Earlier this week, I asked people in a therapy group what their greatest strengths were. When somebody replied, “I don’t have any strength,” I changed my question to “What are your positive qualities?”
One of my greatest strengths is noticing interesting things around me and taking pictures of them.
It looks like Siri’s greatest strengths include answering questions but NOT driving a car.
Another one of my greatest strengths is expressing appreciation for others. Thanks to all who helped me create this post and to you — of course! — for all your strengths (even if you don’t feel strong).
Yesterday, the wonderful Kathy at cardiac rehab said to me
Life is short
when we were discussing my long-lived wish to live the rest of my short life near a beautiful body of water.
Whenever somebody says
Life is short
I agree with that person, even though I’ve lived much longer than most people expected I would.
To me,
Life is short
means
seize the moment,
don’t waste time,
do what you love,
spend time with good people,
enjoy yourself,
don’t settle for less,
take care of yourself,
be mindful,
balance your needs with other people’s needs,
do what works,
accept and experience all your feelings, and
appreciate the here and now.
What does
Life is short
mean to you?
Here are the pictures I took yesterday when I was seizing the moment, not wasting time, doing what I loved, spending time with good people, enjoying myself, not settling for less, taking care of myself, being mindful, balancing my needs with other people’s needs, doing what worked, accepting and experiencing all my feelings, and appreciating the here and now:
Because life is short, I won’t keep you much longer, but here’s a short song with lots of life.
Short thanks from this short person to all those who helped me write this short post and — of course! — to you, for improving my short life with your short visit, today.
Please take notice of what I notice, here and now:
I notice the sounds of our cat Harley eating our other cat Oscar’s special prescription diet.
When my boyfriend Michael and I are away in Minnesota for my open heart surgery later this month, both cats (who will be staying home) will be eating Oscar’s special prescription diet, so we don’t need to worry about Oscar eating Harley’s regular food.
My son’s student visa still has not arrived and I can’t help but notice he is scheduled to leave for the University of Edinburgh in two days.
I am going to follow the advice of my sister Ellen and my downstairs neighbor Karen and call the office of Senator Elizabeth Warren today hoping they’ll take notice of the visa issue.
I ate a lot of foods yesterday — including kale, spinach, and ginger — that I notice will interact with Warfarin, which I’ll need to take after I get my new mechanical heart valve.
My surgery is less than two weeks away.
My sister Ellen and her spouse Linda gave me noticeably wonderful gifts yesterday, which you might notice in my other photos from yesterday:
My co-workers are taking notice as I get ready for my “game day” of September 21. Some of them took notice yesterday that listening to music during recovery from surgery helps with healing. I’ve noticed that too. Please take notice that I’ll be listening to music you may have noticed I love, like this:
Please take notice of this: I’m noticing that “Tell Her You Saw Me” seems like a noticeably apt title and song for today’s post.
Please take notice that I would love to know whatever you notice about this post.
Please take notice of my gratitude to all who helped me create today’s post and to you — of course! — for taking notice of my blog today.
No matter what your age, chances are you have some thoughts and feelings about age.
Adults of all ages have been attending my therapy groups for a dog’s age. Yesterday, I asked people of different ages to write, draw, or otherwise express themselves about age.
I, age 63, wrote this poem about age:
What are your thoughts and feelings about age?
When my age was a day younger, I took other photos. Do any of them relate to age?
As I was thinking about age yesterday, I heard two ageless songs about age — “I am a Child” and “Old Man” — from Neil Young (who I’ve been listening to between the ages of 15 and 63).
What song would you choose about age?
For more than a hamster’s age, I’ve been expressing ageless gratitude to people of all ages (including you!) who help me create this daily blog.
Soon after I published this post, I saw this age-related poll about the British vote to leave the European Union.
I’m mindful that I’ve asked that mindful question, many times before, to people whose minds are full of pain AND hope.
I’m mindful that “mindful” was the first thing I was mindful enough to capture on my iPhone yesterday.
The world was filled with many other mindful things yesterday, when I was mindful enough to notice them.
Which of these mindful photos fill your mind, and why?
Here’s what I’m mindful of, right now:
Yesterday was the home opening game for our beloved Boston Red Sox.
As I walked through the crowd directly after the Red Sox game was over — mindful of how people looked, sounded, and acted — I tried to guess whether the Sox had won.
Yesterday, several of my therapy patients talked about the gifts of the here and now. Here and now, I’ll tell you some things they said:
Being in the here and now — letting go of worry about the future and regrets about the past — increases confidence and inner peace.
