Posts Tagged: emotional resilience

Arlington Cemetary Allows Personal Mementos

October 18th, 2013
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Arlington National Cemetery has a heart.
Officials at the cemetery recently talked to families about their months long practice of leaving personal items on soldier’s headstones and Arlington is now compromising on its policies about leaving the personal mementos at gravesites.
Today’s post is an update of a story I  wrote about on October 3 discussing how staff at Arlington National Cemetery were collecting and discarding personal mementos left in Section 60 of the cemetery an area where soldiers who lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan are buried.  This area of the cemetery is where each visitor’s grief is … Read More

Joy Of Motion

October 17th, 2013
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Blogging plus my full-time job equals too much time in front of the computer. When I am involved in a deadline project and super concentrated on what I am doing, it is very easy for me to lose track of time and forget to move from my chair.  Sitting at my desk for hours on end may help me get my work done, but researchers also say it increases my chances of getting diabetes, heart disease and shortening my life.  So as comfy as it feels to sit or hang out on the couch, I’ve got to get moving. Because … Read More

A Silly Ode to October

October 16th, 2013
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I know the calendar says it’s the month of October but there have been days when it has felt as though it were July. When it feels like summer I am definitely one happy camper!!  It’s all I can do to stop myself from driving to the beach!!  But then there are the shorter days when it now gets dark earlier and earlier and that is difficult for me to deal with.  It’s really a downer to come out of work at the end of the day and it’s dark already.  Autumn may not be one of my favorite times… Read More

Love On A Two Way Street

October 15th, 2013
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I went to Trader Joe’s after work the other evening to pick up some up their fabulous pita chips and instead gained some insight into a different part of life in DC: being a homeless vendor. Near the entrance of the store stood a man, who introduced himself to me as David.  He was selling newspapers called Street Sense which I have previously written about.   This vendor was middle-aged and friendly but not in an aggressive way.  He was just talking to people and smiling, letting them know that his newspaper was for sale and that he was a writer.… Read More

Malala’s Light

October 14th, 2013
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When the news first broke a year ago that 14-year old Malala Yousafzai had been shot in the head by the Taliban while sitting in a school bus all I could imagine was the extreme fear and chaos of that terrifying moment.   How could someone be so afraid of a child on her way to school? Just by going to school, Malala defied the Taliban and its oppressive measures directed towards women by supporting education for girls in her small village in Pakistan’s Swat Valley.  That simple act made her a target.  Given the extreme nature of her injuries… Read More

The Light Between Oceans — Fantastic Fiction

October 11th, 2013
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You know you’ve read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend ~ Paul Sweeney The above quote captures the way the way I felt when I recently finished reading, “The Light Between Oceans.” by M.L. Stedman. If you are looking for a book of fiction that will transport you to another time and place, then I would highly recommend “The Light Between Oceans” to you.  It is beautifully written and for a first novel, an amazing piece of storytelling. Essentially, it is a story of stunning loss,… Read More

The 64 Untalked About Ways of Grief

October 10th, 2013
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People love to read lists.  I’m not sure why, but it could be because all of the best ideas relating to a particular subject are organized in one place.  Or maybe it’s because people want to see if what they guessed would be on the list is actually on the list. I think that sometimes lists are over used but not in this case. Today’s list comes from a wonderful website I recently discovered called What’s Your Grief? (www.whatsyourgrief.com) and I bet you a million dollars that you probably have never read a list like this one. Titled “64 Things… Read More

Wednesday Beats with Usher

October 9th, 2013
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I don’t have much to say today.  It’s Wednesday and things in DC have been tense with the government shutdown and furloughed workers.  Unfortunately, I know a handful of people who are working but unsure as to when they will get paid. And that is why is it time for some uplifting music.  Did you know that music is a quick stress reliever?  I believe we can always make time for the beats and music makes almost everything bearable. I was lucky enough to see Usher perform live earlier this year at the Inaugural Ball this past January (that seems… Read More

Truly Breathing

October 8th, 2013
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Breathing, centering, finding my inner peace.  That is what today is about. Thich Nhat Hanh is a Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk, author, poet and peace activist. Just typing the combination of those words makes me feel calmer. I know that somewhere, under all the rushing and running around and multi-tasking is a peaceful inner core, and my aim is to find it. But first I have to create the conditions to get to it. What is the hurry? With the help of Thich Nhat Hanh’s quote below, I will decrease the speed with which I am living my life.  I… Read More