Posts tagged "post and photo by Ineta Mcparland"

I found this really interesting from book Ageless Body, Timeless Mind by Deepak Chopra.  It made some great points about quality of life we choose to have, and how it affects our longevity.

“Trying to articulate a specific “longevity personality” is too constricting for centenarians – the benign, quiet, wise grandfather or grandmother is only one type among many.  Living to be 100 also happens to selfish, sarcastic, and unsociable people.  The common thread is a sense of self-sufficiency that runs much deeper than personality.  To support this point, a 1973 study in New York of seventy-nine healthy people 87 years of age and older found that they almost never went to doctors, were never found in nursing homes, and were rarely in homes for the aged.”

“Jewett’s study saw longevity in broad terms, and the majority of the factors he came up with were subjective, having to do with how these people felt about themselves.  In comparison, the purely objective factors linked to long life were few and very general.

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS

Not seriously overweight or underweight

Little weight fluctuation over their lifetime

Good general muscle tone

Good grip

Young appearance to skin

Still drives a car and engages in physical activity

PSYCHOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS

(Including Lifestyle and Behavior)

Superior native intelligence, keen interest in current events, good memory.

Freedom from anxiety, few illnesses, not prone to worry.

Independence of choice in their vocations.  They tended to be their own bosses.  They worked at farming and in the nursery business, and in the professions of law, medicine, and architecture; others headed small businesses of their own, and in a few cases large businesses.  The majority did not retire early.

Most had been hard hit by the Depression, which came along in their fifties and sixties, but they recovered and built new futures.

They enjoyed life.  All had a degree of optimism and a marked sense of humor.  They responded to simple pleasures.  Life seems to have been a great adventure.  They could see beauty where others saw only ugliness.

Great adaptability.  While many cherished childhood memories, all preferred living in the present with its many changes.

They continued living with satisfaction from day to day.

All may be described as religious in the broad sense, but none exhibited extreme orthodoxy.

They were moderate eaters but willing to experiment.  No special diets.  Diet included a high variety of foods high in protein, low in fat.

All were early risers.  Average sleep was between six and seven hours, although they rested in bed for eight hours.  (Shortened or interrupted sleep is typical in old age.)

No uniformity in drinking habits.  Some drank moderately, some drank too much at times, some abstained.

Smoking – some abstained, a few had smoked very moderately but had long since given it up, a few were inveterate pipe smokers.

Medications – used less medication in their lifetimes than many old people use in a week.

Most drank coffee.

I can’t thank enough my brother Max Spiker and author Jacob Liberman, O.D., Ph.D. for giving my eyesight back (see my previous post).  It feels so incredible!  Each day, I feel spurs of joy when I start seeing something new.  A few nights ago, for the first time I saw a Big Dipper, and the sky filled with the brightest stars.  I see more and more stars now.  All without my glasses!  Even nights became brighter.  Now, I started to see smaller street signs, numbers on mail boxes, a menu board at Starbucks.  Each new seeing is a victory.  According to the eye chart, I went from 20/200 to 20/30 in two weeks.  Now into 2 and a half weeks, I read 20/25 line, and saw 4 letters in 20/20 line.  I left my eyeglasses and I did not put them on since I started this journey.  I even drove through a little fog and in the rain day and night without glasses.  Interestingly, rain made my vision even more clearer.

My vision is not constant yet, but I have longer and longer periods of great seeing.  One blink – I see everything absolutely clearly, another blink – it becomes a little blurry (but nothing like it used to be), a third blink – all clear again.  When outdoors and in the car, I see it better than being inside in the artificial light.  Sometimes, I see double or triple, but with adjusting blink it goes to normal again.  When that happens, I think it would be neat to capture what I see on the camera:  like a triple moon or a handsome double guy.  LOL!  It all depends on light, my mood, my thoughts, how I react to people’s conversations.  If a person is stressed out, I find myself putting blur blinds because I feel that person’s energy, and I do not like it.  If the person is excited and enthusiastic, my vision becomes really clear.  The same is with my thoughts.  If I get excited, the vision becomes really clear.  If I start to worry about something, the blur comes back.  The blur is not like used to be, though.  I used to see only fog.  Therefore, when I would get up, I would automatically put glasses on.  Not anymore.  When I wake up, in the first minutes, my vision becomes clearer and clearer (especially in the last few days, as at first it would take 15 minutes to half an hour for vision to clear).  Also, if I stress to see, it does not work.  If I relax and breathe, I see so much better.  Interestingly, the faces I start to see are so smooth.  Still have a hard time to see them in a distance, but I’m working on it.  Again, outside I see them so much better than inside in the low light.

