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My Lenten calendar yesterday asked me to tell someone what I am grateful for. Why not you, Internet? The list could go on forever, so I will do one thing for each day of Lent. These are not in order of importance, but in order of my random brain.

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When a child experiences big feelings or emotions, it can be confusing, deflating, and sometimes scary for parents and the child. The 5 books listed here can help parents and children talk about and navigate the sometimes windy road of emotions.

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I recently started a new homeschool curriculum with my 4 kids. It's LDS-based and covers science, history, geography, art, literature, and music. We are enjoying it, and I plan to do a thorough review soon.

Until then, if you are an LDS homeschooler, find out more about it at www.latterdaylearning.org.

(If you are wondering what the heck LDS means, it's what we Mormons call ourselves. You can learn more here.)

Today we studied literature for Family School. Each lesson is based on Gospel Principles. As part of literature today, we read The Fisherman and His Wife and Rumplestiltskin. We talked about selfishness and greed and about what brings true happiness vs. what brings short-term pleasure.

Anyway, I've been thinking about that today.

Bubs, who is 9, has a talent for selflessness. He gets it. He thinks about others' happiness before his own. On Wednesday night, he had to get stitches. It was a first for our family.

He had been taking apart on old DVD player, and he left some pieces on the floor in his room. Well, he got startled, tripped, and cut deeply into one of his toes.

It was late by the time he got back from the ER. We were all tired.

The next morning, his sister (Welly, age 7) said that Bubs was sobbing during the night in pain. She told him she was going to wake me up, but he wouldn't let her. He told her to let me sleep because I was up so late.

So unselfish. That's the beauty of it, though. We find true happiness in seeking the happiness of others. When we put our own happiness first, it falls short.

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By Susan David

We humans are funny. Often we create beliefs or engage in behaviors that seem to help us in the short term, only to discover they get in the way of the lives we really want to live, or the people we want to become.

Allow me to share the story of my friend, Erin. Over lunch one day, she told both her mentor and me about a division director job she had truly wanted. The role offered good challenges, the chance to develop her skills, fabulous travel, and unparalleled flexibility. It would have been “a dream come true”.

But then Erin began to recite a litany of reasons why she hadn’t gone after the job. She wasn’t good in interviews, having never received the coaching that so many candidates are privy to these days. She was overweight, which would surely make a poor impression. On top of all this, due to the economic downturn, many people more qualified than she would apply. She thought she’d be great at the job if she could have made it beyond the interview, but all things considered, she “knew” she hadn’t stood a chance.

“So I never applied,” she told us. “Instead, I sent the advertisement to a peer and encouraged him to interview.” She paused. “He got the job.”

How was it that this bright, hardworking, lovely young woman also had such an aptitude for self-sabotage?

There are plenty of smart, even gifted, people like Erin. They are bonded by a common behavior psychologists call “self-handicapping,” which involves anticipating a real or imagined obstacle that might get in the way of success, and using that obstacle as an excuse.

Self-handicapping allows us to protect ourselves from the pain of assuming responsibility for our failures, and people do it all the time. In a groundbreaking 1978 study, psychologists Berglas and Jones found that participants who “succeeded” at a test (that was really just luck-based) were more likely to choose to take a performance-inhibiting drug before taking a second test. In other words, they actively set themselves up for failure on the second try. By doing this, they could blame their subsequent poor performance on the drug, and also protect their earlier feeling of success.

In a more recent set of experiments conducted by psychologist Sean McCrea at the University of Konstanz in Germany, participants were asked to take several intelligence tests under a variety of conditions. The research showed that people who were encouraged to make excuses for their poor performance — blaming poor performance on loud noises, for example — maintained high self-esteem, but were also less motivated to improve.

This kind of behavior is often so subtle and habitual that we don’t notice we’re doing it. Think about the manager who has to give a big presentation and fails to practice ahead of the event, or people who procrastinate on work projects and wind up “not having enough time” to do a good job. In a 2010 HBR article, Jeffrey Pfeffer identified self-handicapping as one of three major barriers to building professional power: people avoid the pain of failure by never trying to build power in the first place.

