Tag Archives: music

Feel good (in an instant)

Posted on May 14, 2012 | 4 comments

Below are some simple, speedy ways to uplift yourself… instantly!

Smile (Simply put, this will tell your brain that you are happy.)
SIT UP STRAIGHT (When you’re depressed, you slouch. Change your posture, change your mood.)
Get out in nature (Energetically speaking, nature has a high vibrational frequency, which will override the low frequency of a bad mood.)
Sing
Put on your favourite tune (And dance!)
Read an inspiring quotation or watch an encouraging video (Buy a calendar that has a daily quote or subscribe to a blog / YouTube channel / Facebook page that posts regular uplifting updates.)
Write down five things you are grateful for
Say (aloud) five things you love about yourself
Light a candle
Take a few deep breaths
Put on a slick of lipstick and your favourite perfume / your best shirt and sexiest aftershave
Buy yourself a bunch of flowers (You’ll smile every time you walk past them because 1. they’re beautiful and 2. they’re a reminder that you’ve done something wonderful for yourself.)

Do one of these things right now and observe the change in your mood. Then, work your way through the list. Soon, you’ll be doing these things automatically because feeling good is so natural. Enjoy!

“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.” Thich Nhat Hanh

4 Comments

Posted in Health, Personal development, Random

Tagged beauty, breathing, depression, encouragement, energy, facebook, frequency, gratitude, happiness, health, inspiration, joy, light, music, nature, posture, quotations, self-love, singing, smiling, thich nhat hanh, vibration, youtube

Life is miraculous. From pregnancy to childbirth; fingernails and eyelashes, involuntary muscle action and the healing process; sleep and dreams, tears and laughter, memory and pain, pleasure and love…

Miracles abound in plant life and in the world beneath the ocean; from sleeping flowers to deep-sea bioluminescence. In the moon’s effects on the tides. In the stars and the planets that glow. In the ever-changing, ever-moving clouds and the simple strangeness of a rainbow. In rivers and mountains and volcanoes. In the mere 62 miles from here to outer space.

Miracles can be sensed in the steady growth of a seed, in the sweet scent of yellow furze, in a silent snowfall. A miracle can be witnessed in every lamb, lion, peacock and panther. In every earthworm, elephant, foal and firefly. In the astonishing metamorphosis of frogspawn, caterpillars and eggs to frogs, butterflies and soaring eagles. In the transformation of chunks of wood to keening violins, the deep tones of a cello, the heartbreaking ambience of a piano and the flamenco dancers invigorated by the passionate plucking of guitar strings.

Miracles can be felt in the beauty that arises from sweeping paintbrushes, from words that tumble from vision to feeling to pen to paper, from a voice that channels raw emotions. Miracles can be found in mathematical genius, geometry and quantum physics. In spirituality, creation, destruction and creator.

A miracle is born with every breath and birdsong; when the leaves dance in the wind, the weeping willow sways and the cherry blossoms fall. Miracles rejoice in the delightful chuckle of an infant, in a lover’s touch, in the awe-struck appreciation of a sunset…

The miracle of life is found in the searching, in the connection, in the bliss and in the discovery of self. In the present moment, in the here and now, in the being beyond language and analysis and definition, in the space between everything else; this is where magic happens. This is life as miracle.

4 Comments

Posted in Spirituality

Tagged amelie soundtrack, animals, art, beauty, being, birth, bliss, comptine d'un autre ete, connection, creation, creator, destruction, discovery, emotion, flowers, growth, life, love, magic, mathematics, miracle, music, nature, now, pain, plants, pleasure, present moment, quantum physics, science, searching, self, spirituality, yann tierson

Life is short. Live it.

Posted on December 20, 2011 | 2 comments

The other night, I watched The Diving Bell and the Butterfly – a film based on a memoir written by a man suffering from Locked-in syndrome. Locked-in syndrome is a condition in which a patient has full awareness but cannot move due to complete paralysis of all voluntary muscles in the body except for the eyes.

At the age of 43, Jean-Dominique Bauby, editor of fashion magazine Elle, had a massive stroke. He woke up 20 days later to discover that he was almost completely paralysed. The determined French journalist wrote his memoir by memorising what he wanted to say then dictating the text to a transcriber by blinking his one functioning eyelid (a system known as partner assisted scanning). It took him 10 months (at an average of four hours a day). He died two days after its publication.

I don’t know whether I felt depressed or inspired after watching the movie. This man had everything taken from him – his career, his partner (who abandoned him after the stroke), his health, his speech, and his independence. Understandably, he expressed his desire to die. But then he realised that, apart from his left eye, two other things were not paralysed – his memory and his imagination. He went on to write a bestseller and set up a Locked-in syndrome association. He had lost so much but the spirit within him was still able to create something extraordinary. And then he passed away.

