New brains for old . . . you can't do much about the years rolling by, but you needn't be 'elderly' in your mind: all you need is a different outlook.


You Can Be As Young As You Think*

The Six Wisdoms of Youth . . . . . . . . . 

Being open to others

Being open to change

Having enlightened selfishness

Being always 'switched on'

Having fun

Being Creative

1 Be open to others: This Wisdom is about extending your social gene pool - being open to people, so that you have a growing network of friends and associates, rather than a diminishing one.  Finding friends can be hard, but start with friends of friends or by joining new associations.
Using the internet is not for everyone but is clearly a success among most people who use social media for networking.  However you do it, you should have two aims.  Add at least one new friend a month! And introduce fresh blood from different demographics.  For example, ask yourself, how old is my youngest friend? My oldest friend?  The push that age range.  
Finally, start going to busy places, joining in with the crows.  Rediscover the joys of shared emotions and 'feeling part of it'.


2  Being open to change: When life moved slowly and changed little, being inflexible and stubborn didn't matter.  But these days, accelerated change means that being able to navigate through life is the only way to remain connected and interested.
Change, of course, is scary because it means leaving something known behind and taking a risk with something new.  To overcome this fear, start with altering little things and get into the habit of doing this differently.  Change where you sit in the lounge.  Get an electric toothbrush.  Buy a vegetable you've never tried before.  Then go on to the bigger things in life.  One year you might spend Christmas with friends rather than family.  Mix things up.  Make them exciting.  Get life fizzing again.


3  Enlightened selfishness: Giving to others brings goodness to our lives, but occasionally we need to focus on our own learning and growth in order to be more effective at giving.  Part of this personal learning is about giving ourselves permission to explore - and able to make mistakes.
Ensure that errors and setbacks (even serious ones) are learning experiences - so a 'failure' is seen as a growth opportunity rather than a personal flaw.  Work on how you interpret mishaps and focus on how far you have moved forwards.


The Wisdom of Experience
Of course, life teaches us lessons and judgement along the way - about morality, about realism, about the value of families and so forth.  This of course is what we know as maturity, and this Wisdom is a profoundly useful compass.  Fusing experience with the Wisdoms of Youth offers your best chance of a revitalised, meaningful life and will bring you fresh joy and interest along the way.
It is possible to liberate yourself from mindsets that limit your prospects, and rejuvenate the way you view the world and interact with it.  You will discover a fuller, richer life, fill your later years with relevance and find new, interesting, nourishing friends.
Because you really can be as young as you think.  Go for it - and good luck!


Mini Brain Age Test
Someone asks 'How are you?'  How do you respond?  If you have a Young Brain, you will say 'Fine' and change the subject to something more interesting.  Old Brains, on the other hand, will respond with a litany of hospital appointments, ailments and assorted minor disasters.
The French have a phrase, 'moins on en parle, moins on en souffre' that means 'the less you talk about it, the more you suffer from it'. Wisdom indeed.


* book by Tim Drake and Chris Middleton

The WISE way to a happy life

Extract from book about Marcus Aurelius*, which looks at his philosophy on living in the world:


Marcus Aurelius's teacher, Epictetus, said the aim of Stoicism was to become like the wise man or sage.  Living your life in a philosophical way, you could make a great deal of progress in the development of your character.
Against Nature
Begin each day by saying: 'Today I shall meet people who are interfering, ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious and selfish.  They are made this way because of their ignorance of what is good and evil.
'But I, who have seen the nature of good and its beauty, and of evil and its ugliness, know the inner nature of the man who does evil is the same nature as mine; therefore I can't be harmed by any of these men, for no one can impose on me what is degrading.