Focusing on the here and now should be called “anti-therapy,” because conventional therapy focuses on the past.
Staying in the here and now is difficult, because human minds naturally drift to the there and then.
Are you with me, here and now?
Here and now are forty-one photographic gifts from yesterday, when I was there and then during a gorgeous, unseasonably warm March 9 around Boston, Massachusetts, USA:
Through the gifts of blogging, I can tell you that this house in Lexington, Massachusetts …
… is where my ex-husband and I got married in 1988, which resulted in the here-and-now gift of my eighteen year-old son.
Here and now, can you see how this photo
… offers the gift of a musical choice, honoring the Beatles and George Martin (who passed away two days ago)?
Here and now, I would appreciate the gifts of any comment from you.
Here-and-now thanks to those who heal in therapy, to Lexington Massachusetts, to the Beatles, to George Martin, and to you — of course! — for being here, now.
Now that you’ve read the dread title of this post, do you dread reading it?
Do you dread posts that link to previous posts that might be dreadfully relevant? (e.g., here, here, here, here, and here)
I dread:
hurting other people’s feelings,
rejection,
making a fool of myself,
mistakes,
death,
taxes,
losing things,
harsh judgments,
miscommunication,
isolation,
illness,
violence, and
forgetting to express what’s important, including something a patient brought into therapy yesterday:
Isn’t that dreadfully clever? It’s so great, I dread comparing that to any other definition of dread, like this one:
dread
dred
verb
anticipate with great apprehension or fear.
“Jane was dreading the party”
synonyms: fear, be afraid of, worry about, be anxious about, have forebodings about
noun
great fear or apprehension.
“the thought of returning to New Jersey filled her with dread”
synonyms: fear, apprehension, trepidation, anxiety, worry, concern, foreboding, disquiet, unease, angst
informal
a person with dreadlocks.
adjective
greatly feared; dreadful.
“he was stricken with the dread disease and died”
synonyms: awful, frightful, terrible, horrible, dreadful
Obviously, the person who wrote that online definition dreads the state of New Jersey.
Do you dread seeing any of my other photos from yesterday?
Because I dread posting photos that are too confusing, I’ll explain that last one: Yesterday I facilitated a therapy group where we focused on the topic of “sensitivity” and I drew that personal sensitivity scale (with my dreadful handwriting).
Here and now, I do NOT dread:
any thoughts, feelings, or other reactions you might share, below, about this post,
I hope you have room for some roomy associations with “room” today.
I’m leaving room to tell you that I’ve written three previous posts about “room” — here,here, and here. Perhaps you’ll have room in your day to read them.
Yesterday, in two separate rooms at work, there was room for me to facilitate group therapy. In every therapy group, no matter what room it’s in, I always make room for a mindfulness exercise. In the first group, people asked to focus on something they noticed in that room:
After the mindfulness exercise, we had room to talk about the idiom “Elephant in the Room.”
an English metaphorical idiom for an obvious truth that is either being ignored or going unaddressed. The idiomatic expression also applies to an obvious problem or risk no one wants to discuss.
Later, we made room to express roomy thoughts, feelings, or images about this roomy topic:
I had room, in that group room, to write and share that one of my core values is making room for myself and others to grow and learn.
Before I ended the group in that room, I asked if there were any elephants in the room. I hope people felt room to be honest when they all said there were no elephants in the room, besides the little origami one.
Later, in another group room, I asked people to mindfully look up and focus on the ceiling in that room. I had room to share that, when I was a kid, I would look up at ceilings and imagine that the ceiling was the floor, leaving me room to visualize walking on it. There was also room for me to mention a movie where Fred Astaire dances on the floor, the walls, and the ceiling, in a room that revolves:
I had room in my head for that wonderful dancing memory in that room, last night, because I knew that tonight I’d be going to see “So You Think You Can Dance” in a great room in downtown Boston.
I assume I’ll have room in tomorrow’s post to write about that.
I shall now make room for other photos I had room to store on my iPhone, yesterday:
Speaking of storage room, I’ve been getting a message that my laptop hard drive is running out of room.
Everywhere in my life, I’m making room for the philosophy in this book about decluttering rooms:
Make room for the important things in your life by throwing away everything you do not love.
I hope you know there’s room for any thoughts or feelings you have about this roomy post, below.
There’s always room for gratitude, so thanks to therapy groups, people who leave room for dancing, Fred Astaire, Marie Kondo, the driver who left room for that “I love science” bumper sticker, everybody who had room for Mama’s vegetable soup at work, those who celebrate Diwali, elephants everywhere, and you — of course! — for making room, here and now.
