“Thanks for taking these library books back for me.” I said to my friend.
“You’re welcome, I’ll try to take care of that for you.”
“Try?” I asked myself. Try?
“Do you think you won’t be able to?” I asked her.
“Oh, no, I’ll stop over this afternoon and drop them off.” She replied.
“Okay, thanks so much.”
 
There’s a big difference between try and will. When my friend said she’d try, she didn’t sound committed to making sure the books would be returned. If at first she’d said, “Yes, I will take them over this afternoon” there would have been no question. It’s a firm commitment of intention.

There are many ways we can move our bodies, but for me, I like walking. Inhaling fresh air, especially on a crisp fall day, is heaven on earth.

In the summer when it’s hot, I like to get up before the sunrise to walk. More than the heat though, the road I walk on is due east/west so the sun rises behind me and I’m not visible to oncoming traffic. The road is a very narrow country road, so there’s a survival component to my getting up early.

As I walk, I greet the maple trees in my front yard and the neighborhood Golden Retriever Ginger who sits outside waiting for a passerby to play ball with her. One morning, she sat with a plastic bat in her mouth – the image of it still cracks me up.

When I try to force an idea into being, and inevitably get stuck, my ego starts spurting out thoughts of not being good enough or of how lame I am.

An interesting thing about the mind is how it’s not creative. But then again, that’s not really the mind’s role, is it.

The mind can only use information it’s attained externally – it’s not creative, it doesn’t imagine, but it is a whiz at processing.

Trying to force the mind into bringing forth a fresh idea only creates fodder for the ego.

So where do those imaginative ideas come from?

Are you feeling nourished? For so many of us, the answer might be, “Are you crazy? I don’t have time for that.” We get busy taking care of those around us, at home or at work, forgetting to fill ourselves up.

But honestly, how many times have we been told we have to put our own oxygen mask on first, then tend to those around us?

We can’t give what we don’t have. Whether it’s our attention, love, care, whatever. We need to be closer to full on the nourished needle than to empty.

Self-care is nourishment. Remembering, and accepting, that you’re as important, if not more so, than anyone around you can be a challenge. We tend to think we need to go all out and be everything to everybody. But it’s not possible and especially not when you’re running on fumes.

In the softness of your heart
Venus
Her loving embrace
Invites an opening
An awakening of your truth
 
Who are you
When Venus expresses herself through you

A few weeks ago, before I went on a short break (which was lovely), I left you with some reflection questions. To recap, they were:

• Would you like your life to be different than it is now and if so, how?
• Where would you like to see yourself in 5-10 years (or maybe reframe that to one year)
• Do you see an open path to your goal(s) or are there obstacles and if so, list them out so you can see them clearly on the page
• What’s your definition of abundance? Do you see yourself living in abundance now and in the future? If not, why not?

How did reflecting on these questions go for you? If you haven’t spent time with them, it’s never too late.The question I’d like to focus on is “Do you see an open path to your goal(s) or are there obstacles?”

I know for myself, there have been times when I’ve seen my future-self doing something that I feel really passionate about, but it doesn’t seem possible. I only see obstacles such as I’d have to go back to school to learn more, can I afford it, who am I to think so big?

If you can think it, you can do it.

I received the results of my fasting glucose and A1C tests the other day. Prior to receiving the results, I had been listening to Dr. Mark Hyman’s podcast the Doctor’s Farmacy where he was interviewing Jessie Inchauspé, a French biochemist and author of Glucose Revolution and The Glucose Goddess Method.

One of the things that Jessie and Mark talked about was how even though the medical standard for our fasting glucose levels might be 65-99mg/dL, 99 is way too high to be a norm. They both agreed that 85 or lower was a better marker and Mark Hyman was more comfortable with the numbers at around 50(ish)!

I love ice cream. In a cone. Not in a dish, not as an ice cream soda or a shake. These all leave out the best part of enjoying ice cream. The lick - tasting the cold creaminess on the tip of my tongue and having to lick fast to avoid the same cold creaminess from running down my arm. And then there’s the contrast of biting into the crispness of the cone itself, a strategic bite to ensure just the right amount of cone is broken off along with just the right amount of ice cream. Eating an ice cream cone properly takes practice.

I do limit the number of cones I eat so I don't overdo the sugar thing which allows me to make getting an ice cream cone into an outing. Once in a while we’ll go to the ice cream stand that unfortunately opened up about a mile from my house. It’s a cute little farm stand with an ice cream window that, much to my dismay, is open year-round.

It saddens me to see so many drugs on the market to assist with weight loss. Some of these drugs are FDA approved, but does that mean we should take them?

Weight loss drugs have a storied past for sure. In the 50’s and 60’s the weight loss drug of choice was amphetamines. According to an article written by Jacques Peretti in the Guardian, they were banned in the 70’s due to being highly addictive and causing heart attacks and strokes.

The door had been opened however and the pharmaceutical companies could not resist the opportunity to sell to women (and men) who were desperate to lose weight.