'I shouldn't be angry with my brother or hate him. For we are made to work in harmony, like a man's two feet or hands, eyelids, or the rows of upper and lower teeth.  To work against one another is against nature: and it is acting against nature to be angry and to turn away.'
Taking Aim
Are you distracted by the things of the world? Give yourself some quiet time to discover something new, and learn how to stop this restlessness.  And be aware that you don't fall into another kind of error: the folly of those who wear out their lives in ceaseless business, but have no aim on which their every action or thought is focused.
Seeing Wealth for What It Is
Accept prosperity without pride, and always be ready to let it go.
Meeting Challenges
Just because you find something difficult to do, don't think it's impossible.  If something is humanly possible and appropriate, believe that it can be attained.
The Fruit of Ignorance
People who do wrong, wrong themselves. People who act unjustly, act unjustly to themselves, injuring their nature and making themselves evil.
Life & Destiny
Adapt yourself to the life you have been given, and truly love the people with whom destiny has surrounded you.
Forgetfulness
If you feel annoyed, you've forgotten that everything happens in obedience to universal nature, and that another person's stupidity has nothing to do with you.
You've also forgotten that things happen, have always happened, and will happen again just like this everywhere.
You've forgotten how close is the bond between an individual and the whole human race, for it's a community, not of a little blood or seed, but of mind: and each individual mind is a god, an emanation of the divine intelligence.
You've also forgotten that nothing belongs to us, but that our children, our bodies and our souls come from that divine source.  You've forgotten that everything depends on judgement. And finally, you've forgotten that every person lives only in the present moment, and can lose only this.
The Bad Return
When you have done a good deed which another benefit from, why do you need - as fools do - praise for having done well or the need for a favour in return?
Tolerance
People were created for the sake of one another. Either teach them, or bear with them.
Real Time
You don't have time to read.  But you do have time to restrain your arrogance, you have time to rise above pleasure and pain: to be superior to the love of fame, and not be annoyed by foolish and ungrateful people, but even to care for them.

The Virtues of Family and Friends
When you want to cheer yourself up, think of the good qualities of those you live with.  For instance, the energy of one, the modesty of another, the generosity of a third, and so on.  For nothing gives us as much pleasure as the virtues presented by those who live among us.
Talking and Being
Stop talking about what the good person should be, and just be that person.
Needs and Rules
Since you are part of and governed by nature, observe and accept what your physical nature needs.  Act on these needs, provided your living being does not become degraded by them. Observe also what your individual nature requires of you as a compassionate being.  This you must also do provided your rational and social nature is not made worse by it.  If you use these rules, there is no need to worry about anything else.
Firmness and Gentleness
Though people may try to stop you from following the correct path, they can never divert you from correct behaviour.  Just make sure they don't force you to lose compassion towards them.
You need to be prepared for the firm decisions and action, without losing gentleness towards those who obstruct or abuse you.  It's as great a weakness to be angry with them as it is to abandon your plan of action and give up through fear.

The Eyes Are the Window of the Soul
How empty and insincere is the person who says: 'I've decided to be fair with you'.  What nonsense.  There's no need to say this.  The intention will reveal itself.
A person's character immediately shines in the eyes, just as one who is loved reads everything in the gaze of the beloved.  Good, sincere, and kind people show their character in their faces for all to see.


And finally:
The Best Revenge
Not becoming like your enemy is the best revenge.


(From The Spiritual Teachings of Marcus Aurelius by Mark Forstater, pub Hodder & Stoughton, 1999)
* (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Aurelius)

PInterest

I have joined pinterest: http://pinterest.com/shushab/, so far I've started six boards and posted 40 pins (pictures). - this may become addictive!

Why pinterest is 2012's hottest website: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/02/06/tech/web/pinterest-website-cashmore/index.html

Brazil

Urban Design from the British perspective:
http://urbandesignbrazil.blogspot.com/

Lots of information from a Brit living in Brazil:
http://livinginbrazil.blogspot.com/






And finally: Learning Portuguese with the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/portuguese/talk/greetings/

LIFE

Something to read regularly, learn and inwardly digest:

I love this, but don't always remember to do it, of course.

60 things to do now I'm 60

I've just been looking at a list of '100 things to do before you die' and have done (or nearly done) most of them, so here's my 60 a@ 60 list (not 'to do before I die'!):

