Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut elit tellus, luctus nec ullamcorper mattis, pulvinar dapibus leo. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rf2X933EMWM&ab_channel=CityofHuntingtonBeach Make sure and ALWAYS give credit to the source of a video that I get from YouTube.
Have you ever heard that the 10 most empowering 2-letter words are: If It Is To Be, It Is Up to Me. When I heard first this, I wanted to change the last word so that it would indicate more inclusiveness. So I changed this quote to If It Is To Be, It Is Up to…not Me, but ‘We’ which sounded grammatically incorrect, so I changed \’We\’ to ‘US’! Wouldn’t you agree that when we work together, we will accomplish more as a T.E.A.M, Together Everyone Achieves More! As we look ahead to 2023, consider how Pope Francis’s replied when asked if he thought 2017 would be a good year. He calmly said: “It will be a good year IF we are good to one another.” Now that 2022 is behind us and 2023 ahead of us, I think of all the happy times I have enjoyed throughout 2022 as well as the challenges with the covid fiasco. While my ego may rationalize that I can\’t influence potential criminals from committing crimes in the future, my spiritual half of me reminds me of Eleanor Roosevelt’s challenge: Women Need to Elevate Their Skills from a Domestic Level to a Social Level. And I added a P.S. to her statement: …especially women who have time to e.g. empty nesters like me or retired ladies vs ladies who are deep down on mothering! Given most of us want peace, I feel Eleanor’s statement introduces an opportunity for each of us to assess how we can create peace in our own life far beyond our home and families. And hope, from a spiritual perspective, that what we do will ripple outward and, somehow, someday, someway, reach those who are – sadly – considering harming anyone else. So, here are my suggestions for you to consider: 1. Think of the four areas of your life other than yourself: e.g. those you work with, loved ones, acquaintances (people you know but may not necessarily love) and Good Samaritan opportunities (helping total strangers in their time of need). 2. Think about someone in each of those areas that you may have rationalized why you haven’t made the effort to create peace with them. Then, consider the new Serenity Prayer, Grant me to serenity to accept the people in the world I cannot change, the courage to change the one person I can, and the wisdom to know It’s me!’ and think of some little ways you can begin to create peace with that person. 3. Then, Just Do It! Or, rather, CHOOSE to do whatever you can to create peace with that person whom you may not have been getting along with for some time and wait to see how the Law of Karma rewards you for your good choice! 4. Next, with each new day, move onto another person or situation and brainstorm on how you can create peace with that person. This is how we can put these 10 or 12 or 14 words into action to make 2019 one of our best years ever! I believe there is a lot of love bottled up within all of us who want to have peace, but we may be waiting for the other person to take the first step. Don’t wait! Take that step and start the ball rolling toward more peaceful relationships in 2023! Then, in return, you’ll see how you are *blessed back* many times more than the love you gave to someone else in their time of need. It’s simply seeing the Law of Karma in action. Together, let’s make 2023 the best year ever by creating happiness in every way possible and hopefully prevent tragedies too from our choices to create good affecting others to do good!
With our holiday season ahead, I hope wonderful get-togethers are ahead for you and your loved ones. Hopefully, you can enjoy some of the hustle and bustle of this year’s holiday season without getting all stressed out. Hopefully, you can enjoy shopping, mailing packages to loved ones, attending holiday parties, maybe hosting one. It’s what makes the holiday season what it is. Yes? As you are enjoying all your holiday get-togethers, you may start thinking: What comes after the holidays? What’s on the horizon for me next year? Should I explore a new career? Take a relationship to the next level? Take some self-development courses? Maybe launch a little business of your own on the side? Or the most famous New Year’s Resolution of all, Lose Weight! All kinds of choices you get to make soon! Whatever you do, consider this simple formula to avoid overdoing yourself in your new effort. Think of using the colors of the holiday season to create balance in your new year: Green for your *giving* activities and red for the *receiving* activities in your life. Are you are wondering: Should I focus on first? If you are, think of the Christmas poinsettia as a guide. Its first color is Green! So, think, first, of what to you can give before thinking about what you want to receive. Or, you may prefer to follow one of Stephen Covey’s habit of highly effective people, Begin with the End in Mind. For example, ‘To receive a paycheck, I’ll need to – first – give my skills in the form of service to my employer and its customers’ or ‘To receive love, I should start by giving love’ which matches ‘To have a friend, first, be one.’ In all these situations, remember that, by giving, you will receive – at a minimum – that heartwarming feeling anyone receives from any \’giving’ effort. If you are thinking, ‘Heck, I give way more than I receive’, ask yourself: When you are ‘giving\’, what are some of the ‘reds’ that you are receiving from your giving efforts that you may not notice easily? How about simply feeling grateful you have a job vs not not feeling grateful that you have one? And appreciating those crazy friends of yours at work that make your job a joy vs a boring job. If you are a stay-at-home parent, think of all the countless, priceless heart-warming, precious moments of parenting. For entrepreneurs, there’s the working ‘half-days’ (12 hrs a day) that will, hopefully, generate far more income over time than continually going to that same old job day after day, decade after decade. And, as we all know, with any kind of work comes the need to rest and re-energize. So, for that, I recommend you consider one of Mother Teresa’s words of wisdom, “Work, Rest, and PRAY” or Dr. Jack Groppel, well-known sports physician, who suggests: “Work, Rest, and PLAY!” In closing, stop and think about your life now and ask yourself: “What are the green *giving opportunities* in my life and what are some hidden *red rewards* I may enjoy from them?” When you are helping someone, remember the quote: \”Many people spell \’love\’: T I M E. In closing, as you celebrate with family and friends this upcoming weekend and begin the new year, look for ways to give by simply ‘thinking of all’ whenever you make a choice and let the rich red receiving moments rain upon you. Best wishes for creating a happy and balanced Happy New Year! May it be your best year ever!
