A quotation

Life is not life at all without delight.

-- Coventry Kearsey Deighton Patmore (1823–1896)

Victory in Defeat

A quotation

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Cultivate everything

that brings you some joy

in being alive.

– from Carl Jung's letters

April Showers & Other Good Things

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

It’s a little hard to believe April is here already, let alone nearly a week gone. It’s also a little hard to believe – and somewhat disappointing – that I couldn’t find any April celebrations sillier than April Fool’s Day. Guess that one has to carry the month. I hope you played a good joke on somebody.

Anyway, I've been unexpectedly without computer access for several days, so I’m running a bit late with my monthly list of observations. But here they are, listed with any websites I could find, in case you’d like more information.

• Sexual Abuse Awareness Month -- This link lists a Google search for this observation.

• Alcohol Awareness Month (http://www.ncadd.org)/ -- an American site

• Counseling Awareness Month (http://www.counseling.org/) -- the American Counseling Association

• Eating Disorders Awareness (http://www.anad.org/) -- website for the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Eating Disorders

• Conflict Awareness Month

• Informed Woman Month

• National Child Abuse Prevention Month

• Couple Appreciation Month

• Reconciliation Day - April 2

• National Siblings Day - http://www.siblings-day.com/ -- a Google search page listing many links

So, I hope you have a great April. Whether you follow any of these leads to relationship and personal information, I urge you to listen to yourself and others. Open up to change and to feeling better. Learn and do what you can to become a happier, healthier, more centred you.

Flower Power

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

This is not a post about hippie Flower Power (though I did mention having been a hippie in a recent blog post).

No, today I'm writing about the wonderful power of flowers to cheer us up, wake us up and just generally help us feel better.

On a website called aboutflowers, I found a number of scientific surveys that show how beneficial cut flowers are when displayed in our homes and workplaces. Few people need to be told by scientists that fresh flowers look beautiful and cheerful, whether we've received them as a gift or have cut them ourselves from roadside fields or our own gardens.

However, this research shows that flowers don't offer only pleasing colours and scents. Cut flowers have also been shown to affect our emotional and mental selves. They can:

• decrease anxiety and depression
• help non-morning people wake up more happily and fully
• improve social interactions
• increase a general sense of well-being and satisfaction
• enhance intimate relationships
• foster creativity
• increase productivity
• improve learning
• decrease stress

So do yourself or somebody else a favour. Roam through a field or flowershop. Plant a windowbox. Buy a flowering plant for the kitchen table.

What a simple way for everyone to win.

I Hate That Life is Not a Fairy Tale...sort of

January 25, 2010

Ah, fairy tales...those sweet stories that have animals falling down stairs and little girls being forced into years-long servitude and innocent children getting lost in the bush and then cooked and eaten by nasty witches. What joys abound in children's literature.

If my life were like those fairy tales, I'd be in really big trouble. Fortunately, it's not. Unfortunately, it isn't always like the happy-happy, joy-joy side of fairy tales, either.

So, what to do, what to do... Well, as most people of a certain age discover, I've learned to recognize and accept that life comes in waves. The painful follows the ecstatic, which follows the frustrating, which follows the satisfying. 'Round and 'round it goes, with no clear beginning and no clear end.

However, what is clear to me is that all of us have what we need to make this time better than a previous time. It doesn't matter whether we're talking about seconds or decades. We can choose how to feel and think, what to say and do. We can choose to fix our mistakes or at least not repeat them. Believing these things helps me a lot, a lot of the time.

When it doesn't help, I keep in mind the sage words imparted to me recently by a student of mine: "Well, then, just suck it up, Buttercup."