Stop Rushing through life

Stop Rushing through life

Monday was a very calm and quiet day without mentioning all the running around between here and there throughout the day. What I mean when I say calm is that there weren’t any major stress causing factors. I was at ease, I felt so much harmony in my heart and soul unlike other days when I watch the news, all the turmoil going on in the entire world, deaths, crime, drug war, abuse, you name it. Those news are really energy draining and they leave me with a bad feeling in my stomach, feeling distress and despair towards humanity so Monday I decided to start out my week differently and not watch the news first thing in the morning.
I did the usual routine and everything went pretty smooth a, I got home safe and sound, started getting ready for the following day, I was stress free until 9pm when I stormed out to move my car closer to the house because I leave at the crack of dawn most mornings and it is a bit creepy when I come out so the closer my car is to the house the better.
I grabbed my car keys and being in such a rush I didn’t pay attention that I had forgotten to grab the house keys. Needless to say, it dawned on me until I tried to go back into the house. Nothing can ever go perfect! The problem is that I am a very distracted person, I always have so much going on and I always have so many things in my hands that I end up losing or breaking and dropping absolutely everything!
The problem is that there are always too many things going on and knowing me, I always want to do more work than what I can handle and the time to dedicate to myself never comes. I just realized that I’ve forgotten how to have fun and I don’t like that.
The last couple of months work has managed to wrap me around in a very tight and suffocating embrace that it is almost impossible to let go and I always leave “me” on the back burner. “I will get a facial this weekend and get my nails done, visit a new place or go out for a drink,” I say to myself. “Oh! Never mind I won’t have time, I have a dead line to meet, lesson plans to do, etc,” Now it even feels a bit ackward to go out, LOL! I’ve forgotten how to stop and smell the coffee, enjoy life and have fun. There is always so much to do and such little time that I’d love it if the days were longer to get everything done.
Many times it is difficult to get focused in one thing when we are being pulled towards another twenty directions. “Rest!” I tell myself but then I say, “naaaah! I will rest when I die.” So don’t get distracted like me. Notice where your mind is every single moment and also chose to be fully engaged in this activity – whatever you are doing at that precise moment and do everything with love, learn to take love in all the things you do.

Happiness lies within

Happiness lies within

Sunday October 24, 2010
By: Gina Roman


The phone just rang and as soon as I picked up this woman went off blabbering away at a million words per minute that I was unable to catch a single word until I said ok, “stop! Who are you and how can I help you!?” Annoyed as one can get when trying to concentrate to get something done I came close to snapping at this woman and hang up on her immediately after that because I am trying to write and have dinner at the same time. I was barely getting really into my word game here but baahm! The phone rings and I lost my train of thought! It took me a few seconds to gain my coolness and be grateful that I am home on Sunday evening doing something I like and enjoy doing unlike this poor woman on the other line so I decided to be polite and take the time to listen to her for a few minutes.
She was calling from a financial services company trying to sell life insurance and then transferred me to take a survey to rate her services. She asked me something that caught my attention which was, “are you single or married?” I said, “Single.” So she inquired “felizmente soltera?” happily single? I thought about it for a moment until I replied “pues, a veces.” Well, sometimes. Honestly speaking I can say exactly that, “sometimes.” There are moments where I think that it’d be nice to come home to someone but then I snap out of it and I panic and my heart starts beating out of control. If I were married and had children then I’d have to give up my workouts, my writing, perhaps my job, and my moments alone to reflect. Perhaps not completely but I’d definitely not have as much time for "ME" anymore. I don‘t know what would happen, maybe I’d become extremely depressed and die in agony. LOL!

