Finding the Perfect Job Match

Dreams of Flying

Dreams of Flying by Jan von Holleben

Crossing the desert on the back of a dog, or searching for lost treasures on the bottom of the ocean. Jan von Holleben’s photographs make nostalgic dreams come true.

Jan brings the influences of his parents – a cinematographer and child therapist – to his work. His focus on the visual representation of childhood, 'Child-History' and concepts of 'Playing', come from his teacher training course and he combines these theories with his personal experience and childhood memories. Inspired by classic childhood books as well as modern superheroes, he produces ‘Dreams of Flying’ since 2002 with children from his local neighbourhood in South West Germany – ongoing!

Click here to view them

Counting Marbles

The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.

A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the garage with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time. Let me tell you about it.

I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net. Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind. He sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business.

He was telling whomever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles." I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say. "Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well, but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet. It's too bad you missed your daughter's dance recital," he continued. "Let me tell you something that has helped me keep my own priorities. And that's when he began to explain his theory of 'a thousand marbles.'"

"You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years."

"Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3,900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now, stick with me, Tom, I'm getting to the important part."

"It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail," he went on. "And by that time, I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays." "I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So, I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1,000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear."

"Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away. I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important things in life. There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight."

"Now, let me tell you one last thing before I sign off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday, I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time."

"It was nice to meet you, Tom. I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. This is a 75-year-old man, K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"

You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then I was going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next club newsletter.

Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon, honey. I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast."

"What brought this on?" she asked with a smile.

"Oh, nothing special. It's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together with the kids. And hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles!"

--Unknown

Getting Ready for Tomorrow

You heard about the sign posted on a rancher's fence? On the other side of the fence resides the biggest, meanest looking bull you can imagine. The sign is intended to strike fear into the hearts of would-be trespassers. It reads: "Don't attempt to cross this field unless you can do it in 9.9 seconds. The bull can do it in 10 flat!"

Don't try to cross that field unless you are prepared! And isn't that the way it is in life? We have to be ready when the opportunity arises or else we will have little chance of success.

Sixth-grade schoolteacher Ms. Shelton believed in readiness. Students remember how she walked in on the first day of class and began writing words of an eighth-grade caliber on the chalkboard. They quickly protested that the words were not on their level and they couldn't learn them.

Their teacher insisted that the students could and would learn these words. She said that she would never teach down to them. Ms. Shelton ended by saying that one of the students in that classroom could go on to greatness, maybe even be president some day, and she wanted to prepare them for that day.

Ms. Shelton spoke those words many years ago. Little did she know that someday one of her students - Jesse Jackson - would take them seriously ("Leadership," Summer 1992). She believed that if they were well prepared, they could achieve high goals.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "People only see what they are prepared to see." If that's true, then it is also true that they only become what they are prepared to become. And a lot of life is just about getting ready.

"I want to be doing something more significant with my life than what I am doing now," a young man once said to me. He felt like what he was doing was just not that important. Other people have said things to me such as, "I only wish I had a meaningful relationship." And, "I'd really like to get a better job, but I just don't see how."

You fill in the blanks. What is it you would like to happen that isn't happening? Perhaps the answer is that you are not yet ready. Maybe you need more time to prepare before you are truly ready for that which you desire.

Think of today as another chance to prepare yourself for that exciting future you are looking for. Today is not wasted. If you desire more from life, then you can use today as training. For you will experience only what you are prepared to experience. Something wonderful can happen. And you can use today to get ready for tomorrow.

-- Steve Goodier

Olympic Games News Updates

Beijing During the Olympic Games

Put Your Behind in Your Past

I like what Miguel de Cervantes, the author of DON QUIXOTE, said, "Love not what you are, but what you may become." There is hope that I can always change for the better. I can become more self confident, more in charge of my life, healthier, happier -- you get the idea. And there is hope that I can change a situation -- like finding a new career or going after a new life-style.

