Want Recession-Proof Happiness?
"Worried? Skip to the heart and never miss a beat of happiness."

As our world changes around us, I have been observing how people handle these changes. There is panic in some, general fear in others. But, overall, there seems to be a sadness in those who have known better times, and that’s most of us. Young people are less affected by these circumstances or simply more protected from them, except for those who are job hunting.

Being a problem-solver at heart, I took on the task of figuring out how people could be happy and remain happy in unhappy times. It is my belief that people live better, perform better, and create their futures better when they are happy. So, it seemed a worthy endeavor. Here is what I came up with.

I have found in the various teaching that I have done, whether it’s tennis, art or life, in order to improve, a person must first find a level of harmony that he or she can comfortably function within before that person can improve. This is true whether it’s learning a forehand, painting a portrait or finding a true love. Harmony must be found. This is what we are seeing now with the tremendous down-sizing with families in their living conditions and businesses with their operations. People are seeking that level at which they comfortably function.

The same thing is true with individuals in regard to happiness – the need is to find first a place of harmony. That place, that harmony, is within every person and it is essential that it be found and latched onto. From there happiness can grow. The mind may whirl around trying to find answers to all sorts of discomforts and

inconveniences, but it cannot lead to a sense of calm. Only the heart holds harmony. To dwell in the heart for a short time each day sets things right and reminds one of what is important. The breathing in of this harmony is more than a breath of fresh air. It is a return to one’s essence.

I like the word “essence.” It contains all the references to spiritual matters that we can think of, but it is more tangible. As I take a few moments to rest in the heart each day I think of “essence” in this way:

I am rich because my essence is abundance.
I am happy because my essence is joy.
I am strong because my essence is power.
I am smart because my essence is infinite intelligence.
I am kind because my essence is love.
I am good because my essence is God.

As I lay near death, long ago, I asked for life with all my heart. My prayer was answered. How we consider the gift of life that we have been given determines much. We mustn’t take life for granted. It is everything. Never let a little thing like a recession disturb you or upset your sense of harmony and therefore your state of happiness.

Please, as we go through this “recession” together, be bright, be happy and keep going. Don’t wait for it to be over to be happy. Be happy and its effects on you will be nullified. And, you too will be able to uplift others by your mere presence. It is the most we can do at this time and it is the most needed.

Want More Friends?
"For every friend added to one's heart, more room is made for others."

For every friend added to one's heart, more room is made for others.

In these particularly challenging times, friends come in handy more than ever. We need them. We want them. We can hardly do without them, and they need us. The more the merrier.

Working in a store daily, I have the opportunity to make and create new friends all the time. But this is a unique situation. Not everyone has access to fresh faces. They see the same faces daily -- a few co-workers and a few family members. But whether you see new faces or familiar faces, they are faces of friends, or at least potential friends. Everyone fits that bill.

The importance of expanding one's circle of friends cannot be overlooked. Personal connections, no matter how remote, are the way of the future. The computer cannot help if your car breaks down and you need a lift. When you need a haircut, it is useful to have a friend who is handy with a pair of scissors. A little graphic design help is real help if you are not Photoshop savvy. The list goes on. There is no amount of help by you or for you that cannot help. And, that, it seems to me, is what we're here to do.

It's fun to help -- move a friend, introduce a friend who needs a sweetheart, give some of your stuff away, help clean a rug or put up a screen door. We're turning into a sharing caring society. With less funds to buy everything we need or want, friends can be the best assets we have.

In truth, friends are our life-lines. They sustain us when things get rough. They encourage us. They share their insights, experiences and wisdom. They sit us down and talk to us. They listen.

As loved ones move in and out of our lives, friends remain present. They are our true loved ones, because there are no strings attached to their loyalty. These loved ones can be family members or not, but they are worth every effort to keep
them close.

Our life-lines are our love-lines, our friend-lines. Cultivate many. Share them with others. Develop your friendliness skills. It's so easy -- be a friend first. You never know who might need you.

Want Cary Grant's Secret To Romance
"Live in love and life will take care of itself."

