I never Thought

Can I touch you?
I can’t believe that you are real
How did I ever find you?
You are the dream that saved my life
You are the reason I survived

I never thought that I could love
Someone as much as I love you
I know it’s crazy but it’s true
I never thought that I could need
Someone as much as I need you
I love you…

Can I hold you?
Girl your smile lights up the sky
You are too beautiful for the human eye
You are the dream that never dies
You are the fire that burns inside

I never thought that I could love
Someone as much as I love you
I know it’s crazy but it’s true
I never thought that I could need
Someone as much as I need you

 

woman in black crew neck shirt

The First Thing You Need to Do If You Want to Change Your Life

“Awareness is the greatest agent for change.” ~Eckhart Tolle

There are two ways to live life.

One is a more reactive approach, where you fight back when you encounter challenges in your personal or professional life. The other is a more proactive one where you are mindful of the trends within you and around you and ready with your surfboard whenever a big wave hits!

The only difference between the two is awareness.

Awareness empowers you to make conscious choices based on an understanding of yourself and the situation, to notice what your choice created, and to then choose again. This is why awareness is powerful. By becoming aware, you are snatching control back.

Merely observing your thoughts and behavior can spur positive action.

Big words. How am I so sure?

Just by tracking my sleep, I was able to gain insights into what aids my sleep and what disrupts it.

When I started tracking my food, I realized calories don’t matter but macros do. I then changed how I consumed food.

Journaling allowed me to observe my mental chatter and learn from it. It made me aware that most of my anger and frustration stems from lack of sleep, food, or water.

Tracking my finances made it easier to make tough calls with my spending.

I didn’t make these changes overnight. They took days and months of being aware before the changes actually happened.

Awareness is knowledge. Knowledge gives you power. Power makes it easier to change.

In the absence of awareness, you react mindlessly to your surroundings because all you have is the movement of thought. Your reaction will then depend on your past experiences and conditioning.

If in the past, you dealt with stress by eating, you are going to reach for your favorite snack. If your past experience taught you to raise your voice to get heard, you will easily shout when you are being ignored.

You start to believe what you are experiencing is reality when actually you are experiencing the narrative your mind created as a reaction to what is going on around you. Without awareness, you confuse what is happening in your mind with reality. You are at the mercy of the conditioned mind.

“Awareness is all about restoring your freedom to choose what you want instead of what your past imposes on you.” ~Deepak Chopra

Most of us are clueless about why we do what we do, how we present ourselves, and how others perceive us. And we get stuck in negative patterns as a result.

Here are some ways you can improve your awareness so you can improve your life.

Practice self-reflection.

This allows you to take a step back and ask probing questions of yourself. As Ferris Bueller said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

Ask yourself: Why did I react this way? Why is this making me sad? Why am I so against this viewpoint? Where did this belief come from? 

Doing this will allow you to make stronger connections. It will make your convictions stronger and give you the fuel to argue your viewpoint in a civil manner. It will also make you aware of your bad habits and thought patterns.

For instance, self-reflection has taught me that I have a tendency to eat unhealthy food when I haven’t gotten enough sleep. I also have a tendency to shut myself off from people when I am angry instead of talking to them calmly. Knowing this about myself, I am able to catch these unhealthy habits and choose healthier responses.

Journal.

Journaling is a great tool for self-reflection, since it helps you understand and challenge your thoughts and beliefs, and it’s also an stress reliever. It acts as a brain dump. Think of this as a parking lot for your thoughts. Just like your back feels lighter when you take off your heavy backpack, your mind will feel lighter and less stressful once you dump your thoughts on a piece of paper.

You can do this once a week, once a day, or even once every fortnight. All you need is a diary and a pen to get going. Trust me, nobody is so busy that they cannot take five minutes in a day to journal.

Take personality and psychometric tests.

Whereas a personality test can give you insight into why you do the things you do, a psychometric test can help you asses your skills, knowledge, abilities, and characteristics. I am not a big fan of these, but there are scores of free tests available online. You might find yourself agreeing or disagreeing with the results, but they will give you some food for thought.

