Category: goals

  • Can you be happier?

    Dr. Laurie Santos, a Yale professor, says money and status don’t make you happier. Instead, she suggests things that contribute to your physical health, such as sleep, exercise and nutrition. And, things that contribute to your mental well-being, such as community, gratitude, mindfulness and finding meaning in everyday life. I read about Dr. Santos’ suggestions…

  • Christmas is over

    The Christmas tree is still decorated—although our live Christmas tree is getting a bit dry and droopy. Our nutcracker still stands proudly on the table in the entry hall, and our collection of snow globes—some musical and some not—still adorn the coffee table in the living room. However, Christmas is over, and it’s time to…

  • Start over again

    Everyone is supposed to make resolutions in January. My friend Fayteen and I used to promote spring as the best season to make new goals. Maybe autumn would be best!? As F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, “Life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall!” –Joy

  • Creating yourself

    I found this Bob Dylan quote in The Week—and someone on The Week staff found it in The Minneapolis Star! ”Life isn’t about finding yourself, or finding anything. Life is about creating yourself and creating things.” –Joy

  • Be positive!?

    Test negative. Be positive. I had my patience tested. I’m negative. I heard both of these lines during a Zoom meeting recently. Since then, I’m determined to be more positive—and more patient. –Joy

  • Think outside your walls

    I am writing letters for Beto, talking to friends on the phone and smiling at everyone I meet when I take my morning walk. I am tired of this pandemic and tired of hibernating, but I am trying my best to stay connected to the world. As John Ruskin once said, “A man or woman…

  • Every little girl

    We hope our daughters will have a smoother path on their way to the offices of president and vice president, says Debra Adams Simmons, an executive editor of National Geographic. And, Simmons quotes Kamala Harris: “While I may be the first woman in this office, I will not be the last because every little girl…

  • The great harmonies

    Reinhold Niebuhr, in his book The Irony of American History, talks about happiness as harmony. “Happiness is desired by all men and women; and moments of it are probably attained by most men and women,” Niebuhr writes. “Only moments of it can be attained because happiness is the inner concomitant of the neat harmonies of…

  • Hillary Clinton at 80

    Hillary Clinton “writes she plans to stay alive to see the first woman become president,” writes Susanna Schrobsdorff in the September 25, 2017, issue of Time. “When I read that, I envisioned her at age 80, back on the Inaugural podium in a white pantsuit….Maybe all those women and girls from all those marches will…

  • Let go

    You can’t control everything—although I often try to. “We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us,” Joseph Campbell once said. –Joy