Best Friends

The best friends are those who can tickle your brain, make you laugh, have a great sense of humour, are witty, just have the right dose of sarcasm and are critically honest yet remain kind.

You volley back and forth ideas and engage in intellectual fencing, agreeing, or opposing without rending or wounding each other. You are both thoughtful without being morose, and silly without being foolish. You may opine upon and critique a range of ideas or persons without engaging in calumny.

Between you, honesty is not negotiable and loyalty is standard. Trust is the tie that binds. You share that which matters the most. Caring glues you together. You laugh together, a lot. You watch out for each other, catch each other when you fall.

You may be in each other's company, yet remain taciturn. You spend time away from each other without weakening your bond. You may be near together yet allow yourselves to wander silently in your own minds, thinking, reading, meditating. You are never bored with one another because neither of you are boring.

Many people go through life looking for such friends. If you find even just one, you have more than enough. It took you a long time to get where you are. Keep each other.

• "Your friends will know you better in the first minute you meet than your acquaintances will know you in a thousand years." — Richard Bach
• 
• One of my best friends, now departed this world in 2019.  This photo of Rod and I taken in 2006 at a hat party.  Miss you my friend.

Remember Back When

Remember back when you were a kid? You would just do things. You never thought to yourself, “What are the relative merits of learning tennis versus soccer?” You just ran around the playground and played tennis and soccer. 

You built sand castles and played tag and asked silly questions and looked for bugs and dug up grass and pretended you were a sewer monster. 

Nobody told you to do it, you just did it. You were led merely by your curiosity and excitement. 

And the beautiful thing was, if you hated tennis, you just stopped playing it. There was no guilt involved. There was no arguing or debate. You either liked it or you didn’t. 

And if you loved looking for bugs, you just did that. There was no second-level analysis of, “Well, is looking for bugs really what I should be doing with my time as a child? Nobody else wants to look for bugs, does that mean there’s something wrong with me? How will looking for bugs affect my future prospects? 

There was no bullshit. If you liked something, you just did it.

A child does not walk onto a playground and say to herself, “How do I find fun?” She just goes and has fun. 

If you have to look for what you enjoy in life, then you’re not going to enjoy anything.

And the real truth is that you already enjoy something. You already enjoy many things. You’re just choosing to ignore them.

“You never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.”
― Dr. Seuss

Joseph back in 2008 enjoying interacting with the lambs

Tribute to Beryl Florence Cameron

My dear beloved Mum passed away in her sleep on 25 January 2024 at the age of 101 years, 9 months and 20 days. 05/03/1922 - 25/01/2024.

What a wonderful long life she had, an inspiration to all who knew her, generous in everyway, who will be loved forever and never forgotten.

My brother-in-law found a poem that blew me away, written by Linda Ellis called THE DASH.

Between the time we are born and the time we die, there lies a dash of events that sum up our life. According the Linda Ellis, this dash represents our whole life.

I read of a man who stood to speak
at the funeral of a friend
He referred to the dates on the tombstone
from the beginning...to the end.
 

He noted that first came the date of birth
and spoke the following date with tears,
but he said what mattered most of all
was the dash between those years.
 

For that dash represents all the time
that they spent alive on earth.
And now only those who loved them
know what that little line is worth.
 

For it matters not, how much we own --
the cars...the house...the cash.
What matters is how we live and love
and how we spend our dash.
 

So, think about this long and hard.
Are there things you'd like to change?
For you never know how much time is left
that can still be rearranged.
 

If we could just slow down enough
to consider what's true and real,
and always try to understand
the way other people feel.
 

And be less quick to anger
and show appreciation more,
and love the people in our lives
like we've never loved before.
 

If we treat each other with respect
and more often wear a smile,
remembering this special dash
might only last a little while.
 

So, when your eulogy is being read
with your life's actions to rehash,
would you be proud of the things they say
about how you spent YOUR dash?

Mum and I at the Kirribilli Club in Sydney celebrating her 101st birthday in March 2023.

 

Use it or Lose it.

Use it or lose it, they say!

