Blog

• 

Happy Friday everyone! I hope your work week was quick and your weekend goes by super slow. I heard a comment this week on a program I listen to every morning, ‘Don’t compare your insides to someone else’s outsides‘. This got me to thinking about social media and how we portray ourselves and our lives to others in our circle. We want to be seen as having lives that are enviable, posting pictures of our foods, our travel and our recent purchases.

Brett and I are planning a trip to Pennsylvania to see our grandsons (and their parents, LOL!) We cannot wait to hit the open road. We plan to take our pop-up camper and spend the week camping. I did some camping when I was a child, my parents had a 5th wheel camper and I have some amazing memories in our camper. My favorite is the wild horses on the NC shore and a unfortunately large turkey, too big for the camper oven at Thanksgiving!!

Brett and I would often camp in a tent when we lived in North Carolina. We’ve camped in the Uwharrie National Forest and on Carolina Beach. Both of those locations have some amazing benefits …… the sounds of nature with rolling rivers and creeks, the wind in the trees, the birds and other animals that live in the woods. We also enjoyed the sound of the beach, with the waves breaking right outside our tent, hoping we calculated the high tide correctly.

The more we work on our pop-up, the more I recall how amazing it has been to explore the new areas we have been. We have talked about travelling more and exploring the amazing countryside. We would love to mark off many of the National Parks in our travel book!!

Then our discussion became more serious. We were talking about our long term goals and travel opportunities. We discussed our material possessions and what we want at the end of our lives. Brett said he would like to have memories of our travels over things in our house. This sent excitement through my whole body!! Travelling the country with my husband by camper!! My dream come true! So now…..we start the planning for the rest of our lives!

We have decided that our material things are not as important to us as our memories! So we have decided to make the jump into full-time RVing. Of course this isn’t an immediate change (much to my dismay!) We have gotten our 5 year plan to make this a reality. There are many things to prepare for and now begins the real hard work!

I’ll be sharing our plans for full-time RVing and how we are pulling this off. Stay tuned for our adventure!

Enjoy your weekend! Live your life starting today!

Tracy

Happy International Women’s Day everyone! Today has been set aside to recognize women and their contributions to life and love. But today is not just for women……it’s for men too!

Women are a wonderful, beautiful part of life. Women are nurturing, caring, beautiful and strong. Women are scientists, doctors, lawyers and airline pilots. Women can run Fortune 500 companies as well as running a home with the skill of a CEO. Women are teachers in primary education as well as professors in secondary education. Women are head chefs in 5 star restaurants and journalists at internationally known publications.

But as I said earlier, International Women’s Day is for men also. Men can be wonderful partners to women. Helping in the home or in the work place- not ‘helping’ women because women can’t do a job, but rather, helping women as a partnership. Helping each other succeed should be a human action as a compassionate act and not seen as a man/woman concept.

I’d like to encourage women to allow themselves to be helped, partnered with or assisted by other women, or even men. Life is so much easier when we go through it with help! As the Beatles said… “I get by with a little help from my friends!’ And it shouldn’t matter if those friends are women or men! So go help out a woman in your life today!

Hi everyone! Happy Friday! Hope your week has been fabulous. It has been an exciting week here! Brett and I are watching our dog Dino get better each and every day. For those of you that aren’t aware, he had a stroke 2 weeks ago. We are watching him improve everyday and are amazed at his determination.

Watching Dino wake up every morning trying to walk (despite looking like a newborn deer) has got me thinking about his determination. He attempts to walk, but due to the weakness in his front legs, he continues to fall down. He often bumps his head when he falls forward, but will try to get up again.

He doesn’t remember falling down earlier that day, he doesn’t remember falling down the day before and he doesn’t remember that he had a stroke. He tries to stand, tries to walk and tries to keep up with his brother and sisters. In his head, he can walk and run and so, he continues to try.

I am amazed at his determination. I don’t know what drives him, but he shows no signs of giving up! I wonder what is in him, despite the obstacles he faces, that drives him to try over and over and over again. What can I learn from my sweet 7 year old dog? That challenges should be met head on!

I love the phrase from the character Barney Stinson on ‘How I Met Your Mother’ when given an almost impossible task. He will meet the invitation with “Challenge Accepted!”. This is how we should meet all our obstacles… Challenge Accepted!! Imagine the heights we could reach or the goals we could meet if we accepted every deterrent or difficulty in our lives with that phrase! At work, at home, in relationships….Challenge Accepted!

I can’t wait to see Dino’s recovery and how he will meet his hurdles head on! I hope to use his determination as my drive for my own obstacles in the future. I am going to get up over and over and over again until I too am running!

