Insights – Melannie Thomas

Archive for the ‘Finding Your Center’ Category

April showers bring May flowers.   The Earth awakens from winter’s sleep and  moves into action.  The Green Goddess unabashedly displays her beauty,  alluding to glories yet to come.

Gratefully,  winter rain has fed our parched landscape;  the deep, rich colors of Spring vibrate with renewal and regeneration.

May is a perfect time to launch our plans for the rest of the year.  A time of planning and planting.  A good season to shed trite and stagnant energies.  Spring cleaning is not confined to the physical aspects of our existence.

I invite you this week to relish the opportunities for cleaning and clearing making way for expansion and growth.

“The naked earth is warm with Spring,
And with green grass and bursting trees
Leans to the sun’s kiss glorying,
And quivers in the sunny breeze.”

~Julian Grenfell

Former slave Harriet Tubman will replace Andrew Jackson on the $20.00 dollar bill, (Jackson will be moved to the back of the bill) and  six leaders of the Suffragette movement will be featured on the back of the $10.00 bill.  It is the goal of the U.S. Treasury to place these new currencies into circulation by 2020,  coinciding with the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment

For the past decade the gender pay gap has remained static.  (‘The Simple Truth About the Gender Pay Gap’, ‘Graduating to a Pay Gap’, Forbes magazine’s Lisa Maatz, Michelle Singletary, Washington Post columnist).

The U.S. Census Bureau cites that women working full time, year round, earn 77% of what men earn.  Add to this the ‘pink’ tax or ‘gender’ tax, where women pay $1,351.00 more a year than men for equivalent personal care products and services like dry-cleaning. (According to 1995 CA study.)

The Paycheck Fairness Act, which was preceded by the Equal Pay Act of 1963, was first approved in 2009 and  has been on the floor of the Senate four times since 2011.  All four times it has been blocked by Senate Republicans.  It does not appear women are going to get any help there.

According to the National Women’s Law Center long term financial effects of the gender gap are staggering.  Over the course of a forty year career the loss for Caucasian women is $430,480.  For African-American women it is $877,480. and over $1 million for Latinas. These figures are not adjusted for inflation. www.nwlc.org.

I have some ideas.  To balance this economic inequality, women will only pay 77% on the dollar for ALL purchases.  Women will only pay 77% to rent living spaces.  Additionally, women will pay prices for shampoo, deodorant and razor blades that are equal to those of our male counterparts.  For example, women will now pay only $2.00 to dry-clean a shirt (the price men pay) rather than $6.50.

With Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Alice Paul on the back of the $10.00 bill, and MLK Jr., Eleanor Roosevelt and Marian Anderson appearing on the back of the new $5.00 bill, perhaps it is time for women to renew the fight against gender inequality and economic injustice.

Placing Harriet Tubman on the face of the new currency is an honor to the resourcefulness, power and dignity of the feminine.

Harriet Tubman

We are a wired world.  The amount of time each day that we are connected is growing as fast as the technology that it feeds upon.

A growing body of research is pointing to the darker side of this phenomena.  Swedish studies show that folks, especially young people, who profusely use technology are at pronounced risk for depression, stress and sleep disorders.  Indications are that the light from our myriad devices reduces the production of the sleep hormone, serotonin.

Kansas State University Researcher YoungAh Park says that not setting good tech/communication boundaries between work and home life creates a serious stress load, and that media multitasking reduces efficiency.

Although still up for debate, Internet Addiction is now a serious candidate for being classified as a mental health disorder.  I am sure this extends to cell phone and texting also.

March 3-4, 2017 is National Day of Unplugging.  You can take the pledge to unplug at the National Day of Unplugging website.

This week I invite you to look at how much time each day you spend plugged in.  Schedule some planned breaks, create good boundaries, unplug and  focus on the moment…BE PRESENT.

As I was preparing for today’s post,  I found a quote I liked.  The author was listed as Unknown.  In hot pursuit of this creative wit, I found a wealth of material.  Below is a sampling, beginning with the quote that inspired my search.

