Farts

PostSecret

Heaven on Earth

With the semester coming to an end and work closing out I am finding myself pretty stressed out. It becomes frustrating because all I want to do is stop but I literally cannot so I have to find other ways to create peace within the day. This is a challenge sometimes to see the beauty in my surroundings while enveloped in my thoughts and strict schedule.


To start my day off I get up about thirty minutes early read a reflection from a prayer book or website, eat a bowl of cereal, and drink a cup of hot green tea while still in my PJ's. This allows me time to wake up, say hello to God and start on the right foot. I find this to be one of the most relaxing times of the day for me. Not much thinking happens during this time and I am just allowing my body to be soothed from the warmth of the tea and my soul awakened by God.

Then my day takes off running whether I am ready or not. My days mainly consist of class-lunch-class, more class-dinner-class again-work out-homework-4th meal-bed-repeat. As you can see there is not much down time involved in that schedule so I have to seek peace in daily occurrences.

Lunch is spent at my desk at work and I take this time to relax. I pull out my PB&J sandwich with my apple, turn on the radio and just relax. I stop all thoughts at this point and focus on nothing I am giving my body and mind a rest. The same sort of thing happens at dinner. I will go to the cafeteria, pick up a news paper and grab a table by myself to just veg out on a healthy meal and good ol' news. These are the times I make a conscious effort to rest during my day because I believe that rest is necessary to give life 100%.


As for the rest of my hectic day I do several things:

1. I try to see the beauty in my surroundings and nature no matter where I am. I will pick out one thing and thank God for it.
2. I try to see God in all my interactions. I ordered my sandwich from a woman today that is always smiling and I smiled back just as big because she brightened my day.
3. I try to smile at as many people as possible and/or do something to brighten someone’s day.

These things are small but allow me to keep God involved in my day and to keep peace within my mind, body, and soul all throughout my day. This is my heaven on earth.

Great Undertakings

A few weeks ago I walked into the cafeteria at school after work, handed the woman at the counter my card to swipe and was sort of preoccupied with my thoughts. "Are you a teacher?" snapped me out of my trance and back to the impending question. "No" I responded, shaken a bit from what I thought to be odd question. The lady behind the counter proceeded to tell me that she sees me around here a lot and thought that by the way I carried myself that I was a teacher.

There is something to body language. My mom always told me to walk with my shoulders back, chin up, and with determination. I have been doing this for so long now it is a habit. I didn’t realize how much poise had an effect on others perceptions of me until this incident. In one of my classes we are talking about a speaker’s credibility and how body posture affects if the audience views them as credible or not.

Slouching with shoulders down indicates being timid and afraid. This gives them little credibility. Leaning against something while speaking shows that the person is nervous and unsure of themselves. Most of the time when a person is leaning they are no longer directly facing the audience creating an automatic barrier.

Although those are just a few things speakers do I would like to be bold in saying that some of these concepts can be applied elsewhere. For example, when I see someone walking on campus with their head down and a slouched posture I think they are shy and don’t like to be confronted with new people. On the other, more extreme side when I see someone walking with their shoulders so far back they are almost waddling, nose up in the air, and greets everyone with a “hello” I think they must be stuck up and think they are above everyone else.

This is not an exhaustive list of ways that body language can affect your life daily. I believe that body language is such an important part of interpersonal relationships and is something that everyone should pay attention to.

Dear God, allow me to present myself in a way that will cater best to your mission for me. Help me to see others and respond fully to their needs. Amen

I am Smiling with Love

"I am smiling with love..." What does this mean? As I sit at my desk and wonder what it means I become distracted by an interaction outside my window that is obviously between two lovers. The man hugs the woman, gives her a kiss, smiles at her and she in turn smiles back. Then it comes to me, this interaction that I have just witnessed explains this quote so well.

A smile closes the distance between two people, it says things when words are not available. This man and woman were smiling with love at each other. They may or may not have verbally said 'I love you' but one can see that their smiles communicate that they care about each other.

I personally love smiles. I love it when people are smiling it makes me smile also. This kind of smile is a sort of prayer. It means 'I am smiling with love' at you, you are important and I love you whoever you are. I believe that when we do something for someone else and they smile we have touched their soul. This is my goal starting now: to smile with love as much as possible each day regardless of if the smile is for a stranger or a friend.