Our mortality is something we are born with. Sometimes, I think we ignore the fact that this lifetime will not last forever. We get so caught up in routine and obligation that we are often oblivious to the beauty and wonder of the world around us. We become disheartened and apathetic, or frustrated and angry, so gratitude and appreciation seem irrelevant.

Life is short. So, we should do the things that make us feel thankful to be alive. Last week, I took my mother to see the New York Spirit of Gospel. The vocalists astounded us with their talent. They encouraged us to shake off our self-consciousness, get up off our seats and dance, clap and sing along. The performance was all the better because we joined in.

We spend so much time passively watching the world do its thing. But it’s only when we actively participate that we come alive. So, get out there and really live. Life is a gift if that’s how you choose to see it.

The world is full of miracles and adventure, blessings and delight. And there are so many ways to acknowledge this. Money or mobility don’t have to be an issue. You can travel to foreign lands or visit spectacular spots within your own country. You could walk through whispering forests and across the backs of ancient mountains. Or simply allow the deep tones of a cello to awaken your senses.

Embrace life and each other. Laugh long and hard and often. Learn how to surf or bake or speak Spanish. Tell someone you love them. Admit to your fears and share your passions. Swim in lakes and oceans. Feel the earth’s water on your naked skin. Dance. Cry. Sing. Love. Live.

Images: http://favim.com/image/31398/; http://xaxor.com/photography/25467-appreciating-life-photography.html

2 Comments

Posted in Modern Society, Personal development, Spirituality

Tagged appreciation, art, book, coma, death, depression, elle, experience, expression, film, gratitude, jean-dominique bauby, laughter, life, living, locked-in syndrome, love, magazine, memoir, mortality, movie, music, new york spirit of gospel, paralysis, participation, passion, song, soul, spirit, suicidal, the diving bell and the butterfly, travel

Am I Only Dreaming?

Posted on December 10, 2011 | 10 comments

Why is dreaming big so frowned upon? When a child announces that he’s going to be a dancer, his parents and teachers hope he’ll grow out of it. Why is it more acceptable to say you want to be a doctor or a teacher, rather than a playwright or a photographer?

Simple. It’s because the people who care about you want to protect you from disappointment and hardship. Because your talent, no matter how much you and your loved ones appreciate it, might not be to everyone’s taste. Because so few people blessed / cursed with creativity “make it”. Because “struggling” is the most common adjective to describe “artist” or “actor” or “writer”. Because they want you to be safe and get a “real” job – one that comes with a company car and a pension. So, you’re advised to just be realistic.

But what’s realistic is acknowledging your gifts and doing something with them. What’s realistic is at least giving it a shot. What’s realistic is wanting to live a happy life doing something you’re passionate about.

Of course, it’s easier to live a normal life. Sharing your creativity means baring your soul. It means lifting the comfortable veil that most of us wear. There can be no secrets when you allow others to glimpse the depths of your emotion, the shades of your pain, the hidden creases of your heart, and the crevices of your imagination.

Sadly, many people don’t even try to pursue their passion. They know they’ve got something special but they’ve given up on it before they’ve even started. Or they’ve never had the time or space to explore their creativity. There are too many bored secretaries, frustrated sales reps and depressed accountants. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not condemning these occupations. Creativity manifests in many forms. I’d just hope that if you work at one of these professions, it’s because order or commerce or numbers are your passion. And if not, that you’d at least humour your creative side on the weekends.

Without dreamers, the world would be a very dull place. We would never have even heard of music, poetry, theatre or literature. If nobody took a chance on their dreams, there would be no Harry Potter or Bilbo Baggins, Dracula or Holly Golightly. We wouldn’t be able to talk on the phone or fly to another continent. Andrea Bocelli would be just another blind Italian. And we wouldn’t have the likes of this.

Or this.

Starry Night - Vincent van Gogh

Or this.

Featured Image: Painting by Georgia O’Keeffe – http://www.artchive.com/artchive/O/okeefe.html

Other Images: http://www.flickr.com/photos/amandamabel/5597604359/;

http://www.arthistoryguide.com/Vincent_van_Gogh.aspx

10 Comments

Posted in Modern Society

Tagged actor, andrea bocelli, art, artist, belief, bilbo baggins, blind, career, child, company car, creativity, dance, dance of the sugar plum fairy, doctor, dracula, dreams, emotion, fight, georgia o'keeffe, harry potter, heart, holly golightly, imagination, italian, job, led zeppelin, money, music, occupation, pain, painting, parent, passion, pension, playwright, poetry, poverty, profession, salary, self-belief, singer, soul, stairway to heaven, starry night, struggles, success, tchaikovsky, teacher, theatre, vincent van gogh, writer

From the Depths of December

Posted on December 6, 2011 | Leave a comment

I wander downtown to buy Christmas cards, in the hope that it will assuage my guilt at not yet having begun shopping for presents. There is no escaping the swift approach of Yuletide on this brisk December day.

