Leaving Busy

2020 unleashed a series of events that took me by surprise. Although my intensifying struggle with my hair had been brewing for some years, epic health crisis, the emergence of COVID and lockdowns emboldened me to try something equally dramatic. After years of wrestling with my hair, I decided to give up the struggle and explore the unknown territory of wearing wigs.

At the dawn of our 29th wedding anniversary, we are celebrating a long-dreamt milestone, the fulfillment of our home mortgage! 

One of the joys of life and friendship is having the opportunity to watch extraordinary women grow and come into their own as the years progress. I have the privilege of knowing many fabulous women who are doing amazing things and am excited to feature them periodically in my new "Extraordinary Women in Focus" article series.

February 2021 is upon us, and I have fully embraced the love theme of Valentine's Day by decorating my home in an unprecedented way. There are pink flowers, white ribbon, hearts, lights, candles, and traditional colour-themed candy.

Everything that speaks of whimsical romance and creating lifelong love and it makes me happy.

Walking down the aisle almost three decades ago, my husband and I may have been voted least likely to succeed in marriage, but somehow we beat the odds. This season has me feeling grateful while contemplating our lives together and what secrets we might share about creating lifelong love.

As December drew to a close and 2021 was dawning on the horizon, I was decidedly shy about emotionally investing in new year goals.

I have always advocated making life plans and daring to dream, but my optimistic agenda was drop-kicked and knocked unconscious last year. When I woke up, the world had changed, and so had I.

Still, nothing inspires dreams and new year goals like a pristine, blank calendar and the promise of a fresh start.

My friend eyed me inquisically, and I found myself unburdening years of negative experiences trying to connect with hobbyist groups in search of "support and encouragement." It was apparent that I had found precisely the opposite. Not that all these groups were terrible and didn't have support to give. Just that they were too intensely focused on their own agenda to welcome someone who didn't share their cult-like devotion or think outside their formula of success. Sometimes it was just collective limiting beliefs that I chafed at, and when I proved them wrong, I found myself facing suspicion or outright jealousy. Instead of group support, I'd encountered varying levels of sabotage.

During my sedation, I was aware that things were not going as planned. The combination of fentanyl and morphine I was given while sedated had an effect on my perception of real and imagined events. In Part 1 of Life Tsunami: Surviving the Unexpected, I lay out the facts that lead up to my surgery, two weeks of sedation and the aftermath I woke up to. This article, by contrast, features the imaginary experiences I mistook as reality. The following narrative is fiction except for the rare occasions where I reference real events that intersected and influenced my dreams. It is a comical, yet sobering glimpse through the looking glass of medicated unconsciousness.

As my friends and I toasted the arrival of 2020 on New Year's Eve with all my hopes and plans for the months to come, I had no idea of the events soon to crash the peaceful shore of my life. A silent storm was brewing, and a life tsunami was about to break, not only for me personally but for everyone globally. Since that celebratory evening, life has taken on a surreal, cartoon-like quality with a theme similar to the post-apocalyptic movies that my family and I can't get enough of.

I’m talking about the stuff that we know we should address but don’t and somehow, we think that 2020 is going to be different without us behaving differently. Changing our behaviours is something we can do at any time, but most of us are more receptive to change at the ushering in of a new year. So here are 3 Ingeniously Practical Ways to Expand Your Resources in 2020.

Christmas. It is supposed to be the season for joy and merriment and for the most part, it is; however, even for the jolliest Santa, Christmas preparations and celebrations can bring out their inner Scrooge! No-one likes going into debt, but we all want to enjoy generous festivities, bless our loved ones and extend our giving to those less fortunate. Between parties, gifts, Christmas dinners, charitable donations and holiday-themed events, by January, our pocketbooks can become rather thin. With this in mind, here are 21 memorable ways to celebrate Christmas on a budget.

My love for Christmas advent calendars is progressively turning into an obsession. It started as a child when my mother introduced me to the store-bought cardboard version that contained chocolates. I suspect this was her way of coping with the “How many more days is it to Christmas?” question I posed to her multiple times a day. Now though, chocolate advent calendars are a relic of my childhood, and I am finding more creative ways to count off the advancing toward our most celebrated holiday of the year.

In the Christian community, Christmas is traditionally celebrated on December 25th as a religious holiday commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ. However, in the marketing world, preparing for celebrations is launched well before the Canadian Thanksgiving, Halloween, continuing past the US Thanksgiving through to Christmas Eve. All this results in a rush to buy presents for family and colleagues, send greeting cards, plan celebrations, decorate the house, trim the tree, wrap presents, clean the house in preparation for visitors and overnight guests, and hopefully make it all happen by Christmas Eve. It is necessary to take proactive measures to prevent burnout during the holiday season!

