ANOTHER SNEAK PEEK CHAPTER FROM MY UPCOMING BOOK

Well, I have not posted a blog in about a month. The writing time that I set aside every day has been taken up with the book I am writing.  I hope to have it done and E-published within the next 3 or 4 months. Meanwhile, here is a sneak peek at one of the chapters.

From the book 'THE SELF HELP BOOK FOR PEOPLE WHO HATE SELF HELP BOOKS ' 
©2017 Speedcat Productions

CHAPTER 10

Sand Dunes

Have you ever felt like you are climbing a sand dune? You start at the bottom, and begin climbing. You get a little way and then slide down. You know if you can get up to the top, that the answers are right on the other side. It's a long way. It's hot and it's, well, sandy. It's in your shoes, it's in your shorts and chafing places that sand really should not be.

We do this to ourselves all the time. We beat our heads against the wall trying not to get a headache while hoping to figure out answers that are on the other side of the dune. We somehow have this Hollywood vision of sweeping vistas and a beautiful mountain landscape waiting once we reach the top of the dune! Sometimes it's a mirage.

Here is a thought. Sometimes it might take a little longer, but maybe walking around the sand dune might be a better answer. You expend less energy by walking instead of climbing, and you don't get sand in your crack.

If the answer is on the other side of the Dune, it will still be there whether you go around or up. (Some people even try to dig a tunnel through the dune to get to the other side....but that image is just too horrendous to even think about....

I have learned that when you get to the other side, it's easier to handle whatever you find there if you are not exhausted from getting there. Because, sometimes the answer is not what you expect it to be,

Expectation is the key word here. We all have expectations. They can involve work, upbringing, marriage, dating, friendships and pretty much everything you do with a vision of what you desire out of something. Even a pet, or new car...If it isn't what you picture in your idyllic mind, you are disappointed and unhappy. Why? Part of it is expectations that others have planted into you. “I just got this great Jack Russell Terrier. He is the perfect dog...... So off you go to get a perfect dog of your very own. You bring your Jack Russell home and he barks all night and tears everything up and becomes your worst nightmare. You call your friend and chew his ass because he planted these expectations in your head. He didn't mention that he lives on a farm. You live in a one bedroom apartment in the city. Expectations depend a lot on the perception you garner from what others say. Be it friends, relatives or advertisers. Advertisers are the worst for planting expectations in our heads. Climb the sand dune and the world is better on the other side. What a large pile of crap.

Now, here I go again telling you that positive thinking is not what you should subscribe to. Not at all. We all have to have expectations, and not all of them are going to pan out like we want them to. It goes back to how we react to the outcome. If you go into things without depending on a particular outcome, you will find things work better in the long run. If things work out the way you picture, great. If not, Then take the pitch as it comes. Sometimes when you are looking for a fastball, a curve ball comes sneaking up to you. You have to be ready to hit whatever is pitched no matter what you might think it's going to be.

I told my wife when we first moved to Las Vegas where people do NOT know how to drive, 'Here is what you do to survive driver here...(or anywhere really). Be aware of those around you. Think of the craziest, stupidest off the hook thing they could possibly do...and prepare for that! That way when they do it, you are not taken by surprise.

One more thought about sand dunes. They are fluid. Always moving and being reshaped by the wind. They are not stagnant like a huge rock wall (which as we said before is also changing constantly, but at much slower pace). Sometimes if you have a goal, and you climb the sand dune to no avail, and you don't have the ambition to walk around it, maybe just leave it be for a while. Come back to it later. Maybe the winds of change will reshape it and even make it a smaller hill to climb.

Life is a desert of shifting sand dunes. Unpredictable. Erratic. Harmony changes into dissonance, the immediate outlives the profound, esoteric becomes cliched. And vice versa.  – Ella Leya