Here's How You Know What a "True" Friend Looks Like

So many people I meet tell me about their friends and when I hear the bad things these "Friends" say and do to them I think this person does not know the definition of friend. Some adult children say they are best friends with parents that are not their friend.  How do you know the difference?

When you are friends with a "true" friend:

1) You can tell them bad news and they will not tell you why you are so stupid it happened to you.  Or ask you what's wrong with you? Or why do you get into these situations? When will you grow up? Why can't you do better? Or they may launch into how something worse happened to them once and derail the entire conversation.

You can actually tell a "true" friend bad news and they will listen.

2) You can tell them good news and they will help you celebrate instead of telling you something good that happened to them years ago or worse tell you, they know another person who did way better than you.  Go away from that person, this is not your friend. Family members can be like this. When family is like this you don't want to share your good accomplishments, you may be afraid to tell them because you know they may feel bad about themselves when they compare themselves to your success, or find a way to belittle your accomplishment.  This is not a healthy environment, stay away.

You actually cannot wait to tell your "true" friend because that friend will suggest a celebration party even if it is only the two of you and then actually celebrate with a date on the calendar!

Pick true friends that celebrate your discoveries, your growth, your successes, your dreams.  You do not want to be around people that are sitting in misery and can only be with you if they can bring you down to their level of "no responsibility" to make their lives better.  Victim personality will settle for a life they claim they did not choose but reality is they choose that life every day they don't make a plan to change it. Don't fall for the lie "they can't change their life," yes they can. But remember it is NOT your responsibility to change it for them!  You can't! You can only change YOUR life and friends. Choose new ones now you know the basic truths of what a true friend is, move away from negative ninnies even if you are related to them.

Get on with your good self and living the good life, even if you have to go it alone for a while. Tie a knot and hold on, never give up! You will find true friends, they are NOT a dime a dozen. To find one you first have to know how to define what a true friend is.

You are deserving of a wonderful group of people to discover new things with, discuss new ideas with and try to make life better for you. In turn you will be a part of them making their life better. If your family, your parent(s) cannot support your efforts to be better and do more, love them as you move on without their approval.

Thankful to have found a handful of these true friends that I love, thankful to have married my BFF.  Thankful to have three wonderful friends in our "adult children" and now with their fantastic mates. Wow, I have more than I ever dreamed I could. Life is good. You can make your life good too. 😉

Every successful person knows this, it is not a secret. Surround yourself with positive supportive friends. Now that you know one part of the success formula, get on with your dream.

The Campfire Turkey

When we moved into our new country house with acreage around and wildlife, the older children would be in school and leave me and the baby to spend our days playing. The little guy liked to play alone with trucks and matchbox cars. He had 300 matchbox cars and yes he played with all of them. We took walks outside every day like I did with all the children when they were growing up.

There were days when I would take his trucks and him out to a dirt pile just north of the house and watch him out the window as I cooked lunch. On one glance out the widow I was horrified to see a huge turkey, as big as three year old Steven, taking a dirt bath in the yard about 15 feet behind him. I had seen turkeys here but never thought about whether or not they would hurt you. I never approached one and now my baby was within 15 feet of him taking turkey time for a long dirt bath.

I was so scared I thought if I run out there it could spook the turkey and cause him to fly at the baby and I did not want the turkey to hurt him, I did not know what that turkey might do, I wanted to protect my little one. A thought to call my husband… I knew my husband was raised on this farm and would know better how to approach this situation. My husband advised me to wait and not go out there or yell, but sit still. He said that turkey will not hurt Steven, and you don’t want to scare Steven or teach him to be afraid by my reaction. So I waited nervously.

The screened window allowed me to listen and wait. I was so far away had the turkey tried to go after him I could not have gotten out there fast enough to stop him. I dare not go around the house or downstairs and take my eyes off then both. His father was right once again as many times before when I turned to him for advice about the kids in areas I had not a "calm" idea.

The turkey was spreading his tail feathers and flapping his wings, I thought for sure if Steven got scared when he heard this he would cry out and I could call to him out the window that “Mommy was coming!” and that would help calm him until I could run out o him.