If you're like me, making any big changes can be scary. We will have to COMMIT. And we may have to take a risk.

Let me illustrate what I mean:

Consider a performer on a trapeze. She swings back and forth. And then she encounters another trapeze bar. It is swinging toward her and it is empty. Now she has a decision to make. She may continue to hang onto her present bar, or let go and grasp the new one. But she can't do both! She can't hang onto the old and grasp the new with her other hand. She HAS to decide which she wants.

If she chooses to let go of the past and grasp the future, she finds herself suspended for a moment in mid-air. Scary! It's too late to go back and she has not yet latched onto the other bar. She is vulnerable and at risk. But she has decided to take that risk in order to move forward.
Life is like that. Sometimes you have let go of something if you want to latch onto something else. Maybe you will need to let go of an old job in order to take a new one. Or you may have to let go of an old relationship before fitting a new one into your life. You have to let go of other priorities on your time or money before grasping that new opportunity.

And for a while you may feel suspended in mid-air. You've committed to something new and let go of the past, but you have not yet grasped what is ahead. You feel vulnerable and you may be frightened. But you know that the only way you can reach the new "bar" is to let go of the old one.

But like Pumba (from "The Lion King") says, "Ya gotta put your behind in your past." Then you're ready for whatever comes next.

-- Steve Goodier

Father Forgets

Father Forgets
by W. Livingston Larned

Listen, son; I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead. I have stolen into your room alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me. Guiltily, I came to your bedside.

There are things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.

At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, "Goodbye, Daddy!" and I frowned, and said in reply, "Hold your shoulders back!"

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came up the road, I spied you, down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated you before your friends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were expensive - and if you had to buy them you would be more careful! Imagine that, son, from a father!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door. "What is it you want?" I snapped.

You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither. And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible sickening fear came over me. What has habit been doing to me? The habit of finding fault, of reprimanding - this was my reward to you for being a boy. It was not that I did not love you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night. Nothing else matters tonight, son. I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

It is a feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours. But tomorrow I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come. I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: "He is nothing but a boy - a little boy!"

I am afraid I have visualized you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby. Yesterday you were in your mother's arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much, too much.

Happy 43rd Birthday to Singapore - National Day Parade Preview 2008

Here are some photos that i took during the Preview on 2 Aug 2008

View of the stage, floating platform

Red Lions coming in to land and the performance on the waterfront

Contigents forming up outside, preparing to march in

Parade formed up and ready for inspection, Sir

Singapore Flag Flypast

The Finale - Fireworks

Cheers to Singapore

Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams

"Almost all of us have childhood dreams; for example, being an astronaut, or making movies or video games for a living. Sadly, most people don’t achieve theirs, and I think that’s a shame. I had several specific childhood dreams, and I’ve actually achieved most of them. More importantly, I have found ways, in particular the creation (with Don Marinelli), of CMU’s Entertainment Technology Center of helping many young people actually *achieve* their childhood dreams."

- Randy Pausch

With equal parts humor and heart, Carnegie Mellon professor and alumnus Randy Pausch delivered a one-of-a-kind last lecture that moved an overflow crowd at the university — and went on to move audiences around the globe.

Randy died July 25 of complications from pancreatic cancer. He was 47.

Watch online or order a DVD

Inspirational Story - Steve Wozniak

Steve Wozniak’s first big goal wasn’t big by today’s standards. All he wanted was his own computer.

But Steve was in high school when he had that big goal, and it was the 1960’s. His dad scoffed at Steve’s goal. A computer cost as much as a downpayment on a house, Steve’s dad said. Steve was undaunted. He said, “Then I’ll live in an apartment.”

By the time he reached his 20’s, Steve still hadn’t reached his goal. By then, he was a shy young man working at Hewlett-Packard. He still didn’t have enough money for a computer.

He had the skills to build one (he was an engineer and had had an aptitude for tinkering with electronics since he was a kid). But even though he had the skills, he didn’t have the money for parts.

