True Beauty is not seen with the eyes alone
I have a long lunch hour at work. Yawn. Being me, I spend it outside. The other day, I walked around and chose a place to sit that was in the sun and out of the wind. The way I chose a place to sit, you’d think I was a reptile. One of these days I’m going to sit down and find a rattlesnake sharing my space.
The place I sat down was graveled. Not with boring old white and grey chipped rock, though - with what I suspect is crushed native rock mixed with sand.
I’ve always had a fascination with rocks. New Mexico is a real treasure house if you love rocks. In a matter of minutes I had found this little group - each of them intriguing, interesting, or beautiful in their own way. One is just the color of the land on the ranch, another is pure sparkles (although the photo doesn’t show that very well), a couple look to be quartz, and I think one of them is a citrine. Another isn’t as “pretty” as the rest, but shows a lot of iron oxide which is interesting - a symbol of strength and endurance. Some have interesting colors.
People are like that to me. If you stop to look at any one person, there is something interesting, intriguing, or beautiful about them (sometimes all three!). Perhaps they are not pretty in a conventional sense, but have an inner strength that makes them special. Sometimes you have to look at people with your heart or mind rather than your eyes. If you don’t see something admirable in them right off - perhaps you just haven’t looked deep enough. Life doesn’t always afford us the opportunity to take the time to do that, in which case I prefer to act as if that wonderful spark is surely there even if I haven’t seen it yet.
This little rock looks kind of plain. But sometimes if you crack a rock like this open, you find an amazing treasure inside. And when I picked it up, I found just a bit of sparkle on the other side.
I have to resist the temptation to end up with a pocket full of rocks. I allowed myself to choose three to keep and take home. Friendships are a bit like that. You might love everyone, but you chose a few that are most appealing to you to take to your heart and into your most intimate life.
Taking all of our unique traits and working together - what magic we can create.
Photos from my phone
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Speaking of mindfulness, Leo Babuta of ZenHabits shares The Mindfulness Guide for the Super Busy. If you think you are much too busy for meditation, spare yourself a few minutes to read this post. As a person who tends to get workaholic myself I can promise you that even a few minutes a day to just do nothing will make a difference that you have to experience to believe.
I have to share this post about dealing with it when others try to bring you down, yet another fine article from Happy Lotus. Any of us who try to keep a positive attitude, have run into those people who can’t help but try to bring you down to their level. I believe it is because if you manage to hop along being happy and creating a good life with good thoughts - it points up that they could do that too, if they would only put in the effort. Thus - much easier to try and bring you down. Sometimes, they succeed. For a few minutes.
Myself, I’ve concluded that there is no point trying to bring these people UP to my level. It is like any kind of addiction - you cannot cure anyone who doesn’t first admit they have a problem they want to be cured of. Anyone who is interested in learning to change their life, is going to be attracted and open and asking questions about why you are so “ridiculously” happy. People like that, you should certainly share your wisdom and philosophy with, and hopefully they will take it from there to seek their own happiness.
OTH, people who are clearly intent on “bringing you back to reality” are not going to change. The best thing to do is smile, send them love (because they probably really need it) and move away while affirming “I do not accept this negative energy”.
My work schedule is about to flip flop around and I’m not thrilled but I think I might like it more than I think I will. If that made any sense. I just might have a bit more Internet time. Maybe. 
I posted a few of the drafts of the sketchbook drawings. Some of them posted for today, some back on the date they were originally written. I clearly don’t have the hang of this! I wanted to have some fresh art for you to look at it if you came by to read this post. Sigh.
Blessedbe
Summer
My Squidoo lens Fairy Coloring Pages is in the top 100 in the Arts category (#47) and as of today is in the top 1000 lenses on Squidoo!!
It isn’t the best pic, blurry and all - but considering I was trying to take it with the phone in the bathroom mirror…
