life

It’s More Than Just Cake

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It’s More Than Just Cake
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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There is a big difference between a box cake and a made from scratch cake, each cake is typically created with love. Food is love. Most people that bake believe that, they make food not just to eat but to satisfy that desire to make and to create. There is so much satisfaction that comes from making food and even more satisfaction when it is well received and appreciated.

Making a scratch cake is labor intensive, it takes time and it takes more effort and typically it shows in the finished product. People that know, know, they can taste the difference between a box cake mix and one that is created from adding all your own fresh ingredients.

My two favorite scratch cake recipes are the classic Hershey Chocolate cake that includes 11 ingredients and the other a simple Hot Milk Sponge cake. Both cakes stay fresher longer than any box cake I have ever made and they taste so much better too. It is always worth the effort.

Thinking about cake making and the big scheme of life also made me think about effort and where and how we choose to devote our time. We don’t bake a cake with a desire for it to fall and fail. We don’t choose to spend our time and efforts and have an outcome of failure. If we knew we were headed toward failure we would change course, we would try again or we would try something new. We would do things differently. If we knew for certain that the outcome would be failure, we may not even try at all.

“Strength and growth come only through continuous effort and struggle.” Napoleon Hill

There is a big difference from thinking about a task as opposed to actually doing that task. Buying a cake at the bakery and making a homemade cake will have the same desired results if the goal is merely to show up with a cake in hand. But the experience and knowledge from making it and creating it for ourselves will be lost. And even when the outcome is failure, we will have learned something during the efforts and the process.

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With cake, everyone has an opinion, an idea of how it should be and a favorite. People may love cake but they know which cake they prefer and they certainly do have their favorites. The desire to create is an act of love, pure and simple. And just like in life, the efforts that we may bring and that we put forward show itself in the final analysis and final product.

Happy cake baking … Happy efforts … Happy life …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer

Books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes & Noble

Appreciation Doesn’t Coexist With Depression

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Appreciation Doesn’t Coexist With Depression
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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Our adult son is battling “severe depression” after his place of employment closed their doors, and he lost his job. One thing that stands out is how much his thinking has changed. Not that long ago he was happy and so appreciative. He appreciated everything. If you gave him a gift, even clothing he was thrilled with it. If you treated him to the movies or out to eat, he was happy and he was appreciative.

He respected and he appreciated his job too. It made him happy to have a place to go, to have connections to other people and of course to be earning his own money. He often worked 10-12 hour days in retail, he worked full time and he greeted customers and waited on them. He was very social there. When you watched him in motion you would see his joy. He was also doing this while being on the autism spectrum and no medications. He was active, always walking and going out to the gym to workout.

What stands out today is his lack of appreciation. And not just lacking it but his deep sense of entitlement. He is now like a walking encyclopedia on all the free programs that the government provides for people with disabilities even though he has been told by his doctor that he is “not disabled.” With the help of social workers he knows more about food stamps, rent vouchers, social security benefits, SSI, SSDI, form 500 and much more.

He says he wants to live “independently” when in reality he wants to live dependent on the government. Well intentioned social workers have put all kinds of ideas into his head. They did not know him when he was happy and productive and truly independent. They did not know him when he was appreciative and grateful.

The more he is handed the less he seems to appreciate and the more “depressed” he has become. The more he thinks he can get, the less he is interested in doing for himself. Today and with the team of his doctors and social service workers he is taking 9-different medications and 27 pills in a single day. He has gained more than 50 pounds in less than two months and while being hospitalized.

On so many levels it is so hard to witness such decline in someone who is so young. This entire experience that we have witnessed has made us see the connection between appreciation and gratitude and how they do not coexist with depression. Someone that is depressed is unable to appreciate what they have, they spend their time thinking about all the things they lost and all the things they don’t have. It also drives home for us the importance of how we think, how we all think.

If we can find things to appreciate and to be grateful for we can fight off depression. We can fight depression naturally with a gratitude journal or diary. We can fight depression with a gratitude jar. We can focus on all the things we already have rather than on what we don’t have.