What can you do to overcome self-handicapping? Here are four steps:

1. Watch for the warning signs. Drawing down your efforts, generating lists of excuses, or distracting yourself (music, alcohol, etc.) are signs that you’re engaging in self-handicapping. Everyone needs to take breaks and manage energy during the work day, but these activities can be clues that you are veering onto the trail of self-sabotage. A mentor or colleague can often help steer you back on course.
2. Use “what-ifs” and “if-onlys” to help you generate goals instead of excuses. Research shows that the thinking people engage in during self-handicapping can just as easily be flipped to be motivational. When you ponder what could have gone better, or recognize obstacles in your way, you generate valuable information. Identify factors within your control, and see what you can do about them. Erin, for example, could have responded to the thought “I’m not great in interviews” by researching the right skills, practicing them, and requesting support from her mentor.
3. Recognize and manage your negative emotions. Research shows that when we use our “if-onlys” to motivate rather than excuse ourselves, we will also likely experience negative emotions, such as disappointment and self-directed anger . If you can notice these emotions and be kind to yourself in working through them, you’re more likely to be able to move into positive, empowering behavior.
4. Go for mastery. Self-handicapping is most likely to kick in when we are trying to perform well in order to avoid negative feedback from external sources, such as criticism from colleagues. When we focus instead on developing mastery in a domain we care about, we tap into our inherent motivation to learn and grow. Recognize what matters to you, and brainstorm ideas to get yourself moving in that direction.

Going for what you really want takes considerable courage. Let’s face it, even when you put forth your best effort, things don’t always turn out as you would like. But by taking a risk you open yourself not only to the possibility of failure, but also the possibility of learning, growth, and real attainment. It’s up to you to decide which is more perilous: the risk of disappointment, or the risk of never reaching your potential.

Reprinted with permission from Harvard Business Reveiw.  This blog was originally published here.

Susan David is co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of Happiness (due out in January 2013) with Ilona Boniwell and Amanda Conley Ayers. Susan is is a founder and co-director of the Harvard/McLean Institute of Coaching and a member of the Harvard faculty. She is also the director of Evidence Based Psychology, a leadership development organization and management consultancy.

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In his new book A New Language for Life: Happy No Matter What, Dr. Louis Koster shows you how to transform your life from a place of higher awareness, to trust yourself and life, and experience an overall sense of peace and well-being—no matter what.

Why did you feel compelled to write A New Language for Life?

Louis:  I was humbled by my experiences. There is no other way of saying it. I felt entrapped by the circumstances of my life and at some point realized that there was nowhere else to go. I knew that the way I viewed the world had to change. This was my defining moment. I realized that if I considered life as fundamentally good, I may as well trust what was occurring in my life as fundamentally good, rather than condemning it. I made then and there a commitment to be happy and content, no matter what the circumstances of my life. This commitment became a passage of awakening and higher awareness that allowed me to transcend the circumstances of my life and reclaim my capacity to manifest my life. I then became willingly compelled to share this message of awakening and inner peace with others.

Why would someone want to read A New Language for Life?

Louis:  Entrapment in our circumstances is the human experience without exception at some point in a person’s life. In A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What!, readers are invited to dwell in two powerful affirmations–The Choice and The Insight, which by its own unique design, open up a passage of awakening and higher awareness without changing anything about the circumstances of your life. The Choice andThe Insight release being from its entrapment in language and allow readers to experience an authentic freedom to be and be present again to the true joy of life.What makes A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What! so appealing is the simplicity of its passage. A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What! is attractive, since the title of the book is attractive and captures people’s immediate attention.

Is there a particular timely nature of the subject area?

Louis:  We live in an era of unprecedented change and are trapped in cycles of crises. In depleting the resources of our planet, we may lose the fragile web of life that sustains us on planet earth. There is more at stake in being happy than our individual happiness, since a commitment to being happy brings about a sense of oneness and perspective to our experience of life. Readers learn that our default way of being is insufficient to deal with our current issues and concerns and that true survival of the human race is only possible inside of oneness.

Are there specific benefits from reading your book?

