Awhile back, I saw this posted on a friend’s Facebook page “Happiness is . . .” I, am a long time Beatle fan who came up with the following lyrics “a warm gun, yeah. . . JL/PM” Later that day, I received a few text messages in close succession to one another. They were from that same friend, who thought I was suicidal. Lesson learned, I shall quote the lyrics better, citing words with more specificity as to whom they belong.
Hello Everyone! I skipped a post last week because of tons of homework and we were doing some family things, specifically celebrating little Jack’s 1st birthday. Kristi (my sister) and Stan (her hubby) asked Dean to take photos for the party so I’ll have to post some when he processes them (we only have 100 or so)!
I knew there would come a point in the semester when the content in my classes and my life severely intertwine. This week was one of those times! After picking up our son, partaking in a big birthday bash then spending all day Sunday attempting to get my homework finished for class; I was running on empty all day, by midnight I managed to get to a point where I knew I’d successfully complete my assignments -without too much stress. Monday morning rolled around, 0515 the alarm sounded, shortly followed by a dong-chong (my text message alert). I picked up my phone and read “Due to weather, Bloomsburg University classes are cancelled today, liberal leave for faculty and staff” Oh really? Seriously?! So I had 4, maybe 5 hours of sleep then went to work (driving in crappy conditions always burns more calories=more tired). Good times! This really was not my point of writing my blog post tonight.
My point was to link my philosophy on life to what I am learning about life. Those of you who are close friends know what turmoil and stress Dean (the family) and I have been through last year. Business-wise, we hit a turning point and opened our minds to taking on new and different avenues. Personally, it was one of the most frustrating years I have ever lived through. I am not to be mistaken for ungrateful, there were some high points. With that said, I can appreciate a new point of view from my 2 classes this semester. In my Psychology course, I gain new understanding and empathy for those that I share nothing with; the professor takes our course content (psychology of adjustment) and has us learn from a positive view point. So instead of studying substance abuse, child/spouse maltreatment, etc. We learn more broadly, that stressors are both positive and negative and that our perspective and approach is what we can add to the solution.
Taking that idea and applying it is where the effort lies. Not every situation is good and not every situation has to be a disaster. However, some of us have the capacity to find good through storm cloud. I know it sounds cliche and it kind of is. Where I can visualize this fitting into our business and life is through our current clients; having a sort of snowball effect. I know it’s not much but I see the quality and such specific uniqueness in Dean’s approach to photography since having met him. He’s evolving into what he ‘sees’. Like everything in life, it’s a work in progress. -in a good way. Cheeky, I know!

During Dean's down time, I think he enjoyed himself.