use your good dishes -- everyday.
shave on weekends.
do not wait for special occasions.
do not tuck your best away in the drawers, in the back of the closet, in your heart.
don't wait for holidays or invitations.
declare that your today is the special occasion.
call instead of emailing. (it feels so good to connect.)
go for coffee.
quit.
take care of it.
renounce your glory days. you've told all of those stories more than twice.
focus forward.
wear perfume for yourself. toss your only-wear-around-the-house clothes and let your good clothes graduate to around-the-house status.
make ecstatic sex a priority. (this deliberateness will make you more creative, productive and generally gracious. on your death bed, you will think about all the amazing sex you had this lifetime.)
write poetry. one a day.
make a point to be as encouraging as possible, as much as possible, to everyone possible.
don't look back.
if you feel like you're always failing, consider that this is part of being an artist. let it be a divine inclination. keep going.
enter.
leave.
often refuse to be in the presence of people who make you feel repressed, anxious, or pull your frequency down.
do not entertain haters.
send light to the haters.
give it away. you probably don't need it and someone else does.
turn off the tv.
burn candles. during the day.
fall in love. with yourself. with the person you're with. with the persons in your orbit.
because no one is perfect, but you can let the love be perfect for the both of you.
because everyone -- everyone -- is a doorway to God.
because you can get there from here.
because life is short."
A lot of changes have taken place in my life lately.
Last year this time I was tired, beyond tired actually, from working crazy hours and having no time for any living. I was just going through my days like my life was one gigantic chore - and forgetting the living-part from it.
I woke up at 4AM every morning (joys of freelance make-up artistry) and continued my working till 5 or 8PM and when I got home I had zero energy and zero interest in...well, anything really. It was super scary - cause that was not me! I was grumpy, had eyebags that were more like eyeluggage, didn't do any exercise, ate all the time and mostly just bread or candy... And may I add that I was miserable most of the time.
Then in December last year I decided I have to do something about it, to the fact that I was turning into a zombie with serious mood-swing issues.
I started to organize my work so that, little by little, I cut down my work hours and started to feel that I could breath again. And I started running again - which I looove. I started eating better - and feeling better. I started making smoothies every day. And I started seeing the change in not only my mood, but my body, skin, in everything...
Then last July I found a school. A school I could study nutrition and wellness, things I had really started to create a passion for, and it felt right from the first minute. I just knew this was my school! The only problem was - it was in New York... But then I found out they have a distance studying-system that made it possible to start the studies, doing everything from my very own writing desk from little old Helsinki.
So, now I have been studying at IIN for nearly 6 months. And lately other things besides school have also started to just fall to their places.
When you start new things, go towards a path that is totally new - change will become a buddy of yours. And right now so many changes seem to be happening in my life and in me that sometimes I just smile - just cause I feel like it, just because I am so happy that I have found ways I wanna do things and live my life... I have so many dreams I want to make happen, so many places that I want to see, so many people I want to meet, so many things I want and will do. and what I have realized is that - it really is up to me whether I do those things or not... And it's scary how your life may change when you go after your dreams; places may change, people included in your life may change, new situations may (and will) occur...
But someone just wisely said to me, that the scared feeling we get in front of new things, in front of change - it's just growing pains. And just like when you were a kid, they will pass - and you grow stronger.
And yes, it's superscary sometimes to think that your dreams really are - for the most part - up to you. But that's also the best part of it.
Had her cancer been diagnosed only a handful of years earlier, says Dr. George Demetri, her oncologist at the Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and a world leader in the study and treatment of rare sarcomas, chances are she would have been subjected to aggressive chemotherapy, probably to no benefit.
Instead Carr received what at the time may have still seemed an experimental strategy for treatment: no treatment at all. They decided to keep it under medical surveillance, but otherwise, “it was, ‘Let’s let cancer make the first move,’ ” Carr says. “It was, ‘Go out and live your life.’ ” And she has since made that her message, one that’s suited to these times: not life in spite of cancer, but because of it..."
Read the whole NY Times-article here.
