We had never left a $100 tip before. Actually it was $101. Our favorite server at our favorite dinner spot jokingly told us the table before really had him running around, BUT they left him a $100 tip, so his spirits were high-flying. After another great dinner and superb service, my husband and I joked that we should also leave a $100 tip and make it the best night our server has ever had. While we're at it, we chuckled, let's up the ante by $1, just to be his favorite customers of course.

We really didn't have an extra $100 laying around, but I promised my husband that I would deposit $100 of my cash sales that I made from selling all the baby stuff (I can't believe how much baby stuff I had). Planning on buying a new rug with the baby sale money, I decided I'd much rather make our server's night instead. After all, he had always been so good to us.

Our bill came. Total for dinner: $38.80. That made a 270% tip (I hope I did the math right; I can never remember which way to divide it). We left laughing and visualizing what his reaction would be. It was pure fun to give it.

Last weekend was the first time we'd been back to our favorite dinner place. We, as usual, requested to sit in our favorite server's section. He laughed and greeted us with: "You guys are ridiculous!" We snickered and pretended we had no idea what he was talking about.

Our dinner came: halibut with butternut squash. My husband and I chatted about the kids and work, the two things we were trying to get a break from and then finished our meal with a small dish of ice cream. Our server places the bill on our table, holds his hand on it to make a point and says: "What goes around comes around. Dinner is on me." We tried to argue with him, but he left smiling, enjoying the surprise he just gave us. My husband kept saying how amazing it was that our server bought us dinner. Completely unexpected, I would add. We were both taken back at his thoughtfulness and generosity.

This morning I bought a vanilla latte for my daughter's second grade teacher as a thank you (he loves coffee). Pulling up to the window to order, I noticed a tip jar sitting on the edge of the window. "Tips are Karma!" it read (and yes, I took a picture of it with my iPhone). Surely that is true as with anything we give. What goes around comes around.

Yesterday I took my husband to my favorite little teashop in a quaint part of town. It’s one of those teashops located in an old rundown building that at first appears to be a bit scary. But upon entering, you feel the ambiance of a totally hip renovated shop complete with a water feature and a large golden Buddha. While ordering our spiced chai with blended ice (pretty much the most delectable tasting smoothie-like drink in all the world), a stocky man enters with a stack of books in his hands. With the look of a graduate student pulling an all-nighter, he takes a seat at a nearby table, placing his books carefully down.  My husband, instantly intrigued, notes the titles of the books, one being: “Teaching Peace.” Pretty cool, we both think.

We sit down waiting for our chais to blend up, when we notice the man beginning to talk to himself. Hot tea is brought to him in an old-fashioned teapot. He pours the hot water into his cup. Looking straight ahead, he continues his conversation. After a minute, he gets up and grabs several packets of white sugar, sits down and in deep thought again continues talking with someone he is most likely seeing, but we are not.

This man is probably suffering from schizophrenia, I casually mention to my husband, a disorder making it difficult to differentiate between real and unreal experiences. It was intriguing, however, to watch this man associate and connect with something not real. He exuded sincerity and I speculated he must have been discussing peace with his phantom friend and how to spread this message to the world.  More importantly, it was interesting to see how he was completely unaware of his delusion. In his world, everything he was thinking and seeing was real.

My husband commented to me how difficult it must be to live this way. I paused, reflected and explained that to some degree we all do.  We tend to believe our thoughts and often act accordingly. How about the thought: “I’m a worthless person”? When one believes this thought, one might feel depressed and fail in their health, at work or in their families. How about: “I’m nothing without the person I love”? When one believes this thought, one cannot find their inner strength and power. “I’m a terrible mother.” This thinking leads to giving up when life gets a little tough. “I’m too old to start over.” This drains you from the passion that still resides in you. What thoughts are you believing?

Truth is, when we believe our thoughts, most of which are simply broken records there to debilitate us, we are no different than the man we would deem crazy. At least he is reading books about peace. Are we even searching for that or are we completely identified with the voice in our heads that create confusion, chaos and stress?

Thinking is there to help us create, not to cause mental illness that comes from repetitive dialogue in the mind.  If you’re not using your thinking to create something, you’re in the realm of schizophrenia. Thinking about the past, worried about the future, over-analyzing an issue, reliving an experience over and over again — all qualify. If it’s not happening now, you are making up stories. And likely those stories are not between you and an imaginary friend. Those stories are between you and your life. Your schizophrenic thoughts are stopping you from living your life fully and seizing the opportunities that are awaiting a fresh mind.

Fortunately, you hold one vital element that a mentally ill person does not have: awareness. Although the man at the teashop may never become aware of his disorder, you can. Simply by recognizing the thought, you can overcome it. By bringing awareness to it, a little space is created between you and the thought and that gap is all it takes to let the delusion pass. What is left is unyielding pure power to create your life as you desire. And that is as real as it gets.

