Deanna Verbouwens - Happiness is…

*My four year old pummeling me with hugs when I come home from work.

*When my husband does the dishes…without a nudge (it happens a lot!).

*My seven year old kissing me good morning, without fail every morning!

*Knowing that I still have the mental strength to run 6 miles with relative ease.

*When support pops up in the least expected places.

Find more from Deanna:  www.theunnaturalmother.com

FROM FUNK TO FISHNETS...BRINGING SELF BACK

Dawn Boyle
It's here. The very last week of "summer". I feel like it was over in a blink of the eye. I feel that the days, months and now years are going too fast. I feel like I am entering into a new phase of my life...

A handful of months ago I turned 40. I handled it pretty well, if I may say so. I celebrated with my family and friends (somewhat - I think someone slipped me a mickey that night...you know who you are). I barreled into my new coming of age year with balls to the wall. I have to admit, I fell short of all the personal promises to myself. I wanted to accomplish way more than I did. I will say I kept to my word on a number of key issues, but once again let myself and my attempt at continuing it to be a "ME" year flat line.

I am not one of those people who believes in making resolutions, but I have to do something to bounce back. To get out of the funk that has encompassed me for a while now. I am taking the starting of the school year as my key to unlock the bullshit I have allowed into my own head and release it.

I had a good summer, not a great summer, but a pretty good one. I feel that I really need to start reading the Soul Food on our site, I need inspiration. I need a boost. I need a fresh start.

My friend Mary Sunshine tells me all the time that it starts with believing it and making it happen. So I say this...I believe. I believe that it's time to snap out of it and MOVE FORWARD. Leave all the crap of what is coming up on the year anniversary behind me. To let go of the issues other people have that for some reason I take on as my own. I need to embrace my immediate future and make it happen...what "it" is, I am excited to reveal within myself.

It's time to pull on the FISHNETS and let it ride!!! START SOMETHING POSITIVE TODAY. MAKE A DEAL WITH YOURSELF TO MAKE THIS A YOU YEAR!!! SHAKE IT UP  AND LIVE THE LIFE YOU WANT TO LIVE...I am going to give it my all!!

YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE IT! EVERYDAY!

Barbara Ward-Finneran

What enables us to go from what we are today to who we want to be tomorrow?

All the options that exist in today's tech savvy and fast moving world along with all the decisions and choices open to us each moment don’t necessarily give you a sum of happiness and optimism at the end of the day.  How has the simplicity of that beautiful aspiration been lost along the way? Multitudes of options seemingly make life overwhelming, not easier.  Wouldn’t it seem like many choices would make life easier.  Rather the opposite is at times blindingly apparent.  With choice comes responsibility.  UGH!  Therein lies the problem.  Do you become trapped in not choosing rather then risk the wrong one?  

Although not easy to admit out loud, or in this case, write and read typed out, I’ve been making choices by default.  By spinning my wheels. YUCK!  I despise that - yet I have been lost in a cycle of it.  By not keeping your eyes on the prize and focusing on the outcomes you desire, you let life happen to you, instead of creating the life you crave and deserve.  I know better.  I do better.  So, WHY?  Why am I, why have I been floundering in a pool of potential?  

I’ve been putting in some time soul searching for that "AH-HA answer".  It’s not a black and white issue, so there isn’t a simple answer, but a spectrum of shades and tints to investigate.  Layers to peel away, acknowledge, and feel before you can escape the torture of life in the gray and once again look through those technicolor glasses.  I know I have those glasses!  Hell, I usually blind people when I put ‘em on. They have been just out of reach - like that lip gloss that you know is in the black hole of your purse.  Reach in feel around, pull stuff out, you know it’s 'freaking' in there.  Yet there is no getting your hands on it till later when you can get somewhere and do the “great purse dump” in a safe place with decent lighting.  

Seems my mind and heart have needed a “great purse dump”.  Yet like when looking for that lip gloss, sometimes you choose to forget about it, rather then finish the task of searching for it, or finding the time, energy, and place needed for the “dump”.  You use (choose the safety of) the chap stick that you have pulled out ten times instead or just go without.  

WICKED IS AS WICKED DOES

Barbara Ward-Finneran

I am a big believer in the idea that you have the power within you to create your own happiness.  Foster your own dreams and fashion a reality that is the sum of your combined goals and talents.  The life you dare to imagine dwells in your spirit and feeds your soul.  To change anything, to create anything that you imagine or desire takes one thing - YOU.

If you get lost in the doubts.  Let reason rule why it can't be done.  Listen to the nay-sayers. Abide in negativity. Or allow impossible to be in your vocabulary. You have already put the writing on your own wall.

You are meant to have an astounding life! To accomplish your own greatness.  To have love and happiness abound.  You have to believe it!  Desire it!  Want it!  Speak it into being with your thoughts words and deeds.  Challenges will surface and if you view them as tools to learn and grow rather then as just obstacles and endings - things seems to turn a corner sooner.

I CHOOSE HAPPY!

Barbara Ward-Finneran

It amazes me how many people don't allow themselves to be happy.  Really happy.  Happy in that light-hearted, enthusiastic, positive, energetic kind of way.  Happiness is not a luxury.  It is a choice!  Not to choose it - seems to me, to be a very unfortunate form of self-denial or torture.

Being happy and positive fosters motivation, gives you and edge, makes you look and feel better.  So, why does it's importance get so overlooked?  Now, I know people, WANT to be HAPPY... but they seem to lack the concept that you have to CHOOSE to be HAPPY!  This choice has to be separated from your troubles and challenges - we all have those.  Many which you cannot completely or instantly control or change.