Don’t Back Down

April 7, 2011 by 2 Comments

This is Part One of a two-part discussion. Before you read my comments, you’ll want to be familiar with “Tough Little Boys”, a country song by Gary Allan that has been bouncing around in my head the past couple weeks. This is an extremely touching song that any parent will relate to, especially dads, but even my ten-year-old daughter gets it.

Here is the video, followed by the lyrics, followed by my comments.

Tough Little Boys – Video

Tough Little Boys – Lyrics

Well I never once
Backed down from a punch
Well I’d take it square on the chin
But I found out fast
That bullies just laugh
And we’ve got to stand up to them

So I didn’t cry when I got a black eye
As bad as it hurt, I just grinned
But when tough little boys grow up to be dads
They turn into big babies again.

Scared me to death
When you took your first steps
And I’d fall every time you fell down
Your first day of school, I cried like a fool
And I followed your school bus to town

Well I didn’t cry, when Old Yeller died
At least not in front of my friends
But when tough little boys grow up to be dads
They turn into big babies again

Well I’m a grown man
But as strong as I am
Sometimes its hard to believe
How one little girl, with little blonde curls
Could totally terrify me

If you were to ask, my wife would just laugh
She’d say “I know all about men
How tough little boys grow up to be dads
They turn into big babies again”

Well I know one day, I’ll give you away
But I’m gonna stand there and smile
But when I get home, and I’m all alone
Well, I’ll sit in your room for a while

Well I didn’t cry when Old Yeller died
At least not in front of my friends
But when tough little boys grow up to be dads
They turn into big babies again

When tough little boys grow up to be dads
They turn into big babies again

Tough Little Boys – Commentary

Today’s post is about the first paragraph, about the importance of standing up to bullies. I don’t think the typical adult is subjected to messages about bullying, and the bullying adults face is more subtle than with kids. Many people face bullying on the job that is harder to recognize as such than “Give me your lunch money or I’ll smash your brains into lizard spit!” More often, there is the underlying risk of losing one’s job or of being passed over for promotion if one doesn’t…

  • Work lots of extra hours
  • Fetch coffee for the boss
  • Sleep with the boss

I would like to think such occurrences are extremely rare, but I suspect they are somewhat more common than I would like.

Adults could learn from the kids’ messages, and sometimes it’s worth risking a job loss or promotion loss rather than a loss of dignity and self-esteem (I know, I know, this is not always an easy call).

I recall just four fights I was in as a kid. Just four because I was a coward. Yes, I would do just about anything to get out of a fight. But there were four times that my inner coward lost the battle.

Once the kid hit me good in the jaw. But I didn’t hit back. Just as in the song – “As bad as it hurt, I just grinned” – and after that first punch, it was over. I guess he didn’t know what to do with someone who doesn’t hit back.

I met the same kid a second time, just off school property after school, just as he challenged me to. He didn’t hit me that time. He said something about respecting me for showing up, and he let it drop.

The third time (I think I have these in chronological order) was a different kid, who also punched me in the jaw and broke his hand. I don’t know if it really broke, but he did go see the school nurse – either way, i like my memory’s version and I have no need to learn whether my jaw really was a fist-breaker or not.

The fourth time, I did run – but I will beg your forgiveness. The other boy did not try to hit me. Son a moved out of the way. He ran after me and tried to kick me. So I moved out of his way. Like this, he chased me around the school yard for about ten minutes before giving up. I actually recall him getting more and more frustrated and angry and I was finding it harder and harder not to laugh.

Kids have to learn to resist bullying, but so do adults. It’s worth watching some kids shows and learning from them. There are a lot of basic life lessons that many adults still need to learn, too.

This post was included in the Saturday Show & Tell – 8th Edition

Filed Under: Happiness Tagged With: ,

Are You Really Happy?

April 4, 2011 by 1 Comment

Being happy and achieving true happiness does not rely upon how much wealth you have, how successful you are and how famous you might be. It can’t even be acquired through money and getting all of the things we want. Perhaps at first, we could get in our mind that we can be happy if we get almost everything that we wanted. But then later on, we realize that these can’t make us happy. We just wanted them, and happiness is not a want but rather it is a need. We don’t want happiness, we simply need it.

For you to be happy, being the real you is all it takes. No one gets true happiness by putting the mask on and getting to play the clown. Instead, just by smiling through the crowd and revealing the real you is how it is being made possible. In order for us to be happy, we must be focused in our goals in life. We must know ourselves. Know the things which makes us happy and then set them up to your ideals. The next thing to do would be to organize your plans in life. Arrange the things you need in the right order so that it would be easy for you to come up with the most important one. The other thing is being a positive thinker. Almost all of us know the power of positive thinking. Make use of it to make yourself happy.

