Conquered

Dieting and Exercising.  

Eleven years ago, I joined a gym because I had a coupon for a certain amount of classes for a set price.  I decided to give going to the gym a try again. I had signed up at gyms previously many times before and I knew that I would probably attend for a bit but then my attendance would taper off and eventually I would stop.  Knowing this, I still decided to try again. I had a coupon after all.  I attended every session for a month.  I liked the coach, made quick gym friends in the month I attended, and I have been going ever since.  I currently attend the gym about four times a week and I still have some of the same friends as when I started..  When I don’t go to the gym on my scheduled days and times I usually get very stressed, mad or start complaining.   If I cannot make it to the gym or if it’s closed I do alternative things such as walking and running. Exercising has become a part of me. I do not think of it as a have too or a gotta do because.  I do it because I have seen the benefits of it..  

Once I started exercising regularly, I obviously thought “I have to eat properly.”  “ I need to go on a diet.”  The following month I got a coupon for a discount to see a nutritionist.  I had never been to one and decided to give it a try. I got my prescribed diet from the nutritionist and followed it.  I felt pressure as I had to return in a month to see my progress.  I stuck with the nutritionist and saw the results.  The weight came off.   With the nutritionist I learned how to eat properly.  It took time and there were setbacks but I kept at it.  Today, we are an “ ingredient household,”  which my son recently pointed out to me.  Overtime after making your food from ingredients rather than from boxes and cans, food tastes differently and eating what I call “processed” food is kinda gross, even desserts.    

Is eating healthy and exercising regularly easy?  No.  Is this quick? No. It’s a process.   It takes time, dedication, and setbacks.  But if you maintain your course it becomes part of you and you will see the long term benefits.  

Why did it stick this time? Accountability. I highly recommend going to a nutricionist and going to a small gym where everybody knows your name. Cheers!

Good luck to all those who have made this your resolution for 2023!

Chores

The very word conjures up negative feelings and thoughts. Ugh! Who likes doing chores? No one. But, what if we changed the word? Would it make doing or wanting to do a chore more exciting? A quick synonym search on the word chore and up come the words tasks, duty, assignment and job. Hmm… not sure if I called dusting a duty it would make it more pleasing to perform. What about I have the task of dusting the living room today? Nope. That does not do it. How about we swap out the word chores for some other postive word? Think postive right? Perhaps this might make the activity more pleasing. Reverse psychology, no? Let’s see.

Positive spins to the word chore: aim, goals, ambition, aspiration, dream.

Let’s them out.

My aim is to dust the living room.

My goal is to dust the living room today.

My ambition of the day is to dust the living room. Hmmm…perhaps.

My DREAM is to dust the living room today. Nah.

Nope changing the word chore for a more positive word does not make performing the action any easier or better.

Arguement flawed. Dusting still sucks and I find it challenging to do.

Success

How do you define it?

Deep, personal, subjective is how I define this question.

How do I define success? My answer is, it depends. First, I believe you should be using your own measuring stick, not societies measuring stick, to determine your success, but we tend to use societies stick instead.

Take for example grades and school. We use a random set of numbers, which were decided by a group people, who knows when ,to determine whether a person is successful in school or not. Then we take these numbers and tell people that they can or can’t get into a school based on that number. If the number is high, your are successful and get to go to a “good” college and if it is low, you are not successful and your college options are limited. But, does this number help to determine a person’s success? No, of course not. There are a multitude of things, to many to list and discuss here in this blog, that go into determining a person’s success in school, their occupation and in their life. Using that societal measuring stick to determine success is well, no bueno, not good.

Success, is determined by each individual person. Outsiders can and will use their own measuring stick to judge you, which is bad and needs to stop. The question is, how do we instill this thinking in the future generations? Should we?

Books

Has a book changed your life?

The first set of books that I was hooked on were the Dr. Seuss books. I would read them over and over again. I remember I was so proud because I could read them by myself. The next memorable set of books were The Little House on Prairie books, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. I remember I would beg my mom to take me to the library so I could get the next book in the series. Then, came the romance novels which I would devour.

Did these books change my life? Yes. They created a love of reading within. Weekly trips to the library and countless hours of reading, “the just one more chapter’ or ‘just one more page,” which of course never was true.

As I got older, I stopped reading. I am not sure as to why, but I stopped. I don’t recall being asked to read classics in school either. Perhaps poor schooling or just life happened. I did however became more of a magazine article reader. I would read books here and there, the ones that “everyone” was talking about, but that was it.

As stated in a previous blog posts, I picked up my reading habit once again when the pandemic hit. I think I read a total of twenty-three books that year. And from that point forward, I have committed to reading and I set a reading goal in Goodreads. Last year I read 2 more books that I had set for myself. Let’s see how this year goes as now I have added a writing goal too.

Going back to the question, have the books changed my life? Yes. All of them have.

