Monthly Archives: October 2015

Day 1014: Positions

Last Wednesday, I was in a position to meet with a sleep specialist at Tufts Medical Center in Boston. He took the  position that my mild sleep apnea could be effectively treated without my wearing a mask positioned on my face and a machine positioned by my bed.  He said that some data — from my sleep study performed over a year ago—  indicated that if I stayed sleeping in a side position, that would position me to have few or no occurrences of sleep apnea during the night.

He also told me about “positional therapy” devices I could buy that would position me on my side, all night long.

My positions about that included:

  • joy, because I REALLY dislike being attached to medical machines at night,
  • surprise, because I wondered why nobody else had noticed or interpreted the data that way before,
  • amazement about  the fancy  term “positional therapy” and the fancy price for something that looks like a fanny pack gone wild (if you position your cursor over my link for “positional therapy,” you’ll see what I mean), and
  • belief that I could MacGyver something else that would work just as well at keeping me in a side sleeping position, all night long.

If you don’t understand how I positioned the word “MacGyver” just now and do not want to position your cursor to find a helpful definition,  I’m in a position to easily share that right now:

MacGyver
Syllabification: Mac·Gy·ver
Pronunciation: /məˈɡīvər/
Definition of MacGyver in English:
verb

US informal
Make or repair (an object) in an improvised or inventive way, making use of whatever items are at hand:
“he MacGyvered a makeshift jack with a log”
“he has a pair of rectangular-framed glasses MacGyvered with duct tape”

Origin

1990s: from Angus MacGyver, the lead character in the television series MacGyver (1985–1992), who often made or repaired objects in an improvised way.

I am now in a position to tell you that I’ve stayed sleeping in a side position every night since my appointment with the sleep specialist last Wednesday.  How? I positioned socks and other clothes tightly in a backpack and positioned it on my back.  That perfectly keeps me in position sleeping on my side, all night long.

Now that we’re at this position in this post, is anybody else aware of a particular song positioning itself to be heard?

That disco song — “All Night Long” by Lionel Ritchie — reminds me of the very entertaining film my son, my boyfriend, and I saw positioned on a movie screen last night. Aaron, Michael, and I — positioned in some comfy theater seats — watched The Martian, about an  astronaut/botanist played by Matt Damon who is positioned on Mars for many months, MacGyvering his own survival over and over again, with disco the only music keeping him company.

When we got home from the movie, I said to Michael, “I think I could have survived on Mars.” Why did I take that position?   I was thinking about my “positional therapy” backpack and many survival techniques I’ve used over the years.

I shall now position some photos — taken from several positions yesterday —  into this post.

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Cats sure do get into some interesting positions, don’t they?

I think you can guess my position about any comments you might position below.

I’d like to position some thanks to Michael and Aaron, sleep specialists, The Martian, the Broken Tail Rescue Shelter (positioned at the PetSmart in Cambridge Massachusetts), everyone who has ever MacGyvered a solution to a problem, survivors everywhere, and you — of course! — for positioning yourself here, today.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 43 Comments

Day 1013: Compliments

It’s a compliment to the power of compliments that I’ve already blogged about compliments twice before, in Day 191: Compliments and Day 795:  How to Accept Compliments.

It’s a compliment to the Smothers Brothers that I was inspired to create another post about compliments today.

If you pay me the compliment of watching a video I’ve chosen for you, you’ll find that Smothers Brothers performance of “Boil That Cabbage Down”  at Boston’s Symphony Hall contains much about compliments.

I shall now pay a compliment to Tommy Smothers, who has a lot to say about  family compliments: I am proud we both share the birthday of February 2 (a date that pays a compliment to groundhogs in the USA).

Speaking of family compliments, I know a  very effective exercise that helps families give compliments to each other. Here’s how it works:

  1. The family gathers in a room, with a writing implement and some nice paper.
  2. One member of the family leaves the room.
  3. The rest of the family members come up with compliments about the person who is not there. (These must be authentic, unqualified and non-left-handed compliments.)
  4. One of the family members writes down the compliments.
  5. When the person who left the room returns, that person is given the list of compliments from the rest of the family.
  6. Repeat Steps 2 through 5, for each family member.

