You probably think that this post is going to be about hiking, how much I enjoy it, and what went on on my hike of the mountain Saturday. However, that's not what I'd like to talk about. While that would be a great blog topic, today I'm going to be discussing the appreciation of the beauty around us- something that I'm sure most of you regular readers know is talked about frequently on this blog.
For those who weren't aware; Mt. Monadnock is the world's 2nd most climbed mountain, behind Mt. Fuji. It has about 150,000 hikers per year... which is crazy, honestly. I've hiked the mountain 5 times now and it's been crowded every time. A recurring theme with each trip up, however, has been the array of languages I've heard each time! It's crazy how many foreigners climb the mountain. It got me thinking... do these people really travel to here...just to hike? I guess when you live right at the base of the world's second most climbed mountain, you don't really think about it. It's just average for you, something that you see every day. Now don't get me wrong, I try to always appreciate the beauty of what's around me. But it really stunned me how many people there were who certainly weren't from the area. Another thing that my friend and I noticed (not on the mountain, a different time) was that the leaf peepers have started to come out! While waiting in the town center of Temple for his mom to finish work; we saw a few NY tourists taking photos of the scenery around them. This caught us both a bit off-guard... and made us stop and realize that we live in a place that people are willing to travel to see just for the beauty. I think that says something, honestly. I think sometimes when we're so used to the beauty around us; we don't fully appreciate it. We take it for granted because we see it every day, and it's not right. So, readers- I have a challenge for you. I want you to find natural beauty that you may not always appreciate from where you live, and I want you to send them in to my dad's email ([email protected]). I want to see the beauty you find. - Maddie
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"We don't understand life any better at forty, than at twenty, but by then we realize it and admit it." That's a quote by Jules Renard. Jules was a French author. He wrote poems, short stories, and plays, for the most part, but also had one famous novel. His most-famous work was Carrot Top, if you can believe it.
Renard died at the ripe old age of forty six, so I guess we'll never know if he would have figured it out by sixty. I am now fifty, and I can tell you that my understanding of life is always in flux. Not in a bad way, mind you, but just constantly changing. In general, my understanding of life seems to change every five to ten years. When I was ten, my baseball card collection and my ability to play sports were VERY important to me. I played all of the sports during their seasons, and tried to be as good as I could at each of them. Sports were my world! As I hit fifteen, I became more interested in partying. A lot of the "cool" kids were into drinking, and I foolishly drank along with them. My friends and I liked to get a buzz, and we all couldn't wait until we could get in the bars. By twenty, not much had changed. I was still partying every chance I got, and getting into bars was old hat. New York's drinking age had been eighteen when I turned eighteen, and I was grandfathered in once the drinking age went to 21. I worked in New York during the summer months, so my friends and I took to hanging around Bleeker Street on Friday or Saturday nights during my early twenties. In my late teens and early twenties I stopped drinking for a bit, going so far as to joining AA for a bit. I remember I was sober on my twenty-first birthday. I was stressed out and depressed though, and went back to drinking a few months later. My drinking was different now, though. I was no longer drinking just for the buzz, I knew it was bad for me and I was drinking more out of boredom, or so I told myself. By thirty I was a functional alcoholic. I held a good job at Merrill Lynch and I was looking for a girl to settle down with. I met my wife when I was thirty three and she was only twenty three. She too, had a problem with alcohol, and she asked me to help her stop drinking. I gave up drinking the moment she told me that (July, 1999) and I have not had a drink since. My understanding of life had gone from let's make lots of cash and get a buzz to: "we can have a beautiful life together if we can both quit drinking." Two years later, my first daughter was born, and my priorities grew to include spending as much time with my wife and daughter as possible. I left corporate life in late 2002, and started my own consulting firm from my basement. My life revolved around my wife, my daughter, and my work. In 2009, my mid-life crisis began... although at the time I didn't know it. Sharon and I had decided to have another baby. Sharon had never been able to stop drinking excepts for about two years while she was pregnant with, and then breast feeding Maddie. We had originally wanted to have three children, but stopped after Maddie because Sharon had had postpartum depression and was afraid to have another bout with it. Sharon then began to believe that if she had another child she would be able to stop drinking during the pregnancy again and hopefully stop for good. Her drinking had gotten progressively worse over the years, and Madison had begun to catch on to what was happening. To make a long story short, Sharon was not able to stop drinking, and we put her into an in-patient facility to keep her from drinking while she was pregnant. She made it through the system and returned back home two weeks before she was due with Ashleigh. She started to drink again that evening and the doctors decided to deliver Ashleigh early to help protect her. I brought Ashleigh home from the hospital when she was four days old, She was two weeks premature, underweight and had alcohol withdrawal symptoms. Maddie was home with us too. At forty four, I was raising a new-born baby and a seven-year-old little girl on my own, while also trying to keep my successful business running and keeping the house in some semblance of shape. Let me tell you, my understanding of life, and what truly was important grew in that time period. I am now fifty. At this point, I think there is no one true understanding of life. All of our experiences are too different. The more we share similar experiences, I think the more our understanding of life will be similar. Not the same, but similar. Honestly, I think that part of the reason that the divorce rate is so high is because couples are not able or willing to spend enough time with each other. Their common experiences become fewer and fewer, and they eventually drift apart. So, do I understand life? Nope. I understand what I am doing in my life at this moment, but I have no clue about what awaits me in the years ahead. Lord knows that if you had asked me where I would be in five years at any point in my life from say the age of twenty five on, I would have likely guessed wrong. In the end, life is for living. Have fun, make memories with the ones you love, and pray that you will be able to see them again in the afterlife. One Day I was Jumping up, and down with my jump rope under the trees. A little later, I put my jump rope down and started to run up and down the hill. Then I ran inside my house and got some bubbles to blow outside. A few minutes later, I got my skooter, and rode it up and down. Finally, I went inside to have a rest! It is fun to play outside when the weather is nice!