Louis:  Dwelling in the affirmations of the book, The Choice and The Insight, the reader experiences an authentic freedom to be in whatever circumstance they find themselves in life. A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What! shows how you can defeat day-to-day depression, struggle and unhappiness, or any ordinary bad mood.  A New Language for Life shows you how to weather the winds and storms of life from a deep and abiding source of inner peace.  Some of the benefits that workshop participants of A New Language for Life report are less resentment and more peace.  After the workshop, they were less preoccupied with other peoples’ opinion about them and the freedom to just be.  Participants felt less immobilized and consumed by the circumstances in their lives and were able to give attention to what really matters in their lives.

Describe the audience for your book.

Louis:  The book is for anyone who is in transition in life and has a sense that there is more to life than what they are currently experiencing. The book is for anyone who is committed to a life beyond struggle and suffering, a life beyond a sense of entrapment by circumstances. The book allows you to empower yourself through the challenges you are facing in life. You are led  to a place where you start to trust your own experience of life and begin listening to your own truth again. The book offers a way to reconnect with the essence of your being and a way to live according to your true nature.

What personal experiences led you to write A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What!?

Louis:  In essence, the idea for the book came to me by making the distinction between being, and the “I,” and by recognizing being as a separate, but invisible reality, the only reality that is in keeping with our true nature, despite what our senses, or the “I” tell us that we are. In hindsight, each event in my life has been an integral part of a journey of trusting myself and life, which allowed me to free myself from my self-imposed limitations, realizing that I am much more than what defines me, and come to an authenticity of being.

How do you see A New Language for Life making a difference for people?

Louis:  A New Language for Life is a message of peace and oneness. A New Language for Life is a message of a higher awareness. A New Language for Life  allows you to live a life that is wholesome. A New Language for Life shows you how to defeat day-to-day depression, anger, and unhappiness, or any ordinary bad mood. A New Language for Life, shows you how to weather the winds and storms of life from a deep and abiding source of inner peace.

Where do you see the messages in A New Language for Life going?

Louis:  I see A New Language for Life  becoming part of our daily conversations. People may see in A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What!a simple and elegant design that allows them to release themselves from the entrapment in language and start living their lives in a way that is more wholesome and in an alignment with the true nature of their being.

What do you see is the relevance of A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What! in today’s society?

Louis: The innate nature of being is kindness. How to get in touch with that and how to maintain that in the face of life’s daily occurrences, is the challenge. A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What! could aid people who are already participating in some spiritual practice to stay centered in their being. Now is the time. Now there is a window in the experience that people have of our current times, an opening to look beyond the horizon of what they see. Apart from personal enlightment, there is a narrow window in the next couple of years to change the way we view ourselves and each other to sustain our fragile life on planet Earth.

How do you see A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What! is in keeping with other spiritual teachings?

Louis:  Anyone who has been dwelling in the possibility of A New Language for Life, Happy No Matter What!will recognize similarities with Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity and Taoism. This book aligns with other spiritual teachings, in fact enriches other spiritual teachings.

What people, philosophers have influenced you in writing this book?

Louis:  I was influenced by the philosopher Martin Heidegger, by Albert Einstein, and Krishnamurti, who all from their own unique perspective dwelled inside of oneness. I am inspired by the message of peace by the Dalai Lama. I have a deep respect for the wisdom of the pre-Socratic philosopher Parmenides, who spoke about unveiling the truth of oneness.

How has writing A New Language for Life influenced your personal life?

Louis:  It allowed for my wife and I to have an extraordinary relationship. It allowed me to live a peaceful life. It allowed me to be more caring for my patients and be in touch with what really matters for them. It allowed me to step a little outside the classical paradigm of practicing medicine, which is predominantly evidence-based, and return to the art of medicine, where true caring makes a difference. It allowed me to have a great relationship with my brother and appreciate his great wisdom. It allowed me to just be grateful for the privilege of being alive.

Who were your biggest teachers?

Louis:  My biggest teachers were my parents, my brother, and my wife and daughter. They kept me straight.

What are your other interests?

Louis: Spending time with my family, traveling, reading and language. I am currently studying Arabic, and welcoming any opportunity to practice speaking Spanish.

Who are you favorite authors?

Louis: My favorite authors are historical novelists like Gabriella Garcia Marquez, John Steinbeck, George Orwell, and Ernest Hemmingway.

