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June Sunrise <3

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“The sunrise, of course, doesn’t care if we watch it or not. It will keep on being beautiful, even if no one bothers to look at it”

Today I woke up at 5:30am and watched the sun rising in the beautiful early morning sky!

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It’s always magical and never gets old. 

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(this one is edited with a “bold” effect)

And there, above, is a lovely quote about being our beautiful self even if no one cares or gives us credit. Keep being beautiful, keep shining, keep helping and loving even if no one seems to notice. 
It’s not about being acknowledged or getting credit or having a positive image in the eyes of others. It’s about being true and being the best we can be in general for others and our own selves. ❤

Much love & light to you, always!

😀

Xoxo Kim 

Earth angels <3

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(not my photo)

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” ~ Mr. Rogers

There’s always beautiful Earth angels to help us when in need and we all have the power to help, uplift, inspire in some way. It can be a sweet hug, a friendly hello, a warm smile, a helping hand, a compassionate message. It doesn’t have to be something “big” like material things, money….although that’s great too. But even the simplest gesture can brighten someone’s life even if only for a few moments. ❤

Thank You all the Earth angels who help those in need!! Whether it’s a paid/volunteer job or just in mundane encounters, thank you! ❤

Ordinary Angels – Craig Morgan – mobile

Ordinary Angels – desktop

Let’s be someone’s ordinary angel today. ❤

Much love & light, always. ❤

😀

xoxo Kim

Two kinds of beauty

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“There are two types of beauty. The one that smacks you across the face and is plastered on magazine covers. And then there’s the type that grows on you. The one you don’t expect. The one that poets and authors write about, the eternal kind.”

This isn’t my photo. While, it’s great to appreciate both kinds of beauty, I agree that inner beauty is the deepest kind and more worthy of celebration. And not just the beauty of people but of all of life. Life is full of all kinds of beauty. My word this year for the one word challenge is beauty so this is a great quote for that!

I want to remind us all to live intentionally and consciously look for beautiful people & things everywhere! 😀

❤ 😀

Much love & light,

xoxo Kim

Hey Man (now you’re really livin’) {May Sunrise}

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“Well, I just saw the sun rise over the hill
Never used to give me much of a thrill
But, hey man, now I’m really living”

This morning I fulfilled my goal of watching the sun rise and getting a picture at least one day. This is my goal for each month this year and I have succeeded up until now!

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While I love early morning(there’s something so magical about it), I’m not an early bird. It takes a lot for me to haul my ass out of bed very early in the morning, especially at some ungodly hour like 5:00am!

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I got myself up a couple of mornings just after 6:00am recently and missed the sunrise! It has been coming up around 5:30!

So today I was prepared and got myself up at 4:30 to watch out for it. It’s not always accurate online when it has the time for the sunrise. One night I checked to see and then got up earlier and it was coming up then, minutes before it was scheduled online. 

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Today I succeeded! Yay!!

My goal isn’t just to snap a pic and then share and that’s it but to genuinely and mindfully appreciate the beauty and wisdom.

Each day the sun comes up, why keep missing it! It’s a gift to be alive, a gift to have the sun coming up, and a gift to be able to see it. 

Let’s take advantage of those sweet blessings! 

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“Do you know what it’s like to fall on the floor
Cry your guts out ’til you got no more?
Hey man, now you’re really livin'”
“Do you know what it’s like to care too much?
‘Bout someone that you’re never gonna get to touch
Hey man, now you’re really living”

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(I think this is the same picture as the one above it. lol I have a different one but can’t seem to find it. Also, the first two pics in this post have a photo effect I put on to blacken the edges a bit and blur them some.)

“Have you ever sat down in the fresh cut grass
And thought about the moment and when it will pass?
Hey man, now you’re really living”

I love this song by the Eels! It’s so uplifting and encourages us to live deeply, appreciating the pleasant and the unpleasant in life.

Check it out!:

Hey Man (now you’re really living) – Eels – mobile

Hey Man – desktop

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(this one also has a photo effect)

I love how they mention both pleasurable and painful things and remind us that all of these situations allow us to truly live. 

How wonderful!  

And this one isn’t mine! But it is a stunning Philadelphia sunrise!

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I hope you are having a beautiful day/night wherever in the world you are! It’s a beautiful warm, rainy night here in Philadelphia! 

❤ 😀

Xoxo Kim 

Enduring LOVE <3

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“He drew a circle that shut me out – 
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win;
We drew a circle that took him in!” ❤

I don’t know who the original author of this lovely piece is but it’s so inspiring and full of Truth. 

“When they criticize you, love them for teaching you humility. 

When they heap scorn upon you, love them for helping you discover your resiliency. 