Ashleigh I was looking at some Zen koans earlier, and I came across something that wasn't realy a koan, but got me thinking nonetheless. A koan typically is a paradoxical anecdote or riddle, used in Zen Buddhism to demonstrate the inadequacy of logical reasoning and to provoke enlightenment.. The following anecdote, will get you thinking, but it isn't really a koan since it gives you the answer to think about. A true koan would leave it to you to figure out, and thus gain enlightenment. Here is the paragraph in question: Read this slowly: "LIFEISNOWHERE" What did you read? Life is No Where? OR Life is Now Here? My friends, Life is all about how you look at it! That last line is what really kills it as a koan in my opinion. Still, it does make you think, and the author is correct, in my opinion. Life is all about how you look at it!
Have you ever met someone who seems perpetually happy? I have. I think we all have actually. I notice when I am around these people that the world seems to be a little less foreboding and seems to have more opportunity. Their smiles are infectious, and I generally seem to have a better time while I am around them. Other people seem to have the opposite effect. Everything is a chore for them, and if you are not miserable too, then you are just not trying enough! These people have the ability to suck the life out of me, and I try to avoid them as much as I can. I also notice that these people are not the same for all people (although the happy ones are!). Someone who is a time suck and a drain for me, may just be an ordinary person for someone else The final group of people are what most people seem to be... that is neutral. For the most part, these people have little impact on your life most of the time. About 90% of the people you meet are going to be neutral in your life. My advice is to find the perpetually happy, and try to make friends with them. At the same time, make friends with all of the neutrals you can as well, since they are usually nice people, and while they don't have the ability to always be happy around you and help your happiness, at least most times they will be amicable. The final group, I call them the buzz kills, are the ones you really want to steer away from in your life. Life is too short to be miserable, or to be around perpetually miserable people. For me, I also try to avoid drunks and liars as well, since I really don't have the patience for them. Finally, although I initially read the above line of letters as life is no where, it is not how I truly feel. I like to live my life so that I am experiencing the now. Life is way too short to live in the past, and I find I am happiest when I am working towards a better tomorrow. There is a quote I read once that I honestly try to live by. That is: "Be the change you want to see in the world." Now, although I'd like to see many changes in the world, I am realistic. I won't be able to change the entire world, but I should be able to have an impact on my immediate surroundings. Thus, I focus on making things better around me. I like to help out people when I can and I try not to harm anyone around me, if they are not hurting me. Peace over power. In general, I see my world as a happy place, filled with opportunity. That type of attitude makes me happy. I am happy as long as I actually work towards bringing those opportunities about. How do you see the world? Do you take steps to be the type of change you want to see in the world? Because, in the end, life really is how you look at it! Meld it into your vision. Today's blog post is going to be a bit different than usual; because I'm writing it while I'm out and without a real set topic!!! I have a lot to get done today before my friend comes over, so I figured I'd write this before I even got back to the house so I wouldn't have to deal with TOO much stress. I still have some algebra, another post, AND my vacuuming to take care of.
