About – Happily Healthful

Memorial Day Memory

It was now a very long time ago. I could not have been older than 4 or 5. My parents took us on a day trip. I couldn’t tell you where it was or the name of the town. I simply remember the reverence with which my father held that trip.

I remember it being a town that harkened back to colonial times and that there was a cemetery there. My dad walked through the headstones stopping at the ones that bore an American Flag. He took the time to read the headstones of which the engravings were still legible. It was the quietest I can ever remember my dad being, as he was a great talker of many things.

Being very young, I did not understand the significance of the flags or my dad taking that time at each headstone bearing one. Then he explained that these headstones were of those that fought in the Revolutionary War. They had fought and sacrificed their lives during the birth of this great country that we were blessed to live in. He shared, that though the war had been fought a very long time ago, because of what they sacrificed and why, they deserved to be remembered and honored.

My father instilled in me that day, and many times after, the love for this beautiful country that I get to live in with the freedom to be and do what I want. He further instilled in me the desire to honor those that have given all that they have to ensure the freedom of those they love as well as those they would never know.

To all who have given everything they had to protect our country’s freedoms as well as to protect those around the world who could not protect themselves, you are remembered and revered. Thank you for all that you gave. Thank you also to those who carry the memory of family members, friends or brothers and sisters in arms. You ensure that they are never forgotten. Yours is an honorable task. They are grateful for it as are we.

Uvalde, Texas

This is not one of my typical articles. There won’t be any pretty pictures or flowery writing. This will just be straight from the heart.

To those who lost loved ones on Tuesday, May 24, 2022 at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas there are not enough thoughts, prayers, love, social media posts or anything else that will make any of this any better for you right now. We are going to send them anyway. It is all we can give in hopes that at some time in the future, it is going to give you the love, strength and courage to go on living and giving in this life. We do stand with you because there are not many that cannot imagine to some degree the suffering of loss. You are in my thoughts and prayers. I am sending you every ounce of love and support that I can find within myself. My heart as a mother is with you now and moving forward.

We are stunned. We are angry. We are lashing out and questioning “why”, “how”? We want answers. We want someone to blame. We want this to never happen again. These are all reasonable responses to what is happening in the world.

I invite all to share their feelings and thoughts on this tragedy and so many others like it. I don’t care if I don’t see it your way, you have a safe place to share and be supported in how this is affecting you. I don’t want to fight. Feel free to speak your piece here and now in the comments. It’s okay. I don’t have to understand. I won’t unfriend you and you don’t need to unfriend me. I know that we all cannot continue to walk around holding all this pain inside of us fearful of sparking yet another painful and possibly violent incident. So you go ahead and let it all go, right here, right now. I got you.

I don’t want to see this kind of tragedy play out even one more time. I know I may not get my wish on this right now. But I am willing to come to the table and do the work that moves us all in the best direction. I am not going to split hairs and give nasty, snarky quips about what or who kills. Guns in the wrong hands are dangerous. It is time to find away to have frank discussions and come up with answers that over time make our world a better place to live. We may not come up with perfect solutions, but we won’t come up with anything that serves the greater good of all if we don’t start talking and listening with each other.

Freedom Brings Happiness

Let me start by saying that this article is in no way a political statement or discussion. There are those who are far better equipped than I for that conversation. If that was what you were looking for you need read no further. Enjoy the personal freedom, which is what I will be talking about, to go no further.

Okay, whoever is left, thanks for sticking around:

Freedom: the condition or right of being able or allowed to do whatever you want to, without being controlled or limited
Cambridge Dictionary

We all have goals. “I want to be happy” is the most popular goal of them all. Then comes the question what do you need to be happy? That’s when the wish list comes out: I want lots of money. I want this kind of house. I want to live in this certain place. I want to weigh a certain weight. I want this certain job. I think you get the idea. That leaves us with the understanding that we can only be happy when we have that wishlist met. Happiness then, it would seem, is fleeting at best. It comes and it goes as the items on our wish checklist do and changes at a moments notice based on almost anything that passes or does not pass through our lives. There are many things in this ideology that can stand in the way of our happiness.

Perhaps then the goal should not happiness. Maybe what we are actually looking for is the space for more opportunities to be happy and that those times last longer. We may consider that happiness is then the by-product of what we are actually looking to obtain. What I have heard from most people is that we all want to do what we want to do, when we want to do it, how we want to do it and with whom we want to do it. I believe that this is the layman’s term for freedom.