If you are quite discontented with what you are right now, relax, empty your mind and say to yourself, “Am I really happy?” If you think you are not, then start it right away…

More information about happiness at Live Life

Filed Under: Happiness

Words on Happiness

April 1, 2011 by Leave a Comment

This is an excerpt from Words on Happiness Vol. 1 by Jen Bluekissed:

Walk in the other guy’s shoes.  Before you do, sanitize them so you don’t get foot fungus.  After you’ve walked a mile in them, give them back, and respect that he might not be willing to walk in yours yet.

Give of yourself.  When you die, what you’ve held back will be forgotten, but what you’ve given will be remembered by all those whose lives you’ve touched.

Most people act out of a desire to have their wants and needs met.  They do not act out of vengeance or specifically to hurt you.  If you are hurt in the process, realize that it’s probably easier for the them to ignore the pain you’re feeling than to deal with their own issues.

When you speak softly and carry a big stick, try not to do so in the house of someone who keeps a loaded pistol near his/her bedside.

When upset, make sure to tell the people you’re talking with afterward whether or not you’re looking to vent your frustration or for them to help you fix your problem.  Your friends need guidance for when to listen and when to speak.

Deliver the goods you’ve promised.  If you can’t, chocolate always helps to smooth things over.

Keep your sense of awe and wonderment.

Spend time near flowering trees.

Root for the underdog, but don’t necessarily place a bet on them with anything other than Monopoly money.

Hold your friends close, your enemies closer, and your family closest.

Smile, even when you don’t feel like it.

Allow yourself anger, frustration, sadness, despair, envy, bitterness, etc., but schedule a time to end those things so that you can again feel hope.

What isn’t said speaks as loudly as what is said.

Make time to ponder and reflect.

Own a teddy bear to hug when you’re down.  People are great for hugs, but teddy bears aren’t ever too tired or too busy for a good squeeze session.

Money is a finite resource.  Treat it as such.

Love is not a finite resource.  Give some away, and you’ll always get more back, even if it comes from unexpected places.

Forget you’re a grown up sometimes.

Schedule a day every now and again to have no responsibilities.

Allow yourself to cry when crying is necessary.  Do decide that you will stop crying after you get it out of your system.

Try not to marry your job.  It won’t be there to take care of you when you’re old and start getting dementia.

Deliver bad news with compassion.

Hands are shaped for holding other hands for a reason.  Try it sometime.

Be careful whom you trust.  Trust is a privilege, not a right.

We are fish in a giant fishbowl.  Very few things are secrets if the right people employ the right tactics to know your business.  Live life knowing that someone will probably find out.

Jen Bluekissed chooses to see the world in color.  She kisses in color too.  Her work can also be found on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

Filed Under: Happiness Tagged With: ,

You Suck

March 29, 2011 by 6 Comments

…the air out of a room when you make it all about you.

…the life out of everyone around you when you make it all about you.

…the joy out of every endeavor when you make it all about you.

…the lightness out of every quest when you make it all about you.

…the potential out of every business when you make it all about you.

You fill.

…every room,

…every person,

…every endeavor,

…every quest,

…every business with life, with energy, with potential,

When you make it all about them.

++++

The challenge is to serve, solve and delight from a place of genuine personal interest without relying on the experience to complete you.  Be who you are, but can you be a filler rather than a sucker.  That didn’t come out totally the way it was meant, but either way…who would want to be a sucker?

Agree, disagree…need more latte?

Reprinted with permission from personal development and marketing blog – JonathanFields.com

Filed Under: Happiness

Working Your Self-protrait

March 26, 2011 by 1 Comment

“Every man’s work, whether it be literature or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself.”

Samuel Butler one-ups the you-are-what-you-eat crowd, with his you-are-what-you-do idea.  Or at least, our portraits are what we do. But are these our most accurate portraits? Or are there other things, besides work, that better define us? That draw sharper lines? That paint clearer colors?

Abraham Harold Maslow came up with the term “self-actualization”.  He said, essentially that a painter has to paint.  That a cook has to cook.  That a pilot has to fly.  That we are what we do, that we are driven to do what we do.  But is “what we do” our careers?  Or is what we do the rest of the stuff?

I am a hiker, I must hike.  Well, I wish I could hike a lot more than I do, but I think that description defines me better than what I do for a living.  Is Samuel Butler’s “every man’s work” necessarily what he does for a living?  Maybe in a majority of cases it is.  Which is a sad statement.  Or maybe it is a happy statement, if it means people are doing what they really love.

What do you think?