With black volcanic rock petrified below our feet, we traversed the rocky canyon trail surrounded by red mountain cliffs. Not knowing where we were headed and really not caring either, we came to a cross roads. Should we take the Three Ponds Trail or continue on the Hidden Pinyon Path. Deciding the latter sounded more mysterious, we continued the course stepping through red sand and protruding rocks. At times we would stop to take our photo with my iPhone in front of some amazing red cavern. Or we’d have to hold each other’s water bottle, so we could jump down the three foot drop between massive boulders. Novice hikers we were, we joked about how “die-hard” we’d become in the hours we spent hiking through Snow Canyon, Utah – a spot home to the internationally acclaimed destination spa where people come to find inner strength and purpose. We weren’t staying at the spa, but we were lucky enough to share the same serene spot for a few days. Perhaps we’d find ourselves too.

I don’t know how many times we said in pure amazement: “Wow, this is so cool!” or “I can’t get over this!” But one thing was for sure: We were in pure bliss. Two ladies in our early 30’s venturing out into what seemed like the wilderness to us… Yes, we jumped a few times when something sprinted through a nearby bush and yes, we contemplated what to do if we saw a rattle snake, which we knew were out there. But really the only thing that made me run for my life was a buzzing something near my ear. And besides that lonely sprint, we didn’t have a care in the world. This was refreshing for us, since we’d both come to this hike carrying our own unique but similar burdens.  

Coming to the trails end, we couldn’t believe our eyes. A lookout point covered with big slabs of volcanic rock, a visual reminder of how this canyon once flowed with hot lava perhaps from a nearby volcano now dormant and ancient. You could see how the lava literally poured over the cliff’s edge, dripping down into the 50 foot or more drop and creeping to an end as the lava cooled, slowed and dried. We sat at the edge, feet dangling and awe struck as our necks turned from one side to the next trying to take in the panoramic views of tall red cliffs with white limestone mountains in the distance, which christened the name: “Snow Canyon.”

It was then that my sister-in-law turned to me and said: “This makes me feel so small.” And it was in that very moment that I perfectly understood the power of nature in regards to finding ourselves and our true power, a mystery I’ve contemplated for years. It’s not that you “find” yourself; you actually lose yourself. You lose the life you think you have. In viewing the grandeur of nature or even in noticing a small flower along a busy street, you and your stories grow small. Your worries, your issues, your ego, the things that hold you back… become insignificant. And then oddly enough, something inside you enlarges. Some say this is your soul or your spirit or your aliveness. Whatever you want to call it, it grows in the presence of nature. Maybe this happens because you are connecting with all that is and no longer attaching to what is not, like distorted perceptions, living in the past, worrying about the future, mental conditioning, things that only exist in the mind. As your life and worries become small, the real you becomes big. This is your true power derived from presence. Love, peace, non-judgment, unity, oneness remains. Now imagine living like this all the time. It is possible and nature is a reminder of that.

As we sat there taking this in, I made a simple comment, but maybe it was a request. “I can just imagine a Native American standing upon that mountain calling out to us,” I said as my sister-in-law nodded in agreement. A minute later, no joke, we heard a noise. At first we were alarmed. Was it a coyote howling? A bird? And then within a few seconds we realized that in the distance on another hill a man stood on the mountainside playing a Native American flute. It was the beginning of a Tai Chi class getting underway as part of the destination spa. We looked at each other, laughed in bewilderment, and then felt even smaller and more enlarged listening to the flute echo through the canyon.

Kids always tell the truth. My four-year old, Brooklynn, just grabbed my hand and said: "Your hands look like a grandma's." I would love to explain to her that it's because I live in a high desert and no matter how much lotion I put on, they are dry and cracking. And I could also mention that I am constantly washing my hands because "somebody" still hasn't learned to go poopy in the potty. Instead, I simply agreed.

This followed last week's comment while we were swimming. I was wearing my new swimsuit, actually feeling pretty good about myself, when my six-year old, Jillian, pointed to my thighs and asked: "Why is that so bumpy?" She of course was referring to my less-than-perfect, post-giving birth and going from huge-to-normal and huge-to-normal-again legs. I wasn't feeling "so good about myself" any longer and found myself saying the exact thing my mom used to say to us when we poked her belly and said it was soft like a pillow: "Well, they are so bumpy because of having you two." I always thought my mom was saying that as an excuse and even if she was, I'm still using it.

When I told my mom the story, she surprised me. She told me not to do what she did for so many years. "Don't worry about how your body looks after having kids. You'll turn around and realize you spent 40 years concerned about it. What a waste."