When I was a little girl I used to love writing and as far back as my memory can take me, I’d always keep a diary of everything I went through, like when I rebelled against my father’s overly strict character, I felt like a bird when someone cut its wings he lost his freedom, got depressed and died. So writing has always been my sanctuary, my get away from reality for a short while so I when I get interrupted I can get very irritated and turn into a monster just like when I’m working out and someone approaches me, I know they’re just trying to be friendly or sometimes some random dude may want to hook up or see what he can get; I like to think of my time at the gym as my pedestal where no one can reach me, my place and time where I can get away from everyone and release all my bad vibes without having to hurt anyone.Ha, ha! Or when I don’t eat at my right times I want to put a huge sign saying "don't mess with a hungry girl!" When it comes to my meals of the day I really go by the clock and I get anxious when I don't eat because I don’t function well without food. I get angry, annoyed to the point where I can’t even stand myself. Yuck!
Writing is one of the best gifts I’ve ever been given and even though I don’t even come close to being a professional writer, I still love it because it helps me dig into the most profound space in my heart and get to know myself more. It helps me reflect on what I learn every day and understand many things for instance accepting the fact that sometimes we cannot have everything we want in life, perhaps because God has traced better plans for us way before we were born.
Going back to that comment “happily single,” it made me think of how easy life can be and how complicated humans make our existence miserable for no reason at all. When we want something we do whatever it takes to get it, once we are there we don’t want it anymore, we want something else, it is the same thing with relationships. We want to be with someone, we start a relationship, some of us make it to marriage, commit to this person for life and a few years down the line, “ooops, this person wasn’t the one.” The same way a child is thrilled when he discovers a new toy or another way to get entertained, he gets excited for a while but as soon as he becomes weary of it, he drops it and goes on to discover something else. At least children are the most innocent and transparent human beings in this existence and it is in their nature to behave like that. What about adults though? What excuse do we have?
Nowadays there are very few marriages that make it till the end and I wonder, what did they have to go through to survive the turmoil, the black and white, the good and bad moments together? To this day it is a mystery but I will ask a very happy and solid couple I know. I’ll call her Virginia; a few weeks ago she was diagnosed with leukemia which can turn into cancer. I don’t understand completely what is going on there and I don’t want to ask because everyone is very sensitive at this time. Virginia is one of the most positive women I’ve ever known and despite the fact she’s going through one of the worst moments she still wants to live. She’s being really strong and she is standing up to this battle against death, she’s fighting with every single particle of strength within. Her husband has been there for her every single step of the way. They love life and they are holding on to it because they are so full of peace and love each other on top of everything. That is my example of a beautiful and perfect marriage, they have overcome many obstacles together, they accept one another as they are, and they don’t care about outer beauty because as Virginia once told me, all of that comes second. The beginning stages of a relationship are all physical but that wears out eventually and it becomes second. There are a million more important things ike the moments you go through together, that's when real love is proved.
Thinking about them made me ponder about life, it is a long and intense process which brings us precise moments that touch us very deep inside and give us strength to either stop our existence or keep going with those who truly love us, accept us the way we are and are able to forgive and let go of the bad and painful moments. It is moments like these when we really get to know ourselves and allow us to find the purpose that life has for us. God manifests himself to every single one of us in different ways and I personally hadn’t felt him so close, so strong and so direct to me until last year when I had an awful wreck and I thought I wasn’t going to pull through. At that moment I neglected to see it but now that I look back, I know he was there to give me another opportunity, another chance because he has a plan for me, this plan that I haven’t been able to decipher quite yet but I keep getting closer to it day by day. I was too occupied trying to “recover” other people and things that were not part of God’s plans for me. Life has given me many opportunities and has taught me many lessons for which I am very fortunate because not everyone has chances in this long journey.
Virginia and her husband have also taught me a very important lesson; we may spend many years in life looking for happiness, we may run away from ourselves searching in a million places yet we ignore the fact that it’s been there and it’ll always lie within us.
Moments like these are priceless so let's make peace not war.

