Upon the death of a dear friend, I began thinking about the nature of life and death. Death brings my feet back to earth. My mom has often accused me of having my head in the clouds, and I readily admit it.

But losing my friend brought me crashing back down. I’ll admit that I’ve been a bit morbid over the past few weeks, since her passing, because it has come to my attention that we are all going to die. There is no other way out of here.

During the celebration of life for my friend, several people spoke of her generosity, her love of animals, her quirky nature. Many kind things were spoken then, and I thought what a beautiful tribute.

But wouldn’t it be better if we could share those kind thoughts with our friends before they die? Wouldn’t it be better to tell our loved ones how much we appreciate them, while they are still living?

Kind words are like a soothing balm to the soul. No matter what a person is going through, the kind words of friends and loved ones can calm the fires of rage, anger, or fear.

So why wait? I have said, on numerous occasions, that I plan to live to 111. I realize that by then, many of my friends and family will likely be gone. They will have gone on before me, to whatever awaits our physical death.

By then, I wonder who will eulogize me. I wonder who will be present to remember the remarkable life of an old woman, who outlived those who could speak of her life. So, the way I see it, I have two choices. I can live a remarkable life for the following 64 1/3 years, and make sure to make an impression on everyone I meet, hoping that someone will live long enough to remember me.

That is Plan B. That plan involves a lot of work, a lot of community involvement, and making friends of all ages. While that does seem like a fun way to progress through life, it also seems like a lot of work. Of course, I plan to do it anyway. Far be it from me to shy away from hard work and perseverance.

But, I have a better plan. My go to plan is to throw a big party. I’m not waiting until I’m dead to have a party. I’m going to have a party and invite all of my friends, and we will gather and talk about the beauty of life, the beauty of love and friendship. I plan to have that party when I am 55. I’m going to call it my “halfway there” party.

I plan to invite everyone I have ever known, to celebrate the gift of their presence in my life. I want to celebrate while I am still alive and cognizant. I want to thank people for their kindnesses and love, which have buoyed me through my life.

And my point, in all of this, is lets not wait. Let’s not wait to tell the people in our lives how much they mean, how much they bring, and how much they give us.

Tell them while there is still time. Once your friends are gone, it becomes too late to tell them how much you cherish them.

Of course, once people pass on, we can still speak of their goodness and kindness. It brings us together, it unites us when we face death, and it helps us heal from loss.

But so much better, is the idea of telling people of their impact and influence while it can help them.

It is never too late to tell someone how much they mean to you. If you don’t feel like saying it, then write them a note. You could even send an email. But don’t let the kind words go unspoken. Today is the perfect day to tell someone how much they mean.

Namaste, friends

I learn a lot from my kids, and sometimes if I’m lucky, they even learn a thing or two from me.

Recently, during a discussion with my 16-year-old daughter, I said, “Well, if I had my druthers, I’d rather you not.”

She looked at me skeptically, with the scorn and derision that seems second nature to teenagers.

“What does that even mean? I think you’re just making up words so I can’t do what I want.”

I confess. I do make up words. Sometimes I try to slip them into my columns, but Kae, the stalwart copy editor of the Uinta County Herald, never fails to find and delete them. Sometimes she looks at me as if I’m crazy. And sometimes she smiles sadly, shaking her head, as if talking to a small child.

But I digress. I explained the phrase “If I had my druthers” to my children, who still do not believe it is real. I guess my penchant for using fake words has tainted their view of me.

Technically, to have one’s druthers means to have ones own preference. It is a shortened version of the phrase “I’d rather,” and is not widely used outside of the United States. It’s a colloquialism to our part of the world. When I explained this to my young ‘uns, they all rolled their eyes, and wondered why a person wouldn’t just say, “I would rather,” and save all the confusion.

Upon further study and investigation, I discovered another meaning to druthers: the power or opportunity to choose.

It occurred to me then, that we can all have our druthers. We all have an opinion about how we would like things to be. Realistically, we can have our own preference, if we are willing to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve those things.

You can have your druthers, if you really want to.

Each one of us has the power and the opportunity to choose exactly how we want our life. Many of us, however, relinquish this power in order to embrace the victim mentality so prevalent in our culture. Rather than making our own choices and taking responsibility, we sit idly by, hating our lives and blaming someone else.

