A grateful heart is a beginning of greatness. It is an expression of humility. It is a foundation for the development of such virtues as prayer, faith, courage, contentment, happiness, love, and well-being. ~ James E Faust
While no year is truly ever bad, and there are always positive things that happen, I can’t say many people will be sad to see 2020 end. So an appropriate photo to flush 2020 away.
Happy New Year my friends, may 2021 bring you much happiness. ~ Rev Kane
Drop the last year into the silent limbo of the past. Let it go, for it was imperfect, and thank God that it can go. ~Brooks Atkinson
Happy New Year’s Eve my friends, tonight we celebrate the end of a year and the beginning of the next. We hope to put behind us the things that went wrong this year, the bad news, bad memories. We look forward to the morning and the New Year, the resolutions we will surely keep, the changes we’ll make, all the good things that are coming. At least for tonight all of that is true and certain.
A long time ago a family friend, Jack Wrigley, was the first to refer to New Year’s Eve as amateur night. I didn’t quite fully comprehend until I was older and started attending New Year’s Eve parties. Once I did I got it, a night for people who don’t normally drink to get drunk and out of control. Inevitably it seemed some drunk always wanted to take a swing, there were drunks all over the road and quite honesty those parties were rarely fun. So I adopted a habit of either ignoring or quietly celebrating New Year’s Eve off the beaten path, lots of bonfires in the mountains or on the coast. I nice quiet way to bring in the New Year and avoid the hangover the next day, previously I posted a piece on Alternative Ways to Celebrate New Year’s Eve.
This year was a great year for me personally and the Ministry of Happiness Blog and I’m looking forward to the adventure ahead. If you are going out to celebrate tonight take care, be careful and watch out for those who are not, and have a happy New Year’s Eve my friends ~ Rev Kane
Memory is the diary all of us carry about with us. ~ Oscar Wilde
So today a friend texted me to remind me our our New Year’s Eve celebration for the year 2000. As you may remember, there was a lot of talk about the world possibly ending. That whole pesky Y2K thing had everyone very excited, amazing what a few misplaced 1’s and o’s might do. So I figured if it was going to be the end of the world, it ought to be celebrated in style.
When I was younger, I never expected to ever see the year 2000. I have a clear memory of laying on the playground watching clouds with a friend. We were maybe 12, and it dawned on me that we would be 36 in the year 2000. Then we both started laughing and said, “well, guess we won’t see that.” My life and my mind were in a very different place at that point in my life.
So, having made it, I decide to celebrate in style. So with a friend I rented a beach house in Port Saint Joseph on the Gulf of Mexico in Florida. I also bought the most expensive bottle of wine I’ve ever bought. I was a grad student and a $100 bottle of wine was a lot of money for me back then. The first thing we did, was to watch TV as the first places in the world hit the magical 2000. I remember watching the fireworks in Sydney Harbor, meaning of course that things hadn’t gone haywire on Australian computers. It looked like the world would survive after all. Turns out a lot of hardworking nerds had actually averted a potential disaster, if it actually existed.
The plan was at midnight to pour a couple of glasses of excellent wine and ring in the New Year standing in the Gulf of Mexico. Why? Seemed like a good idea at the time. As the night progressed we made friends with our neighbors who invited us to join the massive Cajun style boil they were doing. We had a great time hanging out with them and eating really good food. At midnight we indeed clinked our glasses to welcome in the next year, century and millennium.
It was a bittersweet time for both of us, our grandfathers‘ were dying and in between our small adventures, including paddling out to some dolphins in a tiny rubber boat, we could call to check on them. The dolphins in fact were sharks, and it was a pretty funny realization that quickly reversed our paddling direction. Unfortunately both of our grandfathers soon passed away.
