Random Thoughts

Just some random musings on a summer afternoon:

The waiting may be the hardest part, but sometimes it's the best part.

Want to be happy? Say yes more than you say no, and mean it.

It is unfair that some people are allergic to watermelon.

The best job for you? The one that doesn't feel like work.

Different is not wrong.

When you're giving more love than you're taking out, and it feels effortless and inspiring -- you've found your life's purpose.

Ice cream sandwiches may just be the perfect thing to eat at 3pm on a July afternoon.

How to make a million bucks? Reading glasses that work in the shower.

If you need to talk with your teenager, take a long road trip with him or her. Let 'em drive. That way, they can't wear their IPod.

The majority of people in the world have no access to air conditioning.

The most electable candidate for vice president -- for either party -- is General Colin Powell. Second best choice for McCain? Condoleezza Rice. Wouldn't Dr. King be amazed?

Want to have more love in your life? Be the person you'd fall in love with.

Bring an open mind and open hands to all that you do.

If you don't know, ask. If you do know, let someone ask before you say anything. Which is a darned good cue for me to wrap it up.

Happy summer.

The Songs of Summer

There's something about a song that becomes a hit in summer. Hear it again on the coldest day in January and you are immediately transported back to the top-down, sunglasses on, sun on your skin, scent of Coppertone kind of summer living. Ahhhh.

You know the drill. Summertime, and the living's easy. Yes, In The Summertime (when the weather is high), you might be Sittin' On The Dock Of the Bay, you Girl Watcher, you, hoping to just Drift Away. You've got Good, Good, Good, Good Vibrations because you've just seen the cutest Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini! Hey, that means V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N, in the summertime!

School's Out for summer. Kids say, "See You In September!" (or will I lose you to a summer love?). Hang On, Sloopy. I'm going to Build You Up, Buttercup. My Hips Don't Lie -- I promise it'll be a great summer. You'll be Groovin' on a Sunday afternoon. Or Cruisin' -- remember: if you want it, you got it, forever.

Yeah, we'll go cruising. Just Me And You And A Dog Named Boo, in your Little Deuce Coupe. I'm thinking Myrtle Beach Days, having fun in the waves. Hey, Hey, Baby, you'll be wearing your Swingin' Medallions, on the cutting edge of fashion like always.

Just a tick, I've got an idea. Let's go surfing now, everybody's learning how -- we'll be Surfin' USA. Oh, no! The Tide Is High! Help Me Rhonda -- it's a Wipeout! Hey Ya, let's try something else fun -- all the Summer Girls go to Kokomo to learn the Macarena. Want to join me?

Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah, there's going to be a Stoned Soul Picnic this summer. Uncle George will be Grazin' In The Grass, you'll be Drinking Wine, Spo-Dee-Oh-Dee, Aunt June will be Walkin' On Sunshine. What a Sweet Escape.

Can't get away? And it's Summer In the City, back of your neck feeling dirty and gritty. It's like a Heat Wave, burning in your heart. "My," you say to yourself, "It's Hot In Here. I best be Gettin' Jiggy Wit It." So get yourself Up On The Roof. From high above the city, you can see it's really a Funkytown. And, oh, ho, ho, ho those Summer Nights!

You, in your plain white tee, see a friend and shout "Hey There, Delilah!" -- but she's no Hollaback Girl. She's feeling the Summer Breeze as she says, "I Don't Want No Scrubs! What you trying to do -- Steal My Sunshine?" No, our Delilah's Dancing in the Street. The way she dances Mambo No. 5, she might as well be Walking On The Sun.

So, girl, Put Your Records On, play me your favorite song. Go ahead. Let your hair down. It's time for some Hot Fun In The Summertime.

And next January, you'll hear one of these songs -- and it'll be just like having a Pocketful Of Sunshine.

Easy Sledding

Imagine your brain as if it's a sledding hill. When you arrive, it's a pristine, untouched landscape of clean, white snow. Take your first trip down the hill and you leave an imprint of the path your sled has traveled. As the day progresses you see multiple tracks in the snow -- but one or two seem to be more frequently used than others.

This is exactly how you learn. This is how habits -- good and bad -- are formed. This is how thoughts and ideas are entrenched in your mind. Paths are formed in your brain -- use that path over and over and you reinforce behaviors, habits and thoughts.

The snowy hill metaphor comes from Dr. Alvaro Pascual-Leone, associate professor in neurology at Harvard Medical School. Pascual-Leone's ground-breaking work is profiled in The Brain That Changes Itself by Norman Doidge. And, Doidge shows, the cool thing about your brain is that when a path is blocked in some way -- by injury or illness -- the brain can re-wire itself to take an adjacent path to get where it needs to go.

Experiments have shown just how amazing and malleable our brains are. Consider the puzzle of "phantom limbs" -- extremities amputated but still registering as "present" in the brain. It's as if the communication between the limb and the brain still exists. Why? Because the neural pathways continue to exist! Doidge details an experiment using a mirror box that fools the brain into "seeing" a whole limb in the place of a missing limb. Once the brain registers "oh, there's that hand!", the phantom limb -- with its phantom pain, itch, gestures -- disappears. The brain has taken another path.

Using this new understanding, cutting-edge methods have been developed to help stroke victims learn to re-wire their brain by forging new neural pathways, bypassing damaged areas to regain movement and use of affected parts of their bodies.

Children with attention deficit disorders or learning disabilities are forging new ways of using their brains to overcome their hurdles. Using specific drills and techniques, attention improves and learning increases. Even with autistic children.

All this research confirms what so many of us have been talking about -- that you can change your thoughts and change your life.

