Tag Archives: gratitude

I Dream in Green!

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“Dream as if you’ll live forever, live as if you’ll die today.”  James Dean

I have been watching Caribbean life, a show on HGTV of people in America, choosing to relocate to various islands in the Caribbean. Oh, how that resonates with my soul. I first visited the Caribbean when at University in the USA. My first Island was the Cayman Islands. My love affair with the Caribbean, began when I was little. We had an old Grundig record/radio player at home. My mum would play Soca/Calypso LP’s. I liked the sound of the people, the carefree living described in the songs. 

When I visited, it was like I was stepping into paradise. I later visited the Bahama’s and other Caribbean Islands on a Royal Caribbean cruise. Eventually got married and lived in Antigua, from where I visited other Islands like Barbados’ St. Kitts and Nevis and Dominica. I lived in Antigua for 5 years before returning to Kenya. I have never gotten the Caribbean out of my system. It is in my blood and I yearn for a time I can go back and live there again. 

This yearning lies deep in the recesses of my soul. In this last year, I have a desire to leave Kenya and go somewhere else. Somewhere where I can re-invent myself. Where I can live on my terms and not have to live by the dictates of others. I envision a time when I can wake up when I choose. When I can earn a living, completely location independent. Working when I feel most productive and not when someone says I should be working. My Angel says I should open a little café wherever I end up living. Pastries and baking are one of my passions. That’s not a bad option, I could run an all pastry baking cafe, and also have my time to myself, to live my best life.

All my dreams sound good, feel good, resonate with my soul. Upon reflection, I realize a few things. Currently, I have two homes, one in Nairobi the capital and one in Mombasa at the coast. In Mombasa, my home is the second row from the beach and ocean. It takes me 3 minutes’ to walk to this lovely beach. My job is one of those I can do remotely and lately, I have been doing it from the confines of my home. This is because of the current lockdown due to COVID. I do mostly logistics and management of resources and people. So in many ways, I am living in a tropical paradise and am pretty much location independent as we speak. I am living my dream.

Lessons to take from this? Well, look around at your current situation, recognize and be grateful for what you have already. Be careful not to look so much into the future that you forget to breathe and live now. Everything looks rosy in the future. Because we dream, and we can manipulate our dreams to look how we want, it is easy to focus on that and not appreciate attention to how you are living now. The present can bog you down and seem heavy, uneventful and not at all exciting. It is easy for us to envision fantasies in the future. The future has not yet come to pass. As the saying goes “the grass is always greener on the other side” in this case this side being the present and the other being the future.

We can paint pictures of what the future will look like. We can envision the location we want which is typically different from our current one. Our limited knowledge of where we want to be allows us to paint glamorous existence to the one we are currently living. In this we have not taken day to day living and the typical struggles found in any location, into consideration.

In retrospect, what I envisioned a while back, months ago, years ago and I look critically at the life am currently living, has come to pas. I wanted it then,worked hard to make it happen and am living that ideal I had in the past. I now want different and feel disatisfied. It is too easy to take life for granted and not stop to appreciate all that is here now. Living in the future is easy, because we can envision living our dreams.

Dreams are not bad, in fact they are necessary, they give us the incentive to strive forward. However, it is just as important to stop and be thankful for what we have. We should stop and recognize that what we are living now was a dream in the past that has come to be our reality. The present is here now, we should appreciate the hardwork it took to get us hear. Pat yourself on the back, you are here in your future, which is now your present. If it is not exactly what we envisioned,then we should work to adjust it accordingly. We should be grateful for it and use it as a springboard to our next set of dreams and aspirations. Remembering always that our situations, could be far worse.

We should be grateful for each and everything around us, good or bad. Grateful because it is either what gives us joy now or teaches us lessons that will be very useful for us tomorrow. Dreaming is good as it allows us to chart our paths for our visions, but we should be careful not to get so caught up in our dreams that we forget to live now. 

Gratitude Series: 1. Attitude

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“Gratitude is a currency that we can mint for ourselves, and spend without fear of bankruptcy.” Fred De Witt Van Amburgh

My friend Gillianne has a great way of being optimistic, no matter her situation. Often, when I am about to start a pity party, I remember her saying that we should always have an “attitude of gratitude”. I take a deep breath and change my attitude. Change it to one of gratitude. Gillianne is also the person who taught me to remember always that “it could be far worse”. Thanks, Chica! I am grateful for you!

