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Home › Money

Poll | 11/17/2008 11:00 pm

What do you do keep your spirits up during hard times?

Read more about: Economy, exercise, Food, Hard Times, Work

94 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

Joni Evans
Today’s poll comes at the suggestion of wOw reader rocky rocky. Do you have a poll idea? Send it to us by clicking here.
By Joni Evans on 11/18/2008 12:00 am
Lizzie R.
I try to keep my mind occupied by keeping busy, working, reading, listening to music - anything that will not allow me to sit idly by and possibly worry and/or brood which is counterproductive.
By Lizzie R. on 11/18/2008 1:06 am
FeliJane Ramjohn
I like ur style IM LIZZIE. I love to listen to music, it always keep my spirits up. But I also like reflecting on humourous stuff. I have a cat and sometimes wen Im down I imagine my cat dancing to this upbeat hiphop tune wid his paws swinging and him pumping his paw in the air yelling yeahh yeahh yeahh. If not that, I imagine me being a cat, but sometimes that just brings dwn my spirits cuz cats are soo free and worryless, they got their issues yeah, like wen is food gonna come, but they dont have to do homework,. Or do they?
By FeliJane Ramjohn on 11/19/2008 7:32 pm
Delete This
-Exercise [as in last week walked the 17-miled drive from Carmel to Pacific Grove]. -Go out to new or favorite restaurant. -See/go to/read something completely new. -Listen to music/arrange flowers/cook. -Speak with son/mother/best friend/email dear old Dad. -Work. -Get out the watercolors. -Write done whatever the challenge is and then brainstorm/logic it out. -Read about heroic people and then put own challenges in those terms. -Also need a Golden Retreiver as soon as get through current projects. Am dog crazy and especially Goldens. http://www.justdogbreeds.com/images/breeds/golden-retriever.jpg
By Delete This on 11/18/2008 1:09 am
joan larsen
The tendency when things are “too much” for most of us is to curl up on the bed, hoping that when we awaken, life will be back to normal. But I think I have a prescription even better: pick up the phone and call someone you can talk to, confide in, and who will listen without judgment and raise your spirits with just a nod and a few words that tell you he cares. Talking things out - not letting things endlessly stir inside - is a catharsis like nothing else. I like the poem below so much — a reminder of what to do in those bad times: My soul drifts aimlessly in times of hopelessness. It searches tirelessly for meaning and truth … Yet finds no direction. My heart bleeds quietly in times of loneliness. It yearns to find warmth and happiness … Yet it somehow eludes me. My eyes seek out visions in times of want. They gaze endlessly through the blackness that envelops them … Yet they cannot see the light. My ears listen earnestly in times of silence. They search for familiar sounds to comfort and console … Yet they cannot penetrate the darkness that surrounds me. My arms reach out frantically in times of despair. They seek strength and compassion to enfold me … Yet they find nothing substantial to enwrap. My mind cries out desperately in times of solitude. It poses intense questions that demand answers … Yet there are none to be found. *** My hand reaches out earnestly in these times of confusion. It dials the number of a familiar and calming voice … And gratefully, my lifeline to sanity … remains intact.
By joan larsen on 11/18/2008 1:27 am
Jane Cougar Melonhat
Hi, Joan, didn´t expect you to be up this late. Left you a message in the private school thread.
By Jane Cougar Melonhat on 11/18/2008 1:33 am
Patrice Baldwin
Now I’m really depressed!
By Patrice Baldwin on 11/18/2008 6:01 pm
Agyness O
Joanie….I am sending this just for you when you are feeling down….it is my personal group of musicians that I keep on staff at all times. They are Singing…Joanie, don’t you worry…………from their song, Same all Drag…..and it is JUST for you…… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8ekaScs-4k It says you’re going on a voyage…that must be arctic exploration! Your best partner in crime. Agy
By Agyness O on 11/18/2008 8:37 pm
joan larsen
You, dear Agy, are better than good. You are wonderful and the song you picked resonated with me (as did my house in playing it LOUD) —- and I sure don’t need the same ole drag, don’t need none of that — and they talked about my polar adventures like they knew they were coming up. . Do you know these guys — or what? All I could think of was the two of us with this crazy group - who I KNEW would be there at the airport with YOU — and we’d get so into the song on the way back — and their others — and it will be like “let the world go away” AGY-style. Lord, Agy, do you have to be so thoughtful also ??? Or are you just jazzing me up, moving me along, and getting me set to be hostess-with-the-almost mostes’ (you are the Queen, my dear) at OFTER. I somehow think it is the latter — you are like me usually - energy knows no bounds — and what a twosome and I am sure that we have a crowd that definitely can TRY to show us up — as we have THE live ones!! SUPER. I’m sending everyone to Agy when they are having a hard time — forget the other comments - you are the BEST!!
By joan larsen on 11/18/2008 11:52 pm
Agyness O
