Letter to a Stranger

Hello there,

I had an idea to write to a stranger today. I don’t know you, or what your needs, or your desires are. This is not a sales pitch. I’m not offering anything but a little advice, on how to live the best life possible. How to live the life you dream about.

What I do know is; life can be wonderful, but we have to make it so. If we don’t like where we are, we are the only ones who can do something about it. We can’t wait for our ‘knight in shining armour.’ If we want to see change, we have to make it happen. 

We live in either pain, or pleasure. When pain gets so bad, only then will we do what we need to do, to move towards something more pleasurable. Why wait until it gets so bad? What would happen if you tried to change your life today?

If I had one thing to tell you, one thing of great importance, it would be to do what it takes to have the courage to move toward your ideal day. 

Most of us live in fear. Most of us wish we had courage. What if I told you courage is easy to step into? Courage is only a matter of seconds away. Whatever it is you wish you had courage for, count. Count 3, 2, 1, get in and get it done. In as little as 3 seconds, you can go; make that phone call, have that conversation, apply for that job, do that exercise, study for that test. Take 3 seconds and act and your life can change. 

Not only that, courage may be difficult the first time you try, but by the second or third time, what you were fearful of begins to dissipate. Have the courage to continue, in spite of your fears and courage becomes easier and easier, until there is no fear at all over the issue. 

Situations often look hopeless, only because we don’t have a clear idea of what we want in life. Plan your ideal day. If money and time were not an issue, what would you be doing today? If you could be anything you want in life, what would you choose?

Once you know where you want to be, you need to work out the steps to get you there. And once you have the steps, take action. Take those steps and make them part of your life. Do what you need to do, to move yourself to where you want to go. 

Life is joyous and if yours isn’t, get excited, because you can grab hold of your dream and make it happen. There’s plenty of books and articles on the internet, about achieving your dreams and designing the life you want. All you need to do, is access those.

I hope you don’t mind me writing to you today. One just doesn’t know, who needs this kind of thing and who doesn’t. If you feel you don’t need this information, pass it on, or throw it out. If it helps and you find it uplifting, then I’ve achieved what I set out to do, with this short letter. 

God bless you and may your life be the life you dream about and may you become the person you wish to be. 

With loving kindness, Alexandra Grose – photo journalist and author.

P.S.; If you wish to get in contact, please feel free to email me at:

alexgrose04@gmail.com 

What I know now, that l wish l knew then.

 

What I know now, that I wish I knew then.

I wish I knew courage, when I was younger. For whatever reason, I didn’t have any. I was fearful of everything and everyone. 

I wish I knew it didn’t take a lot of courage, to be courageous. All it takes to have courage, is to try one or two times and the fear of whatever it is, will leave you.

I wish I believed in myself more. As a writer, photographer and investor, I didn’t get started until into my 40’s. I didn’t think I was capable of much and didn’t believe I could do anything. If I knew how capable I was, perhaps it wouldn’t have taken as long, for me to become successful.

I wish I knew earlier, about goal setting and following your passion. It took a long time, for me to get to that point and a long, long time, before I could live the life of my dreams. Once you start setting goals and following through on them, the world really is your oyster.

I wish I wasn’t afraid of failure. If I knew way back then, that to succeed, one needs to fail and that failure isn’t the end. Failure was to show me, how not to do it next time. Failure also isn’t anything to be ashamed of. Any great person in their field, will have failed at some point, learned not to do it that way, and then moved on to success. 

I wish I didn’t get stuck in that failure, but learned to move on quicker. When we’re failing, we’re learning and growing. Failure’s not the end, but a new beginning. The only true way to fail, is to quit. 

I wish I knew anxiety and stress were things I could change and not things that can’t be helped. Anxiety and stress cause us to stop, when they should cause us to explore. Look at what’s giving you anxiety and stress and work out what you need to change and how you can heal.