To find out more about Dr. Louis Koster, visit his website: http://www.louiskoster.com/

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Strike at the heart of the beast! Show no mercy!

Why do people feel compelled to do battle with all things related to aging? Hair gets colored, as if having gray hair is shameful. Young, nubile women begin getting Botox before the age of 30; begin using anti-wrinkle creams in their 20’s.

Have we come to despise these signs of having lived past our teen years?

My hair gleams with gray sprinkled throughout from years lived and loved.  Hard work went into the making of those signature hairs. Why should shame be associated with them?

Small lines have taken up residence around my mouth. Are they caused by laughing too much? If so, my favorite past-time will continue to occupy me. Laugh lines are far better in my estimation than facial stress fractures.

The reasoning behind this abhorrence of aging escapes me. My entire experience here on Planet Earth was lived at the same moment—the one in which I am aware. Age has rarely meant anything to me.

At age twelve, people treated me as 19-20. When nineteen came along, people assumed I was in my mid-20’s. By the time my 30’s arrived, most of my friends were in their early 20’s. Even now, I have few real friends my own age. I know plenty of people in their 50’s and 60’s, but those whom I call true friends are of all ages, from the very young to those in their late seventies and older.

It’s always been my contention that age is only a marker for statistical purpose. The body may have tell-tale signs of wear and tear. But the me operating this body has no age, except the one I inside my head.

The question which needs to be posed to a person is: If you’re so unhappy to reach your current age that you need to reconstruct your body to hide your experience, is reconstruction likely to erase your unhappiness?

Does one’s happiness depend on the physical representation of the person inside? After all, our bodies are only the vessels, which carry us around on this planet. Is our preoccupation with conforming to culture’s definition of beauty the only path to self-satisfaction and acceptance? Must we all be life-sized, unrealistic Barbie’s and Ken’s in order to be accepted as vital, beautiful, and worthwhile? If so, aren’t we all waving a white flag; surrendering our individuality and uniqueness in favor of a cultural i

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Strike at the heart of the beast! Show no mercy!

Why do people feel compelled to do battle with all things related to aging? Hair gets colored, as if having gray hair is shameful. Young, nubile women begin getting Botox before the age of 30; begin using anti-wrinkle creams in their 20’s.

Have we come to despise these signs of having lived past our teen years?

My hair gleams with gray sprinkled throughout from years lived and loved.  Hard work went into the making of those signature hairs. Why should shame be associated with them?

Small lines have taken up residence around my mouth. Are they caused by laughing too much? If so, my favorite past-time will continue to occupy me. Laugh lines are far better in my estimation than facial stress fractures.

The reasoning behind this abhorrence of aging escapes me. My entire experience here on Planet Earth was lived at the same moment—the one in which I am aware. Age has rarely meant anything to me.

At age twelve, people treated me as 19-20. When nineteen came along, people assumed I was in my mid-20’s. By the time my 30’s arrived, most of my friends were in their early 20’s. Even now, I have few real friends my own age. I know plenty of people in their 50’s and 60’s, but those whom I call true friends are of all ages, from the very young to those in their late seventies and older.

It’s always been my contention that age is only a marker for statistical purpose. The body may have tell-tale signs of wear and tear. But the me operating this body has no age, except the one I inside my head.

The question which needs to be posed to a person is: If you’re so unhappy to reach your current age that you need to reconstruct your body to hide your experience, is reconstruction likely to erase your unhappiness?

Does one’s happiness depend on the physical representation of the person inside? After all, our bodies are only the vessels, which carry us around on this planet. Is our preoccupation with conforming to culture’s definition of beauty the only path to self-satisfaction and acceptance? Must we all be life-sized, unrealistic Barbie’s and Ken’s in order to be accepted as vital, beautiful, and worthwhile? If so, aren’t we all waving a white flag; surrendering our individuality and uniqueness in favor of a cultural i

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- Because you get a letter from three six graders in Nebraska who tell you that are going to write your biography, make a poster for you, and dress as characters from your books - and one is even going to dress as you!

- Because you get a letter from an 11-year-old in Georgia who thinks you are as cool as you thought Roald Dahl was when you were 11.

- Because you get a note from a girl in Tennessee that says, “I just finished reading Girl, Stolen. ... I enjoyed the book very much. So much that during school I would sit in the back of the class and read under the desk.Thank you for making my geography class much more interesting!”

