Tag Archive | dreams

I Wish!

I Wish

I just received a letter from a company I’d applied to work for. They told me they’d be happy to consider me for one of their positions if my circumstances changed and I acquired my own means of transport (a car, motorcycle or motorbike). But I know I won’t be able to get a car, not at any time in the foreseeable future (and the way things are going, probably not as long as I live either).

I’m really really really sad I couldn’t work for that company. I really liked that company. But I guess you have to work with what you have, not think of all the things that you want that you can’t have.

Like a friend of mine, Maria*. She also wanted a hotel job and they told her, the job is yours if you had a car. But she didn’t have a car and she couldn’t get that job. In the end she had to resign herself to working at jobs she could get around the city. Well today she still doesn’t have a car, but she has a much better job. Maybe it wasn’t the hotel job she wanted but it’s still a good job, today she manages a tearoom.

So what she did was she just decided she’d do the things that she COULD do where the lack of a car wouldn’t be an impediment. So I guess I just have to do the same thing. There’s no point in even talking about something that’s not going to happen.

I guess that would be a bit like saying: “Oh I wish I would grow 5 more inches so I could become a flight attendant”, because you’re 5 feet tall and you need to be at least 5 feet 2 to be a flight attendant, but you’re an adult now and you’re never going to grow anymore.

Or saying, like I do: Oh I wish I’d grown up with a whole bunch of brothers and sisters (I’m an only child). That’s something that’s just not going to happen. It’s not! Not ever as long as you live. So there’s no point in even thinking about it.

BUT OH I STILL WISH……….!!!

And if you’d wish to read some exciting thrillers before bed tonight, not to sound like a sleazy saleslady but I’ve written a few, so if you’re into creepy, scary, suspenseful novels, I’d love it if you’d check them out here: Thrillers by Moi.

If you enjoyed this post (I really hope you do!), maybe you will also like:

How Much Do YOU Value Your Friends?

The Meaning of a Friendship

Everyday Scenes From Everyday Life in Spain

Poetry by Hermenegildo: Bienvenida Sea La Primavera

*not her real name

I’ve Written a Book!

Aug25

Oh yes it’s been a while since I’ve dropped by this blog. It’s been so long, I almost feel like it’s someone else’s blog hehe.

Most of the things I’ve been up to are things of no transcendence and that aren’t worth mentioning, like working long hours at dead-end jobs that don’t lead anywhere.

So I thought I’d write a book. Unlike a dead-end job, a book doesn’t have an end date or a best-before date.

A book is eternal, evergreen, always relevant to the human condition and to what it’s like to be human (as long as there are still human beings around, of course!).

And unlike in a dead-end job where you have to please your boss or, you know, get the sack, in a book you can be whoever and whatever you choose to be.

In a book you can be yourself. You don’t have to please anyone. You can say what you want to say. You can proclaim to the world what you really BELIEVE IN.

So without further ado, here is the book:

“The Power of Loving Yourself: 10 Simple (But Effective) Tips to Help You Raise Your Self-Esteem, Self-Confidence and Self-Worth”.

(And don’t worry, you don’t have to memorize the subtitle!)

People do ask me what this book is about and you know, it’s like, ooogghh, how do you summarize a book? How do you condense 120 pages into a single paragraph (or blog post)?

It’s about…… when you’re at peace and in love with yourself, there’s no room in your heart for hatred, rancour, vengeance……

If all people were at peace with themselves WE COULD ERADICATE WAR in the world! But it’s not easy to find ways to feel peaceful……

So I’ve put together a set of PRACTICAL exercises to help people feel more at peace with themselves and in love with themselves.

To help people learn to LOVE, and RESPECT, and to be TOLERANT, of themselves and with other people.

If we ALL LOVED, and RESPECTED OURSELVES and other people there would be NO MORE WAR on earth! We would no longer need weapons.

There would be no more bombs. No more children orphaned to bombs and guns. No more mothers crying for children killed by bombs.

But first we must LOVE OURSELVES. So in my book I teach PRACTICAL exercises to help people learn to do that.

Because, you know, people do say, “It’s all fine and well and all to say that we should all be full of peace and joy and love and all that s**t, but the last thing I feel right now is joy! Or love! The only thing I feel like doing is griping! I can’t even stand to look at myself in the mirror! So what can I DO???”

Well, you can read my book.

Of course it’s got some chatter to help you change your mindset too. I mean, after all, hating yourself, or believing you’re NO GOOD, or believing in yourself, or not, are mindsets.

