Michael

My Guide

I have debated with myself about telling the following story. Part of me won the debate, so here goes.

On day three of my Mexico trip (October 23rd, 2008) I, along with several others in our travel group, decided to take a two hour horseback ride to the valley’s edge outside of Cerocahui. We wanted to see the waterfalls and pools among the rocks. It sounded like fun so I signed up.

I made it a point to tell the head of the tour that I was not an experienced rider, so please give me a gentle horse that obeyed. A few minutes later, a young boy walked up with a grayish horse (see the photo on the left). He was going to be my guide. So, he helped me up into the saddle which turned out to be made of wood with a very thin blanket thrown over. Translation: I had to be careful how I sat (if you catch what I’m saying) so I wouldn’t damage myself.

The next thing I know was that our party of horses started walking down the road to the outskirts of town. Guess what? I was not in control of my horse. My “guide” was leading the horse I was on. He was obviously walking and I was sitting on the horse. He walked me and my horse all the way to the waterfall and all the way back.

As we walked through the small village, everyone saw us and most of the kids laughed and snickered when seeing me being “guided.” It was quite embarrassing.  :-)  Next time, I should verify that my translation was understood the way I meant it.

The trip was still fun even though I didn’t have control of my horse.

Michael

The difference between holding on to a hurt or releasing it with forgiveness is the difference between laying your head at night on a pillow filled with thorns or a pillow filled with rose petals. - Loren Fischer

Forgiveness is all-powerful. Forgiveness heals all ills. - Catherine Ponder

One of the most powerful single acts we can do is forgive. Most people find it easier to forgive others than forgive themselves. Self blame can be found at the core of many emotional issues.

Learning to forgive yourself is a giant leap on the road to happiness. Each time you forgive yourself for something you’ve done, didn’t do, said or any other action where you judge yourself, you remove a layer that is blocking you from being more whole or complete.

Work on forgiving the little things you feel guilty about and not the big ones that happen only every so often. These little “guilts” pile up over your lifetime and become a heavy emotional burden. Though this may seem strange to some, I would suggest consciously forgiving yourself by looking in the mirror and saying out loud what you are forgiving. Be specific. Look into your eyes. This is a powerful exercise and could potentially change your life.

Think what you have guilty feelings about and start (today) forgiving yourself.

Have a great day!

Michael

Make education a continuing, never-ending process. - Nido Qubein

I have an intense curiosity about the world, how things work and the meaning of everything. I am constantly and consistently striving to learn something new every day. I’m fascinated by many subjects and never seem to have a lack of something new to learn.

I think it’s important to learn something new on a regular basis. It keeps the mind fresh, puts new life into your curiosity, jumpstarts your creativity, enhances your logical thinking and gives you an appreciation for the diversity of our world.

You don’t have to be quite as obsessive (maybe that’s too strong a word) as me, but striving to learn new things on a regular basis; daily, weekly or monthly will go a long way towards promoting mental health which helps in sustaining your overall happiness level.

Nowadays there are a host of resources available at our disposal; regular schools, online resources, public libraries, continuing education, craft/music/art classes, social groups, clubs and etc. If you don’t know where to start, just pick something that sounds remotely interesting and try it out. If you don’t like it, drop that idea and try something else. You can’t make a mistake here. It’s all about trying something new, learning a new skill, fact, craft and etc. Have some fun while you are experimenting.

You may find that you will generate an interest that you didn’t know you had until you tried it.

Enjoy.

Michael

Nat and I are developing short brochures with exercises to help in your pursuit of happiness. You can download a PDF version of the blog text below.

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Nearly all of us can list activities that make us happy. It might be listening to favorite songs, or playing with the dog, or cooking Mexican food. Some of these are easy to do. You can do them any time or any place. They don’t cost a lot of money.

Create a list of these activities and carry it with you. Then, if you start to feel sad or anxious, you can pull out your list and do one of the things that makes you feel good.

EXERCISE:

1. Write down 10 activities that make you happy (jogging in the park, picking flowers, eating a sandwich from your favorite deli, calling your best friend)
2. Add 10 more activities to your list
3. Rate each item from 1-10, where 10 means that every time you do this you feel great and 1 means this activity makes you feel good some of the time but not always
4. Cross out every activity that you rate lower than 8
5. Copy all items with a score of 8 or greater to a new list
6. Put this list in a place that you nearly always have with you (your wallet or purse, your car)
7. Take it out and look at it before you leave the house in the morning
8. Plan when you are going to do the next one on your list
9. Do one each day
10. [EXTRA CREDIT] Write out for each activity everything you enjoy about doing it (It is very important to know why something makes you happy)

Happiness is a habit. Your written inventory of activities that make you feel good makes it easy for you to cultivate the habit.