There is no pill that will cure depression! There are many people that find relief in medication but pills won’t make a depressed person happy and they don’t take depression away. We can all be depressed if we want and yes I am aware that we are all wired differently. Some people are pre-disposed to depression. Sometimes it runs in the family genetic make-up. Sometimes changing how we think actually changes our brain chemistry. Like a car that isn’t wired properly and won’t start and run, a person who isn’t properly wired won’t start and run either.

We always knew our son was on the autism spectrum, and we take great pride in knowing that we parented an autistic child that made national honor roll and achieved Eagle Scout. He worked hard and so did we in our support of him. He made it into the United States Navy and he held down a full time job for over three and a half years all the while that we supported him and encouraged him and rooted for his success. He was so grateful. He was so creative and he was interested in other people and less self-absorbed.

When we love someone, anyone it is hard to witness them being on the decline, destructive and making poor choices. It is hard to watch someone, anyone with so much life ahead of them spiral so far downward when all you want to do is pick them up and help them and yet you know there is really nothing that you can do. You have done all that you can do. This is his journey and not ours.

The biggest takeaway for us is that with appreciation and with gratitude, depression is far less likely to take root and stick around. A happy person is a productive person and a thankful person.

Today and every day we pray for people with mental illness and that they may find the strength, and the desire to pull themselves up and find gratitude for all that they do have rather than focusing on what they may have lost …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer

All books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Home

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Home
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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“There is no place like home.” From The 1939 Wizard of Oz is probably one of the most famous movie quotes. But did Dorothy always appreciate her “home” or did it take the loss of her “home” for her to truly appreciate it and all that came along with her home including all the special people, her family.

“The magic thing about home is that it feels good to leave, and it feels even better to come back.” Wendy Wunder

This past holiday season was so special and so calm and so peaceful and the truth is unlike many previous Christmas holiday seasons because we purposefully chose to do very little. For the first time in over 10 years we did not travel but rather we stayed home and enjoyed that entire experience of just being at home. It was also the first Christmas in our 25 years together that my husband and I did not have any of our children with us at home. They are all adults now and out in the world doing what they want to do. Living their adult lives the way that they have chosen to live them.

We didn’t know what to expect living with just ourselves, two adults and our two precious pooches. We decided not to go anywhere but rather to enjoy our “home” we bought very few gifts and made our own food and drink. It was a pretty paired down holiday from so many that we experienced before and yet it was truly special. We appreciate everything so much more as we age. Our next big birthday will arrive in just a few short years when we both turn 60. We’ve never known “home” with just us.

During the holidays several celebrities died that were younger than us and others who were really close to our age, it drives home for us that each and every holiday is a gift and that we have no way of knowing when our time here will end too. How many more Christmas holidays will we share together? And how many more will be shared here in our home?

What made this year so special? It was the combination of complete gratitude and appreciation for all that we have and the peace that we share in the “home” that we created together. There was no family drama, no pressures and just pure bliss. We cooked together, we cleaned up together, we watched movies together, we ate together, we drank together and we prayed together.

Home can be anything that we want it to be just like life; it can be a place of peace and of rest or a place of drama and upsets. Being at peace means that we didn’t need many gifts or big yahoo type celebrations, we had everything we ever needed right here at home. We were together.

And like many kids with their toys, we did have fun playing with our new electronic gifts. It was fun, it was simple, it was peaceful and above all it was Christ centered and filled with love and that special feeling we all know as “home.”

Of course our two precious pooches Happy and Chipper were right there with us and a part of our “home” experience too because with them and for us, there really is “no place like home!”

Oh and because it’s always good to change it up each holiday season, we see you again next year Nashville, Tennessee! We did miss you this year but we were just as happy to be home.”

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.Facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer

All books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes & Noble

If You Think You Can, You Can!

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If You Think You Can, You Can!
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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If you think you can, you can! This first came to me from a favorite teacher when I was a young girl in school. It has stayed with me ever since. The mind is the computer system of the body, what goes in is what comes out. If we believe that we can achieve it we will.

The opposite is true as well if you tell yourself that you can’t do it, you won’t do it. There is nothing that we can’t achieve if we work hard enough for it and believe in it. One of the greatest gifts we can give to ourselves is to believe in ourselves and our own abilities.