However, my caffeine addiction knows no bounds and even with this heavy schedule I still asked my dad to take me out for our routine cup of coffee during the day. I really enjoy the coffee; but more than the coffee I enjoy the time spent in the truck with my dad talking about whatever we happen to come up with. Usually, we end up talking about life or some such engrossing topic- in fact; we just started talking about how life could possibly be a computer simulation!!! Talks like these are why my dad and I are so close. He doesn't have any real limits and he never "grew up" in the ways that DON'T matter- so he doesn't mind talking about whatever and making jokes with me. It's pretty awesome, to be honest. I feel like most people say that they "never grew up", but so many say it without knowing what it means. How close are you to your kids, if you have them? Can you relate to them and help them and talk about the world with them? Or would you rather blame them for your own mistakes and categorize them into the generation they were born without choice into. My dad can not only level with me on most things; but he tries to take interest in the things that I'm interested in as well. Hell, he even took up karate to help me train when I was 7; never knowing that he'd enjoy it! He's now a second degree black belt and a sensei. Aside from that; he also hikes with me and my sister, plays xbox with us, watches anime with me, and even tries to fit in with "meme" culture (which can be a mix of embarrassing and amusing to me). He's a great dad and he has a great connection with me... and in today's world, I couldn't be more thankful. - maddie Before you get on me for copying my dad- I'm not. Winnie the Pooh was just a large part of my childhood that I dearly appreciated; and because of this I wanted to write a post about it. My dad's post just happened to inspire me. My dad did snatch up most of the good quotes that I wanted to use in this post; so it seems I'll have to do some deeper digging to find mine.. but honestly; for a children's book series the quotes that can be found within it are very good and fortunately for me; very many.
As I mention the quotes, if I have anything to say about them I will. I don't want this post to seem like TOO much of a knock-off of my dad's. "A little consideration, a little thought for others, makes all the difference." I've written a few posts about this before that explore this subject in further detail, but it's quite true. Sometimes even a simple compliment can change someone's day around; and if you have a small opportunity to be nice... then by all means, do so. "Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them." Simple though it may be, I love the message that this quote conveys. While it might mean something else, I took it as a judgment of outward beauty compared to inward beauty... some people may not be the most attractive on the outside; but if they have a beautiful soul it doesn't matter. I truly believe that beauty is defined by what's on the inside anyway; and that outer appearance barely matters. "One of the advantages of being disorganized is that one is always having surprising discoveries." This quote speaks to me on a spiritual level; honestly. I am an extremely disorganized person and I tend to "go with the flow" of things on a regular basis. The quote is right- doing so will lead you to some surprising discoveries... some of which create the best memories you'll have. “I don't see much sense in that," said Rabbit. "No," said Pooh humbly, "there isn't. But there was going to be when I began it. It's just that something happened to it along the way.” - Maddie Well, here is a weird post for you. One of my favorite characters growing up was Winnie The Pooh. In fact, during college for a time a few of my friends called me Pooh Bear, both for my ability to quote the friendly cartoon bear, and unfortunately for my shape and style of walking after a night of drinking. As an adult, I made sure to raise my daughters with a good dose of Winnie The Pooh. Both had Winnie The Pooh blankets and many of the stuffed animals. In fact, I even sang the Winnie The Pooh song to Ashleigh when she was younger and I was trying to get her to fall asleep. Those facts aside, it took my wife's death to unknowingly teach me the hard way that many of the things the little bear said had a pearl of wisdom hidden within them. Without further ado, here are some of the pearls of wisdom that Winnie the Pooh has uttered over the years that are very true: "Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart." "We didn't realize that we were making memories, we just knew we were having fun." "If there ever comes a day when we can't be together, keep me in your heart. I'll stay there forever." "People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day." "I think we dream so that we don't have to be apart so long. If we are in each other's dreams, we can be together all of the time." Promise me you'll never forget me, because if I thought you would, I'd never leave." Piglet: "How do you spell love Pooh?" Pooh: "You don't spell love... you feel it." "How lucky am I to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard." Well, there you go! And remember (to quote Eeyore) "It never hurts to keep looking for sunshine."
"Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.” That's a quote by my favorite stoic philosopher, Marcus Aurelius. Marcus was brilliant. In fact, I will go so far as to say he has taught me more about living properly than anyone I can think of. It's not just me that sings his praises either. His major work, "Meditations" has existed for thousands of years and is still in print today.