Oftentimes, blaming seems easier than responsibility. Victimhood feels more comfortable than choice. It’s easier to complain about things we don’t like, than to step up and make changes.

The good news is you do have the power and opportunity to choose. You can choose where to work, who to hang out with, where and what to eat, whether to exercise, where to live. The list goes on and on, but the truth is, you have complete choice over every aspect of your life.

I can hear some of you now saying, “That’s not true. I don’t have any choices. I don’t get to choose….” Well, unless you are a minor child, the truth is that you do have a choice.

You might not like the work or the responsibility involved in making a different choice, but you do have a choice. We are not victims of our life. We are authors of our destiny.

Today, you can choose to live exactly as you choose. You can choose freedom over bondage, peace over anger, and happiness over sorrow. You have the power and the opportunity to choose, in each moment, exactly what your life looks like.

If you don’t like the outcome, you are free to choose again. Remember, the effects of a decision stay in place until the decision is changed. If something doesn’t work for you, then you can change it.

Whatever you face today, remember that you can choose again. You are not a victim of your life. You are the creator of your life.

Namaste, friends

In the aftermath of chaos and holiday madness, I lost my phone. It wasn’t such a bad thing, really. I spent all of Christmas Day enjoying peace and quiet, unable to text and call. I even found time to take a nap.

As we began to filter through empty stockings, piles of paper and the remnants of Christmas, I discovered my forgotten phone, buried under the cheery rubble.

It was so nice not having it, I decided on the following day to just put the phone away.

Most of us are attached to our stuff. Our phones are always nearby. Our computers are nearby, ready to answer emails, check Facebook, and immerse us in online escapism.

Besides the electronic madness that controls our daily lives, we are surrounded by stuff. We are buried by more stuff than we can ever use in our lifetime, and our children will suffer after our passing, as they sort through all the stuff, wondering why we kept so much.

I was caring recently for a dear friend who has become quite ill. While sitting by her side, holding her hand, massaging her feet and reassuring her, I noticed that she was surrounded by stuff. Piles and piles of clothes, papers, knick-knacks and tchotchke. It was overwhelming, to think about her imminent passing and the responsibility of wading through all of that stuff.

When I got home after one particularly stressful day, I began sorting through my file drawers. I wasn’t looking for anything in particular, but I decided to look through every single piece of paper, and honestly assess the value and necessity of each.

Although I’m not a hoarder, I tend to hold on to special notes from people I love, as well as clippings and pictures from magazines. After a couple of hours, I was astonished at the pile of papers headed to the recycle bin. When I honestly looked at all those papers, it turned out that most of them were not essential to my daily life. Most of them had no real purpose, other than to keep my file cabinets brimming with paper.

With a proud sense of accomplishment, I closed the mostly empty file drawers and wondered for a moment why I need such a large file cabinet anyway. Now that it’s empty, it seems redundant. However, it does make a good television stand.

Although it was getting late, I was energized by all that purging and I began cleaning out my drawers.

It is amazing, how attached we can become to things like clothes. I had a closet full of clothes of a variety of different sizes. Some are too small, waiting in vain for me to lose just enough weight. Some are way too big, just in case I get fat. Some are from long ago, with emotional baggage attached. I began yanking clothes out of drawers, off of hangers and throwing them into a bag with reckless abandon.

It was freeing, to release so much stuff. Now, when I walk through the house, one eye is on what I can get rid of next.

I don’t want to die at 111, surrounded by junk. I want to be surrounded by people who love me. Most of the stuff we accumulate and refuse to part with has some emotional significance to us, but to no one else.

Instead of filling our lives with more and more stuff, perhaps we should acquire experiences. We don’t need more stuff. What we need is more love, more passion and more fun. When we fill our lives with experience, our need to be surrounded by belongings will diminish.

Namaste, friends

You see them everywhere. You know the ones, those happy people who walk around with a big smile, acting as if they don’t have a care in the world.

They are the ones who are always happy, seemingly oblivious to the tragedy, terror, and general mayhem surrounding most of the rest of us in the world.

