Fist pumps of Positive Thinking

The power of positive thinking, "The Secret" and welcoming the abundance of the Universe is a concept that gets many people as stirred up as my sock drawer on a Monday morning.
It's one of those ideas which separates the squares from the squiggles in society.

In a nutshell, this whole way of thinking is based on the Law of Attraction:
"If I put out positivity, positive things will happen to me"

And this can also be applied to specifics:
"If I imagine a tall, attractive man, who rides a silver fixie bike, plays social indoor netball, has great taste in music and a pet Airedale Terrier named Albus, one will come to me"

I don't know if I have been imagining hard enough on that one, but if you see me walking around with a clenched face resembling a dried up piece of ginger, that is probably me working on it.

Nevertheless, I have consciously applied 'The Secret' and it has saved me several times.....

Left my camera on the roof of the car and drove off at Green Lake in Rotorua.
Got it back.
17kg excess luggage when I moved to Melbourne.
Flew with that
iPhone fell out when I showed appreciation for the lushly maintained grass (by rolling around) at Flemington Racecourse.
Returned, not a scratch.
Bag broke and wallet fell out at the tram stop.
Retrieved, all intact. 
(the person who found my wallet messaged me on Facebook, no bull shoes, I told myself this was going to happen)

Each time, I did not doubt for one second, think about buying a new one, cancel credit cards or tell anyone I had lost it. 
In my minds eye, I saw myself with my looking at the pictures on my camera. Saw myself walking through security of the airport pretending my overweight bag was not cutting the circulation off my arm. Imagined all the text messages I was going to have and the selfies I was gonna take when I got my phone back. Imagined opening my wallet and counting my coins.

This is how this way of thinking works.
If you go through the day thinking you are tired, you will feel tired.

If you wake up, find a fistful of positivity and give it a pump, you will feel ready to take on the world.

Just make sure you don't accidentally fist pump into your partner sleeping next to you.

"You get out what you put in" 
"You get in what you put out"
Same words, different order- but if you think about it, it makes sense for those times you have shocking days with one bad thing after another. Your alarm doesn't work, you get a flat tyre, rip your pants while trying to fix it, show up late for work with ripped pants so get a bollocking. You are more than mildly peeved. When ordering coffee in this peeved tone, the barista gets peeved and burns the milk. You burn your mouth, the coffee tastes as bad as you look, and you don't even get a stamp on your loyalty card. Then you are crookshanks grumpy and shaking your fist at the world like a villain from Scooby-Doo does at 'those meddling kids.'
And who do you thank? No one. You blame everything else.

Thank the Universe unendingly for all the uhmazing things uhround you. 
 (And thank whoever returns camera, phone, wallet, doesn't burn milk, invents stretchy pants and makes sure you wake up with a fist pump)

And I thank you for reading this, as hopefully you had as much fun reading it as I did writing.

Yay everything! *pumps fist*

Jj

A blog about not blogging.

The last time I missed a week and got the dates of this blog out of kilter, I wrote a poem. (See "A Poem." 8 August)

And now the same situation is sticking to my mind worse than peanut butter to the roof of my mouth. (Sorry to all the Arachibutyrophobes reading this.)

So what are the reasons for this untimely upset? 

Well, being in Tonga two weeks ago gave me so many wonderful experiences I don't know where to start writing about them. Hopefully the memories won't go away as quickly as my mojito/mosquito bites did.

Then the whole thing was overshadowed by having to go to Sydney to be in a reality T.V show, which, alongside giving me great exposure and almost a fantastic public humiliation; sucked the wit out of me through a curly straw. I now feel as funny as a salt shaker.

Boring as a bath mat

A frozen yoghurt is 10 times more entertaining than me, even before the topping.

All the one liners I used to say have now become 'one lamers.' You know that dissappointed feeling you get when you order sticky date pudding and it's really dry and the icecream/cream to pudding ratio is all out of balance?
 That is how I feel about not having written this blog to a proper time frame for the last three weeks.

