It is only in sorrow bad weather masters us; in joy we face the storm and defy it.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.

Amplify Love....Dissipate Hate

I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You

I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You

I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.

I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.

Maybe January light will consume
My heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.

In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.

To be or not to be ?

Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for: it is a thing to be achieved. – William Jennings Bryan
　
I can’t remember what started it, but for the last couple of weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about the idea of destiny. Are we traveling through our lives like trains on a track, with a pre-set beginning and end point? When I think about destiny, I feel like I’m hurtling through time toward an end that’s already set, like a stationary point. And it’s hard to articulate why, but that scares the hell out of me – that it’s already out there waiting for me and there is no way, ever, for me to know what it is until I get there. I think there are a lot of people who feel the opposite – the idea of their lives being predetermined (by various Who’s or What’s) and that certain things are meant to happen is immensely comforting to them. You marry the person you marry because you two were meant to be. You were meant to do the job you do, have the friends you have, be the person you are. It’s a little easier to face disappointment, because you can sigh and say, “It just wasn’t meant to be.” I catch myself saying things like that all the time, even though I’m not sure I believe that anything is “meant” to be or not be. Can a person believe in things like that and also believe in a higher power? Do the two go hand in hand? It seems that way to me most of the time, but then sometimes it doesn’t. There have been moments in my life when I’ve felt like I was exactly where I was meant to be, at the moment I was meant to be there, with the person I was meant to be with. Sometimes everything lines up perfectly and it feels like that can’t possibly be a matter of chance. But if I’m brutally honest with myself, I have to admit that it probably is. When push comes to shove, I have a hard time believing anything is destined to be. The idea just doesn’t sit right with me. I think it’s more likely that our lives are a series of accidents, a mess of interconnecting paths that could just as easily have crossed in completely different ways than they do, or never crossed at all, if we made different choices. Maybe it doesn’t have the elegance of a laid-out map where we’re all following carefully planned-out, predestined paths…but I think it’s still beautiful. Just in a different way.

Here’s the thing, though: Even if nothing is meant to be, I think it’s a good policy to go through life looking for the people and things that feel like they are – people and things and moments that feel so right, they seem like they were meant for you…or you were meant for them. Even if there is no “predestined” path, those people and things and moments help us know when we’re on a good one.

Decisions....Decisions.......

“If you truly expect to realize your dreams, abandon the need for blanket approval.  If conforming to everyone’s expectations is the number one goal, you have sacrificed your uniqueness, and therefore your excellence.” – Hope Solo


I spent many, many years of my young life in possession of very little backbone .  I rarely made a decision that wasn’t immediately called into question. As a result, I spent a lot of time feeling lost and frustrated and unhappy, because that’s what happens when you ignore your own intuition and assume that someone else knows what’s best for you.  The blame can’t be placed on anyone other than myself, because I’m the one who gave people that power over me.  I’m not mad at myself over it, but I look back at that version of myself and I feel like I don’t know who that girl was.  I don’t recognize her.  Because something’s happened to me over the last few years, so slowly that I hardly noticed:  I stopped caring what other people think of what I do.  It seems like such a simple thing, but it really isn’t.  It took me a while to realize that in the instances when I was able to tune out everyone but myself and do what I wanted, I ended up feeling really good about it.  I don’t know if this happened because I’m getting a little bit older and a little bit wiser and a little more secure with myself, or because I booted a couple of toxic people from my life, or a combination of both, but it hardly needs saying that this is a good change.  There is a big difference between taking someone’s opinion under advisement and automatically assuming their opinion is more valid than mine and acting accordingly.  Sometimes I feel really resentful when people load unasked-for “advice” on me, but then I remind myself that I don’t need to resent their advice, because I don’t need to follow it.  And there’s no need to be testy or defensive when someone disagrees with my choices, because they’re mine and I know what’s best for me, not them.  And as long as my decisions aren’t hurting anyone, that’s all there is to it.  It’s not that I’m unwilling or incapable of heeding someone’s advice; I think advice from someone you respect can be invaluable.  I’ve just put it into the appropriate perspective.  I feel good enough about myself to trust my own mind and my own decisions and when I feel certain about something, I don’t seek the approval of anyone else.  There will always be people who feel the need to tell me whether they approve or not, and that’s fine.  It just doesn’t factor into most of my decisions anymore.  And I can’t even tell you what a relief that is.  I’m proud of me.  I think it’s a big step forward on the path to figuring out how to be happy.

''Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live''.

Darkness

 ''We stumble and fall constantly even when we are most enlightened. But when we are in true spiritual darkness, we do not even know that we have fallen''.

''Dreams are today's answers to tomorrow's questions''.

Something I needed to remind myself......

"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.'' E.R. 


Someone may try to suggest to you that you ought to feel inferior. When you feel put down by someone around you, it is one of the worst feelings. Yet, it is also a time for realizing that only you have the power to stop this feeling or to allow it to get to you. In reality you control your own feelings and will only feel inferior if you agree with them (if you consent to feel inferior). No one can ruin your self-esteem, unless you believe the negative things they say. Deal with it constructively rather than making it into a case of feeling victimized and self-defeatist. Learn from the experience, improve aspects of yourself that bother you, and highlight your talents and good points. After all, quite possibly, the barbs were but jealousy of all the good and cleverness which you already shine forth. It has taken me a while to learn this, and I still practice looking at myself better than others do to this day. Just because one person doesn't like me or I am not their equal economically and socially doesn't mean the entire human race hates me. I am not inferior; I am just as human as they are.