It’s Friday!
For anyone questioning themselves right now, know if you can imagine it, dream it, you can achieve it. I believe this with my whole heart.
I’m so glad you to see your smiling face!
I’m sending Good Karma your way for a great weekend with friends and family staying COVID safe.
Melinda
I wish you could see the happy dance I’m doing right now after receiving my first COVID vaccine today. I’m so impressed with the University of Texas Southwestern for the professionalism and getting me out at rapid speed, under thirty.
I packed a tote think I would have to wait for at least 30 iTunes, I didn’t sit still until in the observation room, and then for only 15 minutes.
I know you are counting the days until you get your vaccine and soon we’ll all have a chance.
Melinda
I was kindly gifted The Joy of Selfish by Michelle Elman from WelBeck Publishing Group for an honest review. The book was released earlier this month and the timing is perfect. This is a must-read for everyone.
When I saw the press release for the book I knew this book was going to be a great seller. Most people know that taking care of themselves is important but they don’t look at it as critical to their health. Well, it is. If you keep putting yourself behind others and the daily task you have, you’ll never get around to yourself. You have to plan and make yourself a priority, and most importantly is you have to buy in 100%.
It doesn’t matter if you’re chronically ill, a mother of five, just retired or a college student you need this book. It’s never too late to set boudoirs for your life and create the life you want and envision.
Michelle Elman is a five-board accredited life coach, award-winning activist, author and podcaster. In 2020 she was named one of the Top 50 most inspirational women in the UK and is respected globally for her work as a body positivity influencer, best known for her ‘Scarred not Scared’ campaign.
Michelle has over 300k followers across Instagram and Tik Tok and has been a guest on media outlets including Sky News, Channel 5 News, Loose Women and BBC Radio London. She’s written for publications including HuffPost, Grazia, Metro and Stylist. Recently she coached Emily Atack on her series ‘Adulting’ and appeared on Geordie OGs to discuss online bullying and its impact on mental health. She also featured in the BBC3 documentary Being East Asian which aired earlier this year. Michelle’s podcast, In All Honesty, is available on Acast. Her first book, Am I Ugly?, was published in 2018.
The Joy of Being Selfish redefines selfishness as a positive act, allowing us to love ourselves and those around us authentically without apology, It explores the different types of boundaries, offers tip on how to start setting them, and helps with the quilt of felt after boundaries are put into place.
Learn how to deal with her of being disliked, common responses to boundaries, dealing invitations, block/mute/delete-how to limit information, learning to express yourself-and most importantly using you inane power to start a new life.
The idea of taking care of ourselves is being selfish is outdated and ridiculous. If we do nothing but give until we are depleted who is going to take care of us let alone our loved ones. I can’t agree with Michelle more on this message. Self-care is not selfish and if so then get selfish.
In 2015 Michelle was a Life Coach at crossroads in the direction of her career focus. She decided to see a Business Coach. Little did she know this chance meeting would make her future very clear and she set out on a mission to accomplish her new goals.
The Joy of Selfish is a tool for anyone who needs guidance in setting boundaries. dealing with guilt, self-sabotage, and help with dealing with the outside influences that try to throw you off track.
WelBeck Publishing Group
We are Welbeck Publishing Group – a globally recognized, independent publisher based in London. Our mission is to deliver talent-driven publishing with leading authors and brands worldwide. Our books and products span a variety of categories including, fiction, non-fiction and stationery and gift. We are renowned for our innovative ideas, production values, and developing long-lasting content.
Welbeck’s amazing product comes to life for adults, children, and families in over 30 languages in more than 60 countries around the world. We have collaborated with many of the world’s leading institutions and licensors including – Disney, Universal, Paramount, HBO, Queen Productions, FIFA, International Mensa, Roald Dahl Literary Estate, the Science, Natural History and Imperial War Museums, and Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Melinda Sandor
Have a great Wednesday!
This is a photo of the White House taken in 2015. I had to funk up the colors but not too bad. Life was very different 2015 or so it seems. We’ve had our share of challenges as a country since the beginning of time but right now it seems every day is an uphill battle. I pray we can come together as a country, lessen the divide and make America the shining star I know it is.
I look forward to seeing you again next week.
Melinda
The facility close by has finally received vaccines and I have an appointment on Thursday for my first dose! I can’t tell you how happy I am. I had no idea when my time would arrive and was so shocked when I found out today.
Keep your chin up your day will soon arrive and you too can get protection for this killer virus.
I’ll keep you posted on my experience.
Have a great day.
Melinda
By JUWON PARK, Associated PressPublished: February 16, 2021, 6:11am
SEOUL — K-pop star Eric Nam was having a meeting in New York when he suddenly felt a pain in his chest.
“I thought I was going to have to call 911,” he said, recounting the experience from 2019. But instead he remained sitting and “had to quietly breathe my way” through the meeting, he said.
Similarly, Jae-hyung Park, better known as Jae from K-pop band Day6, was in a cab returning from a music video shoot in Seoul last year when he experienced what felt like a heart attack.
At first, he put it down to stress, saying that for years he had dealt with “out of place” and “weird” feelings. But he realized he couldn’t ignore the symptoms, and in the “calmest voice” asked the driver to take him to a nearby hospital.
“I’m … feeling like I am going to die, I am going to die, I am going to die,” he recounted.
Park and Nam said they later found out they had suffered panic attacks.
Many recording artists struggle to cope with the trappings of fame. In South Korea, as in many cultures, talking about mental health issues is seen as taboo, causing K-pop stars to grapple with depression and mental illness on their own.
Nam and Park have joined other Korean American K-pop artists in raising awareness about mental health beyond the K-pop community by publicly sharing their personal journeys.
Nam moved from his hometown, Atlanta, to Seoul in 2011 and launched his music career after competing on a Korean music television show. A Boston College graduate, Nam said the racism he endured growing up in suburban Georgia left deep scars on him.
He explains he was bullied and even spat on by a classmate. “It was one of the most degrading, embarrassing, infuriating moments of my life up until that point,” Nam recounts on the first episode of MINDSET, a paid podcast series he’s just launched to promote conversations about mental health and wellness. “And I think still to this day that is a topic that I never feel comfortable speaking out about.”
Nam said he also struggled with an identity crisis as a Korean American, being treated as an outsider in both South Korea and the U.S.
“It felt like I didn’t belong anywhere,” he said.
Park, born and raised in California, said he had difficulty navigating between two vastly different cultures. And the intense competition in the industry also affected his mental health.
“It’s a dog-eat-dog world,” Park said of K-pop.
