What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

I guess I may have forgotten this one for a bit. Actions do speak louder than words, so I will try to be better

Waxing is proof that most beauty rituals must have been designed by men intent on torturing the women on this planet... I would provide a picture, but since I just ripped the uppermost layers of skin off my face, you really don't want to see one anyway...

I know... I wrote about them... promised pictures... and now I am delivering. Here is a picture of those wonderful, baked from scratch with love banana nut muffins. I know you want one, it's such a shame they are all gone now...

Happy Birthday Momma!

This one is especially for one of my favorite blog readers... you know, the one that taught me to read... (Ok, so she didn't know she was teaching me at the time, she thought she was teaching my older brother, but she is still the one that taught me to read in the first place)

The gifts my mother have given me are too many to list, but I will highlight some of her initial gifts to me. From the time she gave me the gift of life, she was giving me the gift of a clean diaper, food, hugs, teaching me to walk and talk, teaching me to read, tie my shoes, laugh, drive, and write. Then there were the gifts that I didn't know were gifts at the time... chores, laundry, to be self sufficient, independent, homework, library fines and tons of other lessons learned (willingly and unwillingly)...

Thank you Momma for all that you have done, and continue to do... for your love and support. I wish you the happiest of days to celebrate you!

I learned how to embed full articles now, and this is one that popped up on my radar today. I just thought I would share it, since I need help in this area... I put too much pressure on myself, and I know it. This article was written for those of us who seem to measure up on the outside, but on the inside never seem to measure up to their own expectations.

The problem comes when you are already trying to implement the tips below, and don't feel the effects right away. That's when you need a good ol' reminder... why you are trying to be grateful, why you are "being nice" etc. That's why I am posting this one... just as a reminder to myself.

How to Stop Feeling Like Your Life Isn't Good Enough

from wikiHow - The How to Manual That You Can Edit
In recent times, it seems there are only three measures of success: Money, looks, and fame. If you don't have one or all of them, you just don't measure up. But you're an ordinary person, and it's hard to feel self-worth, self-respect, and self-esteem when you go to an everyday job in an everyday world. How do you find a sense of significance in a world that seems so shallow?

