How Your Inner Cynic Can Guide You To The Things You Need To Hear!

This morning I was taking my usual cursory glance at the headlines over my morning coffee, when, one in particular, caught my eye.  "Is THIS the secret to happiness?"  the attention grabbing headline asked.  As one who is on a constant quest for any scrap of happiness I can find, I immediately zoomed in a little closer on the seductive sentence...  It was accompanied by a photo of an attractive brunette in oversized glasses and with bright red lips.  Further perusal of the rest of the headline informed me that the lady in the photo was the blogger who has come up with a fifteen point plan to guide you to happiness.

It was at this point I had to ask if I'm the only over-weight, plain looking blogger on the planet! Any of them that go viral always seem to look like they could do modelling on the side. But I digress... Not only was this lovely lady a blogger and personal development guru but she was also described as a "happiness guru".  A happiness guru!  What the hell is a happiness guru and why the hell aren't I one of those???

The lovely Luminita

I have to admit at this point that my inner cynic jumped into action.

"For fuck sake!" It announced loudly, "here we go again, some self-appointed personal development quack, calling herself a bloody happiness guru, feeding us all a load of trite bullshit about what we need to do to be 'happy'."  I swigged my coffee, ready to move on to the next headline but my inner cynic wasn't quite finished.  "Spare me!" It announced in an even louder voice.

So, of course, always up for pissing my inner cynic off, I clicked on the headline. If there was a chance that there was even one nugget of advice as to how to improve my chances of happiness in this lifetime then I wasn't going to risk passing it up!

And I am so glad I did!  Because it would seem the lovely Luminita - also known as The Purpose Fairy - is onto something...  Below is her list of the fifteen things you need to give up in order to achieve happiness.

15 THINGS YOU NEED TO GIVE UP TO BE HAPPY 

1. Always being right

2. Always being in control

3. Apportioning blame

4. Self-defeating thoughts

5. Limiting beliefs

6. Complaining 

7. Criticising

8. Impressing other people 

9. Resisting change

10. Labelling people

11. Fear

12. Making excuses 

13. The past

14. Attachment

15. Living up to others' expectations

The article went into each point in more detail and the more I read the more I was impressed.  I've come to all these conclusions myself over the years.  Every experience I had to go through to finally arrive at these conclusions was a painful lesson and I instantly recognised that Luminita hadn't come to creating this list without a significant amount of pain in her own life.  No-one does.  I have to admit I still struggle with understanding some of these truths and applying them on a daily basis - especially number fourteen - attachment.  However,  I continue to explore their meaning.  I've been sidetracked and sidelined in recent months from this sort of exploration and feel I am none the better for it.  So, despite my inner cynic's objections, I am very glad I clicked on this headline this morning as it provided a very timely reminder to take a step back and have a look at the bigger picture.  And I would add another point - always listen to your inner cynic and then do the exact opposite!

Luminta has written a beautiful book entitled "Fifteen Things You Need To Give Up To Be Happy - An Inspiring Guide To Discovering Effortless Joy."  It will be going on my bookshelf very soon.  

Luminita's Book

The article appeared in the Daily Mail.  The link is below.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3867048/Blogger-reveals-15-things-need-happy.html

Chubbygirl And Big Bertha

Well the Queen's birthday saw me and my family enjoying the mid-morning sunshine out on the deck and the conversation turned to superheroes, as it inevitably does when the Dude is involved.  This morning he wanted each of us to tell him, if we could be a superhero then which superhero would we be.  The fact that he was asking was merely a formality as he had already decided who everyone should be.  La-la was Batgirl, Bid Daddy was Superman and I was......., well this is where the poor Dude hit a bit of a road-block.  You see if there is one thing all superheroes, either male or female, have in common, it's that they have rather impressive physiques and the ladies in particular are on the slender side.  The Dude looked most perplexed.

Big Daddy as Superman!

"Mummy," he said, "I don't know who you can be because there aren't any chubby superheroes."

"Oh, I replied," that's ok, "all mummies are superheroes anyway, I'll just be super-mummy."

I could tell by his face that this just would not fly.

"Nooooo," he protested, "that's not the way this works!  Mummies don't wear capes!"

So then I thought about it and thought how sad that there wasn't a superhero with at least a little bit of padding, I mean how handy would that be if you were a superhero?

Big Daddy tried to help out and searched for a curvy female superhero on google but the best he could come up with was The Vixen, who I might add has some pretty sensational curves going on but who was dismissed by the Dude as being "too sexy."

The Very Sexy Vixen

"Okay," I chirped in, "then I'll be Chubbygirl."

"Huh?" asked the Dude, whose face suggested he didn't quite like the sound of what he was hearing.

"Chubbygirl, she's a new superhero," I informed my lovely family, who were pretty much all catching flies with their mouths at this stage.

The Dude was unimpressed.

"Chubbygirl!" He exclaimed, "what the hell is her super-power?"

"Well," I started to explain, "she rolls herself up in a ball and launches herself at villains and goes really fast and knocks them out."

The Dude was impressed.

"What else?" he asked.

"She squashes things," I replied, "she's a bit like the Hulk.  He crushes things and she squashes things.  She also has some deadly ninja moves."

The Dude was liking the sound of Chubbygirl more and more.

"But what does she look like?"  he asked.

That's when Big Daddy started snorting.

"Something like this," he managed to squeeze out through snorts.

The Dude took the phone offered by Big D and looked on in horror.

"No way Mummy!  You can't be her!  She's enormous!"

It seems I can't win on the superhero front - I'm either too chubby or not chubby enough and I most certainly am not allowed to be sexy!

I took the phone and looked at what Big Daddy found so hilarious.

Big Bertha

Big Bertha - who knew?  Looks like someone beat me to the "superhero with a bit of padding" idea. All I need now is for Big Bertha to show up and sort out the husband known as Big Daddy.