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A Season of Love: Three Weddings and A Silver Anniversary

By Bernette
on Sep 17, 2018
in You

This summer I attended three weddings and celebrated a matrimonial milestone of my own. I will always remember 2018 as A Summer of Love.

The edges of tree leaves are already tinged with their fall colors. Reflecting on the events of this summer, my memories of it are tinged with love in many stages and outward expressions. I have witnessed countless relationships develop, blossom, unfold and mature–including my own.

Silver Anniversary

My partner and I celebrated our 25th Wedding Anniversary this summer, so love and marriage have been at the forefront of my mind. It’s no small thing to be with another person year in and year out! Our relationship has been the source of countless joys and victories. Our relationship has survived the deaths of three parents, many moves and changes. We’ve raised two children who are on the verge of leaving the nest. We’ve both faced countless challenges, setbacks. Though we may annoy some people with our seemingly endless inside jokes and our shared “wife and husband shorthand,” we have not and will not always agree on everything–we are two separate people after all! But at the beginning and end of every day I am still overwhelmingly grateful to have shared these years with my best friend. Bonus: he and I are both marriage experts–for real!

Now, in midlife, I have not had the honor of being able to celebrate weddings as frequently as in my earlier years. Not only do I like celebrations and the unique melding of the traditional markers of love unions with each couple’s personal touches, but it is a great honor to be asked to be present on the occasion of the solemnization of a couple’s decision to walk the planet together, come what may. During the Summer of 2018 we had the honor of being invited to witness three beautiful nuptials and each was as distinctly perfect, as each couple were stunning.

Grown & Dapper

One wedding was that of a brilliant, kind and dapper family friend who exchanged vows with his beautiful bride in a very modern and soulful church ceremony. From the church pew, their fondness for each other was palpable and it was clear they were both tickled to be able to commit to the person they cherish most in the world. He has been a wonderful friend to us and an indispensable and active member of my faith community. Celebrating one of the best days of his life (so far!) with him and his true love was pure goodness.

Cherished & Shared

My gorgeous sister-in-law joined hands and shared her marriage vows with the love of her life, before a lattice covered in vines and summer blooms in the backyard of their home. The ceremony officiated by her mom. Dear reader, I want you to know that by “backyard” I mean that they transformed the area behind their home into one of the most elegant outdoor wedding venues I have ever been to! She and the groom were radiant, and absolutely cherish and adore each other. It was such a heartwarming feeling to share the day filled with the love that all who were gathered feel for them and their beautiful family.

Beloved & Bespoke

A former co-worker and his partner are two of the kindest and socially conscious people I know. Their wedding was at a sprawling landmark and the couple encouraged guests to use a hashtag to share memories of the day. Because our workplace had been very casual, they are both millennials and being on the west coast, I was surprised and delighted to see both of them decked out in the sharpest pair of identical suits that surely had to have been tailored from cloth woven with them in mind. Their officiant gave a beautiful message that included readings from Loving v. Virginia and Windsor v. U.S., before leading the couple in a sand ceremony that echoed the blending of the cultures of their families as they joined together their lives.

A Wish

So yes, I enjoy weddings and I appreciate what a huge honor and great privilege it is to celebrate each couple’s wedding day. It is also my duty to wish each couple a good life together. Have you heard the saying “every funeral you attend is your own?” I don’t think every wedding is my own. Instead, every wedding I celebrate is a wish for the kind of love I hope everyone can experience. Pure, focused Wedding Day kind of love. Now I am not saying that everyone should get married or that marriage is the only way to experience love, because it isn’t. Marriage isn’t for everyone, but love is for anyone. Whether you are married or single, younger than many, or older than most–may you and everyone you know have the kind of love in your life that makes you feel beautiful, adored, cherished and blessed!

Photo by Bernette Jenkins-Pleas

International Self-Care Day

By Bernette
on Jul 24, 2018
in You

The International Self-Care Foundation designated July 24^th as International Self-Care Day. That date was specifically chosen in 2011 so that it would serve as a reminder that Self-Care is an always-on sort of thing. Well, because, like, you know, many parts of the world write this date as 24/7. . . .

