be that girl – Page 5 – Be That Girl Now

Inspiration is Everywhere!

This morning when I went to make coffee, I noticed a little saying on the tray where the coffee was stored. It said “Enjoy your life”. Funny, I have made coffee everyday for 5 days, and yet today is the first day that I actually noticed this little message. I guess I needed a little inspiration today.

My 3 beautiful children were up at 5:30 this morning (and we are on vacation!), and the sun had not even peaked up out of the ocean. Good thing I went to bed early last night. But really Tina, come on. You are on vacation, you have 3 lovely, healthy girls, and you got to watch the sun rise over the ocean blue this morning. Enjoy your life! Because it is truly amazing, and everyone needs a little reminder of that sometimes.

Inspiration is everywhere in your life, but you have to be looking for it and you need to be perceptive enough to see it and understand it! Enjoy every moment of every day, no matter what gets thrown at you. Smile and breathe. Relax and don’t worry. Keep your eyes open… the Universe is waiting to inspire you!

Living differently.

Being on vacation in Roatan is amazing… and different. We are staying in a house, not a resort, so we are pretending that we live here. We are buying our own groceries and cooking all of our own food. Others have told me that this is a lot different than it is in North America, but I really did not believe them. Until now. The first noticeable difference is at the till and on the shelf. A bottle of wine costs 173 Lempira’s, which equals about 9 US dollars. And when your grocery bill totals 2000 it can seem a bit scary! (That’s about 100 US Dollars).

Everything that is not grown on the island has to be imported, so almost everything costs more here than it would at home. Due to the heat and humidity here, maintaining the freshness of food even in the grocery stores is an issue. The meat in the grocery stores looks very different than what we are used to, and I still cannot bring myself to buy it. You have to look carefully at expiry dates, and a lot of times the stuff you want to buy (like milk) may not be in stock when you choose to shop. Yesterday for breakfast, I was fully prepared to make pancakes with a yummy pancake mix that was in the cupboard. We had a bunch of bananas that had just been cut off a tree and I had mushed them up to add to the mix. When I opened the bag of pancake mix and looked inside to measure out a cup, the mix was crawling with tiny little bugs. I promptly threw the whole bag in the garbage and moved on something else. These little bugs are common place here, and I suppose one either gets used to them or you don’t eat certain foods. Today, I cooked up some Macaroni Noodles for lunch. When I opened the box and saw movement, I thought “oh, well. At least they are going into the boiling water.”. I dumped the noodles in, rinsed them well once they were done cooking, and we all ate our yummy lunch. A girl has gotta do what a girl’s gotta do for herself and her family. Rest assured that I may be sticking to more fruits and vegetables while we are here from now on, and I will be asking others who live here how to compensate for the interesting foods here.

For now, I have some counters to wipe off so the sugar ants don’t come. I am officially playing “Survivor Roatan” and I feel like I’m going to win!

Bathing Suits

I have a new bathing suit, and now that our luggage is here (woo hoo!) I get to sport this new suit every day. I just loooove it. The colors are great and it makes me feel like a million bucks. I mentioned out loud the idea that “a new bathing suit can make you feel like a million bucks”. We are vacationing with my dad, and his response was interesting. He made the comment that no matter what body type you have, and no matter what your bathing suit looks like, if you walk with confidence when you have it on, everyone will take notice. Keep your head up, shoulders back, suck your tummy in, look around with interest at everything, keep your arms by your side, and smile. It is all about how you handle yourself that gets you noticed, not what you are wearing or how your body looks. But you will be more willing to walk with that confidence if what you are wearing something that makes you feel good.

It’s not what you wear, but how you wear it. Feel confident about your body and yourself, and then let the world know that you are amazing. Have a wonderful day!

Reward Yourself

You work hard everyday, so make sure you reward yourself often with small things, and occasionally with larger things. Give yourself small rewards on a weekly basis at minimum. Daily would be a interesting goal. Reward yourself in BIG ways at least once per year.

Small rewards can be things like:

a bath with some aroma therapy and a locked door
a dark chocolate bar, a bottle of wine and your favorite book for an hour (or more…)
a yoga class
a sporting event
coffee with a friend
buying yourself a new plant, or some flowers
5 minutes of meditation

Big Rewards are things like:

Trips or Vacations
Shopping for Shoes, Clothes, Purses
An item you’ve been wanting for a while… hot tub, lamborghini, motorbike, house
Spa Weekend

You put in effort everyday in your life, and you deserve to be rewarded for those efforts. If you take responsibility for rewarding yourself when you have done good things, you will build confidence in yourself and you will not need to look externally for rewards. This will improve your outlook on everything, and when you have something to look forward to, you will be more motivated to put the effort in. And the more effort you put in, the more you will be able to reward yourself. Cool, huh?

Have a wonderful day. Namaste.

Cooincidence?