I wish I knew depression is a state of mind and once you change your mind, you change your state. I’m not making light of it here either. I know how hard it is to break out of depression, but if you really work at it every day, it can be done. Learn from those who’ve been there before you, do what they did and you will have breakthrough.

I wish I knew it didn’t take a lot of money to have investments, it just takes small amounts frequently, if that’s all you have. Investing can be anything from coins and stamps, to housing, business, antiques, wines, shares and all sorts in between. If you knew you could start small, perhaps you too could invest. 

I wish I knew, if I’d just saved $20 a week from when I started work, until I retired, I’d retire wealthy due to the compounding of interest. $20 doesn’t seem like a lot, when you consider later in life it needs to be ten times that amount, to come close. You need to start early to take advantage of compound interest.

I wish instead of being “Jack of all trades,” I’d been master at one. I didn’t know what my passion was and I tried a lot of things before I found it. From an early age, I wanted to write, but the pessimists around me, said get a job. Then I changed from job to job, unsatisfied, whereas could I have done my passion, I might have been great at it early on and not limping along for years.

I wish I hadn’t listened to the pessimists, who told me I couldn’t do/be what I wanted. I wish I’d worked hard to prove them wrong, rather than give in, thinking I lacked intelligence and skill.

I wish I believed in God and the bible, when I was younger. If I’d believed, I could have learned all the more quickly, for the bible really is the success book to living life.

If you could look at your 80-year-old self today, what would you look back on and do differently?

Do you think you’d spend more time with your family? Do you think you’d have the courage to try for that job, do that course, study the field you wish to be in? Do you wish you’d not let your addictions (whatever they may be) take hold? Can you stop those addictions now, before they get worse? Do you wish you might have saved a few dollars, for a rainy day, or purchased that property you always wanted? Or not wasted years in a loveless marriage, instead, perhaps trying harder to fix it? Do you think you might like to try for happiness, in whatever form that is for you?

Ahhh, so many regrets in life. I’m told it’s not what one does, that one regrets in the twilight years of life, but what one hasn’t done, that one regrets. Your life isn’t getting longer. There is no time like the present. No matter what age you are, it’s time to take control of your life and do what it takes, to live the life of your dreams, or forever live with regret.  

Shoot for the stars, for even if you miss, you might still end up on the moon!

Pasta Free Lasagne, with a bit of a bite.

Ingredients;

2 onions, chopped

500 g turkey mince (you can use other mince, if you don’t have turkey, but as a lighter calorie alternative, turkey is good for this recipe.)

1 tsp garlic

2 finely chopped small chilli, or 2 tsp dried chilli 

1 tsp paprika

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp mix herbs

Salt and pepper to taste

1 of each; carrot and zucchini, grated

1 red capsicum, chopped

1 tin red kidney beans, rinsed

2 tins chopped tomato

1 packet wholemeal and grain soft wraps 

1 tub 300gram light sour cream

Light cheese, grated (enough to completely cover the sour cream – or as thick as you like) 

Method;

Heat oven to 185 deg.

Fry onion in oil, until cooked and remove from pan.

Place mince in pan, with salt, pepper and all herbs and fry, breaking up the meat, until cooked.

Add onion back into meat, along with all vegetables and kidney beans.

Stir until well mixed and heated through. 

Coat a round 8” casserole dish with spray oil.

Place 1 wrap in bottom of dish, then layer mince and wrap, until 1” from the rim, finishing with a wrap. 

Spread sour cream over the final wrap, and top with grated cheese. 

Place in oven and cook for 25 - 30 minutes, until cheese is nicely browned.

Possibility and Potential

Your possibility and potential, are limited by your beliefs. If you’re confident and have faith in your abilities, it’s much easier to succeed. For the less confident person, success can still happen, but you have to work harder for it. 

There’s science behind how powerful we really are when we use our minds correctly and this is why the law of attraction works so well. You need to understand; your thoughts are very powerful and you have the ability to make your life much more fun and exciting. Your thoughts can also bring your life to the exact opposite, where despair and depression rule.