Usually the slogan refers to memory or frequent flyer points but the same applies to vocabulary, too.

Maybe you learnt a word last week - let's call it "farkle" - and unless you use farkle in a sentence pretty soon then the same word is likely to melt into oblivion.

Let's pretend farkle means to pick up an object with your toes. Anglers at low tide can be nifty farklers of buried pipi shells, just as anyone who's gathered a sock off the floor has been known to indulge in farkling.

That's the problem with acquiring strange words. Unless we use them, then the farkles of this world will only grow stranger to us.

According to different sources on the web this is what I learnt about farkle:

"Motorcycle enthusiasts may install accessories, called farkles (also spelled farkel), to customize their machine. The term Farkle apparently originated among the ST1100 riders. It is an acronym:"

F ancy
A ccessory
R eally
K ool &
L ikely
E xpensive

"Always and never are two words you should always remember never to use."
~~ Wendell Johnson

Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi, Australia 2022

Shine on and Flourish

Like plants, to some degree, all of us struggle or flourish according to where we are positioned. Our lives can be hard or easy depending on where the pot is placed. 

Most of us, I think, have had this experience: behaving quite differently according to the people in the room at the time. With some people we feel in perpetual shadow; with others, the sunlight seems to angle in and we are aglow.

With one friend you feel as if you are quite intelligent, discussing erudite issues of politics or literature. You are witty, insightful; the right phrase springs into your mouth at the right time. The very next night, in the company of someone else, you feel dumb and boring. Anxiety or insecurity grips so strongly that the right word, the witty phrase, can never fight its way through to the surface.
I've been thinking about the subtleties of positioning - how the sunlight can hit us when we are standing on this spot, but not in this other spot.

Why, then, don't we strive harder to move into the sun? 

Why don't we spend more time with those who bring out our best selves, and less with those who bring a nuclear winter? Perhaps we could all send out the mental note: ''Paul Whatchamacallit, I know I'm booked in for a barbecue with you on Saturday week but suddenly I find that I am busy. I'm off to spend time with people who think I'm fabulous. And guess what? When I'm with them, I mostly prove them right.''

The best compliment you can pay someone is to say, ''I like the person I am when I'm with you''.
 
"Yeah we all shine on, like the moon, and the stars, and the sun."
~~ John Lennon - Instant Karma

Waratah Flower at Vivid Sydney Light Show 2017

Acceptance - 2023

In reflecting and selecting my word for 2023, “Acceptance” felt like a natural choice. 

Accepting and meeting others where they are at.

Accepting and loving myself as I am.

Accepting a difficult reality.

Accepting a challenge.

Accepting help.

Accepting praise, feedback, and different points of view.

Accepting new opportunities. Deciding what one cannot - and will not - accept.

Acceptance isn’t about giving up, or surrendering. It’s about getting perspective, and making a decision that is best for you at that time.

 

Acceptance supports us in making good choices. When we get thrown a curveball, it helps us move forward towards new goals instead of getting stuck in muck of regret or disappointment. 

The longer I live, the more I’ve come to accept that things rarely go the way we imagine. While we may get blown off course from time to time, we may also end up somewhere more beautiful than we dared to dream.

"I think tolerance and acceptance and love is something that feeds every community."
~~ Lady Gaga

Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi, Australia 2008

The Answer Maybe in the Question

Asking the right question in order to get ourselves thinking, really thinking - there is so much truth in this.

When we can ask that question, at the right moment, and that gives us clarity of direction, how powerful this can be in our lives.

These questions I found while surfing the web have no right or wrong answers, because sometimes asking the right questions is the answer.

1. How old would you be if you didn't know how old you are?

2. If we learn from our mistakes, why are we always so afraid to make a mistake?

3. Are you doing what you believe in, or are you settling for what you are doing?

4. To what degree have you actually controlled the course your life has taken?

5. Are you more worried about doing things right, or doing the right things?

6. What’s something you know you do differently than most people?

7. What one thing have you not done that you really want to do? What’s holding you back?

8. Which is worse, when a good friend moves away, or losing touch with a good friend who lives right near you?

9. Would you rather lose all of your old memories, or never be able to make new ones?


"I cannot stress enough that the answer to life's questions is often in people's faces.  Try putting your iPhones down once in a while, and look in people's faces.  People's faces will tell you amazing things, like if they are angry or nauseous or asleep"
~~ Amy Poehler

I took this photo in January 2011 when hiking with friends at Seal Cave, near Stoney Bay on the Banks Peninsula Track on the South Island of New Zealand. It would be a perfect spot to contemplate some of these questions.