This mantra doesn’t just work with the goals that we set for ourselves like becoming the class President or securing that job. It also can be used when we are faced with adversity. As human beings we are survivors and have a built in desire to live, to survive and even thrive.

One of the reasons I love teachers so much and have so many in my life as good friends is because they don’t see the obstacle as much as they see the possibilities. They know that with effort and the right attitude everything and anything is possible.

When we are faced with a challenge and a struggle and with adversity we must learn to use the same tools of “If you think you can, you can!” If you think you can beat cancer you will try your hardest, if you think you can get over “it” “him” or “her.” You will!

It is when we tell ourselves that “we can’t” is when we are doomed to fail. Kids have a natural born in desire with an “I can do that!” attitude. We should remember that as we age. If we believe in ourselves and believe that there is nothing we can’t accomplish with the right mind set we become fully accomplished. Then there is no challenge that we cannot overcome. So often getting through that challenge and to the other side is when we see the gifts of overcoming that which was once an obstacle.

Change your thinking and change your world. If you think you can, you can! Say it, see it, believe it and then do it!

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer

All books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes and Noble

A Brand New Canvas

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A Brand New Canvas
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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We have a brand new canvas ahead of us and what will we paint on it? What colors will we use? What pictures will we portray? What scenes will we draw? What look will we create? What words will we use?

Each New Year affords us an opportunity to be new again, we can continue the path that we are on or we can turn about and turn around and start anew. We have a brand new canvas upon which to draw our stories. Our stories may be bright and uplifting or they may be dark and desperate. What will inspire us?

As we turn the page and draw upon a new year all is white and all is bright with the endless possibilities and new opportunities that a new year holds for us. What we do with the possibilities and opportunities is completely up to us.

Do we have an idea of how we want that final portrait to look or are we going about it without any forethought and plan? Each New Year affords us hope …

“Where there’s life, there’s hope.” Theocritus (c.270 BC)

Happiest of New Year’s 2017 may you be blessed with good health, much love and abundance …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer

All books by Bernadette A Moyer on Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Christmas Memories

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Christmas Memories
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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Christmas memories, we all have them? We remember being children and the anticipation of waking up on Christmas morning and opening up all our gifts. We remember those special years when we received exactly what we asked for and other years when we were so happily surprised with others gifts that we never even thought about but turned out to be perfect.

What was your earliest Christmas morning memory? What present stands out the most? What gift did you receive that you remember so fondly and what gift did you give that was so much appreciated? Where did you go and who did you spend your time with?

What were your family traditions and what traditions have you carried on with? What are your favorite places to go and be on Christmas? And who are you spending time with that is part of not just today but the memories that you will hold onto in the future?

One of my earliest memories as a child was when I received Barbie’s pink convertible car for Christmas and another year our Uncle Michael, my father’s brother gave me and my four sisters matching quilted bath robes. Five little girls with matching quilted bathrobes. Then there was the year my mother gave us all new bicycles. I received a new 10-speed bicycle. It was All-American looking in red, white and blue and I was just a teenager and loved it.

Then came the years when I was married and my husband spoiled me and later the years with children when we spoiled them. There were the many years when we packed up the gifts and the twins and off we went to Nashville Tennessee and another holiday season when we spent Christmas in Key West, Florida.

It only takes one bad holiday with loss and grief and when after you get through it you pledge that will never happen to me again! And you do your best to plan ahead and make sure that Christmas is as special as it can be. Of course the off years make you appreciate the glowing years all the more.

Often as we age it becomes about “it is in giving that we receive” and it is about that food, clothing or gifts for kids that we donate to those less fortunate. Or that check and cash donation made out to our favorite charity to help them continue the mission of helping those that don’t have.

Christmas may be about our church or a new place of worship or that special drink and food that we enjoy to help us celebrate. It may also include that big game and sports event or a newly released movie or theater show. We celebrate. We love. We share. We enjoy. We remember. We make memories.

Merry Christmas and may you be filled with all the love and goodness this life offers and be surrounded by the people that you love most and together create fond memories for the many years to come.

God Bless Us All!