If you’re in a place of despair and can’t see a way forward, there is hope. If you can’t see yourself surviving the next few days, or even hours, I want you to write down your ideal day. Don’t think about it and don’t poo-poo the idea. Just take a moment to write your ideal day. 

If you don’t know what your ideal day could possibly be, just think if right now you had all the money and time you need, what would you be doing with your life? (And don’t say laying on the beach with a Pina Colada, because believe it or not, you would soon get bored with doing nothing.)

If money and time were no barrier, what would be the dream for your life? Write it down and then write the steps it would take to get you there. Are there things you need to learn? Do you need to improve your health, or your diet? Are there things you know you need to wait for, before you can proceed? Do you need more money, or time to make this happen? How are you going to get that money/time? Make your dream as big as you like! There are no barriers to dreams and writing them down brings a little hope into your world.

Once you start focussing on the answers to your questions, the universe lines up with you. Once you start to focus on what you want, instead of what you don’t want, the universe will line up with that also. So far you’ve focused on all the things that can go wrong in life and the universe has given you what you focussed on. So now you need to focus on better things. When you do, you put yourself on a better vibration level and things start to move you towards a better tomorrow. 

You are responsible for your life. You made the choices which brought you here and now you need to make new and improved choices, to take you from a time of depression and despair, to a life of joy, fun and excitement. 

Sure, you can blame others, and at times it might be others, but from here on in, the responsibility is yours. How you react to what’s happened, how you move from your mistakes to a new life of adventure, is up to you. No one can do this for you. You have to do it for yourself. Get in and do the work. 

Once you know this information you can no longer play the victim. If someone out there is controlling you, your feelings and thoughts and you feel like a victim, now is the time to do the work and stop this victim mentality. 

What is the work? Get off the couch, for one. Stop watching mindless tv and start reading books which will expand your mind and your horizons. Books on how other people succeeded. Books on how others overcame what you’re going through. Books on positive thinking and achieving your dreams. 

"You don’t like to read," I hear you say. Learn to like it. What we read, who we hang out with and the actions we take are what make us successful, or not. So read and if you really don’t like to read, get on you tube. It’s all there and you can listen while you work, while you exercise, even while you cook dinner, if that’s all the time you have available. 

Learning new things makes new connections in your mind. Learning new things, strengthens and grows your mind. Information creates awareness and these days you have all the information you need, at your fingertips. This information helps create the life you dream about and the freedom you desire to see in your life.

When you have a vision, one you’re striving towards, it’s easy to be distracted and to lose that vision. You need to know what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. Keeping the vision before you, helps keep your focus. Ask yourself, when something crops up to distract you; will this take me away from my goal, or move me towards it? This will help keep you on track and lessen the disruptions and interruptions to your plans for your life.

Once you build momentum, you start feeling worthy and more confident. Your body can tell and you’ll notice you’re more confident. You walk more confidently, you’ll be less shy around others and you’ll exude an ‘air,’ about you. This ‘air’ is not something anyone can see, but others will be drawn to you and your confidence and even they won’t know why.   

And when things go well, give yourself a pat on the back. Only you know what you’ve been through and how far you’ve come. Give yourself a pat on the back and tell yourself; "Well done!" Because it’s easy to move past your accomplishments and get caught up in the doing. If something goes well, acknowledge it, as this reinforces what you’re doing right. And it will make you feel good about yourself and how your life is going. 

The stronger the emotion you feel, where you place your attention, gives your life greater force. So, regulate your thoughts, think about what you want to see, do the work in mastering your emotional state and you'll find you have the energy to heal and move forward.

All this time, you’ve created your reality, you just didn’t know you were doing it wrong. If you are in lack and emptiness and you spend your life wanting, this is the lack and emptiness you brought about, through your lack of understanding. 

Now you need to turn that around and you can do that by the way you think and feel and it’s a process and it takes practice, but if you don’t quit (because there will be difficulties and road blocks along the way) you’ll get there in the end. 