But it’s also got PRACTICAL exercises too.

Because sometimes it’s not enough to just, you know, “think you’re great” or something.

Sometimes you do need to PROVE IT to yourself, first, before you can believe it.

So. Try out the exercises in my book, and soon you’ll see how you, too, will find that you just CAN’T HELP but start to feel better about yourself, and to see yourself in a NEW LIGHT.

Even if you’ve always hated yourself. Or, like me, you’ve always been shy.

Once again here is the URL for more info: The Power of Loving Yourself.

Oh and by the way, I know it’s not a subject very much related to the subject of this blog, but if you Subscribe to the newsletter on the website, you’ll get a couple of gifts from me, with no strings of any sort attached, including two excerpts from the book.

So you can check it out a bit first, you know, see if it’s something you could be interested in, before you commit yourself and actually press the “Buy Now” button.

You don’t usually get a chance to read parts of a book before you buy it.

But I’m offering you the chance to do just that! All you have to do is Subscribe to the site newsletter at www.seasofmintaka.com. There’s a Sign-Up Box in the right-hand corner of any page on the site.

Enjoy!

I’ll end this post with a link to the page where you can read all about my new book and download it immediately, if you feel like it: www.seasofmintaka.com/the-power-of-loving-yourself.html

P.S. Did you check out the really horrid video from the last blog post? I saw TWENTY-SIX enlightened and lovely souls actually sat with their gaze TRANSFIXED on the screen staring at it since we put it up! The last time I’d checked (which was in April) only 10 people had looked at it haha. So…… it’s an interesting video, isn’t it, haha? Well trying to mix up some more horrid videos so when (if) we ever get them out, you’ll all be the first to know!

P.P.S. Oops gotta add, I meant, when you subscribe to my website, www.seasofmintaka.com, I’ll give you all these oodles of wonderful gifts. Here’s the link again: www.seasofmintaka.com.

But I’m sure chuffed all the same that so many of you are subscribing to my blog too!

If you’ve recently subscribed to this blog and you’d like to get my gifts, hop on over to my website and sign up over there, and you’ll automatically get taken to the page where you can download your gifts IMMEDIATELY.

Cheers! And thanks again for your interest!

Grey Skies: Ces Jours Si Tristes, Si Gris, Profonds, Estos Días Tristes y Grises, Profundos, Just a Little Piece of Sky

Feb8

Ces jours tristes, profonds, sans fin et sans espoir, quand les rêves deviennent gris et plus lointains que jamais et le ciel pleure incessant, grisâtre et sans repos.

Just waxing dreary and drab on a drab and dreary winter’s day in southern Spain. Even if we’re really lucky and we never get snow or ice, we do get grey skies. I love the rain. But life can seem dreary and hopeless when this is the only piece of sky you can get from the window of the tiny one-bedroom-with-a-walk-in-closet-as-the-second-bedroom in da inna big city where we live.

On a brighter note, this is the Med in January. You can see it is raining somewhere around Torremolinos (where all the grey lines are slashing down) and out at sea. But you can still appreciate the brilliant sunset.

Just daily life here in a warm country in winter. It’s great to be in a place where it never snows, but on the other hand, daily life can still drag you down, especially if the economy is bad and you have to work ten hours every day just to make ends meet and pay the bills. There’s no time to even go out for a walk to enjoy the brilliant weather that we have the privilege of, well, enjoying! This photo was snapped as I got off the bus and dashed off to trudge away yet a few more hours at one of the companies where I work. I like the company but the hours are long. Not at this particular company, in case they happen to be reading this hehe, but all together at the three companies together, the hours are long.

If you enjoyed this post (I really hope you do!), maybe you will also like:

Andalucía Cuatro de la Tarde

…And It’s a Rainy Night in Malaga

Happy Giant Cockroach Hunting!

How Much Do YOU Value Your Friends?

Andalucía cuatro de la tarde

Nov3

Today I thought I’d work on the “musings” part of being a single mama in Spain, rather than the “adventures” part. What do I think are the pros and cons of being a single mama in today’s economy in Spain?

Well, Andalucía, the southernmost region of Spain, is definitely not the place to be in these times if your aim is to become rich and have a prospering career, with unemployment over 26% (and depending on which segment of the population you belong to, could be over 60% as pretty much the only employable people these days are single, childless men with a great professional training), a majority of businesses and jobs reserved for “family” and businesses going bankrupt left and right (like the company that I was working for).

