Discipline

Discipline is maybe one of the hardest things to get in life. Why? Because we are lazy, we dont feel like doing something repetitive, we get bored easily, there is always something better to do, even if it's just staring at an empty wall.

What is worst is that you need to be disciplined in all sorts of things! In monthly or regular reports, in paying the bills, in going to gym, in eating healthy, in updating your Facebook profile, in taking selfies, in drinking water, in educating the kids, in visiting parents...my God. All over discipline, discipline, discipline...

I know you resent it, but I have a small challenge for ladies especially, though men will thank me too if they can go beyond prejudices.

Discipline the way you treat your skin. Yes, you heard me well. Some of us have beautiful skins, due to our genetic inheritance, but even in such cases, skin will never get younger (don't believe in exaggerated commercials).

Skin gets old like any other organ. So why don't you try for one year straight to fight with time a bit and see the results? Deal? Deal.

Well, first of all, no matter how busy, in a hurry, tired or not in the mood you are, you must follow the next regime.

Every day, in the morning and in the evening:
-clean your face (use a separate cleanser for eyes and lips)
-tone your face (with a toner, depending on what your skin feels good with, preferable without strong alcohol ingredients)
-moisturize your face (one cream for the day, one for the night)

Once a week (use it on Monday morning and you will thank me), instead of the cleanser, use a peeling product (water based and with very fine abrasive micro-particles).

Also once a week (do it on weekend, when everybody is out, or when you want to have fun with the kids), apply a mask (plenty of options in the commerce, but if you want even more fun use stuff you have in the house like honey, chocolate, eggs, yogurt, etc). Use the mask between cleansing and toning.

After one year of strict discipline, you will thank me for the good looking skin.

It will be a moment when you realize that actually discipline turned into pampering. 

"One frame. One million stories"

Lovely readers, I am going to talk about a project that insinuated slowly, but strongly into Twitter world.

To put it into a nutshell the website http://www.oneframestories.com/ uploads every Friday a frame, and people can submit a story in 99 words centered around it.
Once next Friday comes, more than 40 stories are selected and published accordingly, with a top 4 to motivate the competitive devil in each of the writers.

The Frame 8 from today consists of a gorgeous photo of a man, smoking inside a forest (click on the link above and you will understand what I am talking about). Well, I read all the stories, twice...trying to understand why this week I wasn't impressed too much.

It felt as if people couldn't see the heavy past weighing down the man or the incredible mysterious atmosphere. Instead...they focused on "the beedi", which is a thin Indian cigarette. Well, once in a while the beedi brought a nice flavor in the rhythm of the narration, but otherwise...You fill in the gaps.

The top 4 from today was a little bit puzzling for me as well. While definitely different, and well written, they couldn't wake up in me any feelings or after thoughts about what could have happened if...

When I evaluate a story, I usually focus on originality, on the unexpected idea, but which is still subtly linked to the frame, or if none of these is available, then on the classic elements of a really very short story: stasis, trigger, climax.

The next frame is very generous topic wise: a splendid moon and a bat...so go ahead people...submit your stories there and impress me. I am a very generous reader and I want to be put in the position to not know what to choose...and to spend my entire Friday, re-reading small jewels.

Good luck!    

A special Top 10

If you are not familiar with @thelistserve project, shortly put, this is an email lottery, and once you get registered, you have a daily chance to win and write an email to a growing list of subscribers.

Couple of weeks ago, after a long time of waiting, my turn came and here I was...ready to write to so many strangers. If you think it is easy, well, it's not.
Anyway, in my email, among other things, I asked those who would end up reading my lines to let me know what book they would take with them if they were going to live on Mars.

The replies I received from people all over the world were overwhelming. Besides the warm kudos and the sudden and genuine interest for my country and its history or culture, the "listservians" literary choices stunned me in a positive way.
They covered almost all literary genres and authors from all continents. I wish I could nominate all the recommended books, but I promised a top 10. For those unique picks, let me assure you, they will find their place on my Facebook page dedicated to books. Because some of those titles deserve to be known!

So...without wasting too much time, I present you below the Top 10 treasures picked by lovely people belonging to @thelisterve community.

1. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams (totally makes sense!)
2. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (as expected, right? happy heart!)
3. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller (American satire at its best!)
4. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen (I see men smirk. Don't!)
5. A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens (I didn't see this coming! Honestly!)
6. The Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien (sorry Martin, you didn't make it to the top, but we love you!)
7. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie (personally, not my favorite, but totally worthy of this top.)
8. Anna Kareninna - Leo Tolstoy (wow...the biggest surprise of all...wow!)
9. Harry Potter series - J.K. Rowling (we are all children afterall in need of fairy lands, no? so be kind!)
10. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte ( I almost clapped, when counting the votes. I am a hopeless romantic, ok? Ok.)

