This morning I walked to my chiropractor’s.  The 0.7 mile walk was extremely enjoyable.  I met two women from my condo complex along the way and visited with each briefly.  Due to the hilliness of the local terrain, the walk involved some cardiovascular effort, especially while coming home, which is mostly uphill.  The county library is along the way, about half a mile from my home.  I visited the stately building on the way home, partly to cool off a bit from the late morning heat.  This time I did not check out any media, though I looked at a few movies.

 

I did the head weights at the chiropractor’s again, this time all by myself.  It was easy.  Most of the pain I had when first starting with the chiropractor is gone.  My chiropractor is a genius.  His Web site says he is rated the best of the best.  I agree.  When I started with him, I imagined I was going to die soon.  I considered the brevity of the rest of my life.

 

The walk to the chiropractor’s lies partially along a one-way street.  I walk against the traffic.  Because of this, I cannot take the same short cut to get there by car.  To get there by car, I must go through a commercial district.  Along the walkway is a beautiful residential area, multiple-family dwellings, the library, a kinder care with its playground, a park with water spouts and picnic tables, trees, flowers, bees, dogs, people on foot or lying around, etc.  Walking in the somewhat cool, Colorado, summer morning is a piece of paradise.

 

 

Most of the rest of the day I have been on the phone, getting an Instacart order ready, putting delivered food away, and eating my favorite fruit:  cherries.  My husband has been very tired.  I think he is relieved that his therapy is over.  However, he needs to do something new now and take advantage of his sobriety.  I have not been able to interest in him in a devotional, and I cannot get him to take a bath.

 

However, it is not worth my while to stew over what my husband will not do.  I did learn today that his retirement account does not have survivor benefits.  So even though I am his beneficiary, it will do me no good.  I am hoping to live here by myself once my husband passes on.  However, I may not have enough money to do so.  It appears that I will at least inherit the condo.  So that is a start.

 

 

I have been reading Seth Godin’s book, Linchpin.  I even mentioned it to my husband’s son yesterday when he came over to help us work on the estate.   I told my step-son that he was a linchpin.  He thought a linchpin was something awful at first.  Then I explained that it was someone who was indispensable.  Now that I have read most of the book, what is it going to mean to me?  Can I be indispensable?  Do I have gifts of art for others?

 

 

How can I develop and share my art?  Art is not just visual art.  It can be writing, or it can even be an interaction with a customer.  I want my writing to be something special.  Godin said that a blog can even be used to help us get a job.  Projects are becoming the new resumes.  Standard, by-the-rules resumes are boring.  If you are forced to use one, you are not likely to get a good job.  A resume I used in the past truly was a work of art.  It stood out.  I received many fine comments about it.  Hopefully, from now on my art rather than my resume is what will get me a job.

 

My cookbook is a work of art. Scarlet Night is a work of art. Emotional Wisdom is a work of art. Joyful Vibrance:  Transform Your Body Image, Energy, and Mood! is also a work of art.

 

My blog is a work of art.  Godin emphasizes one word:  ship.  You have to ship your art.  You set a due date, and you ship your art on that due date whether or not the art is finished.  There is no stalling to get your art perfect.  Shipping has not been my strong suit.  It is time to re-emphasize it.

 

Art that is not shared is not truly art.  The purpose of art is to cause a change in someone’s life, perhaps the lives of many people.  My blog is truly art in that it is a gift.  Godin talks about the importance of giving gifts that cannot be reciprocated.

 

Godin sold me on becoming more artistic, motivated, aware, and genuine.  He de-emphasized the need for strict obedience.  He said you will not become indispensable by striving to follow your boss’s instructions more and more closely.  The work of a linchpin does not go by a manual.  A manual cannot be written to describe what a linchpin does.  Trying to follow every rule in my SEO plugin is probably counter-productive too.

 

So far this month, I have worked to overcome anxiety and then to get my focus back.  Today, is the day that I start focusing on sharing my art.

 

 

The index card booklet Jacque gave me last week has encouraged me to come up with new powerful, affirmations.  I searched the Web for a great set of affirmations and found one I wanted to implement.  I memorized the affirmations, and they are as follows (with some slight modifications):

 

1.	My body is healthy; my mind is brilliant; my spirit is tranquil;
2.	I believe I can do anything.
3.	Everything that is happening now is happening for my ultimate good.
4.	I am the architect of my life; I build its foundations and choose its contents.
5.	I forgive those who have harmed me and peacefully detach from them.
6.	My ability to conquer challenges is limitless; my potential for success is infinite.
7.	Today, I abandon old disempowering habits and take up new empowering ones.
8.	I can achieve greatness.
9.	Today, I am brimming with energy and overflowing with joy.
10.	I love and accept myself for who I am.

