CYBERHOTFLASH: ashes and snow

Check out this web site...

"ashes and snow" is by far the best internet experience I have come across in a very long time.

This is the internet at its very best!

You will be drawn in by the beauty of the photography, gentle tone of the spoken word...the serene melody that runs through the background like a calming stream of ideas, thoughts, emotions.

It IS a meditation through pictures, words and music.

Discover the beauty...the emotion...the serenity of ashes and snow.

CyberHotFlash: A Delicious Contest LIVE from Maine

The Maine Lobster Giveaway at the Fresh Maine Lobster web site is a treat that is hard to resist. Check out this new web site and enter to the win a prize worth $100 and receive a LobsterGram Gift Certificate. It is easy to do...just comment on the blog entry, share the link with friends...sit back and digg through the web site.

You will find everything you ever wanted to know about Fresh Maine Lobster: cooking tips, lobster history, recipes and the ultimate information for every lobster lover...the LobsterFest.

Even if you don't win the Lobster Giveaway...you have a discovered a direct source on learning about and ordering Fresh Maine Lobster.

Remember CyberHotFlashers...seafood of any kind is a wonderful source of Omega-3's...we can eat these tantalizing red delicacies without too much worry that it will make our "muffin tops" expand....just don't over due the butter. This is a wonderful treat for we can give ourselves every once and awhile...consider it as a celebration ...a feast we definitely deserve.

Now...go enter this giveaway, while I start boiling the water and melting the butter. Don't forget your lobster bib!

http://www.freshmainelobster.com/the-maine-lobster-giveaway/

Am I Becoming Too Cynical or Bitter?

See the woman to the right....this is the woman that I fear I am becoming...OMG...please don't let this be!!

Since turning 50 years old, I have become more opinionated, less patient, frustrated with the world-at-large....everything seems to rub me the wrong way or will get a rise out of me...and don't forget to add in the new experience of having hot flashes at the most inconvenient of times. Coming of age, yet again, has been just as trying for me as embarking on my teenage years back in the 70's. I struggled then, as I struggle now with all the many changes in my body, in my mind and in the world that revolves around me!

Oprah wants me to find my purpose, while "giving BIG"; The Secret wants me to have a vision and reach for the stars; along with all the many second adulthood books for women out there who want me to jump out of airplanes, climb Mount Everest or give up my career and pursue the one dream I have always held near and dear to my heart....this usually involves wine tasting in France or Napa or renovating an old Victorian home as a Bed and Breakfast. I am supposed to do this while doing Pilate's or yoga fives days out of the week, watching my carbs and eating Omega-3/Antioxidant filled meals, plying my face and body with over priced natural creams and exlirs...ensuring I get eight hours of sleep...all in the pursuit of making sure that my eyes won't puff, my rear end won't drag and my muffin top (a residual from bearing my five children) will not hang over the top of the low-rise jeans that I am forced to purchase because no one carries a jean that covers a muffin top any more that doesn't look like pants that my 80 year old mother would wear.(WHEW!)!

Don't even get me started on plastic surgery, Botox and boob-jobs! My boobs are just fine, thank you very much!!

Do most people really have the extra pocket change to invest in all of this junk? Even though I do have extra money, these things are not what I want my money going toward just because the new way of keeping up with the Jone's is not only having the $800,000 and up custom built home, but being custom built ourselves...this is what will get us through the second half of our lives...Yes, indeed. It is all so temporary...all so material....superficial.!

Somehow I believe we are missing something here. In our effort to find our purpose and discover "the secret", we have raised the bar on ourselves yet again. We no longer view life experience and growth, knowledge and understanding as a priceless commodity...age and wisdom are dismissed. We will risk anything and everything to have what Mr and Mrs. Jones2008 has gotten for themselves. (Here's a Secret: Mr. and Mrs. Jones is in just as much debt, having the same trouble with their kids, is just as unhappy, if not more than most folks in the neighborhood...don't let Mr. Jones's sport car in the drive or Mrs. Jone's botox filled forehead & boob job fool ya!)!

We wrap our lives around celebrity, wanting to look, act and live like people we are not. Women have lost their elegance trying to look like they've walked out of the pages of a magazine, while men fear that being of noble character will some how offend the many women AND men in their lives...in the end men have been put in the position of being doormats.!

Simplicity is no longer simple...there is even a proper media dictated method of going about this also. Even in today's society trying to keep your life easy going, calm, uncomplicated...simple is work.
!

Now I ask you my friends...if all this be true...is there any wonder on most days that I worry that I will one day end up looking like the lady above? Maybe a good airplane jump or a trek up a mountain would do me some good....maybe a pinch of Botox in the corners of my mouth to force a smile.............NAH!!!!!!!

