Happiness is Simply Loving Your Life And Those Who Matter Most

There is much to be said for the simple life. You get to see, understand and truly honor what is most important to you.

Most people say they want to be rich. If you stop and talk with someone who is rich, leading the rich and famous life style o those who flaunt their riches (Most millionaires do not live in palatial homes in the lap of luxury!) many will tell you that more money brings more responsibilities, more worries and, in general, more woes!

Interesting, yes?

If you increase your worriers do you feel better or worse? Most people would agree they enjoy life less if they worry more. Hmm.

What, then, makes people happy if it is not about having lots of money?

I ask you, what makes your life worth living? How do you define happiness and success in life? In other words, what would it take for you to feel wealthy if more money is not the end goal?

Many people look at what they do not have in life. They want the material things their neighbors seem to enjoy. They want the fancy homes, the smart phones and cool games. Most people want more, more and more things.

I grew up in a simpler time. When I was a little kid my family gathered around the piano and sang songs together. We played board games inside and croquet, badminton and baseball-like games outdoors.

Televisions were pretty new. Ours was an enormous box with a tiny tube and you only got about three stations. Needless to say the broadcast was in black and white. We didn’t spend lots of time watching the television. When we did we watched Lawrence Welk and sing Along Wtih Mitch.

We could have chosen to spend family time watching others enjoy their lives (the actors on television living their dreams). But, happily for me, we didn’t. I grew up constantly being around music. My mom sang all the time. She sang like an angel. And my brother would have friends over to dance Rock ‘n’ Roll. The Texaco Opera(Texaco sponsored broadcasts from the New York Metropolitan Opera House.) played Saturday afternoons on the radio.

My family chose to enjoy each other’s company and being a family – when I was very  young and all was well.

I am so grateful for that background. I raised my own kids that way – surrounded by music and art, sports and doing and being together. I feel so blessed and  also grateful that I made the choice to run our household that way.

Polarities and The Law of Polarity

Polarities allows us to experience life and give meaning to what we sense. The Universal Law of Polarity reminds us that everything in life is at once good and bad and we get choose how we view it.
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Happiness and Peace Comes From Wondering and Exploring

What do you do to increase happiness in your life? What do you wonder about and explore?

I live in such a neat place, here in Southwest Idaho. I never lived in the high desert before. I heard the only tress here were brought in. Interesting that Boise is called the City of Trees.

Of course a massive (and beautiful – looks like streams and rivers) irrigation system brings this farmland to life. When you fly into Boise you see nothing but brown mountains for miles and miles.

Suddenly you see a large dam (or two) about the time the green area appears. All very fascinating!

I see the sage-covered hills that were probably sand dunes at some point in the past. OR were they beachfront area to some enormous lake.

When I walk down the street I see (are you ready for this – remember this is high desert) many sea shell remnants. All the rocks are very smooth as if they had been weathered or worn down by years of flowing water.

I see coral in my yard and rocks I never saw any place back East. There is a lot of volcanic rock here.  I have not yet figured out which mountains may have been  (or are) volcanoes.

My front yard boasts a multi-trunked birch tree. It so beautifully sets off the red-leafed Cherry plum tree beside it.

Nature painted an exquisite canvas here in m neighborhood. How lucky am I to witness and revel in its beauty?

This is most a remarkable area. I know there is a major energy vortex here. I see the energy lines when I drive home at night. Still have not figured out the exact spot but I know I have never experienced such issues with electronics of all sorts any place I lived before moving here!

There are many caves out here. In fact the next street over (on the other side of the huge hill) is named Kuna Cave road. My friends tell me there are petroglyphs in those caves and also on the mountain trails down the road at the dam where the Snake River cuts through the rock. Powerfully exquisite Birds of Prey dwell in that area.

Yes, Idaho is a fascinating place to explore.

All my life I collected rocks. I used to make jewelry and sculptures from semi-precious gems and crystals. Much to my delight I discovered that Idaho is known as the Gem state. There are guides of where to find which stones. I never even heard of many of the gems that naturally formed here – and lie on the ground. You just have to know what you are looking at since they look like rocks until you cut and polish them.

I could write a whole travel guide for the very many natural attractions in this state – except I don’t need to. Someone made a great documentary that I borrowed from the library. That is how I learned about some of the unusual natural sites and formations – there for the viewing.

Can you tell I derive peace and pleasure being in Nature – and excitement from exploring? Those activities contribute to my happiness and peace.

