Ramblings

Life, family, business

Tag Archives: life


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Goals

At kick boxing class tonight, the trainer asked each of us for an accomplishment in our lives, and a goal. Luckily, I was toward the end of the line, but I still had a hard time coming up with a goal I felt comfortable sharing with the group. Most of them had fitness related goals, or nutrition related goals. I came up with the goal of losing my belly fat, which is a true goal that I’m striving toward, but what about all my other goals? And what’s the difference between a goal, and something I’d like to do?
A goal is a desired result a person or a system envisions, plans and commits to achieve a personal or organizational desired end-point in some sort of assumed development. Many people endeavor to reach goals within a finite time by setting deadlines. (Wikipedia)
The “something I’d like to do” is just something, well, I’d like to do someday if the opportunity arises. So it seems that I have a huge list of things I’d really like to do someday, but only a handful of true goals.
And what about the goals I have already accomplished? There’s quite a few, I can proudly say. But in reality, many of the goals I accomplished weren’t really goals, they were just things I’d like to do. The opportunity arose, so I did them.
But maybe we all set goals differently. Maybe some people have a hard time writing goals in stone, and others of us, like me, have somewhat squishy goals. Sure they are goals, but yet, I have no definite plan for how to accomplish them. But yet my subconscious knows they are goals, and works me into a situation where I can accomplish them.
So in this goal of fulfilling my goals, I need to have faith. I need to have faith that the Universe will send me ways to accomplish my dreams and do the things I want to do. I need to have faith that I will notice the opportunity when it arises so I can take advantage of it.

But I do have concrete goals as well. Some of my super-goals are to start a community garden in my town, to finish writing my book, and to have shoulders like Jillian Michaels.  These are the goals I actually work on, on a regular basis.  But the rest of my many, many goals are just spinning out there in space, waiting to see if they can latch onto anything.  I’m a “go-with-the-flow” kind of person, so this doesn’t bother me at all. However, I imagine if you are a person who likes their lives to be regularly scheduled, this may not work.

What kind of person are you, and what kind of goals do you have for life?  I love to hear about it in the comment section!


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Snowday!

Sunday started out as a beautiful day. The temperature rose into the 50’s, there was a very light breeze, and it was a beautiful spring day. (Don’t forget, I live in North Dakota.)  I started out by cleaning my chicken coop of the soiled straw.  I shoveled it up, and made numerous trips to the garden to dump it.  My husband started a bonfire to burn some old pallet boards.  The chickens ran around the yard, pecking and scratching at the dirt, and eating all the seeds they could find.

After the coop was cleaned out, I put in fresh straw for the ladies, and they pecked and scratched at that too.  I found my pair of loppers and started cutting and pruning the dead wood from my privet hedge, and cutting it down to a manageable 6 feet tall from the 9 or 10 it had grown to last fall. The dead wood went in the fire. I cut down my raspberry stalks and burned them up too.   My husband grilled some elk sausage and elk steaks over the fire for us and our son.  And it was good.

IT WAS GOOD.

Then, the wind started to pick up in the afternoon.  The wind continued into the night, and we knew the storm was coming.  The air felt shifted.  It felt heavy.  The next morning I went to work in the heavy, hard wind, and then the rain started. I wasn’t just any rain, but freezing rain.  It stuck to the windows, and where it hit, it froze immediately.  I could see the tiny grains of ice in the drops.  And then it stopped.  I put ice melt in front of the door.  Within a couple hours it all melted.  Then the next round started. This time it was graupel.  ( http://www.fsavalanche.org/encyclopedia/graupel.htm)  It coated the roads and the parking lot.  The corn husks and dried up leaves whipped across the parking lot.  When I went outside, the frozen pellets stung my face and then I realized the temperature had dropped quite a bit.  The wind rattled the windows and shook the walls.  All sorts of things flew by the window, and it was foreboding.

Once home, I sat and read for awhile. My husband, home from work an hour early because the interstates had closed at 3:30, was working in the garage putting the new tires on the golf cart. (Yes, we are optimists.) He came in and exclaimed that he couldn’t see our neighbor’s house behind us.  I looked out the window, and sure enough, behind the chicken coop was a white sheet, hiding the next house about a block away.  The snow continues into the night, reducing visibilities and making the roads very hard to travel.  It was dangerous.

In just 28 hours my backyard turned from a happy spring day, into a blizzard. Luckily, it only dumped 4 inches of snow on us, far short of the earlier prediction of 12 to 18. For this I was grateful, but still, I had to wonder if Mother Nature was playing an April Fool’s trick on us.  We went from the green grass starting to peak through the brown dead grass from last fall, to white snow.  We went from bonfire to snow bank in a very short time.  And it was discouraging.