When they doubt you, love them for giving your dreams greater courage. 

When they point out your faults,
love them for their accuracy.

When they wound you, love them for showing you your capacity to forgive. 

When they try to stop you, love them for making your resolve even stronger. 

When they cast you into darkness, love them for helping you discover your inextinguishable light.

And when you stand victorious, when your love has conquered the impossible challenge, invite them to stand with you so they too can see love’s power and possibility.”

Love doesn’t exclude or seek revenge or resort to loathing. 

Let’s love, love, love, let love conquer the impossible, the negativity, the pain, the struggle, and include everyone into our circle of LOVE. ❤

Much love & light to you, always!

😀
xoxo Kim ❤

Furfriend <3

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If you love dogs then you’re in luck!
Here are a couple pics of my adorable boy, Woody, this morning!  
(he falls asleep with me each night and wakes up with me each morning. Always by my side. <3)
And some doggy quotes! 

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“My little dog, a heartbeat at my feet”
(or across my face!) lol 😀

“Whoever said diamonds are a girl’s best friend never had a dog.”

“He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.”

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“I love a dog. He does nothing for political reasons.”

Lol! 

“If you can’t decide between a Shepherd, a Setter or a Poodle, get them all … adopt a mutt!” ~ASPCA

“Children and dogs are as necessary to the welfare of the country as Wall Street and the railroads.”
❤

"If a dog will not come to you after having looked you in the face, you should go home and examine your conscience."
~ attributed to  Woodrow Wilson but I don't know if that is accurate. (probably not, I often copy & paste quotes and sometimes forget to remove the inaccurate names or state that I'm not aware of the accuracy of it. So much wrong info. Floating around cyberspace! And if we aren't careful, it's so easy to unintentionally perpetuate it)

"If your dog doesn't like someone you probably shouldn't either."

Lol right?! Unless your dog is one of those snippy little things who seems to loathe everyone in the world! I have a few of those!

Those little dogs are the worst!  

"The more people I meet the more I like my dog."

No, I love people just as much! ❤

"The average dog is a nicer person than the average person."

What's up with the people bashing? (I copied some of these quotes off a page that has quite a few quotes implying that people are no good) Most people I meet aren't horrible. And if we keep dwelling on how terrible people are and what's wrong in the world, it just perpetuates the negative energy and hostility. 
How about instead let's counter their hostility with love? ❤

And if we walk around thinking people are terrible, it may provoke us to have a defensive or negative attitude and contribute to us acting in ways (unconsciously or intentionally) that provoke them to act in unpleasant ways during interactions with us, confirming our view that people suck. On & on & on…

Also, by nature humans have more choices and abilities and less limitations than dogs. We can reason and think abstract thoughts. This can allow us to do more unpleasant (and pleasant) things than dogs. Like if I see someone do something I don't like, I can be rude about it, seek revenge, flip someone off, say something unkind….because my brain has that capacity. A dog's brain doesn't. It doesn't mean my dog is nicer than me. Lol 

We just have a different nature in this way. If dogs could drive cars and flip people off and yell obscenities, you know they would! Lol 
I see dogs getting pissed! They just can't react in all the ways humans can. 
It doesn't mean they are better. 

"Dogs love their friends and bite their enemies, quite unlike people, who are incapable of pure love and always have to mix love and hate."

We don't have to. And I don't "hate" anyone or anything! Hatred is destructive. Sometimes it can fuel us and motivate us to act for the better but so can love & compassion. Hatred may influence us to act out it ways that destroy or put more negativity in the world. And it can eat us alive if we let it. It is toxic energy. Compassion inspires us to act lovingly. There are things I strongly dislike in the world but "hating" it does no good. Instead I have compassion for those wronged or who are suffering but it's my compassion for them I focus on more than the dislike/hate for whatever or whoever is responsible for the misfortune. And we are not incapable! That's disempowering. We all have the capacity to love, some just have not developed it more or ignore it.
Some people argue that if we don’t hate things like injustice for example or certain kinds of discrimination, we will not be motivated to take action, to help change things for the better. It’s simply not the truth. Love & compassion are motivation enough.

We mostly all have pleasant and unpleasant emotions, thoughts, feelings….in us and like the Cherokee legend says, it's the ones we feed that win. Let's feed that love! 

"I hope if dogs ever take over the world, and they choose a king, they don't just go by size, because I bet there are some Chihuahuas with some good ideas."

Chihuahuas have big heads (not literally), those things can be quite vicious! They are usually the ones growling at me when I see them outside! Lol Woody is a pomchi (pomeranian and chihuahua mix and also part dachshund) and he does tend to get pissed off when things don't go his way! He's a yapper and a screamer! 