They are the people who smile at work and try to make the best of every situation, regardless of how bleak it actually is.

They are the ones who, when you ask how they are doing, typically respond with a big smile and say something along the lines of, “Great!” or “Awesome!” or “Fantastic!”

It’s as if they are always happy, in spite of the dreary weather, or the stock market crash, or the fact that the internet has been down at work all day and no one is able to get any work accomplished.

There are some people who know the secret to happiness, and if you give it some thought, you can probably think of one or two people you know or have met, who seem to know the secret.

So what is the secret to happiness? It’s no secret really. The secret to being happy is to be happy.

“What? That’s it? That’s not a secret. That’s just stupid.” That’s what I thought too, when I first read about the secret to happiness. “Be happy? If I was happy, then I wouldn’t be reading this book (or this column), trying to figure out how to be happy.”

It is true. The secret to happiness is to be happy. It might seem trite or overly simplified, but if you stop to think about it, it really is true.

Being happy, just like being miserable, is a choice. Each morning when we rise, we have a choice about how our day will go. Not only do we choose which clothes to wear, and how to fix our hair, we also choose our mood.

I always tell my children, as they head out the door for school, “Remember, nothing can ruin your day, unless you let it.”

Some days, I have a hard time remembering that for myself, but I hope that with my daily reminder, they will eventually learn that they have a choice about how their day will go, and how they will respond to different situations.

Life isn’t always easy, nor is it always fun. We always have a choice, however, about how we will respond to even the most dire of circumstances.

You can choose whether you’d like to be happy. In spite of what is happening in your life right now, you can still choose to be happy, and that is the secret. There is nothing, absolutely nothing stopping you from being happy.

Does being happy mean you have to walk around every day with a big sappy grin on your face? No. It means that rather than look for the worst in every situation, you stop, reassess, and look for the positive aspects.

Being happy means you choose to open your heart. Instead of closing yourself off and isolating, you open yourself to the possibility that life is good.  In fact, life is great.

If you doubt the veracity of this secret, give it a try. You don’t have to choose to be happy all day. Just try it now, in this moment.

Decide that right now, you will be happy. Do the things a happy person would do. Ask yourself, “If I were happy, how would I speak, what would I do right now?”

Then, do that thing, just for a moment.

Try it and see. Make a choice to be happy, and then share the secret with those who haven’t yet discovered it.

Namaste, friends

I ate a cookie. After I resolved to cut sugar out of my diet less than a week ago, I ate a cookie. And it was good.

The problem with New Year’s resolutions is, they are easy to break. And I am weak. That’s the real problem. My resolve isn’t what it used to be.

Actually, my resolve was never what it used to be. Over the years, and going back as far as I can remember, I use the new year as a time to make all the changes to my perceived shortcomings. These usually include a long litany: lose weight, stop swearing, exercise more, work harder, sleep less, be nicer, spend more time with my kids, and pray more. I was exhausted, just trying to remember all the things I was going to do right. Within a month or so, I would have forgotten half the list and given up on the other half, dismayed at my lack of discipline and self-control.

Over the years, however, that list has evolved as I have grown up. I don’t really care about losing weight. I do care about being healthy, but I haven’t weighed myself in a very long time. I know I feel tired and worn out when I eat too much sugar, so my decision not to eat sugar was based more on feeling well. I don’t really make New Year’s resolutions anymore.

I have realized as I’ve grown older that I don’t need to wait for a certain day on the calendar in order to make a positive change. It’s nice to have a benchmark, and to see how far you’ve come over the past year, but most New Year’s resolutions are forgotten before the end of January.

Instead of creating a laundry list of improvements, I have decided to live each moment as it comes along. That way, if I need to make any changes, I don’t have to wait an entire year.

Right now is the perfect moment to be kinder. If, in the next moment, I fail to be kind, then there will be a moment right afterward during which I can change.

We can all make the changes we desire, in this instant. We don’t have to wait for a new year, or a new month, or a new day. There is a new moment coming along shortly. In that moment, you can choose to be exactly what you’d like.

If there is something you wish to change, then change it now. You have an opportunity to be exactly what you want, to live the exact life that reflects your values, your goals and your desires.