I honestly believe that if more people read "Meditations" there would be less war and bloodshed in this world. In fact, his work is so important to me, that I am currently looking for two leather-bound copies of Meditations to give to my daughters when they are ready to leave home. The picture above has another of his quotes that I think everyone should have to read while they are in school. If you know someone who likes to think... do them a favor and get them a copy of this book. If they can get past the first few pages, then they will be reading for a lifetime! I keep a copy right near the side of my bed, and I like to read a couple of pages a night, right before I go to bed. To get back to his quote, I think it is direct and to the point and quite simple. Too many people want to argue about what is best... instead of doing what is best. To Marcus Aurelius, he didn't want to quibble about who was right or wrong or what was best for any one person. What he cared most about was that everyone worked toward their ideal of what a good man should be. Obviously he is right. It shouldn't matter to you (not really anyway) what I believe a good man should be and how he should act. What should matter to you, is that I am doing my best to be the best that I can. All of us have had different life experiences. I don't care whether you are brother and sister or husband and wife. None of us have experienced anything the exact same way as anyone else. We have all seen the world through our own experiences. Even so, We all have a basic idea of right and wrong and just and unjust. If we all worked toward living these ideals, the world would be that much better of a place! Since we all view things a little differently, we have courts to decide between those major differences. The best courts have juries decide those differences. Twelve people to act as the judgement for our society. When done properly, these twelve men can reach a consensus on what is just and what is not. The system breaks down when people can no longer decide what a good man is let alone try to be one. And THAT is where I believe we are right now. Too many people are not trying to be a "good" man (or woman). Instead, they only worry about their present circumstance and how they can best profit from it. A good man does not kill innocent people... although they may kill the unjust or guilty. When people rely too much on their society to figure out what is right or wrong, instead of on their own instincts, then we get into long periods of chaos. My advice: Read meditations. Think about what he is actually saying, and then try to live your life to the best of your abilities. There is so much in "Meditations" that is worth quoting. I will leave you with two last quotes. "Our life is what our thoughts make it." and "It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.” Live people! and be the best man that you can be! (Ladies, I use man but it can quite easily be woman! Don't get offended by me using the masculine. Instead take the advice for how it was meant.) "“There are more things to alarm us than to harm us, and we suffer more often in apprehension than reality.” That's a quote by Seneca. You say you don't know Seneca? For shame! Seneca was a tutor and adviser for Nero, way back during the Roman empire. He was forced to commit suicide after being found complicit in a plot to assassinate Nero. Was he guilty? Who really knows. I guess he found something that could both alarm and harm him!
Regardless of what happened to Seneca, I think his quote, for the most part, is spot on. I find that the things that really bother me and stress me out rarely do more than that. All of the worries that I have seem to be about what could happen, and not what has happened. At one point, I was worried that I was going to lose my house. My business was not doing well, and funds were getting short. All of the worry and stress was keeping me awake at night, and many of the solutions I came up with were either short sighted or too long-term oriented to be of any help. So what happened? I resigned myself to losing my house, thought out an exit strategy that wouldn't be too bad for me and my daughters, and then stopped worrying about it so much. (Yes, I still worried and felt bad... just not as bad as I had been feeling.) After resigning myself to my fate, I found a way out. Some of that way out included lucky things happening, but still I went from one small victory or coincidence to another until I finally worked myself out of my jam. Two years later, we still live in the same house, and I no longer have a mortgage on it! In accepting what I thought was inevitable, I stopped worrying about it as much, and in so doing made better decisions. Some of those decisions involved a bit of luck, but at the same time my mind was able to focus better and I could see different opportunities that I couldn't see earlier. Tonight, while reading Seneca's quote, I saw the wisdom in his observation. I suffered more from the apprehension of what I thought was going to happen, than I did from what actually happened. In hindsight, I can also look back and see that even if my worst fears were realized, I would have survived and eventually have been happy since the things that mean the most to me would have still been with me. I of course, mean my daughters, If ever you are alarmed about a potential outcome, please take a look at your fear. Ask yourself "What is the worst that can happen?" Once you can accept what the worst thing is, find ways to neutralize its impact on your happiness. Look for what really matters the most to you, and see if you can find a way to protect that, no matter what happens. With knowledge comes peace. Instead of focusing on what might be the worst. Think of ways that the worst may not really be anything else but change. The only constant is change. There is a bonus quote for you. Look it up and see who said it... although I think I may have discussed that quote once before anyway, so you can likely find the answer to that question right on this blog. Since change is constant, it makes sense that some of that change will be bad and some of it will be good. As long as its not fatal for you and yours, then you will survive and bounce back. Life goes on, and worries and fears will not work to make it any better. Thus, when you start to worry, think of Seneca and his insightful quote. Recently, I was reading a book by Greg Iles called The Footprints Of God. Now, before I go losing half of you thinking that this was a religious book I am going to review here, I would just like to say that it is not, and reviewing the book is not my intention. The book is actually about the development of artificial intelligence and its potential ramifications. While discussions about God do occur in the book, it is more in regards to philosophical debate. With that