Park was offered counseling from his record label, but said he found it difficult to connect with his therapist and eventually took a break from his career last year, when his band went on a hiatus.
He took part in Nam’s podcast series as a celebrity speaker.
Nam is hoping the shows can address stereotypes and stigmas surrounding mental illness.
“I never thought that I would need, I would want to talk to somebody about my mental health,” Nam said. “But once you’re in that position, I just didn’t know really how to deal with it. And so I remember those very isolating kinds of moments that I had had earlier on in my career.”
This was one of the most popular posts last year and I felt it was time for an update since my routine has changed somewhat. New Year’s Resolutions or goals as I call them, can start to lose their luster at the end of the first quarter of the year.
The key to lack of motivation is to look at the root cause, maybe it’s time to shift your thinking to realign the goal with where you are now, today, not three months ago. We have to constantly reassess as life and our health changes, hard and fast resolutions don’t work for me. They don’t allow for changes.
Despite having Chronic Lyme Disease, Fibromyalgia, and Hypogammaglobulinemia., which is an Immune Deficiency Disorder, I’ve been relatively healthy for the past year or so. I count my blessings and chalk it up to some big lifestyle changes including learning to forgive myself. If I get off track, I can’t beat myself up or if I need more naps than I think, I have to take them without quilt.
I believe self-care is the things we do every day to stay healthy, not just the special moments we spend taking care of ourselves. I’m learning more every day about the importance mental health plays on physical health, they are intertwined.
Below are the simple but important steps I work to accomplish every day, there may be a day or two where I don’t get outside or go to Starbucks but as a general rule the outline is my daily schedule.
We go to the Starbucks drive-thru for a coffee. We have a huge container of Clorox wipes and have a routine we go thru before leaving the drive-thru to ensure we don’t get the virus. We take the dogs with us and it’s like a family outing. When the time allows we take them for a short walk at the park. This is where I get my exercise in each day, or however many days a week I can.
Taking all of my medications is critical to my physical and mental health.
Women’s over 50 Multi-Vitamin with Calcium.
Biotin for healthy hair, this step also boosts my self-image.
Calcium 1200mg.
Vitamin D with K-5000 IU of D3 and 180 Mcg of K2 MK7
Probiotics 100 Billion CFU
Nicotinamide 300mg-Recommended by my Lyme doctor to help improve the immune system at the cellular level.
Manuka Honey, Certified UMF 20+ (MGO 850+)
Use Vegan CBD products.
Eat fresh fruit and yogurt for lunch.
Reduce stress by meditating several times a day for at least 5 minutes. Nothing fancy, no special location in the house, just in my chair or wherever I’m sitting.
Only watch one hour of news, 30 minutes local, and 30 minutes national per day!
Light an aromatherapy candle, placed somewhere I won’t forget it’s burning.
In spite of COVID, I still schedule critical doctor’s appointments and lab work.
Getting outside for fresh air even for 10 minutes. Just hearing a bird call can change the outlook on my day.
There are several bird feeders and a birdbath at the kitchen window that my husband takes care of for me. I can not tell you the enjoyment I get out of seeing the birds, woodpeckers, and squirrels every day.
I spend multiple times a day with my dogs, one on one attention and training. It’s rewarding to watch them grow and learn. The love I get is unconditional.
Go to bed 1.5 to 2 hours before bedtime. During that time, there is no sound, no computer, no phone, nothing. I lather up with my CBD creams and favorite hand lotion and a touch of aromatherapy oil. Sometimes I’ll turn on the diffuser.
That extra time gives my mind a chance to wind down, get all the ramblings out, and let my mind completely calm down. At bedtime, I take my sleeping meds and another round of CBD cream. I’m now ready. Rarely do I have trouble going to sleep.
I don’t accomplish these every day, it’s impossible to always have the motivation to do what’s best for our health. Looking at the big picture each week I can see if I’m focused on the right things, if not I have to ask why. Sometimes it’s just that life got in the way.
There’s no one size fits all to have the best healthy life but we all can take steps every day to push ourselves forward. What small steps have you taken each day to improve your physical and mental health?
In Health,
Melinda
Wait your turn!
Take what vaccine comes your way first!
I’ve kept my mouth shut thru the entire COVID crisis, not one post. Today is my day.
In order for the WORLD to kick the COVID 19 virus and prepare for the next killer virus, 70-80% of the world population has to take the vaccine to stamp it out! That’s a TON of vaccines. That’s a TON of science behind creating a vaccine in under 10 years. It’s a TON, a logistic nightmare that is not managed in a central process under a standard set of rules.
Each state, county, and city can do their own processes, they are given guidance by the CDC, which by the way is the leading scientific organization we have in America, but each entity who thinks they know better can serve the vaccines as they wish.
I know you’ve heard all this information in bits every day but the bottom line is there are so many moving parts and time is still only 24 hours in a day. We have several promising vaccines and possibly one getting approval this week. We still need millions and millions of doses and companies and time to make enough for everyone to get a vaccine.
Why am I stating the obvious, I just need to vent. There are people who truly need the vaccine first, and even if you don’t or I don’t agree, which may be on a number of issues, there are some clear lines. Even with what I see are clear lines, my state, county, and city may not administer exactly as I would prioritize. That is life!
Dr. Fuchi has made it clear when he thinks we will all have a chance to get vaccinated, there are logistic hurdles in there beyond his control but I buy into his theory that by the end of this year everyone that wants a vaccine will have a chance to get one. Last week I heard him say a much more aggressive timeframe but I’m not buying into or repeating that one. I work hard to deliver no FAKE news here.
Everyone will get a shot, we have to wait our turn and realize science is already working at warped speed and our day will come.
If you’ve already received your shot, Thank GOD! You’re a good American and a smart person. I look forward to my day, I’m on the High-Risk list but no vaccine has been available to me yet. I will be in line with pride, with my MASK ON to take my shot and kick COVID 19 in the ass.
Melinda
We regularly think of our home as one big building. We tend not to even think of our gardens as being truly part of the property per se. This is because it’s easy to become more attached to the space that we live in day after day than the space that we hardly visit. This could be solved by sitting in our gardens for more times of the year but that’s not the issue that is being looked at. We are going to focus on what types of outdoor living structures could be best for your home and why? It’s quite simple. We want to look at the cost of building, space and leisure as well as style.