I’ve never even been to Georgia or Nebraska, and I was only in Tennessee once for a business meeting. All I saw was the airport, the meeting room, and the hotel.

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One year ago exactly, February 23, 2011, was the worst day of my life (at least so far). First, I got a bad piece of publishing news. And then I got an even worse piece of publishing news. (I don’t feel comfortable sharing what these were, but I guess the takeaway is that even after publishing more than a dozen books, not everything goes your way.) I was so freaked out that I just forwarded the second piece of new to my agent instead of calling her.

A few minutes later, the phone rang. I was so sure it was my agent that I didn’t even check Caller ID.

But it wasn’t Instead, it was LK (Lisa) Madigan’s husband with the news that she had died from the pancreatic cancer that had been diagnosed just eight weeks earlier.

This all happened in the space of a couple of hours.

As the year wore on, I lost two more friends, Bridget Zinn and Craig Warner. Two weeks ago, someone I’m close to was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Over the past 365 days, I’ve also had deadlines that I honestly did not know how I would make. I have worked so hard that I don’t even remember what I used to do on evenings and weekends. I wince when it’s sunny because the sunlight throws into relief just how dirty, dusty, and disorganized things have gotten in the past year.

There have been good things, too, that happened in the last 52 weeks. I’m not denying that.



But I’m still officially declaring today the start of a new year. A new year where I hope to not go to any memorial services. A new year where I read more for pleasure. A new year to live out the single resolution I made for 2012: “Less and more.” I want to go big with my family, my friends, my books, my fitness. I also want to cut out the clutter in my life, chuck all the little things that don’t add anything.

Here’s to a new year!

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Four years ago was my very last day working for someone else, after having worked for a variety of someone elses for 32 years. (For those of you trying to do the math, let’s just pretend I was baby model). I had a contract coming my way for a nice chunk of change, and I figured it was now or never.

So I gave notice and packed up my emergency makeup (I occasionally dealt with the media), my snacks, my photos, and the little cup where I kept spare change. I said goodbye to a lot of folks and tried not think to hard about whether I was crazy to quit when the stock market had lost 40 percent of its value and I hadn't actually signed said contract.

However, as a wise friend of mine said recently to another friend who was thinking about quitting her day job: “If you really want to be a writer, f*ck the back-up plan." Our friend is young, without children or a mortgage. She has the flexibility to not work for a while, or to do some freelancing or a job that requires little thought. Sometimes you have just have to take a chance. (When I quit, I had both a mortgage and a kid. I still do. They make life more ... interesting.)

Of course, it's not all sunshine and lollipops. Thank God I've got health benefits from my husband, but everything else I pay for out of pocket (like retirement) or simply don't have. I net out a little less than I did when I worked full-time (but I was well-paid). There have times when I have done the math and wondered exactly how we were going to pay the mortgage.

But you know what? It has worked out. I've had a bunch of books out since I quit: Face of Betrayal, Hand of Fate, Heart of Ice, and Girl, Stolen. The Night She Disappeared and Eyes of Justice will publish in the next few weeks. I've got contracts for four more. I’ve had foreign sales, movie nibbles, and books chosen for the Scholastic Book Club and the Junior Library Guild.

And I am so much happier!! All day long I get to kill people (or at least make them worried they might be killed) and it is so much fun. And if some of those people occasionally bear a passing resemblance to an old boss or annoying co-worker, I’m sure that’s a coincidence...

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"You look happy," I told a friend yesterday.  We were at the dance studio, a dark storm lashing against the window glass. 

"Of course," he said.

I asked him why, half a joke, a plea for sun on a rumbling day.  He began (it was easy for him) to enumerate.  Youth was on his list.  Health.  Love.  Opportunity.  Dance.  Not riches, he said.  He wouldn't want riches.  Riches wouldn't make him happy.

A little girl came in, next to dance.  She put on her shoes, he bowed to her, they walked down the hall, arms linked together.  I went out into the storm and for the rest of that night, my friend's happiness was mine, his celebration of what we have right now, this moment.