I am going to pay a compliment to my old friend, Joe: I really appreciate him for telling me about this family exercise, decades ago.

Here’s a photo of some of the compliments I got from my family (including my sister Ellen, my late mother, my late father, and my ex-husband) when we did that family exercise:

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It’s a compliment to my family members how I’ve saved and cherished that list for so many years.

Here are some more complimentary thoughts from me about compliments:

  • I’ve witnessed many people in group and individual therapy struggle to accept compliments that are sincerely given.
  • Receiving a compliment that does not fit your perception of yourself can feel painful at times.
  • I like to give people compliments, authentically and freely.
  • I believe that learning to accept compliments can be powerfully healing.

I wonder if I’ll get any compliments about these photos I took yesterday.

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All my photos are taking forever to load in WordPress today. Since I have paid WordPress the compliment of buying additional storage space and I have paid my readers the compliment of spending hours in the service of helping my photos load more quickly, I hope this is temporary.  Otherwise, I may have to pay some left-handed compliments to WordPress over this long weekend.

I shall now pay myself the compliment of sharing my first ever tweet with hashtags, which I created on Twitter while I was waiting for my photos to load here:

I love being in the moment, especially when that moment is a Friday night of a long weekend.

I shall now pay a compliment to my cat Oscar and my boyfriend Michael by including this photo from August, two years ago (which I hope pays us all the compliment of loading easily).

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Feel free to include any right-handed or left-handed compliments in a comment, below.

Complimentary thanks to my family, to Michael/Mike the boyfriend, to Joe the friend, to Oscar the cat, to the Brothers Smothers, to WordPress, to Twitter, to people who do their best to give and receive compliments, and  to you — of course! — for paying me the compliment of visiting here, today.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism, Psychotherapy | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 43 Comments

Day 1012: Piece of Cake

“Piece of Cake” is an idiom that means “easy.”  I’ve never understood where that idiom comes from, since making a cake isn’t easy (although eating one is).

Want an explanation about the title of today’s post?  Piece of cake.

  1. I often think about what’s easy and what’s difficult for me and other people.
  2. In group and individual therapy, people talk about how changing old behaviors and patterns of thinking is NOT a piece of cake.
  3. I’ve changed my diet to drastically reduce all sweets, including pieces of cake.
  4. Including photos in my blog SHOULD be a piece of cake, but isn’t.

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Taking photos like those is a piece of cake for me (although sharing them with you isn’t).

Hungry for some quotes about cake?  Piece of cake!

“Love is like a good cake; you never know when it’s coming, but you’d better eat it when it does!”
― C. JoyBell C.

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“I suppose I wanted to have my cake and eat it.
But then again, what were you going to do with your cake if not eat it?
Frame it?
Use it as a sachet in your underwear drawer?”
― Marian Keyes, Watermelon

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“SITTING TIGHT? Holing up? Waiting for answers?
Those are things I’m not good at.
Planning a massive attack against mechanical geeky-like things when i was already furious and itching to kill something?
Piece o’cake”
― James Patterson, Max

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If you wait for a cake to be given to you so you will be happy- then you will be happy when someone gives you a cake. But if you buy a cake (or bake one) for yourself so you will be happy, you have found the way of happiness.”

― C. JoyBell C.

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Mma Ramotswe sighed. ‘We are all tempted, Mma. We are all tempted when it comes to cake.’

That is true,’ said Mma Potokwane sadly. ‘There are many temptations in this life, but cake is probably one of the biggest of them.”
― Alexander McCall Smith, In the Company of Cheerful Ladies

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“It baffles me that people think that obliterating the past will save them from its consequences, as if throwing away the empty cake plate would help you lose weight.”

― Timothy B. Tyson, Blood Done Sign My Name: A True Story

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“Out of love I made you a cake. Also out of milk, eggs, flour, sugar, and vanilla.”
― Jarod Kintz, The Days of Yay are Here! Wake Me Up When They’re Over.