The holiday season can be one of the most stressful times of the year. Starting around mid-October, straight through into the New Year, it seems like we go non-stop. From preparing food to home decorations, parties, shopping for presents, booking accommodations, and incurring travel expenses, etc., celebrations can become overwhelming if you're not careful. If you are considering simplifying your festivities, here are 10 reasons why smaller holiday gatherings are better for families:

Essential Oils. Even two decades ago, I had never heard the term. I certainly had no idea that I would not only try them but come to love and share my love of oils with friends as well.

The coupon codes were everywhere. In my Facebook feed. Little coloured slips of advertising in my regular correspondence. Tempting ads in my Google finds.

Goodfood.

Another meal subscription service that promised to make my life more convenient while allowing me to enjoy better home-cooked meals.

Honestly?

I ignored the message. I kept on browsing. Threw the coupon codes away.

I wasn't interested.

This morning I dragged my reluctant body through a 30-minute stretch routine. Struggling to harness my attention span, I would catch myself staring listlessly off into the distance as the drone of fitness instruction guided me through a series of body positions.

In this stage of fitness repentance, stretching is full of awkward reminders that my late-forties body doesn’t move like it did a couple decades ago.

Tightness in my chest muscles from years of sitting over a computer keyboard with less than stellar posture makes the meeting of my palms behind my back impossible. I grasp into the air behind me and eventually settle for hand-over-hand folding somewhere at the base of my spine instead.

Same goes for a standing twist stretch that results in a token turn of my head or the forward fold where my fingers fall a good 12 inches short of my toes. Darned years of office chair existence. My hammies aren’t cutting me any slack.

When it’s over I feel a mix of relief and elation wash over me. Score one for healthier lifestyle and I actually do feel better than I did 30 minutes before. I’m just glad I didn’t have any spectators other than my two doggies. Instead of a graceful workout it was more like a one-person wrestle match.

This year, Marie Kondo’s system of tidying up has swept North America. Households are embracing the very practical “KonMari” method and purging record volumes of excess possessions from their homes. Why? To enjoy the promised mental, emotional and relational peace that comes from making decisions, getting rid of clutter and moving forward in life with the items that serve them best.

What if we looked inward and applied the same decluttering principles to our hearts as we did our homes? What would that look like? It is totally possible to overhaul heaps of useless junk that is smothering our most sacred space with a series of simple, practical steps through the life-changing power of forgiveness.

I’m convinced that unresolved conflict is a major cause of poor mental health and that confrontation that leads to healing can be the best elixir to a troubled soul. Yet even the word “confrontation” brings a sense of adversity, does it not?

The truth is that conflict doesn’t have to be adversarial! Addressing offences can be loving and gentle. Healing confrontation is the portal where vulnerability and greater understanding merge to create unity and growth.

Adopting a pet comes with multiple benefits! Dogs definitely lead the pack when it comes to pets but cats are a very close second and their owners are no less enthusiastic. While there are many other creatures one can enjoy like hamsters, gerbils, fish, turtles, lizards, snakes, spiders, pigs, rabbits, horses and more…we’re going to focus today’s article on the stereotypical dog and cat variety.

Easter is just over a week away and it brings to mind a springtime long weekend, pastels, bunnies, chickees, eggs, and CHOCOLATE! It also includes a festive Sunday morning church service with best dresses, excited musical pageantry over Christ’s triumphant resurrection and an afternoon with family around an abundant table. Tucked in there is the somber assembly on Good Friday for those who choose to acknowledge it and the violence that makes all the other celebrations as intensely beautiful as they are.

You just signed up for a blog filled with oodles of great information that you need and earnestly want to read. The moment you hit “subscribe” your inbox is filled with confirmation emails, offers and those valuable facts you plan to consume…later on when you have time. Soon those emails are sandwiched between work and personal correspondence, volunteer schedules, sales notices and social media notifications.

Today I want to share 3 risk factors to avoid mental health crisis. There are many factors that contribute to poor mental health including genetics, trauma, drug abuse etc. and this article will not be covering those. This list is presuming that other more serious psychological issues are not at play and we are dealing with a relatively well-adjusted person under normal circumstances.

If you’d told me that I would be starting a blog dedicated to the promotion of mental health and the many topic threads woven in and around it…well let’s say I didn’t see this coming.  Before we move on, let me introduce myself and how the topic of mental health became one of importance to me personally.

An introductory welcome to website visitors in the first weeks of development