The ABC's of Empowered Living

Check out this list or ABC's of Positive Approaches to Living an Empowered Life...it is just one of the many things I have "Stumbled upon"..... Og Mandino Quotes

Making or Breaking the Grade

Today's Cyber Hot Flash: Are our children being prepared to compete on an international level?

According to a story on Good Morning America highlighting an upcoming film documentary on the education system in the United States....it is a resounding NO!

In the story they compared the educational systems of China and India to ours...US schools just aren't competitve enough. Students in China and India will not move forward in to Junior and Senior High School unless they succesfully test or meet the high standards of these advanced schools...thus leaving them without a complete education and forever restricting them to a certain part of their societies and cultures.

This is not only true in China and India...but I learned this first hand when I was stationed in Japan back in the 1980's. Getting into Senior High School in the Japanese society is not a given...you MUST test in with high scores or you are left behind, with no hope of ever going on to college....your life is determined at the young age of 15-16 years old. Many Japanese will enter in to the military...it is here that they will learn a trade...AND...college is still not a future option.

I am unsure if this still remains true in Japan...but I believe that probably things have not changed that much in 20 years....change comes much more slowly there. If anything I am sure the standard has probaly been raised much higher than when I was living in this awesome country. The competition was extremely high even then.

Should we be concerned about our students ability to compete on an international scale?....You bet ya! Our educational standard affords the opportunity for all children to go to high school even if they are bearly making the grade...in fact, they are required by law in most states to attend school until they are 18 years old. Some even fail and fail and fail until they reach the cut-off age...then leave or even choose to drop out OR they choose to just get by knowing that some college will probably take them on. This is not so in Japan, China or India...college students are their stellar students...they have earned there place through intense study, high scoring tests and diligence. They have proven themselves over and over again...the the tests and standards weeds the other students out.

Now, I am not saying we don't have these types of super achieving students here in the US....but I do believe that our educational standards are not as high as many of the emerging international cultures/societies. Our educational systems are not necessarily in the business of weeding out the good students from the bad....they want everyone to be given an education no matter what their ability levels.

One important fact that must be brought out here is that these countries school year is much longer than ours. Japanese students go to school year round with only August off...BUT...this time is not necessarily for going to the beach or hanging out with friends...these kids are required to do research papers or projects in all of their classes during this August break....they are due on the day that they return. I'm not talking about a 'What I did during my summer vacation "essay....I am talking about full fledged research papers with in-depth projects in about six subjects!

I wonder what our kids would do if they had to do this type of thing over summer break...Hmmmm?....Would be interesting to find out...wouldn't it?

In any case....this GMA story was very interesting. Please check it out at the following link...come back and comment.

In my humble opinion...this is not new....we are more than 20-years behind the curve on this one!

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=4316090&affil=wrtv

The View: Too Much Talk...About Talking to Your Kids

Today's President's Day topic on The View was all about a new book Elisabeth found...in fact she has read it to the point of being "dog-earred". I have tried to find the title and author at the web site...but much to my dismay was unable to get this information for this blog post. (I will further research it and get back later) Needless to say, the discussion was on disciplining children in today's modern society. Let's talk to them and then have them perform acts of random kindness to make up for their offenses...how politically correct is that?!!

Elisabeth, who I normally tend to agree with on most days of the week, was going on and on about how this author doesn't believe that children should be made to apologize for inappropriate acts towards others. Instead, a mother or adult should encourage the offending child to commit an act of kindness toward the offended. For example: child says something nasty to another child and the other child's feelings are hurt...an adult observing this should NOT make the child who made the offending comment apologize for what was said (children don't understand this concept), they should instead go give the offended child a ball or toy that would make that child happy. SAY WHAT? What does this teach either child?

Mother/Adult: "Now, Johnnie that wasn't nice...go give Sally
this toy...it will make her happy!"

Child: "Why would I want to give Sally this toy...she
just pushed me down behind the slide and then stuck her tongue out at me...yeah
right , Ma...you go give Sally a toy."

Break away to the long shot of the whole View cast....Whoopi is sitting there in stunned amazement with the biggest "Say what?!" expression on her face....along with every other mother who was raised in her generation. Whoopi finally speaks up after letting Sherri, Elisabeth and the clueless, Joy have gone on and on about not making a child apologize for an offensive act . Whoopi states that she never allowed her daughter to act in this way...she nipped it in the bud immediately and not necessarily by talking to her child. She would perform the same mean act upon the child, thus demonstrating or allowing the child to feel what the other child had felt...followed by a firm reprimand telling the kid that the behavior was unacceptable. Whoopi even tells a story about how her mother would have handled a situation: if a kid pulled the tail on a cat or dog...her mother would have come up and pulled her hair to let her see how it felt. Joy immediately comments how this indeed would probably teach empathy...yeah! Joy...you actually got something right.