said, there was one passage in the book that I found very interesting, and I thought I would share it here. Before I quote the interesting passage, let me set the scene. In the book, the two main characters are travelling to Israel and are having a discussion on the plane. The one character has been used as a test subject for an MRI machine that is about 1000 times stronger than the ones currently in use. He, and the other test subjects have been suffering psychological effects. His are in the form of narcolepsy and vivid dreams. He is talking about a dream he had where he thought he had memories of being God, and he is having trouble relating man as he is, to his dream of God. The woman he is speaking to is a Jungian psychiatrist. The passage I am about to quote is her idea of why man is flawed, and why free choice often leads to unintended consequences. I found it very interesting. With that as a background, here is the passage. Hopefully, I have not cut too much of it out so that you at least get the gist of the argument. "I believe that to create means to make something that didn't exist before. If God is perfect, then the only way he can truly create is to make something separate from himself. So by definition, his creation must be imperfect. You see? If it were perfect, it would be God." "I believe that for human beings to be distinct from God, we must be able to make our own choices. Free will, right? And unless bad choices resulted in real pain, free will would have no meaning. That's why we have such evil in the world." Well, those are the parts that I found interesting. The two characters carried on their philosophical discussion for another five or ten pages, and a few other gems were nestled among the writing. I may paraphrase some of the thoughts in the next couple of paragraphs, but for the most part, those were the passages I wanted to highlight. In my mind, the above passages do go a long way towards explaining our world. Yet many people would say, "Well, what about instances where there was no clear choices made yet evil still happened. They point to people who die in natural disasters or childhood cancers as examples. I think part of the problem is that they are mistaking bad things that happen as evil. Also, many people look at natural things that happen and say "there was no reason for that, when in actuality, there is. As an example, when people die or lose their homes in flooding, it is often because they built their homes in a flood plain, or on a part of a beach where it may be above the line of a typical storm surge, but still within an area that gets impacted during extreme storm surges. In the case of illnesses, people can suffer from genetic disorders or due to dangerous materials in their environments. Two good examples of environmental factors would be workers who got sick due to their exposure to asbestos. Many ship builders, and factory workers have gotten sick over the years due to their exposure to that legal (at the time) product. Children who got lead poisoning from paint chips is another good example. The parents didn't knowingly put their children at risk... they didn't know any better! Although their is some evidence that paint manufacturers did know the risk, but made the paint anyway! A current example would be South African gold miners. There is a class action lawsuit taking place in that country concerning the care for miners who got tuberculosis and silicosis from inhaling rock particles while working in the mines. A personal example of a genetically caused disease is hemochromatosis. Although many people can be carriers of the gene, they may not be directly impacted from it. For a person to become ill from the genes, both the mother and the father had to be carriers of the genes. My wife was afflicted with hemochromatosis, because both of her parents were carriers. Meanwhile, her step sisters were not affected by it since they had a different father, and he was not a carrier. I guess what I am trying to say is that not everything that happens that is bad is evil. I think many agnositcs and atheists see this as being proof that there is no God, or that he is an unjust God, but I think that this may be lazy thinking on their part. The passage above goes a long way towards explaining the flaws, and our decisions can go along way towards explaining the rest. One final quote from the book. It is about facing evil head on. The character went on to quote three statements that made thoughts about western religions suspect. These were:
He then stated that you can logically reconcile any two of those statements, but not all three. Many Eastern religions believe that evil flows from God, and they do not try to blame some lesser figure, such as Satan.
That might be all well and good, but I think the topic them moves away from the existence of God and into the realm of thinking that God must fit the definition of any one religion. When man gets involved, there will always be flaws present... and that includes with their religious thoughts. After all is said and done, I don't think anyone can reliably describe God or his/her traits. For me, I believe there is a God, and I am happy to pray in my own way. At the same time, I believe that most religions can be a positive force for humanity. Which one is right and which ones are wrong, I can't truly say. No one can. I go to church on Sundays because I believe it is a positive action for my daughters. And that if they listen to what is being said, that they will eventually turn out to be honest, caring and empathetic people. That is why I go to church. In my own life, I try to live my faith. Hopefully, my daughters see that in me more than they see my flaws. I try to lead by example. To do that, I need to actually live my beliefs so that they have a good example of what I want them to become. That's about it for tonight. I hope these thoughts make you think a bit about your own beliefs and whether or not ou actually try to live them. Peace, empathy and kindness. It's the way I try to live. This post is probably going to be short, I'm just giving my readers a warning- but please don't criticize. I have 3 more posts to write tonight; and this one actually required a LOT more thought than you'd assume. For those who don't know, I am SUCH an open book so it was extremely hard for me to come up with a list of 10 things people (mostly) don't know. I challenge all of you to do this in the comments. Leave me some entertaining stuff, guys.
God, this took so long. Ah well, I wanted to post it and contrast my dad's post- so here you go. Leave me some comments. Gnight folks. - Maddie
"When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion." That's a quote by Dale Carnegie. Best known for his book "How To Win Friends & Influence People" Carnegie was an expert at... well making friends and influencing people!