 

 

Since reading Kevin Horsley’s book, Unlimited Memory, I am memorizing many useful things, which have changed my life.  Perhaps the most profound change has come from memorizing Dr. David D. Burns’ list of cognitive distortions.  For the past seven weeks, I have spent time almost every day routing out distortions from my thinking, casting doubt on thoughts that follow certain patterns.  I do this in The Journal with the following template:

 

1.	All-or-nothing thinking
2.	Overgeneralization
3.	Mental filter
4.	Discounting the positive
5.	Jumping to conclusions a.  Mind reading b.  Fortune telling
6.	Magnification
7.	Emotional reasoning
8.	Should statements
9.	Labeling or mis-labeling
10.	Personalization or blame

 

The beauty (and utility) of having these memorized is that I can also do this exercise in my head and often have.  Is my thinking less distorted now that I have done this for seven weeks or so?  I think it is.  If a distorted thought shows up, I can more quickly catch it.  Sometimes however, I am still tempted to believe it.  My mind has had the habit of entertaining distorted thoughts and wants to stay in its old groove.  However, knowing my list of cognitive distortions helps me shed doubt on questionable thoughts.   If I have a distorted thought but do NOT believe it, it cannot do its damage.  I believe routing out distortions in this manner has spared me a lot of depression so far.

 

 

Another beautiful summer’s day has dawned here in Colorado.  I just finished cleaning the kitchen after preparing my husband and myself breakfast.  I have yet to get in the shower, but I have set up an appointment to get the A/C recharged on the jeep.

 

My feelings this morning are mixed.  My doctor’s office staff called this morning and wanted to check my thyroid a third time.  Fortunately, if it is not at the right level, there is more that can be done.  I thought they were out of options.  

 

My weight drifted down a bit the past two days.  That is probably because I resumed my Cronometer log.  Since June 22, 2019, I have kept a complete record 71% of all days.  It is important for me to keep track of that.  I want to do a complete record at least 50% of all days for an entire year, and possibly beyond.

 

So far, here is my progress:

 

 

Goal:	Complete Cronometer Record
Instructions:	Add the food Completed to each day just before setting it to completed.  Completed is a food record that simply has 100% of a typically unused field. Run the Trends Nutrition Report and check that field each week to determine the percentage so far (from June 22, 2019). Fill out the Progress Notes: and Accomplished: each week. Forward the Progress record to the next week. Keep the same Start Date and increase the End Date by one week each week. The goal is to achieve 50-90% of all days with a complete Cronometer record for a year.  If you can get more than 90%, so much the better. Add additional extrinsic rewards as you think of them.  You can specify interim, short-term rewards, if you wish.  Unless a date is specified, the rewards are for after one year. At the end of the year, if you have achieved at least 50% of all days, you have earned the rewards. Do this for another year, if you wish, with a different set of rewards.  You may use the same start date or specify a different one. Do this as long as you wish.  You can change the rules later, if you want. Have fun!
Points:	50-90%
Filter:	use Cronometer to determine percentage
Start Date:	Saturday, June 22, 2019
End Date:	Monday, July 29, 2019
Trigger Event:	Whenever I Eat
Intrinsic Rewards:	Clarity Consistency Courage Influence Joy Necessity Productive creativity Timeliness Energetic vibrancy Wisdom
Extrinsic Rewards:	Kirkland Signature Organic Pine Nuts 1.5 lbs (2-day delivery) Black Friday 2019 – New International or Collector Barbie doll for myself or Jacque (eBay)–Consider an Irish doll for Jacque as she is Irish; Polish is also okay as she has been to Poland.
Progress Notes:	06/25/19 – 100% so far!  I lost .4 kilos last night! 06/26/19 – Still 100%, I lost .2 kilos last night, so that’s .6 kilos in two days! 06/29/19 – 100% 07/05/19 – 93% 7/13/19 – 82%
Accomplished:	7/29/18 – 71%

 

My percentage has steadily gone down, but it is still holding within my desired range.  I have kept this up for five and a half weeks now.

 

 

I have listed, as my intrinsic rewards, my top 10 values.  My ebook, Joyful Vibrance:  Transform Your Body Image, Energy, and Mood!, which you can download from this blog, has an exercise for determining your top values.  Though I have de-emphasized the importance of setting goals, I am setting some goals which support my top values.  The goal mentioned above is one that touches each and every one of my top 10 values.

 

Now that I have read most of Seth Godin’s book about becoming a linchpin, I am thinking about the values he presents:  artistic, motivated, aware, and genuine.  Would these be powerful in my own life?  Energetic vibrancy, timeliness, and productive creativity together would probably spell motivated.  Wisdom would probably encompass aware.  Productive creativity probably covers artistic.  What would mean genuine?  I used to have authentic as my central value.  That would be genuine.  Could I include authentic as value number eleven?  It is worth considering.