Grandpa Kane
I rarely celebrate New Year’s Eve, a neighbor of mine used to refer to it as amateur night. A night for people who don’t normally drink to go out and get drunk. Too many drunk people, too many fights, too many drunk drivers. My celebrations now are quieter, alone or with a friend or two. A quiet celebration of the passing of one year into another and the hope for many happy days to come. Happy New Year my friends. ~ Rev Kane
I cannot even imagine where I would be today were it not for that handful of friends who have given me a heart full of joy. Let’s face it, friends make life a lot more fun. ~ Charles R. Swindoll
The holidays are a very stressful time for everyone and an exceptionally hard time for some. So, until the New Year I’ll be posting a Holiday Happiness post each day to try help folks out who are struggling. As always you can reach out to me at Happinesskane@aol.com for a kind word or someone to listen. ~ Rev Kane
An interesting little piece for you on how your family, friends and the environments of your life impact your happiness. Have a happy day my friends ~ Rev Kane
How do you find contentment in an acquisitive society? By changing the things you spend your money on, says a US academic. The Secret of Happiness, talks about something that researchers have been saying for a couple of years now, money can buy happiness if you use it to buy experiences instead of things.
Appalachian Trail Happiness: Precious Moments
Happiness is Swimming with Whale Sharks
Three Questions & Some Thoughts from Anza Borrego State Park
Rev Kane relaxing in the arctic snow flurries
Love yourself for who you are, and trust me, if you are happy from within, you are the most beautiful person, and your smile is your best asset. ~ Ileanna D’Cruz
The new year is upon us. Most of us will make grand proclamations about the changes we will make. Damn near everyone is suddenly on a diet that almost everyone will have abandoned by Valentines Day. Lot’s of new exercise equipment and gym memberships are about to be bought and eventually become dusty and unused. This cycle is a bit mentally destructive, you see it focuses us on the failures we have, especially when it’s the fifth year in a row you have resolved to eat less chocolate, as you dig into a tasty Ghiardelli chocolate square.
So my hope for all of us is to break that cycle for the new year. I’m going to make a suggestion that we all do something a little different this year. Let’s be clear, I’m not suggesting that you shouldn’t try to eat better, work out more, lose weight or drink less in the new year. These are all worthwhile life changes that would make you healthier and happier. There are lots of ways to achieve those goals and all I’ll say about them is that where I’ve had successes in my life on that front, has been by taking things slowly, forgiving the times you fall off your goals and just keep pushing. Beyond most things, believing that you can be successful is hugely important to actually being successful. Sounds pretty simple right?
One of the most important things that is key to personal success is confidence, or belief in yourself. But if you don’t already have that kind of confidence, how do you get it? Well like most things, it takes work, but work that is pretty easy to do. You build up your confidence slowly with small successes. So let’s say you have a goal of drinking less alcohol in the new year. Let’s also say right now you have a drink or two after work each night, occasionally more on the weekend. So, a lot of people will suddenly limit themselves to just one drink on a Friday night. Then they’ll have a rough day and boom, they have a drink and feel like a failure. Instead, start slowly, with minimal goals and celebrate their achievement. So start with having a drink every other day instead of every day. After a week of doing that celebrate the achievement and don’t make the reward a bunch of alcohol. 🙂 From there you increase slowly, go every 3 days, succeed, reward and keep expanding the time frame. Celebrating those successes is important as that is exactly how mentally you start to accept your ability to succeed.
So now that we’ve laid out a fairly simple process to help you achieve goals, how do we turn that toward the goal I’m suggesting for 2021, and what do I mean by valuing yourself? Let’s start with the second part first, far too often I see people devaluing themselves. Often you see it in the way people devalue their time. Far too often I see people agreeing to do things for other people that take up a lot of their time. Often this is just the idea of come with me. Now there are certainly times this type of request is important for support or even just to have fun, but often it’s just someone infringing on your time because they don’t want to be alone. Again, if it will at least be fun, great, but too often people go along, eating up their time because they don’t want to face the grief of saying no. This applies to all kinds of things, running errands for someone, cooking for someone, etc… usually little things that are inconvenient for you, but make things much more convenient for someone else. Often, these type of activities include add-ons. You’re going out to get lunch, someone asks if you’d pick them up something as well. So they place an order with you that is either utterly complicated or they throw the add-on of, since it’s on your way, could you drop off/pick up something for me?