1. Go up in the balloon at Torre Abbey (http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1949325)
2. Visit Torre Abbey http://www.torre-abbey.org.uk/
3. Visit the St Pancras Renaissance London Hotel
4. Get two new teeth where I have gaps
5. Go to Brazil?
6. Do more painting
7. Grow some basil and coriander and eat them before they go to seed
8. Try and go to bed earlier
9. Have a go on the swan pedalboats at Young's Park
10. Learn how to put on eyeliner
11. Visit Penlee House (http://www.penleehouse.org.uk/) see painting above.
12. Eat less chocolate
13. Go to Ireland again http://www.discoverireland.ie/ 
14. Tidy away old magazine and newspaper cuttings
15. Stop having toothache
16. Visit Barbara in North Carolina  www.blackmountain.org/
17. Grow lots of carrots
18. Burn candles as they often have interesting aromas
19. More exercise
20. Get solar panels
21. Visit Tate Modern in St Ives
22. Eat sensibly
23. Moisturise, moisturise, moisturise
24. Grow some swede turnips and parsnips.
25. Make a watch strap
26. Finish some embroidery projects started at Westcountry Embroiderers www.westcountryembroiderers.co.uk/
27. Improve singing
28. Grow and pick peas - to perfection
29. Go on Eggheads - or similar
30. Play the keyboard
31. Finish the patchwork cover
32. Get the photographs in some sort of sensible order
33. Swim in the sea here
34. Go back to the toning tables
35. Find out about the genealogy questions which got me started in the first place - Why Hodgson etc.
36. Explore north Scotland  www.northhighlandsscotland.com
37. Make a shell necklace or hanging
38. Visit Chester again  www.visitchester.com
39. Have a short story published
40. Go to Devon Guild of Craftsmen, Bovey Tracey
41. Go over to France
42. Ride a horse again
43. Ride a bike
44. Go to a beer festival
45. See how far I can travel with my Bus Pass (when eligible)
46. Improve my drawing
47. Give blood
48. Be silent for a day(!)
49. Make some ravioli
50. Meditate
51. Write the story of my life
52. Keep Bees?
53. Get a dog?
54. not much further to go now! ...

May and June Musings

30 June 2011
Love: A temporary insanity curable by marriage 
or by removal of the patient from the influences 
under which he incurred the disorder. 
(Ambrose Bierce)

29 June 2011
Further advice: don't lose 

your mobile the day after you lose your camera ...

28 June 2011
My advice to everyone is - don't lose your camera on the last day of your holiday 
when you could have spent the whole time away enjoying experiences 
instead of photographing them for the future ...


27 June 2011
The reward of energy, enterprise and thrift - is taxes 
(William Feather)


26 June 2011
A day without laughter is a day wasted.
(Charlie Chaplin)

25 June 2011
Saving is a fine thing. 
Especially when your parents have done it for you 
(Winston S Churchill)


24 June 2011
Better to do something imperfectly than 

to do nothing flawlessly

(Unknown)

23 June 2011

The things you own end up owning you. 

(Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club, 1996)

21 June 2011

We learn from experience. A man never wakes up his second baby just to see it smile (Grace Williams) 

19 June 2011
If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange apples then you and I will still each have one apple. 
But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas 
(George Bernard Shaw)

18 June 2011

'Be Yourself' is the worst advice you can 
give to some people (Tom Masson)

17 June 2011

I wrote a short story because I wanted to see something of mine in print other than my fingers (Wilson Mizner)

15 June 2011

To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness (Bertrand Russell)

10 June 2011 (Duke of Edinburgh's 90th Birthday)

It is never too late to be what you might have been 
(George Eliot)

8 June 2011

What's the difference between a Taxidermist and a Tax Collector - the Taxidermist takes only your skin. (Mark Twain).

5 June 2011

The harder I work the more luck I seem to have 
(Thomas Jefferson).

4 June 2011

In theory, there is no difference between theory and 
practice, but, in practice, there is. 
(Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut)

3 June 2011

Always forgive your enemies - nothing annoys them so much (Oscar Wilde)

25 May 2011

I'm extraordinarily patient - so long as I get my own way. (Margaret Thatcher)

24 May 2011

(Jack and Dorothy's Anniversary, 1949)

The creative person basically has two kinds of jobs. One is the creative kind - the second is the kind which pays the bills.  Sometimes the task in hand covers both bases, but not often.  This tense duality will always play central stage.  
It will never be transcended. 
(Hugh Macleod)










12 May 2011

Well it's a busy week with work with lots of people to see by Friday!  They are all lovely people and I enjoy seeing them and having a chat about them and their lives.  

This week they're all much younger than me and I realise how fast time goes and that 

we need to make the most of life, recognising and grabbing opportunities when they arise.

"They are not long, the days of wine and roses: out of a misty dream our path emerges for a while, then closes, within a dream." (Ernest Dowson)

Someone wise once said it's often not what we've done that we regret later, but what we haven't done.  So will now go and do ...