Tag Archives: life

Family, fun, life, mindset, positivity, Wordsmith

Be Living Reality 

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Ask anyone I taught with, I was a reality tv junky. 

Addicted? 

Probably! 

The Bachelor.  

Big Brother.  

American Idol.  

Survivor. 

At the schools I worked at, I used to organize Survivor Pools where we each would ‘be’ a character and we would see who would be the ‘Sole Survivor’! 

Hours upon hours of reality tv, where my week would be organized around the specific day and hour the show would be on. 

Survivor was Thursdays.  

8:00pm. 

5:00pm if you had an eastern channel!

I loved it when my mom moved to town because she had that eastern time zone channel. 

Yup, imagine revolving your whole week around a reality tv show?  I did it!  Yes, I did! 

When my oldest, who is now nine, was four months old, I knew I had a wake-up call from tv land and I realized I had to make a decision.  

I had just started maternity leave and was home full time with JC!  I was moving from an incredible, full 14 hour days as a teacher, to home and my Reality tv land.  Can you see where I was going?

I knew I had to make a choice: watch reality from the couch or live it everywhere I went.   We decided to live it.  We stopped paying for cable television.  We started being intentional about what and when we wanted to watch tv shows on the Internet or via DVD’s.  We saw less commercials.  Our boys have rarely seen a commercial in their lives and often find them annoyingly interrupting to what they are watching.  

(Sidenote: The constant Oil of Olay commercials on the children’s network, Treehouse, also persuaded me to cut cable. Did I want my boys to think that women’s faces looked like that?)

Now, I live in reality every day with my brood of boys.  

I live it everywhere I go.  

Television shows and movies are rare. 

Connecting with others and creating space to be is happening every day. 

I have space to let my mind meander.  

I have nothing ‘pulling’ me away from my vision of what I want my daily reality to look like.  

My living ‘reality’ involves copious amounts of food in somewhat strange combinations, refereeing wrestling matches, going off the beaten path and lots of high energy activities.  That sounds exactly like reality tv, doesn’t it? 

Survivor anyone? Who will be the sole survivor?  Some days it’s me!

Big Brother? Me and my houseful of boys.  


Really real. 

Living life.  

Awake.  

Aware. 

Alive.  

Perfectly imperfect.  

Being me.  

In my reality.  

Hmmmm…. maybe it’s time to get rid of Facebook?  But that’s really real, isn’t it? 😂

author, Christianity, encouragement, God, Jesus Christ, philosophy

Be Finding Forward

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Forward.

Moving not backwards.

Forwards.

Moving in a direction.

Which one will we choose?

Moving from the west to the east.

Finding the dance that takes you forward.

Into your dreams.

Into your spirit.

Into your spidey sense.

Presence.

How does one stay present?

Moving forward?

This is what I have learned and this is what propels me forward.

Taking peeks into the tiny, narrow, rear view mirror to pour gratitude into where I came from.

Gratitude.

Love.

Letting go.

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Looking straight-forward into my large, expansive windshield watching the exciting places I am going.

Joy.

Peace.

Light.

Eyes, wide open, looking for the gold thread of hope woven throughout my day.

Holding my empty hands of faith.

God’s goodness poured out over all our lives.

Into my hands.

Will we choose to look for it?

Will we choose to have open hands to receive it?

Moving forwards.

Dancing the dance of my life.

Trusting.

Fun.

Faith.

Forward.

Smooch, Joanna

author, Book, life, mindset, Wordsmith, writing

Be Wondering About Writing

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As I wonder and wander through my daily life and hangout with my peeps, many of you have asked, “What are you going to be writing next?”

A few of you might now be wondering, “What do you mean next? What happened to the book that I have been editing for the last year?”  Well this happened:

i-am-free-book

I decided that this beautiful book about finding freedom on the inside and outside as a human being was just for ME!  And here is the book cover:

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Yup, it took me slightly over a year to edit and I decided to put this little baby into the filing cabinet.  And I feel free!  It was just for me.  It has been an incredible year of growth and seeing it written on the pages of a book over twelve chapters has been humbling and freeing!  I released it into the filing cabinet and for the last two weeks I have been wondering what WILL I be writing next?