The turkey bathed in the dust for about 20 minutes, dust was everywhere. Steven did not turn around at all, he never saw the turkey. The turkey completed his dirt bath and walked a few steps towards the baby, watched him a minute or so and calmly walked into the woods. No harm intended or done.

Now three decades later there is a campfire where the turkey bathed that day long ago and that little guy is all grown up. He has gone to school, in the military and traveled the world and some nights when he is home with us he chops wood and sleeps out by the fire all night. Now when I see turkeys meander near him while he sleeps I don’t panic anymore. I know the turkey is curious and our son is a man as comfortable in the woods in nature as I was as a teenager.

When things were unhappy at home for me I use to take blankets, a pillow and a Bible and drive out of town as far as I could, many times crying, and then I would pick a place to stop. Go into a cow pasture or a wooded field, build a fire, read a Bible and sleep there all night. I would stare into the fire and think about my life, where I was going, where I had been, and what to do next, But for that night, I was just being happy to be alive, safe alone in the woods, and at peace for a while. I would ask God to help me find my life, he did not answer but I waited, I had no choice.

In time I did see the next move and then I moved to the next chapter of my existence. Maybe this is why I love real fires whether in a fireplace on a snowy winter day, or outside in the woods, I get lost watching the flames. Thankful for my life now and this wonderful son, Steven. He was an answer to one of my prayers and I did not know it then as a teen but I do now.

Happy Birthday Steven, so glad you are ours.

Love always, Mom & Dad

What App Is Draining Your Battery?

Yesterday I was walking along the Long Island Sound Beach and wanted to track my miles. My husband uses an app for his distance walking and bicycle miles so I called him for the app. He told me I downloaded it and stopped it when the walk was over.

The road home was a back road that lead me beside meandering mountain streams with ripples of water over gray black stones. Rock walls on either side of the road cut my cell service off for a period of time as well as XM radio. The day was blue skies, warm air, but cool enough to breathe in and feel renewed, a peaceful ride home.

When I returned home I did some household tasks and went to bed. When I woke up a few hours later I see my battery was getting low and there was a notice that an app was running in the background. I thumbed through the apps and see the walking app was running even though I stopped the walk, after not being able to stop it I had to go to settings, look up app and completely uninstall it, it was the only way to stop it. 

This reminded me of our mind and what I study about the thoughts and mind.

We have a conscious mind thinking all day long but in our subconscious there is a program that really affects the outcome of what we do every day.  This subconscious was programmed when we were in the theta wave of learning, the first seven years of our life.  If we were taught to fear anything or anyone, it was set up there.  The only two fears we are born with, fear of falling and fear of loud sounds are innate, but babies don't have depth perception that is why they will crawl off a table or jump into your waiting arms in deep water. 

The fear of failure, the fear of embarking upon an idea we have that will start a business of our own, the fear of never enough money, the fear of not being lovable, the fear of not being enough or acceptable, fear of lack in anything, fear of rejection, fear of too late now, these fears were programmed into our subconscious by fearful (but well intention-ed) care takers in an environment of lack when we were innocent babies. 

So this is the app running 24/7 in the background draining our battery, our entire adult life unless we see the problem and fix it.  But how?

This app is running in the back ground of your mind 24/7.  This is where self-sabotage and fear of being able to trust yourself, or make a sound decision is programmed and running all the time. It is an app in the background of your mind in your subconscious that must be found and stopped. Sometimes you can uninstall the program, sometimes you can force a stop, and sometimes like me, you have to dump the entire program and start over from ground zero. Before you can do any of this you have to identify the app because it is draining your battery for living life to the fullest with acceptance and approval.

My book is to help people identify the app in their brains that is draining the battery so you can reboot, dump, and become the programmer of your own life.  When you have a dream you can accomplish it with less stress and struggle. Only you can identify the app and only you can take the appropriate actions to uninstall it and put in good apps to ensure your success.

Thankful to see this, find the new apps that help me most to program me successful and loved, every day.  This is why I write my book to help others identify and dump a negative app running in the background of their mind so their battery will not burn out before they are settling for a life they did not plan.