So Steve designed computers on paper.

Finally, though, prices came down enough so he could move his ideas from paper to reality. He built a small computer, and since he couldn’t afford a display (what we now call a monitor), he used his TV.

At the time, a computer small enough to fit on a desk was a novelty. His peers were fascinated. One of his friends, Steve Jobs, suggested they build a PC board, a device that allowed others to build their own small computer.

Steve then went to his bosses at Hewlett-Packard and suggested the company build a small computer that worked with a home TV. The company rejected the idea.

So Steve and Steve decided to go out on their own. Jobs sold a van and Steve Wozniak sold his prized calculator , and they used the few hundred dollars they raised to finance their computer company, which they called Apple Computer. Their first computer was Apple I.

With the bank account nearly dry, Steve and Steve got 30 days credits on parts and then went into overdrive. They subcontracted the basic manufacturing, but then they had to do all the quality testing, which they did in Steve Jobs’ garage.

From these meager beginnings, Apple Computer was born. In 1980, the company went public, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Steve turned his little idea into a big success. That’s being bodacious.

If you have an idea, what are you waiting for?

Everything Counts

Early 20th Century African-American poet Countee Cullen spent the summer of his eighth year in Baltimore, Maryland. Shortly after he arrived he noticed a little white boy staring at him. Countee smiled, but the little boy did not smile back. Instead, he stuck out his tongue and called him a hurtful, racial slur.

Cullen later wrote a poem that included his recollection of the summer when he was eight. In it, he says this:

"I saw the whole of Baltimore
from May until September.
Of everything that happened there
that's all I can remember."

The white child likely soon forgot the episode. And he probably never was aware of the pain he inflicted on the young stranger. But the truth is... everything counts. EVERYTHING. Everything we do and everything we say. Everything helps or hurts; everything adds to or takes away from someone else.

Educator and writer Leo Buscaglia put it like this: "The majority of us lead quiet, unheralded lives as we pass through this world. There will most likely be no tickertape parades for us, no monuments created in our honor. But that does not lessen our possible impact, for there are scores of people waiting for someone just like us to come along; people who will appreciate our compassion, our encouragement, who will need our unique talents. Someone who will live a happier life merely because we took the time to share what we had to give. Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. It's overwhelming to consider the continuous opportunities there are to make our love felt."

How truly amazing life can be when we know that... EVERYTHING COUNTS.

-- Steve Goodier

Dancing Around The World

14 months in the making, 42 countries, and a cast of thousands.
Amazing ...

The Way We See It

The eye doctor instructed her patient to read a chart on the wall. He looked at it and read, "A, B, F, N, L and G."

The doctor turned the light back on and wrote in her notebook.

"How'd I do, Doc?" the patient wondered.

She replied, "Let's put it this way -- they're numbers."

"But Doc," he argued, "this is the way I see it!"

Much of my happiness or unhappiness is a result of my perception. "This is the way I see it," I tell myself.

I see some problems as challenges that energize me to action and others as obstacles that stop further progress. It's just the way I see it.

And sometimes I see new situations as fun, and other times I see them as fearful.

The busyness of my life can be OK if I see it that way, or it can be a major source of stress. And an unexpected intrusion in my schedule can be an irritant or, if I see it that way, possibly the most important thing I could do that day.

Even an embarrassing mistake can be the beginning of a new learning or an occasion to berate myself. It's in the way I see it.

One of the greatest blocks to my happiness is forgetting that it is not always about what is happening to me -- it's more about the way I see it.

Like Marcel Proust said, "The real voyage of discovery lies not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes." It's in the way we see it.

-- Steve Goodier

Free Hugs

"Do you want a hug?" the young man asked Ginny.

He held a sign in his hand that said "Free Hugs." I looked around. There were other people with him. They held their handmade signs high. The message was the same on all of them: "Free Hugs!"

"Sure!" Ginny smiled and walked up to him. She reached up, wrapped her arms around his neck, pulled him down to her level, and hugged him with all the love she had in her heart.