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“You never know. Say the arena’s actually a giant cake-”

“Say we move on,” I broke in.
― Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games

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“I tried to explain as much as I could,”  Poppet says. “I think I made an analogy about cake.”

“Well, that must have worked,” Widget says. “Who doesn’t like a good cake analogy?”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

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Deciding what music to feature in today’s post?  Piece of Cake!

It’s a piece of cake to find Cake’s “Symphony in C” on YouTube.

What piece of cake do you like best in this post?

Piece-of-cake thanks to all the amazing cakes, people, and one cat contributing to the baking of today’s post and to you — of course! — for being the icing on the cake, today.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | 41 Comments

Day 1011: Simplicity

Simplicity came up in a therapy group, yesterday.

After that group, I simply saw simplicity everywhere.


  
  
  


Those last two simple photos are of a simple yet sturdy walking stick at an Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) therapy session. I used that stick to simply beat the stuffing out of some pillows, expressing some old and simple feelings of anger.

How did I feel after that exercise? Simply wonderful. As I told George, my EMDR therapist:

Instead of having a painful tiger inside me, now I am the tiger.

I’ve simply been considering, for over two years, sharing the non-simple song “Simple” from Stephen Sondheim’s 1964 musical Anyone Can Whistle (which features a psychotherapist sorting people into groups).

I prefer the simplicity of a local stage production, sometimes. (“Simple” simply starts at the 4-minute mark in that YouTube video.) If you want the simplicity of “Simple” from the original cast album, here it is, in two simple parts:


If you simply do not have time to watch those videos, I simply understand.

Some more simplicity: there’s no time like the present to do something helpful you’ve been considering for years.

Like simply beating the crap out of some pillows and accepting your own anger.

What do you think of the simplicity of this post?

Sincerely simple thanks to therapy groups, my EMDR therapist, sticks, pillows, Stephen Sondheim, and you — of course!

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism, Psychotherapy | Tags: , , , , , , , | 21 Comments

Day 1010: I talk to myself

If you — like lots of other people — have automatic negative thoughts, some therapists recommend that you talk to yourself.

Here are some examples of how I talk to myself, challenging habitual and unhelpful thoughts:

That person seems to have a negative opinion about me BUT I ACTUALLY DON’T KNOW THAT.

If that person has a negative opinion about me IT WON’T HURT ME AS MUCH AS I FEAR.

My writing sucks right now BUT IT’S GOOD ENOUGH, AND I CAN MAKE IT BETTER.

I feel like I look really weird BUT NOBODY NOTICES THAT.

I’ve made a mistake BUT IT’S NOT THE END OF THE WORLD.

I may feel like I’m alone with this problem BUT I CAN ASK FOR HELP.

I just talked to myself and told myself those were enough examples.

If you have this thought:

People are going to think I’m nuts if I’m talking to myself!

… take a look around and talk to yourself like so:

Don’t most people look like they’re talking to themselves, these days?

And who cares what they think, anyway?!?!?!

Can you imagine how I was talking to myself, yesterday, as I was taking these pictures?

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Now, I’m talking to myself about what music to include in this post.

There’s this, with Clint Eastwood singing to himself:

And there’s this, with the Smothers Brothers talking to (1) Judy Garland, (2) themselves, (3) each other, and (4) a TV audience:

Don’t talk to yourself about this post; instead, share that self-talk in a comment.

I talk to myself all the time about how grateful I am to have this blog. Today is no exception! Talk to yourselves, please, about how much I appreciate you for visiting here today.

Categories: blogging, personal growth, photojournalism, Psychotherapy | Tags: , , , , , , , | 56 Comments

Day 1009: On Fire

Yesterday, I was on fire,  taking photos for today’s blog.

For those of you not familiar with the idiom “on fire” —  I wasn’t actually engulfed in flames;  I was inspired by the visuals around me and I captured them with enthusiasm.

I was also on fire listening to lots of music I love, as I went through my day.

As usual, I was on fire with many ideas about

  1. what title to use for this blog post,
  2. what topics to include,
  3. which pictures to choose, and
  4. what music I might share.