I’m re-emerging again 🙂 While I’ve met most of you at a recent conference, workshop, or meeting of one of the organizations that I’m affiliated with, it’s been some time since I’ve connected with you online. This was due to an extremely busy schedule with back-to-back projects that have filled up my schedule beyond overflowing…until now. Life is a bit slower for me now. Because experts recommend linking a message to an event, I’m linking my blog today to the death of my sister, Carla, who died unnecessarily 20 years ago today. You ask: UNnecessarily? Yes. I\’ll explain that in a bit. But, first, I have some questions for you. As many of you know, I frequently ask someone when I meet them: What events have made you feel happy? Glad? Sad? or even mad? The reason I asked \”What events have caused you to feel glad, sad, or mad” vs ‘What things have made you feel glad, sad, or mad is because ‘things’ are tangible items like a comb, cell phone, or computer. Agree? Technically, it’s not ‘things’, but people that make us feel happy and glad, sad or mad e.g. isn’t it usually someone who did something that makes you feel glad, sad, mad? Like a romantic event with your spouse? An accomplishment at work? An achievement of your child? Every time I ask this question, I receive a wide range of answers. From When my husband proposed!” or “When my wife and I got married” or “When I FINALLY got that promotion that took THREE YEARS!” Or “When my daughter got accepted into the university of her dreams!” Do you see how all these answers are events caused by someone’s internal choices vs a ‘thing’ causing your feelings? Now, think about how your answers to my questions above are the result of an original thought followed by many choices to advance that original thought – or idea – into an actual event. Next, consider all the thoughts that advanced your original idea into reality. It is said we have about 70,000 thoughts per day. This means between 35 and 48 thoughts per minute to use. See the importance of our thoughts and choices? Of course, we all prefer to focus on the happy and glad moments of life. However, life is a roller coaster of memories, wouldn’t you agree? Along with happy times in our lives, sad times happen in our lives and, if you\’re human, also feeling mad may, at times, creep into our heart for justified reasons when someone chooses to harm another person or a group of people … like any of the terrorist\’s attacks or a tragedy caused not a gunman, but the gunman’s choice to use his gun to harm others like the 33 people killed at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. One of the Saddest Events of my Life… For me, one of the saddest events in my life happened 20 years ago on Saturday, Aug 12, when my sister, Carla, died UNnecessarily! I say ‘UNnecessarily’ because she died from a brain tumor for which a cure had been developed, but the medical industry wouldn’t allow cancer patients like my sister, who was suffering from that kind of tumor to be cured. At that time, a wonderful Dr. Burzynski in Texas had been working on a cure for that kind of cancer for decades: www.burzynskiclinic.com. He had successfully invented a cure for the kind of cancer my sister had: an astrocytoma. However, because the FDA, Federal Drug Administration, had forbidden him to give it to patients…because doing so would reduce their revenue earned from treating cancer patients like my sister, she died UNnecessarily 20 years ago today. To read about this cover-up here: https://2016burzynskicancercurecover-up.vhx.tv/ Imagine how you\’d feel if she were your sister who could still be alive if it weren’t for the greed of the medical industry? This is just one of millions of examples of how selfish choices are harming innocent people and their families because so many then die unnecessarily like my sister. Have you ever lost a loved one…whether it happened intentionally or accidentally like the 100s of people who die every day from traffic accidents…many times simply due to inattentiveness by a distracted driver who was texting or drinking while driving? The loss never goes away. Whether it’s a massively large tragedy like 9/11, the terrorist attacks here in San Bernardino, CA, in Paris or London or anywhere, they are all caused by someone’s internal choice to not only plan but carry out the plans to harm others. THIS is the reason why I work so much to draw attention to the internal, invisible choices that create the external results in our lives. While millions watch the news such as how North Korea is steadily increasing their plans to launch a nuclear war that the media here in the USA, sadly, gives the vast majority of its attention to war-related instigations vs peacebuilding efforts, I – as an author, educator, and consultant – am one of countless social activists. What I do is teach people ways to consciously be more aware of one\’s choices so we can, collectively, create more good results e.g. peace vs bad results. My work is based on the new more empowering version of the original Serenity Prayer. As you know, the original serenity prayer is: God grant me the serenity to accept the ‘things’ I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Are you ready for the more empowering version of it? God grant me the serenity to accept the PEOPLE I cannot change, the courage to change the ONE person I can, and the wisdom to know it’s ME.” Do you like the 2nd one better? Wouldn’t you agree we can create more good results in our lives by living this more empowering version of the Serenity Prayer and focusing on what each of us is
