Holy Holistic!

Going from Draft to Published Novel The decision is made. No going back now. The writing sample was chosen, the project description written, the personal profile penned, and the sample critique completed. Yes, I missed the note about the word count for the critique being limited to 200 words and exceeded it by 47, but if that’s the only error I made while knocking the whole thing out in a couple…

Am I Ready To Up Level My Writing? A friend has put me in a quandary. As much as I’ve been trying to get back to editing my novels and memoir, the best I’ve been able to do is get somewhat regular with my blog posts. She threw a monkey wrench into my excuse mechanism by sending me a link for a writing certificate program offered completely online by Stanford. It’s a 2-year program with 1 course…

Innocent Lies The older I get, the more I give myself too much credit for remembering a thought beyond the moment it’s thought. Things like: I don’t need to write that down I don’t need to set my alarm so I’ll be up in time for an 11:00 AM appointment I will put this away and remember where I put it when I need it I don’t need to check my calendar daily The trouble is, with each passing year,…

Repeat to Learn Years ago, a client recounted a story she’d heard about a marketing campaign for a well known shampoo. In an attempt to sell more shampoo, the marketing team came up with the slogan “Lather, Rinse, Repeat” to convince people, essentially, to wash their hair twice every time they washed it, thus, using twice as much shampoo as they really needed to. While repetition might be…

Consistency Isn’t For the Weak One of the people I follow on Facebook started a discussion on consistency wherein it’s not about how much you can do right out of the gate, but about keeping it going, and increasing your output, weight, or simply the length of time you consistently perform the actions. I feel this can apply to any aspect of our lives, be it health and fitness, working towards a…

Taking Advantage of Excellent Advice I always tell newer dancers to try different instructors as they might find learning easier from some than from others. More importantly, it gives your brain different perspectives. Like a math problem, sometimes, having things explained differently clarifies an area of confusion. I wish I’d heeded my own advice sooner. I got into a real rut post-COVID,…

Keep Your Agenda Close to the Vest Everyone has “hot buttons”. Everyone has subjects on which it would take a load of dynamite to get us to alter our opinion. It may be social, political, environmental, or anything else which raises our ire, or lights our passion. If anyone questions our position, our initial reaction would be to either shut down, or fire back. Yet doing so solves nothing. Being…

Healing as a Path to Soul Purpose Once again, my writing dug something out of my psyche I’d managed to stuff down unintentionally from the years of practice I gained as part of my family. This time, it wasn’t another toxic package of unfelt emotions, but the realization that elusive soul purpose I’ve been seeking has been right here all along…in multiple iterations. It might have been easy to…

A Milestone Birthday Inasmuch as I’ve been rattling on endlessly about my 70th birthday, the 30 year cycle it’s brought to light, and the fact that 70 is a milestone for me, I figured I at least owed my loyal readers a post for the day. I don’t know which twisty turny paths my mind might take, but it’s clear to me that write it, I must. My plans to spend my birthday alone with my cats and a movie…

Rejecting Other Peoples’ Darkness Despite my best efforts to keep this blog light and amusing, life gets in the way. Like you, I have my good days, and my not-so-good ones which are most likely to occur when I allow the world and it’s current brand of insanity to invade my peace and tranquility. Allowing other peoples’ darkness to dim the colors of my world never works in my best interests. While…

An Unpleasant State of Mind I’m in a state of being mentally scattered. My mind barely settles on one topic before racing at warp speed on to the next several dozen. Even my dreams are all over the place, marrying unlikely bed partners like triggers, closed roads, and both wild and domestic felines and canines living in blissful harmony while munching on raw vegetables. Nothing makes sense right…

At a Loss for Direction I’m at a crossroads. The trouble is, I can’t actually see what my options are, or how many possible directions I might choose from. It’s more a feeling that things are changing…must change before I can move on to whatever comes next in this journey upon which I embarked nearly 70 years ago…or 70 years and 9 months if you count the point of conception when the choice of…

Appetite Begone! One of the biggest roadblocks to my visions of being a svelte seventy-year-old isn’t lack of exercise, or yo yo dieting. No, it’s my dang fool yo yo appetite! One day, my body tells me it’s starving, and I’m eating everything in sight while trying hard to stay out of the kitchen. The next I cook dinner at the usual time and my body says “ho hum. I’m bored with eating. Let’s do…

Routines are Meant to be Broken A few days ago, I mixed things up. First, my walking buddy and I walked in the morning because Summer showed up unannounced,  and I had evening plans which precluded walking closer to dark. Then I decided to run some extra errands; picking up orthotics for my walking shoes, getting gas, washing my car, and as an added treat, an iced Oat milk Espresso to help me…

Faith and the Cult Perspective More and more lately, I’ve observed what I tend to refer to as a lemming personality in followers of a certain ideology. However, after reading an article about cult followers recently, I’m revising my perspective as it seems to describe the current national crisis more accurately from where I sit. The article pointed out people like me are trying to make sense of…

Happily Sitting at My Own Table After several months of intentionally avoiding a once-monthly dance event, I decided to show up…mostly because the personnel was different than usual and I knew the vibe would be more to my liking. I wasn’t disappointed, especially when two of the ladies I’ve been hanging with at most of the alternate venues were there too. What I found interesting was maybe 10 or…

Hugging Them Less Sincerely Lately, when I meet one of what I now think of as my old crowd, we still exchange the requisite, hugs, but it’s not the same. I feel like they’re no more than a conditioned habit; all action, no feeling. At first, I attributed it to their response to the huge step backward I took in November, until I realized it’s all me. I’m the one who hugs as a matter of habit…