Sometimes the inspiration and application of an idea can come from a familiar message that’s been put into new words.

That old idea will grab us in a new way, when it’s presented from a different angle.

I’ve written about taking small steps for years, both here and in my books. But this book about Kaizen I referred to last week, has been just what I needed.

And look – even its size reflects its message!

As I stood in the chaos of moving boxes, not sure of which way to go because some of the options required other efforts to complete, I put Kaizen to work.

Clearly, the whole project, or even part of the project, was not going to be finished that day. What was one tiny thing within my reach that I could put away? One thing.

Easy enough. Done.

Next?

By the end of the morning, I had finished moving my things into the bathroom: Shelving assembled under the sink, objects sorted, discarded, and put away.

This job had been put off for several weeks. I had enough personal hair, make up, and tooth brushing supplies – it was not an urgent task, but to complete moving in, required me to get these things out of the ugly box in my new bedroom.

You can imagine the sense of accomplishment – albeit small – that propelled me to tackle one more object in another box. Ultimately, four or five boxes were processed that day. Wow!

Reading Maurer’s book opened my eyes to another reason why small is good.

Approaching any topic from the point of view of making the smallest changes is simply more user friendly, because we are comfortable with small steps.

When faced with change involving big ideas and big leaps, our fight-or-flight response is triggered. Our body prepares for physical action (fight or flight) and the circuits for less critical operations are shut down.

In a fight-or-flight response, we do not need to digest lunch, or think about our relations with Aunt Sarah. We need to stand and fight, or get out of Dodge as fast as possible.

The problem we face in everyday situations that bring on this response is that it also brings on some degree of fear. We fear departing from anything that takes us away from the norm – and we often end up like deer in the headlights. Stuck. Frozen.

Looking at major projects can leave us wringing our hands and walking in circles.

But, learning to take the smallest step possible keeps that fight-or-flight response asleep. We can tiptoe right around it.

I’m not opening and putting away fifty boxes today. I’m going to find a home for this bottle of Listerine.

Twice weekly, extreme gym workouts aren’t happening; but I did 5 minutes of arm exercises with 3 pound weights during the commercials last night – several times. Whenever I relocate my 5 pound weights, I’ll use them to ramp up the experience.

Little things.

How can you dissolve the potential fear of facing a large or difficult project by finding the smallest possible step to take?

What’s one thing you can do for your health today?

How can you incorporate one more glass of water into your day?

Are you looking at a mess? What is one small object you can put away?

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Quietly stepping around that fight-or-flight tiger.

In health –

Deidre

Bet you thought I had forgotten. Life was such a whirlwind last year, I did forget – at least to write about it.

This year, the ripples of past words and ideas returned to me – this time through an author friend, Otakara Klettke – who posted a query to her friends about what they had chosen as their 2023 Word of the Year.

Brilliant!

I grow so much from 1) setting a mindful intention for my new year and 2) spreading out the contents of last year’s blessings jar – and doing it now, the day after epiphany (as I write this), seems appropriate.

Besides, blessings are pouring in for 2023, and I need an empty jar to hold my notes!

My unspoken word of the year for 2022 had to have been GROW. What a ride of new experiences! Looking back, I am grateful for how life unfolded: I learned new things and improved on them; how I will do some things better; and how I had such amazing support every step of the way.

With most of these life changes complete, Otakara’s query about my 2023 Word of the Year gave me pause to think. Only one word popped into my mind and spirit: LOVE.

Not that love was lacking at any time in 2022, but my soul wants to turn its striving and focus to love.

Certainly, all intentions need to start at home. I’ll be mindful how I explore and show love to myself; but I long to show love more completely to others through my presence, helpful acts, and remembrances.

So, what is your Word of the Year for 2023?

I think it’s better than a resolution – any day – because it’s an intention set deep in our hearts that colors how we think and proceed. Resolutions fade away even before January ends, but an intention can stick with us.

Write it on a sticky.

Make a pretty drawing around your word.

Paint it on a canvas.

Sharing these easy ideas. Just use the options on the MORE button below to share this post with others.

In health and love –

Deidre

Peace, Hope, Love, and now JOY.

Have you found your peace? Have you discovered and explored it this month? Have you helped to create peace in your life, and have you shared it with others?

I hope so.

Oh, there’s that hope. There is a way. You can do this. We can do this. There is strength enough inside of you, and there is help and hope available from those around you.

Are you feeling love in more than one realm? The here and now kind and the other-worldly kind from those who have gone before?

As I think of those who are newly grieved, a sense of peace, hope, and love may seem a bit of a stretch right now. Experiencing that first holiday season without someone and all that it brings to grief can overwhelm.

The peace may look different this year – but it’s still peace.