Steps

1. Cultivate a grateful heart. Gratitude is the one thing that most people who feel a low sense of self-worth lack. If you can look outside your own world, and see how good you really have it, you will feel much more like your life is a worthwhile thing. If you don't have a terminal illness, have had something to eat today, have a bed to sleep in tonight... materially speaking you have it better than 70% of all the people in the whole world. If you're reading this on your own computer, you're better off than about 90% of everyone.
2. Know when enough is enough. Take the advice of Mary Poppins. She says, "Enough is as good as a feast." Think about that for a moment. You can only eat so much, no matter how good the food is, or how much there is. It doesn't matter if your meal is served in a fancy restaurant at $1000 a plate, or in your own kitchen at $2.79 a plate. When you're full, you're full, and if you try to eat more, you will very likely get sick. When you have enough, it's exactly the same as having sat down to a tremendous feast and eaten your fill. Mary Poppins is right. Well, she is practically perfect in every way, after all.
3. Learn to value deeper virtues. The media seems to be overflowing with images of the young, rich, and beautiful, and unless you fit that mold, you feel less worthy of good things in your life. But those things are so fleeting - youth and beauty fade with years, and in a short while, those celebutantes won't be so pretty (or at least it won't be cheap for them to be so pretty). Fortunes can be lost. But love is eternal. Honor lasts. Truth abides. Beauty comes in all forms: a butterfly is beautiful. So is a waterfall, and the ocean, and the sky on a starry night. Learn to appreciate natural beauty, good character, honesty, your family.
4. Be nice. Believe it or not, this can be the first step to feeling your own power. Feeling a little ... ordinary... can make you feel like it isn't worthwhile to care about the feelings of others. You don't realize just how much power you have. Your lousy mood is contagious. It casts a pall over everyone you encounter, from your family to your friends to your co-workers. Instead of being abrupt and surly, try giving each person a smile. Take a moment to make eye contact. People enjoy talking about themselves or those closest to them. So give them an opportunity to do so. Try to remember names, and ask about their loved ones. You don't know what's happening in their lives - you might be the one and only person to treat them like a human being today. You may not realize how just one kind word, even from a stranger, can refresh someone's spirit. Try it and see. It may be very nice to be important. But it's much more important to be nice.
5. Realize that being part of your family is important.You may not have family, in this case you must cherish the relationships with friends. If you have children, a spouse, siblings, parents who depend on you, everything you do for them is a good deed, a mitzvah,[1] as they say. When you come home from a dreary day at work, let your mood be lifted by the smile and kiss of your wife and kids as they welcome you home, and know that, without you, their life would be very different - and not in a good way. When you help your mom find her milk, which she put in the cupboard instead of the fridge, even if she doesn't remember it 10 minutes later, you're doing something so valuable and important for her. Let your life with your family and friends rejuvenate you with the feeling that you are with people who love you no matter what.
6. Be humble. Of course if you go around bragging about how amazing you are, people are going to try to knock you down. Plus, people who talk themselves up to others are usually covering up an internal feeling of inadequacy. Just look at celebs - no sooner are they hot than the rumors start and the sniping begins. It's called "Schadenfreude"[2] - getting shallow satisfaction from the misfortune of those seemingly more fortunate than you. No matter how much you want to feel important, it won't help you unless you can appreciate it when it happens for the right reasons. By exercising humility, and refraining from all the brag and swagger, you free people to praise you when it's appropriate instead of hogging attention when it isn't.
7. Help others. There is nothing that will make you feel like you are valued, needed, and essential like volunteering to help and serve others who are less fortunate than you. This really goes along with the "humility" thing well - stepping up to help the elderly, coach at an after school children's center, feed the homeless, help build a home for someone (Habitat for Humanity), collect toys for orphanages at Christmas time - these things allow you to be of service to others, and nothing will make you feel better. Give a gift in secret. Tell no one of your deed. Let the satisfaction of helping another stay within your heart by holding on to your little secret. The first time a little child brings you a hand-drawn card and throws his or her arms around you to thank you for helping their family, it's practically guaranteed you'll feel tears of joy flow from your eyes and a big lump in your throat. And that's when you know your life is not just "good enough" - it's awesome.

Tips

• It's hard to feel impressive if you do nothing to impress yourself. Go out there and do something wonderful, not just for yourself, but for someone else.
• It helps if you have something bigger than yourself to believe in. If you are a praying person, lean on your faith as you work through this time in your life.
• Never use someone else's life or accomplishments as a measuring stick for the worth or value of your own. It's just like running, or your looks: there will always be someone faster (and someone slower). There will always be someone prettier (or you may be prettier than someone else). There was a song from an old musical that talked about running a race. It encouraged you not to be sad if you didn't come in first, because "someone else who is last is sure to think you are fast." Your life is your own. Rise up and live it. If you have enough, despite the fact that you aren't rich or famous, enjoy the fact that you are not wanting for essentials, that you have family and friends who love you, and that your health is good. You can work for more, as long as you want to!
• Eat proper nutritious meals, sleep enough and get some exercise every day.
• Turn off the TV and the radio. Listen to your own thoughts and explore what is inside. Internal dialog is not a ticket to an institution but rather a chance to really begin to make positive changes within.

Warnings

• This doesn't imply that you should not strive for excellence. You should. But you should not feel you are a failure just because you haven't accomplished all you hoped to yet. You can still work at things.

Related wikiHows

• How to Elevate Your Self Esteem
• How to Be Respected
• How to Be Good
• How to Enjoy Life
• How to Simplify Your Life

Sources and Citations

1. ↑ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitzvah
2. ↑ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schadenfreude

Article provided by wikiHow, a collaborative writing project to build the world's largest, highest quality how-to manual. Please edit this article and find author credits at the original wikiHow article on How to Stop Feeling Like Your Life Isn't Good Enough. All content on wikiHow can be shared under a Creative Commons license.