Yesterday, after work — when I was on fire trying my hardest to solve my current blogging problem of transferring photos from my iPhone to my laptop — I came up with today’s title.

Much earlier in the day, I was on fire with the idea of naming this post “People You Can Count On.”

Are you on fire to learn more about my process of being on fire throughout the day?

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After looking at that last photo — which includes water, fire’s natural enemy — I am now on fire to share these thoughts with you:

  • Michael, my boyfriend,  takes control of the laundry here, and I’m happily on fire about that.
  • When I can’t control things in my environment — like transferring photos from my phone to my laptop, which SHOULD be easy —  I am sometimes on fire with frustration and anger.
  • I was on fire yesterday, at work, helping other people identify, express,  and let go of frustration and anger.
  • I refuse to duck my responsibility, today, to link to this list of cognitive distortions like SHOULDs and this list of ways to let go of unhelpful thoughts.

What music am I on fire about sharing with you now?

When I was in my 20s, I was on fire with admiration for John McLaughlin and the Mahavishnu Orchestra,  and I loved listening to his album, Inner Mounting Flame.

Yesterday, I heard this on-fire tune, in which John McLaughlin‘s guitar-playing is ON FIRE:

That On-Fire tune is called “Vital Transformation.”  I was also on fire, this morning, when I discovered this string quartet version of John McLaughlin’s transforming music:

Am I on fire with anything else I want to share with you today? I do like this “On Fire” Garry Shandling joke, even though I’ve already included it in this previous post about “I-Statements.”

I met a new girl at a barbecue, actually, a very pretty girl. Blonde, I think. I’m not sure. Her hair was on fire. And all she talked about was herself. You know those kind of girls – “I’m hot. I’m on fire!” You know,”Me, me me!” “Help me! Put me out!” Jesus. Some sort of Hollywood chick.

Are you on fire with any thoughts or feelings about this post?  Leaving a comment might help you put that fire out.

Thanks to everybody who helped me be on fire, today, creating this blog post and thanks to you — of course! — for heating things up here with your support.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism, Psychotherapy | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 37 Comments

Day 1008: From the top

From the top of my head to the bottom of my toes, I hope you enjoy today’s blog post.

From the Top is a radio show I’ve been listening to for years, which features young classical musicians performing and being interviewed in front of a  studio audience.

I was at the taping of From the Top at New England Conservatory of Music‘s Jordan Hall in Boston, yesterday.

From the top to the bottom of the following list, I’m going to tell you some things about all that:

  • The last time I was at Jordan Hall, I was onstage singing Antonin Dvorák‘s Requiem as a soprano in the Dedham Choral Society.
  • Before the radio show/concert began yesterday, somebody on stage told us not to turn off our cell phones.
  • They gave away t-shirts to three people who used their cell phones to email a request for one, but I wasn’t one of them.
  • After the t-shirt give-away, we all had to turn off our cellphones, so I have no photos of the actual radio show/concert.
  • I was sitting in the front row, so I got some close-up-and-personal photos before and after the show.
  • The person sitting next to me in the front row told me that George Li, the special guest yesterday, was in the same middle school class as his daughter, in Lexington, Massachusetts.
  • Besides the amazing George Li,  whose incredible piano skills recently got him second place in the XV International Tchaikovsky Competition, other young people appearing yesterday included a 9-year-old girl, Harmony Zhu, who’s been on the Ellen DeGeneres  Show and who is already a master at piano AND chess.

From the top, here are about 50 photos I took yesterday, in chronological order:


  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


  
  
  
  
  
  

From the top, here‘s (1) George Li in his first appearance on From the Top, when he was 11 years old …

(2) Harmony Zhu on The Ellen Show:

… and (3) George Li competing in the International Tchaikovsky Competition three months ago:

From the top to the bottom of my heart, I am grateful to all those who helped me create today’s post and to you — of course! — for visiting here, today.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism | Tags: , , , , | 31 Comments

Day 1007: That stinks!