Michael

Nat and I are developing short brochures with exercises to help in your pursuit of happiness. You can download a PDF version of the blog text below.

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Fears are limiting beliefs. They can curb our creativity, stifle our happiness and prevent us from being all we want to be. Fears take away our power, but often we have the power to see through them. Many fears are based only in a remembered past or in an imagined future, not in a present danger.

Seeing these types of fears for what they are is one way to overcome them.

Exercise

1. Make a list of your fears and rate each on a scale of 1 - 10; ten being the most fearful and one being the least.
2. Pick one fear from the list that has an average in rating (say 4-6 out of 10) It should not be so terrifying that it completely immobilizes you all the time and not be so small that it doesn’t really matter.
3. Write down answers to the following questions. Your answers will help you see the fear for what it is.
   1. What feelings are associated with this fear?
   2. What other symptoms does it include (cold sweat, nausea, self-doubt)?
   3. Do you have any life experiences that may have contributed to this fear?
   4. Do you think this fear is a symptom of a deeper underlying fear?
   5. What circumstances or life events exacerbate this fear?
   6. What is this fear preventing you from doing?
   7. What would you do differently if you didn’t have this fear?
4. Study your answers for proof that the fear is less overwhelming than you think when you are consumed by it. Does anything about it seem ridiculous? Have you outgrown it? You are studying its weakness. Don’t hesitate to get professional help if overcoming any particular fear seems overwhelming. The work you do here will be an excellent foundation.
5. Repeat this process for each of your fears when you have a handle on the first fear.

The first step in overcoming your fear is to see it for what it is.  By facing fear and unmasking it, you can weaken its hold on you.

Michael

The most exciting time of your life is right now. - Michael Thornton

The most exciting time of your life is right now. The past is over. Only memories should survive now. The future is still being decided and will only be exciting when it becomes the present.

If we look to the future as more exciting, then we miss being excited right now. This is the moment we are living. Your future’s template (hopes, dreams, desires and etc.) are formed by you from the present moment. The future will be exciting if you are excited right now.

The future is just another point on your life’s journey forward. It becomes special when it meets you in the present. The past is also another point on your life’s journey. The difference, obviously, is that it’s already happened. It’s over and done with. You can’t change it nor should you worry about it. All you can do is be what you want to be right now.

Right now is your most exciting time. Your most powerful moment. Your gateway to everything you desire. Make good use of it.

Have a great day!

Michael

And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise.  The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt. - Sylvia Plath

I love being a writer. What I can’t stand is the paperwork. - Peter De Vries

Writing. If you had asked me 10 years ago if I would be writing regularly, I would have laughed. But, here I am writing my thoughts down every day on more than one blog. I’m writing a book with my friend and business partner Nat. I have other writing projects in the planning stages. It’s all quite surreal to me.

Sometimes for me, maybe more than most people realize, writing can be difficult or challenging. I may not know what I want to write about. I may not be able to express what I’m truly feeling or I can’t quite get my point across. I am my own worst critic. There are periods when I have a lot of self-doubt. When I’m in a down mood (yes, it happens sometimes), I find it hard to write. Nat says when you can’t think of anything to write, that’s when you should sit down and write.

Just like in life, writing has its ups and downs; its moments of elation; its periods of illumination. Many times there are surprises. Other times I know exactly where I am going.

But, generally, I don’t know what I’m going to write about until I sit down to write. That’s the writing journey for me; a parallel path right beside my life. It can be frustrating at times, but mostly it’s fine as I’ve been trying to make my life more about being in the moment anyway. My writing discipline should reflect that, I believe.

Bottom line……I’m not stopping. I find it too personally rewarding to stop now. So, when it’s hard like today, I’ll sit down and find something to put down in words.

Have a great day!

Michael

Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Louis Pasteur, Michelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson and Albert Einstein. - H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Where do you want to go in the next five years? What do you want to do? What do you want to become? Most of us have dreams, goals and desires for where we would like to take our lives. A common reason or excuse for not going there or doing those things you want to do is “I don’t have enough time.”

Is that really true? Would the better question to ask be, do you really want to do or be the things you state? I’m sure you’re looking at the quote and saying that some of those people were genius level intellects. Yes, I would say at least two, but the rest had the time and inclination to follow their hearts and do great things.

Arthur Blank and Bernie Marcus were fired from their home improvement jobs. Three years later their company, Home Depot, had annual sales of $1 Billion. They had the time.

