Happy Birthday to You....

A Measurement is Born…By @nit@
First and most important of all allow me to say Happy Birthday to my new measurement. I’ve been thinking about this for a quite a while, and I finally figured out why my new measurement could change the way people view their lives. So this is a celebration, I think any birth is worth celebrating!

I’m sure most of us realize there is a measurement for EVERYTHING… the only thing I can’t figure out why we don’t have any measurement for, or at least none that I have come across in my 56 years on this Earth, is a measurement for 'ABUNDANCE'….. I don’t believe there is such a thing, so I want to give Birth to a 'MEASUREMENT FOR ABUNDANCE' sort of like a standard where we can base ourselves when we want to see how we are supposed to be feeling, and whether we think our lives are happy, harmonious and content for the most part. I don’t mean to say that we shouldn’t have challenges, how would we know otherwise what it feels like to win, to feel euphoric, content, happy, excited, etc. if not by having experienced the total opposite.

I ask you how much Abundance are we supposed to have? Is there such a thing as too much Abundance? I don’t know, you tell me. All I see is that there is such an ENORMOUS gap between total poverty/helplessness, and some people who seem to have everything they are told they should have to deem themselves successful in life; the relationships, the money, the health, their physical appearance, their successful careers, and they wind up trying or succeeding at messing up their lives and even some at committing suicide. And yes of course there are many shades of gray in between. What I believe is that if we don’t create a lower expectation of what abundance should be, there will come a time where we will never be able to reach total harmony. The standards seem to keep on getting higher and higher.

I’ve been reading a lot about “The Law of Attraction” and I think I can finally understand why my life has been the way it has. It is exciting to know that with the right thoughts, feelings, accompanied by actions, I can accomplish anything I want out of life, and from experience I realize now that I was always in control of my destiny, but I only started realizing this about two years ago, so imagine all the mistakes I made my whole life, even as early as 2 yrs ago I was still doing most of it wrong. Now you can understand how this made me shift the responsibility of the outcome of my future entirely to me, and I take my responsibilities very seriously. So the hard part was just starting, forget about the way I was doing things and learn new tricks. No more blaming the environment, the job, the family, the friends, luck, etc. Can you imagine the wake up call I experienced?

I have gone from the worst of tragedies to the heights of success and back a few times, and when I think of those moments that stand out in my mind, where I keep my fondest memories, my best ones happen to come from the simplest of times.

We can have a surplus of Abundance, and that could be much better than just the standard, but we have to be very careful that we don’t have an overflow of abundance, where we amass something to the degree that it goes to waste. Just think about it for a moment, we have say Royalty. In how many rooms in their palaces do they live? I bet you they have rooms they don’t see too often if at all. How many cars, jewels, clothes or "stuff" that we pile up do we really need? Is bigger always better? Or maybe it’s just bigger. As a child I know I liked the simplest of things, and even though I’ve developed a more sophisticated taste and more desires, I find that it is still simplicity that brings me the most warmth, joy, serenity and inner peace.

If you are born in a third world country out of poverty, chances are that your standards are set very low for you from the start, because as we all know, for some people it really does seem like an uphill battle that they will never win, so they settle for very little, and anything extra that comes their way, they appreciate it probably more than those who have everything they can possibly need from the start.

Then there are those who are born of wealth, and without too much of an effort they have over abundance and it either overflows and drowns them, or it goes to waste when others could be making great use of it, or they simply can never get enough of it, and in my opinion, in non of these cases can you experience true harmony, there is turmoil going on inside. Too much, too little, or none at all.

This is a 'HARMONIOUS' Universe, and as spiritual beings we are all connected through mind and soul, and if we set standards and we can stick as close to them as possible; although some will ALWAYS have more than others, because not everyone either understands the concept or is willing to make changes, the closer we get to the baseline, the more Harmonious this Universe will be for everyone.

This is an Abundance Universe, we can all have anything we want, but it shouldn't be what we have that determines how happy we are, or how much we enjoy our lives.

To those of us who are lucky enough to know what we want, we should always be able to make every single one of our wishes come true, and there should always be someone out there happy to help us along our quest to reach our dreams, as we should be happy to help others reach theirs.