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Gotta love it when people find their place in the world.  This guy is obviously doing what he should with…

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It will take just 37 seconds to read this andchange your thinking.. 

Two men, both seriously ill, occupied the samehospital room. 

One man was allowed to sit up in his bed for anhour each afternoon to help drain the fluid from his lungs. 

His bed was next to the room's only window. 

The other man had to spend all his time flat onhis back. 

The men talked for hours on end. 

They spoke of their wives and families, theirhomes, their jobs, their involvement in the military service, where they hadbeen on vacation.. 

Every afternoon, when the man in the bed by thewindow could sit up, he would pass the time by describing to his roommate allthe things he could see outside the window. 

The man in the other bed began to live for thoseone hour periods where his world would be broadened and enlivened by all theactivity and color of the world outside.
The window overlooked a park with a lovely lake 

Ducks and swans played on the water while childrensailed their model boats. Young lovers walked arm in arm amidst flowers ofevery color and a fine view of the city skyline could be seen in the distance. 

As the man by the window described all this inexquisite details, the man on the other side of the room would close his eyesand imagine this picturesque scene. 

One warm afternoon, the man by the windowdescribed a parade passing by. 

Although the other man could not hear the band -he could see it in his mind's eye as the gentleman by the window portrayed itwith descriptive words. 

Days, weeks and months passed. 

One morning, the day nurse arrived to bring waterfor their baths only to find the lifeless body of the man by the window, whohad died peacefully in his sleep. 

She was saddened and called the hospitalattendants to take the body away. 

As soon as it seemed appropriate, th

0 Comments on Best Internet: You Can Always Be More Positive! as of 1/1/1900

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Hi Friends,

I'm feeling very blessed because...

*We're feeling settled into our beautiful, new home.
*I'm about halfway through this pregnancy, and feeling the baby move is one of the most wonderful feelings in the world.
*We're getting to know some wonderful people in our new hometown.
*Tomorrow, Robby and I celebrate 10 blissfully happy years of marriage.
*Last week, my parents came up to visit (and worked like dogs helping us get settled in).
*Bubs (now 8) was baptized last week, and it was wonderful.

Life is beautiful.

See you soon.

Emily

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Erica Nelson writes about happiness, and how you can get there. She wrote her first book of poems at the age of twelve and her first self-help book, Prospect When You Are Happy, in 2007. Erica’s latest book, Happiness Quotations, has just been released.

Hi Erica, Welcome to Literature & Fiction. Please tell everyone a little about yourself.

Erica: I was born in Sausalito, California just a hop across the bay from San Francisco. Born to parents who published newspapers, I was writing as soon as I could read. I remember my mom had sandpaper letters that I traced as a child to learn the alphabet. Later we moved a lot, almost every other year, and I spent a lot of time in libraries. As soon as we moved to a new city, I would learn where the library was located, and walk there often, carting books home. Love of reading was born inside me, and has never left. My first book was published in 2007, Prospect When You Are Happy, created for the conscious business person to create prosperity from a happy place inside. This new book Happiness Quotations: Gentle Reminders of Your Preciousness is my first book for a general audience, although many of my readers seem to be women.

When did the writing bug bite, and in what genre(s)?

Erica: I can’t remember a time when I didn’t write. I would carry my journal around with me as I rode my bike and walked in elementary school. In middle school and high school, I wrote songs and wrote for the school newspaper and yearbook. Then in college, I wrote concert reviews, dance reviews, and feature stories on dance and music for the college newspaper. Straight out of college, I became a journalist and I still write a weekly column that runs in seven San Francisco Bay Area newspapers in the education section of the papers.

When you started writing, what goals did you want to accomplish? Is there a message you want readers to grasp?

Erica:  When I started writing, I didn’t have goals. I just wrote. I have boxes and boxes of journals. I have clippings dating back to the 1980s. I interviewed Jay Leno once, before he was famous. That sounds like such a long time ago! I guess I had one goal once, “I want to be able to support myself writing in any city anywhere, wherever I want to live.” Later, as I got in tune with my spirit and soul, I wanted to write about being happy and experiencing happiness in difficult situations. That’s where my new book comes in.

Briefly tell us about your latest book. Is it part of a series or stand-alone?