Jeff Bezos was living in a 500 square foot apartment at age 30. Five years later because of his company Amazon, he was worth $10 Billion. He had the time.

Over the course of her amazing life, Mother Teresa helped thousands of people and many had their own lives changed by her. She had the time.

Michelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel in less than 5 years. He had the time.

Over a period of five years, Columbus discovered the “New World”; the Bahamas, Cuba, North and South America. He had the time.

In less than two years, the mostly unknown Barack Obama became the 44th president of the United States. He had the time.

You have the time. Now, go use it for what you want.

Michael

Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind. - Seneca

Continued from yesterday.

My trip to the Copper Canyon in Mexico was one of my top 5 trips ever. The countryside was extraordinary. The people were wonderful. The food was great. And our tour guide, David Rico Olalde, was fantastic. Most of the tour group was a group of Americans living in Miguel de Allende and the rest came from various parts of the United States.

Day 5 - We really started to explore the amazing landscape that is the Copper Canyon. We left Cerocahui to take the second half of our train ride through the Canyon to the city of Creel. Most travel journals state that this particular ride is the most spectacular in North America. I have to wholeheartedly agree. I stayed on the observation deck almost the entire time. There were just too many sights to see. I didn’t want to miss a thing.

Read my original post for Day 5.

View my photos. (21 photos)

Day 6 - A whirlwind tour, nonstop until dark; Mirador del Rio Oteros, The Balancing Rock, the Divisadero Barrancas, Elephant Rock, Turtle Rock, Arareco Lake, Cusarare Falls, Cusarare Mission, Valley of the Frogs, Valley of the Mushrooms and a Tarahumara Cave Home. Phew! Needed a good night sleep after this day.

Read my original post for Day 6.

View my photos. (26 photos)

Day 7 - The road to Batopilas was a hair raising adventure along 43.5 miles (70 km) of curvy paved road, 40.4 miles (65 km) of mostly one lane bumpy dirt road and a drop of over 6000 feet (1829 m) of elevation. Once we made it to Batopilas, a small group of us toured the ruins of Hacienda San Miguel. Very cool.

Read my original post for Day 7.

View my photos. (18 photos)

Day 8 - We started our day by making a very bumpy 3.1 miles (5 km) ride to the Lost Cathedral of Satevo. Wow! It feels like you are in the middle of nowhere but here is this cathedral. We made the long trip back up to Creel with a little stop while they re-built part of the dirt road that was being widened. It was exciting for a while there.

Read my original post for Day 8.

View my photos. (12 photos)

Day 9 - It was with a mixture of emotions as we boarded the bus that would take us to Chihuahua for our fly to Toluca and then home. This trip was well beyond my expectations and I had some very high ones. David Olalde was a wonderful host, guide, organizer, problem solver and therapist :-). I hope to travel on another of his tours in the future.

Read my original post for Day 9.

This adventure is over, but the memories will last forever.

Michael

A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving. - Lao Tzu

My trip to the Copper Canyon in Mexico was one of my top 5 trips ever. The countryside was extraordinary. The people were wonderful. The food was great. And our tour guide, David Rico Olalde, was fantastic. Most of the tour group was a group of Americans living in Miguel de Allende and the rest came from various parts of the United States.

Day 1 and 2 - Erica and I made the journey to Guadalajara from Houston on Oct. 20th. We met up with the rest of the group and early the next morning we boarded a plane to Culiacan. From there the remainder of the journey was on a bus with our final destination for the day being El Fuerte.

Read my original post for Day 1 and 2.

View my photos. (7 photos)

Day 3 - On the morning of Oct. 22nd everyone piled onto the Chihuahua Pacific Railway. Our ultimate destination was Cerocahui but we had to stop in Bahuichivo to board two buses. During the later half of the train ride, the scenery became increasingly spectacular as the train slowly made its way through the many canyons. I stayed on the observation deck (the small space between cars) for most of the trip taking photos.

Read my original post for Day 3.

View my photos. (28 photos)

Day 4 - Today we viewed the deeply inspiring Barranca de Urique about 18 miles (30 km) south of Cerocahui. The trip was bouncy on the dirt road, but it would prove to be one of the better roads on our trip. This was our first true introduction to the Copper Canyon, a few of the indigenous people and a taste of the adventures to come. Later in the day several of us by foot and horseback went to some waterfalls outside of Cerocahui.

Read my original post for Day 4.

View my photos. (21 photos)

I will post the remaining days tomorrow.

Michael