But in the end ALL of The View cast missed the point....Whoopi was the closest to the right anwser....

We as a society do not set boundaries and dealbreakers for our kids. We have proven for years, since the infamous theories of Dr. Spock of Baby & Childcare fame, that talking at children without reprimand or consequences has failed miserably in the raising of our children. If our children do not have boundaries laid down early on...insisting that they apologize for their mean acts and words...these children will not learn how to measure their words and tame their tongues...even their actions towards others. They will blurt out whatever they feel and follow it up with a kindness to buy the offended persons forgiveness...or even physically harm someone thinking that all will be well when they do their community service act toward that person or society.

Elisabeth throw that book away...you will be sorry that you followed this advice.....set boundaries and dealbreakers with your kids....make them apologize for their words and actions, even if they don't understand now...they will learn after awhile because you have pointed out their wrong and made them atone for it by apologizing. Soon you will find that your children will measure their words...learn self-control in their acts...learn to walk away from another who is hurting them with out confrontation, instead of performing senseless acts of kindness for someone who is too young to get it anyways or may be just as guilty of being mean as your child.

Small Pearls of Wisdom: Positive Attraction/Intention

I have been trying to work out my brand, writing a book, writing a column at Fabulously40, encouraging men and women at Path Partners, trying to get my own web site created and running.

In much of this effort of trying to fulfill my goals, reaching and hoping for the vision I had placed on my Vision Board over a year ago...I have slowly come to realize that none of this happens as quickly as one might think that it will...this is yet another 'secret' to the "The Secret".

On a daily basis I still struggle with 'reclaiming my womanhood"...my family and children eat up my time...I am constantly putting out fires. paying bills, contacting the workman that didn't quite do his job to the best of his ability, not seeing the nuance in the school's rules and regulations on attendance and tardiness...realizing that after all this time I should have been making carbon-copies of the notes I write to my kid's school. I find it hard on some days to utilize the power of positive attraction...when being bombarded by the negative forces of daily life.

And then, I realize this thing called life is really truly work .

I may struggle at it every day...it may be weighing me down at times...but in the end it MUST be done.

A lovely lady that I know through Facebook sent me this today:

"You must avoid breaking when things don't go your way.You'll always be secure to the degree that you accept change.True security comes from being able to bend your insecurities.Recognize and accept that change will inevitably take place.You'll become secure, not by standing still, but by growing,moving, and staying energized.Be secure in the knowledge that you can deal with anythingthat happens to you.Have the courage to bet on your ideas.Take some calculated risks and act on your dreams.There is no permanent security on this earth, there is only opportunity." JoAnn Donahue

I think in this moment of being burned out by the fires of my daily life, I will flood my thoughts with the wisdom of the hope that is held within these words from this extremely positive ray of sunshine.

Thank you, JoAnn.

I hope that maybe someone out in cyber-space receives this cyber hot flash and it moves them through yet another day...filling it with positive attraction and blessings.

USA Today- Middle-Age Article No New News

"USA Today - "Middle-Age is truly depressing, study finds"

Duh! Okay...tell us something we don't already know and then don't tell us why this is the trend! Skim the surface of the subject and then have every news outlet from ABC's Good Morning America to the Evening News trot out all the middle aged Pollyanna's that have reached or are in Mid-Life "Nirvana". Give me a break!

I guess we will have to wait for the report to come out in the journal of Social Science and Medicine...but even then I am wondering if this research was too broad, not taking in to consideration cultural factors and various other indicators, let alone that they grouped men and women together...or did they?....they didn't tell us...now did they.

Let's just take the fact that the research study included people in 80 different countries, from Albania to Zimbabwe. WHAT?!!! I can't relate to this! Where does the U.S. fall in between these countries? Then they tell us that only 72 countries showed this "U-shaped pattern". Which countries showed this and did the U.S. fall into this grouping? What countries didn't have a "U-shaped pattern"? I don't know...do you?!

But we are supposed to remain calm...relax...accept what this study is showing...read the story...watch the news...take a collective sigh of relief as we realize that everyone who is entering into their 40s are depressed...it is out of their hands...just go with it....take your anti-depressant...it will all be over by your 50Th birthday! YEAH...RIGHT!

Excuse me, while I get into a lotus position...repeat my mantra and become one with the universe...

Who are these people kidding? Mid-Life is much more complex than this study is revealing...at least at this point.