“Attitude is defined as the posture, action or disposition, the position as indicating an action, feeling or mood.“

Having an attitude of gratitude means, taking the action of being grateful. It begins with the thought ” this could be far worse” and then a review of all that is around, an appreciation for all that is good 

Sometimes I have had to go below the surface to reach the good, particularly when I feel overwhelmed by my circumstance. However, by grace, I can always find that which I can be thankful for or about. That which I can focus on with a disposition of gratitude.

During this current world situation, we are all facing, I want to truly embrace this attitude of gratitude. I want it to become a part of who I am of how I deal with the pressures of the world. I would like gratitude to be my way of being, my attitude to life!

When I review the last few years of my life, I have certainly come a long way. I live a more positive hopeful existence than I did before. My outlook on life is one of hope. I am now aware that though I cannot control life itself, I can control my outlook to life. My outlook to the life I have allows me to manage any situation I find myself in. I realize that my life is finite. It is not a dress rehearsal, and I cannot trade it with any other person, now would I want to. 

When I look at how blessed my life is, how much I have in this life to be thankful for, I am overwhelmed with gratitude. As time does not stand still nor am I able to turn it back for a redo of my life. It is futile for me to spend any time looking back at what could have been. Looking back with regret. Far better use of my time is to focus on now, with gratitude. For all, I am and have.

I challenge you to do the same, look at your life currently and find one or two things that make you feel truly grateful. Focus on that and somehow even the worst of situations become more palatable. Have an attitude (take action) of gratitude.

Gratitude Series

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gratitude: “quality of being thankful”

noun: the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. The word is derived from the Latin word gratus meaning “pleasing, thankful” (Oxford University Press)

In these trying and troubled times, it is very hard to feel thankful or to show any appreciation at all. All we see is how hard things are and what a difficult time we are experiencing. We cannot give in to the negativity we are currently facing. Consequently, we may be better able to forge forward, by taking the following steps;

  1. Stop and take stock of our lives,
  2. Accept that things may be bad right now and, will more than likely get far worse before they get better.
  3. Make a concerted effort, and dig deep inside of ourselves, searching for any positivity we can find
  4. Concentrate on that positivity we find within ourselves and utilise it to re-align our minds
  5. Focus on all the good in our lives, which subsequently allows us to be grateful.

A good focus in these trying times is by showing gratitude. No matter how bad things get, if we take a keen look within ourselves, in an effort of finding something good, we will find it. Something no matter how small, to be thankful for. Focusing on that thing we are thankful for, will allow us to turn our minds from all the negatives, to the positives in our lives.

This should result in us taking a reprieve from wallowing in the negatives in and around our lives. We must be determined to get above our situations. Look critically and recognize all the good happening around us. Making it easier to overcome our current situations, feel better and have the strength to do better. 

I am making great efforts to refocus my energies from the current negative situation to more positive endeavours. I have come up with different ways to show gratitude, by doing a series of articles focusing on gratitude.

The different gratitude’s I will be speaking of in these series, are not the only ones available. I would challenge you to come up with some of your own, that resonate at the frequency of your soul.

Walk with me as I go through the different posts in my series. Feel free to comment and add your ideas of other ways we can all express gratitude.

Perspective

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“One moment the world is as it is. The next, it is something entirely different. something it has never been before.” Anne Rice, Pandora

Sitting in the patio, at home in the coast. I am surrounded by beautiful gardens full of palm trees, tropical flowers and 30 degrees (Celsius) weather.   I feel blessed, spending quality time with my Angel, listening to music and loving life.  All of this while I work remotely, in this case from the safety of home.

I am settling into quarantine far better than I thought I would. 7 of 14 days of self-quarantine, life has never been so sweet.  I am healthy.  My angel is here in quarantine with me she is the reason for it.  She just returned home from Costa Rica! 

Sadly, the world is in crisis right now with the Covid-19 situation affecting most countries in the world.  Things are dire in many parts of the world, with people losing loved ones, people fighting for their lives. More people are losing their livelihoods. Businesses are shutting down, and most of the worlds’ economies are in a downward spiral.  

Then there is the fear of this virus that is raging through the world.  Forcing nation after nation to shut down, no end in sight.  Knowing, that too that when we get a handle on the virus, we will feel the repercussions of it for years to come.  

What is happening is happening and nothing I can do will stop it or make it go away.  I am concerned, yet grateful. Having a roof over my head, food to eat, and a secure job through this ongoing global pandemic is not something I am taking for granted. 

I will do my part by staying home during quarantine. When the period will ends, continue to maintain social distance. I will do all that has been prescribed, so as not to infect or get infected.  