If in any particular moment, your thoughts, words or deeds don’t reflect who you really want to be, then you can change in an instant.

Our lives are meant to be lived as a reflection of who we really are and who we were created to be. When we live in such a way that magnifies who we are, we are filled with energy, joy and passion.

Too often, our lives are bereft of meaning, and we wonder why. I would suggest it is because we have lost sight of our purpose. We have lost sight of our passion. We have lost sight of the fire that burns inside.

Rather than try to change a long list of things during this new year, how about if we choose to embrace ourselves and live authentically?

It doesn’t take a lot of work. All it takes is a decision, a simple decision to listen to your heart, trust your gut and do what you know is right.

Once you begin living a life infused with joy and passion, you won’t ever want to look back.

Namaste, friends

I remember the year I discovered that my parents were indeed Santa Claus. I was about eight, and awoke in the middle of the night to noise in the living room. I crept down the hallway of our trailer to see my bleary-eyed father assembling a dollhouse.

Quietly I snuck back to bed, excitedly anticipating the morning when I could play with my new toy.

Imagine my surprise on Christmas morning, running to the Christmas tree only to see the tag on the dollhouse: “To Mary (my little sister), Love Santa.”

For a moment I was utterly confused. The tag was supposed to say: “To Debbie, Love Dad.”

At first I thought maybe Santa brought my sister a similar dollhouse, so she wouldn’t feel sad. Imagine my dismay as I realized there was no dollhouse for me from my dad. My confusion gave way to understanding as I slowly realized that my dad might actually be Santa. Although the evidence was right before my eyes, I could hardly believe that to be the truth.

Years later, after my dad moved on, I recognized my mom’s handwriting on the tags from Santa and in my teen-aged rebellion I began calling her Sandra-Claus (since her name is Sandra.) She admonished me to keep the secret safe for my little brother, who was still young enough to believe in such things as Christmas magic. But in my jealousy, I told him that our mom was Santa. With the steadfast belief of the young and naïve, he argued until I made him cry.

Years later, as a parent of eight children, I have had similar conversations with my own kids.

One year, when we were dirt poor and had no presents for Christmas, the kids were quite disappointed. I worked as a waitress then, so during the course of the week following Christmas, I saved all my tip money and hit the post-Christmas sales. With only a couple hundred dollars, I was able to fill a box with presents for my kids. On New Years Eve I placed the giant box, loaded with toys, clothes and presents under the tree with a note.

It read: “Dear kids, this box of presents fell off of Santa’s sleigh. It took us a week to find it. Sorry to ruin your Christmas, Love Santa’s Elves.”

When my son discovered the box the next morning he came running into my bedroom yelling, “Mom, Santa Claus is real.”

Their delight and amazement helped me feel better about being a week late with the presents.

Years later, when I was a single mom with six children still in the house, the women in my book club decided to give my kids a Christmas like none they had ever experienced. Little did they know that they would also give me a Christmas like none I had ever experienced.

The ten of them gathered presents for my family throughout the month of December. On Christmas Eve, after my kids had gone to bed, my book club friends and their husbands delivered three car loads of gifts to our home. It filled the tiny living room knee-deep in presents.

When my kids had gone to bed, our tree had a pitiful pile of presents under it. I bought them gifts, just in case the book club thing didn’t work out, and two of the teenagers had jobs, so they had purchased gifts for their younger siblings.

When the children awoke on Christmas morning, the living room was filled with presents.

The little kids were convinced that Santa is real, and as my daughter handed gifts to everyone, I too, believed in the magic of Christmas.

Christmas magic isn’t about large piles of presents. It is the kindness and generosity of people around us,that is truly magical.

We can each keep the magic of Christmas alive in our own lives by sharing love, kindness and forgiveness with those around us. We can offer someone an unexpected gift. We can go back and make things right.

Yes, children, there is a Santa Claus and he lives on in each one of us as we share our lives and love with those around us.

Namaste, friends

A lot of people suggest that the holidays have become too commercialized. They complain, as they walk down the crowded aisles of the local department store, talking on their cell phones, and filling their carts with unnecessary piles of stuff.

They complain as they turn up the television and shush their children. They complain on Facebook about how no one remembers the reason for the season.