Habits to avoid

Sunday October 17, 2010


It’s 10 what!? Oh my, it’s 10:30pm and I am barely getting started on my writing. As much as I wanted to get on the ball and get to it earlier, I just couldn’t but at least I am right now as much as I’d like to hop into bed at this precise minute. This week I thought I’d have more free time on the weekend but of course I didn’t because I had progress reports due, the usual lesson plans and something always comes up at the last minute. This time the excuse is that a very dear friend of mine came over to chat with me for a “little while” but we ended up talking for about three hours!
One of the things we talked about was “bad influence” and how easily it is to get sidetracked and pulled into the wrong direction. This “bad influence” topic is something to really ponder because it always makes me wonder and ask myself whether or not it is just in our minds. Perhaps as a child, teenager or as a young adult it is easy for us to incline towards the “easiest” and “fastest” solutions, but not as an adult, not at this point in life because from the moment we decide to go with that so called “bad influence” we know what the consequences will be and we have to confront them as much as we want to avoid them. We are perfectly aware of what harms our body and mind, we know who to stay away from and who to stay close to. We are always full of excuses but why not incline towards good people, good habits and the good things in life?
Let’s stay for instance when someone starts drinking they may think that they went through the same when they were children but why not do good things for others? Plain and simple, because we are very sleazy.

But as adults we are entitled to select good and bad we are capable of deciding who and what we allow in our life. Ending 2008 and most of 2009 many unpleasant things happened in my life and I was so bitter and angry that long after I realized that it happens to every single human being. My biggest problem was that I didn’t know how to handle my emotions and needless to say that affected a few relationships and I lost some of them because I was a very negative and unhappy human being so now that I’m in control of me again I´d like to help others reach peace within.
Ten things to say no to:

1. Rushing.
2. Energy draining people
3. Negative thoughts.
4. The inner critic who tells you to play it safe.
5. Pushing yourself to do more when you feel tired.
6. Unhealthy guilt or shame.
7. A request that immediately causes you stress.
8. Second helpings when you feel full.
9. More work when you already have a full plate.
10. Living life from the neck up.
11. Not forgiving

What Makes life better?

Sunday October 10, 2010


It's Sunday again! I can’t believe another week has gone by and once again here I am, worn out staring at my computer with all my brain cells fried after having worked the entire weekend. I’m thinking, “I’m too exhausted to do anything, I don’t feel like writing or doing absolutely anything anymore but I still have another hour or two before I drop dead. I want to stop at this precise moment and head to bed to get my beauty sleep but I still have to do my lesson plans but I needed to do something before getting started so why not write!? Plus I have made writing and working out my rituals, my sanctuary, my haven a complement, a part of me.
I’m transcribing some audio interviews for a documentary about tequila that I’m working on (which I’ll give you the full scope of later on). I’m the research assistant for this film and I am thrilled because never in my life did I have the slightest clue of me doing this!
Writing helps me relax and since I’ve had enough of tequila, I came up with this list to get inspired and get others inspire as Guadalajara rates number one in suicides. Something that I constantly ask myself is, does a single human being reach complete happiness at some point in his/her life?


What makes life better?

These Golden Rules

1. Eat healthy and exercise.
2. Be around people who make you laugh.
3. Set a goal or dream that won't go away and accomplish it.
4. Be in nature and getting fresh air.
5. Sit in sunlight and spend time in nature and meditate.
6. Hug someone spontaneously
7. Accept an invitation that feels exciting and scary at the same time.
8. Rest more than you think you need.
9. Moving your body as much as you can.
10. Have an open door for those who need companionship.
11: Do volunteer or charity work
12. Spending time with a baby or child.
13: Read every night.
14: Smile all the time even despite the fact that everything seems to go wrong.
15. Be grateful for all the good and bad times and taking them as a learning experience. Taking the good aspects of the bad times and learning something from them.
16. Start off your day by Thanking God for being alive.
17. Don’t complain; be happy with what you have and don’t compare what you have with what others have.
18: Don’t get caught up in the “Keeping up with the Johnese’s”
19. Spend more time with your family.
20. Have the maturity to accept your mistakes; listen to someone else when he/she has made a mistake and give him/her another chance.
21. Learn something new every day; you can lose a loved one, something material, yet your knowledge is one of the few things you will have until you cease to exist.
22. Don’t gossip and don’t be jealous of others; start with your own expectations.
23. Be yourself. Let it rain, let it pour, let it sunshine, as long as you are yourself, you will remain intact.
24. Do a daily ritual of gratitude.
25. If you do someone a favor, don’t expect anything in return.
26. Don’t work too much.
27. If you borrow it, return it.