A garden home is separate from the home. It’s not attached (usually) and it can be styled in a totally different way to your main property. It’s usually for guests as it will provide one bedroom, a small kitchen that is probably linked to the living room. It makes sense to have an open plan for this just so there is a feeling of more space. It should be seen as about half or maybe two-thirds of the space that a normal ground floor would provide. But what can you do about it? Well, it’s best used as an extra space that can be converted into a different kind of space when needed. It can be a game or entertainment area. Maybe it could be a play area for your small children, or maybe, a guest room.
An annexe is linked to the main home. This means it will have a hall or corridor that allows the occupant to enter the home directly, from the annexe. Many people might not understand why this is so, but when you see this granny annexe explanation, you’ll understand why. It helps older people to essentially move into your home, without actually, living inside it. They will have their own bedroom, kitchen, bathroom or shower but they won’t have a lounge area or dining room. Usually, this kind of property may cost anywhere from about £5,000 to £30,000. However, the living conditions are excellent and there is a separation that you can create, physically, so you have privacy and space for yourself.
The next best option aside from these two is the log cabin. This is great for properties that are by waterfronts such as lakes, rivers, or streams. But it can also double as a cabin for a home that is in the forest or countryside. It’s cheap to build as the materials are essential, insulation in themselves. Logs don’t need insulation like a normal house with hollow walls does. To build a cabin, it might cost anywhere from £5,000 to £15,000. It provides space for one or two people. It can be a two-story building or just a bungalow.
What is your favorite type of outdoor property? We think that space and leisure are a delicate balance, but the cost always plays the deciding role.
This is a collaborative post.
Melinda
The most common reason for hair loss is genetics. If you have a history of hair loss in your family, it is more likely that you will lose your hair.
This is known as pattern baldness, both male and female. It will often start slowly and in patterns, such as thinning hair and bald spots at the crown or a receding hairline. Most of the time, people who have a family history of baldness will expect hair loss, but this doesn’t make the initial occurrences much easier to confront.
Just like stress can cause your hair to turn gray, it can also contribute to hair loss. Too much stress leads to your hair thinning out, and you will usually find it most frequently when washing your hair in the bath or shower.
Such stress can come from a traumatic event, and the hair loss symptoms will usually last for at least a few months after. However, the good news is that this is usually temporary.
Some hair treatments, such as certain hairstyles or products you use in your hair can also contribute to hair loss. The more strain your hair is put under, the less healthy it becomes, and this can cause the hair follicles to fail, causing your hair to fall out.
Chemicals can also impact the thickness of your hair, but like stress, this can be temporary is you catch it early enough. If you experience hair loss after changing shampoos or testing new products, go back to your previous products to see if there is a difference or consider searching for PRP (Platelet Rich Plasma) treatment to help slow and stop hair loss.
Hair loss can also happen as a reaction to certain illnesses and medications, such as cancer, arthritis, and depression. Often, this is a side effect of medication you take for the illness, although the stress of the sickness can also be a factor.
There are also medical conditions like alopecia related to your immune system and leads to hair falling out in patches, ringworm, a scalp infection, or even chronic hair pulling, a disorder also known as trichotillomania.
For anyone who considers their hair part of their identity, suddenly losing hair can make you feel entirely unlike yourself. It can cause stress, lack of confidence, and affect your mental wellbeing. However, if you can understand why you are losing your hair, you can come to terms with it more comfortably and even consider ways to prevent or halt losing more hair.
This is a collaborative post.
Melinda
It’s the weekend!!!!!!
I’m so glad you’ve joined me this week for another edition of Weekend Music Share. I love music, all types of music, and can’t imagine life without music as a backdrop. I know many of you feel the same way, I’ve read your comments over the years and know how much music can mean in a person’s life.
There’s a strain on us all, across all borders and at times it can feel bleak. One thing to remember is we alwasy have each other, alwasy have and will get thru another storm with the help of a friend or a stranger.
Have a great weekend!
Melinda
Welcome back to Weekend Music Share; the place where everyone can share their favorite music.
Feel free to use the ‘Weekend Music Share‘ banner in your post, and don’t forget to use the hashtag #WeekendMusicShare on social media so other participants can find your post.
It’s Friday!
I’m so glad you to see your smiling face!
I’m sending Good Karma your way for a great weekend with friends and family staying COVID safe.
Melinda
To celebrate Rare Disease Day 2021 this February 28th, here are just 5 reasons why raising awareness of such conditions is so vital.
Rare Disease Day 2021: 5 Reasons Awareness Is Important — Invisibly Me
Imagine you’re the hero in one of your favorite movies. In a hero’s journey the character sets out from his home to learn, grow and “get beat up” from life experiences. The hero faces villains along the way and overcomes many obstacles. The hero then comes home and helps everyone around him. The Pandemic has […]
The Hero’s Journey — Shedding Light on Mental Health
Have a great Wednesday!
I took several beautiful photos of jellyfish at the local aquarium and couldn’t help but funk them up. What do you think? Can you still tell they are jellyfish?
I look forward to seeing you again next week.
Melinda
A week ago a major winter storm hit a large part of Texas causing several of our pipes to freeze and it left us without water. The plumbers are wrapping up the repairs and I’m ready to jump for joy! I will not miss having to put water in the toilet every time I need to flush and can’t wait to take a hot shower!
This is me!
My prayers are with the many who are still struggling to get water, repairs, and some even housing. Please donate to give water to local charities if you can.
Melinda
I want to say first that we are totally blessed!!!!!!! I have nothing to complain about by a small inconvenience when people have lost everything they owed , have no where to live, and still have no running water and electricity.
This storm didn’t catch us by surprise but the magnitude of it did. There is no way to prepare for a storm that Texas is not built to the specs to handle that type of weather.
I will be watching closely to see who our power suppliers show transparency through the aftermath of the storm, what we’ve learned, and did they do all they could This is the last major storm we’ve had since 2011, which brought sweeping changes from the shortfalls then.
I’ve included a few photos of the small inconveniences we’ve had to go thru, the biggest is not having running water and having buckets of water in the bathroom to flush the toilet.
Yesterday it was the 70’s and today a beautiful 60 degrees. That’s Texas for ya!
Please give to local charities if you can to help to provide meals and water to those without not to mention the devastation that will show itself in the coming weeks.
We have three water lines broken, a drain on the pool frozen, the line for the ice maker broke but we consider ourselves extremely lucky.
Please take advantage of the warming centers if you don’t have electricity and most importantly check on the elderly.
I’m sending all my fellow Texas lots of love and love to the rest of the country who are dealing with record temperatures.
Melinda
By Marc Malkin
Ozzy Osbourne is finally in a good place.