Erica: The vision for this book is to be one of many, as a series of passages that show up for me and then I share these visions, concepts, situations where you can navigate rough waters with more clarity, more poise, more loving approaches, more joy, more of all that good stuff and less of the drama, less sorrow, less poverty, less spiritual abandonment and more connectivity to source energy.

What’s the hook for the book?

Erica: Everyone needs to be reminded of their own preciousness. Some days it is easier than others.

Do you have a specific writing style or preferred POV?

Erica:  I write as though I know everything, and that’s kind of funny. I write from a place of connectivity to source energy, the all-knowing being within us. I’m not like this 24 hours a day, some parts of the day I am not the “me” that shows up as all-knowing author. When I speak for audiences, they can be surprised at my humility. In my books, I come across as powerful, intense, insightful and wise, or that is the feedback I have been given.

How does your environment/up

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Fellow blogger and “intelligent misbehavor”, Rick Lewis, has kicked a hornet’s nest in my brain. 

Rick was in Philadelphia last week, where Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence and where the great American issues of “freedom” and the “pursuit of happiness” became grist for Rick’s daily blog.  I commented, sceptical about all this so-called happiness and liberty. 

Yes, back in 1776 the notion of individual rights must have been a radical concept, and happiness perhaps in short supply.  The demand for those “inalienable rights” has since become society’s mantra, and that would be okay if, over the years, conventional wisdom had come to embrace a profound understanding of happiness.  Or freedom.  But has it?  `

“Look what freedom has brought us,” I suggested to Rick, who then invited me to elaborate.  And that’s why my brain’s all abuzz.  No one has ever invited me to continue a rant. 

So here goes:

Happiness and freedom are so entrenched in our culture as “rights” that we ignore what we all know to be the truth of the matter – what real happiness is and how it’s earned.  It comes at a cost.  I’ve arrived at this conclusion after years of studying films and novels (not to mention my own life story).  Writers know what it takes to fashion a sense of verisimilitude, and it appears to come down to determined effort expended in the direction of a challenging goal or vision. 

Problem is, it has become uncool to appear to struggle.  What to say about suffering or, heaven forbid, failing.  It’s as if we are now obligated to be happy.  Little wonder that we fake it.  No one has explained this phenomenon better than Pascal Bruckner in an article called “Condemned to Joy”. 

Bruckner explains how the right of happiness has become a duty in our individualistic society.  A burden, in fact: “If I don’t feel happy, I can blame no one but myself.”  Never mind if we’re more or less happy than our ancestors, “our conception of the thing itself has changed,” says Bruckner, “and we are probably the first society in history to make people unhappy for not being happy.”

This really sets my mental bees to swarming because we know better.  Everyone understands the nature of honest to goodness contentment, and likewise we understand how profound sadness can be.  WE ALL KNOW THIS!  Yet we tend toward the path of least resistance. 

Every time we see a good movie or read a good novel we are reminded once again how the human organizm achieves its peak experiences – through risking encounters with failure and all the unhappiness that may ensue. 

Rick Lewis, in a more recent blog post, reminds us that avoiding unpleasant experience has become a defining feature of our culture.  And then he says a very important thing: 

“As long as we believe (that) our ability to create comfort for ourselves is freedom, we eliminate the possibility of realizing it.”

Stung with the truth. 

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I didn't realize just how many of my daily thoughts are crap.  Seriously.  Unless you're a positive person by nature, I think you'll agree that our thinking tends to lead us down a negative road.  Want to abolish those crappy thoughts forever?  Then grab a copy of, Happy Crap - 8 Tools to Choose Your Thoughts for Prosperity, Productivity and Peace by Erika Oliver.

This book isn't just another 'self-help-find-the-golden-path-to-life' read.  It's laid out in a simple, easy-to-follow and practical format that truly will open your eyes to how much negativity our brains can conjure up; most of it needless.

Oliver offers short exercises that point out areas where negative thinking creeps in and 8 easy tools we can use to combat it. 

We all want to be happy and lead productive lives, so don't waste another moment letting your brain rule with crappy thoughts, get your copy of Happy Crap today.

"It's all crap, so why not make it Happy Crap?"