"Wow!" he exclaimed. "That was the best hug I've had all day!"

"I'm a hugger," Ginny smiled at him.

He looked at me. "How about a hug?"

"You got it!" I walked into his open arms. We held briefly and parted.

A young lady walked up and hugged Ginny. She turned to me, opened her arms, and hugged me too.

Ginny and I stepped back and watched the "free huggers" work their magic with those who accepted them. They offered hugs to anyone and everyone.

---

Juan Mann returned to Sydney, Australia in 2004, after living in Europe for several years. He was depressed over his parent's divorce. Most of his friends had moved on. It was just him. He sat for months.

Alone and depressed, Juan decided to make a difference and reach out. He made a sign that read, "Free Hugs," and stood at the Pitt Street Mall, one of the busiest streets in the center of Sydney. He put his arms around anyone who accepted his offer.

At first, he left his wallet at home, had a friend watch over him, and expected to be ridiculed. After fifteen minutes, a woman approached him.

"My dog died today," she said. "It's also the first anniversary of my only daughter's death. I could use a hug."

Juan was quoted as saying, "That first woman, it was more than a hug. It meant something to her."

Others joined Mann. They opened their arms to others. His message spread across the city. Afraid of lawsuits, officials banned the free hug movement, but the people protested and more than 10,000 people signed a petition to allow him to continue his mission.

Shimon Moore, the lead singer of "The Sick Puppies" happened to see Juan. They hugged and became friends. Moore borrowed a video camera and filmed Juan giving hugs. When Mann's grandmother died, Moore put the video together with his band's song called, All the Same, and posted the video on YouTube with the following caption:

"Sometimes a hug is all we need. Free hugs is a real life controversial story of Juan Mann, a man whose sole purpose mission was to reach out and hug a stranger, to brighten up their lives."

The video was a hit. It spread around the world. Juan has appeared on Oprah and several other major television shows. His idea continues to gain support and grow.

After his first day on Pitt Street, Juan wondered if others were doing the same. He found Amma, The Hugging Saint of India. Jason Hunter in Atlanta, Georgia, and Jayson Littman in New York.

Jayson started his hugging campaign the same year as Juan. They both felt a need to reach out to humanity. A financial analyst in Manhattan, Jayson believed New Yorkers could use a hug. From 2004 to 2006, he spent one weekend afternoon a month holding his "Free Hugs" sign in his hands and opened his arms to anyone who needed human comfort.

Since then, Jayson's mission has been taken over by others who believe. Hugs for all!

On the last Saturday afternoon of the month, you'll find them gathered in Union Square in Lower Manhattan. They hold their signs high and offer their open arms to all who need a human touch.

---

The huggers worked the crowd. Most people ignored them or shook their heads to indicate they were not interested. Those who opened their arms in return, walked away with a smile on their face.

I felt a warmth, a glow, fill my heart. Ginny and I were going through rough times. Money was scarce, bill collectors called on a regular basis. We were stressed and worried, but on that afternoon, for a brief moment, it was all forgotten.

It took a simple hug to make everything better.

--Michael T. Smith

Awaken to A Beautiful New Day

Awaken
by Ralph S. Marston, Jr.

In your life
A new day is dawning
Awaken and touch the beauty

Wherever you've come from
Whatever you've been
New possibilities beckon
Right here and now
Awaken and make them real

There was a time when you held in your heart
The most magnificent of dreams
A time when life seemed to carry
Endless promises and possibilities

Those dreams are still with you
Awaken and bring them to life

What you long for
Is longing for you
What you dream of
Is what you are meant to create

The doubts you have exist only in your mind
The anxieties that seem so burdensome are of your own making
Now is the moment to awaken,
and allow those doubts to melt away

Awaken, and dive deeply into the beauty of this moment
Allow your spirit to fully experience the richness of it all