I start this discussion with these little time sucks for a specific reason, they are the nibbling little annoyances that open the door to people demanding, and you giving more of your time than you want to give. Once you’ve shown that you don’t value your own time, or yourself for that matter, it gets easier for people to treat you that way. And for them to make larger and larger asks of you. When you acquiesce to these types of requests, that you don’t want to do, you build up resentment and diminish your happiness.
So how do you start to change things? You follow the same rules that we discussed above for your new year resolutions. You start small by addressing those time add-ons. If you’re picking up a sandwich for lunch and someone else asks for one as well great. But when the, since you’re out, could you stop….question comes up, say no. You can be polite, hey I’m under a time crunch, so I won’t have time. You need to start valuing your time and not let people take advantage. One way I do this is to think about my salary. So if you make $35 an hour, think about your time in terms of your rate. Now I’ve always thought of my personal rate to be about twenty percent higher than my work rate. So imagine anything you’re asked to do is worth $40 an hour. And set a minimum time interval, 15, 30 minutes or an hour. So is that extra stop worth $10 to the person asking or $29, would they pay you that to do the favor? I’m not suggesting you asked to be paid, but if you start to think in terms in monetary value, you start to put a value on your time. Suddenly, accompanying someone for a couple of hours when you don’t want to, is like losing $100. It can change your perspective on your time.
The monetary idea is just a mechanism for you starting to value your time. The real need is to value yourself, to understand that your time, your thoughts, your friendship and even your love has value. As such, you should be very thoughtful about where you choose to expend that value, and that perhaps it should be spent only when that person brings equivalent value to you.
Valuing yourself, building your own confidence, succeeding and being more thoughtful about who and what you spend your personal time/value on, will bring you happier days my friends. ~ Rev Kane
Over the last month or so I’ve posted a little bit of happiness each day, for those of you who prefer aggregation, here they are all in place, Happy New Year ~ Rev Kane
Day 1 – Wisdom
Day 2 – Zen Habits
Day 3 – A quick Video
Day 4 – Giving
Day 5 – Happiness Poem
Day 6 – Happiness Moment
Day 7 – Volunteering
Day 8 – Time to Laugh
Day 9 – Thanksgiving Stories
Day 10 – TED Talk on Happiness
Day 11 – Happiness Images
Day 12 – Happiness Poem
Day 13 – Happiness Moment
Day 14 – There are Angels Among Us
Day 15 – Deng Ming-Dao on Happiness
Day 16 – Happiness and Fun
Day 17 – Happiness and Being Special
Day 18 – Happiness Images
Day 19 – Pablo Neruda
Day 20 – Happiness and Travel
Day 21 – The Dalai Lama on Caring for Others
Day 22 – Deng Ming-Dao on Happiness
Day 23 – Tips for 30 Days of Happiness
Day 24 – Happiness Photos
Day 25 – Inspiration, Art & Happiness
Day 26 – Maya Angelou
Day 27 – Inspirational Quotes
Day 28 – The Dalai Lama on Hope
Day 29 – Deng Ming-Dao on Worry
Day 30 – Charles Bukowski
Day 31 – 15 Lessons on Being Happy
Day 32 – A Little Laughter
Day 33 – Happy Christmas Eve
Day 34 – It’s Christmas
The holidays are often a very stressful period for people so for the next 34 days (Thanksgiving through Christmas) we’re going to do a post a day, something happy and uplifting each day, perhaps an image, a poem, a quote, a moment of happiness or some bit of wisdom all in an effort to boost everyone’s happiness a little bit. You can do your part by paying it forward, send these little bits of happiness on to others and ask that they do the same and as always, have a happy day my friends ~ Rev Kane
A cautionary tale for you holiday pranksters out there and a bit of a chuckle for the rest of us. http://laugh.housewifemafia.com/Louises_Stockings.html
The Art of Smiling and Being Positive
Twelve Days of Christmas – For People Who Don’t Like Christmas
Minion exercise routine
To enjoy the glow of good health, you must exercise. ~ Gene Tunney
The holidays are a very stressful time for everyone and an exceptionally hard time for some. So, until the New Year I’ll be posting a Holiday Happiness post each day to try help folks out who are struggling. As always you can reach out to me at Happinesskane@aol.com for a kind word or someone to listen. ~ Rev Kane
No secret to anyone who has met me or read this blog regularly, I’m not a skinny guy and I really love to eat. Pizza is my favorite food and coca-cola is likely rightly considered an addiction where I’m concerned. Growing up, we didn’t always have enough to eat, my mother, as a single mom 99% of the time did a great job providing, sometimes via herculean efforts. There were however a few times and one in particular for me, when quite frankly there just wasn’t enough. I was 7 or 8 years old and one night I spilled my dinner, the dog of course pounced on it when it hit the floor. I went into the kitchen to ask for more. My mother snapped at me that there wasn’t more, then crying, gave me half of her plate. Every single detail of that night is burned into my brain and it is one of my most vivid memories. It is also not a coincidence that within a year of that night, the skinny little kid that I was, turned into a chubby little kid. My mother used to joke I went from slims to huskies overnight. That’s weight that frankly I still carry, but a little less every year.