Joanie, These guys are at my beck and call and are known as The Apples in Stereo in the musical world. Same Od Drag is my absolute favorite tune that they perform…this particular video was done for fun at the Sundance Music Festival last year where they brought down the house, byw. They are all brilliant and musical geniuses…Robert Scheidner who is the lead vocalist wrote his first piano concerto at the age of nine. He was at my house one day and started playing my Yamaha Grand and I thought for a minute that I was listening to Mozart!! He wrote the song “Same old Drag” and it is as if he did it for US!! My favorite song and you are the subject!!! Our friendship is DESTINY, Joanie. I tried to make contact with the band yesterday to find out the inspiration for “Joanie” but have not heard back yet but will let you know (they are in a recording studio in NYC this week and are busily at work). But, anytime you and I are vitually together, know they will be with us and playing their hearts out. Sometime in real life maybe we can get together and enjoy the same. They travel the world and when they are doing a US tour and perform in Chicago from time to time, I’ll just fly in and we will all have the time of our lives….okay?? As to my intentions, they are very simple. I just plainly adore you…your attitude, your love of life and sense of adventure, and your mind which just happens to be brilliant!!! I am smart, but being from the south, didn’t have the opportunities for a great education like yours even though I did attend the Smith of the South. Hee hee You rock, Joanie, I am just trying hard with all my might to just keep up!!!!!! Your new and very best friend. AGY
By Agyness O on 11/20/2008 3:03 pm
Jane Wagner
Lovely poem, Joan, thanls for sharing it with us…and all your thougtful posts. Edith Ann says”Hello”. by the way/ Love,Jane
By Jane Wagner on 11/20/2008 7:45 pm
joan larsen
Jane . . . once in a blue moon, something tells me that we would relate very well — and you know, as I do, that “friends” are one thing, but it is much more difficult to find someone that probably would be a match. Life passes too quickly, and while we can be caring and compassionate, I frankly am one that thinks the best prescription is lots of fun playing off each other’s conversation and laughing - I mean really laughing. Being serious has its place, but I have good times and laughing on my own pedestal — and from your writing, so do you. Oh … Edith Ann is sulking now, feeling left out — and we can’t have that as don’t want to have to pull out the Kleenex or have to pull her out of the closet — and she has my sense of humor. Edith Ann, let’s just say I would almost gamble that we would be a good threesome. And remember … if you are ever within a hundred miles of my great city, Chicago, let me know — and I will be there. Wouldn’t miss it — so please please remember. Good times are promised. . . and I’m in political office, but promise I will NOT introduce you to our mayor or governor — which should tell you that I have extremely good taste … and I will leave it at that.
By joan larsen on 11/20/2008 10:53 pm
joan larsen
Jane . . . once in a blue moon, something tells me that we would relate very well — and you know, as I do, that “friends” are one thing, but it is much more difficult to find someone that probably would be a match. Life passes too quickly, and while we can be caring and compassionate, I frankly am one that thinks the best prescription is lots of fun playing off each other’s conversation and laughing - I mean really laughing. Being serious has its place, but I have good times and laughing on my own pedestal — and from your writing, so do you. Oh … Edith Ann is sulking now, feeling left out — and we can’t have that as don’t want to have to pull out the Kleenex or have to pull her out of the closet — and she has my sense of humor. Edith Ann, let’s just say I would almost gamble that we would be a good threesome. And remember … if you are ever within a hundred miles of my great city, Chicago, let me know — and I will be there. Wouldn’t miss it — so please please remember. Good times are promised. . . and I’m in political office, but promise I will NOT introduce you to our mayor or governor — which should tell you that I have extremely good taste … and I will leave it at that.
By joan larsen on 11/20/2008 10:53 pm
joan larsen
How embarrassing, Jane, to put on a P.S. after throwing out a blanket invitation as I did, BUT I have to amend that to any month but this January. YOu see, I am addicted to Ice and penguins and, as usual, I am going to hang out with the little back and white guys for that whole month in Antarctica again (and again). I have to go the length of the globe to find anyone absolutely addicted to ME, but even the scientists there admit that the birds have an addiction to me. . . and I them. They have actually filmed me acting as Pied Piper to a whole series of penguin adolescents who follow me everywhere - which is behavior they have never seen. They even bring their babies to meet me when I sit on the beach - and ask anyone, no one else has ever had this luck. At home, when I get that inferiority complex, I remember that I have hundreds of thousands of little friends down on the Ice who must think I am their supreme leader. I wish Edith Ann could see it actually as I have been written up and all, but she is so cute that they would leave me in a flash for her black patent leather shoes and white socks. (Twenty years ago my ship sank down there and we usually visit the little part of it still above the water and remember THOSE exciting times. OK, I like exciting times. I am a drawing card to exciting times. So come soon after that.!!! Pretty please!)
By joan larsen on 11/20/2008 11:55 pm
Judy K.
Read, read, read. It helps the mind focus on something other than the problem and sometimes the diversion helps the subconscious come to a solution.
By Judy K. on 11/18/2008 1:27 am
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