Impressions of one another

Hey guys! I hope that you're all doing very well indeed!

Very recently, I had a discussion with a friend of mine about one of the cons of knowing someone for
a long time and that's that sometimes if you change, that isn't really taken into account or fully accepted by someone who's known you for a long time. This isn't always consciously done at all but when you're stuck in a way of doing something for a long time, it can easily become the image that is associated with you and that's hard to shake off.

It can sometimes be that you're childhood friends and that when you mature it can be kind of odd to realise as someone looking in from the outside as someone's who's been there but who hasn't undergone the changes. It can feel like people are always going to stay the way that they are but it's always important to be present and to treat people with respect and dignity, especially if they're trying to break a habit that's been with them for years and become a different person to the one everyone knows.

Sometimes it's not always even necessarily that you're unhappy with the way that people know you, you've just made even more improvements to make yourself an even better person and you want other people to know that.

In this way, it's always important to be present and to be aware of the person that you're connecting with today because we're all ongoing projects and we're all changing, for better or for worse. We should always treat the person that we meet and treat them with respect.

It is important to be wary, having said that, that we always do so because not everyone in the world is open minded and therefore to make sure we don't hurt other people we treat everyone in the best way possible.

Thank you so much for listening guys! I hope you have a wonderful time doing what you're doing what you're doing and I'll speak to you very soon indeed!

Gratitude and Happiness

Hey guys!

I hope that you've all been well, it's been a while!

Today, I read this blog post from Marc and Angel who I love to read because their posts are always about life truths that can really change your life. They're simply and utterly amazing.

What it reminded me about was the fact that being thankful for everything that you have can make you such a happy person. This is often because you can find ways of taking the goods from what could be on the surface a bad situation and it can leave you feeling so much more fulfilled because you've taken from it rather than let it take from you. It's wonderful!

Being thankful also makes you happy because it makes you realise that you have so much right in this moment. For many of us, we take a lot of things for granted and only stop to be thankful when those things are taken away from us. This can include our health as well as our wealth but also the people that we have around us.

It's become so important to me to try and be thankful today, in the now, because quite often things we have today can become things we had, like friendships or any close friends. People can slip through our fingers because we're too busy looking the other way or worrying when there's so much now to see and be thankful for. Here and now. Not yesterday, not a week ago, not tomorrow either. Now.

So, I challenge you, stop for five minutes everyday and just be thankful for what you have and what's happened to you today. You wouldn't believe how much a bit of reflection can add to your joy and leave you feeling so much more content than you could've believed to be possible. I've tried to do this by both daily journaling as well as daily blogging on my side Tumblr blog everyday through summer. If that's something you'd be interested in reading, please do go and check it out! I would encourage you to do the same, even if it's an appreciation tweet or just a moment out of your day when you become truly present.

It makes all the difference.

I hope that you all have a wonderful time doing what you're doing and I hope to speak to you very soon indeed!

What is Love?

Hey guys! I hope that you're very well indeed!

So today, I got drawn into watching even more Soul Pancake videos, particularly this one entitled 'What is Love?' which I absolutely loved. What I love about this kind of video by Soul Pancake is that they don't ever script their videos, or that's the impression you get, but they ask people of many races and cultures and ages and genders and it makes all the difference. It makes it feel so authentic and if you get the time, I would highly recommend you watch the video!
What is Love?

For today though, I'd like to explore some of the answers that the people gave in the video when asked the question 'What is Love?'

When watching the video, the one that stood out for me as the one I resonated the most with was

'I've been married 55 years and our main job is to look after each other and see to it that we are our best selves, so to speak.... To me, that's love!'

This really spoke to me and what I believe in because like what some of the other people said, love is also about accepting the other person for who they are, it's a two way street, it's about doing things that you wouldn't normally do because you want the other person to be happy. But it's not just about accepting another person, for me it's what the man said, it's all about helping each other up and being a mirror for the other person to show them their beauty and their flaws but to help them improve and become even better.

A man even gave a definition where he said; 'The condition or the state where the happiness of another is essential to one's own'  and that too spoke to me.

Quite often, we, like the people in the video talk about love and loving other people but we don't always explore what that means for us. We don't talk about what it means if we truly love someone and how that affects how we act and how we feel. We don't always realise the meaning behind our words and the weight of the concepts of which we speak. It's not something easy to do but with reflection, we can achieve so much more.