I posted this one on my other site...yeah, I still have http://recruitingminutes.com too but wanted to make the 2 readers I have here (hi mom) aware of this too. This is not a political discussion... just a few assumptions... and I do know what they say about when you assume, (thanks to Benny Hill) but sometimes it's necessary... There is no way to have this discussion with out an assumption... of insanity.

Talk about having to take a pause... The National Debt Clock in NYC can no longer show the true national debt. Read this article to see the details, but apparently when it was put up in 1989, no one thought the national debt would grow greater than 9.9 TRILLION dollars. This week, it went over $10 Trillion, hence the problem. There aren't enough digits available on the sign.

Now that isn't as scary as the bottom number... the "Your Family's Share of $86,017." How is it possible that each family's share of the national debt is double the average earnings of an average family, with most families living on wages that are a third of their share of the debt?  I also must mention that this is in addition to each families personal debt, such as their mortgage, car payments, credit card debt. Are you listening now??

Assuming the average family has at least a $200,000 mortgage, $15,000 car loan and $5,000 worth of credit cards (and believe me, these are VERY low assumptions, most everyone I know in my age group has higher balances than this) and earns $43,000 per year (approximately the national average) it will take them over 7 years to pay off both their debt and their share of the current debt.

Keep in mind, that these figures DO NOT include groceries, gasoline, or other daily living expenses! This is paying every dime in income to either their *assumed* personal debt, and their income taxes (not property taxes, not sales taxes and certainly not STATE taxes).

A person earning $43,000 per year, would pay about $13,330 in income taxes alone. (Remember, these are all approximate, made up numbers I am just playing with right now). Realistically, if those taxes were dedicated to the national debt, after 7 years, this wage earner would have paid $93,310 in income taxes. The problem lies in the fact that this is not the final debt, and does not take into account the annual federal budgets. Those budgets eat up every cent of income tax that every taxpayer pays, and then some, since there are other taxes that I don't even get into for this one, so every year the national debt increases to make up the difference.

After 7 years, and payments of $93,310, the nation and the taxpayer will not have reduced either of their shares of the national debt at all. So... how will you pay your share, if what you do pay does not contribute to paying off the debt, and you can't control what is spent to begin with?

I didn't put him there, he willingly posed for this one! It's just my perspective that this is where he belongs

That's right... muffins... Banana Nut muffins to be exact. I baked them this morning! I have not been possessed by a "baking bug" so don't fear, I won't force anyone other than my immediate family to consume them.

The truth is that I had a few banana's that were getting close to looking like they were dipped in chocolate. I didn't want to mistake them for the frozen chocolate dipped banana bliss I inhaled ate in Disney so I thought I better do something with them. I pulled out my handy dandy cook book and looked up banana bread. Well... banana bread requires an electric mixer, more sugar than I had in the house, and an hour to bake. Then I looked up muffins... muffins require a lumpy batter, less sugar than was in my sugar bowl, and only 20 minutes to bake.

The choice was made for me! Muffins it was! I whipped them up like a pro, and even hubby had one when he got home from work. Let me tell you, I must have a natural talent for baking. Scott's exact words were "these came perfect" meaning not overdone, not underdone (which is amazing considering who baked them!) I know you are probably looking for a picture... but you aren't getting one today!

I did take a picture to share with everyone, but I thought I would let you use your imagination a little bit. Think of what the perfect Banana Nut muffin looks like... I wouldn't want to ruin your vision by showing you what the perfect muffin actually looks like

Today I am going to break from my normal posting habits...
You know... I post up a picture from some place I have been recently, and add some comment at the end... after the picture...  instead I am going to give you a picture of my mind... Wander over to this post on Off Topic to understand me... then wander back here for your picture...

Don't worry... I'll wait... It's hard to figure me out sometimes... even for me Also, my comment for this one will be ABOVE the picture, instead of below it... just trying to change up a few things here before I get bored with myself!

This is a perfect example of simple beauty... from my perspective anyway. About 5 minutes before the thunderstorm hit, Hubby took this picture and now, since he stored it on my computer, I can share it!!

I personally would have chosen something besides "Mrs. Potato Head's" lips for him... but I guess since he was performing it's acceptable.