WHY BLOGGING IS ESSENTIAL

Why do we blog??.......OR more to the point WHY DO I BLOG?

I have given this question considerable thought and concluded it is because I love being stroked, complimented, flattered, hugged........am I being shallow?

Probably!

Blogging has enhanced my creative side and expanded my knowledge 100 fold. I actually feel I am a better person since I started blogging.

I blog to be part of a community of people whom I respect; I want to understand your thinking and I want you to understand mine. 

I blog to be part of the conversation. I blog to remember. I blog to refine my thinking. I blog because I don't think I really understand something until I write about it. 

Finally I blog because there are truly remarkable people in the world, who perhaps would not be recognized by the world. I blog to connect with persons who share some (if not all) of my values. 

So I keep coming back to blogging because of YOU my friends, yes YOU, I keep coming back because of YOU. BLESS YOU. 

"A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked".
~~ Bernard Meltzer

One Little Word 2022

Twenty Twenty Two marks my 14th year of choosing one little word for the year.

My word for this year is FORWARD.

Words carry tremendous power, words spoken or thought produce actual physical vibrations.

When we think or repeat one word over and over it can directly impact our lives.

That's why I choose one little word (OLW) every year instead of making New Year resolutions.

OLW primes the brain to search for the positive and expands our consciousness to look for the blessings that already exist.

"Better than a thousand hollow words, is one word that brings peace"
~~ Buddha

Languishing

As scientists and physicians work to treat and cure the physical symptoms of long-haul COVID, many of us are struggling with the emotional long-haul of the pandemic. 

This is called Languishing -  a sense of stagnation and emptiness. It feels as if we're muddling through our days, looking at our life through a foggy windshield. 

According to experts languishing is the neglected middle child of mental health. It’s the void between depression and flourishing, the absence of well-being. 

Languishing dulls our motivation, disrupts our ability to focus, and triples the odds that we'll cut back on work. 

The term was coined by a sociologist named Corey Keyes, who was struck that many people who weren't depressed also weren't thriving.

Part of the danger is that when we're languishing, we might not notice the dulling of delight or the dwindling of drive. We don’t catch ourselves slipping slowly into solitude; we're indifferent to our indifference. 

So folks it could give us a socially acceptable response to “How are you?”

Instead of saying “Great!” or “Fine,” imagine if we answered, “Honestly, I’m languishing.” 

"Inch by inch I conquered the inner terrain I was born with.

Bit by bit I reclaimed the swamp in which I'd languished. I gave birth to my infinite being, but I had to wrench myself out of me with forceps."

— Fernando Pessoa

Seal Cave in New Zealand 
Chairs in the Wilderness

Deja Vu Sensations

There are many theories as to what causes déjà vu.

One says that our "spirit" can actually travel faster in time than our earthbound bodies so it charges off into the future from time to time for reasons we can't explain.

Another claims that it's because we are reincarnated and old memories from past lives are seeping through into our current consciousness.

And then there's the parallel Universe theory that suggests our lives are always splitting off into different directions whenever we make big decisions and that at the point of experiencing déjà vu we are connecting with these parallel worlds.

All of which rather ignores the actual sensation of déjà vu that is simply joyous and mesmerising regardless of what it actually is.

Déjà vu experiences stay with us too, logging themselves into our memory banks where they can be withdrawn whenever those "déjà vu" conversations occur, usually over a few glasses of wine late at night!


"There's an opposite to déjà vu. They call it jamais vu. It's when you meet the same people or visit places, again and again, but each time is the first. Everybody is always a stranger. Nothing is ever familiar."
~~ Chuck Palahniuk

Visiting Norway in July 2010 and we stopped at this place for a short while, an eeriness came over me as I photographed this scene. I wanted to hop in that boat and paddle into the mist.