So why DO I keep hanging on here and struggling away, instead of seeking out the “greener pastures” up north in Barcelona or Madrid, or even, for that matter, in another European country? Well, I do debate that myself, and sometimes I wonder whether I shouldn’t just pack up and head on north.

So, let’s see what I consider the pros and cons of continuing to live here:

Cons (or why life is so tough here in Andalucía):

obviously, just about all the cons will be related to money, since that is what appears to be most lacking in this part of the world
the first major con, of course, is the absolute torpidity which is the act of trying to find a job here, trying to secure any kind of employment, even if only the most unstable, temporary of temporary or contract positions, is like trying to wade through treacle
the salaries here, which graze on the minimum wage in virtually any and every field or profession, unless you happen to be a highly qualified CEO, doctor or lawyer
it’s hard to get ahead as well, both professionally and personally, if you don’t have family or know a lot of people here, when you come right down to it, nepotism is still pretty alive and well in these parts
the social life, people are very friendly, but it’s hard to enter into the real “inner circles” if you don’t have some sort of family base around here, I myself have loads of acquaintances and people I might stop in the street and chat with, but I have virtually no close friends at all, people I would actually confide anything near and dear to me to
the importance of family life, now, you could say that that is also a pro, because it provides me with every opportunity and excuse to get closer to my family (aka my kids) and spend more time with them, but I find that it is also a con, because people here place the greatest priority on their families, which means that they will plan most of their activities around their families and have little time or energy left over to do things with anyone outside their families
once again, the social life, in a land where most people make the majority of their friends at grade school or the very latest, in university, so if you don’t happen to attend any of those institutions it’s almost impossible to meet good new friends, that is, people who are open to becoming friends with someone who is not from around hereabouts, although as I mentioned earlier, people are friendly and they will be open to meeting you for a drink or to have a café or breakfast, but it’s hard that a relationship would ever get any deeper than that
the difficulties in finding things from outside Spain, now, of course, you might wonder, what sorts of things would I really need from outside of Spain, because after all, didn’t I come here for the “Spanish experience”? Well, there are some things that Spain doesn’t exactly produce an excess of, so you almost virtually have to buy these articles imported, one example is make-up, which, when it comes to Spanish-made products, is pretty much limited to the polvos de Maderas by Maderas de Oriente, a very fragrant and luxurious-feeling face powder but which, nonetheless, I can’t use (much to my chagrin, because I LOVE the way they smell!) because they are too drying for me (probably the only people who could use them are little kids, like my youngest son, who still has that sweet, soft baby skin, and my oldest son, a teenager with greasy teenage skin!)
the lack of ecological, organic and vegetarian products, since unfortunately, Spain is still light years away from the “consciousness” and awareness of the importance of things like taking care of our planet and our health, and the south even more so than the more progressive and modernized northern regions
the very laid-back and non-proactive attitudes that prevail in general around here, my ex (when he wasn’t yet my ex) defined it as: “People here talk a lot about doing things, but no one ever gets up off their butts to actually do these things that they talk about so much”, which, however, on the other hand, can actually be converted into a “pro” when you’re in a situation, like I am, where much of what you are doing you need to do alone, at home, at least for the moment (in the case where, for example, you happen to be working on a project that you need to work on alone in the introspection of your home)

Pros (or why I love Andalucía):

well, it might be legendary and trite, but I bet every andaluz would agree, there’s just something about the sun in Andalucía that you won’t find anywhere else, that glorious fire that can give you a light suntan even in the middle of January and that stings so hard in July and August
the people here are so friendly
the cost of living is quite cheap here, compared to pretty much any other part of Spain or Europe, so if, like me, you are currently living on a fixed income like unemployment payments or pension payments of any sort, your salary will go further here than it would in a more expensive part of the world
the blue Mediterranean, which just can’t compare to those cold, turbulent, dark grey waters in the north Atlantic or even worse, the total LACK of water in a more interior setting
being able to go out and walk along the beach, no matter what is happening in your life, after all the beach is free
the great climate, and isn’t that what draws most foreigners who live here, to settle here rather than someplace else, to begin with?

And here is my wish-list, of things that I could probably do if I weren’t living in this part of the world:

have a car! Then I could TRAVEL (and if you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ve probably realized that I practically live to travel!)
earn enough money to take my kids on longer trips or holidays abroad, so they could get the opportunity to see the world and learn more open attitudes towards other cultures and languages

So who knows? Maybe one day I’ll just pick up that ole curriculum vitae and send it off to a hotel in Paris or a Starbucks café up in London.

But if I did that, I would miss that indelible Spanish sun that you can only enjoy on the coasts of Andalucía.

