Stop Waiting

"Stop waiting for Friday, for summer, for someone to fall in love with you. Happiness is achieved when you stop waiting for it and make the most of the moment you are in now."

How many times a week do we say, I just wish it was Friday? For teachers, I know we say multiple times a year or even a week, when is it going to be summer? I have heard so many times, I will do that when I make more money, or I'll get a divorce when my kids are grown. What are you doing now, in this moment, on this Tuesday? Why can't it be right now?

Friday
Summer
Money
Grown Kids

We live in the future. We think when all these things happen, life will be happier and we'll be more at peace. There have been so many times in my life when I was hoping and praying for something I really wanted.  I would waste so much energy on the "want." I'd think about it all day, lay awake at night thinking about it, but when I finally got whatever it was that I was wanting, it just seemed really  blah. I had spent so much time dreaming about it and thinking about it, that in my mind, I hyped it up to be so much more than it really was. The worst part, was for all those weeks, sometimes, months of wanting, I was missing out on everything that was happening each day. I wasn't focused on anything I was doing in the moment. I couldn't look back at the week and even remember what happened, where I went, or who I saw. I find that to be incredibly sad. There are times when I realize that my day is over and I have no idea what I accomplished or even if it was a happy day, because I get caught up in my own thoughts, what I want to happen in the future, or even the drama of other's lives.
Basically all the things, that in the grand scheme of life, DO NOT MATTER.

My favorite commercial right now is the new State Farm commercial about all the "NEVER's" in your life. We spend so much time saying, I am never going to get married, but then we find the love of our life and we can't imagine doing anything else. We are never going to have a child because kids are challenging, but then we realize that we have so much love to give, how can we not have a child.  I could go on and on about all the NEVER's I have said in my life, but at some point, ended up doing. The best part about the NEVER's, is that they end up being the BEST blessings.

 State Farm "Never's" commercial:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1Z91YkPatw

Maybe instead of focusing on the NEVER's, we start living each moment, each day and enjoying the way life flows. We cannot plan out our lives. We have to LIVE our lives. We have to let life flow and ride the wave. Not only ride the wave, but ENJOY it. Nothing ever turns out like we plan, so why do we focus so much on that part and skip the most important part, which are the everyday moments.

Those everyday moments are where all parts of life exist...

Finding true happiness.

Learning the depths of your soul.

Laughing till your face hurts, and accidentally peeing when you don't mean to.

Taking risks.

Being unconditional love.

Your life matters, right now, this moment. The time is NOW to do whatever you want to do. It's your moment to love, make mistakes, laugh, run wild, to realize anything is possible. It's your moment. Don't wait for Friday, or summer, or when you feel like things will be easier. Those times may never come...then what? What will your excuse be then?

Stress

“Stress is wanting something to be the way it isn’t.”

Wow.

Take a minute.

Reread that quote.

Wow.

When I saw this quote recently, I instantly knew the power in those words. I can totally feel myself becoming “stressed” immediately because of how real that statement feels to me. I know that I live my life this way daily. I always want things to be different than they are, and when they aren’t, I completely become stressed.

Ouch.

Busted, however the good news is, completely my fault and in my control.

For example, looking at my week this week, I am overwhelmed and stressed just by all the events written on my calendar. As I take each event written there, in my handwriting, my own doing, I realize that 85% of those events, I don’t want to do.  I don’t want to attend that event, go have that dinner, coach that game, yet, I have committed….Why? More importantly, just because I committed and I could easily change my mind on some of them, I don’t.

 Why?

Well….

 I stress that I will disappoint people if I don’t show up.

 I stress that I am lazy if I am sitting home watch a movie instead of doing something active.

I stress that I am not “living” if I don’t travel a certain amount of a weekends, hang out with my friends every Saturday night or go on enough exotic vacations.

I stress that my life has changed and I have grown and I really don’t want to do the things I used to want to do, but feel like I have to.

I could go on and on. However, the biggest lesson here is that every one of these statements is all stresses. Not one of them deals with what I really want to do in that moment. They don’t talk about my happiness, they address my stress. Man, when looking at it that way, it kind of freaks me out that I am so worried about what others will think,  how negative I talk about myself and what emotions  I really bring to that outing when I am only going because I feel stressed into going.