If you’re doing the work, you’ll start paying attention and your mind will start to believe in in what you’re doing and you’ll see change, but only if you change your thoughts and your actions.

You are way better than you think. You can live the life of your dreams. And quite possibly, courage will be the first requirement. Courage is the key to life. The opposite of courage is cowardice, a life lived in fear. A life lived in fear is a life of hell. If courage is the key to life, then heaven is behind the door marked; “Courage."

The only way to have courage, is to take responsibility for your life. In life, we are meant to overcome. We are meant to bring order out of chaos. An undisciplined life is a life of chaos. When we act courageously and take responsibility, then our chaos will come to order. 

You be the hero in your story. Don’t wait for your knight in shining armour. Act courageously, take responsibility for all that is wrong in your life…and fix it! Make an effort, not an excuse. If you don’t think you have the discipline, study discipline. Discipline is a muscle and the more you exercise a muscle the stronger it gets. Make the effort to practice discipline, don’t make an excuse. 

If you find you don’t have the discipline, try to focus for 5 minutes. If 5 minutes is too long and you forget everything, do it anyway, then do it again tomorrow and the day after, until you remember what you’ve learned. 

Life is lived in micro moments. 5 minutes now, is forming a micro moment. It’s doing the little things every day, working on the small goals in micro moments, that move you towards the fulfilment of the greater good. 

Put effort into your life. Wake up and get excited about the possibilities. Stop being distracted. Stop frying your brain in mindless internet and tv.

When you start something, prepare for failure. Don’t be disillusioned when it comes. No one ever starts at the top. We all fail on our first attempts and if we don’t, we haven’t set the bar high enough. If you want to succeed, you need to fail more often.

Do something every day, that moves you forward towards your goal. Even on a bad day; make an effort. Show up and do the work, every day. It takes hard work to be good at anything. Set yourself the task of being the best.

Practice! Practice! Practice! If your life isn’t everything it could be, change what you need to change and continue to change, until every day becomes your ideal day. 

It’s easy to do nothing, be nothing, have nothing. That takes no effort at all, and what kind of life is that anyway? It’s an unrewarding life. 

Our success is determined by the books we read, the people we hang with and the action we take. It’s that simple. Want success? Read, hang out with others who are successful and take action towards your goals.

I know what I’m talking about. My life was one of depression and despair and I was suicidal 20 years ago. Now I’m an investigative photojournalist and author, as well as an investor on the stock exchange. I love to cook and walk the dog and I enjoy every day.

I know once you make the decision to start, if you don’t quit, you too can be a success and live your idyllic life. Hang in there. Don’t quit. And watch your life move from depression and despair, to a life of overwhelming joy and abundance. 

An ancient message of hope, during these troubling times...

We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed,

We are perplexed, but not in despair,

Persecuted, but not forsaken,

Struck down, but not destroyed.

2 Corinthians 4:8-9

NKJV

It's a little bit personal, but I hope it helps

It’s a little bit personal…

 

I was 34, when I first heard about positive thinking. I read everything I could on it, for the next 2 years, then that “Still Small Voice” in my head asked; what have all these books got in common? I thought for a moment and then said; a belief in a higher power, a greater consciousness, God. It was there that I recommitted to being a Christian and walked my new path, with God. 

At the time, working towards my ideal day which I now had written down, all I had was a vague idea: I wanted to lose weight and gain money. I didn’t have any particular idea how much weight, or how much money, or how I was going to do it, because I know I’d tried and failed so many times and now ‘fear’ kept me at bay. Fear was stopping me from doing so much, because everything I’d done thus far had failed and I couldn’t bear to fail again.

Still I pressed on, because I was so depressed, I didn’t like the alternative. It took a while to work out what my ‘ideal day’ would look like. Within that first 2 years, while reading over 200 books on positive thinking, I decided I wanted to trade and write and to do it while traveling. 

Since then, I have done this and travelled, mostly close to home, but for me, even that was something and although I’m not making enough money to stop work altogether (I work part time in disabilities and full time as an author), I can still trade, write and travel, as I go to John’s and Olivia’s, or even for a trip to the beach for the day.