“My life is all about math.  I am trying to add to my income, subtract from my weight, divide my time, and avoid multiplying.”  Unknown

“Our days are happier when we give people a piece of our heart rather than a piece of our mind.”   Unknown

“You cannot find knowledge by rearranging your ignorance.”  Unknown

“If you don’t take care of your body, where will you live?”  Unknown

“People who cannot find time for recreation are obliged sooner or later to find time for illness.”  Unknown

“Knowledge is realizing that the street is one-way, wisdom is looking both directions anyway.”  Unknown

I invite you to carry these little pearls of wisdom into the week with you.

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work.  And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.  If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking.  Don’t settle.  As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.”

~Steve Jobs

The following quote led me to a glimpse into the life of an amazing man.  Before reading the quote, I had never heard of Orison Swett Marden.

His story fascinates and inspires me.  After a life of much hardship and challenge, he became among other things, a successful author.  His book, Pushing to the Front (Houghton-Miffen 1894), became an instant best seller.  He went on to publish over 50 books.  Among them,  Prosperity: How to Attract It; an essential and seminal work on the Law of Attraction.  He also founded Success magazine in 1897.

“Obstacles are like wild animals.  They are cowards but they will bluff you if they can.  If they see you are afraid of them…they are liable to spring on you, but if you look them squarely in the eye, they will slink out of sight.”

I love the image of looking squarely at the obstacles we face, both big and small and watching them “…slink out of sight.” Wishing you the power to face your obstacles.

It is the earliest Spring Equinox since 1896.  In Central and Pacific Daylight Time Zones it occurred Saturday, March 19th.

The Spring Equinox occurs… “midway between the sun’s lowest path across the sky in winter and the highest path across the sky in summer,”  Deborah Byrd, earthsky.org.   In other words, Equinoxes occur at the mid-point between the Solstices, and, Solstices occur at the mid-point between Equinoxes; dividing the year into four equal parts, four seasons.

In the Northern Hemisphere the Earth awakens.  In the Southern Hemisphere it is the Autumnal Equinox, a time of harvest and preparation for the coming of sleeping winter.

Four is the number of all things earthly.  In Tarot, four is the Earth Element.  Four represents the natural order;  four represents renewal.  The Spring Equinox is a time of awakening.

I invite you to take some precious moments this week to rejoice in renewal and the blossoming of Spring.

Human history is recorded through storytelling.  “Stories have been carved, scratched, painted, printed, or inked into wood, bamboo, ivory, bones, pottery, clay tablets, stone, palm-leaf books, skins, parchment, bark cloth, paper, silk, canvas and other textiles, recorded on film and stored electronically in digital form.”  (Wikipedia)

Fairy tales, mythology, folktales, legends, sagas and epics are traditional forms of storytelling.  Documentaries and interactive electronic games are examples of contemporary storytelling.

All cultures, nations, tribes and families have their stories; familial,  political, historical, psychological and spiritual.  Stories are kept alive through repetition.

The Spring Equinox is fast approaching initiating renewal and awakening.  I invite you this week to review your path; your personal story.

Music is powerful. It has the capacity to effect a wide range of human functions and emotions.

Music creates and manipulates mood; has therapeutic value; it can help relieve pain and anxiety (endorphin production);  it is used for social, religious and spiritual purposes, and for celebrations of all kinds in all cultures; music influences consumer behavior and jingles create product association.

Music enhances the quality of life… and it is available 24 hours a day.

“As you begin to realize that every different type of music, everybody’s individual music, has it’s own rhythm, life, language and heritage, you realize how life changes, and you learn how to be more open and adaptive to what is around us.”

~Yo-Yo Ma

“Music is a moral law.  It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and charm and gaiety to life and to everything.”

~Plato

It is so very easy to take music for granted.  This week I invite you to look at the influence of music in your life.

I am a ‘hugger’.  Hugs are healthy.  Hugs do many positive things for our body, mind and spirit.

Most hugs last about three seconds.  A prolonged hug, a twenty second hug, boost levels of oxytocin (the love hormone) and serotonin (the mood stabilizing hormone), according to researchers at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.

Nick Ortner’s children’s book, The Big Book of Hugs: A Barkley the Bear Story, helps children and parents understand the power and benefits of hugging.

Humans long for touch; and for good reason.  Hugs reduce stress and feelings of isolation, loneliness and anger.  Prolonged hugs help us relax and they are healing and comforting; connecting us to each other at deeper levels.

I invite you this week to hug frequently.  Try out the twenty second hug. Enjoy the benefits of touching.