What is self-care? The World Health Organization defined it as “what people do for themselves to establish and maintain health, and to prevent and deal with illness.”

To some, self-care has to do specifically with over-the-counter medicine and self-medication. In 2014, The United States Senate unanimously passed Resolution 515 designating July 24, 2014 as International Self-Care Day. No doubt support for its passage was motivated by the economic benefits of self-care. Researchers who compile these sort of findings determined that there are indeed measurable monetary benefits from undertaking self-care. The resolution states that every $1 spent on OTC medication saves up to $7 in health costs.

Medical and mental health care are essential to well-being and in my experience, practitioners often talk with me about actions I can take in the time before the next checkup or appointment. There are many components to self-care that are the perfect complement to professional medical and therapeutic treatments. Self-care includes many lifestyle choices and engaging in behaviors to meet our needs, from the most basic to complex. There are limitless options for self-care, for every time span, budget and situation.

As a mom, I nearly always have at least one area of self-care that needs more attention. I’ll get into the zone on a project, and skip trips to the grocery store and end up ordering out more often than I’d intend to. My daughters are in their mid and late teens now, but when they were younger, I didn’t seek support as often as I should have so I could have time to myself or date nights with my husband. Getting enough sleep, practicing faith, nurturing social interaction, unplugging from time to time and regularly following professional health recommendations are some ways that you can care for yourself. But as Maya Angelou said “when you learn better, you do better.” I’ve learned! I practice much better self-care than I used to.

Della Rae is an entrepreneur, Self-Care Expert and host of the radio show “Bread and Roses” who has recently began a role with the Oregon Women’s Health Network. Throughout Della’s life’s work is woven the common thread of self-care and women’s empowerment. She is the author of several books, including Little Book of Self-Care and is a relentless advocate for women’s self-care. I’ve met Della and can say that she walks the talk. Take a look at “The Self-Care Creed.” She is the presenter of the 2^nd Annual International Self-Care Day Celebration in Portland, Oregon. The event is taking place to encourage everyone to practice self-care and to share stories of women who have used self-care to triumph over trauma.

Olga Phoenix is a Psychology Doctoral candidate and creator of the Self-Care wheel. She is an expert in wellness and Self-Care who brought all of this information together nicely with the creation of this tool. You can get your own copy here. Olga’s website describes her work as a Trainer and Expert Consultant helping providers of trauma assistance use self-care to navigate the pitfalls of vicarious trauma and burnout. Though she may have devised the tool for professionals who help survivors of harm, there are sound ideas on the wheel that anyone can use.

Self-care is both a vital tool and a foundation for wellness. As humans, we are fortunate to have many physiological safeguards hardwired into us that can alert us about needs that must be met: thirst and shivering are examples. But as we move further up the hierarchy of needs it can be tougher to identify the form of self-care we seek. A few thousand years ago, bands of hunter-gatherers needed shelter as much as we do today, but they didn’t have to force themselves to stop scrolling through Pinterest late into the night. For each of us in this age, good basic self-care practices can provide a platform to allow us re-balance and restore ourselves while we evaluate and address more complex needs.

Have you ever been in a situation where you needed a flashlight, but didn’t have one? Or maybe you had a flashlight, but the batteries were dead? Don’t let that happen to you in the area of self-care! Have the flashlight. Charge your batteries. Right now, I ask you to take a moment to put together a plan for self-care. What is one thing you can do if you have five minutes for self-care? An hour? A weekend?

Happy Self-Care Day.

Photo by Leighann Renee on Unsplash

I’m Going to Eat An Elephant!

By Bernette
on Jan 03, 2018
in You

Q: How do you eat an elephant?
A: One bite at a time!

This is a riddle that you have probably heard many times. Yet it bears repeating. New Year’s Day is a time to not only set goals but to get encouragement from words of wisdom, revisit lessons learned and to polish off the tools we already have on hand to help us accomplish those goals.

What’s the best way to set goals? While there are countless ways to set goals, a classic goal setting tool is the acronym SMART which means a goal should be:

S – Specific
M – Measurable
A – Attainable
R – Relevant
T – Time-bound

Specific
Be as specific as you can:
If you are thinking: “I want to spend more time with friends.” To be more specific you could declare: “I will plan an outing with my two closest friends one weekend each month in 2018.”