The idea was evolving all the time and I finally lost a heap of weight, however I got to a point where nothing I did would lose any further weight.

Initially I hit the hundred kilo mark and thought, if I don’t stop it now, it will become 110, 120, etc. And I lost 25 kilos, then put 10 back on and stayed there for the next 10 years, hitting a low and bouncing back up again, but never quite hitting the mark, staying there, or getting under it. 

Now, I’ve found a weight loss system which is working for me and I’m finally making new lows. I would like to lose another 4 kilos, and then see how I feel. Perhaps I’ll try for 5 more, perhaps I’ll be happy where I’m at. 

With a couple of dozen books now published, my weight coming down and my savings going up, (and with no real idea of where to stop with my savings), I finally feel somewhat successful. I make consistent money trading and I never tire of that. It’s fun. I expect to hit my targets by August next year and if that appears to be a long way off, I’m pacing myself, to do it comfortably. 

I’ve made a lot of changes to my diet over the years and am pleased to have not gained weight, but it’s been an elusive mark, to lose just that final 4 kilos. Right now, I feel it’s going to happen and that’s a bit exciting. It’s taken a lot of ‘tweaking’, but I think I’ve got it worked out now and I am seeing those final few kilos coming down.

In thinking about that, I’ve tentatively marked the spot on the calendar…as I said, August next year I should have hit my goal weight and have a nice sum of money in the bank. It’s been a long slow haul and at times, incredibly frustrating, but this is the first time I can actually see myself there. 

With a couple of dozen books on Amazon, I can now really see and believe in myself as an author. I can now see success as an author and as a trader and that’s exciting.

I’ve had a lot of fun along the way. Had some great experiences, as well as difficult days, but I’m pleased to say; I have way more great days (ideal days, the ideal day that I wrote I’d like to live, all those years ago) than difficult ones and that’s something I can be proud of. 

I’m thrilled with my new book; I Think I Have Fairies In My Garden. I’m really pleased with how trading is going. I’m excited to be hitting new lows, with weight loss and new highs with dollars in the bank. By Jove; I think I’m going to make it!!!

Probably the hardest part initially, was all the books on positive thinking said people were making it after 2 years. As the years and years ticked over, I was beginning to wonder what was wrong with me. It’s hard to have confidence in oneself, when one isn’t getting the results everyone else seems to get, in the time frame everyone else seems to be getting them. Perhaps that says something about how low I was, how much I had to work through, and how deeply rooted Satan was in my life, before I could see positive results.

Would I have gone ahead with it all, knowing it would take this long? Probably, because the alternative for me was dire, as I was suicidal way back then (it’s been 20 years). And all the ‘fun’ parts along the way, have made the whole thing worthwhile, in spite of how long it’s taken.

Now, if anyone asks what I do, I can proudly say I’m an author. I used to say it, without much conviction, now I can say it in truth. 

I am an author, who also trades commodities and currency on the stock exchange!

If you’re working towards something, which appears out of reach to you at this time; don’t quit. Hang in there. Hang in there, in spite of the difficulties and dramas and one day you too, will see the success you desire.

The Horror of the Human Condition

 

We go through the twists and turns of life knowing we can do more, be more, have more and yet we’re disappointed in ourselves, because we haven’t reached our full potential. We know we can be more than we are, but we procrastinate. We don’t do as we ought. We don’t manage our time, our money, or our relationships well.

We berate ourselves, for falling short of what we think we could be. We feel shame and guilt and this causes stress and anxiety. We know we should eat healthy and exercise and yet we don’t do it. We don’t like the way we look and we berate ourselves all the more.  

We don’t like the way we behave either. We can be mean, condescending, and downright brutal at times and we don’t like ourselves for behaving this way.

We also don’t need to stay this way.

We don’t need to change everything today. We just need to take one small step of action.