Have a great weekend everyone!!

Tracy

Hello all! I am writing to you on this sun shiny President’s Day. (Well it is sun shiny in Florida, for my daughter Kimberly, it’s a snowy President’s Day!).

Our family has just gone through a health scare with one of our dogs. It is a scary thing when your pet is injured or sick, but can’t quite tell you what is wrong, how he/she feels or how the injury started. Talk about some detective work! My brain is set up to assess and treat people, but I was using my knowledge to the best of my ability. We have figured out that he has had a stroke and now are working towards recovery.

During the initial time period, we were very worried that we may lose him. We have had Dino since he was a brand new pup, this would have been devastating to both my husband and I as well as his sister Pebbles who is his litter mate. They have been together even longer than we have had them!!

During all this stress, I used my go to mode of comfort and it got me thinking about what people do to find comfort. I remember the feeling of comfort when laying my head on my mother’s lap and her playing with my hair until I fell asleep. I remember the feeling of my grandmother’s wrinkly skin on her hand being so very soft and tender and it gives me comfort to think of this now. Certain songs bring me a feeling of comfort- music is often used in hospital settings during procedures, especially with children because of its’ ability to comfort the patient.

Then there is religion that is a comfort to certain people. It often brings comfort in times of stress. Prayer, meditation and biofeedback are all ways people find comfort and attempt to decrease stress.

Then there are the more unhealthy and dangerous ways to find comfort. Those include alcohol, drugs and reckless behaviors. These may provide temporary comfort, but the lasting effects of both of these are perilous to the mind, body and spirit.

You can surely find a person to help you with meditation, a yoga studio, spiritual director or just a friend to stroke your hair when you need some comfort. Its good for your health, both emotional and physical.

Have a Great Day!!

Tracy

Happy February!! You have made it through January!! Does it seem to anyone else that January lasted about 6 months? I know I am ready for spring, and I live in the South. My husband and I visited Detroit December 2017 and I can not imagine living in an area where the temperature is in the negative numbers!

So did you make any New Year’s Resolutions? Eat better? Join a gym? Lose 10, 20, 30 pounds? How about resolutions with a different benefit? Travel to new places, read more, spend more time with family?

These are all great resolutions, but usually about this time is when those resolutions and the enthusiasm behind them seems to fizzle. What can we do to help keep those resolutions that we make? No one likes to fail at a goal they have set and New Years’ Resolutions seem to be that automatic disaster, set up for failure that we self sabotage with.

How about make a resolution to make small changes in your behavior, your life, your habits? Small changes are more likely achieved, therefore are more likely successful.

Start with reading for 5-10 minutes a day. Exercise 2 times a week. Take you lunch every other day. Volunteer once a month for Meals-on-Wheels. Then as you are more and more successful with achieving these goals, you can expand them even more!!

Make your world a better place and you will notice the ripples to your surrounding world!! I’d love to hear your ideas and how you are making these small changes!

Have a GREAT February!!

Tracy

Hi everyone!! How has your January been? Can you believe we are 2 days away from February? It seems like we were just running around like crazy getting ready for the Holidays and dealing with all the stress that comes with that!

So….this Sunday is the NFL’s Super Bowl! Football is not for everyone, but almost everyone enjoys the Super Bowl commercials and/or the Halftime show. This year will be Maroon 5 and Travis Barker, so it is sure to be entertaining. Folks I work with have been talking about hosting the perfect Super Bowl party and what party foods to serve for weeks. Pinterest has been abuzz with the best finger foods and how to decorate and host the biggest party in your neighborhood.

I would like to issue a challenge to you! How about hosting a different Super Bowl….or Souper Bowl I should say. There are so many people that depend on the local soup kitchen, from the homeless community to those that just can’t make ends meet and have enough left over for the end of the month food. This is a harsh reality in every community and is especially prevalent with the recent government shut down.

So grab your closest friends, go down to the local soup kitchen, Ronald McDonald house or even drop off a grocery bag of non-perishable foods to the local food bank! Your version of the Souper Bowl can be a huge hit and help out those in our community that are the most vulnerable!!