With each book I read, I take something from it. Whether it be a new perspective or insight on a given topic or an affirmation of what is known, there is even the occasional “this is bananas” insight. I am always learning something from what I am reading, even the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy offered up some interesting learnings.

So yes, a book, many books, have changed my life mostly because I have most likely learned something new.

M.

Memorable Gift

A large, white soft plushy bear, with a big red bow wrapped around its neck, given to me on Valentine’s Day by Tony Bolzomi, I would say is one of my most memorable gifts. My doorbell rang early one evening and everyone rushed to the door, this was time before cell phones and technology, and there he stood with the big white bear in front of him. “Happy Valentine’s Day!” “This is for you!” My mom was standing right there with me at the door. I grabbed the bear, said thank you, asked who drove him over to my house and then said, ” See you tomorrow” and shut the door. No hug, no peck on the cheek, nothing. I was so embarrassed. Omg! He came to my house! I think we dated for another week and we were over.

That bear was in my room all through my teenage years. When I moved out, I wrapped the bear in plastic so that it would not get covered in dust. To this day, I have the bear. One day I will pass on this special gift to my future grandchild. Yes, the bear skipped my children. Oh well.

Family Tree

How far can you go back in your family tree?

Not to far. My family is very small and getting smaller as the time passes. My mother immigrated to the US when she was young and with that basically leaving all family ties behind. My parents divorced when I was young and all ties were cut with my father’s side of the family. Although, the little that I do know about my father’s side, it would be worth looking into how and why the ended up in America. Being that my family is small, I do cherish it. At times I do not understand how some families squabble over what I consider to be trivial things or even go so far in to stop talking all together. In the end, family are just people and like with any other people in life some you like and some you don’t. That’s just how the tree grows.

First

I am not a fiction reader or writer. I do not care of artistic writing. Today’s prompt was a big challenge for me. Below you will find two poems. The first poem was written by me. I then gave it to my son to read and he took my “infantial,” according to my husband, writing and made some adjustments, improvements really. Lesson learned, incorporate more creative reading and writing into my life. Let me know what your thoughts in the comments.

As always thanks for reading.

Fickle Love

As, I know I am not a our love is a fickle one.

There are moments I really can’t stand you. Such as

6:45 am, as I stand on the roofless train platform or,

as you cover me while I walk up or down the stairs of a subway station.

But there are other times during our relationship in which I don’t mind have you around. Such as

on a warm summer’s night as I lay in bed, the sound you make lulls me to sleep or,

while I sit cozy in my chair reading with a good book.

Hateful moments have arisen to in our relationship too.

Suddenly when you rise up and destroy all that an area or,

Quite the opposite when there has been no sighting of you that for so long that the earth begins to crack.

Rain

——–

Fickle Love – Revised.

sometimes i cant stand you,

when you drench me as I stand on roofless train platforms,

or as I make my way down the avenues of the city,

but our love is a fickle one,

i love you on a warm summer day,

when your gentle serenades lull me to sleep,

or how you comfort me when I read late at night,

suddenly, you act up,

you engulf us with a pure rage,

or vanish without a trace,

until the earth’s surface cracks,

and maybe,

only when we beg and chant,

rain comes back.

Produce Something!

Part Two

Why do I write?

Originally, I started writing this blog because my husband told me to “Produce Something ” during the pandemic. As you know, when the world went into lock down we suddenly had all this extra time on our hands. I was wondering what I could do with my time. My husband and son both play instruments and they spent their pandemic time creating music together but I was stuck. Yes, I was picking up on my reading again but I felt that was not enough. I asked my husband and he turned to me and said “produce something,” “Produce something, anything, it does not matter if its good or bad but just start.” And so, this is how this blog got started.

I was enthusiatic at the beginning but they that wore off quickly, and last year I almost did not write at all. At the beginning of this year, I was even debating on canceling this subscription, but I decided to give it one more try.

So here I am again.

Why do I write? Because, I am actually really enjoying it! Who knew! I do not write with the aspirations of fame or to make money. As I wrote in my original post, I write to share my ideas for discovery, venting, as a hobby and for threapy. I am currently writing everyday because of Bloganuary, and I have started to include audio to some of my posts, which I REALLY enjoy. I am not sure if I am any good at either, but what I do know is that it brings me JOY!

Thanks for reading.

Book Review

Brother’s Keeper by Julie Lee

This is a historical fiction novel set in the time of the Korean War, 1950’s.

Anger, fear, hope, joy, elation, and heartbreak are the range of emotions one will experience while reading Brother’s Keeper. Set in the 1950’s during the Korean War, also known as the forgotten war, it tells a story of a sister and brother’s survival as they are separated from the parents during their escape from the North to the South of Korea. Normally I do not read in the genre of ficiton because I struggle with elaborate detail that some authors tend to use, but Brother’s Keeper is written with just enough detail to create images but not overally done to make one want to skip words or whole sentences. The novel also touches upon Korean traditions, customs and family dynamics. I highly recommend this book as you will learn a bit about the “forgotten war,” culture and at the same time be entertained.