What if I could live in the moment…every moment and not worry about what has not happened yet? What would the world be like if we were all living right then and there, if we weren’t in our thoughts, in our stresses, but right there in the moment, experiencing life as it is? Incredible is what comes to mind. Love and passion would grow immensely. Through love, the world could eliminate hate. We could love ourselves exactly as we are. We could love each other as equals.  

When thinking about life in that way, I am no longer stressed,

I am excited.

I am inspired.

I am ready to make a change.

We have a choice to clear away some of that calendar.

We have a choice to start doing the things we “want” to do without any lingering stressful thoughts of why we shouldn’t be doing them.

We have a choice to put ourselves and own well-being first before anything or anyone else.

We have a choice to control our thoughts and what effects our emotions.

We have a choice to stay in the moment and not get caught up in the “what might happen” scenario.

We have a choice to ask ourselves if this stress will matter in an hour, a month or year from now. When we decide it doesn’t matter, we have a choice to let go.

We have a choice to live in the moment.

What will you choose?

Please Excuse Me Your LIfe is Waiting

A friend called the other day and asked if I had any self-help books she could read. Of course, I have self-help books, I am the guru of self-help books and I told her to come on over. As I was pulling books off my shelf for her and looking through my stuff, I kept coming back to a book that I have read before many years ago. This particular book was given to me by someone I have never met, but only talked with on the phone. Mary told me over the phone that this book would change my life and that it’s important I read it. As with everything, we are very good at taking what we are reading, or experiencing during phases of our lives and applying it. Then life happens, we get too busy and what is the first thing to be put on the back burner, ourselves. Why is that?

Since the last time I read the book, I have been living a very fast paced life full of many ups and few downs.  I personally don’t feel that my downs are very low, but low enough that I just kind live in a flat lined space, nothing really exciting, but nothing really horrible. I go through my weeks of eating better, doing more Yoga than normal, trying to meditate, basically trying to make my life less stressful, but that only lasts a short while, till I am busy again. As do most of us, when I am busy, the last thing I pay attention to is to myself. I am more worried about what I am doing or where I have to be, than taking care of me.  I don’t stop to really listen to what my soul needs, or how my body feels, or what would nourish my life at the moment. Can you imagine what our lives would be like if we just took the time every day to ask ourselves what we need today? Not only ask, but then listen. The possibilities of self-love, joy, happiness and abundance are endless.

Usually when we are so busy and running ragged, so is our negativity about life, things and our bodies. We are constantly in a state of crazy, that our mind streams thoughts that tell us we hate this, or that person annoyed us, or I shouldn’t drink that pop because I’ll gain weight. Our mind doesn’t normally say positive, uplifting comments when we are unaware of our thoughts. When living in that state of negativity we are constantly sending out energy vibes that are negative. We are sending out thoughts that cause our lives to be flat, or unfulfilling, therefore, our life reflects our thoughts.  I do know that life is not meant to be lived that way. We are not meant to live a life of negativity and crap.

How do we change our thoughts, all the things we dread doing every day or finding that love you’ve been looking for? I asked myself that same question just after I was trying to help my friend find her answer in my self-help books. I have been living in a state of negativity since August. Every morning I wake up and I dread going to work. I feel very powerless there and I feel like I do not make a difference. I love the people I work with, which are what keeps me going in everyday, but as a whole, I dread my job. I would come in, dragging my feet, almost kicking and screaming, which then pours out onto my desk and into my classroom. I get all emotional when one thing goes wrong and I am all in all just very grouchy. I can never solve a problem because all I do is bitch about what’s wrong and not look at what I can do to make it better. This has been my life for about 7 months, day in and day out. My life around my job is good, I am in a happy place, but obviously, my negative energy I am casting into the world is collecting and causing nothing in my life to get any better. It’s almost like I have become stuck in a very thick muddy field, the kind of field that you know if you try to move, your shoe will come off. That’s where I have been for way too long.

The answer to my question just happened to fall off the shelf that day when I was looking for books. Maybe it was Mary telling me from afar, to pick up the book again, because yes, it will change your life. I gave my friend a copy and I took my copy and began reading that night. I read the book in 2 days and as I read, I could feel the mud around my shoes starting to dry, very slowly, but all the same, it is drying.

It has been about 2 weeks now since I started reading and taking very big steps of changing my life.