Awaken
Allow peace to fill you completely
Let it touch your deepest longings
Let it bring those longings to life
Your most treasured possibilities are real,
If you will simply let them live through you

Awaken to this moment, and life begins anew
Reach inside, and allow
your most treasured
dreams to awaken with you
Into a bright and shining new day

Remind yourself again and again
Of how beautiful life can be
Remind yourself again and again
That you can make it so

Awaken
Step boldly and lovingly forward
Into this day

You've already come
So very far

You're stronger, more experienced
and more determined than ever
To fulfill those longings
That tell you who you are

Now is your moment to create real meaning
Now is your moment to awaken
And to truly and fully live

Resisting Discouragement

Resisting Discouragement
by Rick Warren

*** *** *** ***

So don’t get tired of doing what is good. Don’t get discouraged and give up, for we will reap a harvest of blessing at the appropriate time. Galatians 6:9 (NLT)

*** *** *** ***

There are many things that work to keep us from completing our life-missions. Over the years, I’ve debated whether the worst enemy is procrastination or discouragement. If Satan can’t get us to put off our life missions, then he’ll try to get us to quit altogether.

The apostle Paul teaches that we need to resist discouragement: “So don’t get tired of doing what is good. Don’t get discouraged and give up …” (Galatians 6:9 NLT).


Do you ever get tired of doing what’s right? I think we all do. Sometimes it seems easier to do the wrong thing than the right thing.

When we’re discouraged, we become ineffective. When we’re discouraged, we work against our own faith.

When I’m discouraged, I’m saying, “It can’t be done.” That’s the exact opposite of saying, “I know God can do it because he said ….”

Ask yourself these questions:

· How do I handle failure?

· When things don’t go my way, do I get grumpy?

· When things don’t go my way, do I get frustrated?

· When things don’t go my way, do I start complaining?

· Do I finish what I start?

· How would I rate on persistence?

If you’re discouraged, don’t give up without a fight. Nothing worthwhile ever happens without endurance and energy.

When an artist starts to create a sculpture, he has to keep chipping away. He doesn’t hit the chisel with the hammer once, and suddenly all the excess stone falls away revealing a beautiful masterpiece. He keeps hitting it and hitting it, chipping away at the stone.

And that’s true of life, too: Nothing really worthwhile ever comes easy in life. You keep hitting it and going after it, and little-by-little your life becomes a masterpiece of God’s grace.

The fact is, great people are really just ordinary people with an extraordinary amount of determination. Great people don’t know how to quit.

Real Liberation

I had a remarkable conversation with a woman about physical limitations. Nancy was a sufferer of M.S. She could no longer walk and spent her waking hours in a wheelchair.

"I'm not 'confined' to the wheelchair," she insisted one day. "It doesn't confine me. It sets me free."

I had never thought of it that way. And I have never referred to someone in a wheelchair since as being "confined."

She asked me, "Do you want to know my reason for living?" It seemed like an abrupt change of subject, but I went with it.

"What is it?"

"To liberate people. To set them free."

She must have studied my face and figured I needed more help. "It's like me...before I got my wheelchair, I had trouble getting around," she explained. "Now I can go places. But other people may be trapped in different ways. So however I can free people, I want to do it."

"People speak of being 'shut in,'" she continued. "People who have difficulty leaving a room or a house or a bed are not 'shut in.' They're 'shut out' -- shut out of activities and shut out of people's lives. So I try to help people find some freedom, however I can."

I wonder how she'd handle my limitations, though. I can get around all right, but I hold myself back by my thinking. I say, "We'll never do that!" or "I just don't believe that is possible" and later find that somebody proved me wrong. It's my beliefs and attitudes that cause some of my biggest problems. They are as limiting to me as Nancy's
disease is to her.

"Almost everybody walks around with a vast burden of imaginary limitations inside his head," says author J. H. Brennan. "While the burden remains, personal success is as difficult to achieve as the conquest of Everest with a sack of rocks tied to your back."