Success starts with me deleting programs in my mind that drain my energy for living. Eliminate these stressful thoughts from my subconscious. Does this mean you will have no problems? Heck no, life happens, you can't control anything but your mind.

One helpful way to reprogram your mind for positives is to find a recording or make one with your own voice, which speaks positives of the outcome you want in your life. Play every single night when you are falling asleep.  This will "begin" the success app in your subconscious. Try it for six months and report back with your outcomes to this blog in comments. Changing your thinking is closer than you know and can be easy once you "see the negative app running" and stop it. Change your mind, change your actions for the better.

Ben Franklin had a Good Idea, Let's Try It

Ben Franklin knew himself well. He set everything on paper for his own clarity of the day.  No idle moment because his life was so exciting. What if we knew how really exciting life is and knew we were important to be present and enjoy every moment of it even if the moment is simply to breathe in and breathe out to smell fresh air or pause to really enjoy a flower, a tree, or the site of a wild animal?

This darn mind and the negative thoughts that can prevent us from being present and content.  So important to stop, give your mind space to NOT think, and just be.  Nature does this for us all if we only let it.

Ben Franklin had a basic understanding that he was here not to just live for himself but give of his talents to the world.  Where was this instilled in him? Society? Family values? Or did he discover this in his own determination to help build a land for the free? This United States of America?  when your WHY is big enough you will absolutely find a WAY.

What do you want to do to share you talent with the world and be your own person? Is your WHY big enough? Then get on with it, greater days are coming your way when you do.

You need a plan, a schedule, and then let's see if we can like Ben, incorporate these two questions into our daily schedule:

In the morning set an intention:

What good shall I do today? 

At night write in a journal the answer:

What good did I do today?

We can make the world a better place by this intention and action every day because we are all here to help one another whether we realize it or not.  And every day we decide what we will do to make this come true, whether we realize it or not.  Be careful what you say your mind is listening.  Act now.

Thankful every day for the mind to make decisions and the will to carry it out.  If you need help try BF schedule for starters and tweak it for you.  Try it for a week, month or three months, any length of time helps develop good discipline to get you in control of your life.

"You gotta run your own life, or it will run you to death."

Gratefulness and Depression Cannot Abide in the Mind at the Same Time

The answers to this life are easy and within your reach but you have to discipline the mind.  We can change our habits, stop the addictions, but if we don't discipline the mind, we will slip easily back into old negative habits in a second.

This is a road I have traveled so often that I am very familiar with automatic negative thinking and the work it takes to get out of it.  Negative self talk is destructive to a joyful life. Life can become joyful instantly when you stay present in the gratefulness of every thing you have now no matter how little it may seem at the present moment.

If something or someone you loved is gone, be thankful you had that thing or that person for as long as you did and accept it is gone. This makes space for new things, for new people, for new love to enter. This makes life easier.

Depression is looking back and becoming sad about things that happened or things you did, but you and I can do nothing to change it now. If we accept and vow  not to repeat mistakes, to move forward and let go of the past then the past has served it's purpose, lessons learned.

The more depressed, the longer the list you must write until the grateful attitude is more prevalent than the anger of depression that leads to helplessness. Helplessness can lead you to give up, don't.  Begin again today, move forward, life is good and we are not here very long.

You are not helpless, you are not a victim when you are in control of your own mind.

This is not easy and the WHY has to big or you will not find the HOW. My WHY is so big, my mental pain was so great, I will study, meditate and renew my thoughts every day for the rest of my life, in this I find I  am the luckiest person alive. Namaste.

Thankful to know this works, if it worked for me, I know it can work for you.

A Grasshopper Scientist

With a baby stroller for the new sister and our scheduled after breakfast daily walk we went outside on the country road where every day in the warm weather I took our babies to breathe in the fresh clean country air and enjoy nature.  He had not been walking long at 14 months he had taken his time taking his first step and to this day he takes his time before taking any step, he is wise that way. His sister arrived when he was 16 months of age.

On this day we went to the end of the driveway and he stopped, pointed and grunted, Uh, Uh, he had not learned to talk yet but in his baby way he let me know he saw something and wanted to know it's name. In the grass there was a green grasshopper and he was so intrigued he immediately lie flat on the ground with face next to it to get a closer look.