I have started paying attention to all my negative thoughts….yes, there are so many of those in my day, especially at work. Not only am I negative at work, but then because I am in such a yucky place, I am very negative to myself. I constantly tell myself I need to lose weight, or my hair looks bad, or I should be working out more (even though I work out 6 days now), or that I am not being kind enough, etc. All of those thoughts, just seem to accumulate and attract so much more of what I don’t want, therefore, getting the same muddy field. So I have this little game I play and visualize. When I have a negative thought about anything, big or small, I picture myself flipping a switch from my negative thoughts to something positive about me or my life. Just the thought of that has been huge for me. It immediately takes me away from the crappy, negative thought, to something positive. It’s amazing how much that changes your energy in an instant. That’s a simple thing I can do anywhere anytime.

Now something else I am doing that is a bit more work. Every time I get a chance, most of the time when I am driving or before I go to bed seems to be the best times for me. I visualize myself where I want to be. For example, I visualize Melissa and me in St. Lucia on a beach. I can see the ocean, I can feel the sun, and I can taste the Corona. I am not worried at all how I got there, where the money came from or when we are going. That part doesn’t matter. What matters is that when I visualize us in St. Lucia, I can FEEL us there. I get this feeling in my gut that reminds me of a buzzing or a whoosh in my heart, sort of like when you feel nervous for something. That’s the feeling. I just focus on that feeling and try to magnetize it as powerful as I can. That’s the good energy flowing, which is also causing my muddy field to start drying up. Now, you can visualize anything you want and you can start small, like a good parking spot at the busy mall, or you can go for the gusto and visualize something you have always wanted. Now the tricky part is that you can’t have any negativity or don’t wants, they have to be all wants and no questions on how it’s going to happen. That is not your job.  Your job is vibrating all sorts of good energy. We want to get our muddy fields to dry up, we want our good energy to be vibrating heavily and collecting other good things.

Think of your energy like a faucet. Most of us going around with our faucet closed most of the time. If we are closed, how can we be happy and alive? We need to figure out a way to open that faucet and let the happiness and good energy flow. Flipping the switch when negative thoughts come into our minds or just visualizing what we want. It sounds simple and in theory it is, but in practice it is very difficult. We are so used to negativity and living in flat lined state, that we have fear on changing that energy. Our ego’s don’t want to change, they like being in control. 

In the last few weeks of these two life changing practices, have opened my faucet even just a little (I have a long way to go), but during this time, I feel better.  My behavior students at school who I dreaded seeing every day, have been great this week. I haven’t had any issues with them at all. I feel like I have taught some good lessons to the kids, I am calmer in my speech and I honestly just don’t feel as grouchy. I haven’t been hard on myself when I took a few days off from working out. I can feel my shoes loosening in that mud, I can see the sun coming up on the horizon, and I can feel the joy flowing from my heart.  I know that I can have everything I want and I can have it now, I just need to enjoy my life to the fullest, with all the happiness the world has to offer. NO more doubt, negativity, lack of love. I am living with my faucet open and vibrating the most positive energy I can FEEL. Thank you Mary, thank you to my friend who wanted self-help books and thank you to the book, “Please Excuse Me Your Life is Waiting.” Yes, my life has been waiting and now, with my faucet open, I am ready to leave this muddy field and take a walk on the beaches of St. Lucia. 

LOVE

There was a time in my life when I hated Valentine's Day. I was one of those girls that made comments that it was just a Hallmark holiday. I thought the day about your special partner was so stupid, (probably because I didn't have a honey) that my best friend and I created our own day in February to celebrate ourselves and our friendship. We didn't need a day of Love; we had our own day now! Fifteen years later, we still celebrate February 11th as Bender/Alicia Day :) As time has gone on, I have realized that creating Bender/Alicia day was just a different name for Valentine's Day.

It was designed in a boycott fashion, but in reality, we created the day from friendship, kindness and love. Isn't that really what Valentine's Day is about? Valentine's Day doesn't have to be a romantic kind of day, but if it is full of romance, that's spectacular too. On February 14th, we can celebrate ourselves, our families, our friends, and a stranger, the love of our life or the love in the meantime. The day is just about love. 

Regardless if you find the holiday wonderful, exciting, annoying, sad or a money maker, try to stop this year and find simple ways to add love into your life. Here are a few suggestions:

1. SELF LOVE. Do something nice for yourself today. Maybe you love a certain kind of wine that you normally don't pay for, go buy it. Do something you enjoy, but don't take the time do often. Relax. Watch a movie that you would enjoy. Go somewhere. 