The 72-year-old rock legend, whose battle with alcoholism and drug addiction began in the 1970s, has been sober for about seven years. “I thought I’d be drinking to the day I die,” says Osbourne, who took the first of his many trips to rehab back in 1984. His wife and longtime manager, “The Talk” co-host Sharon Osbourne, 68, struggled for years to keep the Black Sabbath frontman safe and capable of performing.
Ozzy, Sharon and their 35-year-old son, Jack, who has 17 years of sobriety, sat down with Variety’s Marc Malkin for an in-depth talk about substance abuse, its effect on families and what it’s like to seek treatment while living in the Hollywood spotlight.
Ozzy: I’ve always been self-medicating because I’ve never liked the way I felt. I’ve had great success in my life, but I’ve never felt great about myself. And so, from a very early age, I used to sniff fumes, all kinds of things, anything to get me out of my head.
Ozzy: I think the first time I took a drink. I needed help to get the next drink. And I never went for a drink. I went to get fucking smashed. I just checked out every day. And that becomes a way of life. In England, the thing is the pubs. I don’t know what it’s like there now, but when I was younger it was “We’ll meet in the pub.” Everything was around the pub. One of the last things my father said to me before he died, he said, “Do something about your drinking.” So I had a drink.
Sharon: I knew nothing about alcoholism. Nothing. I had worked with a lot of musicians, a lot of actors. And I just thought that’s how people are when they drink. I just thought, “OK. They just like to drink.” That was it. I understood nothing about the “-ism.”
Sharon: I learned about it when Elizabeth Taylor went to Betty Ford Center. And that was exactly 36 years ago.
Ozzy: She said to me, “I found this place where they teach you to drink properly. It’s called the Betty Ford Center.” And I went, “That’s it. I’ve been doing it wrong.”
Sharon: I read the stories that she was there for drugs and drink, but I knew nothing about AA. I knew nothing about what happens there for your recovery, nothing about how they educate you. I just said, “You’ve got to go.” I was pregnant at the time. And I gave birth to Kelly, and the next morning, Ozzy left for Palm Springs. We lived in the countryside, way up north in England. And it was very barren, and all there was were the pubs. I just knew that this wasn’t the way people should carry on when they’ve got kids.
Jack: No, I guess I didn’t want to be the downside of it. I wanted to be the upside of it, because the upside of it, when things were great, it seemed like a lot of fun. I wanted the excitement of crazy adventures inebriated.
Jack: It was like a bit of a staggered disclosure, if you will. I was suffering from a lot of depression in my early teens, and I was drinking a lot. And then we did “The Osbournes” and it gave me a rather large piggy bank, so my parents had less control, and then my mom got sick [Sharon is a colon cancer survivor]. But in these times, I would dip in and be like, “Things aren’t great.” And then I’d pull back — “Oh, things are OK.” So it was this dance. Eventually, my mom received a phone call from a friend who was like, “This is bad.”
Jack: My mom sent some people to try and get me to go to treatment, but there wasn’t really a plan in place. I had not shown up to film something, and I was tucked away at the beach house my parents had at the time. And then I took off for a very long whirlwind of a weekend, and kind of came back home. I was pretty much done at that point.
Jack: I think it was just a matter of time. I think it just sped things up to the inevitable. Whether I’d never touched a drink until the age of 50, I still think the end result would have been the same. I’m one of those people that have an addictive personality, and I like things that change the way I feel.
Ozzy: That’s just great, Jack. I’m really proud of you for that.
Jack, did you ever think you would have 17 years of continuous sobriety?
Jack: No. I didn’t think that was even possible.
Ozzy: The first year is the worst, isn’t it Jack? After the first year it’s like you can start breathing again.
Jack: But then I found after the first year, you’re like, “Oh, OK. So I guess I’ve just got to do that over again.” And then when you get to two years, you’re like, “All right, I guess I’ve got to do these two years over again to get to four years.” The blessing and the curse, I think with sobriety, is that time goes by really quickly, in a very strange way. It feels like a flash, 17 years, because you’re counting time.
Sharon: No, I was like, “This is really like a huge, huge life lesson for them. They’ll never be like this, because look, this guy’s pissing himself on the floor. This one’s throwing up. This one’s just got a divorce. And their behavior’s outrageous. There’s no way they will follow this.” And they kept seeing their dad go back into rehab, and back, and back. And so I just thought, “They won’t want this in their life.” Little did I know that Jack was sniffing, and drinking, and God knows what else.
Sharon: Probably every week.
Sharon: Oh, my Lord. Well, basically for years, because I was terrified that he was going to get sick in the night, or fall over, hit his head. I would always make sure that there was somebody there, checking on him through the night when he was on the road without me. But it was always in the front of my mind.
Ozzy: I didn’t give a shit, because I was loaded. It’s a very selfish disease. You don’t think about it because you’re loaded, in an altered state.
Jack: We’re on “The Osbournes” in the middle of whatever season we were doing and I decided to go into treatment, and it becomes this very public thing at that point. And I just found it incredibly invasive and, morally, really inappropriate. I was 17 years old. And the stuff that was being written, and having photographers try and take photos of me while I’m in a medical facility. Such violations of someone’s privacy while they’re trying to get help.
Ozzy: The thing is, people call it a disease, but if you had cancer, people wouldn’t climb over trees and take a photo of you in your bed. Yet they do when you’re in rehab.
Ozzy: All I can say is, I’m 72 years of age. Most of the people that I drank with are dead. And the ones that aren’t, that still continue to drink, are going to be dead soon. It’s not a happy ending. If you want to carry on drinking, my hat goes off to you.
Sharon: Initially I thought the first, maybe up to the fourth or fifth time he went into rehab, I thought, “It will work. He’ll get it this time. This time I know he’s got it.” And then after about the fifth time I’m like, “He’s never going to get it.” And you just accept it. That’s the way it’s going to be.
Ozzy: But then you realize the kids have got this fear in their eyes. I mean, it’s a very selfish disease. My kids needed me. … I had a row with Jack. I had to talk business. And I said, “What have you ever fucking wanted? I’ll give you whatever you want.” He says, “What about a father?” That kicked me in the balls so hard. It knocked me sideways. I went, “Oh, my God.” I’d give whatever materialistic things they ever wanted. But the most important person wasn’t there.
Ozzy: Recovery is selfish. But you know if you don’t recover, you know exactly what it’s going to do there. Kelly said to me one day [after she got sober], “Nothing’s changed. I’ve gone so many years sober. What’s the problem? I might as well drink.” I said, “Let me tell you something, Kelly. When I drank after some period of time, it’s the worst feeling you will ever, ever have in your life. And you know what you do? You drink more to get rid of that guilt. It’s just that and it’s over.”
