In the last week at the RV park we are staying at, a family came to visit (the wife’s parents park almost right behind us). I’ve been writing a lot of tweets lately about how great it is to meet like-minded people. I wrote similar tweets when I meet Amelia and Kyle and family. On Facebook, my friend Barbara asked “But one learns more from being surrounded by those with diverse minds.” I thought this was a great topic for discussion, so here goes.

The comments on my previous article about the importance of girls learning and doing the ‘manly’ stuff and boys learning and practicing what the old paradigm would call ‘woman’s work’ so that none of us need be unduly dependent on another made me think of another story I want to share with you.

On Friday (yesterday) morning, I had a bit of an adventure, it involved the sewer. Have I got you? Are you curious? Good, I promise to fill you in, but I really need to start at the beginning.

To find out more info about Mangroves, click here. They are amazing. Here are some pictures from one of my walks through a mangrove forest.

In a cd by John Maxwell, he talked about the fact that when you die people will sum you up in one sentence, so select it now and live it purposefully. I heard a great quote by a Bollywood actor Kamalahasan, who said that death is to life as a period is to a sentence. Combining these two ideas, I’d like to set this idea up for you to think about. Death is inevitable, as is the punctuation at the end of a sentence. What kind of life sentence do you desire: is it long, but run-on; mediocre and useless; short and sweet; succinct and intelligent; wise and humorous; and or full of passion and vitality? It is up to you, as it is your life. Pick it now, then live it so that your thoughts, words and actions all reflect your truth (as Colette Carlson calls it), all reflect your life sentence.

I am so thankful for the people in my life with whom within sometimes moments of meeting each other I have had an instant connection with and forever after had a friend for life. Some of these friends I have not seen for years, or even talked to for years, but then we come together and it is as if time has stood still for we are so connected still. This connection exists with my husband obviously, and  I have mentioned this with Amelia and Kyle, with whom Chuti and I have a beautiful friendship. There is a friend Chuck as well, who was actually my first boss after graduation and only boss when I played the part of an engineer. We met through email as he sent me an email about a job offer, having found me through the Engineering directory of recent graduates. I responded and we corresponded through email only and created an amazing connection. When we met, we hit it off amazingly well. He became my boss for a couple of years and since then we have developed an amazing friendship which is one of my most cherished. Now the friendship with Chuck has expanded to include Chuti and Julie (Chuck’s other half), which makes it even more special. Of course, there is Erica as well, who came into our lives to teach the kids Spanish and became a part of our family.

As I said in the previous post, things tended to come easy to me. I have to admit, that I never pursued excellence enough to push myself, to challenge myself. After all, as Thomas J. Watson Sr. said “The formula for success is quite simple: double your rate of failure.” I definitely did not invite failure and therefore I did not invite success, not in the way I invite it now.

Practice, Practice, Practice!!!

My perspective has changed quite drastically about this subject, that it is worth mentioning. Even though I have always know the adage “Practice makes Perfect”, I guess I never took it seriously enough, or I did not understand how excellent perfect has to be or I didn’t understand how practicing is a constant on-going thing or maybe a bit of all three. You see, as most people, I have many talents. For example, I am considered a good dancer by many people and I have to admit that I am pretty good. I had a natural talent for dancing and it came easy to me. Maybe that was part of my problem. I would learn a new dance for example for a show and sometimes I would learn it the night before (if it was something I was performing by myself). I was even recruited to do a dance where I was playing a boy. The teacher couldn’t get the 5th boy and recruited me during university exams, so I couldn’t join the group for practice until I was done. Guess when that was? A few hours before the event started was when I was finally available. I joined them and learned the dance and performed. I was actually recruited when people couldn’t dance at the last minute because I got a reputation for learning quickly, being confident on stage and being able to pull things off pretty well, at the last minute. I guess this became a habit for me.

I just read this article about the effects of the cold shock on sea creatures. A couple of times when we were at the beach over the last few days, we saw dead fish on the beautiful white sandy beach. It seems such a pity, the poor fish. I guess when the fish and other creatures are optimized for certain weather conditions, all these global changes can drastically affect them.