When you realize that food is not a guarantee, you look at things differently. From that night on, if there was a way to earn a dollar to get something to eat, someone offering, a chance for an extra meal or a snack at a neighbor or friend’s house, I jumped on it. My choices of food were not always the best, junk food in America, especially in the 70s and 80s was by far the cheapest and most available. So the food habits I established were certainly not the healthiest. This continued well into my early 30s and led me to a point where I was obese (250 pounds), my blood pressure through the roof (170/110) when I was put on medication and my blood sugar was well into the Type 2 diabetic range.
It was no coincidence that through those years of excessive weight, bad eating and no consistent exercise, that my allergies were really bad and I had a cold four to six times a year. The funny thing about me during that period is that I didn’t feel bad, I was active, I still cycled, I still hiked, played pick up basketball games, but I did not exercise regularly.
When I moved to California in 2002 a couple of things happened, first I hit that magic 250 on the scale and the idea of weighing one-eighth of a ton was a hit on my psyche. Also, the doctor ordered me onto blood pressure medication. So I decided it was time to start exercising regularly and eating better. The combination was successful, I dropped 40 pounds and with medication got my blood pressure under control. I would eventually drift up to about 220 pounds where I would stay for a few years. I also noticed my allergies had backed off a bit, the semi-frequent migraines I would get had decreased a bit. I was also only getting colds 3 or 4 times a year.
It would take me another 10 years to make another big jump and it came as a result of finally having my blood sugar evaluated and realizing that it was firmly within the type 2 diabetes range. I did well getting my blood sugar down into the high-normal range, didn’t do so great with changing my weight but noticed I was getting sick even less. About a year and a half ago I got motivated again around my blood pressure and dropped to 190 pounds and got a handle on my blood sugar again. Over the last year I’ve drifted up a little over 200 again and have recently started working again and have dropped a few pounds over the last month, a positive change considering it’s the holiday season. Including of course my favorite holiday, Thanksgiving and a lot of business travel which always makes hard to eat well. So hopefully I’m heading into 2018 on a positive note and my goal is to be at 180 pounds by my birthday in August. If I make that goal it will be the lowest weight I’ve achieved since high school ended in 1982.
Learning leads to change
So this journey of positive change I’ve been on in relation to diet and exercise has yielded some benefits and a lot of learning. First the obvious, I’m lighter and this means benefits to my blood pressure, to my blood sugar and more relevant given my knee injury in 2015, less force on my joints. Also, as someone who has become a fairly serious hiker, weighing less, means less overall weight on the trail, again, better for my knees.
Some things that are less obvious, my allergies have been better. This may not be completely related to being healthier but that in combination with living in new places is a nice synergy. I’m rarely sick these days, in the last two years I’ve had one cold. I unfortunately got it while traveling in Jordan. This correlates exactly to the most consistent period of exercise in my life and I truly believe they are connected. With my blood pressure under control, at most I get one or two migraines per year. These things together have certainly made me a much healthier person.