On a final note, another idea I loved from this video was, if you consider anyone like you're family, like your own flesh and blood and as close to you as that, that's love. In many ways I love this because it means accepting someone as like you and as part of you and your story and your world. You can't choose your family but in this sense, you can. You can choose who makes up the fabric of your world and who you would stretch yourself for to make sure that they're happy. You have that choice.

I hope that you guys find this video as inspiring and thought provoking as I have! It's less than five minutes long, I'd definitely encourage you to watch it!

Have a wonderful time doing what you're doing and I'll speak to you very soon indeed!

The Book of Life - Loved it

Hey guys! I hope that you're all well!

So today, on a friend's recommendation, I watched The Book of Life and it was incredibly beautiful for a number of reasons. Before I begin, here's the synopsis of the film to give it some context :)

'Manolo, a young man who is torn between fulfilling the expectations of his family and following his heart, embarks on an adventure that spans three fantastic worlds where he must face his greatest fears.'

From here on, I'm going to tell you what I loved about this film and I will warn you from here that there are spoilers - I tried to signpost them all but it got a little ridiculous so I'll just warn you from now - SPOILERS AHEAD! :)

The first thing I loved was the fact that Manolo, the main character, follows what he wants to do fully. When it comes down to it, he follows what he believes to be right and doesn't use brute force and doesn't kill the bull though that's what his family has traditionally done for generations. He also finds out that no-one before him in his family has followed their passion for singing but went on to become bull fighters as all of their family were. The fact that he follows his passion and does the right thing ignites the spark in his own family and in his best friend, Joaquin to be selfless and honest is what I love. He uses his own strengths in both singing and in bullfighting to do what he feels he should do and to win because he is right and not because he's somehow cheating.

This theme is also explored because both Joaquin and Manolo are in love with Maria and the three of them make up what is very similar to the Three Musketeers. Both Joaquin and Manolo try and impress Maria but what I love about Manolo and why I think he does end up with Maria is because he takes her as she is and enhances her independence in comparison to Joaquin. She loves to fence, is also very good at kung fu and also spurs the town of San Angel where they all live, to stand up and defend the town they love so much. Manolo dances with her to defeat the evil pirate guy who wants to destroy their town and in doing so, they both fight him together. Joaquin when trying to impress Maria, accidentally falls into the trap of telling her that she should be someone who's the stereotypical housewife - evidently not a role that fits for her.

What I did love about how Joaquin grows as a character is the fact that at the end, Manolo goes into the town's largest ringing bell which had fallen from its place and which covers himself and the evil pirate as the evil pirate detonates many bombs all at once. Manolo in fact, survives because he was given a special green medal that the evil pirate wanted from Joaquin which grants the wearer the ability to not be hurt by anything and therefore everlasting life. This therefore means that in doing the selfless act, he survives but what we also find out is that Joaquin was going to go in too and that he was willing to sacrifice himself without the medal for the good of the town.

Manolo with his honesty and bravery was able to light the spark in Joaquin to encourage him to be brave ('never surrender!') and to do the right thing, even if meant danger for him. I think that's what I really loved about this film.

If you guys do get the time, I would highly recommend watching it! It's also immensely humourous and I'm sure that you'll enjoy it :D

I hope you all have a wonderful time doing what you're doing and I'll speak to you very soon indeed!

The Serenity Prayer

Hey guys! I hope that you're well!

This post was inspired by this lovely little youtuber here whose video about Giving Up Power has inspired this post, in part :)

In this video, Liz talks about what is known as The Serenity Prayer which at a glance, I thought I'd never heard of but I'm sure we all have at some point in our lives:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

The courage to change the things I can,

And the wisdom to know the difference.

What Liz talks about in her video is the fact that all of the things mentioned take courage.

You always need courage to be able to accept that some battles, no matter how fiercely you want to win them, that you have to back down and just them be the way they are. I think that this is immensely important because you can come to so much peace within your life when you stop trying to go against the current, which I believe is a topic I've discussed before. 

Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between battles worth fighting and battles that don't need to happen and where surrender is the best course of action but having the courage to look within yourself and without to search for the truth, no matter how hard it is to accept which in my current life situation, is definitely advice I need to take myself.

For me, distinguishing between circumstances around me that I believe are good for me and that don't need to change as well as recognising factors that are influencing my life more than I might expect is pretty hard. Life is never really black or white but what I'm learning in the most clumsy way possible, is that you've got to try and get the best that you can out of the life that you have and of the cards that you're dealt.

To everyone, you're a human being. That pretty much entails being flawed. 

Immensely so.

So don't be so hard on yourself, it's hard to know when to do things and when not to but just so long as you're ready to accept the consequences of your actions and you know that you've settled it within yourself, don't worry. 