For more information check out Erika's website at; http://www.erikaoliver.com/ also avialable on Amazon

About the Author:

Erika Oliver, MPA, is the "Positive Approach Coach."  As a positive communication expert and recovering pessimist, Erika helps people, teams, and organizations find their "happy."

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I was driving my car today, and the car in front of me had this bumper sticker: "Anger is a gift." And I thought, "Wow! What a right on concept!"


Anger tells us that something is wrong, and we better correct the situation, if it's humanly possible. It also reminds us that we have values, and that we are passionate people. You have to feel strongly about something to get angry about it. Your mind is screaming for you to "Do something!" And I don't mean pull out your .45 Magnum revolver. You're not going to make anyone's day with that. Maybe it's time to evaluate what's going on to make you so angry, and then do some problem solving.


In today's e-mail, Wings for the Heart Motivational Newsletter (http://www.wingsfortheheart.com), I came across five steps for striving to be happy. What would your five steps be? Well, I found step two rather interesting:

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If you read my last post you know that much of what I do entails thinking of ideas and forging them into some semblance of acceptable reading material. That is what writers do.

The question is: What else do writers do with their time each day?

I can only clue you in as to what I do. Right now I’m beginning The Artist’s Way course. Therefore, the very first thing of the day is my Daily Pages. If I’m working at home on a given day, I deal with correspondence before moving on to website perusal.

I can’t speak about why other people check out websites. I have specific ones I follow. I’m also a member of SeededBuzz , which promotes the viewing of member blogs, etc. (Check out SeededBuzz if you’re curious. I’m a member of several groups of varied interest. I also look for specific information about agents, editors, publishers, etc.–the usual business end information towards writing. That activity takes care of the clock until around noon.

Of course, within that is also social networking. That’s a must for any writer today. We were told that, we listened, and we do it. Simple as that.

The afternoon gets used for actual writing, whether non-fiction, fiction, journalism pieces, what-have-you. Then, too, it depends on whether submission deadlines loom in the near future and I’m struggling to catch up. Those deadlines take precedence, as every writer knows.

The evenings go through a kaleidoscope of activities. I might be studying research material, reading and studying writing course information/lessons/etc. or working on a piece previously written but not polished. It all depends on if I need a break from the computer and how badly I need rest.

Occasionally, as I did for the past couple of days, I take a major break from active writing. Or, I tag along on a photo shoot with my sister. We’re   making plans for the future which are exciting, intriguing, and scary all rolled into a convenient carrying case called the “Unknown Next Few Months.”

We’re trying to do away with plans other than those immediate ones that call our names and point in interesting directions. I’ve heard that kind of living called “spontaneous,” but I’ve never allowed it take hold before. I’m hoping to do better in future. We’ll have to see how things play out on a couple of fronts before we can commit ourselves to going to the gypsy mindset completely.

So, there you have my day, my life, my example, poor as it may be.

Wishes? Sure, I have them, with more arriving every day. Plans? More like desires than plans. Contingencies come into play always. I can’t do without those.

And my writer’s day. I’m here, aren’t I. I have two blogs, write for Associated Content, have begun doing book reviews, am gearing up to begin again with interviews, and have a few other irons in the fire.

Anyone one of those could control my day according to whatever schedule happens to hold sway that day. Take your pick and remember–You, too, could have a day like mine.

A bientot,

Claudsy

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these delicious whole wheat pancakes...(and you don't even need a wheat grinder!)

Blender Whole Wheat Pancakes


1. Put 1 Cup of wheat kernels and 1 Cup of milk or water in blender. Blend on high speed for 3 min. (I use my Bosch blender. I imagine you need a pretty powerful blender for this.)

2. Add 1/2 Cup more milk and blend for 2 more minutes.

3. Add 1/2 tsp salt, 3 tsp baking powder, 1/2 Cup oil, and 2 eggs. (If you want to make these non-dairy / vegan, you can omit the eggs. I did it once because I didn't realize I was out of eggs, and they still turned out great!)

4. Blend well and pour on hot griddle. (You know the rest, right? Flip them when they look bubbly. Remove them when they've reached desired color. Top with more deliciousness, such as strawberries, whip cream, and syrup...)


(I don't know where this recipe originated. I got it from my mom. If you know where credit is due, let me know.)
Happy eating!

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