When I met my dear friend Barbara yesterday for (1) brunch at Arlington’s Madrona Tree Restaurant, (2) a visit to the store next door, called The Artful Heart,  and  (3) a walk to Arlington’s Spy Pond, Barbara suggested that I title today’s post

That stinks!

Barbara didn’t suggest that because anything smelled bad at  Madrona Tree, The Artful Heart, or on our walk.  She didn’t say

That stinks!

in response to any of the many topics we discussed yesterday, including

  • work,
  • health,
  • friends, or
  • my son’s applying to college.

Barbara didn’t say

That stinks!

as I was taking any of these photos when I was with her, yesterday.


  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Barbara also didn’t say “That stinks!” when I said, “There’s two of my angels!”  when I was taking this photo:

Barbara said

That stinks!

when she sat inside my spankin’ new yellow car and agreed with me that the interior smelled slightly of skunk.

What do I think stinks, this morning, as I’m creating this post?

  1. It’s cold and rainy outside.
  2. I don’t know how long the smell of skunk will stay in my car.
  3. Fellow blogger Irene just commented on my previous post that my blog never appears in her reader any more.
  4. Photos are still not migrating from my iPhone to my laptop, so that creates extra steps whenever I create a post.

What does NOT stink, this morning?

  1. I bought a cool new scarf at the Artful Heart, to help keep me warm.
  2. I have wonderful friends like Barbara nearby and Irene on WordPress.
  3. My son is much further along in his college application process because of a meeting he, his father, and I had yesterday.
  4. I finished writing the Parent Brag Sheet yesterday, so my son can give that to his teachers who are writing his college recommendations.
  5. I’m going to see one of my favorite classical music radio shows, today,  From the Top.
  6. I don’t have the same level of shame I used to have, when something that “belongs” to me smells bad.

Do any of these pictures I took yesterday evening — when I was with my boyfriend Michael — stink, do you think?


  
  
  
  
  

Talk about three wicked sistahs!

It stinks that

  • you may have to scroll back up and then down from the top of this post to catch my stinky reference to “three wicked sistahs” and
  • I don’t know what music to include in this “That stinks!” post.

Okay! I found a stinky video on YouTube,  searching for “From the Top.”

Does it stink that I’m rushing through this ending paragraph of gratitude by simply saying “Thanks!” to all those who helped me create this post and “More thanks!” to all of you who are reading it?

Categories: gratitude, personal growth, photojournalism | Tags: , , , , , | 42 Comments

Day 1006: It Takes Two

It took two earbuds, yesterday morning, to deliver to my two ears a great Stephen Sondheim song — “It Takes Two.”

It takes two exceptional actor/singers — Chip Zien and Joanna Gleason — from the original Broadway production of Sondheim’s Into the Woods to sing “It Takes Two” in that YouTube video.

It takes two things very dear to my heart — seen on October 2 — to create the first  “It Takes Two” image of today’s post:

It takes two happy moments for me to tell you that’s my wonderful friend  (and ex-co-worker) Mary next to my new yellow car.

It takes two — I and my iPhone camera — to notice and capture pictures I think relate to my blog posts, every day.


  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

As I’m typing this post with my two hands, it takes about two moments for me to come up with more than two associations for “It Takes Two.”

  • It takes two parents to help our son Aaron negotiate the college application process, so I’ve asked Aaron’s father, Leon, to meet with us today after 2 PM, to discuss all that.
  • It takes two days for me to come up with all the wonderful things I can say about my son Aaron, so I’m probably going to spend two hours today at the keyboard creating a “Parent Brag Sheet for College Recommendations.”
  • It takes two people, or more,  in a therapy office to come up with effective ideas for dealing with anxiety, depression, and many other challenges to people’s mental health.
  • It takes two cardiologists — Drs. Deeb Salem and Mark Estes — to give me the level of care I need for my very unusual heart.
  • It takes two doctors — my Primary Care Physician and a sleep specialist — to help me figure out how the heck to treat my mild sleep apnea.
  • It takes two sleep machines for me to conclude that I really dislike wearing a medical machine at night.
  • It takes approximately two minutes for me to attempt to explain why I dislike wearing medical machines at night. That experience is way too close to too many memories I have of being attached to medical machines before the age of 12, when it took two parents to take me and leave me at Children’s Hospital to receive more than two pacemakers between the ages of 10 and 12,  to keep me alive.
  •  It takes two months to reschedule an appointment with the sleep specialist at Tufts Medical Center, so I’m too grateful that I’m finally seeing seeing him, in not too much more than 2 x 2 days.
  • It took two tickets to Boston’s Symphony Hall last night to get me and my boyfriend Michael in to see Mozart’s Requiem  — which I sang 2 x 2 decades ago with the MIT Chorus.  Musical scholars think it took two people to write Mozart’s Requiem: Mozart and Franz Sussmayr to complete it after Mozart’s untimely death at age 35.