This reminds me of an experience I once had with my dad. I was five-years old and it was a big deal when my dad wanted to spend time with me. We went to a beach on a hot summer day and as we sat on the big beach towel, he pointed to women walking by. "Look," he said as a larger woman walked in front of us. "She is beautiful with all her curves." Another woman walked by, this time short and stauky, and he said, "See how pretty she is." This continued as 10-15 women of all shapes and sizes strolled by. Even at such a young age, I got what he was trying to teach me. Your body is beautiful.

Brooklynn recently came down with severe modesty. She had to be in a bathroom with the door completely shut and locked before she'd let me get her dressed. She wouldn't even get dressed if the cat was around. I'd simply say to her each time she forced the door shut: "Your body is beautiful." A few days later, she allowed me to get her dressed in front of her sister. She looked up and said to Jillian: "My body is beautiful - OK?"

Brooklynn is no longer scared of getting dressed. In fact, on that day at the swimming center when I wasn't feeling so well after my six-year old's comment about my thighs, it was Brooklynn who spoke up and said: "Mommy, I think your body is beautiful."

I’m a big American Idol fan. It’s really the only adult TV I get to watch. My kids know on Tuesday and Wednesday night for one to two hours, I get to do nothing but watch my show. As I’ve watched American Idol all these years, I’ve come up with some rules or theories about the show. Each night, one of these unsaid rules gets broken and I wonder why some of the contestants haven’t figured these out yet. So, for the current contestants and for all future contestants, I want to let you in on these, so you’re not standing up on the stage looking confused when the judges tell you that you sound like a rehashed cruise ship singer.

-- When the show goes “live” for the first time, do NOT sing a slow song. You have to sing a powerhouse song. You gotta make us love you the very first night out. You’ll create a huge following out-of-the-gate. Sing a ballet 3-4 weeks into the competition to show your soft side.

-- If you are singing first, it means your performance is good, but not great. If you are singing second, it means you have the worst performance of the night. Try to avoid slot two.

-- If you are singing last, it means you have the best performance of the night. The only time this rule gets broken is if you also had the best performance last week. They will then move you to third to the last or thereabouts, so you are not singing last two weeks in a row. In this case, the second to best performance then sings last. If you’re really good, you’ll get to sing last 2-3 times during the season.

-- If you are singing first, be warned. You may be in the bottom three, because no one can remember you by the time the show ends. If you are singing last, you will not be in the bottom three, because everyone will remember you and you were the best anyway.

-- Have a sad story, so voters can get behind you. Show them you’ve been through “something” and therefore deserve to be there. This is how you make an emotional connection with the audience.

-- Have a personality. You gotta make people laugh or feel something. During your video presentation before each performance, make us laugh (or cry). Then during or after the judges' remarks, say something witty and fun. Make us smile! Whatever you do, don’t “promise” you’ll be better next week if America votes for you. Show us why to vote for you instead. It only takes an extra funny comment and we’ll pick up the phone.

-- No matter what, under no circumstances will you become proud and tell the judges off. Never. Don’t even try this. It will always backfire on you. We want to vote for someone who is humble and willing to take criticism. The moment you talk back to the judges, you will be in the bottom three. You don’t always have to be gracious either. You can laugh about it too! Being able to laugh at yourself shows you are comfortable in your own skin.

-- When Simon tells you that you did a great job, we want to see you jump for joy. Really get excited. That always makes us smile and we will vote for you, because we want to see you succeed too.

-- You have to make the song “your own” or you will sound like a wedding singer or wanna be. This is how you do it: 1. Do not sing a song just because it’s your favorite song. 2. Pick a song that has a big ending. That makes us excited and shows your range. 3. Sing only a song that you would put on an album of your own. 4. If you are a girl, consider a song originally sung by a man and vice versa. 5. Don’t dress the part and don’t mimic the original singer in any way. Be yourself always. 6. You can show versatility, but don’t leave who you are in order to do so. All of these things will make a song “yours” and show the judges you are unique, interesting and on your way to stardom.  

-- Don’t sing a song that is 20 years old if you are a teenager. Choose a current song, but make it your own. If you have to choose an old song, make it current. Again, only do the song if you would put it on your album. This is how you know it is current.

-- If you can’t dance, don’t try. A controlled performance is better than awkward movements. Trust me, you’ll get judged on your dancing instead of your singing and everyone will be embarrassed.

-- Become friends with Ryan Seacrest. I don’t know how you do this, but I’ve noticed that Ryan is more chummy with certain contestants (but please, don’t kiss up to him; he’s smarter than that). If he likes you a lot, he’ll try harder to “sell” you at the end. So, figure this out and get on his good side. I like Ryan, by the way.

And last, but not least: You don’t have to win to become famous. If you are true to who you are and we like that, you’ll make it regardless if you become the next American Idol or not.

MY PHOTO ALBUMS

MY RECENT POSTS