Lose our fear of being wrong.

To live a creative life,
we must lose our fear
of being wrong.

The art of slowing down

“no rushing anywhere, anymore”.

Learn more at the-art-of-slowing-down

10 Things Science Says Will Make You Happy

 Many thanks to YES blog

• Savor everyday moments
• Avoid comparisons with others
• Put money low on the list
• Have meaningful goals
• Take initiative at work
• Make friends and treasure family
• Smile even when you don’t feel like it
• Say thank you like you mean it
• Exercise
• Donate or spend money on others

How To Be Alone

By Gerti Schoen, MA, LP
http://blogs.psychcentral.com

Many of us have trouble being by ourselves. We are overcome by fear. What if something happens and no one is there to help? What if someone breaks into my house, robs me, hurts me? What if no one pays attention to me, and I am left alone with my thoughts and doubts?

Anxiety of being lonely is often deeply rooted in the experience of having been abandoned, either factually or emotionally. When a beloved parent dies early in life or becomes seriously ill or leaves the family, it is experienced as a traumatic loss that is never made up for.

But it’s not just about losing someone. When we are unable to be alone, often it is because of a perception that we are lacking. We lack the ability to take care of ourselves. Or to connect with others.

We don’t feel confident that who we are is good and whole and worthy. We need to be reassured that someone else wants to hang around us, and the other person’s attention makes us feel safe and and valued.

It’s when we can’t value ourselves that the need for attention from the outside world becomes paramount.

The good news is that we can learn to be by ourselves. What we need when we are in the grip of loneliness is connection. And when connection with people is hard to achieve, we can get it from other beings in our world.

Turn off all electronic devices. Sit for a few minutes out in nature or by the window. Pay attention to the silence.

Take in what you see. Really look at your surroundings. Maybe there is an old withered tree in the yard. Or a bird flying in the sky. Maybe it’s the scene of an urban street with shops, and hurried people passing by.

Feel how you are grounded by the weight of your own body, by the chair you sit on, the soil or concrete under your feet. When we focus on our bodies, the flightiness of our minds disappears and we can be just be present whereever we are. We connect with ourselves.

When we can feel our own presence, we are able to make a connection to the world, even if we don’t talk to anyone in particular. So much of the non-verbal ties we form get lost in the noise and frantic efforts to get something palpable, something to hang on to from an outside source.

There are more subtler nuances of connection and communication, but we usually don’t pay attention to them. We need to get comfortable with silence first, before we can notice them.

Don’t be afraid of the silence.

When outside distractions fall away, we can start to see ourselves.

http://blogs.psychcentral.com

Stuck

It's a beautiful day outside.
It's now 3.30 in the afternoon
I haven't set foot outside all day
and I'm still here in the house
trying to decide what to do

Cognitive Anxiety and Over Thinking

Recommended Reading for us ADDers

Cognitive Anxiety and Over Thinking

9 Ways to Focus on your Priorities

Extracted and abridged from Far Beyond the Stars by Everett Bogue
For full article go to here

1. Identify the four areas of your life that are most important to you.
2. Learn to say no to requests.
3. Start to eliminate things you don’t care about. 
4. Give yourself huge blocks of time to work on one project. 
5. Turn off distractions. 
6. Don’t comment on things that you don’t want to be involved in. 
7. Make time for important things. 
8. Tell people about your priorities. 
9. Learn as much as you can.

Far Beyond the Stars

Simplify Your Life with Balance

Edited extracts from zenhabits' excellent guest post 'Simplify Your Life with Balance' originally from Anastasiya Goers  

 

These are the habits that I need to work on at the moment:

• Don’t always need to be part of the team.

Social commitments can be a good thing sometimes but they can also be a huge waste of time.  There is no point in supporting causes that you do not feel strongly about or visiting events that are not interesting to you. We are often afraid of what others would think if we do not participate. Be brave enough to break away from the crowd and make room for what really matters in your life.

There are plenty more examples of social standards that we try to follow in life.

• Find the strength to let go

We feel uncomfortable letting go of things and memories that we are emotionally connected to. This connection makes simplifying life very difficult. We feel responsible for keeping certain things (gifts from our relatives of friends) and holding on to memories. Over time it leads to enormous amounts of clutter and huge emotional baggage that does not let you move on in life

Some memories (especially negative ones) can suffocate you. You need to find strength to forgive the person or even yourself for what happened. There is no way to change your past but there is a way to change your future. Grasp the moment and focus on living in the present.

Simplicity becomes very easy and enjoyable if you approach it with balance. Keep decluttering your life until you feel completely comfortable with the results and until you feel simply in balance inside and out.

Throw Away Expectations

 Re-posted From zenhabits

‘Act without expectation.’ ~Lao Tzu

How much of your stress, frustration, disappointment, anger, irritation, pissed-offedness comes from one little thing?

Almost all of it comes from your expectations, and when things (inevitably) don’t turn out as we expect, from wishing things were different.

