a lazy saturday at home...

a little sneak peak of what is sitting in front of me right now....



i came down with a yucky virus a few days ago after running my body through the ringer, I'm notorious at pushing my body without giving it any rest, so joe and I have spent the entire day at home lazing around on the couch today. it's been exactly what I needed. we woke up around 8, no rushing off to the gym our out the door for my usual saturday morning run. In fact we moved from one resting spot to the next! Had some peanut butter and banana toast for breakfast and then took a nap until about 10:30. I've spent the rest of the day reading a book I have been wanting to read for a long time...The Essential Rumi---a book of poetry by a persian poet. I got inspired to bust out the paints that Joe gave me as part of my bday present and did a little doodling in my journal.

unfortunately joe threw his back out yesterday, so we are a sickly and injured lot, but it has given us the excuse to be absolute lazy bums today which I can't complain about.

a couple of recent meals made with my love...

Summer linguini with squash, zucchini, tomatoes, and olives.

Our very own peanut sauce. We call it Mr. Peanut goes to Thailand. Chicken Pad Thai.

Joe's specialty and now mine too!! Homemade pizza! I made the right side and Joe made the right side.

just feeling grateful...

Just finished reading a great book called My Stroke of Insight by a woman named Jill Bolte Taylor. I first heard of this lady from my sister when she recommended I look at a blog posting by John Mayer with you tube footage of a woman talking about her experience surviving a stroke. Then just a couple of weeks ago I was listening to NPR at work and Terry Gross, the host of one of my favorite NPR programs, Fresh Air was interviewing the same woman. I told my boss about the program and she enjoyed it so much that she went out and bought Ms. Taylor's book. When she finished reading she passed it along to me.

Taylor gave some really great insight into the way our brains work. Although I do not have any in depth understanding our our brains, after finishing this book I realize just how much I take for granted the amazing functions that my body and brain carry out each day, each hour, each second. After reading about Taylor's experience, I can't help but feel incredibly lucky to function as normally as I do each day....I can express myself with language, I can read, I can understand other's attempts to communicate, I can call on the thousands of files in my brains to make sense of the world around me.

In addition to a detailed walk through of her recollection of her experience during her stroke, Taylor offers some great life advice at the end of the book---the lessons that she has learned as a result of her experience. She talks about choosing everyday the way that she will react to the things that happen to her. She talks about choosing emotions of compassion and gratitude over emotions of anger and general unhappiness.

I kind of consider myself to be on an ongoing quest for happiness and fulfillment and so much of what Taylor had to say resonated with my efforts to develop an inner peace in my life. Not that I am unhappy with my life right now, but I do feel as though I still take a lot for granted and have a lot to learn in shifting my life attitudes to fully appreciate all the beauty that surrounds me every day.

another year of life :)

yay it's friday and to make it even better it's my birthday AND on top of that there are all sorts of fun things going on today....

I just got back from my 5:30 am birthday run, (couldn't get a better start to the day :) in my opinion) and then a short walk by the ocean...very refreshing and calming.

I'm off to work with a chai tea in hand for just a 3 hour work day and a birthday bash with my co-workers who are such wonderful people!!!

Then it's off to the airport with my love to fly to san diego for another wedding and before that a bday bbq at the Ford Ranch. Who could ask for more...a run, chai tea, bday office bashes, and then my best friends, family and boyfriend all together at the ford ranch/vineyard!!!

it's a good start to year 26.

happy weekened everyone!

p.s. I plan on doing lots of journaling with a chai tea by my side this afternoon at the airport...bit of an annual tradition for myself on my bday to journal about the past year and to set goals for the upcoming one...can't wait!! perhaps i'll post some snippets when i return!

forgiveness

i'm thinking about forgiveness this morning.

recently, i feel like I've lost a bunch of brain cells or something because I have just been a bit careless and to put it bluntly, plain old dumb lately.

i got my car towed in san francisco last weekend and have been making some careless mistakes at work.

i have a tendency to expect perfection from myself and when something goes astray from my desire for perfection, i am affected by it.

in keeping with my last blog about creating and sending out positive energy, i am deciding to attempt to forgive myself for being human.

i will not allow the fear of making a mistake rule my days and simultaneously i will not allow the guilt of having made a mistake to steal my opportunities for joy each day.

i am a human being, i will inevitably make mistakes, but i will learn to forgive myself for those mistakes and know that in making mistakes I am no less of a good person. I will remind myself that I am trying, I am putting forth my best effort and I cannot be faulted for tha.

I will have faith that through mistakes and occasional wrong turns, I am learning and growing into a stronger and more knowledgeable being.

fake it till you feel it...

i credit my college basketball coach for this quote. she used to tell us to fake it till we felt it on days when we were tired or not feeling completely inspired to give our all. i think that saying this was one of her ways of encouraging us to think positively and to attempt to always to make the most of our time together at practice.

today this is what i am telling myself as I am getting ready to go to work. i must be hitting the 6 month slump because i have actually been dreading work a little bit.

i decided last week though, that instead of harboring these negative emotions, i need to dedicate myself to changing my attitude. i need to count my blessings instead of focusing on the negative.

and so i started this morning...my alarm went off at 5:55 am and for the five extra minutes that i was in bed gradually coming back from the world of sleep, i repeated to myself positive things that I would do and feel today.

i am thankful for my health.
i am thankful to have a place to work.
i will believe in my abilities to learn, apply my learning and face challenges.
i will breathe deeply and take each moment in.
i will find joy, no matter how small through out my day.
i will delight in the company of my co workers.
i will smile.
i will be confident in myself.

good end to a long week...

one of my favorite moments of the week is at 5pm on Friday afternoon. The moment I am officially free from the routine of the work week and have an entire weekend of whatever my little heart desires ahead of me.

this week the moment was a little bit disappointing, friday was a really busy day at work and I was frusterated because I wasn't able to figure out couple of things my boss was asking for. Instead of leaving with a light heart, my heart felt a little heavy and my spirits felt a little down.

i reallly want to be good at whatever I am doing and help the people I am working with, but sometimes I have a hard time really giving something my all when I am not completely excited about the project. I was working on mailing lists for my boss on Friday and as much as I love my boss, I just can't get excited about mailing lists, and to be quite frank some of the menial tasks I do at work have been starting to wear on my spirit a bit.

i am working really hard mentally to try to have a better attitude and to be grateful everyday for the blessing of having a job and what's more than that a job where I work with intelligent people in an interesting place....but I just can't help getting down some days thinking that there must be something else more fulfilling out there and not being quite sure how to get to it yet.

when i walked in the door of my apartment on friday night, this is what I saw....

Joe and I went to an orchid farm last weekend and before that I had been ooohing and aaaahing at orchids that we would see. So when I got home, Joe had gone out and bought the most beautiful purple orchid for us. Maybe this will be the first of the many orchids we hope to have in our garden one day.