Health And Happiness Live In Your Mind-Body Connection

To really know health and happiness honor and feed your mind-body connection.

I love sharing what I know really well – all about heath and happiness. I feel lucky to really understand our energy body and how the physical body works.

As health fanatic for more than 35 years and a healthcare practitioner, I have a unique perspective on well being. And I have a deep understanding of the power of the mind to create our state of health.

Many years ago when the concept of blood types became popular I explored that field. Interestingly I found my blood type diet matched my Ayurvedic type diet so I found myself convinced of the validity of both.

Following that life style meant I maintained optimal health by eating meat and cooked, never raw, foods. Can’t say I was pleased with that option as I never liked to think that some animal gave its life so I could eat. (I think I supported the ketchup industry as a kid when I smothered all meat to disguise what I was eating.) And fresh salad was probably my favorite food to eat!

Hmm. So what did I do?

I observed how much better I felt when following those dietary guidelines so, except for the meat, I ate more warmed foods than salads and noticed I did actually feel better. I also found it easy to maintain my weight eating that way.

Until…

A serious injury, a brain injury that impacted every system in my body, pretty much caused my health to sharply decline on the vegetarian diet I enjoyed for fifteen years. When a holistic doctor told me to eat animal protein I realized I had to figure out how to handle such a big change in my eating habits.

I am not going to tell you I enjoyed eating animals. It took years of making gravies and sauces and doing my best to hide what I was eating – from myself. Thing is, I also noticed my health coming back as I ate according to my blood type and Ayurvedic type.

Fast forward fourteen years to the present. I changed my eating habits when I left the East Coast and came out to Idaho I discovered all the organic foods I was accustomed to eating were harder to find out here.

I started eating things I would never even have considered putting in my mouth for more than twenty years! Before too long my health declined. It took years to figure out my new way of not eating so healthy left me with parasites AND to eliminate those creepy crawlies the recommended diet (are you ready for this one?) was raw vegan foods!

Yikes! Totally against what I had grown to believe was my optimal diet.

What to do?

I felt so crummy I decided to jump in and do the raw vegan, organic foods only diet. Almost instantly my health started to improve.

I was stunned. My head was reeling. How could I feel good eating raw foods and only raw vegan foods?

Simple answer? I told my body I had to make this work so I could heal. And my mind led my body to heal.

Happiness is Watching Life Happen – Sometimes (Mostly You Want to Make Life Happen)

You can feel happy by observing the simple things in life. Instead of doing, doing doing, sometime just sit back and watch the wonders of life.

I live out in farm country in Southwest Idaho. When I moved here (this will sound silly) it didn’t really hit me how far north my new home is – until…

As we approach the longest day of the year, the sun does not even set until close to 10:30 PM. We get only about 4-5 hours of darkness as it rises between 5 and 6 AM.

I like the light. The only drawback is remembering to watch the time so I go to sleep! If I forget to keep an eye on the clock I easily stay up writing or reading until 2 AM. That works for me because I can sleep late if I want to.

In fact, since I moved out here I became a night person again. I was a night person most of my life. Hmm. I had not realized how much my life changed with a brain injury back in 1996. I became a morning person back then.

Why do I like the long hours of light? I like to watch what goes on in my world. Frankly not a whole lot happens out here – just enough to interest me and keep my life-long thirst for knowledge alive.

Like right now, it is after 9 PM and the farmer just started spraying or feeding his crop of sugar beets. I think when he runs the tractor he feeds because other times a crop duster flies overhead.

Seems late to start be working but then I have no idea about how to grow crops on a large scale. I just enjoy watching how farmers produce crops.

And my watching paid off because as the sky darkened with a thunder storm (well, at least the thunder part not sure if it will rain or not) the farmer came down the road traveling at a good clip, all his bright lights illuminating his way. I never saw the lights on the tractor before. I guess I never saw him work at night!

Another intriguing activity for me is watching my sprinkler system water the lawn. Now you may think this is weird. Okay. I never had a sprinkler system before. Out here, because we live in a high desert, unbelievably dry desert) everyone has built-in sprinkler systems.

I just turned mine on so I am running the cycle to track what waters where in my yard. This is fun for me.  I guess it is easy to entertain me because every little thing fascinates me!

Egad. I just noticed the smog enveloping Boise. I am every so grateful I moved out of Boise. I definitely do not like to see the air I breathe. That was a big reason for my leaving the East Coast. Dang! My gorgeous mountain views have been temporarily reduced to faint outlines!

How blessed am I to be me living here at this time?