CAN'T ALWAYS GET WHAT YOU WANT

The Rolling Stones said it best: No, you can't always get what you want . . . and if you try sometime you find you get what you need . . .

What are you upset about right now? What is it you want that you're not getting? Did you EVER stop to think that maybe what you want isn't what you NEED?

Years and years ago I fell madly in love and if I'd married the man who WOULD have been my first husband, well, I would've never taken the job singing on the cruise ships in the first place.

Who knows WHERE I would've ended up?? The point is, some of my fondest memories and greatest adventures happened as a result of performing on the cruise ships and I wouldn't have had those memories had I taken for a husband the first man who proposed to me. I'm so GRATEFUL I didn't marry him! If I trace the path of my life, all the disappointments, all the struggles, all the things I did NOT get, have brought me to where I am today: happily married, living in Renton, having adventures and relishing fond memories of things that've gone before! I'm so excited for the future and when things don't go my way, I do my best to shrug them off and realize that something even BETTER must be in store!

STOP for one second and turn it around! Let your mind wander to the POSSIBILITIES that open up if you don't get what you want . . . but if life instead brings you what you NEED!!

Sending hugs and kisses today, my friends!! ~Aunt Dottie

DREAM A LITTLE DREAM

Most people call them “goals”; I prefer to call them “dreams”! (Because it feels more magical!!) When I was traveling with my mother, in our little airstream trailer, she hung up a small bulletin board for me in the main living area of our trailer. That was my “dream board” and I’d tack up pictures of things I wanted or pictures that symbolized something I wanted to achieve. Every time I got something or did something, I’d take that picture off the board, glue it into a scrapbook and come up with a NEW dream. The funny thing about my little bulletin board was that OTHER people saw visual pictures of my dreams, too. One of the pictures I had for a long time was a picture of a big cruise ship –because I wanted to sing on the boats. My friends saw that picture, too. It was a FRIEND who saw an audition poster for cruise ship auditions that alerted me to my first audition; the one that got me my first job! The friend KNEW that was one of my dreams because he’d seen the picture on my bulletin board!

Isn’t it funny how that works?? He wouldn’t have told me about the auditions had I not made my dream as clear as day, not only for myself but for OTHERS so they could be “in” on it and help me! Also, because that was my dream, I knew I had to practice and build my skills so I'd be READY when my turn to audition came!

As I got older, my dreams got bigger but I still have my habit of the pictures. I tape them up around the house; mostly inside closet doors and cupboards! Every time I open a cupboard, a picture shows up to keep me focused on that particular dream.

What do you do to keep focused on your dreams/goals? How do you celebrate when they come true? Today, I encourage you to go for your dreams! Find a way to keep them in the front of your mind and achieve them!

P.S. My current enormous dream is for Nephew Aaron & I to take our show to Broadway for a 9 week limited engagement! I've created a mock "Playbill" cover with OUR pictures on it to keep the dream focused! We rehearse together often and I sing EVERYDAY. That's how we keep focused AND prepared!!

HAPPY-NESS

What makes you happy? Truly happy? I’m not talking about the fleeting happiness that a new pair of shoes or new “toy” brings. I’m talking about genuine, lasting happy? What brings that to you? Years ago, I had a cruise director who I initially thought was a mean, selfish person. It felt like his entire goal in life was to make everyone AROUND him miserable. Then, I realized he was exceedingly UNhappy. No joy in his life. He tried to fill it with partying and possessions but the more he partied and the more possessions he acquired the more SELFISH he got. Finally, a wiser person than I stopped him in the middle of a tirade and said, “You must be so unhappy to be treating all of us this way!” Stopped him in his tracks. He quit soon after and I never saw him again. I truly hope he found some genuine happiness.


My wish for all of YOU is that you find YOUR happy and that your happiness flows to others. What makes me happy? Here’s just a short list: my sweet Husband; my amazing Nephews and Nieces; singing along with a smiling audience; the sun in the morning and the moon at night.