Andalucia

Thank you all for reading! I love to receive (good, positive, bright) comments, so please, don’t be shy, and leave me a word!

If you enjoyed this post (I really hope you do!), maybe you will also like:

Happy Giant Cockroach Hunting

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Bringing Your Dreams to Life

Jul14

Well, as a follow-up to the last post, I thought I’d go a little bit into some more practical aspects, what we can actually DO to put our dreams into action. Because, well, ah, yes, it’s all very nice and good – you might be thinking – the idea of putting our dreams into action and living them instead of dreaming them. But…… HOW??

Most of us have NO idea what to do to make our dreams a reality. So I thought I’d share some ideas here and, of course, I welcome any ideas that anyone else may have on this subject too, and I’d be happy if you’d share them with us in the comments at the end of this post.

I guess the first thing we must do, if we want to make our dreams a reality, is to KNOW WHAT THEY ARE to begin with! If we don’t know what we dream of doing, having or being, how are we going to fulfil those dreams?

I am very lucky, I have always known what I wanted all my life, and the only thing that I was always lacking was TIME to dedicate and devote to my dreams, because I had to earn a living for myself from an early age (yes life can be tough!). But even if you’ve never given it much thought, you can still discover what it is that you really want. Let’s say you won the lottery right now. What would you do?

Would you travel around the world? Give up your job? Would you buy a new home? What would you do?

Perhaps you would open a new company, go back to school or study a new career. Or maybe you’d go out and get those babies and start that family that you’ve always dreamt about having.

So, now that you know WHAT it is that you want, I imagine that you would need some sort of plan as to how to go about getting it.

If it’s a new home or a trip around the world that you’re hankering for, then perhaps you could check out the possibility of saving up for it, starting right now. Go out less for dinner or don’t order that pizza, and save up the money for your dream. Get a second job. Sell newspapers. Walk dogs.

You don’t need to buy a new dress or new shoes every season. I only have one pair of shoes for the winter and one for the summer. Well, all right, I live in a warm place anyways and if I’m really stuck I can just go out and get some dollar store flip flops. I imagine that those of you who live in England, Ireland or Alaska probably don’t enjoy that luxury, but I guess you know what I mean, right? Quite simply put, if you don’t need it, then don’t get it. Put up the money instead, use it for your trip to Jamaica. What would you rather have, anyways? A trip to Jamaica or a new pair of pumps?

If, on the other hand, your dream involves doing something, then start right now jotting down ways that you can do it. Draught up a plan, get to work brainstorming. Do you want to go back to school, but you’re missing some credits or a high school certificate? Is there any way that you can get what you are missing? Most countries offer high school classes for adults.

And right from the start, get mentalized to the idea that we have to arm ourselves with lots of patience. Most dreams take a lot of work and time. It takes time to get a high school certificate. It takes time to get into a university. Whatever it is, it takes time. But if you really want it, you can wait. If you wait a year now, perhaps in five years you will be doing what you love to do. But if you can’t wait out that year, you will probably still be working at the same boring old job five years from now.

With a good plan, belief in your dream and the desire to fulfil that dream, of course, patience and the will to not back down from your dream no matter what, you can attain it. You can achieve your dream, fulfil your lifelong wish.

I don’t very often recommend other websites, but this is one that I have always found quite helpful: http://www.learnmindpower.com.

And for those of you who read Spanish or German, I thoroughly recommend a little book called “Nothing Is Impossible” (“Todo es posible”) by Peter Kummer. It is a real little gem, I find it absolutely amazing. For a long time it wasn’t available in English, but I believe that recently it has been translated. I’m pretty sure that if you follow the advice on the above website and in this little book, it won’t be long before you, too, are fulfilling and living your dreams.

In subsequent posts (probably two years from now! but anyways, as I said before in my previous post, since I’m so busy working on fulfilling my dreams, I just don’t have time to blog!), if I’m up to it, I will put up some details about what I’m doing, so that you can see on a practical level how to put these wonderful ideas into action, by showing you what I myself am doing, and how it is working out. However, I’m not much of a person for going on about “works in progress”, so you might have to wait a while before you can read about these things……

Dreams

Jun22

Well so it’s obviously been a while since I posted anything here. I was always real inconstant at keeping a diary anyways, and I suppose a blog is not all that much different.

We have been quite busy these past few months but I suppose, like most people, just living a fairly ordinary and mundane, routinary life like most people do. The kids have gone to school every day, I’ve been going to work…… In other words, a very normal life.