Life can be one of the most beautiful gifts you’ve ever been given if you follow these golden rules.

10 golden rules for every busy woman

10 golden rules for every busy woman

Life in Guadalajara seems to be happening so quickly and as much as I want to get out there and learn more about this amazing and beautiful city I don’t know where time goes. Lately it feels as if my days are not long enough and I wish there were more hours in the day so many more things could get done - or if I could only have one idle hour, I’d be able to relax and stop and smell the coffee or perhaps I’d come up with something else to do. As I get older my self-expectations get higher and it is a bit frustrating at times not being able to meet them. I must be going through the 30’s crisis because this question keeps popping on my head, “what are you going to do with your life?”
There are so many things to do, people to meet, places to go, goals and expectations to meet before I hit the big 35! Even though I am not married nor do I have a significant other sometimes I wonder if I’d be able to juggle my time between work, my workouts, my family and him.
I guess I’ll cross that line when I get to it. At this moment I have a full plate with all my goals. “and how many hours do you sleep every night? Two?” a good friend of mine asked me earlier in the week. She told me, “I have to confess something, I have always looked up to you when it comes to discipline you are my role model, I’d never said it but I really do admire you.” So this is what I said, “oh! Believe me, I have many flaws just like everyone else does, after all I’m a human being.”
The other person was one of my students, I had assigned some homework to him and to bring a handout to class but he didn’t do it. He said, “I’m sorry, I know you are very organized and you’re always on top of everything.” I said the exact same thing to him. I’m a human being and I have many imperfections.
One of the things that I don’t know how to handle is saying “no” to my mother sometimes when she wants to spend more time with me; even though I don’t have children sometimes it feels as if I did because she’s like a child, she can be very demanding. She is almost my partner in crime in this city because her and my adorable nephew are the ones I spent the most time with outside of work. Even then I may not spend as much time with them as I’d like to. I don’t even have time for myself. Here people have to work harder to make less money. Every week I want to call all my siblings and close friends more often, I want to spend more time at the gym and really focus on my Health and Fitness career, I want to be able to read more and write more articles like the magazine and the newspaper just like I did before and write more in order to accomplish one of my lifetime goals to write a book, and to have more time to better prepare for my classes (it is not like I don’t prepare but I always feel like I should do better – that’s just me with everything though), I want to take more translation courses to brush up on my skills and be a better translator, I want to have more time to study to become a sworn translator, I want to have more time to relax and do charity work, I want to spend more time with my loved ones but from the moment I get up (at 5am every day) it is nonstop until 8, 9 or 10 pm, sometimes even later, I never have one moment’s rest.
This may not be a good answer but I still manage to do a little bit of everything but this year I will decipher my plans for the future and decide what I’d like to do in a long term basis so I can stop doing many different things here and there and that will happen no later than December of this year. I already know what it is because I can feel it with my heart, something that I became very passionate about ever since I was 17, all I need to do is step up and do it and don’t look back.
This turmoil in my life inspired me to come up with this “Must” list for women.



10 golden rules for every busy woman


1) I am not on call to all of the people all of the time.
2) I have needs of my own and they may not be the same as my friends’, familys’ or colleagues’.
3) I don’t have to say yes to every request put to me.
4) I don’t have to carry on doing something just because I’ve always done it.
5) Time I spend relaxing, time well spent.
6) I know there is no such thing as the perfect girlfriend, wife, mother or child.
7) Time I spend feeling guilty could be spent doing more enjoyable things.
8) I won’t do it for others if they are capable of doing it themselves.
9) I owe myself the same care and consideration I give to others.
10) Remember at all times, especially in the face of criticism, when I’m up against difficulties and anxiety: I’m doing the best I can!