Honestly, if you gathered a room full of people, you would likely be hard pressed to get them to agree on the actual reason for the season, because it is different for everyone.

For some, it is a religious holiday; a celebration to acknowledge the birth of a savior.

For others, it is the beginning of the winter solstice; the beginning of winter, starting with the shortest day of the year.

For others, it is a celebration of light and the miracles of God; a time when lamps burned miraculously.

For others, it is a time to share gifts with those you love, as an expression of your love, friendship and devotion.

Regardless of your personal reason behind celebrating the Christmas or holiday season, there are things you can do to make this time of year more meaningful and more personal.

Often times, people confuse spending extraordinary amounts of money with a meaningful experience. The truth is that you don’t have to spend any money to enjoy the fullness of the holiday season.

Think about the people closest to you. That list might include your partner, your children, family and friends. Now, think about what you like best about them and what you like to do with them. What do they enjoy doing? Put some thought into the important people in your life. What do they really like?

How can you invest in the people closest to you, without spending any money?

My son loves to play with Legos. We have thousands of them, strung from one end of the house to the other. I have learned to walk with a light step, lest I should stumble in the dark over an intricate Lego helicopter. I once destroyed a Lego McDonalds with one ill-placed step in the dark hallway.

Although I’m sure my son would love me to buy him more Legos for Christmas, there are other ways I can pour into his life. I could spend some time on the floor, actually playing with him. I could stop and listen to him when he speaks, and look directly at him, rather than continuing to type, as if my work is more important than what he has to say.

To fully experience the holidays, I could spend some time with my teen-aged daughters, truly listening to what they are going through, instead of nodding absent-mindedly while I make dinner.

I could actually involve the kids in the meal making process, rather than getting irritated with them as I make dinner and wash the dishes for the millionth time.

With my friends, I could offer support and encouragement over a cup of hot tea. It only takes a moment to truly listen to someone. 

Life is what you make of it, and that includes the Christmas season. If you are distracted and irritated in your life, chances are you will be distracted and irritated during the holidays.

When you take a moment to be fully present for yourself and those around you, you give the best present of all. You become part of the experience. You get to feel what is happening now. You get to release stress, irritation and judgment and just enjoy whatever moment you are in.

Christmas is the perfect time to remind yourself to stay here now. Breathe deeply of the cold, crisp air. Appreciate the deep clear blue sky. Don’t fret about things. Instead, invest in the people around you and immerse yourself in the holiday experience.

Namaste, friends

A turkey skeleton is lurking in my refrigerator. It is a stark reminder of the recent Thanksgiving holiday. The carcass begs to be cooked into a delicious broth and adorned with homemade noodles.

But everyone in my house has moved on. They were done with Thanksgiving and turkey by early Friday morning. Honestly, by the time we finished the turkey on Thursday, my kids were ready to go shopping.

Although I don’t like the idea of shopping on Thursday or Friday of Thanksgiving, it was impossible to keep my kids, along with hundreds (thousands, millions) of others, out of Wal-Mart on Thursday evening.

Who would have guessed that a simple holiday could be turned into madness and mayhem with a frenzy of early Christmas activity? It’s as if people have completely bypassed the Thanksgiving holiday in favor of one more day of potential savings on a bunch of stuff that no one needs.

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. It is simple. Family, food, and football: what else does one need to really celebrate a holiday? When I was in the fourth grade, I won a school-wide poetry contest for my poem about Thanksgiving:

“What about that poor old turkey, being stuffed?

Don’t you think he’s had enough?

Poor old thing needs some rest,

So he can look his very best.”

Lame, I know, but for a fourth grader, I think that’s pretty good. Besides, I wanted to celebrate my favorite holiday. I’ve always loved getting together with my family, even though the outcome is always unpredictable.

You never know who will drop the pie and splatter pumpkin all over grandma’s kitchen. You could never guess which relative will pass out in front of the TV, from too much spiked eggnog. It’s impossible to tell which relatives will not speak for the entire next year, following an argument about stuffing.  Yes, it’s definitely my favorite holiday, with all that family togetherness.

