Growing up I wanted to be a teacher. I got married right out of high school. I had babies young. 
My life moved forward, and years went by. I always wondered… what if I would have gone to college?
Would I be a teacher? What if I went back to school now, could I still be a teacher? My self-talk would push back with, “well, I can’t do that now.”

I always wanted to be a writer and publish a book. I had a busy job, a busy life and thought no one would be interested in my words and thoughts. I could visualize the cover with my name running across the bottom as the author and thought… what if I would have begun writing when I was younger. Once again that voice in my head said, “well, I can’t do that now.”

What are your 'what if's' and 'can’t do's' in life? Do you allow yourself to believe that a golden opportunity has passed, and you will never be able to accomplish it now? Do you live in a space of wondering ‘what if I would have’ and telling yourself you can’t do it now?

What if instead of living in regret for something you didn’t do or accomplish, you switch your self-talk and began daydreaming, fantasizing, and imagining what you could do? What if you tried?

When I was what many would believe to be middle-aged, I began thinking what if I could. I found information about scholarships, loans, and colleges. My self-talk became, “what if I could.” One day when my courage rose to a confident level, I went to my local community college and signed up for a class. It happened to be creative writing. One class to test my ability and self-confidence. I loved it! I could do it! And I was pretty good at it.

That one class turned into the next semester with a few classes and soon I found myself working towards a degree at the same college my two oldest children were attending. Was it easy? No. But with every step forward I became more determined, and my children were right there cheering for me as I marched across the stage and received my diploma.

I walked off the stage into a busy work life believing there were not enough hours in my day to write. My inner voice kept telling me, I can’t do that. Then I wrote my first blog and hit publish. After five years of writing, my first book was published. I didn’t know that with every weekly blog, I was taking one more step toward my dream. I didn’t know that my writings would fold together to create that book cover with my name across the bottom as the author. I didn’t know that with every word I wrote I was telling myself, ‘What if I could?’
​
Looking at my life I did become a teacher of sorts by sharing my tips and techniques through my writing. It would not have happened if I kept believing that voice in my head telling me that I can’t do that.

I ask you again, what are your ‘what if’s’ and ‘can’t do’s’ in life? I am asking you to change that to, “what if I could.” Take that first step and then the next.  I know you CAN do it!
Pennie’s Life Lesson:
             “Don’t allow your own self talk to tell you that you can’t do something.
​                                        Change it to, What if I could?”

YOUR TURN...        
Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below.  And please feel free to email me  at:
 [email protected]. 
                                                Thank you!  ​
                                      ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
                                                         All Rights Reserved
                                          Copyright © 2013-2022 Pennie Hunt
                             This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt.
Feel free to forward and share this post.  Please keep the entire message intact, including  contact, logo, and copyright information. ​

I came back from my walk frustrated.
   “I forgot to wear my pedometer,
     so I’m not getting credit for my steps!”
My husband heard my grumbling and responded with,
   “It doesn’t have to be counted by a pedometer.
      Your body knows and gives you credit for it.”

He was right. Just because a little tech device wasn’t calculating my steps and chiming when I hit 10,000 didn’t mean it didn’t happen. Every step we take, every move we make, every word we speak, counts – even if no one sees us do it, hears our words, or charts our progress. It counts!
It made me think of how this relates in so many ways to our lives. How many times do you tell yourself stories like these?

• If no one sees me eat a donut, then the calories don’t count. Wrong. Your body counts them.
• If I am speeding or texting it is ok as long as there isn’t a police officer in sight. Wrong. Accidents happen when you speed or are distracted and then the police will arrive. Practice safe driving!
• I don’t have to show up for school or work today. I will just study and get my project done so it doesn’t matter if I was there. Wrong. It does matter. Other’s notice if you don’t ‘show up’ for them. ALWAYS, ALWAYS, show up!
• I don’t have to answer a phone call from my friend, I’ll catch them later. Wrong. Friendship is a two-way effort. When a friend reaches out to you, accept their hand. Hold it in good times and in bad. Cheer for their good news. Cry together when it isn’t. Respond when they call and if you haven’t heard from them in a while, reach out to them. We all need to feel cared about. It counts.
• If I think negative thoughts, it’s ok as long as I don’t say them out loud. Wrong. Thinking negative thoughts is just as damaging as saying them out loud. All that negative self-talk counts.
• I don’t have to tell someone I love them - they should know. Wrong again. Don’t ever miss an opportunity to tell someone you love them. Life is precious and brief. There will come a time when it was your last chance to tell them. Don’t miss it! It counts.
• I’m busy so I can rush by people and not take the time to acknowledge them, thank them, or be kind. Wrong! Showing kindness and gratitude makes a difference. You put out energy with every action. By projecting kindness and gratitude, you put positive energy out into the world to be felt and mirrored back to you. What you project you can expect. It all counts! 
• And yes, every time you take a walk, jog, or workout, your body and your health reflect it- even if you don’t have a device clicking away steps to prove you did it. It counts!

