Day 327: Novelty

What is one thing guaranteed to make attention stick, excitement build, and curiosity soar?

Novelty.

The new, the original, the unusual.

I came across this TEDx Talk recently and the section on novelty really stood out to me.

The speaker was discussing ways in which we can increase our happiness. The concept of novelty was encouraged to be used in areas of life that seem to be anything but novel. Such as people we know well and see every day, things we do with routine familiarity and autopilot - you know, the pillars of American life:

- family

- work

The things that are not so easy to change or refresh when we start to feel bored or blind to them.

Or are they?

Gratitude and appreciatiation are toted as being key to grounding ourselves and being present in the moment. I certainly believe this is true.

Yet, I've now learned there is another trick (or tool, depending on how you look at it) available to us.

Novelty.

Plus a bit of imagination.

The idea is that when we set ourselves (brains) up to think something along the lines of, 

"oh, wow, I get to go home and see my family- I haven't seen them in 8 whole hours!" 

rather than 

"well, work's over, time to go home to predictable people and routine," 

we prime our brains for novelty. We prime our brains to see the novel in the familiar.

Which, in turn, may actually heighten appreciation and gratitude for the very items we are focusing on.

Adding novelty to a situation is really another way of saying or thinking about changing one's perspective. It takes effort, it takes time, and it takes practice.

It takes - that's for sure. And then it gives.

More than we can imagine.

Day 326: Dream Big

 

 

  

Day 325: Small Reminders

Sometimes you receive unexpected confirmation of how great you are 😜.
Roll with it!

I'm planning on sharing this with my sisters as fun joke. I wonder what their reactions will be?!

All jokes aside, there are reminders, validations, and confirmations all around us attesting to our best traits or qualities with the intention of bringing us back - and hopefully closer - to ourselves.

We can choose to ignore them or down play them.
Or, we can try something different.
We can try accepting them with open arms (figuratively speaking. Unless you feel compelled to stretch out those arms!). We can try out acknowledging and appreciating ourselves in the moment.

If we did that regularly, what would change in our world?

If you did that regularly, what would change in your life?

If you do it today, what might change in the rest of your day and the week?

Try it out and see for yourself. What have you got to lose?

Day 324: True Love

 "When I want for you what you want for you, then I truly love you. When I want for you what I want for you, then I am loving me, through you."

Dang. I read this and had to take a long pause.
And then read it again, several more times.

What an idea.
What a total toss out the window of anything close to an "I know better" mentality.

"So, too, by the same measure, can you determine whether others love you, and whether you truly love others. For love chooses naught for itself, but only seeks to make possible the choices of the beloved other."

***

***

***

Did you think about it, yet? How you love based on the above measurement criteria?

Yeah, . . . can't say all of my love's been true, that's for sure . . .
And neither has all the love I've received.

But what if it was?
What if it could be?

I think it can.
Or at the very least, I think we can increase the amount of true love we give.

And I think it starts with awareness.
Awareness of what we want ourselves.
And further awareness that the different wants of others don't negate, lessen, or override our own.

Different wants can live in harmony.

Because when you dig down far enough, they all root from the same place.
Can you guess what that place is??

Love.

Wants are an expression of love - albeit, sometimes incredibly beat-up, cryptic, and/or misleading expressions.

Still having trouble getting on this band wagon?

Consider holding up the binoculars for your awareness.
To zoom in on the deep emotional want attached to every outer, expressed want.

When the emotional want is revealed, no one can argue with it. It can't be wrong.
Because emotional wants are universal - we can all relate to them.
Yet, we can all interpret them differently.

This is why perspective, in addition to awareness, is needed to give love that is true.

In what areas could you benefit from a perspective shift, if even just to try it out?

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For anyone wondering, the topic quotes today were pulled from an early page of Conversations with God: Book 3. Intrigued by what you read? Consider checking out the book yourself - or wait for my later coming commentary on whatever else jumps out at me!

Day 323: Conversations with . . . myself?

I started reading a new book from the library, recently.
Well, the book is old - published in 1998 - but it's new to me.

It's called Conversations with God. 

I'd heard the title before various times in passing, recommended amongst other books (most likely by my iPEC coaching community). But it wasn't until last month that I actually requested it from the library.
[This was after much deliberation of which book to select - there appeared to be 3 volumes! 'Does it matter which I read first? Oh, book 3 is available at the library branch nearest me? Sure, I'll go with that one!']

And then once I picked it up, it sat untouched in my apartment for a few more weeks.

Finally, on January 2nd, I cracked it open. 
I was instantly drawn in.
And quickly proceeded to have my mind blown, consistently, in just the first 8 pages.

"What the heck?!"
My heart rate had picked up and I was experiencing a mixture of excitement, disbelief, joy, happiness, and just a sprinkle of fear.