Somehow, though, Thanksgiving has taken a back seat to Christmas. It’s not as though Thanksgiving ever took a front seat. It’s always been the humble holiday, sandwiched between the two best kid-holidays ever. Halloween, with costumes, candy and late night wandering is a perennial favorite for kids and adults. And Christmas. What holiday could ever compare with Christmas? Presents, Santa Claus, food, decorations; these things make Christmas the ultimate in celebrations. And somewhere, nearly forgotten like the middle child of a large family, sits Thanksgiving. There isn’t much to say about Thanksgiving, other than people eat a lot of food. And many of us watch a lot of football.

Besides the food, family and football, though, what is the purpose of Thanksgiving? It has become the kick-off to the holiday shopping season, and retailers are capitalizing on that by opening earlier and earlier, until they interrupt holiday dinner with shopping madness.

Underneath all the pre-Christmas preparations, it is easy to forget why we have a Thanksgiving feast. Remember the history lessons about the pilgrims and the Indians? Remember how two groups of people came together to celebrate the bounty of the earth, to put aside their differences and share a meal? Those are the things we think about when we think about Thanksgiving.

Giving thanks. That is the true reason we celebrate Thanksgiving, and perhaps it is a good idea to take a moment to be thankful before the glutinous spending that will happen in December.

Let us pause, as December unfolds, to remember those things for which we are truly thankful.

Every life is different, every circumstance is different, and every family is different, but there are still things we can find to be grateful for every day. Take a moment each morning to focus on something you are thankful for, even if it seems tiny and insignificant.

Regardless of who your family is, or who your friends are, there are people on this earth who love you. You are not alone, and you are not forgotten. You are valuable to someone, just as people are valuable to you, and for that, we can each be thankful.

Ease into the holiday madness slowly, and try to remember to give thanks in all things. It will make help you appreciate the blessings you have today, and perhaps fill a void that you might otherwise seek to fill with stuff.

Namaste, friends

I will admit to occasionally choosing the wrong outfit at the wrong time. I don’t have much of a sense of “style.” For me, style means whatever is clean and comfortable, above all else.

It happens many mornings, after I get ready for work,  that one or both teenaged daughters will look at me with raised eyebrows when I come upstairs in the morning.

“You’re wearing that?” they might ask with exasperation, scorn or disbelief.

I usually go change immediately.

You might remember, if you’ve read this column before, the time I wore sandals and cute capris to the pig-picking event.

My dear friend told me to dress appropriately. It was a cool, early spring morning. What could be more appropriate than cute sandals, which were, I might add, waterproof, and capris?

When I got to the fairgrounds to help my children choose their 4-H pigs from the hundred or so on display, my friend looked at me with dismay and said the all-too-familiar line, “You’re wearing that?”

I thought maybe she had talked to my daughters. But no, she was incredulous that I would wear something so wrong.

She thought I was going to help pick up baby pigs and put them in the trailer. I thought I would stand in the sunshine and watch, from a safe distance. This was just one example of my inability to pick the right outfit for an occasion.

During an end of summer trip to San Francisco, the kids wanted to stop at the Golden Gate Bridge overlook.

I pulled the jeep into the parking lot, and the kids raced out of the car, not even looking back to make sure I followed.

My older daughter and I were both wearing skirts and flip-flops, which is entirely appropriate for San Francisco.

It is not, however, appropriate for careening down the face of a cliff to the ocean below, which is exactly what the three younger kids were doing. They found a quasi-trail and hurtled themselves down it to reach the ocean.

Deirdre and I stood at the top of the cliff, watching them slide across rocks, down the barely visible trail.

I suggested we might find a better trail, but she was concerned about leaving the kids alone near the water.

So, we did what any reasonable person would do. We started down the face of the cliff, wearing our flip-flops and skirts. Fortunately for me, I was wearing a skort, a skirt with shorts underneath. It was short, but stable. Deirdre had a short skirt that immediately blew up over her head. She could not hold the skirt and the cliff face, so I offered to go ahead of her to prevent anyone from looking up her skirt. After several harrowing minutes, we made it, barely, to the waters edge. It was quite a show for those waiting below.

I believe my biggest wardrobe malfunction came recently, during a beautiful fall afternoon.