At last, a posting here on my blog from this busy gal: Within a mere 11 days, I attended 5 fabulous events that illuminated how many, many good people are working on many, many *good goals*. Three were women’s events and the other two were about educating ‘locals’ on pertinent issues and what we citizens need to do to hold politicians accountable to serving us/their constituents as best they can. Saturday, March 11: Iranian Circle of the Women’s Intercultural Network, Long Beach. The first event in this wonderful week was the Iranian Circle of the Women’s Intercultural Network held on Saturday, March 11, in Long Beach. The speakers highlighted a multitude of discouraging situations that women around *our* world are facing e.g. gender inequality. All those discouraging statistics illustrate how we women need to continue working together to get more women in leadership positions in businesses and community orgs as well as elect more women into political positions. Monday-Friday, Mar. 13-17: CSW, Commission on (Improving) the Status of Women, NYC The next event, which I am referring to as *the big one in the middle* was the NGO-CSW, Commission on the Status of Women for Empowerment and Gender Equality of Women in New York City! So I traveled from sunny Southern California to NYC with a coat I purchased the day before (it was nearly 90 that day) so I could use it for a mere 5 days! I arrived on Monday, March 13, in NYC at JFK right in front of the big blizzard which caused all the schools in NYC to be cancelled Monday evening for the next day… even before the first snowflake fell! How the blizzard affected the conference I had flown to NYC to attend was it shut down the entire conference on Tuesday! Bummer! So sad I was! So I spent the day meeting with leaders of WFWP, like Angelika Selle, president of WFWP-US who had invited me to their 25th Anniversary Gala Dinner at the OneUN hotel, and many others in their NYC office. On Wednesday, March 15, I hustled back and forth in the blizzardy weather all day..rushing from the Community Center of the UN to the Armenian Center to the Church of New York to attend as many workshops as possible. Wednesday evening, I attended the gala dinner of WFWP to celebrate their 25th Anniversary. At that event, I met many of the leaders of WFWP at the international level like Yeon Ah Moon, President of WFWP-International, along with women from Russia, Ukraine, Australia, Note: WFWP has a presence in many, many countries…. I searched for, but couldn\’t find the exact count.. over 50??? On Thursday and Friday, I hustled back and forth as fast as possible to attend as many workshops as possible for two reasons: First, learn about the topic of each the workshops, but, more important, meet as many women around our world as possible. And that I did! To the tune of more than 125 women from probably over 50 countries. Haven’t counted all the biz cards yet I accumulated yet,much less followed up with all of them yet, but will be doing so soon. As I was leaving my hotel, The New Yorker, which is near Madison Square Gardens, on Friday afternoon around 4pm, traffic was at another standstill. This time, it wasn\’t because of the blizzard, but because of the St. Patrick’s Day partiers on Fifth Avenue who were just beginning to drink their green beers and hop from bar to bar till ‘dark thirty’. Saturday, March 18: Great American Write-In, hosted by Women of Orange County . After arriving home at LAX in the wee hours of Saturday morning, March 18, I woke up and rushed to the Great American Write-in Orange County. It was hosted by Women for Orange County, an advocacy group for women’s rights. The event gave the 50+ activist groups represented that day an opportunity to educate visitors about their specific cause from advancing human & civil rights, promoting peace & justice and seek each visitor for his/her signatures on pre-printed letters that will be sent to each visitor’s designated elected official in support for each org’s cause. Sunday, March 19: Attended a Citizen’s Awareness Meeting in Fountain Valley The next day, Sunday night, I attended a citizen’s advocacy meeting in Orange County to learn about issues in which our constitutional rights are being discretely snuffed away from us. At this event, five leaders in the community shared how they courageously stood up for their free speech and constitutional rights in various situations at work, at their colleges, etc. Their courage and the shocking reactions they encountered was heartbreaking and illustrated the need that if we citizens who take our freedoms for granted don’t defend our rights, they WILL be taken away from us. Contact me for more info re this if you are interested. Tuesday, March 21: WFWP Info Night at the Conference