I think this quote is spot on. In fact, I see it in action nearly every day as I watch my family's daily interactions. When the bickering and nattering start, I notice that throwing a little logic into the mix usually ends in one of two results. One the person that is being forced to see the logic in an argument is usually stumped. Once the logic in a course of action is shown, there usually isn't a way to win the argument so it just stops. The second way I have seen things go is when the one piece of logic is refuted by another bit of logic. These are usually the fun ones to watch since both arguments are logical. There was an old saying that all roads lead to Rome. Well, in some cases, there are more than one logical way to reach a conclusion! Regardless of what people say, we all react emotionally at one point or another. The trick is to recognize when a decision you are making is driven by emotion and to then try to find the logical way to justify your decision. I find that if you can't logically justify your position, then you are likely better off making a different decision. I try to teach my daughters to think logically. Maddie, unfortunately, uses logic as a weapon to win arguments. This is okay, as far as it goes, but I think she also needs to use logic in areas of her life where her emotions are ruling the roost. All decisions are better when they can lead to a logical conclusion. Now, I am not just pointing fingers at Maddie here. I too, have made some bad decisions when I relied too heavily on my emotions. In fact, looking back at my life, I would say that a large percentage of time where I got into some trouble, it was either when I let my emotions guide my actions, or when I just didn't think my actions out to the most logical conclusion. All said, the point of this post is that if you want to make better day-to-day decisions in your life, then you need to start to think logically... even when your emotions are telling you otherwise. Think through your actions people. I believe strongly that your life will be better because of it. Do all things end with their logical conclusions? No. Many times you will find that they don't. Even so, if you act logically, you will have a better chance of seeing a positive outcome. Not everyone will be thinking logically, though, and unfortunately, that is where some of your problems will lie. If you can judge who is acting from emotions only and not bringing things to their logical conclusion, you can sometimes still find a way to avoid a disaster by seeking ways to counter the illogical action. Life is a lot of times like a game of chess. Keep an eye on the key pieces and make your moves logically! What's on your bucket list? How many things have you completed?
Truth be told, I don't really have a bucket list. I tend to just set small goals for myself to achieve as life passes and they often aren't anything too big or long term. I suppose skydiving is something, and my life goal is to live to see the turn of the century- but that's about as far as that really goes. I guess getting my black belt was on my bucket list, but I completed that about 5 years ago. Are you happy, or just a happy person? I genuinely believe that I'm a happy person. I still have underlying sadness and hurt that I do my best to cover up every day; and while I'm HAPPY most of the time I'm not.... happy. And there's a large difference. I'm positive most times but there's a lot to be done before I can consider myself happy. However, I try to take steps towards being generally happy every day by being a happy person. To follow up on my last paragraph... I suppose something on my bucket list is to be happy. What's one thing you wish you could change about yourself... and why haven't you? The one (and only, when I think about it to be honest) thing that I wish I could change about myself is that I wish I could be more peaceful and calm. I tend to be to begin with, but I mean even when faced with arguments. I always try to make progress with it, like anything else- but there's much tension to work through every day unfortunately and the thing that most poses a block to my attempts to change is the environment I spend most of my time in. I'm glad that we're all making steps towards making it better, but when I'm yelled at or belittled I tend to harden up and the only "peace" there ever ends up being is the broken "pieces" left after fights... hence the quote in my bio; be at peace, not in pieces. I'll finish up tomorrow. - Maddie What's your philosophy in life?
Honestly, my philosophy in life is comprised of many parts. I get most of it from online reading- the opinions and thoughts of others that I piece together and recreate as my own. Everything combined ends up being my philosophy. Essentially, I believe in living life without imposing upon the lives of others. I believe in peace over power, and I believe in honesty. I believe in always being there for the ones you love and I think there's a lot to be said for empathy and compassion that often isn't. There's a time and place for logic, and there is a time and place for emotions and the two shouldn't be confused or excluded. Are you an optimist, a pessimist, or a realist? Many people would call me a pessimist from talking to me, but I'm actually a realist. Most people confuse realism and pessimism because they're extremely similar if you don't examine them. pes·si·mism ˈpesəˌmizəm noun a tendency to see the worst aspect of things or believe that the worst will happen; a lack of hope or confidence in the future. re·al·ism ˈrē(ə)ˌlizəm noun the attitude or practice of accepting a situation as it is and being prepared to deal with it accordingly. See? Big difference. As a realist, I can't help if a situation is bad. Recognizing it as a bad situation doesn't make me a pessimist. It just means the situation is bad, and I'm choosing not to sugarcoat it. Well, there are two more answers for you to digest. I'll throw in a few more later. - Maddie Honestly, I am at a complete loss for words currently. This weekend has been all kinds of long and messed up and my inspiration to write is gone. I know I promised you guys answers to the questions I left you with last week; but I'm going to put them off... at least for today. I have enough on my mind without adding to it with philosophical questions about my own life. If I feel better tomorrow, I'll try to post them up.
