To die slowly

“He who becomes the slave of habit,
who follows the same routes every day,
who never changes pace,
who does not risk and change the color of his clothes,
who does not speak and does not experience,
dies slowly.

He or she who shuns passion,
who prefers black on white,
dotting ones "it’s" rather than a bundle of emotions, the kind that make your eyes glimmer,
that turn a yawn into a smile,
that make the heart pound in the face of mistakes and feelings,
dies slowly.

He or she who does not turn things topsy-turvy,
who is unhappy at work,
who does not risk certainty for uncertainty,
to thus follow a dream,
those who do not forego sound advice at least once in their lives,
die slowly.

He who does not travel, who does not read,
who does not listen to music,
who does not find grace in himself,
she who does not find grace in herself,
dies slowly.

He who slowly destroys his own self-esteem,
who does not allow himself to be helped,
who spends days on end complaining about his own bad luck, about the rain that never stops,
dies slowly.

He or she who abandon a project before starting it, who fail to ask questions on subjects he doesn't know, he or she who don't reply when they are asked something they do know,
die slowly.

Let's try and avoid death in small doses,
reminding oneself that being alive requires an effort far greater than the simple fact of breathing.

Only a burning patience will lead
to the attainment of a splendid happiness.”

"A Morte Devagar" is the work of Brazilian writer Martha Medeiros, often misquoted to Pablo Neruda

English translation via GoodReads

Joy in the Ordinary

In all the little things...

image from Action for Happiness

Be the Good

With so much sadness in the news recently, I've been finding it difficult not to feel helpless and a little despairing. I really liked this quote; it made me think that even though each of us on our own may not be able to do very much on a grand scale to change the upsetting situations we are seeing, I find some hope in the thought that each of us can still do good everyday in small ways. And lots of these little bits of good add up and spread and grow, and all will not be lost.

Image via Action for Happiness

Things to give up if you want to be happy...

I love this, words to remember and a state of mind to strive for...

15 Things to Give Up If You Want to Be Happy

1. Give up your need to always be right

When given the choice between being right and being kind, choose kind. - Wayne Dyer

2. Give up your need for control

By letting it go, it all gets done. The world is won by those who let it go. When you try and try, the world is beyond winning. - Lau Tzu

3. Give up on blaming others

A man can fail many times, but he isn't a failure until he begins to blame somebody else - John Burroughs

4. Give up your self-defeating self-talk

The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive. - Eckhart Tolle

5. Give up your limiting beliefs

A belief is not an idea held by the mind; it is an idea that holds the mind. - Elly Roselle

6. Give up complaining

You can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses. - Alphonse Karr

7. Give up the luxury of criticism

Spend so much time improving yourself that you have no time left to criticise others. - Christian D Larson

8. Give up your need to impress others

Don't try to impress others. Let them have the fun of impressing you. - James R Fisher Jr

9.Give up your resistance to change

Follow your bliss and don’t be afraid, and doors will open where you didn’t know they were going to be. - Joseph Campbell

10. Give up labels

The highest form of ignorance is when you reject something you don't know anything about. - Wayne Dyer

11. Give up your fears

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. - Franklin Delano Roosevelt

12. Give up your excuses

99% of failures come from people who have the habit of making excuses. - George Washington Carver

13. Give up the past

Forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future. - Christian D Larsen

14. Give up attachment

The wise individual doesn't get too attached to any of life's pleasures, knowing that wonderful science is hard a t work proving it's bad for him. - Bill Vaughan

15. Give up living your life to other people's expectations

The world is a mirror and reflects back your expectations. What you get is what you see. You create your own reality. - Denis Waitley

Original article by World Observer Online

Original Image via Pinterest

Cookie Wisdom

As a kid, Cookie Monster was always my favourite one from Sesame Street because he had funny eyes and was such a messy eater XD

[Image from artisticstateofmind]

Let it Go

Ok, I know it is possibly one of the most overplayed song ever... but it's a little special to me.

Just to make it more interesting because it has been played so many, many times, here it is in Mandarin from the Taiwan version of Frozen. Beautifully sung by Shennio Lin, and with a translation of the lyrics that capture the feeling of the original the closest I feel, when compared with the Chinese Mandarin or the Cantonese versions.
I went to see Frozen whilst it was still in the cinema last year and heard Let it Go for the first time. When Elsa sings at that point in the movie, she's feeling very alone in the world and the lyrics are reflecting that. I found myself relating to them so much that when she's singing '..no rules for me, I'm free!' and starts running up the ice staircase she's just created, I was starting to well up.

Five years ago I decided to leave medicine, leave being a doctor, and I was really scared. I'd never imagined that I wouldn't be staying in it when I was going through medical school. Six years at university and two years of training later, I found myself hating what I'd thought would be my career. I saw how some others were so enthused by the stressful nature of the work, whereas I found it a struggle. And how some thrived in the competitive environment whereas I couldn't understand the need for a lot of the politics. I didn't feel like I belonged -  the way I am, the way I work, just didn't seem to fit in there. So when I had to decide what do to whilst waiting to get a specialty training post, I realised that actually I didn't want to pursue it anymore. My heart wasn't in it.

