Like this reminder...

If there is one fact in my profession that every client knows, but doesn't "know" it's this. You're not perfect.

Can't for the life of me remember where I read it, but it is so true.

I don't expect to be perfect but I tend to have expectations for life "things" that put a cloud like perfection on them.

I think along with these high expectations and perfection comes another tough word: guilt.

I'm ready to start shedding the guilt.
I recently told myself I was going to buckle down and not drink any adult beverages for the month leading up to my trip to Vegas. We'll I lasted all but two weeks and said screw it and had an adult beverage, or 2. I felt guilty for a few minutes and with that guilt came the other toughy-feeling weak.  However, I moved forward and accepted my choice, took a breath and moved on.

At about the same time I came into this idea of dumping guilt I also finished reading "10% Happier" by Dan Harris. It is a book about this man, author and ABC news anchorman's, experience with meditation and mindfulness. I found many of the ideas from this book as ideas and actions that would help get rid of the guilt I constantly was battling with. "Be present" was definitely the big take home point for me. Intentional actions and experiences instead of my current chaotic, scatter-brained, multi-tasking self.

Then came a new Facebook and blog page to follow: Live Well with Kell. It was a suggestion from a friend at work. Her friend Kell wrote about different ways in which to live well. I love her voice. She is so upbeat an positive and has doable suggestions for living life well. One of Kell's recent posts, which happened to coincide with the reading of Dan Harris' book, was we all make choices and so lets say if Kell decides to eat a donut  for breakfast that's fine, that's her choice, but then she can't complain about her weight. I liked this idea and I liked the mindset of we all have choices to make and no one is perfect. If I decide to lets say eat a  whole Jack's frozen pizza then that's my choice but then I can't complain about it.

so note to self: no one's perfect, get rid of guilt in life, be present, and accept our choices and move on with no excuses or complaints for the choices made. I'll let you know how this new mindset works.

May Reads... I know, I know, its the middle of June

I'm a little embarrassed at the lack of posts/writing I've done this year.  When I went to write today's post on what I read in May I was shocked to see I've only written 24 posts this year.  Part of the reason for my lack of writing has been my lack of running and racing, which for so long has been a great source of my writing.  I've also been working on this online writing class that has been taking up my time and the writing I'm doing for that has been no "post worthy".  So the class is almost done and I plan to move forward with working on my writing, so I hope to be writing more posts. 

But for now here we go with what I read in May.

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng

"Lydia is dead. But they don't know this yet."  Pretty powerful first two lines in chapter one.  I'm being taught the importance of strong lines to start a story, because, as it makes sense, this grabs the reader and they keep reading.  These lines grabbed me and I kept reading.  The story is about Lydia, who is dead.  However, it is a mystery how she died.  It is a story of a family, mixed race: Caucasian and Asian.  The father is a professor, the mother was suppose to go to medical school and be a doctor and instead doesn't, and two sisters (one being Lydia) and a son.  It is a story of a family and all that comes with being a part of family.  It wasn't a feel good book, but I enjoyed it.  It was a combo of family drama + mystery.  Well written and another I'd suggest for you to pick up. 

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
Our book club book.  This was our 13 year anniversary of book club.  It was a good book, but I kind of felt like I didn't enjoy it as much as other bookies did.  However, many of the bookies read this book awhile ago, some of them reading it again, because they liked it so much the first time.  The story was a sad one and shows all of us just what a life of poverty looks like.  It also reminds us that just because you are poor doesn't mean you can't be happy.  It is a family story and the characters were well described.  I think it just didn't hit my emotional side as much as I would've thought it would have.  Francie Nolan, the main character, was  a strong, inquisitive, determined young lady.  I really liked her character.  Again, good book, but not my fav of this month's reads.  I always feel like I pick books with such high expectations of being great that my expectations just set these books up for failure or disappointment. 

Noodle The Puppy Place #11 by Ellen Miles
We, daughter and I, are continuing on with reading about all the wonderful puppies that need homes.  She, my daughter, would love a dog, but alas that just isn't going to happen so I'm going to try and keep her love for puppies and animals alive by reading books with her about them.  She enjoys them and they are fast reads that help our chapter a night goal be realistic. 

The Dragon Rider by Cornelia Funke
This was our kid's book club at church read for the month of May.  It was an entertaining story and the length of this book challenged me to get finished in time for the kid's book club.  I read about the first half to my daughter out loud, son finished it early May, the fast reader he is.  I liked this story and the characters were quite interesting.  Ben (an orphan boy) and Firedrake (a dragon) befriend each other and go on a journey searching for the "rim of heaven".  This "rim of heaven" will be a safe place for Firedrake to live and also he's hoping to find some dragon friends there too.  Ben and Firedrake aren't the only interesting characters in the book, but you will have to read it either by yourself or with your kidos to discover the others.  

The Day After Tomorrow by Allan Folsom
This book was on my parent's bookshelves while I was growing up.  I think I picked it up a couple of times, but never really dived in.  Then last year my parents were moving out of there home into a smaller home and needed to unload some of their things to either my sister or I or to Goodwill/garage sales.  So my sis and I went through their library and picked out books that we wanted and I picked this one and added it to my box full.  I picked it up in April and started reading it and just couldn't get it done by the time April ended so I finished this one early May.  The protagonist is a doctor who is in Europe for a conference/speaking engagement.  He finds a young medical student quite beautiful and quite interested in him- they hook up and then they part.  He has to go back to California and she needs to go back to med school.  He can't leave her though and so follows her back to France.  Game changer- he sees the man who killed his father when he was a child and the mystery begins.  It was at times far fetched, but I thought it was a book that definitely grabbed my attention.  Interesting twist at the end. 

Felt like a snow day...

yesterday the rain came down and after I ran errands and went to PT yesterday morning I arrived home to two kidos enjoying Garfield on Netflix.  Sorry Garfield, nothing against you, but I really don't care for your animated cartoon.  So after the show was done I said, "OK enough TV".

The two awesome kids of mine played almost the rest of the afternoon setting up their own "Animal Farm/Zoo" for youngest and "Jurassic World" for oldest.  It really felt like a snow day.  The kind of day where your kids stay in their pj's all day and get out toys you haven't seen them play with in forever, due to the over scheduled schedules us crazy parents put them on.

It was a great day- full of imagination, creativity, and some video production with the Ipad in tow to make their own videos- way better than Garfield in my eyes.  I may be a little biased.  Hope you and your kids, if you have them, have time to have a "snow day" this summer at home.