We build these expectations in our heads of what other people should do, what our lives should be like, how other drivers should behave … and yet it’s all fantasy. It’s not real.

And when reality doesn’t meet our fantasy, we wish the world were different.

Here’s a simple solution:

Kill your to-do list

From Zen Habits

For the important things, you tend to know what you really want to get done. If you’re a writer, you know what you want to write, usually. If you’re a designer, you already have an idea of what you’re excited about working on. You don’t need a list. You just need to forget about the list, and get working.
Kill your to-do list, and forget about all the things you need to do … except the One Thing you’re passionate about, right now.

Zen Habits

Forever looking?

'Blue' by Joan via  picfor.me

Sometimes the best way to find what you're looking for is to stop looking

Andante

Makeover Time

Image courtesy Tumblr

 Almost a year ago I began this blog to help me out of a dark place.

Each day I looked forward to posting my personal thoughts and observations about life that I needed to get out of my head, even knowing they might go no further than this blog. I eagerly explored the worlds of fellow bloggers and gained new perspectives on life and love and the world we all share.

I gradually chronicled the journey I have taken over this past nine months seeking to find a place of strength, a place where I am able  to finally relax a little and consider the possibility of a brighter future.

I sense I may be very close to that  place.

To mark my newfound confidence in the future I have given my blog a makeover....new design and a bit more colour. Less Black....but still enough to highlight the wonderful coloured images that people share with me.

I am so thankful to all who helped me reach this point.

Andante

Embracing Uncertainty

Image from Sessa La

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is an excellent article by Everett Bogue from  'Far Beyond the Stars'  about the advantages of embracing the unpredictability and uncertainty in our lives:

"There’s been a lot of uncertainty in my life lately, which has made me think about the ways in which I’ve practiced in order to exist in a state of uncertainty without allowing situations to develop into negative situations.

The world is changing at a rapid pace. I know this because I see how technology is accelerating our cultural evolution with my own eyes. I know because when I look within myself I see how fast my internal sense of being is shifting.

I know because when I look outward I see people who can breathe, and I see those who are locking up in face of change.

The ones who can breathe are thriving. The ones who aren’t trained in embracing change are locking up, shutting down, and turning off.

Our first reaction to uncertainty might not always be the most healthy, or even beneficial. We want to search for security when faced with an overwhelming change, security often looks like a box. We throw ourselves into the box, the idea of what we’re supposed to cherish as ‘being safe’ as a way of protecting ourselves.

The box isn’t protection though, it’s a temporary prison. The change is still going around outside, you’ve just shut down your senses so you can’t feel it anymore.

The box can look like many things. The box can be trying to make plans to get past the fact that you have no idea what will happen. The box can be reacting in anger, jealousy, rage, placing blame on others, the external world, for allegedly causing you harm. The box can be ignoring that there’s any uncertainty at all. The box can be as simple as saying ‘it’s not my job to deal with the situation that’s in front of me.’

The longer you’re in the box, the more it will hurt when you come out.

The reality is that no one is ever causing you harm. The world is fluid, and change is the only constant. When we cling, to an idea, to an expectation, to a person, to a place, we simply end up causing ourselves more suffering.

We’re told by society everywhere, on the TVs, movies, books, etc that we need to control our lives. Everything needs to be in nice, clean, orderly rows. A job is supposed to be a job, a man is supposed to be a man, an email is supposed to be an email, a definition is supposed to be a definition, a marriage is supposed to be forever, and a btw why not go get a house in the suburbs and a two cars for the garage?

That was never our destiny, we know that because when we try those things they don’t feel right. Security makes us tired.

When we cling to the idea of security it makes us want to drink an entire bottle of Jäger and puke on ourselves. Security makes us want to turn off our Internet and throw that glass vase our aunt gave us that we didn’t want against our kitchen wall.

I’m writing this from a place of existing in uncertainty, I know because these days I’m not sure where I’ll be sleeping at night. I jumped on a plane to Seattle, and ended up in Boulder –which ended up being the best last minute decision in my life.

The reality of uncertainty is that it is actually the most rewarding state for humans to exist in. In an uncertain world, days can seem like weeks or months in the space/time continuum. In an uncertain world, ideas come at the speed of light. In an uncertain world, you can put your feet down in any city without a plan and you’ll survive, thrive, and discover the depths in yourself and others.

In a certain world, years can blink past in an instant. For me, the last month or so of uncertainty has felt like one thousand years.

far beyond the stars 

Khalil Gibran

Image source being sought

Khalil Gibran has an excellent text about parents and children:

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let our bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.

T.S. Elliot on Waiting

A  very good friend quoted to me the first line of this poem.

Here is the rest of the verse:

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope

For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love

For love would be love of the wrong thing: there is yet faith

But the faith and the hope and the love are all in the waiting

Wait without thought, for you are not yet ready for thought:

So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.