I am often surprised when I look at people, just surviving from day to day, and I wonder, what happened to their passion? Where did their dreams and their spark go? What did they dream of doing or being when they were teenagers, and what happened to all those dreams?

Your dreams can be of any sort, there are as many dreams out there as there are things to be and do out there. Did you dream of sky diving when you were young? Or maybe you wanted to travel around the world. Or have your own house with a garden that you could tend and cultivate.

Maybe you’ve always wanted to visit Jamaica.

Whatever it is that you’ve always dreamt of doing, why aren’t you doing it, or working towards it? Why don’t you start saving up for that holiday in Jamaica, or that house with a garden?

Why don’t you get onto the internet and google “sky diving” and see if there is someone who occasionally offers sky diving trips for complete beginners in your area? We all have to begin somewhere, after all.

My children don’t have any dreams. They are small, they live life from day to day. The only thing they want to do is play with their Nintendo. A good day is when they get to spend most of it playing on their Nintendo. A bad day is when they have to go to school, or someplace else which takes them away from their Nintendo.

I often wonder how children can live like that. Isn’t there something that they wish to do in the future? Don’t they have dreams?

But I suppose dreams are something that comes up in our lives when we reach an age where we are aware that we HAVE a future at all to begin with, usually when we reach our teenage years.

In reality, I suppose the best way to live life is like my kids do, spending every minute of your day just doing what you most love to do, just as they are happiest when they get to spend the whole day playing on the Nintendo. I don’t know what they will be when they grow up, and I do agree that some discipline is necessary in life. However, no one forces them to play on their Nintendo, they do it just because they love it.

What is it that you do just because you love it? That no one has to force you to do?

Of course, maybe we can’t make a living at whatever it is that we love to do. Maybe we love to sew, or play golf, but you don’t see yourself as a golf champion earning your bread from playing golf. Well, that’s okay. You can still play golf. You can spend all your spare time playing golf. Or you can save up and open your own golf course or a golf-related company of your own.

You could become a golf teacher or a caddy, or get a job on a golf course that allows its employees to use its facilities for free.

Of course, in every life we have to eat and fill out our income tax forms (yes, fellows, it’s that time of the year again!). But when we aren’t involved in these necessary evils (well, all right, eating isn’t evil, actually I LOOOVE eating very much!!), we can be doing what we love to do.

So, getting back to the question I was asking myself at the beginning of this post, I do wonder, how do people manage to get ahead every day, if they are not doing what they love to do, what they have always dreamt of doing, at some point in their lives? If you want to be a film-maker, you can make videos on the weekend, as a now-famous Spanish film director used to do (I don’t remember his name, however I can assure you it was not the archi-reputable Almodovar, however the film director in question is also well known).

Where can your joie de vivre come from, if you aren’t trying to fulfil a dream, doing something that you love, at some moment? I really don’t know what can fuel people on to continue living, when they are not doing what they love to do or working towards a dream. Where do they find the incentive to keep going? How can they possibly survive? We all know that there is more to life than just paying the bills and putting food on the table.

Maybe what you enjoy most is blogging and sharing your points of view and your life with the rest of the world. If that is the case, I would love it if you would like to carry out a blog exchange with me. Just click on this link to read more about exchanging blogs with me. (Or more accurately, exchanging blog avatars.)

So, what was all this all about, anyways, you might be wondering?

Well, for a while now I’ve been working at a job that I’m not too fond of, and I’ve been wondering, what is the point of this anyways? Why do we work at jobs that we don’t like? In my case, of course, I’m a single mother and I have to pay the bills and feed my kids some way or another, and in these times of crisis, well, it’s not like we have too much choice as to what we can do to pay these bills and feed our kids, do we?

However, paying bills and feeding kids doesn’t give us LIFE. It keeps you alive but it isn’t LIVING.

I have always wondered how people could go on without SOMETHING to propel them forward, something to look forward to, something that they have always wanted to do, and CAN do.

But you can only live on dreams for so long. At some point in your life, it’s time to bring them into reality.

And that is the point where I am right now. Which, however, leaves me with very little time for blogging. Argh!

So, I don’t know when I will post again, but you can rest assured, at least, that if I don’t post for a while, it will be because I am finally at last starting to LIVE my dreams (and therefore I’m too busy living my dreams to write blog posts!), instead of just DREAMING them!

Of course, I will, however, let you know every once in a while, with a new post here, about how I’m doing and how it is all going. It may be a while, but then, as they say, the fun lies in the journey.