I write every morning to pray and meditate over.  I write to hold and create my vision.   I write to pour out from within.  I allow my words to come out from pen to paper without judgement and without stopping.  It just flows from within, uninhibited, flowing wherever it wants to go.  I write to edify others.  I write to pour out inspiration on facebook.  I write because words do matter, they are the sword of the spirit.  They come from within and wield power.  My sword is covered with white chocolate and is meant to be sweet and easy to savour.  I pray my words always fill the sweet spot in your soul!

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Now what am I going to write, I wondered? And then I remembered these beautiful journals!  Letters to my boys that I started writing when I was pregnant with each of them.  Letters that I wrote daily or weekly about what I was observing as I have the privilege to watch them grow.  Writing between a mama and her boys, from my heart to theirs.  I stopped writing when my mom was living with cancer and since 2013 these journals have moved homes and sat in a cupboard.   And now as I have been set free from the book I completed, I am now going back to my boys.  Backwards to move forward.  Slowing down to speed up.  Writing to them, for them and with them as I watch them grow!

If writing isn’t your thing, what will you wonder about and where will it take you?

Wonder.

As you wander.

Be a human being.

Be present.

Be awake.

Be.

Enough.

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author, Grief, winter, Wordsmith

Be Living A Brut-iful Life!

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img_8886 As I sit, ponder and let my mind wander, I think of all of you reading this 2017 message. Each of my Facebook friends and all 996 of you that follow my blog. I want to pour out extra love to everyone going through their sprinkling of brutal and beautiful as I did three years ago.  Couldn’t that be all of us?  Isn’t life imperfectly perfect?  What a brut-iful life we are living here in the stunning Okanagan Valley!  A sprinkle of brutal, but ALWAYS beautiful!

Three years ago, I walked with my mom as she was being released into heaven.  I walked as a daughter, an advocate, a pain reliever, a massager, a water getter, a midwife and had to make phone calls that I never thought I would have to, I think back at how brut-iful these moments were.  Brutal moments where I just have to lie down and cry and beautiful moments where I lie down and rejoice!  All magically weaved together into living each day with the gift of grief.

My boys were playing in their “Astronomer’s Lair” a few days ago, and I was very surprised to walk in and see them playing with old Tupperware bins.   I experienced one of my brut-iful moments when they proceeded to inform me that the extra bed was a place for their beloved Nana.  It was a lying down rejoicing and crying kind of moment!  The boys were 2, 4 and 6 when my marvelous Mama went to heaven, but she is still very much present in our lives!   It is slowly moving from brutal memories into beautiful moments.  Don’t underestimate your power to leave an impact on peoples lives!

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As I send  you wishes for an healthy, energetic, adventurous 2017 filled with dreams, may you savour all your brut-iful moments knowing that they are neither good nor bad, they just are.

Day by day.

Beautiful.

Brutal.

Memory-Making.

Healthy.

Living EVERY day.

Brut-iful living.

Brut-iful life!

Smooch, Joanna

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author, christmas, Flexibility

Be “UnBusy”

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Right now, I can sense a whirling of energy around me.

Fluttering here and there.

Cars driving quickly.

People walking swiftly.

All around the city.

This way and that.

Me, I choose to be “UnBusy”.

Busy is the swear word of the season.

Right up there with the f-word.

Beside the bar of soap that my mouth got washed out with.

Busy?

Keeping ourselves occupied?

Have a great deal to do?

These are a choice.

Being busy is a choice.

What’s on the ‘to-do’ list is a choice.

Yes, it is 100% up to us.

Fluttering here and there.

Driving quickly.

Walking swiftly.

All around the city.

This way and that.

Or not at all.

I used to rock the ‘to-do’ list.

This list would make me feel productive.

Make me feel occupied.

Now I have created space to be.

Sitting here.

Moving there.

Talking here.

Wondering there.

I purposely move slowly and with ease.

Walking quietly in the crackle of snow.

All around my beautiful city.

Wherever my boys or mind take me.

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Incredible beauty surrounding us in this season.

Ready to envelop and shower us with peace.

Right now, I sense a purple energy all around me.

Loving.

Being.

Seeing.

Allowing.

Peace in this season.

 

author, encouragement, mindset, musings, writing

Be Holding a Vision

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“We become more able to articulate our own boundaries, dreams, and authentic goals. Our personal flexibility increases while our malleability to the whims of others decreases.” (The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron)

In my mind, I am holding a vision of a life where I spend more time with my brood of boys and close friends than I do currently.   

Expansive hours together.  

Cooking, drinking, talking, shaking things up! 

Magical memory making moments all over the world.  

