around me. As I was typing the Table of Contents for the upcoming Horizons Magazine, I looked at the graphic image of the rosebud. Tight in a bud ~ I could almost feel the tightness. I got a sense of anticipation, of tension, of a wanting to relax into fullness, of a wanting to ex-press oneself. (Express: to make known, to force out, to subject to pressure so as to extract) I thought, that’s true of so many of the people I know now. So many on the verge of bursting forth and ex-pressing themselves. That’s why I chose a rosebud and the accompanying Anais Nin quote on the Table of Contents: “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”  Continue reading →

A couple of people have asked me what I think are the karmic implications of bootlegging cds for friends, so I’m posting something I initially wrote in 1997:

The Universe Crashes My Computer
So what’s playing out in my life right now and what lessons are there to be learned from it? Hmmm, I have this big cold slowing me down, making me have to rush at the end to get this issue done on time; then one day away from completion, my computer’s Pagemaker program crashed and I was left with pages of magazine articles unprinted, no way to even open them up and no layout program to help put them together if I could open them up! I took this as a sign from the Universe to go where I wouldn’t be distracted, sit quietly, and ask (1) what was to be learned from this and (2) what was my quickest way out of it? Continue reading →

Yesterday I walked around the property while it was still cool in the morning, and sprayed the air potato vines.  This year I really have them under control, but that took several years of spraying during the season.  They are pretty, but they choke out everything they wind around.  Sound like anyone you know?   I cleared out my car to prepare for this weekend’s delivery of the September Horizons and ran out to do some errands.  On the way back, I stopped at Mid Eastern Aromas by FlaTech, where I picked up a veggie combo (eggplant and pickle!) sandwich and their stuffed grape leaves appetizer, which comes with hummus.  After lunch, I saw Izzy lying on a table in my office and he looked so adorable I took a short video of him for Facebook. The Izzy Cam seems to be popular on Facebook.  At one point, I rubbed his belly and I don’t know why out of all the freeze frames that Facebook had to choose that split second my arm was in the shot.  I was wearing my wrist brace, since my right paw has been on the mend for a few days, and it’s kind of goofy looking.  Goofy looking because when I first got them, I dyed them pink, and they are pretty shaggy by now. But they work, so I don’t care how they look. Continue reading →

Yesterday morning I had just finished up some work and spent a few minutes web surfing and came across the Gateway to Agape Choir singing a favorite song “Wholly Holy Way” It was perfect timing before my 4:00am morning meditation.  Afterward, I napped until 8:30am and then went to see Dr. David Rindge, my acupuncture physician, for some laser therapy for my right paw.  I’d over worked it with the computer mouse during the last week of final layout, so after a little R & R it will be fine again.  The laser treatment gives almost instant relief.  Thanks to David, I never had carpal tunnel surgery after a car accident in September 2000 as two doctors recommended.  Every few years I might overdo it like this week, and the laser treatment fixes me right up.  On the way home I stopped at the produce stand and got roma tomatoes, scallions, mushrooms, garlic and yellow onions. I eat a lot of onions and garlic. It keeps my immune system in tip top shape.  Back home, I spent an hour putting online my new recipe for Low Fat Pasta with Cherry Tomatoes, Calamata Olives and Capers, then I made some for lunch. Continue reading →

You know that song Any Day Now by Ronnie Milsap This favorite song has such a fun, upbeat tune and such sad words.  It used to bother me, thinking I could no longer listen to it, so I would not “program” myself with “negative” input.  Then I realized I didn’t have to make such a big deal of it.  I could just assign different meanings to the words.  Like living in the ashram and when we’d hear pop music, we’d change the love songs into songs to Krshna. The song now is simply to the beloved who has found their way to The Beloved.  No sadness and loss in being left by one who has a higher calling.  And the same with another favorite song, Only the Lonely by Roy Orbison.  I love the upbeat tune that just makes my body want to dance, and whatever key it is in, just makes the cells of my body come alive.  But if you hear the words with conventional meaning, it’s a sappy, pathetic song.  So I just asign different meanings to the words.  When I hear the words, I think, “Yes, only the blissfully solitary can have any idea of how wonderfully free and joyous it feels to answer to no one and to immerse yourself into everything around you, and find joy in the being with it.”  So I adore the song and it makes me happy, even though everyone else may not get it as a happy song.  Just like in the rest of life, we have to read between the lines and extract the pleasure and joy out of every single thing that faces us.  Especially if, like the song, we’re going to let it play over and over in our thoughts. Continue reading →