Measurable
That which gets measured gets done. Tracking your goal provides a record of your progress and planning regular increments of time to measure progress should be one of the first steps you take. It can be as fancy or as as simple as you like. If your goal is to take up jogging, you could wear a fitness tracker, but you might find it more fun to get a piece of paper and add a sticker to it for each mile that you log. Increments are the “bites.”

Attainable
Of course the sky’s the limit! However, you have determine what you need to do to get there. Prayer, manifesting and visualizing are all important to keep you focused. Along with those tools, your own action is the most valuable resource you have available. A lifelong wish to be a professional musician will not probably not come true on its own. But pairing a goal to log a certain number of hours to gain musical skill with a goal to contact a certain number of potential venues could lead to a paid performance opportunity.

Relevant
Why are you setting a goal? Why does it matter to you? Write it down. In fact, you should write at least two whys per goal! On days when you’re tired or tempted to forgo taking even the tiniest of baby steps toward your goal, read and re-read this list. If you are going through a slump or weary from rejection, your why can help your remember why you your goal matters, so you can keep going.

Timed
Just as measuring can help with accountability setting a deadline can be just as valuable in completing a goal. A timeline converts dreams into goals.

Hopefully, you are reminded of wisdom and something you’ve read here will propel you toward accomplishing your goals. I’ve set several goals, and I’d like to share one with you along with its SMART point.

(S) My goal is to read 100 books this year. (M) I can count the number of books and will keep a running log in my planner. (A) To attain this, I have blocked out time to read. I must read roughly a book every other week. (R) I’m doing this because I enjoy being transported or informed by books. I find it very satisfying to read. (T) My deadline is December 31, 2018.

Happy New Year. Without further ado, I will eat an elephant.

Photo by MarcoMaru at Morguefile.com

Use What Mother Nature Gave You: 5 Facts of Life That Could Help You Land The Opportunity of a Lifetime

By Bernette
on Jun 10, 2016
in You

There may be some situations where opportunities seem to just leap into our paths, but like birds of prey we probably have to hunt for the right opportunity. Whether you are researching potential employers, seeking sales leads, networking, or pitching to targeted clients there are many applicable lessons nature teaches.

Collective Intelligence

As human beings, we are equipped with the power of choice, large complex brains, moral codes, and more. Access to modern conveniences mean we generally don’t have to spend a significant proportion of our lives finding food, and our long gestational periods, and the high survival rates of our offspring translate to a relatively low number offspring. We are interconnected, and I am impressed by large extended families that can live harmoniously in close proximity and pool resources. But in my experience, members of the same family are fore more likely to maintain separate households and make life choices independent of on another.

In contrast, wasps have much smaller brains than we do and unlike humans, they live in colonies populated by their relatives and don’t leave the nest. Led by Professor Sean O’Donnel, PhD, researchers at Drexel University studied the wasp societal structure and found that while the brain of each individual wasp is small, collectively the brains of wasps support the existence and success of the colony. Colony-dwelling insects are so in sync and with complete devotion they work toward a common purpose to such an extent that it as if an entire colony is one ant!

Collective intelligence can teach us about the power of actively participating in networks. Working alone, you will probably eventually uncover information leading to what you seek. But a network is a form of collected intelligence. The more you network, the more likely you are to uncover ideas, learn about companies, share information, get leads, and accelerate the pace of learning what it takes to thrive in the marketplace. Perfect your resume, polish your interviewing skills, and be willing to demonstrate how you will be able to support the ongoing success of all members of your network.

Make Yourself Larger

Besides being the star ingredient in sashimi fugu, a dish which can be fatal if not properly prepared, the puffer fish or blow fish is equipped with the ability to puff itself up in times of danger or distress. Some male amphibians and birds also puff up or display full plumage in order to catch the attention of a mate.