Once we decide that freedom is the goal we can start a different list. This list will be what we would be doing if we were free to do what we want. I think very few of us, if any, would choose to work more, whether that is at a job or at home. We probably wouldn’t choose to do more housework, work longer hours or spend more time away from those with whom we love to spend time. I think we might choose instead things like sleep until the sun rose, be creative, take a walk outside in the fresh air and sunshine, be with the people we love. Okay, that’s my list. Yours may look a little different.

What I’m getting at is that freedom, unlike happiness, has little to do with the things we collect. In fact our collection of things and the constant need for more of them to sustain the feeling of happiness may well stand in the way of our freedom. Don’t get me wrong, if going sailing is something you truly enjoy spending time doing, it will be important to have a sailboat or at least access to one with which to do it. We obviously will want to have the tools to do the things we want the freedom to do. More so consider how much stuff we have collected that no longer has our attention while we strive to make enough money to buy more. Personal freedom has a lot more to do with how we choose to spend our time and with whom we spend it and only a little bit about the items needed.

I got to really thinking about the distinctions between happiness and freedom recently as I looked back over the past couple/few years. I know and fully acknowledge that many things went awfully wrong in that time and I will not disregard or make light of the many tragedies that were suffered over that time. However, when I looked back over this time in a personal sense it turned out that a lot of things had gone right. Though I had to close down the practice I had spent a great deal of time building I wound up having time with my son and my husband that I had never before had, ever. I took walks in nature most days with my pup. I woke with the sun. I had time to write and do photography. Prior to two years ago I had been busy busting my tail perpetually to have a bigger paycheck. That bigger paycheck allowed me to take a couple of “good” vacations each year. Those vacations, though memorable, only left me dissatisfied with my every other day. I was dissatisfied because I wanted more of that freedom to do, be, go and have what I wanted.

What I have learned about freedom, personal freedom, is it does look different to everybody. For some, it is to have a business that they run the way they want. For others, it is about more quiet time. Still others, it is the time to be around people having great conversations and lots of laughs.

It does not matter what you want the freedom to do. There are no wrong answers to the question: “What would you do if you were free to do anything you wanted?” It may start as simple as binge watching a show you only saw the first season of before you got too busy to keep up with it. Any place is a good place to start. When we start figuring out what we want the freedom to do, we can create the road map that leads us to that freedom.

To get you started on a path to freedom I’ll give you an example. One of the things I mentioned wanting the freedom to do was getting up with the sun. Now, mind you, I don’t have little kids that I’m raising. If I did, I might have to put that desired freedom a little further down my priority list. For me the road map to that particular freedom was, when I was able to start rebuilding my massage practice, starting my work day later. My hours don’t start until 10 AM because I want to get up with the sun. This allows me to be more relaxed entering my work day and fully present for my clients. All the way around a win-win.

We have the power and ability to create the freedoms we crave. Sometimes it means trade-offs either with our own priorities, time-lines or with our significant others. Once we start working on what freedom looks like to us as individuals, it very quickly sorts itself out which are the most important and achievable right now. Every time we create another one of our personal freedoms we make another step to creating the overall life of freedom we want to be living. The more free we are, the happier we just may find ourselves.

Here is a suggestion to begin creating your road to freedom. Create the picture of what your absolute life of freedom looks like. It doesn’t matter how you do it, but make it concrete so you can refer back to it over time. Paint an actual picture, write a list, make a vision board. The point is to make it something real that you can look at any time you want. It’s yours, so there is no wrong answer and you can change it over time. Even better, over time you can see how far you’ve come.

Photo by Dominika Roseclay on Pexels.com

Once you have your picture, it is time to get to work. Choose the simple, most easily achievable goals first to get that immediate taste of freedom and success. Enjoy the journey. Celebrate the wins. Don’t let the challenges discourage you. Don’t be afraid to change course. Sometimes we have to take a detour to get safely where we mean to go. The only way you can go wrong is if you do nothing at all.

For me life is good and I am happily enjoying my continued journey to freedom. I can’t wait to see where your journey takes you! Please share in the comments some of your personal freedom choices and let’s celebrate each others’ wins!