Jack: If you want it, there’s a way to achieve it. It’s kind of like shut your mouth and be willing to take direction. It’s that honesty and open-mindedness, and willingness, to do whatever it takes. And if you want something bad enough, you can achieve it. Just as if you want to get loaded bad enough, you’re gonna get loaded. And it’s that kind of situation of, for me, I really wanted it. And I did what I was told. And I followed the direction of my tribe, my community around me. And it has continued. Whatever I did has continued to work, because I continue to do it. It’s never over. There were times, when I had 10 years sober, and I was raising my hand as a newcomer at a different 12-step recovery group.
Ozzy: I’m lucky. There’s nothing special about me. I should have been dead 1,000 times. I’m not being big-headed about that, or invincible. It doesn’t take much to kill you.
Sharon: It really doesn’t.
Sharon: Very calm in the house. It’s very pleasant in the house. It’s great for our whole family. It really is.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Feb 9, 2021 / Briar Goldberg
This post is part of TED’s “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from people in the TED community; browse through all the posts here.
Here we are, over a month into 2021 and I’m feeling cautiously optimistic.
I’m hoping that we’ll soon be able to enjoy some of the simple, daily routines we took for granted before the pandemic. But — and I hate to break it to you — there’s one 2020 routine that appears to be sticking around for the long haul: Virtual presentations.
I’m the Director of Speaker Coaching at TED, and before I joined TED, I was an executive communication coach and speechwriter. I’m telling you this because for me, this shift to virtual presentations is a hilarious career irony. I’ve spent so many years hating on webinars and begging the speakers and executives I’ve coached to avoid video communications whenever possible.
But virtual meetings, speeches, presentations and conferences are, in fact, the new normal. So if that’s the way it’s going to be, let’s do our future audiences a favor and polish up our virtual communication skills.
Even though so many of us have been spending so much time on Zoom in recent months, I’ve noticed there are some common mistakes that people — even experienced communicators — are still making. Here they are, along with my favorite tips and tricks to fix them all.
We’ve all heard that eye contact is important. But do you know why? Direct eye contact can influence your audience’s perception of your credibility, trustworthiness, even your ability to lead. But most importantly, your audience will try harder to stay focused if you appear expressive and look them in the eye. In the great battle for attention between you and your audience’s Insta feed, eye contact is one weapon that could tip the scales in your favor.
The only way to make eye contact with your virtual audience is to look directly at the lens of your camera. Trust me: This will feel really strange at first, because we’re used to looking at our screens during video calls so we can see what everyone else is doing (and see how we look). But if you want your audience to remain engaged and attentive, you’ll need to sacrifice your own desire to look at their faces.
My general rule is to keep your eyes on the lens 90 percent of the time and use the remaining 10 percent to look around and make sure your audience is smiling and following what you’re saying. To understand the difference — which is subtle but significant — check out these two photos:
When we talk to our friends and family, there’s a lot of natural variety in the speed, volume, pitch and inflection in our voices. That variety is really important, because it adds context and meaning to our words — and it adds interest and drama.
But when we’re nervous or reading from our notes, we can often lose that variety. This can be a big problem in a virtual setting where the other non-verbal cues that add context, such as hand gestures and facial expressions, are harder to see.
One way to inject vocal variety into your virtual presentation — or any presentation, for that matter — is to use words and phrases that feel comfortable to you. Practicing beforehand also helps ensure your voice maintains its natural spontaneity, and even just one out-loud rehearsal can make you feel less nervous and less dependent on your notes.
Speaking of practice … yes, you still have to practice even though you’re presenting over Zoom. As a communicator, your number-one priority should be your audience’s experience — regardless of the setting. And you can’t focus on their experience if you’re too busy thinking about what to say next or fumbling with your script.
Think about it this way: Your audience is taking time out of their busy days to listen to you. So the very least you can do to honor their time is to practice a little in advance. Just because you could turn your laptop or your phone into a teleprompter doesn’t mean you should.
As we all know, it’s so easy to get distracted when watching a virtual presentation. So when you’re speaking virtually, you want to do everything in your power to keep your audience’s eyes on you and off of their phones. One way to do this is to make sure you’re using slides effectively.
Remember, you’re the main event: Only use slides if they will actually help your audience better understand what you’re presenting. While this is true when you’re speaking in person, I’d argue it’s even more important over video. If your entire presentation is slides — and the audience can’t see your face — they’ll feel less accountable and off to Instagram they’ll go!
Simplify, simplify, simplify: If your audience is forced to make a choice between reading a dense slide or listening to you speak, they’ll go for reading almost every time. In order to maintain control of your presentation, you should limit the amount of information you put on each of your slides. Yes, you’ll have more slides, but they’ll be easy to digest, so that’s OK.
Practice the technical aspects too: Before your virtual speech or presentation, rehearse toggling in and out of “share screen” mode so your slides won’t be projected throughout your entire presentation. Because eye contact helps your audience stay focused, you want your face front and center as much as possible.
Use black slides: Sometimes you’ll have several slides that you want to share in a short amount of time, which means toggling back to full video isn’t an option. However, keeping an old slide up could be distracting. In these cases, here’s a pro-tip: Add blank, black slides in between your content slides so you can essentially click to black and get the audience to refocus on your voice. I prefer black slides to white slides, because black makes it look like you’ve intentionally turned off the slide-sharing feature.
I’ll be the first to admit how much I’ve enjoyed peeking into so many different people’s homes as a result of virtual meetings. But I’ll be honest, I do have concerns about how many people sit in front of their bookshelves so it ends up being their background.
If your goal is to keep our audience engaged and focused, you want to make sure your background isn’t accidentally distracting. At the same time, sitting in front of a plain white wall looks a little bleak. If possible, select a background that’s familiar but not too busy. If sitting in front of a bookshelf is your only option, consider sitting a little further away so you’ll still have a colorful background but your audience won’t be able to read the titles while you’re speaking.
A little lighting can go a long way towards making you look polished and prepared when speaking to a virtual audience. While there are many great lighting products and devices you can buy, you don’t have to spend money to light yourself well.
The key is to make sure your primary source of light is directly behind your camera, throwing light on your face. So you might choose to position yourself in front of a window or a lamp or both. Here are a few photos of the lighting setup that I use when I teach TEDTrainings from my living room.
I face the window and the lamp, and then I use the fireplace as my background
There are a handful of communication truths that I’ve been preaching my entire career, and one of them is that I believe it’s always the speaker’s responsibility to keep the audience engaged. If the audience’s attention starts to wane, it’s on the speaker to adjust.