And if you're not doing what you know to be right, maybe think again because you may not have the chance to put it right if you leave it much longer.

I hope that you guys enjoyed this post! Have a most wonderful time doing what you're doing and I hope to speak to you very soon indeed!

p.s. I'm sorry about the dodgy formatting, copying and pasting here doesn't work out too well :(

A Trick of the Mirror - You

Hey guys! I hope that you're all fine and dandy!

So today, I've been inspired by this little beautiful video by Dottie James aka thisbedottie on YouTube. Before I delve into why I absolutely loved this video, Dottie makes awesomely beautiful poetic videos, usually no longer than two minutes long but that are packed full of wonder and stories and imagination. She conveys meaning without feeling heavy and makes you think in an entirely different way. Definitely worth a look if you've got a spare few moments!

So onto this video - A Trick of the Mirror.

I loved this video because it explores the opinion that you are not your physical being, you can't express your determination completely in the colour of your hair or your passion for the extraordinary in an eyeliner wing, to quote the video.

The most truest expression of yourself and reflection of who you are, comes from what you put out to the world. It comes from, the impact you have on the people around you, from siblings that you love to tease, to friends that you try and make laugh and cheer up, to the creative stuff that you put out. Your stories and your imagination and your art. Those will always better represent you and who you are compared to your physical qualities.

Having said that, you can express yourself through tattoos and through other forms of self expression that visibly manifest and these can bring you closer to showing the world and sharing with the world who you are.

I absolutely loved this video because I think it brought me right back down to earth and to the reality of how things are in many ways. There are many things that you can't change about yourself but that doesn't necessarily mean they shape who you are and represent your personality and who you are from the inside. It's what you choose to put out to the world and who you choose to be to the people around you that shows your true colours. And that's what ultimately matters and what you should keep in mind.

I hope that you guys enjoyed this post! I'd love to hear what you think :) Have a wonderful time doing what you're doing and I hope to speak to you very soon indeed!

What Does It Mean To Be Human?

Hey guys! I hope that you're all well!

Today, I've been inspired to make time to blog from this video which I would thoroughly recommend you go and watch. It's ten minutes of mindfulness, KABOOMS, 'soul-stirring' stuff as a friend of mine left in the comments and in a different light, some well and truly beautiful editing.

John Green inspired this video with his video and talked about the fact that being human isn't really something we can define because often by trying to define what it means to be human, we cut off part of mankind like those who are less fortunate than us in different ways. If we say that communication is what makes us human, what about those of us who are unable to read and write? What about those of us who aren't blessed by the ability to hear or to see or to talk? Are they somehow less human than the rest of us?

The conclusion that John comes to which I find so beautiful is that we're human because of our empathy and our belief in each other's humanness and being. At the same time, this means that perhaps being human is something that we kind of have to aspire to because being that kind and empathetic towards those around us isn't always something that we do and therefore we should always try and become better.

So before I start on the video this post is therefore inspired by, I'd like to say to John, I agree with what you're saying! Quite often, we wouldn't know if we were right or wrong without someone else to help us to understand that and therefore we cannot quite become ourselves without learning from other people and that's incredible! Thank you for your video!

So onto the video this post is inspired by. This video talks about how being human isn't really something that should be defined because we're all so different and yet we're all still human. We don't somehow stop being human because we don't conform to society or to the expectations that we create by trying to describe what it's supposed to be like being human. Just by being, we form a part of humanity and what it means to be as a collective consciousness and just being part of creation in general and that is so powerful in itself.

We have the choice to be however we want to be, how we are human and how we express that being within us. We all have dark and light within us but we are able to shape how that expresses itself outside and how that makes us our version of human. The fact that we're aware of ourselves and the fact that we have that choice and that we can define ourselves from that choice and how we make it is mindblowing.

The other part of this that we all have to remember is the fact that we're never really not a part of creation and humanity because of this being that we share with one another. Because of the fact that we're all intrinsically valuable in the fact that we all have this choice and this opportunity to create meaning in our lives. We can all express ourselves differently, often depending on the society that we grow up in, the inspirations that we have in our lives from friends and family to more well known characters. We all are human and we all contribute to what it means to be human.

Pretty sure that the video is definitely a lot more eloquent than I am and covers a lot more bases which I'm sure that you guys can enjoy much like I've done. Definitely go and check it out here!

I hope that you guys all create wonderful meanings, whatever they are and I hope to speak to you very soon indeed :D