Maybe I should make an effort to answer them, though. At least a few. It may help take my mind off of shit, so let's go. If you had known 5 years ago you would be where you are right now, would you have believed it? 5 years ago would put me at the age of 9, almost 10... and if you told me where I'd be currently I think I'd have a hard time accepting it. I mean, in the course of five years I've gone through my parents divorcing and my mother's death, plus depression and the anxiety and pressure that came with that... I've also gotten past that and realized a lot. Friendships have come and gone, as have relationships. I have a lot more memories and experiences now than I did then and I have a much deeper understanding of life that seems to grow more each day. If you were to tell 9 year old me all of that... it would be a smack in the face as while I was mature for my age, I was nowhere near the maturity level I am now. I'm still not mature enough to "adult" successfully, but that's okay. I'm still a kid and I have the rest of my life to learn how to grow up. Honestly, I wish I could've had a more normal childhood. But it is what it is and the past can't be changed. I can only take what I've learned and use it to help me now and in the future... and to help others. I don't know... there's the answer to the first question. I'll finish the rest tomorrow. Thank you for taking the time to read. - Maddie Earlier in the week, my dad gave me an interesting idea- so this will be my follow-up for it. His idea was as follows- reflect on your life and on the music that has influenced it. What songs play in the back of your life? And since I've really nothing better to talk about and 3 posts to write today- here is my attempt at designing my life's soundtrack. I doubt it'll be much, since I listen to music daily and have only been alive for 14 years... but I'll try my best.
The Immigrant Song - Led Zeppelin This is the first song in my soundtrack of life. Sounds weird, right? Well, allow me to give you a little backstory. Ever since I was born, I've been raised on rock n' roll music. One of my dad's favorite bands is Led Zeppelin, and thus it often played. I loved the opening of the Immigrant Song, and so my dad would often put it on at night on the big stereo in our living room and he and I would dance to it. The memories of this are among some of my earliest and my happiest. Reflection - Mulan Not ALL songs that played were rock, however. I recall having an album of songs from Disney movies when I was little, and I remember playing 'Reflection' from Mulan incessantly because I loved the lyrics and knew them all by heart. Who am I kidding- I knew all the lyrics from that CD by heart. That song just happened to be my favorite. Drift Away - Dobie Gray In all honesty, I'm not sure if the version of this song that I recall was by Dobie or not. It may have been a cover, but oh well. The original is certainly the best. This song seems to be always in the background- it's not always on the radio, but I never forget it and on the rare occurrence that I do hear it on the radio, I love it. In particular, I remember hearing it on a long car trip to NJ from NH twice in one day and really being happy about it. There Was A Little Mouse Honestly, I don't know whether to count this as a nursery rhyme or a song. The only reason this song is appearing in the middle of my soundtrack is because it holds more meaning to me now that my sister exists. My dad always used to sing it to me when I was small, and when my sister was born, the song (and tradition of singing it in the car) was reborn. It holds good memories for me, both in my own childhood and my sister's. I Hope You Dance - Lee Ann Womack This song holds a special meaning to me, because it's a song I strongly remember my mom enjoying (and relating to me). I don't know how exactly I know this, but I do. She mentioned it a lot and I remember her playing it a lot for me. Embarrassingly enough, it's one of the only songs I will cry to to this day. Wow, this list is harder than I thought it would be. Who knew it was so hard to remember songs that have played in your life? The Trooper - Iron Maiden Hoedown - Emerson, Lake and Palmer Both songs mentioned above played a significant part in my life for a bit, as they were competition songs. The Trooper was my go-to song for nunchucks for a long time, and Hoedown was the song my dad and I once did synchronized weapons to. You don't often find people who can synchronize nunchucks and make it look good, so I cherish that memory. As for now? I think that's where my soundtrack has left off. As I've gotten older, my soundtrack has blurred out into my music preferences, and I no longer truly hold songs close to me. I relate too much to lyrics to the point that honestly, my soundtrack would become long and the meaning the songs have to me would fade. So for now, this is my life's soundtrack... and this is how it will remain until I find a song with meaning, true meaning, to me once again. - Maddie first