Filed Under: Happiness Tagged With: , ,

Your Mind Is What You Eat

March 24, 2011 by Leave a Comment

“Women who mostly ate junk and processed foods were more likely to have depression and exhibit increased psychological symptoms.”

So says  Dr Felice Jacka of Deakin University.  She  ran a research the study that tested more than 1000 women from a cross-section of Australian society, finding that those women who followed the national dietary guidelines were less likely to suffer from depression or anxiety.  No surprise – if you don’t get the basic nutrients you need to keep your body functioning properly, how can you expect your brain or your emotions to stay in balance.

The relationship between diet and mental health was strong, even stronger than the relationship between diet and

  • socio-economic status
  • obesity
  • illness
  • education
  • whether they smoked or not

The World Health Organization has identified 2020 as the year when depression is likely to become the second biggest cause of disability – after cardio-vascular disease.  In addition to all the other benefits of good nutrition, preventing an increase in depression has just been added to the list.  Why not take a few moments today at lest to review the basic health guidelines offered up by the government.  They are not very detailed, but following them is way, way better than not following them.

More from Deakin University

Filed Under: Fitness

The Pharmacist is Clowning Around

March 23, 2011 by 3 Comments

I would like to introduce you to Fang Li Yun, a 52-year-old Malaysian pharmacist of 24 years.  She is part of what they call the “Funny Action” project, which helps people learn to laugh and to smile even when there is no good news to smile about.

Like so many other people, Fang Li Yun thought happiness would follow her income, and as a pharmacist she was making good money.

But in 2006 she discovered clowning and discovered there was more happiness to be achieved.  This lead to a mission or pilgrimage of sorts with Hunter Doherty “Patch Adams” and a group of thirty other people from various countries to Mexico last year.  Together they visited patients, the homeless, the elderly, shut-ins and  HIV-infected people while dressed in their best clown attire

What made the biggest difference? In 2008, a friend of hers who was president of a breast cancer  support group, asked her this question: “The happiness a clown brings to people is only momentary. How are you going to make the happiness last?”

Now she teaches people how to laugh: “Everyone is born with the ability to laugh. Laughter is the best medicine and an effective way of fighting illnesses. Based on statistics, babies can laugh up to 400-500 times a day, while adults laugh an average of only 14 to 15 times a day.”

Fringe benefits of clowning around include increased self-confidence and reduced stress. Fang Li Yun discovered that whenever she focuses on making other people happy, she also experiences a surge of joy and forgets all her worries and cares.

And she is still a pharmacist.

This post was included in the That Girl Is Funny Blog Carnival.

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The Value of Value

March 18, 2011 by 4 Comments

I’ll spare you the long-winded intro today.  This is a short message by the former CEO of Coca Cola, very inspirational, that a friend shared with me a while back.  Take a moment to reflect on it, and hopefully your day will be a little more valuable afterward.

This post was featured in the Carnival of Wealth #31, in the Totally Money Carnival #12 and in Cajun Finances Random Thoughts Carnival.

Filed Under: Happiness Tagged With: , , , ,

Give Hugs and Get Healthier

March 16, 2011 by 2 Comments

When you’re feeling gloomy and someone comes up to you to give you a hug, it could really lift your spirit. But did you know that there are also health benefits to hugging? Studies have shown that it causes the release of a hormone called oxytocin. That hormone has been proven to help lower levels of stress and anxiety, reduce blood pressure, boost the immune system, increase tolerance to pain and perhaps even speed up the healing of wounds.

Hugging also just feels good and helps boost your mood. When you really need it, it could help alleviate feelings of loneliness. That is exactly what happened in 2004, to an Australian man only known by the pseudonym of “Juan Mann”. For a few months, Juan Mann was feeling lonely and depressed, suffering a great amount of personal problems. One day, he went to a party and someone randomly gave him a hug. That hug made him feel so much better that he began thinking that there might be other people, like him, in desperate need of human contact.

He came up with the idea of going in public places to give free hugs. He prepared a sign and headed to his neighborhood mall. The first time he did it, he waited fifteen minutes before an older lady finally came up to him and hugged him. From that moment on, a worldwide campaign was launched. Now, all over the world, people stand in public places and give free hugs. What a wonderful initiative.

Hugging and touching is accessible to all. It serves as a powerful way to express our appreciation and our love to the people around us. So, why not do it more often? If we do so, not only will we be improving the quality of our health, but also our happiness, the happiness of those around us, and our overall feeling of wellbeing!

Here is a video of free hugs given in Italy:

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This is a guest post by Alina Boutros who writes 500 Days to Happiness

Filed Under: Fitness Tagged With: ,
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