Dear Reader:

A couple of weeks ago Honey sent me a 2021 New Year’s Calendar…as a donation and tribute to a local artist she knows. I was so appreciative of this gift… since my goal this year is to get everyone’s (immediate and extended family) birthday written down…I, admittedly, can no longer rely on my memory …or lack of…:)

As I browsed through all the different holidays and commemorative events printed on each month’s pages along with the artists’s beautiful works…I realized that something David Nurse had written in a recent newsletter (that pops up on my email) was true.

The one “elusive” missing day on each month… of every page… of a twelve-month calendar (that will never be found) is SOMEDAY.

Shh! It’s a secret but if you want to find SOMEDAY… you need to start TODAY!

The reason we keep putting off starting the climb to our own Mt. Everest mountain of a personal goal is that we fear we don’t have what it takes to complete the journey to the summit and finally achieve a life dream. We don’t want to face the possibility of a life dream shattered by one wrong move or footstep.

Over time this dream turns into a nightmare that ends in failure repeatedly…the mountain grows taller while we grow smaller.

What Nurse points out is that human nature is more comfortable with mundane “do-able” tasks in life. We fear climbing outside our comfort zones so much we convince ourselves to settle for a mediocrity of happiness over an abundance of joy forever.

It all has to do with our limited perception….we don’t realize that our personal “Mt. Everest” of a problem pales in comparison to larger goals and tasks facing others. It makes our own dream feel more minute and do-able with this knowledge.

Take for example- the peak of Mt. Everest (the Holy Grail of mountains) is 29,029 feet. The most massive mountain on earth…but if you lived on Mars and compared Mt. Everest to Olympus Mons…a mountainous volcano that is the perimeter of the state of Arizona and three time taller than Mt. Everest…(69,841 feet…known as the largest mountain in the solar system) your perspective would quickly change.

Mt. Everest doesn’t seem as daunting now in comparison…and that is the way it is in life…a problem in your life might seem improbably mammoth….but to another…they would gladly take our problem and trade “in a skinny minute.”

The best way to get a handle on daily problems or even life goals is to communicate with others about their problems and goals…I guarantee you the open channel of communication will leave you grateful for the problems you have.

I always felt this way and then witnessed it up close and personal (on many different occasions) when I went in for a chemo session. I would watch a young mother come in bringing her two-year-old toddler (because she couldn’t afford a babysitter) to play at her feet or color while chemo was being filtered into her. She would apologize to the room saying her husband had to take on an extra job to try to keep afloat of the medical bills.

(*I am happy to say we all felt so badly for this young mother…we immediately went rummaging through our pocketbooks for pieces of candy or a pad of paper to draw on….play a game with pennies…anything to help the mother out.)

…Or a teacher running in on her lunch break for her chemo session while another teacher watched an afternoon class for her so she wouldn’t lose her job along with her medical benefits.

So until tomorrow…

If you want to find that elusive SOMEDAY on the calendar…write the word “Someday” on everyday of the year…and then work towards your lifetime goal every single day.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

And speaking of Winnie….Mandy says “Winnie is a mess, always into something and very hard to find because of her minute size…BUT her one saving grace is that she is just so darn cute!!! 🙂

Libby shared with me some wonderful words of wisdom after she started losing her parents, suddenly her husband, and other extended family members…aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.

I love her thought process.

“My personal mantra when I started losing those I loved was …I had a choice….

1. Make  their death a “Monument to Misery” or
2. Make their lives a “Legacy of Love.”

I chose the Legacy. It isn’t an instant shift to Legacy of Love, due to grief, but a goal to work toward….”

***A Fun Surprise….Anne came over with the frame she just finished making for her “Big Red” (geranium) painting  that she completed (for me) before Christmas!

I, also, added Beverly Parkinson’s talented original 3-D note cards she made me of “Big Red” on two separate birthdays…so now the whole shelf is a tribute in itself ….my Happy Room just got permanently happier! 🙂