This experience is unbelievable, and I am determined to have a perfect vision.  I can’t believe I do not need glasses and contacts anymore.  Without glasses, I feel as if somebody lit up my world.  It is not everything about my vision either.  The whole outlook changes.  I feel like I am peeling blur layers one at the time.

First layer of blur is fear.  Some people are afraid to try this.  How can anybody go out in the world when all they see is blur?  Self-doubt sets in.  “What ifs” will boggle the mind.  I dove into this experience straight without any doubt.  If author could do it, so can I.  Bravery, determination, and persistence came into my world.

Second layer of blur is self-constriction and staying in the known.  Some people think, “It is great for you, but I’ll wear my glasses anyway.  I just got my new prescription.”   Although it was unfamiliar to me, I had no doubt I’ll succeed.  I opened doors widely to a new possibility of seeing, and I am succeeding.  Freedom came into play.  If I just breathe and relax, I see better.  If I stretch, freely dance, I see better, too.  When I dance, I express myself more through freeing motions.  I feel music with all my senses.  I let it flow through every fiber of my body.

Third layer of blur is a “wall of protection” (that’s huge for me).  To be safe, we often do not take chances.  When people hurt us, we start not to trust anybody.  We build a wall.  It is all about our thoughts and emotions.  Early memories might flow in, the way we felt before we needed glasses:  What we did not want to see, could not see a way out, did not understand.  I used to be really shy.  I did not trust anybody, including myself.  So, it might be one of the reasons why I had difficulty to see faces.  Right now, I’m re-framing my mind and the faces I see are so soft.  They become more clearer each day.  All it takes is to be open.

Life is incredible and I love seeing it without constricting glasses, fears, and self-limiting beliefs.  I want to see more, experience more, touch and feel more.  My self-expression is wide open.  Anything is possible, even a miracle of seeing, if we persist and really believe.

See how it all started: Seeing Miracle

See my latest update here: Mind over Body

Miracles do happen when we believe in them.  They are occurring every day, if we open our eyes to see it.  Literally…

My incredible brother suggested that what if I would take my glasses off and see.  I thought, “Are you out of your mind? I am blind without them!”  Then he told me about this book Take Off Your Glasses and See.  That sounded intriguing,  so I went to Barnes & Noble.  I asked at the desk, “Where can I find “Take off Your Glasses and See?” The lady looked at me offensively and said, “I beg you pardon?” She was wearing glasses.   Giggling inside, I bought the book.

As I started reading it, I could not put it down.  It all made sense.  I took my glasses off and start seeing the world.  It is only sixth day, and I am already driving without glasses day and night.  Every day, I am seeing more and more.  It is incredible!  I am living a miracle!

I wore glasses for around 24 years.  I thought I was doomed to wear glasses for all my life.  At first I hated them.  Then I got used to them.  Then I got contact lenses, and I loved lenses more.  I had no idea that our vision can be improved or restored.  Many people go as far as to get Laser surgery, when our eyesight can be improved naturally!!!

It is not only about vision.  It is about our mind and body connection!  It is about when we put our “blur blinds” on, what we are not willing to see, what we are afraid to face, what we do not understand.  It is about traumas in our lives and how we react to them.  It is about our fears, our hidden feelings, about how we see the world.  Eyeglasses and lenses are only our visual crutches.  We can see through them better, but they do not help to see and deal with reality.  It is like living behind the glass that makes everything smaller (if we have nearsightedness).  It is like living in aquarium with bottled up feelings.

It takes a courage to take off glasses and to have an open mind.  Eyeglasses, especially when we wear them for a long time, becomes our security blanket.  We see what we know, and what we know gives us comfort.  It is pretty scary to be without glasses when all we see is blur.  It is like walking in the unknown.  The miraculous change occurs if we are brave enough to keep glasses off.  We start seeing more clearly.  We got to be patient though.  It depends on our mental and emotional state.  If we feel down for some reason or get scared, the blur might come back, and we might be tempted to put glasses back on again.  It all takes is to be present and feel the emotions that we are not willing to feel.  We got to be brave to see through it no matter what.  If we persist, we might start feeling things that are unfamiliar that we wanted to block it off all our lives.  We got to feel them, express them, see through them.