2. REACH OUT AND TOUCH SOMEONE. Give a gift to your parents and tell them how much you love them. Reach out to someone you haven't spoken to in a while and say hello. 

3. LOVE BOMBS. Pay for the car behind you in the drive- thru line. Buy flowers for someone that helps you. Make cards for your coworkers, letting them know you appreciate them. 

4. MAKE LOVE COMMITTMENT. Commit to saying positive things every day to yourself. Stop with the negative talk. We are beautiful human beings and we should be celebrated for who we are right now.

5. CELEBRATE LIFE. Go out with friends and celebrate being alive, celebrate being loved, celebrate being healthy. 

6. SEND LOVE TO EVERYONE!

Open up your hearts this Valentine's Day and just celebrate the most important emotion. LOVE. 

See You Again

Has someone ever said something to you, words they whole heartedly believed, but you knew in your gut were so very wrong? 

That happened to me. Those words have stuck with me. Even after an extended amount of time and countless hours of contemplating her view, I still know from somewhere deep within, those words were very wrong. 

A friend of mine had someone very close to them die. We were talking about how she was feeling and what I could do to help. She was very upset and expressed that the hardest part for her was that she knew she would never see that person again. At first, I thought she meant that it was hard because they were gone and physically she won't see them, of course being a difficult realization. Then the lightning bolt struck me with such sheer force. She explained because the person who died didn't believe in God, they will never have the opportunity to enter the heaven she believes in and therefore, she will never see them again. 

Man, it was like an arrow to my soul. I felt so strongly against those words, it felt like God was kicking me, screaming at me to express what I felt. Instantly I thought about this person who died. I have heard many different stories over the years about how wonderful of a person they were, loving, caring, helpful, forgiving, a gentle soul. All of those genuine qualities that my friend has lovingly expressed, but yet, when it comes to the day they die, all of that is erased? None of that matters because they were taught or not taught about religion a certain way? They don't go to heaven? 

That doesn't sound like the God I believe in. 

No, the God I believe in...LOVES EVERYONE. 

Loves YOU...

It DOESN'T MATTER what you've done in this lifetime-Bad or Good, 

Who you love, 

What you own, 

What religion or lack of religion you believe in, 

What beliefs you have, 

How many people you've hurt,

How many you love.

The God I believe in just LOVES. 

I don't want this to be about religion or what we all believe religiously. I just felt compelled to say that I don't believe in a God that just ends your life and that's that. I believe in a God that loves and I believe that no matter who you are and what life you have lived, I will See You Again, in some form, in some dimension of time. 

I do hope the next time I see you again, I am a very cool rock star  : )

Italian Traditions

Italian Traditions

Traditions are very unique to each family and individual, especially at Christmas. One of my favorite traditions we have in our family is a trip to DeVitis Italian Store. From as far back as I can remember, all the female aunts and cousins would get together on a morning before Christmas and my Nonna Antonucci would take us to DeVitis. The store is always crowded with many loud, Italians who are standing around talking with their hands. Most of the people in there knew each other, or at the very least, knew someone's uncle. There would always be that time we'd be standing around, constantly moving our cart to let people through, while Nonna talked to someone she's known forever. After the chatting, we'd make our way to the meat counter, where you would take a number. Of course, that number always seemed so far away from the current number they were shouting. 

Once we got to the counter, Nonna always ordered the same thing. Pounds and pounds of Prosciutto, Hard Salami, Provolone Cheese, Antipasto Salad, Olive Salad (with extra juice), Bocconcino Salad (fresh mozzarella balls and tomatoes), and always for me, my favorite, the Cheese Salad. Once we ordered from the counter, we made our way to the bread aisle, where yes, we had to stand there till they brought out the freshest bread and it could not have seeds. As the man is trying to stock the shelves, we are grabbing loaf after loaf from his hands. With our cart full, we would make our way to the checkout. The checkout is very small, always with brown paper bags and Nonna would always grab some sweet goodie on the way out. 

Once we had all the goodies, we'd go to someone's house and eat. It was usually my Aunt Cristine’s house and everyone just seemed to all show up at the same time, as if they could smell DeVitis wherever they were and knew we were back. Once we were all there, we'd unpack the fresh Prosciutto which is always wrapped in a white butcher’s paper. The bread would be cut, the salads put out on the counter and conversation in full bloom about who they saw, what they were doing now, how they grew up to look like so and so. For hours we'd sit around, eat and talk.