Comments? Agree? Disagree? Drop a line. We live in a free world. :)

Forbidden fruit?

I have said it many times: I don't understand women who are attracted by married men.

I mean, ok...there is a chance of 0.000000000000000000001% when super-chemistry occurs and you indulge yourself in the "I have met my soul-mate" unrealistic story. But even then, you get involved... one night, two nights and then you back off, hide the experience in the beautiful memories pocket and move on.

What I don't get is the woman who actively  pursues the married man. Suppose such type of females has hunter or predator characteristics. If so, why would you go for such a lame prey? Without being disrespectful to you, guys, a married man is already caught, tamed and settled. He has already been devoured. At least in parts.

Why would you be the second in line? Why? Why reaching for crumbles? Not mentioning that these are chewed crumbles, impregnated with another woman's saliva.

Why would you stupidly hope he will leave your wife for you? Huh?

I am giving you a practical example. Let's imagine for the exercise sake. A man is using a laundromat, which is right next to the shop where his favorite beer is sold. Tell him that a new laundromat on the other side of the city is open. A cheaper, more colorful, faster one. He might try going there out of curiosity a few times, but, in the end, he will give up and uses his close to home well-known place.

If for such a simple thing, he will not change his habit, why do you expect from a married man to totally screw his personal life?

To me, being around married guys is the best place possible. I am comfortable and behave naturally, because married men, no matter how handsome or brilliant they are, do not tickle in me the urgency to prove myself as a woman.

They are cool, they are my bros. 

Poisonous People

I have never believed in the motivational mumbo jumbo and in stuff like be positive and you will get positive. Nope.
But I do believe in evil. And darkness. And bad, poisonous people. Do whatever you can, to stay away from them!
I know they are not always easily to spot. Sometimes they steal 4-5 years of your life before you could do anything in this regard.

Listen to your instincts. Don't push at the back of your thoughts the unpleasant tingling that warns you from time to time.

Do they seem too good to be true? It won't last. The first mistake they will make will be a big one. And you will tend to say..."Everybody makes mistakes. It won't happen again". It will. And they will force you to find excuses for the mud they spit on you.

If two of your other friends raised at least one time their eyebrows about a situation you and the bad people were in, you have a "winner".

Check your health and your energy levels regularly . If you register signs of deterioration in any of these, you definitely have evil people in your life. Who are very close to your heart and to your soul. The more you give to them, the more they take from you, without giving back anything to you. Except small portions of poison.

Will you lift their spirits up, but they never do this in return for you? Bingo.

Do you feel sad, without an apparent reason? It's your defense mechanism yelling at you to look around.

Do you feel like crying, again without a proper reason? It's your brain struggling to get into the "fight and run" mode, so you can save yourself from the irreparable damage.

Listen to their laugh. If it always stops at the throat level, an alarm flag should slap your face. This is maybe the most subtle sign that you have in your life a walking killing machine that eats you up.

Ultimately, take a step back once in a while and be honest to yourself. Do those people you love and care for... really deserve your love and care? Analyze the facts. Listen to your guts.

Do not ignore the tiniest, smallest doubt. It might save you from years of sorrow and illness.




   

Nightmares, problems, struggles or challenges?

This last year has been a nightmare on a personal level. And I am not an easy user of the heavily burdened words.
This last year I have gone to hell on a daily basis. Up and down, up and down. In a merry-go-round move like, only the merry wasn't merry at all.
This last year I have taken finally some critical decisions on all levels. The multi-layered crisis imposed me to do so.
This last year I have been beyond repair. Crowded from all points of view with no escape whatsoever. At first sight.

The purulent abscess exploded in August. By October my entire being was a pulsating bleeding flesh.

This is when I stopped all my internal engines from grinding, roaring, hushing, sweeping, screaming and I froze myself in time.
This is when I talked to myself. A long, raw and merciless conversation, in which I slapped every centimeter of me giving a shit (pardon the French) about the constant whining.
This is when I also decided that, in spite of my hideous wounds and the emaciated soul, I had to love and respect myself more.

I had hit the bottom. We humans like to stay in the warm, black mud of our personal misery. Pigs are way cleaner than us. They actually run as far as possible from their fecal matters. We don't. Most of the time.

And this is how I forced myself to look up to see some light. Nothing.
And this is how I didn't give up and I looked again. And stared. And it was hurting.
And this is how after a couple of months there it was. High up in the darkness, a needle of a ray. Teasing.
And this is how the nightmare turned into a problem.
And this is how I found solutions. Some good, some bad.
And this is how problems turned into struggles. Sweating days.
And this is how I discovered I was still strong and able to face them.
And this is how struggles turned into challenges.
And this is how I came to love my challenges.

Because challenges are for ambitious people. Because challenges are for the strong ones. Because challenges are for cool people.

And I am one of them now.