A lot has been in the news recently about how to wish folks well in the holiday season and stay ‘Politically Correct’. I just don’t understand how hard it is to be kind and considerate when you wish someone well!! If you want to address someone first thing in the am, say ‘Good Morning’. If you want to wish them well at the end of the day, say “Have a great evening’. If your friend is Jewish, wish him/her Happy Hanukkah!! If your friend is Christian, tell her or him ‘Have a Merry Christmas’. This goes for the other various holidays at the end of the year as well as throughout the year!! Tell your landscaper ‘Happy Arbor Day’, tell your Canadian friend ‘Happy Boxing Day’ (which happens to fall on my mothers’ birthday as well, December 26th!). How about your best friend that has Lithuanian heritage……like my friend April? Wish her a Happy St. John’s Day on June 24th! Do you have someone at work that is Jamaican? Happy Emancipation Day on August 1st!! That’s you Michelle, even though we don’t work together any longer-  sad face!

I feel that if you take the time to learn something about someone else’s heritage and take the time to wish them well on a special day, they will be happier than before!

Take a few minutes and use Google, Alexa, Siri or any other search engine to find out what holiday is coming up, and seek out someone that may celebrate that holiday!

If you see me out and about…feel free to wish me a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!

 

 

Hello everyone!! I hope summer has been kind to you, no sunburns, no family vacations that you will forever regret and those guests have returned from whence they came!

Brett and I have had an exciting summer to say the least. We purchased a Pop-up camper from a friend and have spent almost every waking moment prepping it for it’s maiden journey! We took it about 10 miles outside of town to a great KOA and practiced the ‘Camp Life’ for a weekend. There is still much to do, but overall, we are ready for life on the RV road!

I have recently found myself with an abundance of time! I’m talking organize your filing cabinet, go through your closet, read a book, and dust your blinds time! It’s really starting to freak me out! But it got me to thinking……what do I do now that I have nothing to do?

I’ve thought about things I want to do….that I’ve never had time for before, but there are so many, I don’t know where to start! So I began to write a list of those things I have on my project list (that don’t involve cleaning or house chores!).

#1 Prayer- I am often so busy during the work week that I do not make the time to talk to God. Last weekend at church, the priest told us about a man that was 98 years old that made it to church every day. I found myself envious of his relationship with God and the church. The first thing I put on my list of things to do with my extra time was daily Mass. It was a struggle to make sure that I kept the promise, ( I did miss daily mass yesterday on Saturday), but I was able to make Monday through Friday of this past week and it really helped my attitude.

#2 Go outside- I have so many amazing spots outside around my yard that I love to enjoy. Oftentimes, I am leaving for work, or getting home too late to fully enjoy them. My bench on the front porch, where I can watch the squirrels in the morning aggravating the neighborhood cats, my planted area in front of the porch that I enjoy weeding or watering or my raised garden bed with tomatoes, peppers and basil that I enjoy watering and searching for tiny sprouts of new veggies. These are all things that I miss out on when I don’t have ‘time’.

#3 Reading- I have loved to read since I was a child. It has always been something that has come easy and whether I am reading for fun, reading an article to learn about a new medical therapy or trying to better myself, I enjoy the time alone with a book (regular book or E-book, doesn’t really matter). I have found that combining #’s 1, 2 and 3 have given me the most pleasure this past week.

#4 Crafts- Now here is my Achilles heel. I LOVE to do crafts! I love to sew, crochet, paint, knit or color (yes I have some adult coloring books, but I still can color a cartoon pig with the best of them!). Usually when I get home from work, I am so mentally tired that learning a new craft is difficult. Then on the weekend, there is so much OUTDOORS to do!! Especially in Florida- cycling, beaches, yoga, paddleboard, theme parks (Disney of course) sporting events (Go Orlando City!!) and local community events and fairs! How is someone supposed to fit all that into a 48 hour weekend? I probably have been to a mall <20 times in the past 3 years Brett and I have lived here. There’s just no time to spend indoors, how am supposed to get a scarf knitted? Even in the Winter, the season is nice enough to continue cycling and other outdoor activities that may be too hot to do in the summer swelter!

#5 Trips- And this doesn’t necessarily mean Vacation. Just a day trip to Tampa, New Smyrna Beach, or any of the local springs. There are trips on trips on trips to take!! Then planning a Vacation is an event! Where to go? Do we visit family? How about going somewhere we haven’t been to before? New Orleans? Canada? Should we camp? Can we take the dogs? We haven’t even been on a cruise since we’ve lived < 1 hour from the coast! Boy how does one person fit all these things in one lifetime!?

This is just a small list of the things that I have recently found time for. I make sure to write these into my calendar to ensure that they are done. Habit.former makes a deck of cards to allow you to set good habits, slowly so that you will be successful. The card I chose from the deck today said on the front: make a to do list for the week. On the back: What you write down gets done. Start with a blank piece of paper and write your to do’s for he next seven days. Be sure the list is inclusive” work, family/home and don’t forget….you, personally!