Changing one thing today, will make us better than we were yesterday and it will give us hope for a better tomorrow. Hope is fundamental to enjoying life. A hopeless life puts us in a downward spiral and that’s no way to live life. To have a joyous life, we need to give ourselves something to hope in and hope for. 

We can start with having less cigarettes (drop one or two today and next week try for more) or eating an apple instead of having that biscuit. Perhaps alcohol or drugs are the issue. Do what it takes, to make one small step today. Is it a phone call, a doctor’s appointment you need? Can you throw out all sugars from your home? Remember; one small step today.

We can start with walking, instead of sitting on the lounge doing nothing, even if all we start with is 5 minutes. We can build from there. And that may be only one small action today, but let’s say we take another action tomorrow and another one and another.

In a year, or two years, or three years, you’re going to be in a much better place and feel better about yourself, but only if you take action and what better time than today? It all starts with you and it starts with one small action.

Don’t try to lose 25 kilos, when that’s never worked for you before. Try to lose 1 kilo and then another and then another. Small actions every day.

And sure, you may not be where you want to be next week, or even in 6 months but you’ll be so much better off than where you are right now, if you take action and keep at it.

You don’t have to change everything today, there just has to be some action. Without action, nothing changes. Even a small action is better than no action.

If you get to a point where you have improved 50% on where you are now, how much better will you feel about yourself?

We all want to manage the world and half of us can’t even manage our own home.

Start with looking after yourself. Start to mend relationships. Start taking care of your finances. Eat healthy, get exercise, tidy your house and move on from there.

Because you can’t change the world until you can change yourself and until you can change yourself, no-one’s going to take you seriously anyway. No one’s going believe in you, if you want to change the world and can’t manage your own depraved behaviour. 

And maybe you don’t want to change the world. You might just want a better life for yourself. It still takes action on your part. So take yourself seriously!

Start with you, then your family, then your home, and then your finances and then you can tackle community. Because you will want to help others, once you’ve seen the positive results you get.

Don’t try to do it all at once, just start with one small step, one step at a time. Change something every day, until it becomes the new normal for you.

Also, stretch yourself past your limits. We feel fear and get stuck in fear. And if we don’t move out of fear, nothing changes and we spiral downhill. One small change is all you need to start with.

So set your goals, but before you set your goals, determine your values. If your values don’t line up with your goals, you will have greater difficulty manifesting those goals. 

If you think you have to work hard to earn money, then you’ll self-sabotage any idea you come up with, for ‘easy’ money. Your values have to line up with your goals. It is possible to work towards your goals and succeed, but you won’t have to work as hard, if your goals line up with your values. 

A core value to you might be that successful people are stingy people and although that’s not necessarily correct, that’s just the way you’ve seen it happen. 

You don’t want to be seen as stingy, so unconsciously (this is not something you’re particularly conscious of doing) you’ll do something to hamper your success (and it could be anything which hampers you), because subconsciously you don’t want to be seen as stingy. You might wonder why it works this way and I can’t tell you this. All I know is; it happens.

Do you know why people don’t make new year’s resolutions? It’s because they’ve never followed through and achieved any new year resolution they’ve made. When you make a resolution and don’t follow through with it, you weaken your muscle memory for next time and eventually you come to the conclusion; “I don’t bother making resolutions. They never work anyway,” and so you don’t try.  

Don’t wait though, for new year. Don’t even wait for Monday. Start today. Start while you have a little motivation happening and go for it. 

So, it’s simple; determine your core values, set your goals, make an action plan, start small and go for it.  

You are free to do as you like.

 

You are free to do as you like!

You’re free to smoke, you’re free to become an alcoholic, you’re free to sell your body. You’re free to do all sorts of negative things. You’re also free to do as you ought. You’re free to say no, to that which isn’t good for you and yes to that which is.

Often God gets the blame when things go wrong, but if we truly stop and ask ourselves how we contributed to where we are, we’ll find we did have free will, to make wrong decisions. Does that mean accidents don’t happen? Of course not. Things go wrong in life. Life’s hard. 