Since they’re all based on some sort of questionnaire that you answer, I would recommend taking more than one to get a broader understanding of your strengths, weaknesses, and behavior patterns.

Ask for feedback.

There is a catch to this one. You need to be willing to take the feedback someone gives you without being offended or getting into an argument. If you can ask probing questions from them to dig deeper, even better!

If you are uncomfortable with people pointing out your mistakes and shortcomings to your face, you can ask through email. This way you have time to digest what people write before responding and will be less likely to react defensively.

Step out of your comfort zone.

Once you become aware of your limitations, the next step is to push them and face your fears.

I used to hate talking to large crowds or presenting in front of people. Nothing made me sweat faster!

Since I was aware, I decided to tackle this by joining a student organization in college where my role was to go to different classes and present about the organization in efforts to recruit more students. It wasn’t easy, but within a year, I wasn’t sweating anymore!

For you, this might mean setting a boundary with someone after recognizing your habit of letting people take advantage of you or applying for a job you’ve been interested in after recognizing that you usually hold yourself back with fears of not being good enough.

This is how awareness changes your life: when you not only recognize what you’re doing and why but consciously choose to do something different.

Awareness makes you stronger. With awareness, you are able to bounce back faster after adversity. You are conscious of your insecurities and shortcomings. You have gone through the cycle enough times to understand what triggers them and how you can recover from them.

For example, in my case, when I am feeling sad and depressed, I know I can recover if I take a nap or go workout. It helps me shake off the bad mojo.

Awareness allows you to empathize with people. You can relate to the other person because you know the signs, having experienced them yourself. It becomes very easy to step into the other person’s shoes instead of judging them. In fact, it will come naturally after a while.

Your agility increases because of your awareness. You can pluck yourself in and out of any situation when you want and are able to adapt and pivot as needed on much shorter notice. In other words, you are able to move, think, or act quickly.

The pursuit of self-awareness also leads you to your blind spots. It uncovers the unknown and makes it known, so at least you are aware of it, even if you are not able to act on it right away.

When I look back, I have been blessed to have experienced many moments of awareness discovering things either by myself or because someone in my trusted circle caught it. I am pretty sure when you look back, you will also be able to spot those moments where your transformation first began because of the awareness bringing it to light.

The wheels of change begin to move with the first sign of awareness.

Peaceful Classic Christmas Music

May This Christmas Bring About A Pleasant Change In Your Life,
May My Wishes Find You With A Smile On Your Face,
I Wish You The Best In Life This Christmas,
Merry Christmas To You And Your Loved Ones.

==============================================

This is a 2 hour playlist of traditional Christmas music I arranged and recorded. In the music you will hear flute, cello, violin, piano and guitar along with Irish flute.

These songs cover many of the most popular Christmas songs such as “O Come All Ye Faithful”, “O Holy Night”, “Joy to the World”, “Angels We Have Heard on High”, and more.

This music was arranged in Chicago where I performed for Christmas Season Classical Night. Let the spirit of love gently fill our hearts and homes. In this loveliest of celebrations may you find many reasons for happiness.

Track list:

1. The First Noel

2. Angels We Have Heard on High –

3. O Come All Ye Faithful –

4. Joy to the World –

5. O Holy Night –

6. O Little Town of Bethlehem –

7. Carol of the Bells –

8. O Little Town of Bethlehem –

9. Do You Hear What I Hear –

10. Hark the Herald Angels Sing –

11. O Holy Night –

12. Angels We Have Heard on High-

13. O Come All Ye Faithful –

14. Silent Night –

15. It Came Upon a Midnight Clear –

16. Good Christian Men Rejoice –

17. We Three Kings –

18. The Holly and the Ivy –

19. O Come, O Come Emmanuel-

20. Away in the Manger –

21. Joy to the World –

22. God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen-

23. Sheep May Safely Graze-

24. The First Noel-

 

Happy New Year!!!

To my friends, followers and readers – Maybe this New Year is going to be the one that fulfills all your dreams and so start it with a joyful and a vibrant soul! Here’s wishing you a prosperous new year! As we celebrate the New Year, I wish everyone success, a healthy long life and a fresh new start. Happy New Year!