Pennie’s Life Lesson: Every step we take, every move we make, every word we speak counts – even if no one sees us do it, hears our words, or charts our progress. Everything we do counts!

YOUR TURN...        
Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below.  And please feel free to email me  at:
 [email protected]. 
                                                Thank you!  ​
                                      ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
                                                         All Rights Reserved
                                          Copyright © 2013-2022 Pennie Hunt
                             This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt.
Feel free to forward and share this post.  Please keep the entire message intact, including  contact, logo, and copyright information. ​

​We are experiencing a cold winter with wild winds and heavy amounts of snow. It has gone past the winter wonderland stage with me and slid right into feeling like frigid isolation.

The combination of the letdown after the holidays and the cold winter weather typically opens to a kind of quiet, slow, sad time for me. January has never been my favorite month.

Except for January of 1985. That is the year I was gifted with my son, Jameson Tanner, - J.T., as he preferred. 

That January I relished the cold winter that kept me bound to my home and my baby. I remember the delicious days of holding him bundled in my arms, rocking for hours in the same chair I had rocked my other babies. I would sip hot tea and stare at his tiny face, in awe of the miracle I had been given, knowing it would be the last time I would step into the arena of motherhood.

As the wind and snow whirled outside, I hoped the moments of grace and innocence would be frozen in that rocking chair. I hoped the winter of 1985 would last forever. It didn’t.

The calendar pages turned, and Jan. 14, 2022, is J.T.’s 37 birthday - and it is the 15th January I will have celebrated without him. Since his passing, I have learned to count. In the beginning, it was the weeks since he left, then months, and years. I count holidays. I count how many of his friends have married. I count how many babies have been born and how many people have passed. I count events he has missed. The number is always followed with, “since J.T. passed.”

This cold January wind reminded me of two years ago when I was thinking of his 35th birthday. I was talking to him as I often do. I tell him about what he has missed, how I miss him, and how I need to feel his hugs and hear his voice. Over the years, I believe, I have received messages from him in magical ways. These come in the form of smoke alarms and electronics going off, finding guitar picks in odd places, license plates, and music. He was a musician, so music was large in his life. He loved the Beatles, the Eagles, punk, and hard rock. If there were drums or a guitar in it, he loved it. During the time of his passing, he was in a Bob Dylan phase, so of course, we played a Bob Dylan song at his funeral.

I talked to him as I prepared the contribution to his daughter’s college fund that I make every year in honor of his birthday. As I wrote out the check, I was missing him terribly. I told him how beautiful his daughter is and thanked him for giving us this lovely soul to remember him by. After tucking the donation letter into an envelope, I grabbed a package I needed to mail and headed to the post office. The line was long. I waited with unusual patience. It gave me time to think about him.

When it was my turn, I chatted with the clerk as she weighed the package. I put my credit card in the machine and saw the envelope in my purse. I said,
   “Oh, and this letter is all stamped and ready,” as I handed it to her.
Just then music began playing. The clerk said,   
   “Well, that is good timing, we are all done, and someone is trying to call you.”
 
I looked at her confused. That wasn’t my phone. It wasn’t the normal ring. I looked in the side pocket of my purse and my phone was not in its usual spot. Then I realized the music WAS coming from my purse. I dug deeper to the bottom where I found my phone playing a song from iTunes- Bob Dylan’s, “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right.”

I thanked the clerk, silenced my phone, and ran out into the winter cold to my car. I never listen to iTunes. The phone was at the bottom of my purse and spontaneously began playing just as I handed the clerk the donation letter for J.T.’s daughter. 

I guess the clerk was right. Someone was trying to call me. J.T. was sending his approval. It was one of his perfectly-timed messages. Suddenly, the winter didn’t seem so bad. Suddenly, I felt warm and surrounded by one of his glorious hugs.

This week as I celebrate his 37th birthday, I will be watching and listening for one of his messages. When it arrives, once again, I will believe.
                                     ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Pennie's Life Lesson: If you watch and listen, messages will come. I believe.
​                                       ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

YOUR TURN...        
Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below.  And please feel free to email me  at:
 [email protected]. 
                                                Thank you!  ​
                                      ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
                                                         All Rights Reserved
                                          Copyright © 2013-2022 Pennie Hunt
                             This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt.
Feel free to forward and share this post.  Please keep the entire message intact, including  contact, logo, and copyright information. ​

Recently it was pointed out to me that I am not 28 anymore. This message came in two ways. One from my body as I bent over during a Yoga pose and thought to myself, “Whose knees are those?”

Later, as I was questioning out loud how my knees have changed, a friend pointed out that my age number no longer begins with a 2.