But virtual speaking adds a little wrinkle to my belief — as a virtual communicator, it’s often impossible to know if your audience is paying attention when you can’t see them! So, in Zoom land, it’s 100 percent OK for you to ask your audience to turn on their cameras. And if you want to be very polite, send a note asking for on-camera attendance in advance. That way, your audience can plan!
Speaking of being polite, we can also choose to show up on camera when we’re in the audience. You would never show up to an in-person meeting with a paper bag on your head, but it seems that in our new virtual normal, many of us feel pretty comfortable showing up incognito. So why don’t we make a little pact right now? Since virtual communications are here to stay, let’s all agree to be on camera as often as possible when we’re a member of a virtual audience. That way, when it’s our turn to present, we’ll be able to see everyone’s messy homes and pandemic hair without having to ask.
Here’s to hoping that sooner rather than later, we’ll all find ourselves fending off stomach butterflies backstage before we speak in front of real, live, in-person audiences. But until then, I’m wishing you the best of luck in all of your virtual speeches, presentations, meetings and cocktail hours.
Watch this TED-Ed Lesson on effective rhetoric:
Watch this TED Talk from Julian Treasure:
Briar Goldberg is the Director of Speaker Coaching at TED.
Dec 8, 2015 / Guy Winch
Rejections are the most common emotional wound we sustain in daily life. Our risk of rejection used to be limited by the size of our immediate social circle or dating pools. Today, thanks to electronic communications, social media platforms and dating apps, each of us is connected to thousands of people, any of whom might ignore our posts, chats, texts, or dating profiles and leave us feeling rejected as a result.
In addition to these kinds of minor rejections, we are still vulnerable to serious and more devastating rejections as well. When our spouse leaves us, when we get fired from our jobs, snubbed by our friends, or ostracized by our families and communities for our lifestyle choices, the pain we feel can be absolutely paralyzing.
Whether the rejection we experience is large or small, one thing remains constant — it always hurts, and it usually hurts more than we expect it to.
The question is, why? Why are we so bothered by a good friend failing to “like” the family holiday picture we posted on Facebook? Why does it ruin our mood? Why would something so seemingly insignificant make us feel angry at our friend, moody, and bad about ourselves?
The greatest damage rejection causes is usually self-inflicted. Just when our self-esteem is hurting most, we go and damage it even further.
The answer is — our brains are wired to respond that way. When scientists placed people in functional MRI machines and asked them to recall a recent rejection, they discovered something amazing. The same areas of our brain become activated when we experience rejection as when we experience physical pain. That’s why even small rejections hurt more than we think they should, because they elicit literal (albeit, emotional) pain.
But why is our brain wired this way?
Evolutionary psychologists believe it all started when we were hunter gatherers who lived in tribes. Since we could not survive alone, being ostracized from our tribe was basically a death sentence. As a result, we developed an early warning mechanism to alert us when we were at danger of being “kicked off the island” by our tribemates — and that was rejection. People who experienced rejection as more painful were more likely to change their behavior, remain in the tribe, and pass along their genes.
Of course, emotional pain is only one of the ways rejections impact our well-being. Rejections also damage our mood and our self-esteem, they elicit swells of anger and aggression, and they destabilize our need to “belong.”
Unfortunately, the greatest damage rejection causes is usually self-inflicted. Indeed, our natural response to being dumped by a dating partner or getting picked last for a team is not just to lick our wounds but to become intensely self-critical. We call ourselves names, lament our shortcomings, and feel disgusted with ourselves. In other words, just when our self-esteem is hurting most, we go and damage it even further. Doing so is emotionally unhealthy and psychologically self-destructive yet every single one of us has done it at one time or another.
The good news is there are better and healthier ways to respond to rejection, things we can do to curb the unhealthy responses, soothe our emotional pain and rebuild our self-esteem. Here are just some of them:
Tempting as it might be to list all your faults in the aftermath of a rejection, and natural as it might seem to chastise yourself for what you did “wrong” — don’t! By all means, review what happened and consider what you should do differently in the future but there is absolutely no good reason to be punitive and self-critical while doing so. Thinking “I should probably avoid talking about my ex on my next first date” is fine. Thinking “I’m such a loser!” is not.
Another common mistake we make is to assume a rejection is personal when it’s not. Most rejections, whether romantic, professional, and even social, are due to “fit” and circumstance. Going through an exhaustive search of your own deficiencies in an effort to understand why it didn’t “work out” is not only unnecessarily but misleading.
When your self-esteem takes a hit it’s important to remind yourself of what you have to offer (as opposed to listing your shortcomings). The best way to boost feelings of self-worth after a rejection is to affirm aspects of yourself you know are valuable.
Make a list of five qualities you have that are important or meaningful — things that make you a good relationship prospect (e.g., you are supportive or emotionally available), a good friend (e.g., you are loyal or a good listener), or a good employee (e.g., you are responsible or have a strong work ethic).
Then choose one of them and write a quick paragraph or two (write, don’t just do it in your head) about why the quality matters to others, and how you would express it in the relevant situation. Applying emotional first aid in this way will boost your self-esteem, reduce your emotional pain and build your confidence going forward.
As social animals, we need to feel wanted and valued by the various social groups with which we are affiliated. Rejection destabilizes our need to belong, leaving us feeling unsettled and socially untethered.
Therefore, we need to remind ourselves that we’re appreciated and loved so we can feel more connected and grounded. If your work colleagues didn’t invite you to lunch, grab a drink with members of your softball team instead. If your kid gets rejected by a friend, make a plan for them to meet a different friend instead and as soon as possible. And when a first date doesn’t return your texts, call your grandparents and remind yourself that your voice alone brings joy to others.
Rejection is never easy but knowing how to limit the psychological damage it inflicts, and how to rebuild your self-esteem when it happens, will help you recover sooner and move on with confidence when it is time for your next date or social event.
Illustration by Dawn Kim for TED.
Guy Winch is a licensed psychologist who is a leading advocate for integrating the science of emotional health into our daily lives. His three TED Talks have been viewed over 20 million times, and his science-based self-help books have been translated into 26 languages. He also writes the Squeaky Wheel blog for PsychologyToday.com and has a private practice in New York City.
It’s the weekend!!!!!!
I’m so glad you’ve joined me.
With so much of the country ia a freezing lockdown I looked for an appropriate song about weather, snow, rain, something that might hit the feeling I have right now. My husband and I are blessed, we have only minor damage and did not lose water or electricity. My heart bleeds for those how Mother Nature wreaked havoc on their life. I’m sending warm wishes your way.