Cary Grant, one of Hollywood's all-time most popular and romantic leading men, had a secret. It is a secret that we could all benefit from, especially our present Hollywoodstars, as well as the men in our own lives.

The name Cary Grant, then and today, is synonymous with elegance, charm, good looks, desirability, grace, style, and, of course, romance. There was nothing about Cary that didn't ooze with perfection - his movements, his speech, his gestures. He was subtle and delicious whether he was carrying a gun or a beautiful damsel. His leading ladies may have brought out the best in him, but more likely, it was he that brought out the best in them. There was Grace Kelly, Deborah Kerr, Ingrid Bergman, Katharine Hepburn, Eva Marie Saint, Sophia Loren, Gina Lollobridgida, Leslie Caron, Mae West, and many more.

These were the stars of the 40's and 50's, but Cary's romantic aura is timeless. As is his secret.

I grew up in those times and as all young girls do, I fell in love with movie heart throbs of which Cary Grant was the ultimate. Then one day while watching the film, NORTH BY NORTHWEST, an Alfred Hitchcock thriller starring Cary, I found myself in the arms of this great lover. Actually, I was in his hands. As I watched the movie, during a scene in which Cary jumped into a taxi and held up a newspaper, I found that my picture was on the back of the newspaper! I was beside myself. Cary Grant and me!

How it came about is that I was playing tennis in a big championship held in South Orange, New Jersey and had been playing against Althea Gibson in the finals. The picture in the paper was from that match.

My film debut lasted about a half a second, but Cary's secret is without time limits. Through the years I have had a special affinity for Cary, no doubt due my being one of his co-stars. I have read articles about him and seen interviews with him on television. In this mass of information his secret is revealed.

It seems that Cary, originally named Archibald Leach, was born into a rather low-class, cockney family in England. He was born on the wrong side of the tracks with the wrong accent. But as he developed his skills at entertaining, he also developed his skills at manifesting.

Now here it is: his great secret! When asked how he became the dashingly debonair Cary Grant, starting as he had from such lowly circumstances. He answered, "I pretended to be what I wanted to be, until I became it!" What a man!

"I pretended...," he said. As most of us know by now, our loyal and efficient subconscious cannot discern the real from the imagined and it obediently fulfills our imaginings. It is very effective as Cary proved. He became the most elegantly romantic man in history with his self-created man-of-the-world persona. An interviewer once announced to him, "Everybody would like to be Cary Grant." He is said to have replied, "So would I!"

Now we can take this secret of his a step further into our own lives and apply the Cary Grant phenomenon to love. One of the greatest secrets to falling in love is being in love. Not just being in love after you fall in love, but being in love first. And, if you don't know how to do this, think of Cary and pretend. You can't imagine what wonderful happenings will happen to your love life when you put yourself in the atmosphere of love.

Good luck! And, do not try to follow my film career as I retired shortly after my film with Cary. No Academy Award for me.

 

 

If You Think You Know What Love Is, Think Again!
"To expand the heart in any direction is a good thing."

Love and the heart are some of my favorite subjects.  I love to see love expressed at any opportunity and by anyone who happens to be expressing it.  I think we all are richer by the love that is released into the world by each and every one of us. 

Love is on my mind lately, as well as in my heart, because of a project I have been working on for sometime.  It involves putting people together, helping people find someone to like or love.  In doing so, various people wander into my gallery and chat about their lives and in many cases the love that is missing in their lives.  These are wonderful people who just might be out of the loop of people and the opportunity of finding a partner.  It might be after a previous partner has moved on in some way.  I try to cheer them up and inspire them to keep a look out, for surely there is someone who equals their desire for a friend or mate.

That's just one kind of love -- people to people.  And then yesterday Mia wandered in.  Mia is a golden doodle of such genuine sweetness no one could miss it.  She is calm and patient and she instinctively knows who loves her.  I love her.  She comes right over to me and leans up against my leg, in a manner that is never aggressive or demanding, waiting for me to rub her neck and tell how wonderful she is.  And I do because she is.  Her owner, Cathy, has taken Mia to be trained for hospital work.  She will be such a help to those who are shut-in and have little opportunity to give and receive love.

