Hello Everyone,
Welcome to 2017. Did you send 2016 out with a bang, or like me, with a whimper? Sorry for the delay getting this posted on time. I wrote it way back on Tuesday, but things came up…like a big snow storm…that required attention to little details like getting deliveries to customers before the roads were slick, fighting the crowds in the grocery store before we ran out of food at our house. 
I did, however, start out my 2017 pretty darn well. Historically, I spend my New Year’s Day in my pj’s, curled up on my sofa, under a blanket with a good book. Admittedly, this is not a bad way to start a new year, but this year it is not in line with my pursuit of Hygge. I am trying my darnedest to foster a better relationship with Old Man Winter. You will find throughout this blog, my whining and complaining about winter, the cold, the grayness of it all.
In the U.S., our state parks have First Day Hikes lead by Forest Service rangers. I now live very near Hanging Rock State Park that includes a couple of nice mountains and good hiking. Yes indeedy, yours truly, managed to drag herself out of her nice, warm, cozy house and out into the chilly morning air of January 1, 2017 to go hiking 4.7 miles with approximately 20 people she did not know. Uphill, no less!
It honestly took extreme will power to overcome my aversion to cold AND my introvert personality. Guess what! It was awesome!! Perfect not-too-cold weather, considering the number of layers of clothes I was wearing. The views were magnificent even with some cloud cover. The company was friendly and the rangers had lots of information and a good sense of humor.
Any Andy Griffith Show fans out there? Notice the mountain in the distance with the big rock formation on the top? That, my friends, is Pilot Mountain. Below it is the town of the same name except in the show it is Mt. Pilot. Yep, there really is a Mt. Pilot and I have known a few folks, who move to North Carolina from other parts of the country/world, call the town by its fictional name. There is also a thriving little tourist business there thanks to the show.
So, yes, I felt like I rocked January 1st this year and gave myself a big ‘ole pat on the back. The hike was over by noon and I quickly got home, changed back into my pj’s, settled in on the sofa with the dogs and a good book and all was well with the world. For the record, D. had to work and probably was not convinced that his winter hating wife would actually go hiking until he saw photographic evidence. 
This year my goal is to add meat to the pitiful bones of have existed on this blog for a while now as I got through some big life changes. More creating, more thinking, more exploring. MORE than what I have been giving you. Thank you for hanging in here with me if you have been here a while. Welcome if you are just landing here and wondering what goes on.
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago about a book I found and promised to write about it. I’m going to try and not make this too long or you will never come back. So here is my book story…
From the time I read my first Dick and Jane book (for younger readers, these were our first grade reading books) I have been a voracious reader. For years and years I normally had three to five books going at once and would panic if I started getting low. Up until my mid-twenties I generally read novels and then somewhere after that started reading primarily non-fiction. I noticed a phenomenon happening. It seemed like I often had just the book I needed to work through a work or life problem virtually fall into my hands. It could be fiction or non-fiction.
Now I know that I am not the only one to have this experience. Yours may be a podcast, radio show or a person who shows up. God, the universe, spirit, whatever your word for the mysteries of life, shows up just when you need it. If this has not happened to you, then you need to slow down a little and pay attention. You are not being ignored. You are doing the ignoring of what is around you.
This happened so often to me that I got in the habit of wandering around the library saying a little prayer of “God, which one do I need to read today.” Not every trip to the library was life changing, but it made the search much more interesting.
I had strangely gotten away from reading books all the time for some reason (uh, ipad maybe), but I stopped into the local library to find reading material while I am stuck at our shop without wifi. Now, I’m not going to tell you the name of the book that I picked up. In all likelihood it wouldn’t do a thing for you because you aren’t dealing with the same stuff I am. But, I picked up a book by an author I had read before. I thought it was about organizing and downsizing into a smaller home. Yeah, we still have lots to minimize yet at our house.
What I discovered it was about was clearing out your mental and emotional stuff! Nah, I wouldn’t need that. Cue the belly laughs from off stage here.
For a couple of months I had been getting crankier and shorter tempered by the day and for the life of me couldn’t figure out why. Life is good! What the heck? As I started reading the book it started talking about how to change old patterns. Old emotional patterns set up when life held different circumstances and people. Old coping skills that are no longer working. Well smack me in the head! It began to dawn on me that I was trying to use old coping skills for entirely new situations. I no longer needed the defenses and walls that served me well a decade ago. I no longer had to pretend to be tough and completely in control like I did when I was a single parent with teenagers. Thank you Lord!
We get so stuck in our thinking and reactions. The brain gray matter makes these patterned grooves that seem permanent, but they aren’t. We just have to pay attention to what we are thinking and doing and dissect it down to the roots. It’s not necessarily easy, but it makes all the difference. I’m pretty sure D. would tell you that I have been much easier to live with the past couple of weeks. I haven’t completely broken old habits and patterns, but when I feel a strong reaction coming on I take the time to figure out why instead of just blowing a gasket. Breathe, breathe, breathe.
So now you have my book story. I would love to hear yours. Seriously, I think they are some of the coolest human stories when solutions present themselves in mysterious ways.
Have an awesome week!!
Photo credits…all taken by yours truly.
Pencils, Paint & Paper 