Let us all be hopeful for a better tomorrow. In the meantime pay attention to what is happening in nature. Look for the silver lining these dark times.

  • The canals of Venice clearing and returning to blue, fish and other water animals returning,
  • the pollution levels in China dropping as a result of the overall confinement of people due to the virus.   
  • I am also sure that parks like Maasai Mara will have a reprieve of the constant year-round human traffic.  
  • the time spent in traffic in cities full of smog emitted by the fuels we burn in our cars.
  • The hours we spend commuting to and from work. Precious hours to spend quality time with families who are home with us now

The world is resetting it seems, and I believe we are getting a second chance to remember what is important; family, quality of life.  The environment seems to be better for the break we are giving it.  A part of me secretly wants the restrictions to continue a little longer. Selfishly I want even more time with my Angel.

Whilst at home, we give mother earth a chance to recover somewhat.  Things may seem dire right now. Depending on the perspective we use to view our current experiences, we can see a lot of good that is coming out of this, not very good situation.

Boyfriends, memories and the tapestry of life!

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We don’t accomplish anything in this life alone…and whatever happens is the result of the whole tapestry of one’s life and all the weavings of individual threads from one to another that creates something.       -Sandra Day O’Connor

A while ago, I happened upon an old boyfriend, actually my very first boy friend, talk about a blast from the past! Anyway in conversing with him, he reminded me of a ritual we used to have whilst we dated back in the day, and it was way way back trust me! Continue reading →

Slipping through my fingers

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Slipping through my fingers all the time
Songwriters:ANDERSSON, BENNY GORAN BROR / ULVAEUS, BJOERN K. / KORTNEV, ALEKSEJ ANATOLEVICH

“…………………………………………..
And a sense of guilt I can’t deny
What happened to the wonderful adventures
The places I had planned for us to go
(slipping through my fingers all the time)
Well, some of that we did but most we didn’t
And why I just don’t know
Slipping through my fingers all the time
I try to capture every minute
the feeling in it
Slipping through my fingers all the time ………”

Life! What a wonderful, wondrous and fragile thing! When we embrace life and choose to live it as the real thing and not as a dress rehearsal, it indeed can be very fulfilling.  I bet most of us no matter what stresses we have in our lives and whatever hardships we are facing can stop for a moment and think that one thought, invoke that one memory that gladden’s our minds and lightens our hearts! We can always be thankful for something no matter how small and no matter how mundane it may seem to others, for us it is just what we need to keep us going!

Life, why am I talking about life? Because we take it for granted, we take living for granted, working for granted, breathing for granted, we become complacent and don’t make much effort to ensure that we are living quality lifestyles surrounded by people who add value to our lives.  We forget that the future is not guaranteed; that each and every minute lived is gone and cannot be returned to do over.  Each and every human encounter is special and unique in that it will never again happen like that; A burst of laughter from the gut rendering us in stitches, or the tears of sorrow or sadness or pain, once they occur they are unique and never to be replicated.

We allow life to slip by us without giving it a second thought without as much as a sideways glance at what we have let slip by and lost, oblivious to what lessons we should have learned from it and what memories we could have cherished. Why this somber mood? I will tell you, I was watching my Angel Tween the other day at the craft table in our house doing some home work where she was required to make a scrap-book about the classic Great Expectations(Charles Dickens).  Every time I tried to ask to help I was silenced with a reproachful look I stalled in my tracks and my speech.  I experienced a bitter-sweet feeling, bitter because she does not need me anymore like she used to and sweet from pride because she is coming into her own my little person and doing an amazing job at being independent.  I felt a sadness as I left the room looking back and saying “I will be in my room if you need me, just ask okay sweetie?” her reply? An absent-minded “sure mum thanks”.  She had already reverted back to her task and I was more a hindrance than a help.

Life slips by every moment, every day, every week month and year. It slips by whether we like it or not, whether we are present or absent it slips by. Yesterday I thought life would go a certain way, today I look back and see how many wasted moments I had and I am determined not to waste anymore time.  I am living with determination and purpose, without remorse or apologies; I am living every moment because that moment is the very last till the next one.  I am embracing life and all the experiences around me.  I am hugging my Angel Tween when the urge hits me, and making no apologies, luckily I raised her with enough good manners to humor me as I smother her with yet another hug just because.  My friends, don’t waste another moment, with your friends and loved ones, don’t waste any more time with life.  We only have one life, let us live it before it slips through our fingers never to return.