 

 

This weekend I started learning a tool on the Internet for mind mapping at https://www.mindmeister.com. It is a very powerful tool, which even lets you make three mind maps for free.  After that, it is a little pricey.  I have been debating over whether a tool like this would be worth the money.  I have Goalscape, which is excellent.  However, it is a little hard on my eyes as it slants text at different angles to fit into its concentric circles.  Mindmeister appears to keep all text horizontal, so it can be read more easily.

 

 

 

 

In just a few minutes, I had mind mapped the major concerns in my life, which is shown above.  When I mentally reviewed what I had mapped (without looking at the map), it was easy to remember the different branches and accompanying information.  Mind maps can be a great memory and note-taking tool.

 

I am not going to decide on whether to subscribe to it right now, but I will likely develop this map further and see where it leads.  I noticed that Seth Godin uses mind maps, which is what got me interested in this specific tool.

 

 

Seth Godin has interested me in becoming a linchpin, even though the sound of the word makes it seem like it is something awful.  I am already pretty much indispensable to my husband.  He has even said, “You are not replaceable.”  My husband is essentially my boss.  He keeps me hopping much of the time.  If I start to get resentful of all the work, I remember what my husband has done for me.  No other man has supported me to the extent he has, probably not even my father, though he was an extremely good man.

 

What I realize now that I have read Godin is that strict obedience is not ideal, even if my husband is my boss.  I must sometimes take the risk of not doing what he says in order to please him even more down the road.  I have not ventured to be disobedient very often.  However, there may come a time when I must make a critical decision for the well-being of us both.   If you have followed my blog, you probably know some possible issues on which we could differ.

 

What I have going in my favor is that my husband cannot afford to lose me.  I still have some feelings of being disposable, but they are probably not realistic.  On the rare occasion that my husband thinks I am disposable, he is probably thinking in a distorted manner.  He comes around later.  That happened last December when he asked me to leave, and I left the condo for several days and stayed with Jacque.  I did not realize at the time how readily I could reconcile our relationship.  Fortunately, I saw through the immediate problems to a brighter future, reconciled with my husband, and our love has grown stronger ever since.

 

 

What can I do to develop my art?  With this blog, I want to help my readers obtain vibrant joy.  The most excruciating challenge I have with vibrant joy is to not mistake mania for it.  Mania does not feel magnificent to everyone, but it generally does to me.  It can be so exhilarating I do not even think there is a problem.  I feel poised to finally achieve everything I want in life.  And yet it is just an illusion.  My prefrontal cortex is not functioning properly, and I have poor judgment.  I am impulsive in my decisions with severely racing thoughts.

 

At that point, I am usually on the verge of being hospitalized.  The angst over losing that feeling and being forced into treatment just when everything is feeling great is something that perhaps I have still not gotten over.  There must be another joyful vibrance that is not mania.  However, I have not found it reliably.  I am still searching.  Sometimes, I feel euphoric for moments.  Perhaps vibrant joy can only be found in moments.

 

I have thought of perhaps giving up the pursuit of joyful vibrance and being satisfied with peace instead.  Often, I do feel peace for long stretches at a time.  If I am able to manage the activities of my life, perhaps that is vibrance.  If I feel peace, perhaps that is close enough to joy.  Or should I continue my pursuit for more when I run the risk of getting manic again and thinking that is joyful vibrance?  I do not know that I will have the answer to these questions today.  Perhaps they are the concerns of everyone who suffers from manic-depression and related conditions.  The medications I take for my bipolar prevent me from getting a severe high.  However, it seems they also take the joy out of my life.  Or do they?   Perhaps I can redefine joy.  Is it possible I do not even know what it means?

 

 

Here is what the online dictionary says:

 

joy

/joi/Learn to pronounce

delight, great pleasure, joyfulness, jubilation, triumph, exultation, rejoicing, happiness, gladness, glee, exhilaration, ebullience, exuberance, elation, euphoria, bliss, ecstasy, transports of delight, rapture, radiance; enjoyment, gratification, felicity; cloud nine, seventh heaven; joie de vivre; humorous delectation; literary joyousness; rare jouissance, ravishment, jocundity “whoops of joy” pleasure, source of pleasure, delight, treat, thrill; informal buzz, kick “it was a joy to be with her”

 

This goes far beyond just feeling peaceful.  I have felt many of these things before.  Maybe I cannot give up on it.  I will keep pursuing vibrant joy, with caution of course.  There must be more to experience, even though it does not seem readily attainable.

 

Doing my exercise of gratitude and listing accomplishments helps me approximate a more exultant feeling.  Allow me to do that exercise now and see what develops.

 

my ability to write my ability to create art my loving husband my improved health since getting chiropractic adjustments cherries!

 

I love and accept myself for who I am!