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
All books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Just a Little TLC

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Just a Little TLC
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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It’s amazing what a little love and tender loving care can and will do. For months we watched a home in our neighborhood going from abandoned to a bank foreclosure. There were sticky notices on the door and the fence was coming apart and partially missing. The windows were showing signs of age and there was chipping paint. You could see that this house was neglected and abandoned. It backed up to our community park and practically added the park to extend its own backyard.

The house looked sad and it looked unloved. And it was. Then we started to see cars there and later a new fence and new windows. Some freshly added paint too. The house was starting to come back to life!

It has such a perfect location in being at the end of the block and then backing up to our community park. Love and care brought that house back and renewed its place in the community. No longer is it an eyesore and run-down piece of property but it has new owners. New owners that invested their time and their resources to bring about positive results and I’m sure the neighbors are delighted with those results.

Seeing that home go from down and out to up and rising, reminded me that we can all be abandoned and we can all be neglected but when we are loved and when we receive tender loving care we look and we feel and we act our best. People notice how we take care of ourselves and how we look and how we carry ourselves.

“We must always change renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise we harden.” Goethe

We can look and act like a wreck, worn out and abandoned or we can pick ourselves up, do the work and add some tender loving care and become renewed again. Who doesn’t want to feel renewed and revived and most of all loved?

Here is to the effects of tender loving care and feeling rejuvenated and renewed …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
All books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Pay Attention

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Pay Attention
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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So often we miss the clues because we just aren’t paying attention. When we tune in we learn and we see and our communications are clearer and easier.

Everything living and alive communicates with us, nature talks to us and our pets and animals speak to us and yes humans speak both verbally and nonverbally. Our actions and what we do say so much more about us than our words do.

Last week my dog Happy came into my office, she gave me a lengthy stare just before climbing up on an over-sized chair in my office. She continued to stare at me as she peed on that chair. Her urine was rusty brown. She was telling me that she wasn’t well. A trip to the vet would confirm that she needed surgery again to have stones removed. I could have easily missed her “speak” to me. But I was engaged with her and I was paying attention.

Much is revealed to us when we do pay attention. So much communication happens not by what we say but by what we do what we see and what we witness.

Our dogs are the best teachers of non-verbal communications and some of their communications that would easily be dismissed if we didn’t pay attention to them. A bark and a scratch on the backdoor aren’t just a bark and a scratch but rather a communication that she needs to go out. A bark in the kitchen by the water bowl says so clearly. “The water bowl is empty.” And a scratch and a whine mid-kitchen say, “I want a treat or more to eat.”

“I truly believe that everything that we do and everyone that we meet is put in our paths for a purpose. There are no accidents; we’re all teachers – if we’re willing to pay attention to the lessons we learn, trust our positive instincts and not be afraid to take risks or wait for some miracle to come knocking at our door.” Maria Gibbs

When we pay attention to our dogs, our pets, to people and to all living things they communicate so clearly with us. All living things communicate with us if we are open and receptive to hearing and understanding them.

Pay attention … the rewards are amazing …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
Books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes & Noble

No Trust – No Relationship

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No Trust – No Relationship
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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Think about it? You might tolerate someone that you don’t trust but you won’t be close to them. A lack of trust equals a lack of closeness and the ability to form truly close interpersonal relationships.

I know people that worked through their trust issues in marriages and in family relationships but it took time, it took maturity, it took forgiveness, it took ownership and most of all it took the ability and the desire to fix and to attempt to repair what was broken.

Because of all my writings I hear from parents around the world, parents who had adult child estrange themselves for whatever reasons and the number one take away when that adult child makes an attempt to come back is “guard your heart” and “I could never trust them again.”

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When we hurt others and when we are truly sorry most people will forgive us and if the relationship is important and meaningful, they may try to repair it. But when you have someone in your life that not only hurt you but shows no true sense of remorse, it is virtually impossible to have a relationship with them. You may decide to tolerate them but there is no true closeness and no real relationship.

Every single one of us has done something in our life that we regret and are sorry for and about, and if we want to be forgiven and to be acknowledged and accepted we must start by 1) owning what we did and 2) try to right any of our wrongs.

