Today is the birthday of this special lady. One of those things that I run up against every year is what do you get a lady that brings so much into your life? This is further complicated by the fact that I love surprising her with little gifts as often as I can. When I see something that I think will bring a smile to her face, I pick it up. Saving it for a holiday or special occasion is not exactly something I am good at.
In my second book, Living the Dream, I advocate active listening as a way to learn what would make a heart-warming gift for that special someone. It has served me so well in the past and I hope this year as well. Also working on ways to communicate not just with your partners ears, but with their heart and soul. This makes someone feel valued and special.
After thinking of the perfect gift, I realize these are the things that make up a perfect gift. Listening, speaking to someone’s heart and spending quality time with them is a gift that never goes out of style. Happy birthday my love! I hope your day is as special as you are to me!
This weekend, my beautiful lady threw me a birthday party for my 50th birthday. There were plenty of people, lots of great food and sadly a thunderstorm as well. Here is the crazy thing. Everyone was having such a great time the only picture I got was with my friend Jenny as seen above.
It was oddly refreshing that everyone was focused not only on staying dry, but on enjoying the moment. I was so grateful for all of the wonderful memories that were created. It is a day that I will keep in my heart as long as I live. I can’t wait to see what my 100th birthday party will be like. It is my sincere wish all the people who were at this one will be there too.
The amount of gratitude I feel for everyone who braved the storm to show me they care means more than I can convey. The conversations and connections are the greatest gifts! It is my sincere wish you are all so blessed as I was this weekend!
Special thanks to my beautiful lady and her daughter for making it all happen and giving me a day I’ll never forget!
Today is my mother’s birthday. Normally, this would be a post celebrating that fact. It still is, but this year is a little different. A little over a week ago, my cousin who is two years my junior passed away. None of the family even knew she was sick as she wanted to keep that to herself. Today is her funeral. It is a reminder of two very important things. The first is that life is cyclical. We are at once celebrating a birth and mourning a passing. It is the end of life that gives life its precious value.
This Latin phrase translates to “Death is certain, the hour uncertain.” It happens to be one of my lady’s favorite quotes. It is with some irony that her man experienced it first hand. Life can be likened to an hourglass. The sand in the hourglass that is forever running out is the time we have left here. In life, it is as if someone put a cloth on the top part of that hourglass preventing us from knowing how much time we have left. All we know is that the sand is less every second. It could be several years of sand left, or it could run out tomorrow. We are having a funeral for a woman two years younger than me, and celebrating the birth of a woman 17 years older than me. Proof that we never know when our time may be.
What we do with this knowledge is up to us. How much of life will we spend in fear and anger? How much will we spend in love and compassion? What legacy will we leave behind? When are we going to begin to work on it? We only have so many tomorrows left. What we do with today is entirely up to us.
It is my sincere wish that everyone reading these posts on this website not only enjoy them, but that I am able to be of service to you as well. Above is one of the main reasons why. Today we celebrate the birth of my beautiful lady, Margie. Having the right life partner can make all of the difference. Someone who matches your goals and drive is key to living an amazing life. When I look back to the person I was ten years ago verses the person I am since we met, the difference is night and day.
We are currently on the march towards having 1000 days straight of new content. This would not be possible without the support of this lovely lady. From encouraging me to share ideas, helping me make it through my heart surgery and even making sure that I have delicious meals to keep me going. Without her love and support behind the scenes, there is some serious doubt we would be looking at almost 900 days in a row on this site. If you enjoy my YouTube channel, Neil Panosian, she is behind the camera in almost every video.
She may not get enough public credit for the role she plays in my content, but she certainly earns it in private. This run of consecutive days of content began shortly after my brief flirtation with death. That was one of the most challenging periods of my life. Recently, I have lost my last living grandparent at the age of 96. Through it all, Margie has been right there by my side. I couldn’t ask for a better friend, lover and person to share the rest of my life with. Please join me in wishing the beautiful, loving woman above a very happy and healthy birthday. I know wishes from around the globe would put a smile on her face.
Today is my birthday! Celebrate with me by using one of the many wonderful tools and strategies we discussed on this site. Spend some time on self-care, pursue your purpose, or best of all, spend at least 5 minutes in total gratitude. Feel free to look back and pick something that speaks to you.
Feel free to share whatever you pick and what you plan to do. One of the greatest gifts I receive is the engagement I get from the community here. I look forward to hearing from as many of you as I can. Spend some time with those you love doing what you love as you celebrate the birth of this soon to be best-selling author.
This is my friend Kurtis Perkins. Not only is he an amazing friend and great DJ, but he is an amazing author as well. This is his book. It is filled with his life stories and lessons he has learned along the way.
Yesterday was his birthday, and I can think of no better gift than to order a copy of his book! I’ll place a link at the end of this post. As an author, I can tell you there is no greater gift than your work being appreciated. Order Kurt’s book today. It will be a great gift for him, and a great gift for you! You will learn lots of lessons you can apply to your own life.
Today is a very special day here at Secret2anamazinglife.com. If it were not for today, this site would not exist. Today is my mother’s birthday. That is a picture of my mother and I a few years ago. Throughout the years we have had many excursions together.We have explored different countries, and more recently, different settings of local natural beauty to explore. We enjoy learning different things together and often attend classes. We even belong to the same co-op in an attempt at healthy and sustainable living.
