Wednesday, January 20, 2016

New thinking- Do we always need goals? January 20, 2016

A year from today we will inaugurate the 46th President of the United States. To me that is still an awesome event, but perhaps not to some.
New thinking sometimes leaves me nostalgic for the old.

Take the article from the Sunday NYTimes Magazine for example. It tells us we need cold, hard rationality to set our minds thinking clearly. Out with beliefs we cannot substantiate, out with expecting a problem to go away if we don't pay attention to it. Is this new to younger people?

January is the month we seek to renew our energy toward self-improvement. Okay, let's notice some of our behaviors and assumptions and begin to question them. Can we find the root causes of what we believe and of what we do? Can we use what we learn to make changes in our lives?

Can't we just do what we want to do?
Can't we just complain about everything we don't like, blame others for it and just go about our business as if we are the most important people and we know all the answers even if those ideas haven't worked for us before?                                                                      

Sunday, January 3, 2016

Happy New Year January3, 2016






New Year Resolutions

Appreciate Good Health
Work toward Achieving or Maintaining Good Health
Enjoy My Surroundings
Get Pleasure from Everyday Things
Slow Down at least for a while.
Increase Compassion for those whose lives are limited by pain.

I am so delighted to be well after a month spent recuperating from pneumonia. I just this minute completed a three mile walk in under an hour for the first time since I returned from New York in December. I had "practiced" by walking in the mall for the past few days when the gym was closed due to the holidays. And I had taken yoga classes for the two weeks prior, but every day I had to return home to rest for the remainder of the day!

Recuperating from pneumonia meant initially doing absolutely nothing. I had no energy for reading and I fell asleep while the television was on. I turned it off and listened to music on the radio. Finally I was able to read and I read mystery novels- four of them by Peter Lovesey, interspersed with snippets from a book titled Maimonides and the Book that Changed Judaism by Micah Goodman.

I next began to cook and bake because I could rest while the food was cooking; I had no patience to wait in a restaurant or to dress in anything other than gym clothes.
Finally I was able to share the fruits of my labors  with my family and friends who had been so patient and helpful to me, baking, bringing me food, driving me where I needed to go and inviting me to their homes.

If you are lucky as I have been, to be healthy and full of energy, perhaps you will understand how devastated I was to be sick for a month. Perhaps you will understand how blessed it is to feel well and join me in having increased understanding and compassion for those whom we know who are limited in what they can do everyday by pain and a lack of energy.