Back to the Future - Our New Normal 2021

Time travellers should prepare for tough sledding. If you went back to 1820 or even 1920, all the sudden changes would discombobulate you. And the same is true for someone who came forward to today.

We’ve got a deep-seated desire for things to go back to normal, the way we were used to.

But this, this moment of ours is now normal.

For now.

And then, there will be another normal.

There is no “the new normal”. Because that’s definitive.

There’s simply the normal of now.

A new normal. This too shall pass.

“We sense that ‘normal’ isn’t coming back, that we are being born into a new normal: a new kind of society, a new relationship to the earth, a new experience of being human.”
― Charles Eisenstein

Perceived Infinity -Wyong, NSW, Australia 2015

Off Centre

I've spent much of my life walking down the centre of the road.

I tell myself it's important to be safe. Security comes first.

It's a hard cruel world, so I'd better play it safe now than be sorry later.

Fools rush in.......

But nothing is more certain than if I walk down the centre of the road, I am going to be hit by the traffic coming from both directions.

Playing it safe is the most dangerous thing I can possibly do.

I think we only really get to grow and move ahead in life when we challenge ourselves.


Lyrics from Left of Center by Suzanne Vega

"If you want me, you can find me,
left of center, off of the strip
in the outskirts, in the fringes,
in the corner, out of the grip"


Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi, Sydney, November 2009.

COVID-19 - We're All In This Together

As we are all in this together, we are reminded of the simple things that make life beautiful, helping a neighbour, embracing our community, putting other’s needs before our own.

The only things that matter ultimately are good health and the closeness of loved ones! The wisdom of ages, and now we know it! 

We humans are a resilient bunch and throughout history have survived war, famine, epidemics, trauma and tragedy of all sorts. If there are takeaway lessons from this challenge they are that disease knows no international boundaries, love is stronger than fear, a “we and not just me” attitude serves everyone, and we need each other to survive. 

Let this be a first step to the end of discrimination and a better world full of kindness.

Finally now the Earth heals herself as pollution lessens; birds tweet to their heart’s content in a newly clear blue sky, and leopards, deer and even elephants reclaim their land as we stay locked away.

"None of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with great love, and together we can do something wonderful.
~~ Mother Teresa

 

When I was in Norway in 2010, out walking one day we came across this window, it made me smile.

Writing from the Heart

The easiest way to write from the heart is when you’re having a day or period of time when you are full of emotion.

Also writing from the heart requires you to write about something you’re passionate about.

Your heart can’t speak its truth if you only want to be and appear strong and look good and shiny.

The reason is because so much of the world is based on hype and things that are not real. When you are vulnerable, you naturally write from the heart.

Being vulnerable in writing and in life is not very common. People listen when you’re vulnerable, and you speak what you believe to be the truth. Vulnerability can create immense power, and it’s that power that you can use to change your world.

“Don’t write what you know—what you know may bore you, and thus bore your readers. Write about what interests you—and interests you deeply—and your readers will catch fire at your words.” 
~~  Valerie Sherwood  

Taken at Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi, Sydney Oct 2019. The sculpture is called Floating, Grounded Figure by Greg Johns.

 

One Little Word - 2020

Since 2009 I have been choosing a single word to focus on over the course of the next 12 months.

Ali Edwards initiated this movement called "One Little Word".

It's a powerful way to set an intention for the year ahead.

This year my word will be "HEART".

See Our Way Forward

At certain times in our lives it is difficult to see our way forward.

Finding the way of controlling the stories we tell ourselves and which ones we choose to believe can be daunting.

The place of our power, the process of our power is watching the thoughts that we think, the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves, understanding that even though we didn't put those stories there, we have the power to change them.

Telling new stories is the key to recovery - we can disrupt negative thoughts.  We never have to go back to that negative space once we have a framework for understanding where to go with our suffering, how to transform it into something useful.

When we face our fears or at least define our fears, we can come up with an action plan to combat them.