When did that happen?  For that matter, how did I rush through 3, 4, and 5?  My friend’s point was, why would I expect to have 28-year-old knees when I wasn’t 28 anymore. She added that I should stop being critical and accept myself and my body for the beauty it holds, even if my number now begins with a 5…ok 6.  

Whoa! That set off some major pondering in my head. Accept myself? Accept myself?

The first thing I had to do was contemplate what my perception of me at this age and space in my life should be. What was I willing to accept? 

I will admit to being someone who over the years has had a difficult time with the perception of perfection. I have been the overachiever who wanted to be perfect.

The perfect daughter.
The perfect mom.
The perfect wife.
The perfect friend.

All my life I have held a perception of what my perfect weight should be, what I should and shouldn't eat, how much I should work out, what I should be doing for others… the list could go on and on.   

Take a minute and visualize the Perception of Perfection you hold for yourself. 

Do you have it? If you are like me it is an over-exaggerated, unattainable Perception of Perfection fueled by our own self-talk and the world we live in. The media tells us minute-by-minute how we should look, dress, and feel. We buy into this and continually believe we are not good enough. Is this realistic?
   

My pondering has brought me to a place of honesty with myself. I have eased up on my expectation of being the perfect anything. What I have come to realize is that we are who we are and that is enough and in our own way we are all perfect. Does that mean we can’t improve? No. Life is a continuum of self-improvement. The lessons we learn in the process is the reason we are in this life. It is the continual self-doubt, self-criticism, and self-shaming that sets us up for failure and unhappiness.
My new mantra is this: Pennie’s Perception of Perfection = Honesty, Health, and Happiness. I may not be the same size I was and have the stamina I had at 28, but I look and feel pretty good. I am healthy and I love my life. And guess what? My age number does start with 5… ok, 6 (dang it) and those are my knees.
Now take out your paper and pen and write the Perception of Perfection that fits you. 

Pennie's Life Lesson:
 “Our personal Perception of Perfection should be based on Honesty, Health, and Happiness.

YOUR TURN...        
Share your thoughts and experiences relating to this post in a comment below.  And please feel free to email me  at:
 [email protected]. 
                                                Thank you!  ​
                                      ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
                                                         All Rights Reserved
                                          Copyright © 2013-2022 Pennie Hunt
                             This was written and produced by Pennie Hunt.
Feel free to forward and share this post.  Please keep the entire message intact, including  contact, logo, and copyright information. ​

Growing up I never lived close to extended family. I was fortunate if I saw my grandparents once a year. My grandmother passed when I was 25. This means I saw her about 25 times in my life, and yet she made a massive impact on me. She knew how to take small amounts of time and create memories that matter.

How many times a year do you see a loved one? Let’s use a mother or grandmother, for example. If they live far away, that number may be small. Now think about how old that person is - let’s use the age of 79. The average life expectancy in the US for a female in 2021 is 82.65 years. If you only visit them once a year, then you may only see that special person 2.5 more times.
Even if they are much younger than our estimate, we never know how much time they will be here – or how much time we will be here.

Looking at it this way, time becomes more important. Every time together becomes more important. How you use the time together becomes more important. It made me think about how I use time. How I waste time. How I allow time to slip away.
At the end of every year, we all say things like. How did that year go so fast? How can it be New Year already? Time flies!

Well, here we are. Looking right into 2022. Where did 2021 go?

Ten years ago, I gave up on New Year’s Resolutions. They never worked for me… or maybe I never worked intently on them. So, I began picking a word for my year. A word I could concentrate on to guide my year. A concept I would ponder and pay attention to for an entire year.
​For 2022 I have chosen the word, TIME.

I want to be intentional about how I use my precious hours, minutes, and days. I want to pay attention when I go down a rabbit hole on the internet and come out of it two hours later. I want to limit my scrolling time- scrolling screens of other people’s lives while taking time away from my own.

I want to pay attention to sleeping enough hours. I want to pay attention to allowing myself priority time to paint, sew, read, bake, sit in the sun, walk in the snow, enjoy a cup of coffee, and do all the things I love to do.

I want to pay attention to my relationships. Who I spend time with. Why I spend time with them. Am I spending the most time with the people most important to my heart? If not, I want to change that.

I found a definition of time that reads: time can be defined as the ongoing and continuous sequence of events that occur in succession, from the past through the present to the future. Time is used to quantify, measure, or compare the duration of events.

That is what I want to do. I want to be mindful of my past, present, and future. I want to measure the duration of my events and prioritize my time spent on them by the importance they bring to my life. I want to treat each visit with a loved one like the precious time it is, because we don’t know how many more visits we will have. I want to make even small amounts of time a memory that matters.
My word for 2022 is Time.  

Pennie’s Life Lesson: Make every moment of time a memory that matters.