Then today a friend sent me an e-mail about an extraordinary Washington state man named Jeff who, through his love and efforts, salvaged an injured baby eagle 10 years ago.  He called her Freedom and spent weeks hand-feeding her and nursing this little bird back to life.  Because of her injuries he knew she could never fly, so he glove trained her and took her to do educational programs at schools. 

Then Jeff was diagnosed with non-hodgkins lymphoma and under went 8 rounds of chemo.  During that time he took Freedom out for walks.  She also showed up in his dreams, seeming to help him fight the cancer.  On the day he was given a clean bill of health he took Freedom out for another walk.  She somehow knew of his triumph.  He said she looked at him and wrapped both her wings around him to where he could feel her wings on his back.  Then she touched his nose with her beak and stared into his eyes.  That was a magic moment for him.

There were many other extraordinary healings involving this bird.  It all came from the love this man had for this bird and this bird's tremendous appreciation in return.  It is a story that one might not believe, but I saw the picture that proved it -- Jeff with his Freedom snuggled up against his chest.

Love in any form is love.  The more the better for the heart and everyone.

 

Could We Have a Better American Idol?
"A Significant Other Is Anyone in Your Pesence"

As our latest American Idol stood on stage, humbly and graciously accepting his title, he revealed his generation's Achilles Heel.  "ME and Adam (the runner-up) decided we would just..."  It went something like that.  But it's the "ME and anybody" that concerns me.  I'm old enough to know and remember that "anyone comes before ME" in a sentence or a thought. 

This phenomenon of "ME first" in colloquial speech is everywhere today.  I've heard it standing in line at a lunch counter.  I've heard it in movies.  I've heard it coming out of the mouths of young people who work in my business.  And, when I correct them, they don't get it.  They don't get the deeper meaning implied, or the civility missing.  Then I stopped correcting these people and just listened to this pattern.  Even yesterday in my gallery an elementary school teacher was saying, "ME and my daughter came to town to..."  Ugh!

Then, as so often happens when one is not expecting it, the answer came.  I flipped on the TV while I was having breakfast.  Not a usual thing, but an unusual thing happened.  There on the screen was a woman, Jean Twenge, explaining this very phenomenon.  She was speaking about her new book THE NARCISSISM EPIDEMIC and it was all about "Generation Me."  I had not known technically there was such a thing.  But, besides being an author, Twenge is a psychology researcher with a Ph.D., a professor and speaker. She had research, statistics, antidotes, and everyday common sense to explain this trend. 

Dr. Twenge spoke of how all this self-centeredness got started, the emphasis in our homes and schools on self-esteem with our children, and the lack of allowing our young to understand where they truly stand in the scheme of things, whatever the scheme.  By giving everyone a trophy in a competition or not grading in school an unrealistic self-image is created, which is sure to be a set-up for failure in the real world.  It is important for us all to know the truth, from small children to adults.  If a child does not excel in sports or mental activities, he or she might be good at being a friend.  And, if he or she wishes to pursue an area in which he or she is not the best, that person can get better through work. 

The other interesting point Jean Twenge made was that there was no evidence to support the previously accepted idea that a high degree of self-esteem or self-importance leads to success in life or even happiness.  Better that each person know their true capabilities and their value to the whole of any group.  And, as far as happiness goes, her suggestion was to emphasize gratitude.  Those who are most grateful around the world seem to be the happiest.

There is so much to this area of study, it is wonderful that it is coming to light.  Our desire to have everything and give everything to our children might just have led us to the economic crisis we find ourselves in.  Now we are doing without, learning to appreciate and enjoy what we have, not moaning over what we do not have.

By Twenge's estimation, we are just about the most narcissistic society on the planet.  I say we need to have a better American Idol, an American Ideal.  That  would be a society that promotes wholesome values -- truthfulness, goodness, kindness, effort, gratitude, selflessness, etc.  Perhaps it could be called "Generation You First."