In my first try of driving, I put glasses on the tip of my nose, just in case.  I wanted to see how it is like, so I drove some seeing through glasses, and some through my blur.  The next morning, I did the same, but I found that glasses were just in my way, so I took them off and put them by my seat.  To my amazement, the vision got clearer and clearer.  Right now, I feel like a grade school student after learning how to read.  I read businesses signs everywhere.  I started seeing street signs, some even in small print.  It is amazing!  I still can not believe it!  Right now, I am training my eyes to see faces.  I see them on and off, blurry and in all detail.  I had a flash of great vision where I could see faces across the street.  It is work in progress.   I am persistent, though.  I’ll break through that barrier, too.

Another thing is when I see the real world and not hiding behind glasses and contact lenses, I have surges of joy when I start to see more and more.  My heart is filled with love and passion.  I want to touch, see, feel, experience everything.  I want to push my limits, be brave.  I am already brave.  If I can drive without glasses, I can do anything!  I do not have limits anymore.  Everything feels more beautiful, more fuller, more bigger, more closer.  I am facing uncomfort straight.  I see it eye to eye.  Today for the first time, I left glasses on my desk.  Before I carried them with me in hands, just in case, like a security blanket.  Yes, it felt uncomfortable at first, but I made it!!!

I can’t wait for each day to see more.  The whole new world is opening up before me where I am brave to see through anything. My vision went from 20/200 to 20/60 in 6 days.  I have flashes of vision where I can read 20/50 and even some 20/40 line.  I even started to see more stars at night when before if I would see one, I would be lucky.  Thank you, my brother, and Jacob Liberman, O.D., Ph.D. (the author) for opening my eyes where I can live my life to the fullest.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart!  You are my heroes!

See my update here: Seeing Miracle Continues

See my latest update here: Mind over Body

Many of us in life get hurt.  Our hearts get broken, and we close ourselves in the shell.  Sometimes we come out of it, and get smacked over the head, and we go back into the shell again.  Some of us stay closed in for the most part of our lives.

In our minds we feel safe, unhurt, comfortable in our shells, so why bother to risk?  Why to risk to get hurt again?  What we do not realize is that by staying inside our shells, we miss out on life big time.  We miss out on new opportunities, new ways of life.  So, how to come out of this shell?  How to stop this vicious cycle?  We got to find out why we are in the shell in the first place.  It could be one or all these reasons:

1.  Our heart is broken and we need time to heal.

2.  We think we are not worth it.

3.  We think we are not good enough.

4.  We do not want to get hurt again.

5.  Any other reason.

If our heart is broken, there is nothing wrong to take time off to heal.  It might take months or even years to rebuild our heart from the scratch.  It is different for every person.  Only we can choose how much time we need.  It is all in our minds.  As long as we do not close ourselves forever, we can take as much time as we have to.  The problem would occur if we choose to be in the shell as our way of life or reason one becomes reason 2, 3, 4 and maybe 5, which are a plain nonsense.  We usually look at outside world for confirmation for who we are.  If we do not know our true selves or we do not see who we are for ourselves, the outside world can give us every stupid opinion.  It can turn us in whatever direction they want, and we believe in it.  If somebody tell us that we are ugly, stupid, fat, idiots, we believe them.  We will start seeing that we are not worth it and we are not good enough, and we will close ourselves in the shell.

Now if we have a firm belief who we are and do not look for acceptance in outside world, no matter who will say anything to us, we will just laugh at them and think they are nuts.

In other way, if we are closed in our shelves, nobody will know who we truly are.  We will not be able to show who we are to others allowing them to make wrong assumptions about us.  When they do, we get hurt because we know it is not true.

The only way out of it is to get to know ourselves and stand our ground and show the world who we are, and get people really to know us.  By sharing us and our gifts with the world, we will not give a chance for people to make wrong assumptions about us.

If we choose to be closed in, we will miss out on the world and the world will miss out on us.  We are too good and too important to hide.

Love…  what a mysterious thing…  We can’t see it, we can’t touch it, but certainly we can feel it within our hearts.  We fall in love, and we fall out of love.  We either afraid to fall in love again, or we try it again.

Why some loves work and some do not?  What is mystery behind it?  What is the secret to a true love?