There are many fabulous traits that I have picked up from my mother. My generally optimistic attitude, the way I find treating people with dignity and respect almost effortless. It brings to mind a story I often share. When I was young, my mother did not drive. We took the bus a lot when we had to get somewhere. In an attempt to amuse and keep her children from misbehaving, I recall her quizzing us on words with help of the Reader’s Digest magazine. Do they still print that? That, no doubt, contributed to my rather large vocabulary. Growing up with a larger than average lexicon not only allowed me to craft entertaining and informative blog posts, but assisted me in putting my feelings into words. That is a skill worth it’s weight in gold.
Whether it is exploring different countries or local parks, learning new words while traveling on a bus, feeding a sea lion a fish, or just enjoying great conversation over a good cup of coffee, I always learn a lot from my mom. She encourages me, both in my writing and in my life. She holds me accountable, both in the gym…and in life. She is always teaching me lessons. Most of all she is always giving me more reasons to love her. Please join me in wishing the mother of both me and Secret2anamazinglife.com a healthy, happy and loving birthday!
Today is my birthday! On this day, I like to do a little self-reflection. Who are we kidding? I like to do that every day. On my birthday, however, I do it a little more intensely. I review the previous year and look at where I am now. What did I learn? Am I better than I was last year? Are the things that are truly important to me still taking center stage. Most importantly, what can I do to improve all of those in the year to come?
This year, those questions have different answers. It is the second birthday 🎂 I have celebrated since my open-heart surgery. I still treasure each day that I am given. It is interesting how the emotions surrounding that creep up on you as time goes on. I learned one very important lesson this past year. By focusing on who I want to become, what I should do makes itself abundantly clear. Am I better than last year? In some ways, but there is certainly room to improve. A more concentrated focus on my health, and more to the point diet, would get me a lot further next year. Are the important things still taking center stage? More so than last year, but again room for improvement.
As you join me in celebration of the day of my birth, ask yourself these questions. You do not have to be celebrating your own birthday to have some productive self-reflection. As to who I want to be, that answer has become more clear. I want to be a person who has positively impacted as many lives as I can. I wish to be remembered as someone who left the world a little better than they found it. I think if we all did that, we would have a lot better world to share. As I parting gift for my birthday, I wish to leave you this bit of Native American wisdom to ponder.
Where you come from matters. The influences in life you have as you are young and developing play an important role in your adult life. They can be something you have to work to overcome, or if you are lucky, they can be good building blocks. Today is my mother’s birthday. As you can see, I learned a lot from her. Including, but not limited to, my unique eating style. I was fortunate enough to be instilled with many good skills and habits that have served me as I grew older.
Despite not teaching me how to win a “Howl like a wolf” contest, she has taught me many a great thing. My ability to get along with people had much of it’s genesis in watching her. I recall, when we were young, we took the public bus many places. In an attempt to keep her curious son from wandering off, or talking to people he shouldn’t, we played games. One of the ones I remember best was doing the vocabulary tests out of the magazine Reader’s Digest. In hindsight, it was a little above my age grade. Due to that, I now have a rather large vocabulary.
We have even met celebrities like Smokey Bear on his 75th birthday! There are many things we do to this day that are quite a lot of fun. A few are listed below. Check out both the fun pictures and the amazing things that we explore together.
We go for many hikes in nature. This not only helps keep us healthy, but satisfies both of our appreciation for all things natural. We explore different parks and forests.
We attend different cultural events together, such at the Octoberfest in the picture above. It is fun learning about different cultures and trying their cuisine.
We do various run/walks for charity. Some of them even include a tasty cream puff at the end. This not only helps us do our best to improve our health, but allows us to help others as we do. Yet another thing that I learned from my mother.
We attend and support different activities in the community. Like a soup crawl in the dead of winter. It takes special convincing to get me out when the temperature is cold. Even if her and Margie did enjoy making bracelets.
Speaking of winter! My mom may be the only person who likes our zoo as much as me. We even attended a winter event that featured many beautiful light displays. We could both go to the zoo every day. It was much to her dismay we were not able to take a picture with the otters on this day.
It may be said that nobody enjoys the Wisconsin State Fair more than I do. My mom does come close and Margie is starting to get there. We go and enjoy trying some of the new foods. (I am telling you mom, you missed out with the gummy bear brat) We always watch the awards they hand out and walk around to look at the art and the gardens.
Over the years we have done many things together. We have went on vacations, went to all of the places above and more! Whether it is exciting locations like these, or just getting together for a nice cup of coffee, we always have a lot to talk about, which might be something else I got from her. So I just wanted to take a special moment and say “Happy Birthday” to my mom. Also, to say “Thank you” for playing a large part in the man that I have become today. I love you so much for all that you do and who you are. I am grateful for the best mom on earth. I hope you have the most amazing day!
Today is my lovely lady, Margie’s, birthday. As we celebrate, I could not be more grateful for her presence in my life. I encourage you to think about all of the joy a person brings in your life next time you celebrate a birthday. It may be their special day, but we are the lucky ones!
SECRET 2 AN AMAZING LIFE 