He often wants me to go upstairs and lay in bed with him and yells at me at the top of the stairs until I go up! 

He thinks he's a big watch dog and if he gets yelled at, he yells back! It's the cutest thing!  

And he sometimes growls at my big pitbull and takes her bones! What balls! Messing with a big bully dog! He knows she doesn't do anything back and he probably thinks he's as big as she is. 

He's the sweetest thing! As you can see in the pictures! He's sitting on me as I write this! ❤

He loves bones and toys and is the biggest beggar! Lol He's a spoiled lil thing! 

He chews EVERYTHING! He never outgrows it. All my clothes, shoes, earphones, phone chargers….ruined.

It sucks! Both him and his sister, Quinny, chew whatever they can get their little paws on.  

Woody & Quinny, especially Woody, rip my pants off when I’m attempting to walk up steps, they hold onto my legs and it’s like those dreams where we’re trying to run and our legs are like too heavy or stuck, kind of like that scene in the Fred Krueger movie where the girl Nancy is trying to run up the steps but her legs are being pulled in the muck, like quicksand.

A Nightmare on Elm Street sticky stairs scene – mobile

Sticky stairs scene – desktop

They are bad to the bone, especially Woody. Their daddy, Emmy used to be bad but he outgrew it quickly. I don’t think they will.

But it’s ok, bad dogs are the best dogs! ;-D

I think Marley’s human said something of that sort. Marley wasn’t quite the perfect angel himself, I hear.

Him & his sister will be two years old in July.

We had him since he was born:

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This is him as a newborn. Tell me is this not the cutest thing you ever saw?!

I was reading a horror fiction book, a supernatural thriller, recently one night and there are a bunch of pigs in the streets in Ireland and they were eating a human corpse (I know, eww!) and a little dog wanted to eat but the pigs are bigger and wouldn’t let him so he had to sit back and wait to see if he got any but the body was taken away. I felt so sorry for the little dog and Woody was sleeping next to me so I picked him up and hugged and kissed him, imagining the little dog in the Kindle book who was excluded! Lol 
My mom said it’s good he did not get any and imagine being licked by him if he did! 

😉

“No matter how little money and how few possessions you own, having a dog makes you rich.”

This is true. I have six (living ones) so am rich beyond my wildest dreams! 

I’m blessed! ❤

"If you think dogs can't count, try putting three dog biscuits in your pocket and then give him only two of them."

Lol true again! 

So here is one of my little furfriends! ❤

“I broke a thousand hearts
Before I met you
I’ll break a thousand more, baby
Before I am through
I wanna be yours pretty baby
Yours and yours alone
I’m here to tell ya honey
That I’m bad to the bone
Bad to the bone
B-B-B-Bad
B-B-B-Bad
B-B-B-Bad
Bad to the bone” ❤

Bad to the Bone – Geroge Thorgood – mobile

Bad to the Bone – desktop

Much love & light and sloppy puppy kissies to you! ❤

😀

xoxo Kim

The Rose <3

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(our LOVE statue moved!!!)

“Some say love, it is a river that drowns the tender reed
Some say love, it is a razor that leaves your soul to bleed
Some say love, it is a hunger an endless aching need
I say love, it is a flower and you, its only seed”

The Rose – Bette Midler/Wynonna Judd duet – mobile

The Rose – duet – desktop

This is one of my favorite songs ever. It’s a beautiful tune, achingly beautiful with a powerful message and incredible lyrics. 

I can listen to it every single day, and I usually do, and never get tired of it. 

There can be no better person to sing the song than Bette Midler. Her voice is stunning! 

In this version, both girls do an amazing job singing it, beautiful voices and passion! And it’s beautiful how they sing it together. Their friendship with one another is so sweet! Both women seem like loving and funny, lovely  ladies who are probably so much fun to know! ❤

The song never fails to give me chills no matter how often I listen to it.

It's interesting because I have loved the song for as long as I can remember but never as much as I do now. I used to listen to it when it would be playing but did not feel the startling beauty to the depth that I now do. 

Then one day recently it came on youtube and start playing right after another song I put on ended(I think a Phil Collins song). It's a live version(I don't usually like those but this I LOVE and when I love a live version of a song, I really love it, live ones can be even better than studio ones because they can be more passionate and candid along with the audience's love & passion). It struck me with its fierce beauty and I am now hooked forever. 

It's a beautiful contemplation of what love is, the different ways people define it and all of them can seem to be accurate but the best description, the true one, I think, is the one the singer describes.  