The hope may seem to have evaporated – but look around. Your situation may be unwanted and different, but there is a new path that fits the new you. It’s there. Look for it and move toward it.

Love has no boundaries, and there is always room for new love. May we all take the love we have and the love we have experienced to grow MORE love – the opportunities and needs for love and expressions for love surround us.

As we take our peace, hope, and love out into the world, we will discover JOY.

Joy, I think, is contingent upon action – our action of reaching out to others with peace, hope, and love. It does not plop into our laps – joy requires our efforts.

Joy wants to be shared, too! Who sits around just being joyful? Sure, we have joy in our hearts, but doesn’t it just about leap out of our chests, begging to be spread around?

This is a great time for us all – especially if you find yourself feeling a little lack-luster as we close out the year – to pause and to ponder about small moments when you have found some peace, and hope, and love.

Jot each moment down on a small slip of paper; fold it and drop it into a jar. Every so often, add a short note about something positive – a blessing – to drop into your blessings jar.

On New Year’s Eve, one year from now, dump all your blessings out onto the table and read each one – and you will feel JOY!

Life is a series of tiny moments, and we often get stuck on all the negatives that have happened to us. But by being aware of the many small blessings that come our way, we realize that things are not that bad.

May there be abundant peace, hope, love, and joy for each of us, and may we reflect those feelings and mindsets in all that we do now and in the coming New Year.

Share the JOY by using the options under the MORE button below.

In health –

Deidre

It’s the bottom line.

Everything else can and will fall away. We are left with this one thing. All our striving, our busy activities, our concerns, our vain imaginings – they disappear, and we are left with this one eternal element that is the sum of the Universe.

LOVE.

We need love on a cellular level. Take love away and we become twisted and tortured.

Some of us have mistakenly believed we do not deserve love – we are somehow less than, or we have caused so much harm, that we do not merit love.

But we were designed by love – if only by the power of Universal, love found in the miracle of Creation itself – and were designed to need and give love.

I’ve discovered that love has a handmaiden.

Grief.

When we love someone, we are committing to the grief that will surely follow when that love is taken from our physical presence.

If you have lost someone, the grief you feel is a testament to your love! That’s a big deal.

It makes loving someone an even more precious thing. What a gift!

“I love you fiercely even knowing that when we are physically separated, I will grieve and hurt – BUT it’s totally worth it and I freely do it!”

Moreover, that love never dies.

We may not realize it until we lose someone, but love is so much bigger than the here and now. Love exists on so many planes and in so many realms that we can barely understand it.

I think our souls must be a bundle of love light that when we are no longer here to hold or be held, we whisk away to be love on another dimension – and that the love we were burns brightly in the hearts and minds of our loved ones.

Love is light. Light gives peace and hope – they are all wrapped up together.

In this season of love, may we freely give and receive the love, peace and hope that is the ultimate force of change to ourselves, to others, and to the world.

You may share this message of love by using the options in the MORE button below.

In health and love –

Deidre

Merry Christmas everyone!

Sometimes we just have to wait.

Our little ones are gearing up for a season of waiting as they bounce and wriggle with delight in anticipation, just thinking about presents and festive activities heading their way in the coming weeks.

We adults are the same about some things. While we have mastered waiting to open beautifully wrapped packages, there are other anticipations that tempt us, and we become impatient.

I’m feeling a bit frustrated with waiting right now.

You see, there’s a big project that I’ve been working on for months that was going to be revealed to you this very day, but some of the many moving parts of this multifaceted project are just not in place yet.

So, we wait.

The deadline was self-imposed. It will come together – when it’s ready – and the big reveal will be well done and helpful to those who need it.

A recent message from the daily thoughts I subscribe to by Amit Sood, focused on Gaining vs. Becoming, and has helped me gain patience in my delayed project.

His message urged listeners to consider the difference between gaining vs. becoming as they approached their life goals.

Some people focus on gaining wealth, position, or possessions at all costs as they go about their careers, whereas others focus on the kind of person they want to become while doing their work.

Sure, we all need to pay the rent and buy groceries, but what kind of person are we becoming while we do the necessary work? Is our work requiring us to become less than our optimal self?

His thoughtful words reminded me of a saying about people remembering not what we say to them, but how they were made to feel while we spoke to them.

The first time I ever heard that saying, I certainly felt a pinch. From then on, I have tried to model being a more thoughtful, considerate, compassionate, and understanding person.

We can still get the job done while taking a path that includes honoring what kind of person we want to become.

No one is ever done becoming. Each of us can modify what we work on to become – at any age.

What is the kind of person you want to become?

What are you going to do to become that person?

Take a moment as we anticipate the holidays. Light a candle. Bundle up and step outdoors to gaze at the stars. When all is said and done, what counts?

Become that.

And if you are impatient to get the results of last week’s word search puzzle, you can relax, because the results are posted under this!

