The Desiderata

The Desiderata is a poem by Max Ehrmann that is believed to have come out in the 1920s. Desiderata means "things that are desired".  It is a list of life lessons condensed into one place.  I have a small version of it on my desk at work. I leave it out where the customers can see it while they wait.   I have a larger one at home.   I find something beautiful in it every time I look.   If you have not already read it, I think every one should. 


Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be critical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be careful. Strive to be happy.

Dealing With Inappropriate Touching

Some people have no boundaries. Others are just trying to push those boundaries. The result is often the same. You end up with some one's hand somewhere you do not want it to be; somewhere that makes you uncomfortable.

This is a common problem for pregnant women. Strangers come up and put their hands on the baby bump oohing and ahhing over how wonderful it is. It becomes as though any baby is public property; even before they leave your womb.

Where you are and what the circumstances are do have a lot to do with how you can or should react.  First, you do not have to put up with any one putting their hands on you.  If possible, you can simply step back.  You could smile politely and say, "I am sorry. Have we met?". Should that not work, give them a dirty look or a regal one down your nose and say something along the lines of "I have not given you permission to touch me" or "Would you like it if a complete stranger walked up and started rubbing your belly?"

People also experience this in clubs. Let me paint a scenario for you. You are a young woman hanging out at the club and a man comes up and cozies up against you and puts his hand on your hip or butt. Maybe you are completely against this. Maybe you find the guy interesting but are not comfortable with that level of intimacy yet.

If you are interested but just not quite to that level, you can pick up his hand and hold it in your own.  This indicates that he should not put his hand there but it also says that you are interested.  You should smile as you do this.

If you are not interested, simply remove his hand with a pointed look or step back away from it.

Always try the quiet option first. This lets you avoid escalating things but if that does not work, I would feel free to glare and demand that they release you.  You are not required to allow anyone to touch you no matter how innocuous it seems.

How To Build A Fire--Things Every Goddess Should Know

Building a fire is one of those life experiences that you generally get to pick. You can choose to go camping. You can choose to have a fireplace.  It is also one of those things that can come in handy when you least expect it.  There have been a lot of bad storms these past few years--hurricanes, snow storms, tornadoes. You may find yourself without power and needing to start a fire to keep warm or cook food. You may never find yourself in this position but a little knowledge is not a bad thing.

So here it is, the Things Every Goddess Should Know guide to making a fire that will catch and burn.

 First, you will need some kindling, some paper you can burn, some logs and either a match or a lighter. I like the long necked lighter that you just pull the little trigger. You want to make sure the wood is not wet. Wet wood smokes more than it burns and will not make much flame or heat.

Crunch some paper into a few small balls--about four should do it. Arrange the paper on the bottom of the fireplace. Put a little pile of kindling on top of this pile of paper. (Kindling is just a fancy way of saying you want a lot of twigs or tiny branches.)  Now take two or three logs. Arrange the logs so they are leaning against each other forming a little triangle or tepee over the kindling.  You want to make sure there is room for air to flow freely around the logs. Next make sure your vent is fully open. You will need the circulating air to get the fire going.

Light the paper and wait for it to catch the kindling.  The paper will light quickly. The kindling a little more slowly. The kindling will then help the logs to catch. Once the logs catch, you will start to see a decent sized fire.  Give it a little time for the fire to heat up before closing the flue.  If you close the vent and the fire starts to go right out, open it back up some and wait a few more minutes. You will get a sense of how long this takes for your fireplace once you have done it a few times. Once the fire is hot enough, you can close the vent all the way.  You will need to add another log about every hour or so to keep the fire going.

If you want, you can just let the fire burn out in the fireplace. If you want to try to save the coals to start another fire later, you will want to do something called banking the fire.

Wait until the fire has burned down to a layer of hot pieces of wood that look like coal burning. Push it together and cover it with a thick layer of ash. Keep the vent closed. In the morning, you can push the ash gently aside and you should find some coals still burning. Add some logs, open the vent and it should flare up. If necessary, throw a little more paper in there.  And voila, fire.

Finding the Gratitude

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving here in the United States. If you are like most of us, you will spend it with a large gathering of friends and/or family. This is a great time to catch up and spend time together.  You will probably be presented with large quantities of food; maybe watch some football.

I hope you take the time to be grateful for the things you have.

The holidays can be hectic. You may find yourself traveling around from family to family, event to event. Perhaps you are the one hosting and you have hours of cooking and cleaning to do. Do not let the stress or hectic pace make you forget to take a few minutes to be grateful for all that's good in your life.

No one's life is perfect. We all have complaints. It is easy to sit around and focus on what is wrong with our lives. This holiday is all about taking the time to be grateful for what you have.