Have a great weekend!
Melinda
Welcome back to Weekend Music Share; the place where everyone can share their favorite music.
Feel free to use the ‘Weekend Music Share‘ banner in your post, and don’t forget to use the hashtag #WeekendMusicShare on social media so other participants can find your post.
It’s Friday!
This week was a little hard to stay positive, with this 70 year winter freeze but in the big picture we are so blessed compared to many of our neighbors and those around the world.
So glad you stopped by today.
I hope you have a great weekend with friends and family staying COVID safe.
Melinda
Thinking of moving into a new relationship after a split is a great feeling. But, first, consider the status of the family assets from the broken marriage. You will need to sign a prenup for the children before getting into another relationship.
To attain family peace, have this contract to ease financial pressure, know how to handle the kids in the new formation, and for alimony settlement. Getting into a new marriage without an agreement could paralyze the relationship before it even starts.
Here are few tips to consider when going for a prenuptial agreement:
Before getting into marriage, you need to be honest in all open discussions relating to finances and liabilities. And, highlighting your financial expectation from the partner is essential. You should ask the partner if they’re willing to sign the agreement.
You never know; some people are easily offended by the idea, not to mention the document itself. Often such people perceive it as a lack of trust. For this reason, this is a delicate topic that requires a lot of caution. If the partner isn’t willing, know what to do and remember that the agreement doesn’t have security in removing separation court battles.
Even though you desire to get into another relationship, understanding your partner is essential. Prenuptial agreements are strict, and once this discussion comes to the table, don’t get hurt by your lover’s suggestions.
Most prenup agreements come into being when one partner has more property or assets than the fiancée. In most cases, it shows an imbalance during the negotiation process. And you can use divorce solicitors to help you in case you’ve kids with the property shares.
You can settle the imbalance with straight talks – openly discuss the leverage and power disparities for amicable understanding. If done the right way, the final agreement document won’t be coercive but rather good.
Ideally, these types of agreements are necessary when you’re getting into a marriage with assets and properties made before the partner’s existence. So, you have to agree on how to plan everything and so forth.
It’s not necessary if both of you own nothing. You can plan with your partner on sharing expenses.
When signing a prenup, a mediator is inevitable. You can consider bringing a divorce mediator on board to help with vital information. These people have vast experiences and knowledge on what contributes to a marriage failure and the successful ones.
In most cases, people sign the agreement to help if a divorce arises, making divorce mediators the best professionals for the task. They will help you determine solutions on how to share the assets or properties when a split strikes.
While these tips place you in a better position of signing a prenuptial agreement, you must also consider a professional mediator’s input in the process. You wouldn’t want to carry the burden of overlooking the expert input aspect.
Besides, you can search through and find the best advice fitting your situation with the partner. From there, please consult a professional to help you in signing this vital life document.
This is a collaborative post.
Melinda
Have a great Wednesday!
We have ice in the pool for the second day, we’re praying the pipes don’t freeze. We have half of the pipes in the house frozen, luckily not broken. That’s what happens when a storm like this hasn’t hit in 70 years.
I look forward to seeing you again next week.
Melinda
According to a SkinStore.com survey, 85% of American women never leave the house without using at least 16 facial care and beauty products. The survey established that every day, women wearing on average $8 worths of skincare and beauty products. This may not seem like much, but during your lifetime, you are likely to spend up to $300,000 on beauty products.
Why is the beauty industry so expensive? Indeed, while we are willing to look after our skin and hair, most of us would think twice if they considered their beauty budget as a whole. Does it have to be so costly?
The beauty and personal care market is constantly growing and evolving. The trends of today may not be relevant anymore by tomorrow. Besides, diving into the Personal Care Industry market could highlight some interesting findings. Perhaps, other buyers have identified new wonder products that could be more effective than your routine buys. Alternatively, this is also a great way of understanding how to balance beauty services and products, and where you should spend your money for the best results.
Why are you willing to pay a lot of money for a product you haven’t yet tried? Businesses in this market know how to make their products sound appealing to their audience groups. For instance, a lot of customers are willing to pay more for products that promise to tackle their insecurities. Hair loss products, for example, can cost several hundreds of $, while you could get positive results without breaking the bank. The belief that expensive is better is engraved in our brains. We put a high price on our insecurities, whether it is bad skin or hair loss, based on how they make us feel. Therefore, we want to pay a lot of money for products whose price tag reflects our heightened emotional state.
Science can play a huge role in the beauty market. However, science doesn’t mean you need to buy products that have been specifically designed in labs to obtain positive results. Science is about understanding which ingredients work for you. Therefore, basic beauty knowledge could dramatically transform our routines and beauty budget. You’ve got a lot of natural ingredients in your kitchen that can replace some of your most expensive products without sacrificing results. Raspberries and coconut oil combined can help brighten up your lips and nourish the skin. Comparatively, it is a cheap but effective alternative to chemical treatments.
Everyone wants a personal care routine that makes us feel good. But that doesn’t mean you should confuse the luxury feel of me-time without your product price tag. Beauty is about self-care. Expensive products are not always more effective. Giving your mind the time it needs to unwind can help reduce stress levels and alleviate signs of stress, aka dull complexion, pimples, wrinkles, etc.
In conclusion, while some products are expensive to reflect on the difficulty to find or process some ingredients, there’s no need for the beauty industry to create a hole in your budget. More often than not, we are willing to pay more because we lack knowledge of the trends or the best natural ingredients. The more insecure we feel, the more we are ready to spend money to make our fears disappear. This has to stop! Feeling good in your skin shouldn’t break the bank.
This is a collaborative post
Melinda
https://unsplash.com/photos/KtOid0FLjqU
We all have a dream home in mind. Even if you don’t exactly know what it looks like, that’s okay. Most of us just know that there’s a certain style of home or caliber of property that we’re aspiring to. Whether it’s something that you want to start thinking about now, or it’s a property that you want to work towards in the future. It’s nice to know exactly what you’ll need to do to be able to make it happen.
If you’ve ever bought a property before, you’ll find that you know what the process is like. It can take time. You may spend months or years trying to find the right place. Or maybe you’re just not sure how to find it. Let’s take a look at what you can do to find the luxury home of your dreams.
First of all, you might want to think about working with a specialist to help you here. You may find that working with the best real estate agents is going to be the key. They know the market the best and they may even know about houses for sale that aren’t listed yet. This could be the simplest option to start with.