Sometimes life is a lot like the weather.  Everything is going great, then something changes and a blizzard shows up, right in the middle of your nice spring day.  Things are going great, and then, in the blink of an eye, it all goes downhill.  Its so easy to give up hope when we perceive that bad things are happening to us.  Its easy to give in to depression and sadness, and think that things will never get back to normal.  But in reality, they always seem to work out for the best as long as we expect it to.

And it will.

I know that this is a temporary set back for the weather turning to warm summer days.  It will happen. It always does.  And as much as I rolled my eyes about this storm, the snow brings nitrogen to the soil, and moisture, which the crops, and the flowers, and the grasses, and the vegetables all need in the spring.  It may be uncomfortable for a short time, but in the long run, this makes things better.  It was adventageous.

Many times in our lives, its the hard things that define who we are.  Its the uncomfortable things that make us grow, and learn,  and live.  The next time you feel that you are in a downward spiral, stop fretting.  Open your parachute and rest easy, knowing that it will make you stronger.  Perhaps you will learn an important lesson that will benefit you in life. Perhaps you will meet someone who will become a best friend, or a significant other, or a beloved spouse. Perhaps you will gain life experiences that will help you write a book, start a business, or become a better person.

Life can only get you down if you let it. Because life is good.

Have you ever had an experience where you learned something good from a hurtful experience? I’d love to hear about it.

 


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Finding My Purpose in Life

How many times have you wondered about your life’s purpose?  Have you figured it out yet?

It amazes me that we expect every 18 year old to know what it is that they want to do for the rest of their lives. How often does a college student change their major, or question their choice, or quit.  One of my friends has always known she was destined to be a doctor, and she’s a great doctor.  Another friend told me she’s always wanted to be a mother, and she’s a great mother.  Yet others, like me, work a bunch of different jobs, always trying to figure out what we were meant to do, what we were meant to be.  I love being a mother, and I love my kids more than I ever thought possible.  But I still have that nagging thought:  If I ever figure out what I want to be when I grow up.  I have thought that thought so many times over my life.  (I did figure out what I want to do, just not how to do it.)

When you see your life’s purpose, do see goals?  Or do you see purpose?  Do you see a mountain of stuff you’re going to buy with your piles of money, or do you see how you’ll feel, and who you’ve become?  Do you see how many people you have helped?

Everyone wants money, it makes life easier when there’s enough to pay all the bills and still have some left over. But money is a material thing that buys material things.  Once you’ve traded it for something, its no longer money, its stuff.  And I know you’ve heard the phrase, “You can’t take it with you.”  Its true, you can’t.  But what then, can you take with you?  Is there anything you can take with you?

I know the older I get , the wiser I get.  I realize that there’s so much more to life than just things.  I could have a millions dollars worth of things, and it might make me feel happy for a short time, but no things can actually keep you happy.  I believe that in order for us to be happy, we need a heart full of love.  And that’s something you can’t buy.  There’s no drug you can take that will fill your heart with love and keep it full.  And surprisingly, there is no person that can make you feel this way except yourself.  If you are miserable and depressed, knowing the people around you love you doesn’t fill your own heart with love.  You can have the best family, and the best spouse, and the best kids, but they can’t fill your heart with love.  You have to be willing to open your heart to love in order to make that happen.

And once you have done that, your heart will slowly fill.  It doesn’t happen overnight, and it doesn’t make you feel like a different person right away.  But it does happen, and eventually one day, you’ll realize that instead of being miserable, you’re full of love!  You’re happy!  You’re glad!  You have a smile on your face that no one can take away.  It’s a love and joy that permeates your soul.

And that is something you’ll be able to take with you; your soul.  In fact, that’s who you are.

Once you are happy in your soul, perhaps you will see that your purpose in life isn’t necessarily a job, or a career path.  Perhaps, your purpose is to use your talent, your gifts,to give what you have to others.  Perhaps all of our life’s purposes are to give ourselves away to those around us.  My doctor friend uses her talent to bring healing to others.  Mothers use their talents to lovingly raise children into responsible adults.  So many of us have talents that we use everyday to help others, and we may not even realize it.  Maybe its not a paying position, but its a very important job.  Maybe it is a paying position, and we are able to make a living using our talents to help others.  I feel that as long as we are using our God-given talents to help others, and we use those talents in love, we truly are fulfilling our life’s purpose.

What talents do you have?  How do they play into your life’s purpose?

If you haven’t figured out your purpose yet, what things are you good at?  What things do you enjoy doing?