Center in Las Vegas. Sunday and Monday: Two normal, busy work days for me; then, Tuesday morning, I left for Vegas to help some dear friends and fellow WFWP members, Aimmee Kodachian and Mary Hida, host a wonderful event at the Conference Center in Vegas. As the main speaker, Aimmee shared how her brother, Robert, inspired her when she was so young and facing many challenges. He taught her how to push through them with courage and compassion so she could, eventually, overcome any struggle she encountered, first, in Lebanon, her native country; then, here in America. Her message to all was to create heaven on earth through giving, forgiving, and creating peace in our daily lives. Wrap Up/Why All This Info/What’s Next From the first event of the Women Intercultural Network to the last WFWP event up in Vegas but, most of all, in New York City where I met 100s of women from all around the world….all working busily on their own cause, meeting and greeting one another at or in-between the many workshops,
Did 2018 start out on a good note for you? I hope it did. It sure did for me! After living in Southern California for over ten years and always watching the Rose Parade on the TV, I finally attended the parade in person this year. Oh, what a wonderful choice to do so! Coincidentally, a friend in Hollywood Hills had invited me to her New Year’s Eve party so, after we all rang in the new year, I stayed overnight and was able to get more sleep there than if I drove to Pasadena from Orange County. My early morning drive to Pasadena at 5:30 this morning was a mere 20 minutes vs hours. After pulling into a gas station in Pasadena before 6am which was only a couple blocks from Colorado Ave (the street on which the parade travels), my first day of this new year started off great because of a simple little W.G.A.C.A experience. BTW, I should explain W.G.A.C.A. You’ve heard of Karma, I trust. Well, W.G.A.C.A. is the same as Karma. It stands for ‘What Goes Around Comes Around.’ While in the gas station, I noticed a LASD deputy trying to strategically carry out three, super tall hot coffees. I simply offered to carry one to his car so he wouldn’t spill all three. That’s all I did! Or ‘Chose to Do! Once back in the store, while getting my own coffee and sandwich, I struck up a conversation with a lady, mentioned that I needed to find a place to park my car and I wasn’t excited about paying the $30 stated on the parade’s website. In less than a minute of chatting, she motioned to me to \”Follow Her\” and, in a hushed voice, gave me permission to park my car in her parking spot because she was an employee of that gas station and didn’t need her spot. Whee! She just saved me all parking costs! And it\’s only TWO blocks from Colorado Ave! After parking my car and starting my walk towards Colorado Street, a homeless lady asked me for a dollar for her own cup of coffee. Feeling happy about my recent W.G.A.C.A. experience, I gave her All My Parking Money! While some may argue that there was no link between my effort to simply help someone so he didn\’t spill all of his drinks to, LESS THAN A MINUTE LATER, receiving the kind of help I wanted but hadn’t even spoken out loud that I wanted it was, most definitely, a W.G.A.C.A experience. I went on to fully enjoy every morsel of every moment at my first Rose Parade from floats to marching bands to the honoring of local leaders. Coincidentally, I got an almost front row position so I had a perfect view of every float, etc. Shifting the focus to you now: For you to have an abundance of W.G.A.C.A. experiences throughout this new year, please consider what I mentioned in my Christmas Day blog about using the colors of Christmas to have a balanced year: Green for giving and red for receiving! If you wonder which you should focus on first, look to the plant of our Christmas season, the poinsettia. It produces green leaves first and then red leaves! Next, look to the five areas of your life and see how you can give before receiving. The five areas I’m referring to are: 1) caring for yourself… A great example of \’giving\’ to yourself and a full night of sleep vs half and expecting your body to act as if you had gotten eight hours. 2) helping others in your workplace before expecting something from them, 3) helping those in your family or a friend however s/he needs help, 4) helping a neighbor or someone else in your community that is not necessarily a loved one but they need your help such as the 3-yr-old boy who just ‘helped his elderly neighbor, Mr. Jones, cry’ after losing his wife of 63 years. 5) helping a total stranger by being a spontaneous Good Samaritan such as I had the opportunity to do so this morning… all based on my choice to help vs not. When you begin your day by thinking of a spirit-based question of ‘What choices can I make today to give?’ vs ‘What can I get?’, that kind of attitude is like planting seeds of success for yourself and turning opportunities to help others to receiving an abundance of gifts back for you to enjoy. Again, it\’s called W.G.A.C.A. Try it for a day, a week, a month and let me know of your W.G.A.C.A. experiences. Blessings to you and all your choices!