From here, you might want to think about finding an area that you really love. It might be the case that there are certain luxury apartment communities that you know about and want to explore. Knowing the area is always a good start. So this is important to keep in mind.
It could even be that you decide that you want to find the house of your dreams by building it yourself. Sometimes, you just won’t find the house you want already out there. Or maybe you are inspired by a range of properties you’ve seen and you want to combine the things you love? When you build your dream home, you get to bring everything you want together for all the modern conveniences you desire. So this might be the option for you.
Sometimes, you don’t find your perfect home through the traditional route at all. It could be that you actually know which home you want to live in. Maybe it’s in your area or you’ve seen it before. It could be that it’s not actually for sale. But sometimes, you can actually reach out to the owners and make an offer. It’s obviously not the traditional thing to do, but it happens and there is no reason why you can’t ask. Sometimes it will mean that you get to live in the house you’ve always wanted to.
Searching for a luxury home isn’t always a quick process. When you have high standards and you know what you’re looking for, it can take time to find the right place. But with one of these options, you should be able to find your perfect luxury home.
This is a collaborative post.
Melinda
Did you know that for you and your spouse to be considered legally separated, you should have been living apart for six months? Additionally, while pursuing a separation, there should be no possibility of reconciliation. With 50% of marriages in the United States ending in separation and divorce, it helps to arm yourself with some knowledge on what this entails. Read further to find out the things to consider when seeking a legal separation.
Although it’s a legal separation, the law demands that both parents decide on custody agreements and child visitation rights. Regardless of the circumstances behind the marriage’s breakdown, your young children (under 18 years) should come first in this decision-making process, primarily for their mental and emotional well-being. No matter how low the marriage has sunk, your utmost concern should be creating a stable and balanced family for the kids in question. You should always try to make your children feel safe and secure in every situation.
Remember also that whatever you agree to concern child custody can continue to remain so when the divorce is finally granted, the only exception being when there’s irrefutable proof or evidence of one partner being abusive. In other cases, when a party has a criminal record that bars him or her from getting full custody of kids (biological or adopted), the court can grant supervised visitations.
Indeed, the procedures, processes, and countless paperwork necessary in legal separations are complex. It can be an arduous emotional and mental journey getting through with each stage. With the associated stress and emotional torture that comes with it, you’ll find it worthwhile to seek a qualified family law attorney. Most importantly, your lawyer can represent you in court, which can save you countless courthouse sessions.
If you’re already on the lookout for such help, you can Google “divorce solicitors Manchester” and reputable firms such as Bannister Preston will be among the results. They are a group of lawyers with decades of experience in family law with trusted solutions for your legal challenges. Getting useful legal advice and representation in a trying period such as this can help smoothen the process. As already indicated in earlier paragraphs, legal separation can be intense, and you need experienced hands to help you set the right plan in motion.
This is one of the essential parts of any legal separation and divorce. Dividing assets is a stage every couple seeking separation and divorce will arrive at, at some point. Make a rough list of properties (moveable and unmoveable) you own, ranging from houses, land, bank accounts to vehicles.
Everything both parties own should be listed and valued appropriately, as this is usually the stage notable for contention during the legal separation and divorce proceedings. It’s better to declare everything you both own as a couple to avoid any further strife.
Separation and divorce are not things people willingly look forward to. Unfortunately, circumstances leading to the total breakdown of the marriage may bring couples to this point.
So, assuming you have no choice but to go down this path, make sure it’s done within the confines of the law.
This is a collaborative post.
Melinda
Each month Sheryl from A Chronic Voice does a link-up party and this month’s writing prompts are Defining, Saving, Allocating, Educating, and Uniting. I choose three of the five writing prompts, Defining, Saving, and Allocating. This is my first link-up party and I look forward to joining in more often during 2021.
The purpose of the Link Up Party is for people with chronic illnesses to use writing prompts to share aspects of their life that may help or motivate others to live their best lives. A Chronic Voice has been doing the monthly writing prompts since 2017 and the post contributed each month are very interesting, educational, and motivating, and sometimes very funny.
I’m defining who I want o to be, what I want each day to look like, and most importantly, how I want to act. It’s so easy to go with the flow when you chronically ill, we have every reason too. What I want to do is define what my life is going to look like for all the days I can control. I know there will be days I won’t live up to my expectations and that’s okay, it’s not a failure, it’s reality. I need to clear my head and get back to what my goals are and what am I working for in the way of self-improvement. It only takes a small amount of effort to be nice, and I want to work harder at taking that extra step to help people and not be the naysayer.
This month I’m saving my energy for my health by getting enough rest and sleep. I’m saving a ton of energy by staying away from negativity, and also being more aware of how much time I spend on social media. I already limit my news watching to one hour a day but there are many headlines thrown at you while you’re on the Internet that can be very distracting. I’m working harder to not look at the headlines, for all I know its fake news. Staying clear and focused on my goals will save energy. If I’m doing the actions to support my goals every day then there isn’t time to waste on energy drainers.
I’m allocating time to expand the types of posts I write, one way is by reading books that have been gifted for reviews. I’ve worked hard to transition my blog, Looking For The Light to a Health and Lifestyle blog, not one focused solely on my chronic illnesses. Another way I’m allocating is thru time spent on reading, researching, and taking more time to write each post. Not worrying about a schedule as much. On the health front, my hips are causing me tremendous pain and have even disrupted my sleep for months now. The doctor has increased my meds and has me scheduled for a CT Scan of both hips next week. This is on top of the everyday Fibromyalgia pain I have. I have to allocate time for rest, pain is very draining. Taking time out several times a day to rest or do nothing is important, I’m working on making myself number one more often.
How are you Defining, Saving, and Allocating this month?
Melinda
I remember as a kid my mother would buy us a package of Valentine’s cards to fill out for all of our classmates. And who can forget the sweetheart candy with sayings like Would you be mine? on written them. Somewhere along the line cards became directed at a special someone you wanted to know how you felt about them.
My husband and I still exchange Valentine’s Day cards after 18 years of marriage. it’s an important day to say you care and that you hold them in a special place in your heart. In addition to a card, I received a heart-shaped box of chocolate-covered strawberries and an orchid plant. He knows the way to my heart! Of course, it takes much less than that to win me over.
Valentine’s Day, also called Saint Valentine’s Day or the Feast of Saint Valentine, is celebrated annually on February 14. It originated as a Western Christian feast day honoring one or two early Christian martyrs named Saint Valentine and is recognized as a significant cultural, religious, and commercial celebration of romance and….
Happy Valentines Day, Will you be my Valentine?
Melinda
Looking for the Light 