In a TED Talk, Harvard professor and social psychologist Amy Cuddy says that we humans instinctively cast our arms in and upraised wide manner when we feel victorious. But, she says we don’t have to wait around until a deal is struck or until an interview is over. We can induce feelings of well-being and confidence simply by assuming a posture of power. As a job seeker you can raise your arms in a a victory pose in the privacy of your home or car before an interview or marketing pitch.

Be Eager

We are all born with talents. But how do we apply them? Strengths and gifts have to developed and put to use to make us industrious prosperous. Look at the beaver: bestowed with super strong teeth, beavers thrive in wetlands and have been known to persistently divert water much to the chagrin of developers. Beavers have been known to enlarge ponds, change the flow of streams and rivers. Swedish researchers concluded that beavers are born with the ability to create dams. A group of beavers that had never had access to building materials or the opportunity to build dams was able to build a dam similar to the dam of the control group. In the wild, young beavers work alongside older beavers within their social group. The young ones do okay on their own, but with guidance they become master builders by working shoulder-to-shoulder with master builders.

What can we learn? Internships, apprenticeships, co-ops can all be excellent opportunities for skill-building. Having the wisdom of a trusted advisor can help you better yourself. Enlisting a mentor might be a good idea. Identify someone who might be able to help and ask them to help you. Don’t know anyone who fits that description? According to entrepreneur Paul Carrick Brunson, it is possible to be mentored by a person you’ve never met personally. No matter the circumstances, seek guidance and as you develop your career make yourself available to others who might need a mentor in the future.

The Power of Attraction

Pheromones are hormones released by an animal in order to affect the behavior of other members of its species. Dogs, cats, mice, moths, and ants are among the many members of the animal kingdom that secrete hormones. Animals release pheromones to signal the desire to mate or to communicate the route to food sources. Have you ever seen an ant trail? Pheromones. Or perhaps you’ve witnessed an unspayed female cat that seems to attract male cats from afar. Again pheromones.

Net worth, value and reputation are all signals business send out to the economy. In this case, the business or company doing the hiring seeks to maximize its chances of success by attracting the most desirable customer and the most strongest available talent. Stock prices, annual reports, branding, low workforce turnover rates–these are all bits of information employers send out into the economy. Job seekers have the dual task of detecting these signals and sending signals of their own out to the job market. How? Let people know what you are good at and that you are available. Being aware of industry developments, researching the company, stories that are evidence that you can do the job they need done can potentially influence businesses to hire you.

Tap Into Your Inner Guidance

Have you ever seen video of salmon swimming upstream to spawn. Or maybe you are lucky enough to have witnessed this spectacle live. Salmon have a reliable ability to find precisely the stream in which they were spawned many seasons prior. To return there to spawn young of their own, salmon swim against the current often leaping out of the water, at the risk of easily being eaten by predators. Wouldn’t it be easy for them to just, you know, head to the nearest calm bay, do the deed, then head out to smoother, less perilous waters for some seafood to celebrate the continuation of their lineages? And how do they re-trace their steps? Oregon State University researchers have found that salmon are able to locate the tributaries of their birth by imprinting on the earth’s magnetic field.

If you find yourself looking for work, it is important to assess all of your values, and your strengths, in order to find the best fit to use your all. Use these to guide to your next step. Like salmon swimming upstream on a mission fraught with obstacles all for the purpose of reproducing, a candidate in any market has to do some soul-searching and determine her own purpose and her own mission. With clarity and focus you too can locate exactly where you need to journey to. Expending energy to land clients or the right job is tough, so check where your gifts and strengths are guiding you. Finding a good fit can feel like swimming upstream, as you press forward in the face of obstacle after obstacle. People don’t have to wait for the same timing cues that salmon follow. But be like a salmon during this process so you can find a way to pursue your mission and use your talents where you will flourish!

Besides being fascinating, animals can teach us many lessons from the skills they use to adapt to and exist in their given environments. We humans though have the extraordinary opportunity to go beyond mere survival. Once our basics are covered we can choose what to do to enjoy the lives and connections that we build.

Photos

Falcon kincese_j CC Zero

Wasps, Beaver Qedem1611 via Morguefile

Puffer fish KevinYi CC Zero

Salmon dannymoore1973 CC Zero

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