 

	0-100	comments
mood:	90	Feeling better after writing for a while.
energy:	80	Got the kitchen cleaned and appointments made.

	accomplishment	reason it is important	next action(s)
1	got virtually everything moved to Colorado from Utah.	I’m not sure.  Do I really need that stuff?	Get items from storage that I really need.
2	read most of Linchpin by Seth Godin.	Becoming indispensable	Finish.
3	walked to chiropractor’s office the past 3 times	Exercise, well-being.	Walk there again Thursday.
4	started estate work with my husband and husband’s son.	Financial well-being, preparedness.	Finish the estate documents.
5	enjoyed lots of cherries!	Enjoyment!	Have more before you start on the peach season!

 

 

There.  This just makes me want to eat more cherries.  I ate many yesterday.  I only have a few left.

 

There.  I am eating them.

 

Now they are all gone.

 

Do they give me joy?  Pleasure at least.

 

 

My husband is having challenges getting his medications.  I am on hold at the hospital right now to get some questions answered.   The loud music is on.

 

I submitted my question, and the lady will get back to me.

 

Fussing with medications really seems to take the joy out of things!

 

All I can do is wait for a call, so let me think of other things.  

 

Fortunately, she later called back with more progress on getting the questions resolved.

 

 

Throughout my life, I have had quite a journey in art.  While I was in seventh grade, my teacher liked the level of detail with which I drew my shoe and singled me out to take a scholarship art class at a nearby high school.  I ventured by signing up.  However, I struggled in that class and felt self-conscious about my art work.  However, I did complete the class, and I was exposed to many different types of visual art from painting to ceramics.  If I had learned how to be less critical of my budding abilities and take the time to develop them, my history might have been different.  I took a textiles and later a crafts class in high school and did okay with them, though I must admit sewing was a challenge.

 

I did not do any art in college except for plotting a few graphics files with a graphics package I programmed.  After college, I read about drawing in a book called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards.  Using her coaching, I started to produce pencil drawings that pleased myself and my grandmother, if no one else.  I purchased an Amiga computer in 1985 and got excited about my color pixel drawings with DeluxePaint, especially that of a mystical mermaid that I determined was my alter ego.  Later, I married an artist.  He critiqued my drawings, which made me less proud of them.  He gave away my Amigas, so I no longer had that creative outlet.

 

For years, I did not venture much into the world of visual art, though I liberally supported my husband with his ceramic art.  I purchased several versions of Serif Draw Plus, but never really learned how to use them.  When I purchased an Android for the first time in 2013, I downloaded a finger paint app for it, with which I enjoyed creating.  However, I do not remember the name of the app, and when I migrated to a new Android, it did not get downloaded on my device.  Perhaps my most significant work of visual art was my collection of food photos for my 2012 cookbook, KaeLyn’s Korner Kitchen:  Complete Meals for the Healthy-Minded.  These photos required the art of photography and the art of arranging beautiful food.

 

 

Though I have never arrived artistically, I believe visual art would enhance my blog.  I have even created some art for my blog, most of it not entirely from scratch.  Visual art would enhance my art of writing, which I feel is more developed.  It has long been my intention to do something more in the visual arts.

 

 

AFTERNOON Prayer

Dear Lord,   Thank You for this day, this beautiful day of summer in Colorado.   I have been pondering on how I may become indispensable.  No one is completely indispensable, but some people are harder to do without than others.   Lord, what can I do to share my art?  I believe I need to collect a list of email addresses and do some email marketing.  I have procrastinated getting started with that, but Seth Godin says to ship your art, and ship I must.  The more lives my art can change for the better, the better.   Lord, I aim to be artistic, motivated, aware, and genuine.  These are new values to fit into my already brimming list of values.  I think my values already encompass the first three.  I can add authentic to my list of 10, to include them all.   My new list of affirmations were not difficult to memorize.  However, they are more difficult to believe and live for.  Will You help me personify those affirmations?   Mom called today and asked what book contains the cognitive distortions we talked about.  I told her it was Dr. David D. Burns’ Feeling Good.  She wanted to help a family member who is suffering from anxiety.  Though I mostly use the book for depression, it is equally valuable for people suffering from anxiety.  I suggested the family member memorize the cognitive distortions for the most benefit.   Lord, I have not done everything I intended.  However, I have now posted over 200 entries in this blog.  I want to share it with a wider audience, but even with its audience of one, me, it has changed a life.   I have not cured manic-depression by any means, nor have the symptoms gone away.  However, I believe I am getting better at managing.  When I get derailed, I am finding ways to get back on track and in a more timely manner than I have done in the past.  I wish I could always stay on track, but so far that dream has not been achieved.  However, so far, during my marriage, I have at least managed to stay out of the hospital.   Lord, I ask for a blessing on my readers.  Bless their dreams to come true.  Provide them a with way to share the art within themselves and give their gifts to the world.   Amen.

 

If you would like to join me in this journey from the beginning, please start with Day One.