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January 6, 2010 By 50 Comments

RAOKA: Wackiness

RAOKA

 

Wack­i­ness

 

“I also found child’s play — stuff that was not con­sid­ered seri­ous, but goofy — was the stuff I liked to do, so I still do it as an adult.” ~ Matt Groen­ing

Pref­ace:  Ran­dom Acts of Kick Arse is a move­ment to bring more of {monthly theme} into our lives, and the lives of those around us. 

Decem­ber Theme:  Wack­i­ness.  Find ways to incor­po­rate a bit of wack­i­ness into the world.

The Results:  Wacky.  Hmmm.…this seemed easy, and then…this seemed really chal­leng­ing.  I kept over-thinking it.  Rack­ing my brain, how could I incor­po­rate a bit of extra wack­i­ness into life. 

Noth­ing.

And then (does it pay to have wacky friends?), Carla from Miz­Fit was host­ing a Vir­tual Tal­ent Show, and invited me to par­tic­i­pate.  The only thing — what tal­ent did I have?  And…holiday travel plans would be putting us on the road that day. 

Then, as serendip­ity would have it, two things hap­pened.  Another wacky friend, Josie, sug­gested I try to top her cheese­cake fla­vored water tal­ent stunt.  And, a major Wis­con­sin snow­storm changed our travel plans for Christ­mas.  And so, I present to you, noth­ing with any tal­ent behind it, although I do think it just may qual­ify as a bit wacky:

We fin­ished off the hol­i­day sea­son with a fam­ily pic­ture, and every­one show­ing that wacky is a bit of a fam­ily tra­di­tion around here:

christmas2009

So there you have it.  A lit­tle bit of wack­i­ness from here in the jungle…

Once I stopped try­ing so hard to be a lit­tle bit wacky, what I found was that it just sort of hap­pened.  The les­son here for me is that it’s really about being our­selves, and what might appear nor­mal to one per­son, can be a lit­tle skewed (or wacky!) to the next per­son.  And that’s okay.  In fact, that is bet­ter than okay — that’s great!  It’s great because, we are all unique.  And let­ting that unique­ness shine — be it wacky, or goofy, or seri­ous, or odd, or funny, or what­ever it hap­pens to be — that is the true YOU shin­ing through.  And noth­ing is bet­ter than that!

Be YOU!  Wack­i­ness and all…

What is Ran­dom Acts of Kick Arse (RAOKA)?  With the idea that there are so many ways we can do small things to change the world for good, Sami, from Life, Laughs, and Lem­mings took an idea she had and cre­ated this move­ment.  The move­ment:  A new theme to focus on each month, bring­ing a lit­tle more good to the world.  The move­ment started in Octo­ber 2009, with a core group of participants:

Melissa from Oper­a­tion NICE
Lori from Jane Be Nim­ble
Dani from Pos­i­tively Present
Brandi from Joy Rebel
Zeenat from Pos­i­tive Provo­ca­tions
Sami from Life, Laughs, and Lemmings

Each month a topic will be cho­sen to focus on, and then at the start of the next month, the par­tic­i­pants will write about their expe­ri­ences from the pre­vi­ous month.

Inter­ested in join­ing the move­ment?  Con­tact Sami for details.

Jan­u­ary Theme:  Grat­i­tude (as cho­sen by Melissa from Oper­a­tion Nice)

Logo cour­tesy of Melissa from Oper­a­tion NICE

Filed Under: Life
January 4, 2010 By 78 Comments

And The Word Is (2010)…

Fragole e latte - Strawberries and milk
Creative Commons License photo credit: mas­tro­biggo

“A word is not a crys­tal, trans­par­ent and unchanged; it is the skin of a liv­ing thought, and may vary greatly in color and con­tent accord­ing to the cir­cum­stances and the time in which it is used.” ~ Oliver Wen­dell Holmes

One Word

It’s the dawn of a new year.  A time to start fresh.  To review the past and look toward the future.

“I want to lose weight.”

” I will spend more time with my family.”

“I intend to eat healthy every day.”

New Year’s Res­o­lu­tions.   Grand plans to start the year anew.  State­ments that touch upon some area in our life that we’re not com­pletely happy with.  Ever done them – made New Year’s res­o­lu­tions?  Just like the spike in gym mem­ber­ships in Jan­u­ary of each year – fol­lowed by the decline in Feb­ru­ary, New Year’s res­o­lu­tions typ­i­cally fade quickly as our daily lives takes us to where we’ve always been.

Last year, I was inspired by a much dif­fer­ent approach to New Year’s res­o­lu­tions – a con­cept by singer/song writer/blogger Chris­tine Kane.  The idea – to come up with one word to focus on.

The idea – that this one word will con­nect with us at a much deeper level, and inspire us to make it become part of our daily life.  That it will BE part of our true fab­ric.  And in being part of us at a much deeper level, this word will be a guide toward the life we desire, toward doing the things that are in align­ment with what this word means to us.

One word.  For 2009, the word I chose was COURAGE.  And in many amaz­ing ways, that one word man­i­fested itself in my life. 

2010

My word.

SPLASH!

Note:  If you’re hav­ing trou­ble view­ing this, click here.

SPLASH — what does that mean to me?

As I spent some time think­ing about what word really con­nected with me — my thoughts kept com­ing back to three words: adven­ture, action, and fun.  I bounced back and forth — which one to really encom­pass this new year?  Choos­ing one, felt like I was neglect­ing some­thing else in me.

SPLASH!

It embod­ies all of these:  adven­ture, action, and fun.

Tak­ing action and jump­ing in — SPLASH!

Hav­ing fun — SPLASH!

See­ing the adven­ture that comes in all of life’s moments — SPLASH!

This is about not only the big SPLASHES in life, it’s really about embrac­ing all of life’s moments — big and small and every­thing in between — and see­ing that jump­ing in is really a beau­ti­ful part of life.  And as much as this is about embrac­ing life in a very phys­i­cal sense, for me this also means jump­ing in to my own inter­nal thoughts as well.  Being with those thoughts that I have bounc­ing around in my head and in my heart — and tak­ing the time to SPLASH around with them, to not ignore these thoughts in the normal-ness of daily life.

In every­thing that this upcom­ing year holds, I am ready to SPLASH around with it all!

SPLASH!

Your Turn
What would you choose for a word to focus on?    This year, 2010, has many great pos­si­bil­i­ties in store for each one of you – may you find  much mean­ing in all that is to come in the next twelve months!

Filed Under: Life Tagged With: ,
January 3, 2010 By 53 Comments

Sunday Thought For The Day

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