Take a look at your most hard-wired thoughts. A person who defaults to telling "un-truths" might be operating with an operating thought like: "She'll get mad when I tell her the truth". Chronic lying reinforces a certain neural pathway -- a pretty stressful one, to boot. What if the lie is found out? If the underlying thought changes to: "She may get mad when I tell the truth, but I can deal with mad", the established pathway is bypassed in favor of a new one -- one that is more positive and less stressful.

If your underlying thought is: "I'm not good enough", you might find yourself depressed, hesitant, lonely, unfulfilled and sad. Changing your thought to "I'm good enough", by examining the roots of the negative thought creates a new neural pathway, and a happier life.

Now, perhaps this sounds too much like Stuart Smalley and his twee affirmations: "I'm Good Enough, I'm Smart Enough, and Doggone It, People Like Me!" OK. Got it. But research has shown that creating new thoughts around what you'd like to be or visualizations around how you'd like to act create new ways for the brain to function. So, there's something there we need to take seriously.

And it's this: you are not your thoughts. If your thoughts are not working for you -- creating a positive, abundant attitude -- you can change them. You can overcome your self-imposed limits by working on shifting that which you think you know about yourself and the world. You can re-wire your brain.

All you have to do is point your sled toward another path. And enjoy the ride, baby.

Caps & Gowns

It's the time of year. Caps and gowns on parade. Young men and women on the threshold of the rest of their lives. Awesome. Inspiring. Scary as hell.

I was recently asked to contribute to an article called something like, "Best Advice for Graduates That You Never Received." Started me thinking. And since I am now writing an advice column, I'm all smug about my advice-giving abilities.

So here's my six best pieces of advice to graduates:

1. Have integrity in all that you do. Integrity means that you operate from a place of honor. You say what you mean, and mean what you say. You're reliable. You're consistent. You can be counted on. Coming from a place of integrity creates a sterling reputation. And a sterling reputation delivers a sterling career, and a happy life.

2. Take the time to connect with others. Get to know the people you work with, the people who live next door, the people at the local homeless shelter. Because by connecting with others, you'll deepen your connection with yourself. You'll know yourself more intimately, and allow others to know you fully, too. And you'll be richer for the experience.

3. Live a life full of risks. Maybe that means something as big as BASE jumping to you (please wear a helmet and pay your insurance premiums, dear) but small risks -- like speaking up, or saying no -- can be even more powerful (and don't usually require helmets). Do something that feels like a risk to you every single day, and you will never feel stuck in a too small life.

4. Have passion -- for your work, for your loves, for your life. When there's at least one thing you are absolutely on fire about, the focused joy that results will draw fabulous people and experiences to you. Just a word of caution: don't confuse passion with drama. If it feels even slightly icky or squidgy, it's probably drama. Passion always brings something positive to the world, while drama generally dwells in the negative. Live with passion and you live in a positive place.

5. Define your own idea of success. I have known people who have gone to all the right schools and got the right jobs... and are miserable. Why? Because they were marching to the beat of somebody else's drummer. Money is just a tool that allows you to do what you want to do. Status is a function of ego and ultimately means nothing. [See Integrity above] What means something is who you are and what you bring. Decide on that, and do it. Tap out your own beat.

6. Get out of your own way. Allow great things to happen for you. Because when you're living with integrity, passion, connection and risks, you have created an environment where your best self can come out to play. When that happens, your life will unfold in amazing and inspiring ways. Let it. Be open and accepting and aware of the great stuff -- and more will pour into your life.

Someone said to me this week, "Your twenties are all about figuring stuff out." To which I said, "Honey, LIFE is about figuring stuff out." Life's not like a research project where you line up all your sources, exhaust all lines of inquiry and write up a whopping conclusion where everything is laid out all reasoned and deduced. No, in my experience, it's precisely those times when you think you have it all figured out that -- wham! -- everything changes.

So my final piece of advice is this: be constantly curious, and continue to find and shape who you are and what you stand for. Take it all in, and savor it. Continue to grow. Live a full and dynamic, changing life.

Why? Because it's a really, really fabulous way to live. That's why.

People of the Book

Looking for some magical summer reading? Let me recommend a book I've just finished: People of the Book by Pulitzer Prize winning author Geraldine Brooks.

People of the Book is the wonderfully told tale of one small book, an illustrated Hebrew prayer book created in the fifteenth century, and all the men and women who lovingly owned or protected it for over five hundred years. Brooks cleverly tells the story in reverse chronological order -- starting in modern day with conservator Hannah Heath's efforts to stabilize the condition of the book, and moving backwards until the mystery of the book's creator finally unfolds.

Along the way, Hannah unearths curious clues and signs that give her deep insight into the history of the book. Through war and deprivation, through Inquisition and forced emigration -- the power and beauty of the book causes people to go to great lengths to preserve and protect it. Hannah comes to see that the book is so much more than just parchment, ink and gold leaf.

It's precisely this idea -- that each book tells not only its story but also the story of every hand that ever held it -- that appeals to me. It's the feeling I have when I hold something that once belonged to my great-grandmother. What did she think of as she held it? What was going on in her life at the time? Did she travel far with it? Did she enjoy it as much as I do?

It's the same feeling you can't help but get when you stand on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial and accept the profound realization, "I am standing just where Dr. King stood", or when you hike the Appalachian Trail and feel the spirit of those who've passed the same way before.

It's a walk back into time, into a deep connection with someone else's life.

And Brooks' book shows that we're all connected. Christian, Jew, Muslim -- all worked to save one little book. Soldier, spy, scientist -- each did his part, building on the work of others. Man and woman -- engaged in creation of something lasting and magnificent. Yes, we're truly the product of everyone who has come before us -- an amalgam of their decisions, their actions, their hopes and their loves.

Perhaps you'll pick up People of the Book. You'll read it, love it, and leave it. For someone else to read. And to love. Part of the great continuum.