Live Life Fully

There is a great chasm of difference between surviving and living a life. Many of us are waiting until we have all the things we want and then we’ll “be happy”, “take a break”, “spend time with the kids”, (insert your desired outcome here). Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting all the good things we are wanting in our lives. Those things give us something to strive for and the effort to achieve them keeps life interesting. The issue is, that while we are busy waiting and striving for those things we are not actually living, we are only surviving.

Surviving is when we don’t tune in to all the in between moments. Those are the moments that fill the gaps between the “wow” moments where everything comes together. We plod along, head down, nose to the grindstone, working and striving for those big moments. With our narrow focus, eye-on-the-prize mentality, we miss out on the day-to-day opportunities to be happy, take a break, and spend time with loved ones now. It all passes by mostly unnoticed.

Living, on the other hand, requires paying attention at least most of the time. When we live in the here and now, fully present, we get opportunities to experience the full range of human emotions and experiences. Many of the moments in life aren’t “wow” moments. In fact the large majority of them aren’t. The greater part of life is instead all the beautiful quiet, little moments. They include time with friends and family, the sun shining on our faces, a hug at just the right moment, the pleasant surprise of a favorite old song coming on the radio, an unexpected day with nothing to do and so many other things. Soak up all those little experiences along the way. It is all those moments that are a life. Then, every once in a while, the Universe peppers our already full lives with some real “wow” moments. The graduations, the new car, the dream vacation. You get the idea.

Photo by Alexandr Podvalny on Pexels.com

Sometimes we need a little help getting started on enjoying life moment by moment. I know that I did. This little project helped me a great deal. I hope it will help you too.

Find three pictures of yourself, all before the age of 8. We are looking for pictures of ourselves from before we entered the first grade. Generally speaking, before first grade is the time before we had to start achieving and being what other people thought we should be. It was the time in our lives where we had little or no responsibility. We were allowed to explore. We didn’t think too much about what others thought of us. We played. We were happy. The unhappy moments that we did experience did not last long. We truly felt all the emotions and everything was a new experience that we put our whole selves into.

Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko on Pexels.com

You see, that beautiful, bright, fun-loving, open-to-adventure and experience being is still in us. They are at the core of us. We’ve just covered them up with a whole lot of stuff, expectations of others, and yes, goals. They are always within us waiting. Every once in a while, when no one’s looking, we let them out to play. Those are the moments when we laugh ’til tears run down our faces, do something creative, read a great book, dance like no one’s watching. Can you feel that beautiful “you” right now? They really know how to live! This is who we want to get back to being.

Once you find your three pictures you are going to put them in a frame. Have some fun picking out or making that frame. After all, this is all about you. When you’ve got it together it is time to put the frame in a place of honor where you can see it every day. Spend at least a minute or two each day remembering how it felt to be young, joyful and ready for adventure. It is time to return to that innocent, creative and bright place. It is time we got back to the place where we had every potential and our imaginations could come up with any possibility and live it. It is time to enjoy all the moments that make up a life. Welcome back to the land of the living! What an amazing ride this is going to be!

Here are my pictures. I keep them in my office where I sit and dream, create, breath and live. I check in with this little girl everyday and remember who I really am. She helps me to remember how to live life. Feel free to share your pictures in the comments. I would love to meet you too. Let’s cheer each other on as we enjoy all the moments of our lives!

Lessons by the Sea

Wandering through Pinterest I came across this beautiful poem by Bernadette Noll. It really resonated with me while bringing back so many lovely memories of time spent by the ocean with people I love. I liken my sifting through Pinterest to sifting through the sand by the sea. I am always looking for those wonderful little gems to collect and share. Both tasks takes some time and patience. Yet they bring such unexpectedly perfect rewards.

I spent summers at the shore in New Jersey with my family. We would go on wanders in both good weather and bad. It was there that my mom and dad taught us the lesson of unexpected gifts. My parents showed us that by broadening the lens of our focus and having no expectations we could allow anything to come to our attention.

There we would be, the five of us like the little sand pipers up and down the beach, close to the waves and back again, looking for those little treasures. Some days there might not be much to be excited about. It was just nice to enjoy being close to the water. We all loved hearing the waves and smelling the salt air. The day was never a waste. Then there were those other days. They were the days when out of nowhere someone would find that perfect surprise piece of sea glass all polished and worn. The color would be exclaimed over when a rare shade was found. There was no jealousy in someone else’s find. There was just excited exclamations and joy because sea glass was no easy thing to find. Hail to the intrepid and patient adventurer who found that rare gem!