I often tell my patients, ‘You can’t take care of others if you forget to take care of yourself”. Even 10 minutes of your day needs to be spent refilling your cup! Whatever it is that fills you up, even if it isn’t any of the things listed above, find your ‘thing’ and make sure you include it in your daily activities. You will be a better person for it. A better wife, mother, sister, friend, co-worker and overall a better human.

Go do that thing you would do, if there was nothing to do!

 

Tracy

I was standing in line at the store earlier this week, going over the list of things I had to do while I was out of the house. My mind was mostly on the task at hand, but I overheard some ladies behind me talking about a female they knew ( I’m not sure of the relation to these ladies… ) and how she had ‘finally found happiness!’

Usually I would be happy for whoever they were talking about, after all, someone being happy makes me happy! But this time, I was thinking about the statement one of the ladies said, the female they spoke of ‘finally found happiness’….this was odd to me.

“FINDING HAPPINESS” – the statement struck me as odd because in order to find happiness, it had to have been lost first. How did her happiness become lost? Often we think our happiness is lost after losing something or someone we cared for or loved deeply. But can our happiness be misplaced and not lost?

One of the most frequent topics of self-help books, other than weight loss is success/happiness. I wondered about the two topics being  mutually exclusive. We often hear about successful people not being happy, but how about happy people? Can they be happy without being successful? We often thing about success as being equated to finances and money.

” Success is not the key to Happiness. Happiness is the key to Success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. ” -Albert Schweitzer This is more often true than not. Sitting in my Grandma Hart’s kitchen, I would hear story after story (often more than once) about my mother, her sisters and brothers, and how they would have fun doing this or that when they were children. My mother was one of 11 children, born in the 40’s. There was not a lot of money to go around for that many children, as they children became of age, they would work to bring money home, or joined one of the branches of the military to allow them to take care of their self.

Would I consider them successful? Maybe not financially, no one in my family has retired at 40 an moved to a tropical island. But as a family and as friends to each other, they are immensely successful. And as for happiness, they have happiness by the bucketful. I have myself been through times when I was unhappy, and thought (incorrectly) that ‘If I had ‘A’ or got to go to ‘B’ or bought ‘C’, I’d be much happier. This had a quick moment or two of happiness, but then the problem itself was still there and the unhappiness would return. Kind of like eating a glazed donut, the sugar rush makes you feel good for a little while, but then when it’s gone, your still hungry and back to feeling down.

Once I found my happiness (and this was before I met my wonderful husband, Brett) success was not far behind. It was not a monetary success, but I was a successful friend, daughter, mother and sister. I was a better person when I was happy. And I found my happiness…in myself. Happiness is not found in a store, in a person, a place or a job. You must find happiness within your soul, within your person, within your circle. This is when you will find your success!!

I hope you find your happiness and then find your success! I know this will bring a smile to my heart and my happiness will grow with your happiness!!

‘I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear’. – Nelson Mandela

Bravery has many definitions. Many people think bravery came from facing danger, saving lives as police officers or fire fighters, or even soldier fighting for our freedom. And these are all very good examples of acts of bravery, but today I am talking about the more common bravery!

A single mother that works two jobs to make sure her family is well cared for, someone facing a health crisis and their unknown future, an elderly widow or widower that continues to try to maintain their independence…..these are all more common acts of bravery!

When you are facing a situation that fills you with fear and the fear overwhelms you, being brave is the last think you can think about doing! But this is when doing what needs to be done becomes bravery. Getting up in the morning, putting one foot in front of the other and facing the day is where bravery begins.

Fear of failure, feeling inadequate,  low self-esteem are often factors that prevent us from finding our bravery inside. But we are fearfully and wonderfully made! We are made for greatness! Our minds have brought forth amazing creations and ideas! Imagine the Wright Brothers allowing their ideas to be left on the ‘drawing room floor’ so to speak. Could you imagine life without air travel? Without space travel? We may not make major changes to the world, but we can change our world and the world of those around us.

So, think about that one thing that you would like to do, but fear has prevented you from trying. Do you want to take up a musical instrument? Maybe you’ve been thinking about going back to school? How about learning a second (or third) language? What would you do if you were brave? How high can you set your limits?

“Everybody’s been there, everybody’s been stared down by the enemy. Fallen for the fear and done some disappearing, bow down to the mighty. Don’t run, stop holding your tongue. Maybe there’s a way out of the cage where you live. Maybe one of these days you can let the light in. SHOW ME HOW BIG YOUR BRAVE IS!!’ -Sara Bareilles