It takes two people (at least) to create a legitimate Wikipedia page, and it takes two sentences from the Wikipedia entry about Mozart’s Requiem to show that it takes two of several different instruments to play the Requiem:

The Requiem is scored for 2 basset horns in F, 2 bassoons, 2 trumpets in D, 3 trombones (alto, tenor & bass), timpani (2 drums), violins, viola and basso continuo (cello, double bass, and organ). The vocal forces include soprano, contralto, tenor, and bass soloists and an SATB mixed choir.

When I sang the Requiem with the MIT Chorus  two years after I had graduated from a college not too far from MIT,  I was an “S” in the SATB (Soprano Alto Tenor Bass) mixed chorus.

Yesterday, it took two people to have this conversation about the Requiem:

Me: Perhaps the best music ever written — Mozart’s Requiem — is playing at Symphony Hall tonight.  Do you want to go?

Michael (after a pause):  Sure, baby.

It takes two words from my boyfriend to make me really, really happy, sometimes.

It takes two seconds for me to decide to share this part of the Requiem (which everybody agrees was written only by Mozart).

It apparently takes two musical numbers for me to successfully complete this post.

It takes way more than two people to help me create every post I write here. Thanks to all of them and to you — of course! — for taking the time to read this.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism, Psychotherapy | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 48 Comments

Day 1005: What is success?

I successfully wrote this, yesterday, on my white board during a therapy group:

What is success?

How would you define it?

Is success measured by celebrity? If so, I probably walked by several successes (including Mark and Donnie Wahlberg) last night, at the opening of Wahlburgers near Fenway Park.
  
  
  

Is success measured by recognition?

If so, yesterday I passed by some successful artists, featured in a poster on the door of a doctor’s office.


  
  

I had some success, yesterday,  using  new and unfamiliar diagnostic codes required by ICD-10 — the subject of that artistic and humorous  poster.

To make this post successful, I probably need to explain that ICD-10 is the 10th revision of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, a medical classification list by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Speaking of successes, here‘s successful Daniel Radcliffe and John Larroquette introduced by the original star of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying — the successful Robert Morse — and a later successful star of that same musical, Matthew Broderick.

Personally, I measure success by

  • how you treat others,
  • how you treat yourself,
  • doing as little harm as possible,
  • respecting living creatures,
  • balancing your needs with other people’s needs,
  • overcoming adversity,
  • acceptance,
  • letting go of judgment,
  • integrating and balancing the different parts of yourself,
  • kindness,
  • forgiveness,
  • honesty,
  • creating safety,
  • being in the moment, and
  • other qualities and behaviors which I’m not successfully remembering, right now.

Let’s see if I have any more successful photos on my successful phone.


  
My successful son and his successful mother have been a bit grumpy lately, as he’s been trying to successfully complete the college application process. Aaron was recently unpleasantly surprised by his cumulative Grade Point Average (GPA) — a number that many say is all-important  for success. Because I see the whole picture of Aaron’s many academic and character successes, Aaron has been unsuccessful in convincing me that road-to-success colleges care only about that one, single number as THE measure of success.

Another day, another successful blog post.

As usual, how successful I was today depended upon many others,  including you — of course! –and your success in reading until the very end.

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism | Tags: , , , , , , | 37 Comments

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