If you found this helpful, share with a friend using the options under the MORE button below.

In health with gratitude and thanks to each of our readers –

Deidre

We at foodtalk4you have always promoted improved health – one meal, one breath, one movement at a time.

Yep. There it is on our beautiful banner.

Lately, we’ve been hovering around the mental concepts of boosting our health. Maybe we could say mental/emotional/spiritual concepts.

But it’s all mental, really.

I used to think that our brain controlled everything, but have come to appreciate that the brain does not control things. We control the brain.

What the brain is allowed to send out, influences the outcomes we experience.

These past weeks, we explored a change in command as we recognize that – even if it’s totally new to us – we can purposefully say goodbye to the chains of the past so we can embrace the full potential of the present moment.

One goodbye release may not be enough; but over time, the more we can fully release our past hurts, disappointments, and traumas, the more we can feel that shift in power. We no longer allow the past to hold sway over our present.

This takes practice – along with the new belief that, “I am willing to change.”

Changing the habit of self-talk can take considerable mindfulness to recognize the subtleties of how ingrained our unsupportive and judgmental inner dialogue can be.

What’s the knee-jerk conversation you throw at yourself when you splash some coffee on the floor?

“You nimrod! What an idiot!”

Such a casual phrase, maybe meant to accept responsibility, is also heaped in judgement. Mess happens to all of us, dear readers. We all splash tumblers onto the floor, drop things, and stumble by simply tripping over our own feet – judgement is not needed. Maybe we need to be more careful, sure, but a stack of negative messages can grow over the course of time.

If our first thought is to be judgmental, we need to reflect on why we need judgment. Why do we think we deserve judgment? Because someone always judged us? That’s their message – an old message that we are giving life and power over us today.

Why don’t we forgive ourselves? Wouldn’t that be the kinder thing to do? Wouldn’t you like a little forgiveness?

As I dropped a jar of dill pickle relish on the floor a few days ago and watched half of its contents spatter all over the kitchen floor, I could have judged myself. Instead, there was a reminder to screw on the lid better next time and double check my efforts along with –

“Oops!”

“Man, I’m glad that wasn’t sweet pickle relish!”

“Hmmm, what’s the best way to clean this up?”

Do you groan and say you have to go to work … have to mow the grass …have to go to the store?

We need to do a word swap. Go from judgment to helpful. Go from negative to positive. Maybe just practice stating facts.

How about –

“I’m going to the store so we can have some yummy food to fix for dinner.”

“I choose to go to work so I can pay the rent.”

“I’m going to mow the grass before it rains.”

From the time we open our eyes in the morning until we close them at night, we are making choices. Practice using your power of choice as you actively guide your brain to set the tone of your day.

Be kind to yourself. Wouldn’t that feel good?

If you found this helpful, please share with someone you care about using the options in the MORE button below.

In health –

Deidre

Last week, we opened the idea of releasing the shackles of the past, with the goal of freeing ourselves to live in the present moment.

As each of us does this release, there is a feeling of new-found POWER. We are lighter, freer.

Heady stuff if you are new to it.

It is not new, though. We had the power all along, we just chose to give that power to the past. But no regrets or bitterness about wasting our lives – remember, we are going forward.

What’s important to remember is that you are in control of your mind.

You choose what to think. Feelings and emotions are thoughts. You hold total control over your thoughts.

Old ways of thinking may whisper and whine that you can’t change how you think – changing is hard.

Change is different, not impossible. When the voices of self-doubt ring out, acknowledge them, and release them – they are not needed by you.

Use any adage you want – maybe, the longest journey starts with a single step – but moment by moment, day by day, with consistent effort you can change anything. Step toward the marvelous vistas that await you.

Just believe that you are open to change within yourself – even if you do not know how this will happen or what it may look like right now.

“I am willing to change.”

Write it down. Say it out loud. Whisper it in a prayer. Leave sticky notes. In a private moment sitting in the sunshine, open your arms to the skies and repeat,

“I am willing to change.”

Send positive messages to yourself every day. If your previous internal monologues have always been negative, such positivity may seem forced. It doesn’t matter. Shower yourself with love, praise, acceptance, and repeat your willingness to be open to change.

Life all around you will respond with the positivity you have sent out to the Universe.

We get what we send out.

Chose to be a victorious, positive individual – not a victim of past mistreatment.

Go within to learn of your unique strengths, talents, and desires.

You have the power and the answers to your needs right now. Your inner guidance will lead you to the right resources and the right answers – lean into the positive flow within you.

Until next time –

Release the past with a blessing.

Commit to being willing to change.

Share these positive thoughts by using the MORE button below. By subscribing to Foodtalk4you.com, you will get notices each week of the new post.

In health –

Deidre