ABBA Happy New Year!!!

Lyrics

No more champagne
And the fireworks are through
Here we are, me and you
Feeling lost and feeling blue
It’s the end of the party
And the morning seems so grey
So unlike yesterday
Now’s the time for us to say

Happy New Year
Happy New Year
May we all have a vision now and then
Of a world where every neighbor is a friend
Happy New Year
Happy New Year
May we all have our hopes, our will to try
If we don’t we might as well lay down and die
You and I

Sometimes I see
How the brave new world arrives
And I see how it thrives
In the ashes of our lives
Oh yes, man is a fool
And he thinks he’ll be okay
Dragging on, feet of clay
Never knowing he’s astray
Keeps on going anyway

Happy New Year
Happy New Year
May we all have a vision now and then
Of a world where every neighbor is a friend
Happy New Year
Happy New Year
May we all have our hopes, our will to try
If we don’t we might as well lay down and die
You and I

Seems to me now
That the dreams we had before
Are all dead, nothing more
Than confetti on the floor
It’s the end of a decade
In another ten years time
Who can say what we’ll find
What lies waiting down the line
In the end of eighty-nine

Happy New Year
Happy New Year
May we all have a vision now and then
Of a world where every neighbor is a friend
Happy New Year
Happy New Year
May we all have our hopes, our will to try
If we don’t we might as well lay down and die
You and I

We are even

We are even

We are even

 

Lost in my sorrow, today I evoke you
And I can see you have been,
In my poor, miserable life,
Nothing but a good woman
Your hot-shot airs
Brought warmth to my nest
You were kind, acted according to your principles
And I know you have loved me
As you never loved anyone else
As you will never be able to love again

The appreciation game started
As you, poor lovely woman
Dodged poverty at the boarding house
Today you are a real big-shot
Life smiles and sings for you
You waste the money
Of those you easily fooled
Just like a knavish cat would play
With a wretched mouse

Today you have your mind full of unhappy illusions
Fools, friends and seducers have deceived you
The dance of magnates
With its crazy temptations,
Where social climber pretensions
Are realised and surrendered
Has settled deep inside your poor heart

There’s nothing I should thank you for
We are even now
I don’t care about what you’ve done
What you do now, or what you will do
I believe I have repaid all the favours
I received from you
But in case I unintentionally forgot some minor debt
If you wish, charge it
To one of those fools’ account

I hope that your achievements,
Poor, fleeting achievements,
Will become a long line of wealth and pleasure
I hope the big-shot who now maintains you
Has deep pockets
I hope you forsake your association with hustlers
And that other men will say “She’s a good woman”

And tomorrow, when you become decayed, old furniture
And you have no hope left in your poor heart
If you need a little help, if you would like advice
Remember this friend, who will put his life on the line
To help you in whichever way he can, when the time comes

 

A Journey Of A Poet

By Mihran Kalaydjian, CHA

Consultant, Strategist, and Writer

 

A Journey Of A Poet

A journey begins with
A thought in our mind
Words are chosen and formed.

Lines of poem
Well Written with meanings
With words of emotions and expressions

A poet starts with
An inspiration of mind,
An aspiration in soul mind

With reflection
On our life experience
We start to
Compose some
Wonderful poetry

Expressing our innermost thoughts
With deep contemplation
To put them in poetry words

A journey begins when
A poet takes his imagination
To a place where
No one ever dream or imagine before.

A poet’s journey ends by
Writing another lovely poem
And deep reflection

A poet remains
As a poet
When he or she
Continue to
Write and Share
lovely poems with the world. 

 

 

 

Her Lips Are Copper Wire

By Mihran Kalaydjian, CHA

Consultant, Strategist, and Writer

 whisper of yellow globes
gleaming on lamp-posts that sway
like bootleg licker drinkers in the fog

and let your breath be moist against me
like bright beads on yellow globes

telephone the power-house
that the main wires are insulate

(her words play softly up and down
dewy corridors of billboards)

then with your tongue remove the tape
and press your lips to mine
till they are incandescent