My dad would then get us to thinking about that worn bit of flotsam. What had it been when it was whole? Where had it started? Where in the world had it traveled? Who had touched it at some point? What did its’ color tell us about its’ story? He helped us appreciate why even finding that little piece of sea glass was such a gift. He helped us understand that its’ “life” was an adventure to be treasured. He set our imaginations to wandering and instilled in us a desire to know and understand stories that were not our own.

That is why this beautiful poem spoke to my soul. Our lives are much like sea glass. Where have we been? What have we seen? Who have we known? What has our place in the bigger picture been as we’ve traveled our spiraling, bouncing and wandering paths? We’ve entire adventures to share.

Let us step back and view the panorama of each others’ lives through a broadened lens. Any one of us might be a gift that another didn’t even know they were looking for. It is time we appreciate all that each of our lives have been and where they may yet go. We are like those precious bits of sea glass discovered near the ocean. We become a bit worn, our angles softened by our experiences. Yet we are all still gifts. Let’s find and enjoy the hidden treasure that is each of us.

Noise vs. Nature

All the noise, noise, noise, NOISE
Dr. Suess

We don’t do quiet very well anymore. What’s worse is that we don’t even notice how much manmade noise is in the world around us all the time. We wonder why we can’t string a thought together and are easily distracted. It is all the noise jamming up our brains.

I really noticed this issue when I went down to the Dunedin Causeway today to walk. It’s a great way to clear the cobwebs out of my brain and get my creativity going. The problem was, I couldn’t get my zen on. There were cars going by. There were a few people sharing their high decibel bass music from vehicles. People were walking by sharing their phone conversation with everyone. What was missing was the sound of the breeze moving the palm fronds, the water lapping at the shore, the birds chattering to each other. What was missing was the quiet music of the natural world. I’m sure it was still there. I just couldn’t hear it over all the other noise.

I find that when I get out into the natural world (in a place I can actually hear it), everything just calms down. Time slows down for me. So does my heart rate and breathing. My whole nervous system goes into a rest and digest state. Then the magic happens. My brain stops jumping all over the place. I can string coherent thoughts together. Even better is that this overall effect seems to last for quite a while once I head back indoors to get things done. It is amazing what a little time with nature can do for us.

“Research has found that people who spent just two hours per week outside in a natural setting reported greater well-being compared with people who spent less time outdoors.” I already know what you’re thinking. “I don’t have two minutes in a week let alone two hours to be outside!” I get it. Sometimes, most times, I don’t either. Good news! Further studies have shown that listening to recorded natural sounds has the same benefit. Numerous natural sounds were recorded and played in lab settings in 11 different countries. The results were pretty impressive as those who were tested showed a decrease in stress, annoyance and pain. They also showed a great improvement in mood and cognitive testing.

So, when you can get out into nature, take the time for your happiness and health. Even 5 minutes sitting on a deck, park bench, or wherever you can find nature counts. When you can’t get out into nature there are all kinds of natural sound recordings that you can download to any device and just take a few minutes to listen and reset your balance. One of the apps I use is Calm.com. (I am not compensated for sharing their site). There is a free trial. Then there is a monthly subscription. However, there are plenty of other ways to download free natural sounds online. Just type free natural sounds into your device’s search engine. If you like something that will always be available to you then you can purchasing digital albums through sites like Amazon. (Again, not compensated. Just click on that highlighted Amazon you just saw and it will take you to what I found.)

I hope you get some time this week to get quiet and hear nature in some form. I like to check out new places, and so do others. So, go ahead and share your fave spot to get into nature in a comment and in the meantime, enjoy this quick little natural sound video I took:

Lake Valhalla, East Stroudsburg, PA Spring 2021

Just Getting Started!

So, after 15 years as a massage therapist and life coach, it is time to reach out to the world beyond my office! I love helping people uncover their best selves. You know, the person you started out as before everyone told you who, what, how, where and why to be.

Over the years I have found that I can’t fix anyone. But, I can and have provided the information, resources and support that have helped people do what it takes to be the best version of themselves. That great version of you feels good at every level of their being (most days). So good in fact that you enjoy living each day to its fullest as a Happily Healthful you.

Thanks for joining me here at Happily Healthful. This journey may be challenging at times, but it’s going to be an amazing ride! Ready? Let’s get going!

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