The most difficult part though was after I left. Looking back now, I was really quite low for a few months before and after the official last day. Was I depressed? I'm not sure, but I certainly had periods where I was very tearful, couldn't sleep or slept too much, and had episodes where I felt a horrible hopelessness. I was grieving, definitely, for having left something that I'd planned and based my life on for so long. I am a typical introvert in that I normally don't enjoy large group gatherings and often have to take a few days of being on my own to recharge after a spate of socialising. So for a while I found it particularly difficult to face parties and meet ups because inevitably I had to talk about what I was up to and then explain, and sometimes be asked to justify, my decision, often to people I hardly knew, when I hadn't even fully accepted it myself. I found it difficult when I got negative reactions where people thought I was making such a throwaway decision when it was anything but, and I could see they didn't understand how horrible the whole thing had been for me.

In truth I was judging myself. 'How could you just throw it away?' and 'But you've wasted those years at university!' were things that went around in my own head too. I wasn't sure if it was a brave or stupid decision. But my instinct was screaming for me to leave. Having been away from it for long enough and really enjoying what I'm doing now with my own thing, being my own boss, I am more sure that I made the right choice. It hasn't been easy and it is still difficult, but I am far, far happier now. There is this wonderful quote "You know you are on the right path when you become uninterested in looking back." which is exactly how I feel. I know a few others who left medicine for a career change and are much happier for it as well. I also know some who left but went back again. I know for sure that I don't want to go back to it.

So, back in that dark cinema last year, when Elsa was in the last verse, throwing her tiara away and singing "I'm never going back, the past is in the past!" I was a blubbering mess. But it was a happy mess. It felt quite cathartic. Everyone has their own interpretation of the song. For me, Let it Go is about self-acceptance and how powerful it is when you stop hating yourself for being you. It doesn't matter if others understand why I did it anymore, because I'm happy that I did.

I still can't sing the whole song without getting a tad emotional.

Measure

"If your parents ever measured you as a child, they had you stand against a wall, and made a little pencil mark on the wall to show your growth.
They did not measure you against your brother, or the neighbor’s kids, or kids on tv.

When you measure your growth, make sure to only measure your today self by your past self. If you compare your relationships, your success, or your anything against anyone else, you are not being fair to you.

Everyone has a different path, a different pace, and different challenges to face along the way."

~Doe Zantamata | writer, photographer

...the audience still sleeps

Sunrise on the beach, Rhodes, Greece | 2008

“When you do something noble and beautiful and nobody noticed, do not be sad. For the sun every morning is a beautiful spectacle and yet most of the audience still sleeps.”

~ John Lennon

..to look back on the distance

Nelson Mandela, 2000 via LSE Library on Flickr

“I have walked that long road to freedom. I have tried not to falter; I have made missteps along the way. But I have discovered the secret that after climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb. I have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come. But I can only rest for a moment, for with freedom come responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not ended.”

― Nelson Mandela 1918-2013

Fairy tales are more than true...

Dragon slayer by Katja Kaikkonen on deviantART

“Fairy Tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.”

~Neil Gaiman, paraphrasing G. K. Chesterton

Be the change

Gandhi street art via Street Art Urban

"We need to be the change we wish to see in the world."

~Mahatma Gandhi

Courage

John Wayne by Phil Stern via Chasing Light

"Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway."

~John Wayne

We travel, some of us forever...

Wherever the wind blows, by ilovedoodle

“We travel, some of us forever, to seek other states, other lives, other souls.”

~ Anais Nin

Only when it is dark enough...

Perseids Meteor Over the North Cascades by Michael Menefee

"...only when it is dark enough, can you see the stars."


~Martin Luther King Jr, I've been to the mountain top speech, 1968

The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid...

Acrophobia by Katia Bellomo

"I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear."

~Nelson Mandela

...the thing which you think you cannot do

ghosts by hearte

"You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face...You must do the thing which you think you cannot do."

~Eleanor Roosevelt

If you have good thoughts...

The sunflowers by C-Smooth

“If you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.”

~ Roald Dahl

The colour of home

'Earthrise', from NASA, taken on board Apollo 8 by astronaut William Anderson on the first ever manned lunar orbit in 1968

"For most of history, blue was the colour of the beyond. It was the colour of the horizon, the colour of the thing that so many of us were aspiring to and hoping to escape to. But in 1968 that dream finally came true. When in 1968 we finally went beyond that horizon, we discovered that blue was actually the colour of home."

~Dr James Fox, The History of Art in Three Colours: Blue

...do small things with great love

A Great Many Hearts by cocoaferret on deviantART

“Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.” 

― Mother Teresa

....the shots you never take

Goal by Hermes M Singson on deviantART

"You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take."

~Wayne Gretzy