42 Days of Gratitude: Days 10 and 11

Although I am finding myself more and more grateful by nature, and I know that anything I do every day for 6 weeks will establish the habit, I am finding that acknowledging my gratitude in writing every single day of this 42 days of Gratitude is challenging. So I am noticing today what happens on the days that I don’t do the daily post?

Yesterday was a challenge; a challenge that started on Friday. I am grateful that I have had a fundamental change of heart/mind over the past three months but I find that instead of my old habit of getting angry when I am met with the people I really like not being too thrilled by me just isn’t how I really feel. The anger is irrational and an attempt to assuage my sadness.

I would like to be accepted for who I am and feel comfortable enough to be myself as they say with those I love, but I am also learning to give people time and space. I have to admit that I am pretty high maintenance when it comes to the attention I crave, but for these past days I realize:

I am grateful that I can now see that I am loved even when something I do is not liked.

More Reason to Believe
in Santa Claus

I ran across this link today in my Twitter stream; a news report “Spirit of Alabama”. And since I adore all things Christmas, and particularly Santa, I headed right over to watch!

I was so moved that I cried. These were tears of faith; tears of joy. Anyone who knows me well knows I do not cry often. In fact until 1994 I never cried at all. This was so sad because the truth of the matter was I needed to cry. Human beings are so blessed in that we can cry and a good cry is cleansing and supportive.

So please watch this report and share it with everyone you love. There is goodness in the world and to me this is what Santa represents; unconditional goodness.

Merry Christmas Santa!

Joys to the World

Aretha Franklin and Choir at the Tree Lighting Celebration
New York City, December 2, 2009

All celebrations have a few things in common; special foods, special music/songs, and some have TV specials. This was a special moment in tree lighting history for me. This holiday song rocks the house and Miss Aretha’s hat exceeded expectations this year.

42 Days of Gratitude: Day 9

Today was a challenging day. Like Erich Fromm stated, “One cannot be deeply responsive to the world without being saddened very often.” And today I was sad. But today instead of transferring that very rational emotion to an irrational frenzy of anger, I am grateful that I had the strength and the training to stay rational today.

It is never easy to be rational. It takes lots of work because we humans are irrational by nature; alot like cats. Maybe it’s a predator thing. I am lucky since I am also by nature a very hard worker, and gifted with the energy of teenagers. So I worked it today. I don’t like telling lies to myself. I like even less telling lies to anyone else and I had a breakthrough; sadness is painful but easier to process than anger which is just a cover up for the real feelings of sad.

I am overly sensitive; I know. It goes with the territory of artist. But this is a skill too which enables me to be deeply responsive to the world. And this was not a big thing but a small thing, an every day thing. No biggie. What a great opportunity. By nature I am always a bit paranoid and I really do not trust people easily. Most people are so trusting it astounds me. It takes time to earn my trust.

I am grateful that I am deeply responsive to the world around me and that I am opening my heart to allowing more people in.

5 More Reasons
to Love the Holidays

Happy Christmas Mr. Bean

The Crazy Frog’s Christmas Adventure

Tongue scene from Jean Shepherd’s “A Christmas Story”

“I double dog dare ya” not to laugh at this classic.

Mr. Bean and the Christmas Turkey

“Do you have the turkey on?” hilarious!

Twisted Sister does Oh Come All Ye Faithful

A Sarah Palin Christmas

redneck christmas decorations

42 Days of Gratitude:
Days 7 and 8

Like a breath of fresh air I am letting life in and like releasing a heavy burden I am letting go of negativity.

photo by Thomas Hudson Reeve

I am a fighter; always have been. Being a warrior princess and having indefatigable energies has served me well in the battle. But time has given me the wisdom that LIFE is not just a series of battles.

I have always been a good student. The nuns taught me well, or should I see pounded learning into me. I know how to learn and as a scientist I learned how to analyze and digest data. Over the years I have consumed as much information as I can, every day, every year, on how to live an effective, happy life. I have over-come an abusive childhood and learned to appreciate that I also had a remarkable childhood having been raised by my paternal grandparents until I was six years old.

Who am I today is thanks to the journey of my life so far and that includes the thorny and raw parts, as well as the sweetness and the joys. but life has taken a turn for the better and that has nothing to do with material things (I have to admit my bank account is slipping) or to any particular success or opportunity this year. In many ways this has been a very challenging year. Maybe it has been the challenges that opened the doors to the growth and positive changes in my life?

I am grateful that I am more positive now than I have ever been in my life.

Positive Psychology:
Happiness, Work
and the Psychology of
Optimal Experience

Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi asks, “What makes a life worth living?”

Download Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s “Finding Flow”

Quotations by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi:

“A joyful life is an individual creation that cannot be copied from a recipe.”

“As long as we respond predictably to what feels good and what feels bad, it is easy for others to exploit our preferences for their own ends.”

“Entropy is the normal state of consciousness – a condition that is neither useful nor enjoyable.”

“It is how people respond to stress that determines whether they will profit from misfortune or be miserable.”

“People who learn to control inner experience will be able to determine the quality of their lives, which is as close as any of us can come to being happy.”

“There are two main strategies we can adopt to improve the quality of life. The first is to try making external conditions match our goals. The second is to change how we experience external conditions to make them fit our goals better.”

Erich Fromm’s take on the “Marketing Orientation”

Download Erich Fromm’s “The Art of Loving”

Quotations by Erich Fromm:

“Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties. ”

“Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction. ”

“Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. ”

“Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve. ”

“One cannot be deeply responsive to the world without being saddened very often. ”

“Selfish persons are incapable of loving others, but they are not capable of loving themselves either. ”

“The most beautiful as well as the most ugly inclinations of man are not part of a fixed biologically given human nature, but result from the social process which creates man. ”

“The psychic task which a person can and must set for himself is not to feel secure, but to be able to tolerate insecurity. ”

“There can be no real freedom without the freedom to fail. ”

“There is only one meaning of life: the act of living itself. ”

“Who will tell whether one happy moment of love or the joy of breathing or walking on a bright morning and smelling the fresh air, is not worth all the suffering and effort which life implies. ”

“Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age? “

A Christmas Icon:
Celebrating Jean Shepherd

Jean Shepherd’s “An American Christmas”
broadcast December 25, 1963

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Mister Jean Parker Shepherd born on July 26, 1921 on the south side of Chicago and raised in Hammond, Indiana. He is best known to modern audiences for the film A Christmas Story which he narrated, and co-scripted, based on his own semi-autobiographical stories which were broadcast on the radio station WOR in New York City starting in 1956 and continued weekly until 1977.

A Christmas Story – Original Trailer 1983