Even though I’ve purged a lot of books from my collection reselling them on Half.com, I still seem to have a number of “self-help” books stacked on my shelves. Earlier this week I was directed to open up a book by Barbara Sher and Annie Gottlieb called, Wishcraft, How to Get What You Really Want. (Click here for Wishcraft Online) I flipped to an exercise where you write down twenty things you like to do and then evaluate them through a series of questions. How long since last done? Does it cost anything or is it free? Planned or spontaneous? Mind, body or spiritual? It was a very interesting exercise indeed. I wrote down twenty things in no particular order and then realized how I could prioritize them from “high” to “low.” Continue Reading »

Photo Courtesy of Michael Brenton

Bathing in its radiant, white glow,
The light of the moon with its halo,
Shines down, a spotlight on the black hills,
A memory in the corner of her mind still,
Remembers his hands on her being,
Spirit and flesh both agreeing,
Her innocence, white as the moon,
Is intact, not torn up and strewn.
The spotlight guides her, as she crosses the black hills,
Searching and yearning for love all the while still.
Many miles she’s traveled with the moon as her guide,
Only to find the love she’s looking for is on the inside.

(by Linda Latta)

This year I started a tradition of taking my mom to shows for Mother’s Day and her birthday. She was out of town in May, so I wasn’t able to celebrate Mother’s Day with her. Missing her, I thought a gift of spending time together when she returned would be better than any present I could buy. The Broadway musical, “The Jersey Boys” was playing at the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles and I knew she’d like it. Continue Reading »

Do You Know This Song?

It’s one of my favorite Christmas tunes, which must be played LOUDLY, so you can sing at the top of your lungs. It reminds me of big “glam” hair. And even though it came out several years before I worked in the music business, it brings me back to that time in my life, when I was a “rocker chick.” In college, I worked at Global Satellite Network, a radio syndication company that broadcast Rockline and other music shows. I met lots of rock bands and have glossy black and white photos with artists such as Aerosmith, David Bowie, Billy Idol, John “Cougar” Mellencamp and many more. It doesn’t matter how old this song is, or how old I am, whenever I hear it, I AM a “rocker chick” again. (I even sported a haircut like Martha Quinn’s) So join me in singing…Christmas Is The Time to Say I Love You!

I’ve been working with the idea of “less.” I’ve made strong efforts to say less, worry less, eat less and weigh less. However, one thing I learned about removing things from your life is you need to fill the empty space with good things. So I’m saying less and writing more, worrying less and praying more, eating less and doing more activity. This morning I even went to a complimentary boot camp session. Complimentary boot camp, is that an oxymoron? The struggle with weight has been a lifelong one, but I know if I keep focused on “less is best” I will eventually win the battle. Thinking about weight, it’s easy to see how burdens can “weigh” you down and how pressure can cause you to “expand.” Continue Reading »

“Matthew, can you help me untangle these Christmas lights?”
Putting up the tree on Sunday was a piece of cake compared to getting the lights on it. No wonder I procrastinated. Maybe the procrastination is what caused the strands to get so jumbled? How can you take lights down and wrap them so perfectly one year, just to try to put them up the next only to find a tangled mess? A tangled mess, sounds like the traffic jam I was in today. I felt the same frustration this morning on my commute. I felt like I was never going to get to work, just like I felt I would never get from one end of the strand to the other. What’s this all about? Oh, patience, I see, I’ve been meaning to work on that too, right after the procrastination issues. “Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.” James 1:3-4. This morning when I felt like Michael Douglas in “Falling Down,” I knew I needed to practice patience. So I took a few deep breaths and popped in “A Christmas Song” by Dave Matthews Band and filled myself with love, love, love.
And eventually I got to work. Tonight when tugging and jiggling weren’t working, I knew I had to slow down and patiently follow the strand from beginning to end. I started singing the “Twelve Pains of Christmas” in my head, the second pain being “rigging up the lights.” It brought a smile to my face as I tried desperately to be pleasant for Matthew.
“Isn’t this fun, Matthew?”
“Mom, has anyone ever died of boredom?”
An hour and ten minutes later. A miracle! We have a beautifully lit up Christmas tree.
“Mom, can we put the ornaments on now?”
Well, this is definitely an exercise in patience for both of us as it was past Matthew’s bedtime and the “fun” part, the decorating, will have to wait until tomorrow night.

As I’m putting up our Christmas tree today, I wanted to share a story about Matthew discovering the truth about Santa Claus. It happened when he was eight years old at Easter time. When he asked, “There’s no such thing as an Easter Bunny, right? It makes no sense, how can a big rabbit hide eggs?” it reminded me of when he asked, “Why did Dad move out?” I wanted to ignore the question but felt cornered with nowhere to go, except to the truth. After all he was eight years old, maybe too old to believe in such childish things as giant bunnies and Santa Claus, and yet too young to be intimately aware of cancer. Continue Reading »