The formula of a probable failure is:  a perfect picture+expectations+attachment.  When we fall in love, we have a perfect picture in our minds:  they’re attractive, kind, etc., etc.  Then we add certain expectations of how our partner should be.  Our love should be perfect, isn’t it?  Lastly, but not least, we become attached.  We do not want anybody to have him or her; we got to keep them to ourselves.  It feels so good to be together, no friends or family should have them.

What if our partner is not perfect, or change physically, mentally or emotionally?  What if they do not fit our perfect picture and expectations all of the sudden?  What if they do want to spend their time with family and friends?  The fights most likely will ensue.  All of the sudden, that perfect partner is not perfect anymore.  Hearts get broken, and we break up.

So what is the secret to a true love?  There might be many things involved, but for a starter:  let’s take our partner the way they are+no expectations+let them be

Would it be more exciting that way anyway?  A partner always surprise us for who they are.  We do not need to be right and wrong.  We can let them do their own things, as we do our own.  We do not neglect our family and friends.  We share our time with everyone.  We keep a relationship spontaneous and respect each other.  We do not “need” each other to be complete.  We are two individuals traveling the same direction.  This way we are not closed in in our one-sided point of view.  We have two views that expand our world together.  We let each other breathe and let ourselves just be.  What do you think?

Sending Love on 10-10-10! Hope you are having a great day, my friends!

When we look at the mirror, what do we see?  Do we see tiredness, sadness, wrinkles?  Or do we see happiness, enthusiasm, smile?  Do we see pain and struggles? Or do we see sparkling energy and love?

Now, let’s look at the outside world.  What we notice first? How we relate to people?  Do we see them struggling or being successful?  Do we encounter sadness or happiness?

Usually, our inner state reflect our outside world.  What we choose to concentrate on, that’s what we see.  What we feel inside, that’s what we feel and see around us.  That’s why it is so easy to feel empathy for people who are going or went through similar situations that we did.  We can feel their pain or joy.  Now, if somebody is going through entirely different experience that we never been through, we will not understand it; it will feel odd to us.

We are all conditioned by our past, good or bad and by what we know.  We’ve been through ups and downs and sideways.  We view our world through our past experiences, what is familiar to us.  If we been through pain, we view our world through pain.  We encounter people who are going through the same pain.  Sometimes pain becomes anger, hatred and revenge.  An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.  We want the person who hurt us to be hurt.  We want them to suffer the same way they made us suffer.  Where does it get us, though?  Like Gandhi said, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” It does not do anything good, except it causes more pain.

Now, if we would concentrate from a place of love and compassion, no matter of circumstances, the outcome would be completely different.  We would start caring for each other.  Instead of war, there would be peace.  Instead of hatred, there would be love.  One man can make a world of difference.  Let that be us.  Gandhi is one of many examples.  He saw peace for India; he stood for his beliefs and by being himself, he reached seemingly unattainable.

So, how about instead of wrinkles, let’s see lines of wisdom. Instead of tiredness, let’s see rest.  Instead of sadness, let’s consciously smile more.  Instead of struggles, let’s imagine our dreams come true.  Instead of pain, let’s fill our hearts with love.  Love does conquer it all.  If we change our outlook in life and see our world through new open possibilities, we will change our life for the better.  Let’s reflect goodness from our hearts into the mirror of outside world and make a difference now.

How do we define abundance?  Is it money, or there is something more to it?  Is there ever a shortage in abundance?

If we think abundance is only money, and if there is a shortage in that area, our minds concentrate on that shortage.  We do not see a bigger picture.

Now if we would expand our minds and see that money is only a small part of abundance and look around of us, we’ll find ourselves rich.

Let’s define Abundance in broader terms.  What if we look at it this way:  Abundance is sharing our gifts with the world and being open to receive.  Many of us are givers.  However, when it comes to receiving, we usually refuse it as if we are not worth it, we are not good enough.  Sometimes, we do not even realize it ourselves doing it.  No wonder we think we are short on abundance.  Now if we are takers, the opposite is true.  We take, but we do not give anything back.  In our minds, we believe we do not have anything to give, or we think everything has to be mine, mine, mine.  Abundance only works both ways:  giving and receiving.  It has to be in balance.

Now, if we look at Abundance in a new way, we’ll see ourselves full of richness.  We are truly abundant in our gifts, in our family, friends and pets, in love we give and receive, in smiles, hugs and kisses.  All around us, there is abundance:  nature, sunlight, rain…  We are blessed with abundance and we do not even realize it.