Sometimes it is worth the time and the effort to work on repairing and in other relationships it may just be healthier and better to let sleeping dogs lay. Some people just don’t deserve another chance. Some people do.

In my lifetime, I have forgiven everyone, everything and I didn’t do it for them or because I wanted to have a relationship with them, I did it for myself, I did it so I wasn’t stuck and burdened with that kind of garbage. I have also owned my stuff, what did I do wrong? What could I have done better? Sometimes ownership is all it takes.

My husband and I have been together for over 24 years now soon to be 25years, in that length of time we have hurt each other, we have done things to one another that required true forgiveness.

“It takes seconds to destroy what it takes years to build.” Lou Holtz

Forgiveness that was always followed by our truest sense of sorrow, sorrow over our hurts toward one another and our willingness to put our ego aside and humble ourselves enough to not only be sorry but willing to accept the consequences of our actions and work toward rebuilding those hurts.

Anyone in a long term relationship or marriage knows that inevitably we will hurt our partners either knowingly or unknowingly but the desire to work through it is greater than the need to be right. The greater goal and the greater good are always to get through it together and remember than there is no “I” in “we.”

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
All books by Bernadette A Moyer on Amazon and Barnes & Noble

The Cupcake Kids

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The Cupcake Kids
By Bernadette A. Moyer

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How did we ever survive our youth and young adult years without “safe zones” and all the support of so many mental health care providers and college professors encouraging us to be weak and even weaker? Wow!

Youth and young adults that are rewarded by being upset and sad at the outcome of our Presidential election and to ease the blow how about a cup of cocoa or some playdough and a “cry in” and “hug out?”

What part about babying these young people prepares them for real life experiences? Real losses like when your dad dies or you lose your job or an innocent accident or any other outcome that you find to go against how you believe it should be?

The reason I take offense to “safe zones” is because it is artificial and not real life. Life can be a pretty unsafe place. Wouldn’t a better lesson be how to survive and even thrive in the world as the world is and work toward the changes that you want to see?

If the election results didn’t go the way that you think they should have gone, wouldn’t a better use of your time be to rally and to involve yourself more in the political process and work harder for the cause?

When I was young we were encouraged to write to our government officials and to communicate our case and our concerns in a succinct and polite manner. I remember writing to several political leaders throughout the years beginning when I was in middle school. And every single time I received a response.

Where I believe in everyone’s right to protest, what is the end game? What do they expect the outcome to be? How does blocking the streets from foot traffic and shoppers on Black Friday on the Magnificent Mile do anything to save lives on the south side of Chicago streets or any other inner city streets for that matter?

I think back where was my “safe space” when I was in the sixth grade and my parents divorced? Or when I was 23 and widowed with a 2-year old daughter?

There are no safe spaces for life altering events. How about teaching our young people that out of the struggle we so often find a deeper sense of enlightenment? My own personal loses taught me much, they taught me about life and about value and about being a strong woman and a survivor.

We are all trying to survive with what we have and what we know, creating artificial safe spaces inhibits growth and development. I think back about my grandparents who survived the great depressions and being immigrants from Italy, they were far too busy working and raising their seven children to fawn over “safe spaces” they had an old-fashioned work ethic that cured most things that ailed them. Keeping busy and being productive was their way of living life.

I can’t imagine either one of my grandparents ever supporting the new “cupcake kids” and encouraging weakness. They would have told them that life isn’t always going to go your way but accepting defeat with your heads held high builds character. And when you do get your way, you truly appreciate it all the more because you know first-hand what it feels like to be defeated.

Winning may feel good but in losing we are afforded an opportunity to go deeper to reflect and to think and to learn. We shouldn’t be getting in the way of the “cupcake kids” experiencing all that life offers with the good and the bad and the happy and the sad. In the end avoiding the lessons that real life affords us only does us a greater disservice.

Sure we all want the “happy ever after” and to feel “safe” but the reality is that we create our own happiness or lack of it and “safety” isn’t measured by any artificial means that someone else creates but rather how we handle and how we manage our life and living in it as it unfolds in front of us …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
Books by Bernadette A. Moyer on Amazon and Barnes & Noble