My other favorite tradition is the annual New Year’s Day Wedding Soup. Again, very similar to the DeVitis trip, we would all gather at my Aunt Cristine's to make soup. Over the years, so many people have been involved in the soup making. I can remember many different friends from school coming over and helping out with cooking. Our particular Antonucci wedding soup is completely homemade. Of course, first, we eat the leftover DeVitis and then we start working. We roll every single little meatball with our hands, all 8-10 lbs of meat. The meat balls cannot be any bigger than pencil eraser, and yes, my mother or aunts do come around and check. If they are too big, they will throw them back in your bowl to do again. We all have our plate, sit in a big circle talking as we roll meatballs. After the meatballs are finished about 4 to 5 hours later, depending on how many people are involved, we move on to croutons. Every crouton is individually rolled out on a cookie sheet, baked, and then sliced. After a few hours of slicing, your fingers feel like they cannot move from cutting so much. On a different day, the eggs and gizzards chopped and broth made.  

On New Year’s Day we all gather together and start the New Year off with a big bowl of Wedding Soup, made with love. 

These have been our two traditions for as long as I can remember. My Nonna who started each tradition is no longer alive physically, but her memory lives on each year as we continue honoring her through our trip to DeVitis and each meatball we roll. I cherish those two events. I look forward to the hustle and bustle of DeVitis at Christmas. I can sit here now and taste the familiar smells and feel the love from my Grandma. Traditions should be cherished, they make your particular family unique. What are some of your favorite traditions?

Stop and start enjoying

Stop and Start Enjoying

The holidays seem to be so stressful.  Everyone is rushing around to make sure they get certain gifts, get their house decorated a certain way, send Christmas cards, attend parties, bake cookies and the list could go on. All that hustle and bustle is great if you are really enjoying all the activities, however, I think for most people, they dread more of it than they enjoy. 

What if we all did what we wanted to do over this holiday season? Let's make a list of the activities that bring us joy and take those that we find non enjoyable off the list. Maybe we could make a commitment to ourselves and our well-being, instead of to people and things we really don't care that much about. We all have activities like, cookie exchanges, different holiday parties, Secret Santa exchanges, dinners, etc, that we sometimes do not want to do, but feel guilty if we don't do them. We need to release the guilt and find the joy. If going to that party feels like more of a hassle, then don't go. Replace the party with a different activity that brings your soul love. 

Leave your holiday season open to spontaneous adventures with your kids, relatives, significant others and yourself. Allow that time for ice skating, driving around to look at lights, sitting by a warm fire all snuggled watching a Christmas movie, an exciting lunch with an old friend and all the various other fun events this holiday season. If we have our days and weekends so packed with things we don't even want to do because we feel obligated, then it zaps all the fun out of the holidays. 

Maybe some of the non-enjoyable things on your list is having to cook something to take to a party. Instead of cooking, it's perfectly okay to run to the store and buy something to share. Some people dread having everyone over to their house, because we feel like the house needs to be perfectly clean, every dish matching, and food done all at once. Drop your ego. It does not matter if you have Christmas dishes and if they are all a matching set or if every corner is dusted. No one will notice. If they do, then that's their issue. Find enjoyment in having everyone over to your house. Stop stressing over things that are really not important. People come over to eat, drink and be merry. They don't care what they eat on, when it comes out of the oven or how its presented. They only notice when you make a fuss over it. So, stop, and start enjoying. 

Do all the things you enjoy this holiday season, but if you have to do something that you normally dread, find something positive out of the experience. Go into it with love in your heart. Look at a person that maybe is the reason you dread going, and ask yourself how you can you bring love into their life. Stay in the moment. Try not to think about the event at all prior to going, just show up in love and find the positive. If you have to bake cookies, then invite someone over to help, get kids involved or put on your favorite music and just enjoy the baking. I think if we eliminate some of the stuff we don't have to do, replace it with what brings our soul joy, and then we'd find it’s easier to enjoy the obligations that are non-negotiable. 

This holiday season, let it be peaceful and enjoyable. Do things that make you happy. Release the guilt of not doing things you don't want to do. Show up to every event you chose with love. Keep in mind the real meaning of the holidays. I hope that this year is the best holiday season yet, because you chose what is important for you.