fərst/Submit number 1. coming before all others in time or order; earliest; 1st. "his first wife" synonyms: earliest, initial, opening, introductory I was talking to my friend earlier today and (not too surprisingly) we wound up talking about relationships and love. Before I go one step further with this post; I'm going to ask you to not automatically rip into me for being 14 and talking about this. Age is a number and I try to live by the stanza that age doesn't define maturity. In any case, while we were talking she said something quite interesting that got me thinking. "Your first love isn't really who you first give your heart to, it's the first person who breaks it." I've never really thought of it that way, you know? I think it's simply because first is classed as- well, you can read the definition. Coming before all others in time or order. I guess you just assume that your first crush is your first "love", since love really isn't something to be defined until you meet the one you TRULY love. But I suppose that your first heartbreak would be a good way to class that. Now, despite the fact that love is something hard to pin down- I wanted to talk today about something that IS. While love may be hard to put in a timeline fashion, kisses are not. And while some people may think this is really freakin' stupid, I don't. I honestly don't think your first kiss should be considered your first kiss, you know? I mean yes- in the timeline sense, the first person who kisses you is technically your first kiss but for sentimental purposes, I think your first kiss is the first kiss that is genuine. And by that, I mean the first kiss that isn't completely awkward, forced, and un-enjoyable (as most first kisses tend to be, according to many of my friends and my own experience). By genuine I mean that it should come naturally and should be shared lovingly with someone you actually care about- not grudgingly done with a friend in the back of a crowded car. As of now, I've had my first kiss in both senses- and neither of them have any idea that I have this philosophy OR even who they are. But I know. And at this rate, that's all that matters. - Maddie I like going for ice-cream. Grandmother's favorite ice-cream is Vanilla ice-cream. Daddy likes Vanilla too! My sister Maddie likes to try different kinds of ice-cream. And I like strawberry. We go to Tyler's ice-cream by car. We usually sit in the car to eat our ice-cream.
Ashleigh Aw man, just when you thought you were going to see the last of these posts! HAHA, got ya. It's currently 4:00 am and I'm extremely tired- both of blogging and of my computer shutting my files down on me every time I try to add a photo into a post. I need sleep, I have plans tomorrow. I've felt pretty bad the entirety of the day, too, to make things all the more fun (and I use that word as sarcastically as I possibly can).
So, I'll leave this here and I PROMISE YOU that next week I will be done rambling and complaining and spamming you with photos from our vacation as it fades into the reaches of everyone's memory. It's only taken me an entire month to get this far- why quit now. Here, have a selfie to make up for the length of this post- circa today. IN FACT; have a throwback photo- the first selfie I ever put on Instagram (three years ago) alongside one of present day me. "Infuse your life with action. Don't wait for it to happen. Make it happen. Make your own future. Make your own hope. Make your own love." Bradley Whitford came up with that little gem. It was a little longer than that when I read it, but I shortened it so that I too, wouldn't be a windbag! So who is Bradley Whitford? He seems to be an actor from the show West Wing and some other TV shows. Nice quote Bradley! This is the best quote I have seen on hope in a long while. Usually people go on and on about how hope sustains them... or how they have abandoned hope... or how its a good breakfast but a poor dinner... blah, blah, blah! What they fail to notice is that hope without action is a waste. If you don't take the steps necessary to chase your hope, you will likely never achieve it. Think about it! If my hope was to win the lottery (it's not), I would never be able to win it, no matter how hard I hoped, if I never actually played the lottery.! That little bit of action was necessary! How can I win it if I do not even have a ticket! That is a very simple example. Let's try one a little more complex. I hope to find a home-based business to start in my spare time and eventually do full time as my way of making a living. Now, that hope would be ridiculous if I never take the time to research home-based businesses or try out different ideas to see what will work. You see, without taking any sort of action, all of our hopes are likely to be dashed, unless they just happen to come about by chance. Are you looking for world peace? Well then start in your own back yard! Be at peace and be peaceful with all of the people you meet. I for one did not join the military when I was younger, nor do I teach my children that they should be coerced into joining either. I hope that my daughters will be happy in life. To that end, I try to spend as much of my time with them as I can. I have taken responsibility for teaching them what I believe is important, and I try to help them to make logical decisions about their choices in life. I try to remember that "what I believe is right for them, may not be what they believe is right for themselves. Career choices are up to them. I do try to encourage them to follow their dreams though... and to take action towards them. In the end, I believe all of their hopes can be achieved, if they are willing to take the actions required for their hopes or dreams. An important factor there is that they actually know the costs necessary to achieve their goal. It is very tough to become a black belt if you don't practice. By practice I mean both going to class and working out at home as well. If you do that consistently, then I believe you can achieve a black belt (I told Maddie and now Ashleigh). I tell them this about other of their hopes and dreams as well. I try to point out what they will need to do to reach those goals. Then I leave it to them to decide if the goal is worth the effort. Take actions people. Examine your hopes. Think about what would be necessary to make them a reality, and then take action! |
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