Eating breakfast in Germany, lunch in France and Swiss fondue in a mountain hut.  

Riding and boating through the canals from Amsterdam to Budapest.  

Skiing, surfing and visiting our friend’s south of the border.  

Big visions. Big dreams.  Big ideals… that will be exciting to watch unfold.  

I have been holding smaller visions and watching them unfold, so I just hold and watch, hold and wait.  

Taking little steps every day! 

Two weeks ago, we watched our neighbourhood Block Watch signs go up.  In September, I held the vision that our neighbourhood would have a block watch.  I talked to a few people, collected names, we attended a meeting and viola, the block watch is in place with 100% participation. 


Two years ago, when I started my health journey with my nutrition company, I envisioned that our family would rent a place at a local ski hill.  I didn’t have expectations on how but I knew it would happen.   I started talking to people and looking.  Soon, a friend heard we were looking and viola, we are now enjoying our second year at the condo.  


Allow me to be a living testimony that you can create beautiful, wild, wonderful visions for your life.  Hold tight to them and don’t allow the expectations of others or the ‘old stuff’ in your life to hold you back.  

Being myself.  

Listening to my heart.  

Living my life.  

Holding my visions.  

Comment below if you would like to share your vision: 

Being vulnerable.  

Adding accountability.  

While watching your visions unfold.  

Book, encouragement, Family, health & fitness, positivity, Uncategorized

Be Water-y

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Can we all agree that air and water are basic fundamentals for life? 

Air, our bodies magically intake and expel it. 

Water, on the other hand, is a process that we ourselves need to choose to consume. 

A choice. 

A small daily choice.  

A choice. 

That can add up to a lot.  

Living giving. 

Nourishing.  

Rejuvenating. 

Water.   

Here’s my question this morning: Why do someone people choose not to consume water? 

<insert your personal excuses here>

Too busy.  

Don’t like the taste. 

I forget. 

I don’t like buying water. 

I don’t like drinking it warm. 

These are the excuses I have personally heard. Any of these resonate for you? 

As I walk with people on their health journeys to have more energy, shed some weight, perform better or age more youthfully, I always talk about water because most people are as dehydrated as the Arizona desert that I am currently visiting.   Most people don’t notice the incredible sources of water all around us, ready to be poured into our bodies. 

I could go into the science behind our bodies and water.  I could tell you the percentage of water that makes up our bodies.  I could go on and on, but I won’t.  

Here’s my heart for all people: 

⭐️ Drink half your body weight in ounces every day.  

⭐️ If you exercise, drink more. 

⭐️ If you drink coffee, tea or any type of soda, drink more as well.  


Keep putting deposits of water into your body through the day and watch the beautiful returns on your investment you will receive.  

More energy. 

Glowing skin.  

Better poops. 

Less smelly urine. 

Happy cells.  

Glorious you!  

May you be filled to overflowing on this super duper Saturday. 

Smooch 😘 Joanna 

author, blogger, mindset, positivity, Uncategorized

Be Rejected 

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Sit with me today and ask yourself if you have ever been rejected. I mean really rejected, back-turning, door slamming, get the f* out rejected?  I also want to talk about the simple rejections that happen every single day as we live our lives.

Have you ever been dumped?

Rejection.

Have you ever applied for a job and not hired?

Rejected.

Have you ever apologized and had that person never speak to you again?

Rejection.

Have you put in a business or book proposal and received a denial letter?

Rejected.

rejected
In the sadness, anger and humbleness of rejection, what do we find?

A new way.

A new path.

A new resiliency.

A letting go.

Or holding tighter.

A fortitude to persevere.

Or a desire to walk away.

Rejection is a true gift, a branch of the gifts of grief.

It is ready for us to unwrap in every rejected moment.

gift-giving

We can choose our path with rejection.

We can envision rejection as a branch of a metaphorical tree.

Ponder, with me, how this gift of rejection can help us grow!

Perhaps rejection has come into our life because we have been growing roots in places that weren’t in rich soil.  We may have needed more light rather than darkness.  Or maybe something or someone new may have been needed in our life to bring us new living water. Rejection needed to create space.  Our branches may have needed some pruning so that we could have new growth in our life.

Rejected.

Rejection.

Light.

Growth.

Life.

All symbiotic and much needed in our lives.

Gratitude today for EVERY time I have been rejected in word, thought or deed.

Life-giving.

Gratitude-living.

Rejection.

Be rejected.