We don’t all start out the same, some have better and easier beginnings, but if we teach and help each other, get a little bit closer to the baseline, maybe we can have more strength to bring on a lot more Harmony into this World…

I’ve gone from Pleasantville all the way to The Matrix, I have learned how to pack my backpack, although I do have a few pebbles inside my shoe. I better take them off and stick my hand inside to get all those little annoying pebbles out of my nice shoes…

Ahhh, that’s much better, now let me just wash my hands so we can hold hands and keep on walking, this promises to be a GREAT TRIP…

All aboard whose going aboard…..

I HOPE YOU ENJOY YOUR TRIP!

@nit@

An Age for Celebration

An Age for Celebration
written by my daughter at age 17
Brighton Gardens was a beautiful peach building with an enormous green landscape centered in one of the wealthiest communities of Southern California. The retirement home not only attended to Senior Citizens but to High School teens that sought volunteer hours. It wasn’t long before I joined in and added “Bingo Caller” to my resume. B32 I would call out dully, just to hear quiet murmurs and shuffles of old and discolored bingo chips. I would hear snickers from the Queen Bees, talking about how naïve Olga was to put mustard on her sandwich. Didn’t she know how bad mustard was for her cholesterol? Not only was gossiping a commonality, but complaining was quite routine as well. It was always too hot or too cold, there was just no winning with them.

First, there was Doris who’d sit at the living room’s plastic fluorescent couch everyday at the very same time. If someone had “her chair” occupied, there would be a beheading. Then there was Richard, the bachelor, who strolled around in his walker nodding to the attractive women who still had a head full of hair and a mouth full of teeth, dentures that is. Howard played checkers every Wednesday, and every Wednesday he’d forget he was to play checkers. Then there was Mae. She was the most vibrant, hilarious, and childish out of all of them. Oh, she was also the oldest, 103. I never heard a complete sentence from her without a pun to it or a chuckle that anyone who knew her could identify. It was loud and obnoxious, as was she. While I would watch the majority of the inhabitants sitting lifelessly and waiting to die, I would turn and see Mae swinging on by, cackling with her groupies. Her smile could light up any dark alley way, any night in absence of a full moon, any person in need of a bit of happiness. Here I was subjected to all these elderly people who were bitter and angry at life, and there she was making a joke about it. Along with what I used to call a burden, volunteering bestowed insight, appreciation, and clarity upon me, the clouds had finally made room for the sun. Despite the age, a certain maturity is never met and a certain immaturity is never left.

While I used to drag my feet to make it inside Brighton Gardens, I was now walking, fast that is, to get there. I’d stumble through the door first thing after school in search for Mae. I didn’t want to turn out like the rest of them, holding grudges, spewing anger, detaining regrets. I didn’t want to drag my feet anymore, anywhere. For the last 17 years I had been rushing my life; now I wanted to pull the reigns tight. I didn’t want to get old and sit in a chair and stare at the wall! I wanted to go play on the swings, scrape my knees, and get into childish trouble. I was young, I was healthy, and I hadn’t been satisfied with my being. I had been too preoccupied with the latest Hollywood trends and the gorgeous boys with the baby blues, that I hadn’t even appreciated my existence, my youth. I had always been worried about something, but I didn’t want to be worried anymore, I wanted to be Mae.

That was my turning point in life. My perspective and my attitude, changed. I discovered a difference in me, a positive one. I had a bounce to my step and an optimistic touch in my soul. I had never been so passionate about being who I was! I let go of my regrets, forgave the guilty, and just smiled. I had been at Brighton Gardens for seven months, and every hour I spent there was a blessing, for it opened my eyes to more than anyone could ever imagine. I walked in one day, with that little bounce, and searched for Mae’s presence. She wasn’t at bingo, she wasn’t in the living room or the dining hall, Mae was no where. As I learned, she passed away the night before. The receptionist told me stories about how she had difficulty breathing. While she was being reeled out with an oxygen mask attached to her face, she was laughing and hitting on the firemen, calling them “Cuties” and “Sugar Muffins.” I was told she proclaimed that if it was her time to go, at least she was going out with a set of good looking men. I will never mourn her death, but celebrate her life, as I now do with my own. Thank you, Mae! 

Religion and Politics...Oy vey!!!...

The main reason I don’t vote is because I don’t know enough about Politics, I’ve never really been interested in it, in my humble opinion it doesn’t seem to work very well. If I were the ''President of The World'' you can be sure I’d do things a lot different. And I believe that unless I take the time to learn and decide to educate myself more on the subject, it would be irresponsible of me to cast a vote.