Fairy lights wind their way up tree trunks, like magic ivy. A middle-aged couple carries plastic bags and an air of exasperation. A Norway Spruce leans up against a wall, naked but on the brink of fulfilling its life purpose.

I pop in my iPod buds and drown out the world with the sounds of Video Games and Villagers. A teenager rushes out of a pound shop, her face full of freckles and anticipation. I enter. A mother slaps her children’s hands away from sweets and toys. A man in dirty work clothes holds a basket brimming with tinsel.

I buy two packets of sparkly Santa cards and continue down the main street. A young boy bolts into the library. I follow. As I enquire after a Heather O’Neill novel, which is currently MIA, an elderly woman breezes up to the desk.

“It’s getting cold out there, Mrs O’Brien,” the male librarian tries.

“We’re all ageing,” the woman retorts.

He changes the subject.

“What do you think of the Budget?”

The woman doesn’t respond.

“WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE BUDGET?” the librarian bellows. Children look up in disbelief.

“I heard you the first time,” the old lady announces. “I just don’t bother with all that shite!”

I leave without a book, but not without a story.

I take a detour home along the Liffey. The river is full and fast. The moon clings to the cobwebs of the morning sky. Drizzle settles on nettles. A reluctant dog is pulled toward the nonchalant swans. Ducks fly close to the water, their necks straining forwards.

Reeds clump together and float to the surface, like dead bodies. A leafless tree bends over the water, like a nude diver frozen in time. A woman jogs by, barely lifting her legs. A man in a track suit practises Tai Chi in the wet grass. I wonder if he’s crazy and try not to stare.

As I huddle on a park bench, ignoring the cold and blowing on a Biro, I decide that I am a writer and that there is nothing I’d rather be.

“It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by. How else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment?” Vita Sackville-West

And for all you budding writers out there, click here.

Images: http://gallery.hd.org/_c/art/_more2004/_more12/baubles-glass-and-wire-shiny-tinsel-blue-and-silver-star-for-top-of-tree-decorations-ornaments-JR.jpg.html; http://weheartit.com/entry/18871955;

http://laetificus.tumblr.com/page/8; http://weheartit.com/entry/9454974

Coming to my Senses

Posted on December 6, 2011 | 2 comments

Every so often, I have a flash of what life would be like without one of my senses. And so I give thanks for my five functioning faculties.

I am grateful for my sense of hearing because of the following…

The soprano song of a violin. The passionate pounding of a piano. A talented vocalist. The morning call of a Collared Dove. A baby’s laughter. Howling wind. Hammering rain. Thundering waves.

I am blessed with the sense of sight because I get to see…

Fairy lights. Ballet. A handsome man in a tight T-shirt. The explosion of colour that a sunset brings. A night sky crowded with stars. The ocean. The dimple of a smile. Flowers and foreign lands.

My sense of smell allows me to enjoy…

Coffee, cut grass, and Christmas trees. Sunscreen and spices and incense. Baby smells of Sudocrem and innocence. The whiff of a cooking dinner when I come home after a long day.

My sense of taste gives me the pleasure of…

Kisses. A mug of tea made by somebody else. A glass of juice after a hard night’s drinking. Gyros and Greek salads. Chips from a brown paper bag. A home-cooked meal following a day in the mountains. Picnics.

Without my sense of touch, I would be unable to appreciate…

A tight embrace. The warmth of an open fire. Sun on skin. A welcome breeze. Skinny dipping. A lover on my neck.

Images: http://patriciaquintessence.blogspot.com/2011/06/oceans-day-today.html; http://weheartit.com/entry/18825370; http://favim.com/image/152231/

http://favim.com/image/31925/

http://rachelindsey.tumblr.com/post/13423884962

http://sweetmountain.tumblr.com/

2 Comments

Posted in Random

Tagged baby, ballet, beauty, christmas, eurasian collared dove, gratitude, gyros, happiness, hearing, kiss, loved one, lover, music, nature, ocean, perfume, piano, pleasure, seaside, senses, sight, smell, song, sound, sudocrem, sunshine, touch, violin, weather

Single and all loved-up

Posted on November 22, 2011 | 11 comments

Being single does not translate as “looking for a partner”. In the words of The Pussycat Dolls (this blog really is high-brow stuff), “I don’t need a man to make me feel good.”

Just because I’m single doesn’t mean I’m available. I want to be sure of myself and my own self-worth before exchanging digits (or body fluids) with some randomer. I want to love and accept myself completely instead of inviting someone else in to do it for me. I’ve got to really know myself and be who I am (and proud of it) before I can meet the right man for me.

If I put myself out there prematurely, I run the risk of getting into the wrong type of relationship. One that will bring me soaring up in the honeymoon stage before crash landing back to reality. Somebody’s bound to get hurt. Been there, done that, bought the self-help book.