A large quantity of women stress about stressing. 

That's what this is about.A blog about not blogging.
Since this 15 seconds of fame, I have got about 20 more followers on twitter (fist pump for the epic win), so life has had to be summed up in 140 characters or less.  When creativity has been low; 'retweet' has been the way to go.

I have been staring blankly mid-conversation; knowing that there is something mildly humorous or ironic I could say, but my brain was barren and the tip of my tongue was as sharp as a basketball hoop.

"Sharp as a basketball hoop?" Oh, Joana, you really have lost it.

Which is why I have been keeping away from my keyboard.

I have thought about writing something profound, about the lessons I learnt and the journey through the rehearsal period of the show, how this really has shown me what area I want to work in etc, and how lucky I was to be working with such a creative, funny and inspirational person. But then I remembered that I am no-longer on the show, do not need a backstory, and already had one moulten 'meltdown' of mixed emotions more than is necessary for a maiden like myself. Fortunately it happened off camera.

"The talent show took my mojo."

I can see it in headlines now.

What am I saying?

At this rate, with the amount I have been 'not blogging' the chances of my writing going further than a tweet or #extralonghashtagbecausesayingthingsinahashtagmakesthemsassier

are diminishing.

Really, the only way I can stop blogging about not blogging is to stop.

Full stop.

.

Jj

Just waiting for a bus..

When I started this blog, I didn't think it was solely going to be based on travel, yet at this stage, a fair percentage of my posts are about episodes and adventures in foreign lands.

People say 'life is not a destination, it's a journey' and for me it has definitely been a special one, not only because I have got to see and do some magical things, but whether my journey was to the supermarket or Spain, I have learnt all kinds of lessons that if I was going to try and describe would be harder than trying to smell the colour 7....

So rather than go through moment of 'you had to be there' moment, I will break the last 4 days in Tonga (an country comprising of many islands in the South Pacfic) down into posts about what I have found on this island and the treasures it will teach me. 

Right now, I'm waiting at the fale kaloa for the bus. I have been here for 20 mins and the uncertainty of whether it will actually come is rising.

If I had been waiting for a bus in a city for 20 mins, I prob would have gone to find coffee, then be on my iPhone checking various social networks. Here, it would be more likely for me to find a rooster dancing with a pig than a soy latte.

But for the first time in a long time, I can just sit and listen and see. Open my eyes and my mind to the palm trees blowing, roosters, dogs and pigs roaming and making various noises, the laughs of the locals sauntering slowly down the street, and the grunt of the old cars that come by (any time I heard an engine I stood up expectedly like someone waiting for a blind date).

It's an experience I have added to the album of mental snapshots, so when I am stressed or panicked in times to come, I can just close my eyes and teleport back to this bench.

I recommend the mental snapshot photography to everyone! Consciously push the shutter button on certain situations and you will want to give yourself a high five later.

A man with a t-shirt on his head coasted past on his bike and told me the bus was coming. And what a structure it was. The door stays open, which is a relief since there is no aircon.

A boy got up straight away and moved for me, the whole bus service is a pure example of the Tongan attitude. It doesn't have any sort of timeframe, appears to stop wherever there is someone on the side of the road standing out for it, except at one fale kaloa where about 5 guys were sitting down and the bus went straight past. The other passengers just laughed. They loved it! I don't know if they know each other but they are conversing, some are singing, others just looking out the window. 

And they all farewelled the ones getting off.

I imagine if on any metropolitan bus service I tried to farewell a random or ask to be dropped anywhere, I would get more than a few strange looks. Everything we rattled past was like seeing through a whole different set of glasses.

Most journeys that stand out in our minds are because we meet or share them with someone, go through an amazing canyon or have incredible service. This one stands out not because it's in an incredibly unsafe vehicle, but because it's in an environment incredibly simple. 

I am vaguely sure where to get off, but I am happy to do this all over again.