There is a wisdom that comes from the experience of working through our fears.

Wisdom is always the by-product of facing our fears.

“In the beginning I was so young and such a stranger to myself I hardly existed. I had to go out into the world and see it and hear it and react to it, before I knew at all who I was, what I was, what I wanted to be.”
― Mary Oliver, Upstream: Selected Essays


This sculpture by Kiochi Ishino and is called "In The Grey of Daybreak" - taken at Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi, Sydney, Australia in November 2019. 
The statement says "This sculpture depicts the dawning era of a new beginning in Japanese culture, the Reiwa era. 

Writing Can Be Pervasive

I'm a firm believer in the power of the written word.  It’s a form of “putting it out there” to the Universe.

“The pen is mightier than the sword”.........at least so says English author Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839.  But this is the twenty-first century – not the nineteenth, and times have radically changed. Today most people’s writing involves emails, text messages, Facebook, Twitter and the like; lots of touching base but little true writing.

So in these days we might ask afresh, Is the pen still mightier than the sword?  Should the written word still be considered a powerful weapon in the modern culture in which we live?

The effort of putting pen to paper (metaphorically speaking) is considerable.  Every article we write may not have a powerful result, but it could!

It can be pervasive.

It can permeates lives, penetrating where spoken words would be shut out.
One of the reasons for this is that there is an implied acceptance when we choose to pick up something to read.  In essence, we have given it the right to speak into our lives.

Because of this, an article can often penetrate a resistant heart, for just the action of choosing to read it opens the door to the truth it contains.

The pervasive power of writing also comes from the fact that, since written words easily endure, they often make it to places we would never dream.

So let the writing begin!
 
“A drop of ink may make a million think.”

~~George Gordon Byron  

New Zealand chairs in the wilderness at Seal Cove on the South Island.
What a beautiful spot to read a book or do some writing!

Pen and Paper

To sit at a computer-free desk with a pen,

to pull out a sheet of your hand-printed headed notepaper,

to write those first two words "Dear Friend",

and then to pause a while before letting the ink flow onto the page with tales of your doings and your worries,

to fold up the paper,

slip it into an envelope,

write the address out,

stick on the stamp,

drop it into the letter-box,

and then imagine the pleasure that your letter will bring,

the physical pleasure of opening it and reading it at the other end.

- ah, is this not happiness?

"To send a letter is a good way to go somewhere without moving anything but your heart."
~~ Phyllis Theroux



An old Sculpture by the Sea photo from 2007 taken at Bondi Beach, Sydney, Australia.

Life Is Better When Unrushed

The world most of us live in is hectic, fast-paced, fractured, hurried.
What’s more, most of us are conditioned to think this is the way life should be.

Life should be lived at break-neck speed, we believe. We risk our lives in cars and we break the speed limit, rushing from one place to another. We do one thing after another, multi-tasking and switching between tasks as fast as we can blink.

All in the name of productivity, of having more, of appearing busy, to ourselves and to others.

But life doesn't have to be this way. In fact, I’d argue that it’s counterproductive.

If our goal is to create, to produce amazing things, to go for quality over quantity, then rushing is not the most effective way to work. Slowing down and focusing is always more effective.

Rushing produces errors. It’s distracting to flit from one thing to the next, with our attention never on one thing long enough to give it any thought or create anything of worth.

Hurrying produces too much noise to be able to find the quiet the mind needs for true creativity and profound thinking.

So yes, moving quickly will get more done. But it won’t get the right things done.

The most important step is a realization that life is better when you move at a slower, more relaxed pace, instead of hurrying and rushing and trying to cram too much into every day. Instead, get the most out of every moment.

Is a book better if you speed read it, or if you take your time and get lost in it?

Is a song better if you skim through it, or if you take the time to really listen?

Is food better if you cram it down your throat, or if you savour every bite and really appreciate the flavour?

“Nature never rushes, yet everything gets done.”
~~ Donald L. Hicks

Just outside Christchurch, New Zealand in February 2019 we encountered this large flock of sheep.  We patiently waited at the side of the road for them to pass.