Thoughts are like dogs, unleashed they get into mischief.

. There I was on Sunday, happily pottering around in the kitchen of my Garden of Eden. I was finding a way to deal with the abundance of figs, so I was experimenting. I’d cooked them in lots of ways and this Sunday I tried drying them. I was excited and so looking forward to using the figs for dinner along with the veggies and potatoes I’d gathered from our garden. I was happy, life was good.

Once the thoughts got home I happily made dinner.

Once I had put the figs in the oven to dry, I went outside to see where John was hanging out. I love going outside these days.
One of the things about living here is the peace and quiet.
We live on a dirt road and with the main highway only a stones throw away hardly any traffic comes down our road.  
But when I got outside, I had to do a double take.
Right in front of my eyes was a steady stream of cars driving up and down, on my road! 
Being a rural know it all, I immediately knew what this traffic meant.
A closed highway due to a serious, fatal crash in which at least one person would have died.

Opportunities and possibilities? Do you see them, grab them?

. Are you able to grab worthwhile opportunities with both hands and run with them or do you detect resistance to go for it? Do you see possibilities that could add tremendous value to your life or are you blind to them?

Wilma seeing possibilities and grabbing opportunities; John painting the new kitchen.

In 2008 I declared that I wanted to eat flowers, after discovering the value of good, fresh real food and seeing that I no longer needed to live in the city.
Since I was young I loved nature, but growing up in a city I very seldom had a chance to be in it. My move to New Zealand was because of its greenness, but unfortunately I ended up living in a city.
But now my time had come. My daughters were doing their own thing, our business moved to online learning and here it was. 
A possibility and an opportunity to finally live in nature and grow my own food! 

Stuck in life . . . how did you get there?

. Ever seen someone who’s stuck in life? They no longer enjoy their life yet they haven’t a clue what to do or how to get out of their sticky situation.  So instead they do nothing except sit there feeling and looking completely miserable.

Stuck, I don't like this. What now?

I know what I am talking about as I was once stuck myself.
As a result I can easily recognize others in the same predicament; it takes one to know one. 
The first sign is total confusion. It’s a dead give away!
The second sign is that the individual is full of ideas, they’re constantly talking about what they intend to do yet they just can’t seem to make anything come to life. 
Their thoughts are all over the place. And there’s no way that they can make up their mind or get into action. 

I now love my life and the difference is . . .

. Not so long ago I was agitated, often feeling  overwhelmed, irritable and quarrelsome.  Things that happened around me could very easily do my head in and I often was all over the place with my thoughts, feelings and actions.  These days I feel quite different. I am a lot more at ease and I am so much happier.

Loving my life!

I certainly notice the difference when I look at the people around me and recognize my old self in them. 
I don’t see many of them oozing calm and happiness.   

Even in these days with all the bad news stories that are doing the rounds I feel wonderful, calm and happy. 
I keep on going adoring the place where we live and I absolutely love my life. It’s uncanny how I can hold these lovely feelings in the face of all this current recession talk for example. 
In the past that would have definitely got me going too, but not now.

Lisa … now there’s a woman who knows how to choose!

. In this post I am going to tell you a story about my friend Lisa. You can see her in the photo showing off her most remarkable veggie garden. I kid you not, this garden is made up of over 50 recycling bins! For me this veggie garden is indeed remarkable because it represents Lisa; a woman who defied all odds and in the end got everything she desired.

My friend Lisa and her amazing city veggie garden.

How?
Well she knew exactly what it meant to choose, to really choose.  

I chose and it worked!

. I simply have to share with you how choosing delivered me a freezer.  It all started with this wonderful ABUNDANCE. We have apples coming out of our ears! I am not complaining but from the photo you can see I have an issue here.

Abundance, abundance, choosing what to do with all this.

We distributed as much as we could amongst our friends and relatives, but I knew that we had saturated that market when people started to hide when they saw us coming laden down with bags and bags of apples :)
So there I was, left to deal with the rest of the hoard.
Which I did, however . . .

Choosing. The missing link and cause of misery.

. Ever wondered why you feel happy and why you feel miserable? I have, often. And you know what? Feeling miserable can be caused by a missing link in our decision making process; the missing link being the ability to choose. If you leave out choosing, you are in BIG trouble. What? Yes, and you know why?

I love but no longer choose Holland.

Because . . . ‘Deciding’ and ‘choosing’ are NOT the same and to be happy you need to do both.

Will the real me please stand up!

. Who am I? I guess there is not one person who has not dealt with this question. I have dealt with it often enough when writing resumes. But there was always a context I was describing myself into. For a resume it was the job description, the industry and the company that would determine who I was.

Who am I? Dare devil in the surf, cheat posing for picture, water baby having fun?

But it is a different ball game now I have to describe myself meaningful outside this prescribed and known context of a resume.

On my own volition I have ventured into this new context, this great unknown cyber space, and now I feel lost without the rules that have guided me for so long.
It is just me and my own creativity AND  . . .  ahum freedom.

Freedom to declare who I am.
Doing it in any way I like . . . AND I feel the pressure of; “What do I say that does do me justice, is authentic and is how I desire to be seen?”

If I am honest, I think this freedom to declare ‘who I am’ is actually freaking me out.

Are you kidding? No, new additions and productivity are NOT compatible

. On the Zen Habits blog, a guy asked how to deal with disruptions in life.    He recently had a NEW baby and he was wondering what he did wrong because he couldn’t keep up with his exercise regime and his goal of regular gym visits.My reactions was; “Oh Pleeease, where is your head at? You just had a major NEW addition to your life and you think it is business as usual!!”

Definitely new, my niece