We only attract in what we’re projecting out. So, if you’re feeling needy or unattractive or if you’re beating yourself up over anything and everything, you will surely manifest a relationship with someone controlling or critical or angry (or how about all of the above?)

“If you aren’t happy being single, you will never be happy in a relationship. Get your own life and love it first, then share it.” Unknown author

So for now, I’m tentatively entering into a healthy relationship with myself. A romance that’s guaranteed to last a life-time. It’s uncharted territory, folks. But it’s so worthwhile.

So, be grateful for this time you now have to work on yourself and what makes you happy. Giggle with friends over enormous frothy cappuccinos. Take long walks by the coast. Read. Focus on your passion. Start classes in yoga or art or drama. Dance the night away. Go on a skiing or writers’ holiday. Drive somewhere you’ve never been before, with the windows down and your favourite tunes banging. Just because you’re still single doesn’t mean you’re destined to suffer a long, lonely existence with only your cats and knitting needles for company.

Know that you owe it to yourself to experience self-love first.

Featured image: http://www.kriyayoga.com/wallpapers/widescreen_wallpapers/rose/beautiful_roses.html

Images: http://weheartit.com/entry/16568451; http://www.ilovephotoblogs.com/freelance-photographer-salih-guler-ankara-turkey; http://pulpfactor.com/photography/6840/photography-by-luis-beltran/

11 Comments

Posted in Love, Personal development

Tagged anger, art, attraction, books, coast, coffee, control, criticism, drama, exercise, holidays, i don't need a man, knowledge, learning, lessons, life, love, music, neediness, partner, passion, reading, relationships, romance, sea, seaside, self-acceptance, self-esteem, self-help books, self-image, self-love, self-worth, skiing, the pussycat dolls, walking, writing, yoga

Things that make me go Aahhhh….

Posted on November 19, 2011 | 7 comments

Okay, aside from a little bit of Oooh Aaah Paul McGrath, if you know what I mean (I realise that my foreign readers won’t get the embarrassing rhyming reference to getting jiggy with it), here’s a contented-sigh-inducing list of things that make me go Aahhhh….

That first slug of tea after a long day The climax of a favourite tune

"Life is too short to drink from an ugly cup." jAne at Tickleberry Farm

The first holiday glimpse of the ocean Writing something beautiful

Surrendering my weight into a comfortable bed

Sliding into a hot bubble bath The tightest of bear hugs

Reading the first page of a novel and knowing that this book is going to rock

Taking time out in nature The sound of rain beating off a tin roof

*Snow Magic by TORI STEFFEN

WAKING UP TO AN INCREDIBLE SNOW SCENE Swimming solo

The sky in all its forms and shades and PaTteRn$

Beauty… from nature to a photograph to a piece of music to a particularly pleasing male form…

Freewheeling after cycling up a steep incline

Sunshine on my skin Newly changed bedclothes

The scent of yellow furze and freshly cut grass

The blast of hot air as I step off the plane in an exciting foreign location

Lighting a candle just because…

The first gasp of breath after an extraordinary belly laugh

Now, do fill me in on some of the things that make you go Aahhhh…

Images: http://everafterxo.blogspot.com/2011/04/127-and-i-picked-her-up-and-away-we-go.html; http://www.top4download.com/beautiful-ocean-sunset-screensaver/screenshot-csthcguk.html; http://www.pixdaus.com/; http://abigaylee.tumblr.com/page/20; http://blog.fly51fly.com/2009/03/08/delicious-photograph-20090308/

Featured Image: http://www.aliciaandnick.com/whitenoise/art.html

7 Comments

Posted in Love, Random

Tagged art, beauty, bed, books, bubble bath, comfort, cycling, exercise, gratitude, handsome, holidays, jAne at Tickleberry Farm, laughter, literature, men, music, nature, ocean, paul mcgrath, photography, rain, reading, scenes, sky, sleep, snow, sunshine, swimming, tea, writing

Cursing in a cave

Posted on November 17, 2011 | 4 comments

I was listening to Scala & Kolacny Brothers’ take on The Blower’s Daughter this evening when I was reminded of a Norwegian guy who’d raved about a Damien Rice performance. The gig had taken place at Traena festival 2008 in a cave on a tiny island in the north of Norway. My friend hadn’t been afraid to admit that Mr Rice had reduced him to tears. I attended this festival in 2009 but nothing could live up to Damien Rice’s haunting vocals, which were perfectly enhanced by the cave’s excellent acoustics.

I came across this YouTube clip of Rootless Tree tonight and simply had to share it with y’all. If you can get over the brightness of the video (close your eyes if you must) and the cursing chorus (that’s actually the part I love the most), you’ll get why even the strong Viking folk were crying. If only we could all express the thunderstorm of emotions that follow a tumultuous break up with such talent and passion…