"This is confirming everything I've learned through coach training! Everything I've come to realize through my own experiences with coaching!! Everything I've thought and hypothesized about regarding current social institutions and practices that don't quite sit well with me . . .!!!"

In short, my world was getting rocked.
And I was in the right place, time, mindset, and perspective to receive it.

I was experiencing the direction that I had chosen for my life, reveal truths to me that delighted my soul and filled me with joy.

It felt as if I was having the conversation with God myself, right as I was reading.

As much as I could have tried, I couldn't write these sensations off as 'just feelings from something somebody wrote.'
I knew the words were true. 
But there was something still deeper.
It was as if I was finally feeling that I was true.
That what I yearn to contribute and put out in the world is exactly what the world needs.
That - and stay with me here - I already know the so called 'secrets to life.'

What's that?! Sarah knows the secrets to life?!!!
Well, where's she been hiding them?!

'Well, I don't really know them, I haven't perfected them or my life or anything. But I know what they are . . .'

CUTTTTT!
Let's end that scene right here.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

I know the secrets to life - a happy life.
I have not mastered them, but I know what they are.
And that's all I need - to know what they are.
Because after knowing, it's all practice anyway.

This knowledge isn't a secret.
It's open and available to everyone.
And really, it's quite basic.
But sometimes the most basic things prove the most difficult.

Why is that?

Because we get in our own way.
We get in our own way with life and happiness, in general.

Because we don't trust or truly get to know ourselves.

That is it my friends. That's the secret - getting to know your full self.

For the past year, my suspicion of this has been growing stronger and stronger. But still I doubted.
"What if other people don't believe me? Don't believe it's true?"
"I don't know how to convince them."

But here I am, with the 'randomly' selected book volume that has strengthened my trust in myself and belief in what I know. 

Lucky me, I don't need to convince anyone of anything.
I just get to share the information.

Day 322: Honey Bee-Ess

I was reading a news email and came upon the article summary below:

What's creating a buzz... This new vaccine. Yesterday, the Agriculture Dept gave the green light to the world’s first vaccine for honeybees. For context: one-third of the global food supply relies on pollination, and healthy commercial hives are essential to secure high crop yields. But the colonies had no protection against diseases that regularly wiped them out. It really stung. Now, a biotech company has developed a vaccine containing bacteria that is ingested by the queen, deposited in her ovaries, and ultimately gives immunity to developing larvae as they hatch. It will only be available to commercial beekeepers. The developer is calling it a “breakthrough” in protecting honeybees" that can positively impact food production on a global scale.

If I had zero previous knowledge on the bee population I probably would have thought this sounded great.

But I do have a tiny bit of prior knowledge.

And it's enough to leave me feeling very disgusted and down hearted.

What the summary above conveniently fails to mention is that the honey bee population is experiencing it's steep decline and danger largely because of the agriculture industry. Specifically, the fertilizers and pesticides they have adopted and evolved over the past few decades and use widely today.

If the chemicals that are being used to treat the crops we ingest are KILLING bees, what does that say about our health?

How does pumping bees full of more chemicals actually solve the problem?

It doesn't.

It just masks the symptoms of the problem.

It just puts a Band-Aid over an ugly spot.

The solution to the problem of the declining bee population, amongst many other environmental concerns, lies with us.

It lies within our ability to truly love - ourselves, each other, and the world we live in.

Better doesn't come without change, without growing pains.

If we are unwilling do something different than what we've grown to know, we will never live in a world better than it is now.

I highly encourage you to get informed on the matters of the world that impact your life 'indirectly', because it is these areas that will ultimately cause the most damage.

Here's an article to get you started.

If you are looking for a legitimate organization to support and learn from, I strongly recommend the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). They have a proven track record of success in legal battles advocating for the environment and show no signs of slowing down any time soon.

Each of us can make a difference - no matter how small it seems.

What will you do?

Day 321: I Love Writing

I love writing - and making art in general - because I never really know where it's going to take me.

I'll start writing with a topic/key point in mind and by the middle or near end I often find myself on a narrative path I wouldn't have expected (though not always).

Thoughts along the lines of

''Whoa, that took a turn in a different direction. Huh..."

are not uncommon during my writing process.

And that is what I love so much!

The discovery and effortless (almost imperceptible) exploration.

Of ideas.

Of thoughts.

Of mindsets.

Of perspectives.

The hallmark component of any true "Sarah Story" telling is the curvy, random path one is led down in an effort to gather ALL of the 'absolutely necessary' details required to make it to the moral/point of the story . . . which can only occur at the very end (once all hope of there even being a point - by some - has been lost).

Knowing this about my storytelling, it makes a lot of sense why I would enjoy writing for the same reason. Though, thankfully, with writing it's a bit easier to be more concise, however minor.

 

Creating delight (even if it is just for myself) from unexpected direction and perspective that springs from open exploration.

This is my story style.

This is my writing style.

This is my way of being - to a large degree.

And I love it.