Can you imagine what world would look like if we all would share our talents and gifts with each other and become big part of the world?  We would be abundantly connected.  What a huge difference that would make!

How many times do we make trips to our past?  Ah, memories.  Some of them are sweet, bring a smile to our faces, warm our hearts.  “Those were the good old days, ” we sight.  However, for some of us the past was not that sweet.  We cringe even thinking about it.  It haunts us like a bad nightmare.  We carry it with us like the heaviest baggage; or we bury those memories in the back of our minds.  We lock them and we loose the key.  Our minds shut it off and we forget, until something triggers, and we find ourselves in pain again.

What to do with this haunting hurtful past?  How to make it all to go away?  How to start a new?

To go on, we need to make a peace with our past.  It is not easy.  It might take a moment, months or even years.  We got to be ready for it.  It is something we can not push it.  It depends what eats away at us, and severity of it.  Possibilities could be:

1) regrets;

2) sorrow;

3) people

Regrets usually come equipped with “what ifs.”  What if I would have done it differently?  Each of us have different experiences in our lives.  If we chose to be one way, that means we were not experienced enough to make different choices back then.  We all make mistakes.  That’s what is learning all about:  it gives us lessons and new experiences.  Now we know better from it.  We cannot change our past, only now and the future.  Because of those mistakes, now we can make better choices which we should be grateful for.  There is no use to have regrets about our past decisions, when we can make a better ones now.

We lose someone we love, or someone leaves us.  In our lives, people and pets come and go.  Instead of concentrating of losing them, we should be grateful that they were a big part that touched our lives.  We should feel fortunate to know them and love them.  Each person and animal leave a footprint in our hearts, and we are better because of them.

Then, we meet people who hurt us, betray us, even in some cases abuse us.  These memories could linger for the longest time if we let them.  It keeps hurting us when we look back as if it is still happening now.  That’s where a beautiful thing comes in – being in control of our minds.  We can stop our memories at any time.  Bad thoughts and remembering do not serve us.  It only gives us a headache.  Anger does not serve us either; it only hurts us.  Each person we meet bring something to us:  lessons needed to be learned, a cause of being a stronger person, new experiences.  We might not seen it then, but after time, we can find the reasons why we encountered these people, no matter what painful experiences we had.  The key to these negative situations is to never feel like a victim.  Going back and remembering is like putting ourselves in “victim” mode over and over again.  Now there will be a time where remembering will not affect us that anymore – then the true healing begins.

We all have our minds.  Therefore, we can choose to have thoughts.  If we choose to be angry, depressed, resentful, we only hurt ourselves with our thoughts, and we may even reflect that on our loved ones and not be aware of it.  Now if we choose to make a peace with our past, knowing that past stays in the past, and we only can change now and future, we open ourselves to new possibilities and experiences.  We know that we do not need to make the same mistakes again and let anybody treat us badly.  We can start a new without heavy baggage of our past.

“Hi, how are you?”

“I’m fine. How about you?”

“I’m O.K.”

“Anything new in your life?”

“No. How about you?”

“The same old.”

Sounds familiar?  Ooh, we are such a creatures of habit.  We love our dull routines.  We get so used to them, that even we love to hate them.  We LOVE comfort. We love familiar.  We love what we know and we do what we can to stay in the comfort zone.  What is unfamiliar is scary.  What we often do not realize is that in unfamiliarity we can find freedom – freedom from conditioning, freedom from the past.  Yes, ankles might shake from the fear of unknown, but in that unknown we’ll find something new to learn, something new and exciting to talk about, something new to experience.

What if we would take a new route home?  What if we would visit a new place that we never been before?  What if we would meet new people?  What if we would stop comparing new people we meet with our exes and the past?  How our life would look like if we would look at it from the new perspective?  Would we come alive?  We certainly would.  Now, if we would find time to follow our passions? Schedule them, if we have to.  Our lives would be so enriched.  We are worth it!  We are worth to live lives we desire.  Our daily routines are just excuses to be in the comfort – in the known.

There is enriched life that is waiting for us if we are brave enough to cross the line and free ourselves from the comfort trap.  The unknown is like a blank piece of paper – we can fill it with any colors we want, we can choose any words or it can become any shape in origami form.  It is our source of creativity.  What you choose your life to be?