Saturday, February 28, 2009

focus on the positive...

I was thinking the other day.
We are so depressed because things are going backwards. That is all we are thinking about. But it is still better than some years ago. Instead of looking how many people do have a job, we focus on how many do not have one.
Because of that we are so depressed and plus the panic that was telecast by the media, we all stopped buying things at once and started the immediate downspin...
Focus on the positive and grow that. Then the moral is up and we will find ways to solve our problems. All you hear about is how bad things are. The same numbers would have caused joy a few years ago. It is impossible for things to keep going up, but we are on such a negative approach that we all infect each other with this.
In skating it seems to be the same thing.
When someone makes one or two mistakes, which is a small percentage of the total, the skater’s self-confidence bottoms out.
If you concentrate on what you do well and try to match the rest, you would feel good about yourself and in a short period of time would solve the rest. When something goes wrong , it all of a sudden encompasses our whole world. We are so programmed to see what is wrong and not what is right. It is so sad, because we are missing so much.
We always concentrate what we do not have, instead of counting our blessings to what we have.
I wonder if the Universe is trying to teach us a lesson. We need to find out what is really important in life.
As my dad always said,” you need to be content with what you have and where you are and then try to get some more.”
To be satisfied is happiness, but it seems we do not seem to achieve that ever.
I got a great e-mail today about a story in Washington where a world famous violinist played in the subway for 45 Min., on a violin worth $3,5million, .Everybody raced by and hardly noticed, Some small children were interested , but were rushed off by their parents. What else are we missing in our race thru life?
We need to listen more to our children and take time to smell the roses…

attitude towards food

I was thinking the other day, about weight gain. Until 2 years ago I never had a problem with weight and all of a sudden that changed. As they say your metabolism changes as you get older, but what I realized, that my attitude towards food changed.
When I was a kid, food was fuel. Sure there were certain things I liked to eat more than others, but it never was very important to me. Then I realized that changed. I love going out to eat with friends. I do that a lot and I order food even so I am not hungry. Then that became a habit.
When I got gasoline for my car the other day, it hit me like lightning.
The act of getting fuel is more important than driving the car!
I would never stop at a gas station when the fuel gauge is not low. That is how I was about food. I used to forget to eat until I was starving. Now I cannot remember when I was starving last, because I make sure I eat if I need to or not.
Imagine getting gas when the tank is full…
So now I am changing my attitude towards it. It has been 2 days and I already felt feeling hungry twice.
I let you know how am doing in a month!

Friday, February 27, 2009

Oh no Omi...

When my grandson Corey was 2 years old I drove back with him and his 3month old brother from the Jersey Shore. They sat in the back in their car seats as I was driving. On the Atlantic City expressway Corey started:

“Omi do you hear this?” I said “yes , honey ,they are crickets” he replied:”Oh no Omi they are locusts. I said “they rub their legs together to make that noise”

To that he replied:” Oh no Omi, they rub their wings together.”

When we got home I checked in the encyclopedia and by gosh he was right.

It is quite sobering when you are shown up intellectually by a 2 year old…

Needless to say I am extremely proud of my grandson even though my ego got a bit bruised.

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Cancer Victims unite...!!!

There are 12,000 000 cancer survivors in the United States alone , add their loved ones then take this # by 5 you have 60,000 000. Add the ones that are presently afflicted are high risk or succumbed and all the loved ones that will be affected by their suffering and the # is staggering.

When JFK announced we will be on the moon in 10 years, he started a national targeted program at NASA, that did not tire or stop until we reached that goal and far beyond. We got there quite a bit sooner than expected.

In the next 4 years they estimate there to be 2X as many cancer cases as there are now. Actually they estimate now that 1 out of 2 (50%) of men and 1 out of 3 (33.3%) of women will get cancer in their life time. Imagine the staggering number and the immense suffering…

With technology in place, we can start immediately with the targeted research and development plan . I know there is much done already, but we all need to pull together follow a common plan.

We must unite now, so we will have a loud voice.

It took 69 456 897 popular votes to get to bring about the biggest change in american history. So let's unite and we can beat that number and bring our cause to the fore front.

We must be heard before all the monies of the stimulus package are given out.

If we lower cancer mortality by only 1% it will bring $500 Billion back into the economy

Imagine:

* stop the suffering

* help the economy

* create euphoria and extreme hope amongst the population

I started a group on facebook “cancer victims unite…!!!")

Please mobilize everybody to join. We have no time to lose.!!

Saturday, February 21, 2009

shoot,Justin ,shoot...

A few years ago when my younger grandson was 2 years old, his brother and dad went to play street hockey.
Justin was in front of the goal and in possession of the puck. His dad yelled "shoot Justin Shoot"
He stopped for a second, lifted up his stick pointed it at the goal and went "poof...'
You can imagine the laughter of the group.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

European Figure Skating Championships 2009


I recently returned from Helsinki where the European Championships were held.
I was there with the Swiss dancers Leonie Krail and Oscar Peter. I was there to assist Natalia Linichuk.
I met up with many of my skating friends, which was wonderful. That is the great thing about skating, you always have something in common with old friends, no matter where life leads you...
I was very pleasantly surprised about the caliber of skating in the mens event and the top pairs.
On TV you do not get the speed. This year the emphasis of judging is on transitions and you really could see the difference in the top skaters. They actually use blade skills for transitions.
In the dance meeting we were told that the rule changes will be announced at Worlds and apparently there will be less elements required in the long programs. I hope that will also hold true for single skating. Right now, if you time all the elements requred in a program you have 3-11 seconds for communicating with an audience. ( I timed it...) This might explain why skaters now are not doing it.
If we want an audience to stay and watch, we better leave time for acknowledging that they are there.
I do have the feeling, that things are moving in the right direction. I came back from Helsinki very inspired and happy to go back onto the ice and continue my teaching...