Finding JOY in our own Story

February 1, 2011 By Shan 6 Comments

The opening keynote speaker at the Blissdom Conference was Brene Brown. She is a Wife, Mother, Author, Blogger (www.OrdinaryCourage.com), Social Worker and Professor.

Brene Brown’s presentation resonated with me on a level I can not begin to describe or explain. {Not very good when you are writing a blog.} She spoke about her current book titled: The Gifts of Imperfection. The subtitle says, “Let Go of Who You Think You’re Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are…Your Guide to a Wholehearted Life.“

Isn’t the title of this book just beautiful?

Doesn’t it make you want to just exhale and feel GOOD?

Well then imagine how phenomenal her speech was. Her slides had very yummy photographs as well. But, that’s a whole different post.

Of course I took notes. This line speaks volumes:

“Owning our STORY and

loving ourselves

through that process

is the BRAVEST thing

that we will ever do.”

I was delighted to meet Brene and have her sign my copy of The Gifts of Imperfection. Since she is from Houston, Texas, I had to share with her my story of living in Houston. Turns out, our husbands went to school together and share the same occupation! {Imagine Twilight Zone music here} I appreciated her genuineness and sweet nature. Just finished the preface of her book and I already feel SO GOOD!

If you want to learn more about truly living with JOY in your life, I completely recommend this book! I have partnered with the Amazon.com Associates affiliate program to make things easier for you as well. Just click on the link below and it will take you directly there.

You HAVE the control,

Shan

Electronic Music

January 31, 2011 By Shan Leave a Comment

I heard a beautiful song by Owl City on XM Radio’s The Message this morning. It’s a cover song. I will post a link to it on my blog Faith Brings Joy. I decided to look up his (Adam Young) website and found his blog. His last post is a fun song he just whipped up. It’s influence is from all the old video games from the 80′s like Pac-Man. If there is one thing I definitely learned at the Blissdom Blog Conference is that you can not put copyrighted music, pictures, anything copyrighted on your blog. So you will just have to go to his blog to hear it. Sorry! www.owlcityblog.com

I think it is amazingly cool that we can read artist’s blogs and find out who they are as a person.

Happy Monday,
Shan

Filed Under: Blogs Bring Joy, Me Time Brings Joy, Music Brings Joy, Values Bring Joy

Life Changing Moments

January 25, 2011 By Shan Leave a Comment

Need some inspiration? Head over to my other blog Faith Brings Joy to read, see and hear a phenomenal story. It literally was life changing for me.

So grateful,
Shan

Filed Under: Blogs Bring Joy, Values Bring Joy

Balance…

January 6, 2011 By Shan 2 Comments

is my constant goal. Not just at the beginning of a new year, ALWAYS. I believe, specifically for me, my grand scheme or purpose in this life is to live it with balance. It hasn’t come easy. I find when I do have a balance, I am much happier.

Components of a good balanced day: {no particular order}

Time with my Maker
Time for me
Time with my husband
Time with my kids
Time with friends
Time for rest/sleep
Time for nourishment
Time for work/service inside the home
Time for organizing

Components of a good balanced week:

Exercise Time
Creative Time
Service outside the home
Errands
Church Worship
Everything mentioned for balanced day.

I found the following picture on Flickr.com thanks to Patty Anne. I was looking for a good photo of balance scales to add to this post and came across her genius picture. This is what Patty wrote below it:

balance

My one word resolution for the year is balance.
This year I seek balance in myself, my days, my home, my relationships, in my life.

I often feel like a high-wire act, balancing on that thin line riding a unicycle holding onto opposing priorities with a couple of people propped precariously upon my shoulders while life tosses more at me from all directions, smiling the whole time saying “I’m fine, really, I’m fine”.

I completely agree with Patty.

Work Smarter, NOT Harder,

Filed Under: Blogs Bring Joy, Crafts Bring Joy, Friends Bring Joy, Me Time Brings Joy, Photography Brings Joy, Values Bring Joy

Interesting Observation

December 9, 2010 By Shan 1 Comment

My Son is very observant and intelligent.

After I picked him up from school the other day he began bashing my “new wave” music again. He was saying how all the songs sound alike.

“All the singers sound the same.”

Then as we were conversing I simply said most of the bands from the 80′s I like are from England or Europe. {Surely I already knew this, but hadn’t thought about it in a long time.} He didn’t know that U2 was from Ireland. [BTW, Bono is 50 now!]

It isn’t a coincidence the music I listen to has the same sound, because it is the kind of music I enjoy listening to. {However I enjoy all kinds of music, I just so happen to listen to one kind more than the others} Even though he was “dogging” my tunes, I thoroughly enjoyed talking to him about music. It is one of my passions and I don’t have the opportunity to talk about music as much as I would like. Whenever I get the chance I like to give bits of trivia about groups or songs to my kids. I remember my parents doing the same thing as I was growing up.

I heard The Killers new Christmas single “Boots” yesterday on the radio. I enjoy hearing new original Christmas songs by modern day bands. So I just pulled it up on Rhapsody to listen to again and the beginning of the song is Brandon Flowers (lead singer) saying a prayer. This reminded me, I had heard recently he is a member of my Church. {not my local congregation, our Church is world wide} I pulled up Wikipedia to confirm this information:

“Musically, Flowers is an anglophile and a fan of English bands New Order, The Smiths, Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode, and Oasis. He credits the Pet Shop Boys song “Being Boring“, especially the lyrics “I never dreamt that I would get to be / The creature that I always meant to be”, as a major life influence. He has stated that “It was really weird because other kids were buying Tool and Nirvana and I was buying The Cars and The Psychedelic Furs. I was pretty alienated as a kid.” He states that seeing an Oasis concert, particularly their performance on Don’t Look Back in Anger, made him decide to pursue a career in music.”

No wonder I like The Killers and Brandon Flowers (He just released a solo album)!

“Flowers is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and his wife converted to the faith shortly before their wedding. He has said that religion is “very important” to him.^“

I love learning about musicians!

Grateful for ears to hear,
Shan

Filed Under: Music Brings Joy, Values Bring Joy