"Grasshopper." I said, "Grasshopper."

He stared at it as it crawled ever so slowly up a green blade of grass, not disturbed by the baby face presence so close. As it moved, the baby was fascinated and I decided to stop. Stay far enough away not to intrude on the grasshopper scientist research. He looked and looked, the grasshopper did not move for many minutes as it sat, it finally rubbed its two back legs together and the little scientist looked at me pointing to it as if to say, "Did you see that?"

"Yes," I replied. "Grasshopper."

Now I could have said, "Ok, let's keep moving, I have a schedule to keep..." But I did not.

The little guy got to his knees and sat back on them, eyes fastened on that grasshopper. In that moment I thought, this is his time, his time to relax and discover how wonderful, entertaining, and comforting nature, insects, animals, trees can be if you stop and look and listen.

So I waited, his baby sister and me. She sleeping, me with a book in my hand which I always had with me to read while waiting, watching, while children discover, play, enjoy being free, being little.  No clock to rule our time, just curiosity.

Finally as quickly as he had plopped down on the ground, he got up and the grasshopper hopped off. He was through with his research for today and ready to move on. I  glanced at my watch, he had been fascinated watching that insect for 30 minutes.  So with pacifier in his mouth, he took my hand and we walked on.

It's moments like this I remember when I realize he is 35 years old today. The joy he brought into my life at 28 years old as a baby, he still brings to mind now that he is a man, grown, far from home living life on his own terms many years now.  A Marine Corps Vet, an independent thinker, a kind-hearted soul, a loyal friend to his comrades, a devoted brother and son to his family, a kind man to his girl, a musician, a hard worker, he is a good, good, man.

So thankful for that grasshopper scientist that was given to me for a short while. I held his hand for a little while, he holds my heart forever. Children are like that. I loved being a stay at home mom for our babes and they taught me more about love and selfless giving than I ever knew before having them.

He is one of my happiest thoughts, I have three.  Happy Birthday! Jr.  We love you forever and always!

Listening Is The Most Dangerous Thing To Do, Most People Don't Know How

In The Garden of Eden some religions teach it was not the woman taking a bite of the apple that caused the fall of Adam and Eve from the paradise they enjoyed, rather it was the "listening" of Eve to consider another point of view that was the down fall of them both. Had she not listened to a serpent, she would not question what an outside source, "God" had commanded her not to do, and she would not have acted to take a bite of the tree of knowledge.  This is a great story, but one God did not intend or write.  Yes, I believe in God but not religions, I believe in me.

Religions promote this; "Don't listen to another point of view, this ideology has all the answers you need. Study the scriptures of our belief, all answers are there."  This lack of questioning is to keep followers from thinking for yourself and possibly abdicating the religion altogether.

When you begin to think for yourself you will find you are kinder than you know, you have peaceful solutions that come to you without outside intervention.  Many times you find you are kinder and more forgiving than the religion you follow.

All religions, proclaim this is the "only the true religion."

This belief alone is divisive.

Listening.  When you listen you consider what another person is saying and if that other person is persuasive enough that listening may change you. Change what you think, change what you say, change what you believe, change how you act.

Now listening is beneficial when you are an adult and have developed critical thinking skills through life experience and education. To listen to two differing ideas and to have the patience, the reason and logic to do your own research before you speak, without selfish righteousness, will move to a place of compromise that is more harmonious and peaceful.

But most people listen with the thought of evaluation based on fixed preconceived opinions. Most listen only with the intention of defending their own point of view.  When you are thinking while others are talking you are not listening, you are gearing up for a fight for a personal agenda to be pushed instead of allowing another to have their say.  This always causes division.

Calmly listening to another point of view when you are young, doing your own research to find truth and be aware of all the facts on both sides of the issue instead of pushing a personal agenda you were spoon fed from a reliable source, will give you truth and confidence.  Hatred has an agenda and does not heal any situation no matter how noble.  It cannot give new ideas and answers for a better solution.

Listen we will learn something we did not know. Thankful as years go by to know I do not know everything and to really listen is an art.