"Love is a flower and you its only seed"

I don't agree that love hurts or cuts or kills but it can seem that way. When we love someone who doesn't love us back, whether it's in a romantic or platonic way, when we love someone who dies or someone who is suffering, it can be agony. Like these lyrics, it can feel like the very soul of us is slashed and bleeding.  But it's not the love itself that hurts, it's attachment, other things mixed with love, tainting it, that feels like it's slashing our soul to shreds. Love only heals, only liberates. It never hurts. Rejection hurts, being abandoned hurts, grief hurts, loss hurts, attachment hurts and so these things involving it hurts. Those things are not love; they are just associated with it. Pure love heals. Pure love sets us free. Pure love is bliss. 

Pure love is wanting someone to be happy with or without us even if those people are with others. Pure love is letting go when we must. Pure love is giving to others, helping, inspiring, expecting nothing in return. 

Love serves; it doesn’t cling. Clinginess dilutes it.

Love is also a state of BEing, a state of living, a state of existing, an essence. There doesn't always have to be a specific target of our love. We can just feel love coursing through our veins like the very blood that sustains us. When we engage in activities we love, activities that inspire us, liberate us, we live in love. 

Love can also be an affection or feeling, a verb/action, wanting others to be happy,  when we reach out to others, to help, to heal, to uplift, to inspire… we reach out in love. Love can be self love, romantic, platonic, or universal, all encompassing love, love for all sentient beings, love for the uni-verse and all it contains, love for life itself. 

Love is a flower and we are the seeds. The seed that blossoms into love. We have the potential to bloom just like a beautiful flower. 

We are responsible for the "seeds" we plant. 
Every word we say, thought we think, action we take is a seed.

When we plant seeds of love, it's love that blooms eventually. 

When we think loving thoughts, perform loving actions, speak genuine loving words, they blossom into Love. 

We aren't responsible for what others do, only what we do. When other people do not act in a loving manner, we can still choose to act in love, live in love. This doesn't mean others are getting over on us or that we are being a pushover or don't have a backbone. As long as we live in love and don't let things outside of the self get to us, we are empowered no matter what is done to us. 


"It's the heart, afraid of breaking that never learns to dance
It's the dream, afraid of waking that never takes the chance
It's the one who won't be taken who cannot seem to give
And the soul, afraid of dying that never learns to live"

This is an important and poignant message about taking chances, being open and welcoming all that life is and can give, a reminder to love and live and to give even through the fear and pain and loss. 

It's better to take chances and lose and fall and truly live than to build up walls out of fear of losing and experiencing pain.

Life itself is a beautiful blessing and why resist it just to avoid pain? If we shield our selves against the risk of losing and heartbreak and falling then we also close our self off to the possibility of deep experience, love, all the blessings in this life. It's true if we don't take chances and risk pain then we likely won't be hurt as deeply but then we won't feel happiness or love as deeply either. 

And to experience deep love is worth the risk of deep pain & loss. 

We are blessed to be alive, let's take advantage of this beautiful gift! We can learn to live with and cope with pain & loss and still be happy. 

It's worth the chance! ❤

😀

This goes for anything, the risk of "failing" after amazing success, the risk of losing someone to a breakup or death or drifting apart, the risk of trying and not succeeding as we planned, the risk of having a great job then losing it, the risk of reaching out and being rejected…anything. To have is to eventually lose but that is ok, it's just part of living. Most things come to an end, some more tragically and unexpectedly than others but change & end is the nature of things, part of the essence of life. 
So let's cherish it while we still have it and be prepared as much as possible for when it ends. Nothing and no one is really ours forever. While it's scary and heartbreaking, it's just the truth. 
Let's experience it fully now and have less regrets and more experience later.


"When the night has been too lonely and the road has been too long
And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snow
Lies the seed that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes the rose"

Love is for everyone, not just the lucky & the strong. Everyone. ❤

With love(all love, not just romantic love), we are all lucky & strong. 

There's always hope, always love. Everyone has the capacity to love and the chance to be loved. 

Isn't this song breathtaking?! The music, her voice, the lyrics, the concept…it's perfect!  

I think of this as a universal love song. 

"Love is a flower and you its only seed"

Here is the non live version:

The Rose – Bette Midler – mobile

The Rose – Bette Midler – desktop

Much love & light to you, always! 

{——-{——@ ❤ ❤ 

~Hugs~

Xoxo Kim 

Do no harm <3

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“All beings tremble before violence.
All fear death. 
All love life.
See yourself in others.
Then whom can you hurt?
What harm can you do? 
He who seeks happiness 
By hurting those who seek happiness 
Will never find happiness.
For your brother is like you.
He wants to be happy.
Never harm him.”
(Dhammapada) 

❤ 😀
Much love & light,

xoxo Kim