What I’ve really learned in the last ten years for me is something pretty simple and something that should seem a little obvious but hadn’t been to me. Losing weight for me is not about working out, not at all. Losing weight is simply about eating less and particularly minimizing my carbohydrate intake, which also benefits my blood sugar levels. Please clearly understand what I’m saying. Working out, as I had described above is hugely beneficial, it has made me far healthier than when I wasn’t exercising regularly. However, if I eat normally and work out regularly I don’t lose weight. I may lose a little fat, gain a little muscle but in general my weight doesn’t drop. It’s not until I’m eating fewer calories while minimizing carbohydrates in my diet that I lose weight. This became obvious to me when I was injured and couldn’t work out but continued to eat this way. Even without the exercise I was losing weight, not as quickly, but still dropping. PLEASE don’t take this to mean I’m suggesting that you should just change your diet if you are trying to lose weight. Being thinner, but not getting regular exercise will not bring the other benefits I’ve discussed and it will leave out the next thing I want to talk about, how exercise makes you happier.
Throughout this journey with diet and exercise that I’ve been discussing tonight, I’ve been on a parallel journey, I’ve been getting happier. There may be some coincidence in all of this, perhaps as I was getting healthier I also happened to be doing the right things to get happier. I think there is something to that, however I also think they are connected. There are plenty of studies that talk about how exercises helps reduce stress, releases endorphins and of course being in better shape allows you to be more active and undertake more adventure, which all makes you feel better and happier.
So my friends, this regular exercise and eating better thing has certainly worked for me. My goal each week is to workout at least five days a week, to eat right 6 days a week and to never work 7 days in a row. That formula seems to be working for me and that plan or something more personalized will helpfully help you be healthier and have happy days my friends. ~ Rev Kane
Happiness is a Little Adventure
Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas. ~ Calvin Coolidge
The holidays are a very stressful time for everyone and an exceptionally hard time for some. So, until the New Year I’ll be posting a Holiday Happiness post each day to try help folks out who are struggling. As always you can reach out to me at Happinesskane@aol.com for a kind word or someone to listen. ~ Rev Kane
Happy Christmas my friends, this is my standard Christmas post. The Christmas holiday can be hard on a lot of folks, getting caught in the nostalgia of better Christmases from the past, of relatives and friends that are no longer with us. For some of us the isolation of being alone or the isolation you feel in the crowd this Christmas is almost too much to handle. Christmas is annually my worst day of the year, for many reasons I always feel very alone on this day and earlier this month posted some resources on overcoming holiday depression. If this describes you, reach out for a voice, a shoulder or a hand to hold, drop me an e-mail at Happinesskane@aol.com. Try and stay positive today, enjoy whatever the day may have to offer, a beautiful sunrise, cold crisp air, a walk in nature, the ability to enjoy the quiet with a cup of tea and a good book.
For those of you who revel in this day, pay attention to the fringes of your social and family circles for the ones who aren’t joyous, aren’t around and reach out with a little kindness, that little bit of kindness may be the best gift you give this year.
So Happy Christmas if it applies, Happy Tuesday if it doesn’t and either way, have a happy day my friends ~ Rev Kane
Twelve Days of Christmas: All 12 Days
Twelve Days of Christmas Happiness – For People Who Don’t Like Christmas
Happy Christmas a series of light shows for your holiday enjoyment
A great one from 2011 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojzxvgkB4eY
Sexy and I know it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zjXr6Qnpcw
Some say we are mostly water, I say we are mostly dreams. ~ S A Griffin
I discovered S A Griffin because he’s one of the editors of my favorite poetry book, The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry. Truly the best collection of American poetry I’ve ever read. He’s an LA poet, the writing scene has always been strong there. He’s willing to get down and dirty, in fact, some of his stuff I really love wouldn’t qualify for the PG-R rating I put on this blog. So, you like your poetry that way, pick up one of his books. ~ Rev Kane
strange, but true, angels find you
standing in line waiting to take your
last few dollars out of the bank
when the rent’s due and there’s
nothing in the cupboard
but a crumb
or when you turn just so
and somebody is there with
the right kind of eyes to catch
your falling star inside
their wonder
then the light breaks thru
and the messenger dove
arrives with the news
long live the song of yourself
that knows the pilgrim child
that knows your dream
the one that you
rode in on
never know where
you are going and you will
always get there
bet on it
and ride
___________________________
The Ministry of Happiness 