Even the bible states; you will have troubles. Life is hard. People we love get sick and die. Who do you know, ate all the wrong foods and got diabetes? Who do you know, who smoked and now has lung cancer? Who do you know, did all the right things and died anyway? Life doesn’t always give us what we want. But we can help things to a certain degree. We can make good choices and have good outcomes. 

Finances are a similar thing. Are you spending all you have, to impress people you don’t know and who don’t care? Finances are flexible, you just need to learn to manage them, to have them work for you and not against you.

If you’ve started a business and have found finances aren’t quite what you were hoping for when you started, it will help if you have an understanding about money. You might have thought the business would take off and flourish, but you’ve ended up with the opposite. 

You might have even thought, the passion you have in doing what you love was enough. However, I ask you; how much study did you do, before you invested in that business?  Go to the library, if you can’t afford books and borrow books on business and investing. Perhaps there’s a seminar on finances, in your area, that you could attend.

It’s the little things, the boring and mundane things, the things which you think aren’t all that important, that’s going to get you over the line. Things like making a budget, working out the costings of that one item, to ensure you’re selling it at a profit. 

There’s not many of us who like making budgets. Most of us want to stay home and party, but I gotta tell ya; A disciplined self is a self of power. Imagine taking the one thing you hate about yourself and changing it. That’s discipline! And when you do change that one aspect of your life, you feel empowered. That’s an amazing feeling. 

To become unfit and unhealthy takes years of wrong actions. It’s easy to be consistently broke, just keep spending. Or you can take control of your health, your relationships, your finances, or whatever it is, you don’t like about your life. You are free to do as you like.

One moment of carelessness and life can become wrecked. It’s hard to stay committed all the time and it’s easy to say; I’m free to do as I like. However, you do have moral obligations and if you work with those obligations, it will help you turn your life from one of constant troubles and hardship, to one of peace, joy and success.

The choice is yours. There are no moral holidays. You’re not free to drink and drive. Well you are, but the consequences can be quite dire and I wouldn't recommend it. 

If you want a successful life, you need to do what successful people do. Successful people do what the majority don’t want to do. They get up early and focus on their goals. Successful people don’t procrastinate and waste very little time watching tv, playing computer games, or reading trashy magazines. Successful people have plans in place and act on those plans, without excuse. 

There’s plenty of books and you tube messages on the internet, which tell you how you can become a success, so why aren’t we reading and listening to that? Because it takes action. It takes doing what the majority of people won’t do, of doing what’s difficult, even when we don’t feel like doing it. But I put it to you; if you set a goal and constantly work at it, at some point, you will achieve that goal, if you don’t quit.

You can create a vision board, or write a goals list. Write the goal, post a picture, whatever works for your creativity level. Add the steps, which get you there and go for it. Simple. The above photo, of a vision board, or goal setting board is a relatively simple one, as an example only. You can make these boards as elaborate as you like. Have a look on line and you’ll see some really imaginative ones, or as they say: KISS (Keep it simple, smarty).

We’re not born successes. We work at it, one step at a time and we are free to choose, to do as we like, or to do as we ought.

Curry Pork with Cauliflower Rice

 

         Curried Pork and Cauliflower Rice.

            Serves 4. Cooking time varies.

Curried Pork;

3 pork scotch steaks, cut into cubes

1 brown onion, diced small

¼ jap pumpkin cut into cubes

2 tbls red curry paste

I tin coconut cream

1 tblsp soy sauce

Green beans for garnish

Cauliflower rice;

¼ cauliflower, chopped into rice sized bits

1 brown onion, chopped

Pinch of saffron powder (turmeric, will do if you have no saffron)

2 tsp chicken stock powder

Chopped shallots for garnish. Parsley or coriander, if you have no shallots.

Method;

Place all ingredients for curry pork, except beans, in pressure cooker. Turn on high can cook for 40 minutes. You can use a slow cooker for this dish and leave it 4 hours on high, or 6 hours on low, if you don’t have a pressure cooker. 

