Well we'll jump right in...

~ Take better care of myself all the way around (personal and family life included)

~Indulge in my crafts

~Use my gifts (to praise and glorify the Lord)

~Honor God with my living

~Love the Lord with my life

~Answer his calling

~Be more involved and supportive (with everything)

~Less talk, more action (write more, if that were possible)

~Update journals on a regular basis and form a routine

~Include more water and possibly less coffee in my diet (I know, I'm such a traitor)

~Cure my addiction to online shopping sites – my wallet is hurting

~Gain another source of income for multiple income streams ( I heard somewhere that millionaires have multiple income streams, so I figure if I behave like a millionaire I may actually become one)

~Give in to intuition and positive thinking at all times – even when my mood is low

~Not to live in my anger or my depression, climb out of that crap and shake it off (got shit to do)

~Find the time in my life to accomplish these tasks as this list is ridiculously long...but these are things I need to work on.

~Curb smoking habit...maybe drink more LOL (kidding :P )

~Socialize more (after holiday blues has me in my shell)

~Live in good music ( meaning – find some good music and make it a part of my life's soundtrack)

~Use my hands, mind and skill to create more things!!

~Last but not least, make good on promises and commitments (I don't lie to people but life happens and I find myself leaving people hanging and I hate that – so this is something that HAS to change.)

These are doable goals, I have even started a few of them today...well I started January 4th when I penned these to paper - it has just taken me a few days to put them here. Life is always doing what it does with its constant flow of activity and directional changes...I picture it to look like the East Australian Current as depicted in Finding Nemo. People jump in to ride it along with you and exit where they may but it just continues to flow without end, with or without you.

Swimming against the tides will get you nowhere; therefore going with the flow (assuming that is the direction you want to go) is best. But you have to trust life and trust yourself to know that you are doing the right thing. Sure it seems scary at first especially if it's a new direction you're headed in and the terrain is unfamiliar but then that's where that adventurous spirit comes in. Just get to know your surroundings, find a spot where you fit in and take it from there. If there is no spot, then create one.

New things, new environment, same you! (We won't say new you...unless you've been reborn or your name is Caitlyn Jenner, then yeah...otherwise, you are the same you, you were yesterday with new experiences under your belt. Nothing wrong with being the same you – you change regardless but remain intact. People say that if you are the same person you were last year then something is wrong. We aren't even the same person we were yesterday due to life's changes but very much still ourselves.

We can't get away from who we are. "Everywhere you go, there you are."

Drake said it best – "You don't run from where you come from." If home isn't a physical place and is a state of being then you never left and should be quite happy where you are. Take the memories, the feelings and the experiences with you wherever you go. Good and bad. The bad things remind us of what we don't want, what mistakes were made and what is needed to get better. Without the bad things, we'd never know what the good things feel like.

Back to getting away from who we are – if you really don't like the person you've become, then change. You changed to become that person – you can do it again.

I often wonder – what part of the situations we find ourselves in is life throwing us a curve ball or just our own hands mucking everything up. Can we continue to put the blame on the entity that we've created and called it LIFE or do we take ownership of these things and take the steps to correct them? I think it's a bit of both. We can't predict our situations as they come and we definitely can't control other people (try as we might) but we can predict our own movements and control ourselves. Premeditation is the act of planning something before acting on it...most commonly used in a bad way to describe criminal behavior but essentially we do this every day. We premeditate the things we are going to do. The act of planning out things carefully comes with the territory of routines. Some of us have to do this day to day to ensure healthy living...others of us can just live without all the routine and planning, I long to be one of those people.

I need structure in my life – right now I'm all over the place being pulled in a billion different directions and it's a little hard on the psyche, let me tell you – for the first few days of the new year, I truly questioned who I was and what my motives for living were. You know how (being as vague as possible now) certain situations can cause you to rethink your entire existence as a person. I had one of those. Something that made me ask – well...what the hell are you living for then?

I had to answer that question. Lying to myself is not the way to go, if I'm questioning my existence then speaking the truth needs to happen. The current of my life is sweeping by so fast and I'm caught up in it – I feel the tug one direction but for some reason I want to step back. Like there's an answer back there in the past that I over looked. Signs I didn't see or steps I forgot to take. What the hell does that matter now? I'm in the present and I can't change a thing that happened years ago, so I have get over it, heal from it and learn from it missed steps and all.

That giant vaguely known entity of life is looming overhead and just waiting to throw more stuff at me while I'm juggling mental illness, family issues and now the existential...what else could it possibly give me?

Let's not kid ourselves – life only deals us the big faced cards and asks you to make 21. I mean the big issues for you to deal with but with little help as to solving the problem. That's where we find ourselves on our own, shifting from one foot to the other trying to gain our balance on shaky ground....or possibly even that tightrope with no net while trying to balance that elephant in one hand and a running chainsaw in the other. Oddly enough...I've never met a one armed juggler or one missing fingers for that matter.

Hmm...

Anyway, we are wading in 2016...not quite to the knee caps, maybe just below the ankles and people are already tripping, over their feet, their words and with their actions. Wow. These are just the people around me! Who knows what's going on in the media...I don't care. I escaped a flood!! Missouri was underwater and some parts still are around here but my home is away from most of that. I'm between two big rivers...the Missouri and the Mississippi but I'm so far in the middle no water will meet me. They are spaced apart by miles and miles and miles. My basement did take on a little bit of water though, it was about ankle high and I was pissed too but we lived through that. Hey...all of that rain could have been snow and we could still be trying to dig our way out of it.