It IS a burden, isn't it? Like a sack of rocks. Some people carry the burden that they will never be able to pursue a passion or achieve a cherished dream. And some tote around the idea that other people can experience good things of life, or simply be happy, but they never will. Our thinking itself can be as much a burden as climbing a mountain with a sack of rocks tied to our backs.

When I feel "confined" by my thinking, I sometimes ponder these words from Darwin P. Kingsley, past president of New York Life Insurance Company:

"You have powers you never dreamed of. You can do things you never thought you could do. There are no limitations in what you can do except the limitations of your own mind."

Now THAT sets me free! Free to live. Free to risk. Free to move forward. Free to be...me.

It's real liberation.

-- Steve Goodier

Ten Other Commandments to Live By

1. You shall not worry, for worry is the most unproductive of all human activities.

2. You shall not be fearful, for most of the things we fear never come to pass.

3. You shall not carry grudges, for they are the heaviest of all life's burdens.

4. You shall face each problem as it comes. You can only handle one at a time anyway.

5. You shall not take problems to bed with you, for they make very poor bedfellows.

6. You shall not borrow other people's problems. They can better care for them than you.

7. You shall not try to relive yesterday for good or ill, it is forever gone. Concentrate on what is happening in your life and be happy now.

8. You shall be a good listener, for only when you listen do you hear ideas different from your own.

9. You shall not become bogged down by frustration, for 90% of it is rooted in self-pity and will only interfere with positive action.

10. You shall count your blessings, never overlooking the small ones, for a lot of small blessings add up to a big one.

~ Author Unknown

Get Out of Your Funk

You're feeling less than inspired today. You look at your to-do list and discover you don't feel much like doing any of it.

Some days you wake energetic and raring to go. You tackle one item after another, after another, on your to-do list. Each opportunity to cross something off the list giving you a boost of energy and a sense of being productive, of accomplishing something, of forward momentum.

Then there are days when despite your best efforts, you can't seem to get into that zone. Your energy is dragging, your thoughts are unfocused, your mood less than enthusiastic. It's what one of my closest friends and I call a funk. It's a bad case of the blahs that you can't quite seem to shake. Sometimes it's easy to identify what brought it on, other times it seems to come out of nowhere for no particular reason.

Whether you can identify the source of your funk or not, there are steps you can take to attempt to snap yourself out of it:

1. Let the sunshine in. Living and/or working in a dark cave with all the blinds closed is depressing. Open the blinds or drapes and flood the room with sunlight. If it's warm enough to open the windows to let in some fresh air, even better.

2. Crank up the tunes. Put on some uplifting, energizing tunes. Something with a beat that you can hardly resist moving to and then...

3. Get up and move. Exercise, dance around your living room, wrestle with the dog, go for a walk. Anything that gets your blood pumping.

4. Light a candle or diffuse an essential oil with an uplifting scent. Orange and lemon oils are two of my favorites.

5. Get out of the house. Go for a drive, go to a park, go to your local coffee house, have lunch at your favorite neighborhood cafe. Your funk just might be a bad case of cabin fever.

6. Read something inspiring. Keep some inspirational reading handy for days like these.

7. Talk to a friend. Preferably one who knows you well and knows just how best to help you...with empathetic words, a good joke or a swift kick in the ass. My girlfriend and I do this for one another with the understanding that we are NOT allowed to be in a funk at the same time.

If you've tried all of the above and are still feeling in a funk...

8. Take a nap or meditate. Either can serve as a way to reboot. Ever wish you could crawl back into bed and start over...sometimes that's just what you need to do.

If upon rising, the funk is still with you...

9. Just DO it! Pick something, anything, on your to-do list and Just DO it.

That's not working either?

10. Take a mental health day and go see a good movie, get a pedicure, enjoy a latte, soak in a bubble bath, read a novel, get a massage ...whatever... the idea is to give yourself a break, to pamper yourself, to renew your energy.

And remember...this too shall pass, and tomorrow is a new day.