Same thing happens to me with religion. Now that we have all the access to information that came about with the new 'Computer Era', there is so much that you would have to read to become well informed to make an educated decision on what seems to make the most sense, that the best I have found that works for me is at least exposing myself to as much knowledge about the different religions as I can, simply to be able to pick and chose the teachings that I like about each one of them, and build a religion of my own.

My experience with organized religion has been interesting. I was born a Jew with two great-grandfathers who were Rabbis and in a mostly catholic country, was raised by my very Jewish family and a nanny that was like a second mother to me, a tiny Mexican/Indian woman who was as Catholic as they come. So I went to Temple and I went to Church too. I love the traditions of my people and have always celebrated all the holidays and always will, but I never considered myself a religious person, rather a spiritual one. I find good things in most religions, and some I don’t believe in, so I don’t adopt them in my lifestyle.

I dated a guy who was a hardcore Scientologist, so I decided to expose myself to a bit of that as well. It too has some good teachings but only on the practical day to day life, some that don’t apply to the way I see life, although I failed to find the religious aspect of it, and some things were very strange, more like weird to say the least, I adopted what I liked like how to learn better when you are trying to study any subject or communicate with people, and left the rest for those who believe in it.

Now I’m exposed to the 'Laws of the Universe', and that makes the most sense to me of anyything else, because it explains my whole life. Before I was confused as to why some things had happen to me, and now I understand why. I recently started to learn Kabbalah and this 'Science' as the Kabbalists refer to it is totally new to me so I'll have to wait and see.

If you ask me, I think the “Laws of the Universe” should become a religion, that way you get more people interested in doing the right thing as a group, helping each other by re-enforcing and strengthening their beliefs. And I would definitely vote for that!

To your continuous harmony

Hugs xoxo
@nit@

Yes it’s a Daybreak!...

I was listening to Barry Manilow’s songs tonight, they help and inspire me to keep on believing because I finally came to understand that all these people who had become GREAT at something, anything, were just people who believed, and whatever it is that I still want to become and haven’t yet, is because sometimes it’s hard to believe because you have been without for a while and you forget what it feels like to have.

As Daybreak started to play, for a moment I wondered if I would remember the words, it has been a long time since I last heard that song, I found that I did remember the words, for some reason I memorize many songs and never forget them, even in languages I don’t understand, but what I also noticed was that I never paid attention to the meaning of the words, and that this is not the first time that this happens to me with a song.

I even remember as an adult singing children’s songs to my kids, and as I was listening to the words that were coming out of my mouth, to see what I was teaching them, I paid attention to the meaning perhaps for the first time. It sure came as a surprise to me to realize I have done this many times throughout my life, so now I try to listen and pay attention to the meaning intended when the artists wrote and sang the songs, and try to imagine what was behind them.

Tonight I was having a particular enlightening type of an evening, and when I feel like that, songs seem to talk to me, and Day break sure did.
And as I listen and sing and dance to this music, feeling it deep inside of me, I realize I’m already making it shine, shine, shine all around the world!
YES IT’S DAY BREAK!

Wanna come White Water River Rafting with Me?

Five years ago I couldn’t figure out if my life was about to end, or about to begin. I had so little energy left to deal with the many obstacles and challenges I had ahead of me that I couldn’t seem to make sense out of the madness. But since I was still breathing, and somewhat excited with the thought that maybe, just maybe, I could still fulfill my last dreams, I decided I had to do something about the way I was looking at my life, and try to turn it into a game, an adventure.

At first I picked the game that matched the feelings I had inside, so I could make the game believable for me, and since I feel like I am living in a “Science Fiction World,” in my game I saw myself having all these extra-terrestrials sending me tasks to do with a lot of challenges, and if I didn’t accomplish the task right, or even if they were just in a playful mood, they’d throw meteors that I was supposed to dodge. In the meantime, I’m here on Earth, on the California freeways, trying to make sure the cars that drive by at 80+ mph don’t hit me, while I run across back and forth avoiding the darn meteors.

I don’t know, maybe it’s all those realistic looking video games that my son has been playing for years, but that’s the way I felt about my life at the time.