Place green beans on a plate, on their own and steam in microwave, 1 ½ minutes.

Serve, with beans on top of the meat dish.

For the cauliflower rice;

Place chopped cauli and onion in fry pan, with a dash of olive oil. Fry for a few minutes, then add chicken stock and saffron. Mix well, cooking for 5 more minutes. 

Chop shallots on an angle. Serve cauli rice and top with shallots. 

Just a little spoilt...

One spoiled granddaughter, who now has a book with her name and picture in it...😀  It has arrived and is now available on Amazon. 

"I Think I Have Fairies In My Garden," by Alexandra Grose. 

I think l have fairies in my garden

A delightful fairy story, with a moral for the children. Don't let anyone steal their dreams. 

Available on Amazon.

The Meaning Of Life.

 

If you feel you must compare yourself, you only need to compare yourself with who you are today, as against who you were yesterday. Don’t compare yourself against someone else. They haven’t lived your life, with your problems, or your skills. They have their own problems and skill set to work with.

What’s the one thing in life, that you’re doing every day, which screws you up, which you hate and which you wish you could change? What number one thing do you wish to change about yourself? Because only you can change your life. 

It all starts with you. Your life is your responsibility. It doesn’t matter how lowly we feel we are in life, or for that matter, how high. There’s always one thing we can change in our lives and it begins with us. We need to assume the responsibility for where we are in life and for where we’re headed.

You might not even start with what you want to change, if that task seems too big. It might start with making your bed. If you can achieve that one small thing, you might tidy your room next. Small changes every day, will eventually lead to big changes. So if you feel the issue is too great to bear straight up; start small. 

When you feel you’re able, work on that one thing. We don't have to change everything about ourselves, we just need to make a start on one thing today and when we’ve overcome that, work on another thing tomorrow. You don’t know how much change you can make, or how much good you can do in the world, until you try and once you overcome your greatest battle, you have authority to help someone else overcome theirs. 

And that is the meaning of life. Many of us want to know; what is the meaning of life? Why are we here? Changing your life from drudgery and boredom, to one of interest and excitement, brings meaning into your life. Helping someone else change and overcome their battles, will bring not only meaning into their life, but also more meaning into your life.

Changing what you dislike about yourself, is done incrementally. One tiny step at a time. Let's say you want to stop drinking, smoking, or overeating. Start with an hour, then two, then stretch it out further each day. It might not seem like a lot right now, but in a year, two years, three years, you'll be a lot further ahead, than if you didn't start in the first place.

Don't denigrate these small steps, at this time either. If you were lifting weights, you wouldn't expect to start at 100 kg. You'd start with 5 or 10 kg and you wouldn’t belittle that start, because you know, you'll build on that, if you keep going. Quitting a bad habit is the same thing; small increments each day.

There will be times you fail, times where you have that drink/food, or whatever it is, but don't quit. Have your moment and get right back to it. Don't let your default point stay where it is. Increase in duration and your natural default point will change, as those increments become the new norm. 

  

Bacon and Onion Frittata

Serves 2. Preparation 10 minutes. Cooking time 10 - 12 minutes.

                                         

Ingredients:

3 eggs, whisked

1 onion, diced

A good pinch of sugar

1 rasher bacon, diced

1 small zucchini, grated

1 cup grated cheese, of your choice

A pinch of salt

1 tablespoon chopped garden herbs

Salt and pepper to taste.

Method:

Turn oven on, to 175 deg. Line 8 in cake pan with grease proof paper. 

Fry the onion, with a good pinch of sugar. When onion has turned opaque, add bacon and fry until browned and slightly crisp. 

Wisk the eggs until smooth, add all other ingredients, including fried bacon and onion and pour into lined cake pan. Cook for 10 to 12 minutes (until egg mixture has set and lightly browned). Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly. 

Lift paper lining, from tin and cut into 8 triangular wedges. 

This can be served as a light breakfast, or morning tea, or you could add a salad, for a tasty lunch.