I'm blessed and grateful dammit. Life, the big scary thing that it can be will do what it does. I'm learning from it – thinking deeply over the one I am living and trying to make sense of it all.

I hope some of these things I'm living through aren't like algebra and I'll never ever use it for anything productive in my life EVER! I hope some of the things I am going through don't prove the points of past teachers telling me I'd never amount to anything. Hey, even if I only amount to nothing more than a hill of beans – I am still something lady! I swear I will never forget my 6th grade teacher's name or face.

I do hope to win a Pulitzer ...or become widely known for having invented something that no human can live without! Or have written "The Cookbook" of human life (M. Night Shyamalan movie reference – Lady in the Water). I hope to find the key to human happiness in all my ponderings of this life – and make it a movie like The Fountain! Be the most quoted author in 2018 (I'm giving myself time to marinate and be great) and have a seedy scandalous biography written about me by someone that can't even pronounce my first name properly.

I hope....to figure out...why those little packets they put inside of purses and wallets work...you now the little things that say "Do not eat" and I guess they absorb something...like air??? Who the hell knows? Who made those things – I got them for Christmas along with a pair of boots...I guess they were my "gift with" lol HUMOR, Oh my god I hope to laugh more this year. Hearty snort inducing laughs that bring me to tears! I need some more of that.

And I sincerely hope ...one day...that I write something that at least one person will fall in love with. I just need one person to love it.

Above all hopes, is the hope that everyone realize just how blessed they are. Even in the smallest things there are the biggest treasures, one just needs to be willing to sift through the junk of their lives to find it. Small things those that escape the eye upon first glance are the things that make or break a moment – proverbial straws on camel backs, needles in haystacks...the natural pearl amongst golden beaches of sand. You get my drift. Those things – those overlooked things that no one sees, those are the things treasures; a smile, a glance, a look, a gesture or motion. That hello and goodbye, please and thank you, open door and coat over a puddle (my age is showing with that one- did anyone ever do that??) are the small things that can change entire worlds and build fortunes. I believe so. People remember things like that...common courtesy, etiquette (again do people practice this anymore??) and manners.

A bless you when someone sneezes, a tissue for the tears of a stranger or even the smallest paid compliment are things that I have lived for, things I still look to do for people and hope people do for me. Maybe I'm the last of a dying breed – hell, I still write letters and send greeting cards ...when I can remember to. But I like things like that. I still use my hands to get dirty while making art, I own a lan line phone complete with long ass cord that stretched through the house. LOL I make my coffee the old fashioned way...in the steel coffee pot that perks and I read the newspaper...the paper not the online thing. I read hard bound and paperback books. I own a letter opener, and I still buy CDs for my music.

None of that means I'm better than anyone – no...just means that I'm different, a bit behind in the times and enjoy that craziness. I'm trying to hold on to the things that I think make life worth living because they mean something to me. My grandmother used to open all of her letters with a letter opener an ivory handled one. She used to pen poetry in pencil and do all of her own artwork on her cards. I loved watching her do these things – I kept thinking, "I'm gonna be just like you when I grow up." I'm not even close to what that great woman was in my eyes. I know she'd tell me, be your own person, I know this. When she was alive she nurtured the artist in me, she bought me paints and papers and ribbons and glitter...all of that stuff to make the things that she loved looking at on her walls. Man I miss her. My mom took over and did much the same – she fostered the entire creative person that I am and is still campaigning for a published book of something...anything as long as I know what it feels like to be published.

2016 is gonna be more that – more of being who I am. Doing things that make me happy and clinging to the things and people that I enjoy, which means I need to get on with the updates of these stories and find something new to write about. Even if it's just a short story, I need to do more of that.

Well this was a huge update, so I think I will end here.

But before I go... I'd like to pose a few questions. Are you where you wanted to be five years ago? When you look at the dreams and/or goals you have for yourself – is what you are doing right now a part of that bigger picture that you formed in your mind? Are you happy, truly happy...if life became a total wreck in the coming days can you find your happiness in the midst of your chaos and still hold and see the bigger picture?

What's the bigger picture? It is the vision of your life that helps to bring you closer to the outcome you see for yourself. Is your vision clear or distorted? And what can you do to bring the picture into focus?

This is not just a bunch of psychobabble...these are actually the things that I sit and think about. I'm in therapy so some of this is born of my sessions and the things we talk about but I've been pondering these things. People think that when I'm quiet I'm unhappy – no I'm just giving into the over thinking aspect of schizophrenia – not necessarily a bad thing it's just causing me to reevaluate the things in my life and the things I want. Nothing wrong with that – but I dare you to think on these things and write down your outcomes and answers. You might very well see some growth or areas that need a little help.

Anyway – enough writing.

As always, it has been a total pleasure pouring myself into these words. I am working on being more ...me in my writing and not so formal. Hey, changes all around this place...I want to get back to me, I feel as if I've been led astray by the reading of other blogs...it messes with my mind and I forget to just be me and not compare myself to others.

So there we have it.

I thank you for reading and will see you next time (on a more regular basis)!