                                                                               T.S. Elliot  Four Quarters, ‘East Coker”,

Wake up, shoes on......Rain, wind or darkness

Wake up, shoes on.  Rain, wind or darkness.

Read more: http://adderworld.ning.com/forum/topics/finding-the-motivation-to?xg_source=activity#ixzz1AXNsxiFG

Stages of Grief Theory Challenged and the Healing Power of Exercise

This is an abridged version of an interview by Gretchen Rubin with Ruth Davis Konigsberg about her new book The Truth About Grief: The Myth of Its Five Stages and the New Science of Loss.

The Truth About Grief
Ruth Davis Konigsberg

"The book includes many interesting arguments.

For instance, the notion that people generally go through the Kubler-Ross five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) isn't supported by research. 

The Truth About Grief also makes the comforting observation that most people cope with grief more readily than is often portrayed in literature and movies.
 

The full full article can be read at the Happiness Project

Countering Stress and Depression - His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Image: Miami New Times

Here is a beautiful article by Dalai Lama from his Facebook Site (published in the Hindustan Times, India, on January 3rd, 2011)

At a fundamental level, as human beings, we are all the same; each one of us aspires to happiness and each one of us does not wish to suffer. This is why, whenever I have the opportunity, I try to draw people's attention to what as members of the human family we have in common and the deeply interconnected nature of our existence and welfare.

Rest

Value rest. It’s not a waste of time. To be honest, It’s the path to healing. I know this. 2011 I intend to live it.

The Simple Steps of Habit Change

The simple steps of habit change: (from zen habits:)

•  Write down your plan.

• Identify your triggers and replacement habits.

• Focus on doing the replacement habits every single time the triggers happen, for about 30 days.

That’s it in a nutshell!

But much more at zenhabits

Such as:

 1. Do just one habit at a time.

 2. Start small.

 3. Do a 30-day Challenge.

 4. Write it down.

 5. Make a plan.

 6. Know your motivations, and be sure they’re strong

 7. Don’t start right away.

 8. Write down all your obstacles

 9. Identify your triggers. 

10. For every single trigger, identify a positive habit you’re going to do instead.

11. Plan a support system.

12. Ask for help

13. Become aware of self-talk

15. Have strategies to defeat the urge.

16. Prepare for the sabotagers. .

17. Talk to yourself.

18. Have a mantra.

19. Use visualization.

20. Have rewards.

21. Take it one urge at a time

22. Not One Puff Ever

23. Get rest.

24. Drink lots of water.

25. Renew your commitment often.

26. Set up public accountability

27. Engineer it so it’s hard to fail. 

28. Avoid some situations where you normally do your old habit

29. If you fail, figure out what went wrong, plan for it, and try again. 

More at zenhabits

Existential Dilemma

ADHD-Don't shedule yourself out of your life

I saved this short excerpt from an article some time ago and thought it useful advice to post here. Unfortunately I have inadvertently lost the source and the author's  details.....My apologies.
"I recently gathered with 80 middle-aged women in New York City for a fun and rewarding day. The event brought laughter, tears, and relief to many of them who finally opened up about a long-held secret. They had spent their lives struggling with organization and low self-esteem at the expense of developing their talents and strengths. While worrying so much about time management and planning, they had scheduled themselves out of their own lives

Adult ADHD and Stress

This is a really good article on Stress and ADHD by  by Jennifer Koretsky that was published in the Fall 2009 issue of ADDitude magazine:

"How to 'Treat' Your Worry.....Why every ADHD treatment plan should include stress-management techniques, and how 'treating my worry' helped me.

Sleep

I NEED to sleep......

What I'd really like now is to curl up in a quite place.....and sleep....just for an hour or two....to refresh

Image from  Trend Coffee

Bird on the Wire

Leonard Cohen

Like a bird on a wire,
like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free.

Like a worm on a hook,
like a knight from some old fashioned book
I have saved all my ribbons for thee.

If I....if I have been unkind,
I hope that you can just let it go by.
If I .....if I have been untrue
I hope you know it was never to you.

Like a baby, stillborn,
like a beast with his horn
I have torn everyone who reached out for me.

But I swear by this song
and by all that I have done wrong
I will make it all up to thee.

I saw a beggar
leaning on his wooden crutch,
he said to me......"You must not ask for so much."
And a pretty woman
leaning in her darkened door,
she cried to me......"Hey, why not ask for more?"

Oh like a bird on the wire,
like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free.









--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sometimes......

sayingimages

Live in the present

Image - SayingImages.com

We are what we think

Image- SayingImages.com

This is so true

It is important that we are thinking good thoughts as much as we can. It really makes a difference in how we live our life.How we think about challenges and adversity can determine how much they will affect us.

Have Some Fun Today

            Image:carver art Fashion: maelle bordier            
 Model: Heather Blackstone

 I just love the deep bright colours and playfulness of this photo