So as you can imagine, even though I was managing to move forward in spite of the chaos, I wasn’t doing it without lots of scratches and bumps, not to mention the many negative emotions like fear, disappointment, anger, stress, amongst others. So after all the mistakes I was still making, I decided I needed to change the game I was playing. It still had to be credible to me or it would feel like a lie, but it also needed to feel exhilarating and adventuresome, so that the otherwise negative emotions could become positive to help me move forward faster.

Now I’m becoming much more familiar with White Water River Rafting. I’m still not fully on the driver’s seat, but I help steer with one hand, while grabbing on with the other, and it’s definitely getting to be a lot more fun.

Once we can realize that no matter how many challenges come our way, we can only take care of one thing at a time, that if we stress it makes things even harder, and that if we trust that we are still going to stay afloat, that even if sometimes it feels that the raft might tilt, we can still get back on it, then we can see that anytime now, maybe even on the very next turn, there is a serene lake where we can just float for a while, maybe do some fishing, enjoy the sun, the peaceful setting, the scents and the sounds, until we decide what game we’d like to play next.

 'Life is an Adventure' make yours a fun one!

Hugs xoxo
@nit@

Because We're Keeping the Dream Alive...

When my kids started attending school I began to pay more attention to the way people act and interact, I guess I was reliving my childhood through my children's eyes, while using the wisdom of my years.

I used to volunteer endless hours at their school and after school activities, and noticed how other parents did it. After all children don’t come with instructions and I certainly didn’t know if I was doing it right or wrong. I wanted to be a “perfect” mom, and not do what my parents did, “the best they knew how”. I decided to set my standards high and wanted to learn as much as I could in order to make as few mistakes as possible.

Some of the mothers were right there with me, every day, as volunteers in the classroom and field trips, as well as the multitude of after school activities. There were so many to chose from that I'd go crazy trying to decide which one was best for my kids, so many classes that no matter how many hours they could add to the day there were never enough to do it all, learn it all and be it all, but there we were, trying hard and doing our best.

There were the working mothers and the playing mothers. Those that would meet for coffee at Starbucks and a game of tennis, shopping, a day at the spa, a few trips around the world, some craft making class and wine tasting on Friday night, while the kids stayed with the nannies; or those who couldn’t afford to give their time to the kids because they needed her salary to buy books and shoes. Some I interacted with for years and some I never even met.

Then all of a sudden my kids grew up, and the friendship we had developed over the years started to blossom, but I realized I had put my life on hold this whole time, and although I loved what I did, I needed to find out who I was now.

I knew then I needed to go back to my own childhood and try to remember some of the things I had experienced or maybe even those I left unfinished. I have 'some' very vivid memories of my childhood, but I could hardly remember most of my formative years, I had moved away in my early 20s, so I decided to go in search of my past and started with my long lost family and childhood friends.

I spent many hours doing this, but I had the internet, and never doubted something good would come of this new 'Science Fiction World.' I started by placing a call into my highschool and asked for the principal at the time, to see if he had any information, and found out curiously enough that he was one of my old classmates cousin, so he got me her e-mail address and she gave me someone else's, and in a fairly short period of time, 4 or 5 months, which is nothing compared to the 35 yrs. I had not been in contact with most of them; I had collected about 80+ e-mail addresses. Then I looked for a venue where we could all meet again one more time and catch up with our lives.

I did remember that we were never really a close generation, nor a large one, unlike my kids who just graduated from a generation of almost 1,000, we must have been about 90 give or take. But I did know one thing, that no matter how close we all were, we did have wonderful experiences together for many years, and at one point in our lives, in some of the most impacting formative years, we were spending a big portion of our days witnessing and being a part of each others lives.

And just like the mothers from my kids’ school, there were those who wanted to get involved in making this happen, some that had major careers and trips and busy lives, some who lived very far away, those with not much interest in delving into their past, and some who had challenges and just couldn’t participate.

5 years ago I stood in front of about 70 of my childhood friends. They could have brought Ricky Martin to that party and we would have still continued to talk to each other for hours without paying attention to our surroundings. We had history together and we all seemed anxious to share on the history of the lives we had lived for the past 35 yrs.

We are a very special generation, a lot of stories have come out of our lives, some challenging, some successful, some failures, and we’ve even experienced the loss of a few of our dear friends.

Not long ago I stood again in front of many of them, we put our arms around each other just like we did when we were kids and we will continue to do each time we see each other, with the appreciation of a friendship that lasts a lifetime. A special part of our history. Only this time I know who I am…