I was wearing a dress and tights. I decided it would be a good idea to feed my bees, before the weather turned cold. It’s not good for bees to go without food, nor is it good to open the hive when temperatures drop.

Rather than change out of my dress into pants, I decided to put the bee suit on over my dress and feed them quickly. It’s a five-minute job, and I figured I’d be done before the bees had a chance to get too mad.

Wrong.

I opened the hive, carefully prying off the lid with a hive tool. At first, the bees hummed gently in the afternoon sunlight. When I started adding the syrup water to the hive, their quiet hum turned into a very angry buzz in a matter of seconds. They dive-bombed the bee bonnet, which fortunately protected my face. They landed on my arms, which were covered with elbow length gloves. Unfortunately, the bee suit is only a shirt. It ends at the waist. The dress billowed in the breeze, attracting unwanted attention from my now angry hive. Those bright pink tights must have agitated the bees even more. Before I could get the full gallon of syrup into the feeder, I felt them landing on my legs. I couldn’t swat at them, because my hands were full.

Instead, I felt their angry stings, one on each leg. As I raced to empty the syrup into the feeder and replace the top of the hive, I noticed that several bees were stuck up under my dress.

My heart was pounding. If I left these bees there, I would surely get stung in some very tender areas. So, I did what any smart beekeeper in a dress would do. I lifted my dress over my head and began dancing wildly, to get away from the bees.

I’m sure, if it were anyone else, it would have seemed comical. Instead, my heart pounded with panic as I envisioned bee stings in every place you don’t want to be stung.

I raced away from the hive, flailing wildly, and finally the bees stopped pursuing.

This might be an opportunity to examine more closely my apparel, but I doubt it. After all, what fun would that be?

Namaste, friends

Life is short. It’s too short not to live your dreams. I was recently talking with a friend about the nature of life, and destiny and dreams. She told me about a professor she had at the University of Wyoming. One day, while snow was blowing all around, the wind freezing it to windows and walls and barren trees, he came into class and announced, “It’s springtime in Paris.”

With that, he walked out, never to be seen again. She said they did receive a postcard from the professor, from Paris.

It is time to celebrate springtime in Paris. Time to embrace the changes before us, leave behind the mistakes, sorrows and failures of the past and launch into the future.

Life is too short not to fulfill your destiny. Each of us has a calling on our lives. Some may call it a life’s purpose, the “raison d’etre” (French for the purpose of existence), or the meaning of life. Man has searched since creation to find his place in the cosmos.

I maintain that it is not so hard to find your own truth. What is harder is to live your truth, to let your life be an expression of your greatest self, to show the world who you were really created to be.

When you choose to do that, then you too can celebrate your springtime in Paris.

Most people wonder how to discover that purpose, but the discovery is not so hard. What do you love? What makes your heart sing? What things cause you to lose track of time and space as you get caught up in the moment of creation? That is your destiny.

Your greatest self awaits. All you need to do is listen to your heart. What is your heart calling you toward? Once you hear the small, still voice of the inspired Universe, take a step toward it.

Maybe you can’t quit your job, or leave a relationship today, but you can take one step in the direction of your dreams. Living your destiny won’t be easy, but it will be fulfilling, comforting, compelling and challenging. You can do one thing today that will bring you toward that dream.

Listen to your heart. It is your direct connection to Spirit. Your heart knows what to do, even if your mind starts a litany of excuses and arguments. Let your heart direct your path as you move toward your dreams.

The first step in fulfilling the grandest version of yourself is to stop and listen. Now breathe deeply and relax. Everything will be fine. There is nothing you have to do in this moment but listen. When you hear that small, still voice, let it speak. Do not snuff it out.

Next, think of one small step you can do today. Just one thing to bring you closer to the person you want to be. What is one thing you can do, that will make it more real, more solid, and more true? Just do that one thing today.

Tomorrow, begin again. Listen. Breathe. Do. When you begin moving in the direction of your dreams, the entire Universe will conspire with you to bring your dreams to fruition.

It is time for my springtime in Paris, and as I move forward into a greater calling, I challenge each of you to abandon your fears, gather hope and take a step forward.

There is really nothing to lose, but you have your whole life to gain.

Namaste, friends