Sit down and think about all the wonderful things in your life. Take a few minutes and be grateful.  Do you have a wonderful spouse? Beautiful children? A roof over your head and food on your table?

If you stop and appreciate what you do have, you will be happier for it. So smile, say thank you for the things in your life and eat up.

Happy Thanksgiving! 

"No" is a complete sentence.

We women often have a hard time saying no. We feel guilty about not agreeing to everything we are asked. This is true even if we are running around crazy trying to accomplish the things already on our lists. Yet we still hesitate to say no.

No is not a swear word. It is not an insult. It is also not a negotiation.   Do not let someone try to turn your no into a maybe.  "No" or "No, Thank you" or even "We have other plans" are all you need to say.  Do not try to explain yourself. It just gives people a chance to talk you into doing what they want.

For example,  "Can you come to our picnic?"
 "No I am sorry I can not make it"  
"Why not?"
"Well I have to take Junior to the shop for school clothes."
"You can do that tomorrow after work."
"Well tomorrow I have to work on an important presentation."
"You don't need all day for that."

You get the idea.

This is true of many things.  Learn to say No and stick to it.  Do not let anyone make you feel guilty for not falling in with their plans.  They can not know what your day is like or how you are feeling. Smile, say No or No Thank you and move on.

If someone persists, you must persist as well until they have gotten used to accepting your no. After all, it is a perfectly acceptable answer.

Making Your Password More Secure Yet Easy To Remember

Welcome to the digital age. We have access to an unprecedented level of electronic conveniences. We can bank on our phones and check directions without looking at a map. We also have dozens of different sites asking us to come up with passwords.

If you use the same password for everything, you can remember it but it's not secure. All someone has to do is figure out your password for that seemingly unimportant site. Suddenly they can access all your sites. If you use different passwords for everything, you have to remember them all. You can't write them down because someone could find it.

I want to pass on some great advice I got on how to come up with a more secure password.  First, never use one of the most common passwords. These include God, password, password1, 123456, iloveyou, and welcome.

Second, you should have a password of at least eight characters. You should also include one capital letter, one lower case letter, one number and one special character.  You should have a unique password for every site you go on. I know this sounds complicated but we are going to simplify it.

First pick two words you can easily remember that go well together and are at least eight letters total.  For this example, we are going to use "hot coffee".  Take your base phrase and add a capital letter. Do not make it the first letter.  For example, "hot coffee" becomes "hoTcoffee".

Now replace one of the letters with a symbol of your choice.  So "hoTcoffee" becomes "h@Tcoffee".  Now replace one digit with a number of your choice. Now "h@Tcoffee" becomes "h@Tcoff3e".   This becomes your base password for everything. This is the only thing you need to remember; just "h@Tcoff3e".

We are not quite done yet. 

Next we are going to make it unique for every website.  You decide that for every website you go on, you will always look at the second and third digit (or first and fourth etc you decide).  For this example, we will use second and third letters of Amazon.com.  That would be "m" and "a".  Stick those two letters right in between your two word phrase. "h@Tcoff3e" becomes  "h@Tmacoff3e".  Now you go to visit Pinterest.com and your password becomes "h@Tincoff3e" because the second and third letters of the website name are "i" and "n".

Set up your basic rule and stick to it.  If you run into a website that won't let you use a special character then just plug whatever letter the word originally called for, right back in.  Soon you will find yourself automatically entering the password just by glancing up at the website address. No password is perfect but this is a big step up from "password1".  And all from hot coffee.

Proof They Love You

As women, we often look at our significant others and try to convince ourselves, "They don't love me anymore."   The excitement and romance of those first few months or years has worn off and it's just not the same.  Before you break your own heart, take another look.

It's normal for things to cool off when you have been together awhile. The heart and mind can not exist in a perpetual state of heightened excitement. You find yourselves falling into patterns.

A pattern is not the same as a rut.

By all means, shake things up a little now and then by trying something new. You can have a date night, go for a spontaneous ride, try a new recipe together; just don't assume the romance is over.

Some people are good about saying, "I love you."  Others are not. Some times we look at the lack of grand romantic gestures and the lack of declarations of love as proof that they don't love as anymore.

Not so fast. Let's just try something before you make any decisions.

Instead of looking for proof that they don't love you--"They never say it anymore." or "They never notice when I dress up."--look for proof that they do.

My husband always puts an extra blanket on me if he gets up before I do in the morning. He does this because he knows I am always cold and because he loves me.  As I was working on this post, he brought me a water because he knows I like to drink at least eight glasses of a day and because he loves me.

Does yours kill spiders for you? Do they change the oil or clean the snow off your car? Do they rub your back when you have trouble sleeping or take the kids outside when you have a headache?  It is because they love you. Before you make any decisions or tell yourself any stories, look for the little things they do just because they love you. You might just be surprised by what you see.