I am required to volunteer once a month at my daughters preschool, which I love. If I cannot do my scheduled shift, it is my responsibility to find someone to switch with me. Recently, I needed to swap a shift in February. I have a class list at home, but I was pressed for time and wanted to take some action right away. There is a communication book that the parents write in if they need to communicate with the teachers, so I thought I would just write it in there and hope that one of the moms would be able to cover it off, and that they would chance to look at the book (most of us only ever look at it if need to write something in it, never otherwise).

A few days later, one of the moms came up to me and said, “Hey. I was wondering if you would be able to swap volunteer days with me…I am not able to make it on my scheduled day”.

She had not even seen the note in the book, and she did not know that I was looking for someone to swap with also. Ha ha! Thank you Universe!

We ended up swapping out days, and both of us walked away happy and knowing that a piece of our lives had just been handled. Oh yeah.

And all I had to do was write it down. I put it out there to the Universe, and then just went with the flow.

Start questioning the cooincidences that happen in your life, and try to track what you did to make that happen. When things work, keep doing them. You are in control. Namaste.

Friendship is a gift!

You can never be sure what the Universe will send your way, but one thing you can count on is that the Universe will send you exactly what you need, when you need it.

Interestingly, my book release party this weekend brought back into my life some people that I have missed dearly, and who I obviously need in my life right now. It also brought me in contact with some amazing new people.

True friendship is a gift that makes your heart swell to a size larger than it was before. A true friend adores you no matter what. And although time may pass where a friend is not in your life, when that friend returns to your life, it is as if they were never gone. I want to take this opportunity to welcome back to my life some true friends!

Have faith that the Universe will provide for you, and it will. Have an amazing day!

Value your network.

Do not underestimate how important your network is in your life. Ensure that you maintain every relationship in your life, no matter how small, or infrequent your interactions are. Keep your relationships positive and upbeat, and never leave things negative if it can be helped.

You never know when you will need someone to help you out, or when they will need your help. It really doesn’t take long to connect with people. A quick phone call or email will keep you in the forefront of people’s minds, and you never know what they will have to tell you when you do check in! You do not need a reason to check in with your network. All you need to say is that you wanted to touch base with them and see how everything is going. Is there anything you can do for them currently? Are they doing well, and prospering? How is their family? Reach out to as many people as you can every day. Your network is the key to reaching your goals, and the information and assistance that you need is already waiting for you in your network. You just need to start searching for it! Ask questions, provide information, and be generally compassionate and interested. You will find what you need quickly, and it will seem like magic.

Start using your powers today to get everything you need. Rock your network!

Make Things Happen!

The other day I was excitedly showing my book off to a lady at school. Her response was “Wow! I can’t believe this is happening to you!”

My reply was, “Oh, well I am making it happen!”

Things will not just randomly happen to you. You have got to take action and make things happen in your life! And the more action you take, the faster things can happen for you.

Just last February, I thought to myself “I am going to write a book!” And I did it! And it is now available in bookstores! That is so cool!

You can do anything if you put your mind to it, take action, and grab opportunities as they are presented to you. Go do it now! 🙂

It takes two.

This morning when my alarm went off, I was inspired by Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock’s song, “It Takes Two”.

It takes two to make a thing go right…

It takes two to make it outta sight!

Every successful relationship requires all persons involved to put in effort . One person alone cannot make the world go around, nor should they try to!

When you are a team, and both parties are excited, motivated, and putting the effort in, you can make it “outta sight!”

It is very noticeable when any relationship is one sided. Expectations are placed on one party, while the other party chooses to put their efforts elsewhere.

You can only be responsible for your behavior and your efforts. And you cannot expect to change others. If there is a relationship in your life that is not reaching the heights that you expect, you cannot take that all on! Take on your 50% of the responsibility that you have in the relationship, and be sure to communicate with the other party about your feelings.

If you want all of your relationships to soar, it will take two. Nurture the relationships that fuel you and that create positive results. Think carefully about relationships that don’t.

And above all, smile and remind yourself that you are amazing. Namaste!

Happy Chinese New Year!

Today is the start of the Chinese New Year, so Happy New Year to you all! (or in Chinese, Gung hay fat choy, which means “Best wishes and Congratulations. Have a prosperous and good year.”) Chinese New Year is celebrated for 15 days, and on the 15th day a lantern celebration is held. A lot of food is shared over these next 15 days, and many interesting traditions involving superstitions are upheld, including not eating meat or sweeping ones home on the first day. Interesting!

The Chinese Astrological Calendar is symbolized by animals, with each year being represented by a certain animal.

Today is the start of the Year of the Dragon. If you have ever asked yourself why I have a Dragon on the cover of my book, Be That Girl, here is your answer. I was born in the year of the Dragon. To me, the Dragon is a mythical symbol of power, strength, and confidence … traits that all of us could use a little more of at times in our lives!

The year of the dragon promises to bring excitement, unpredictability and opportunity. This is the perfect time to create change in your life.

Have a wonderful day! Namaste.