Poetic Shutterbug

Photo taken by me at the Botanical Gardens and digitally altered . Unconditional love is a rare virtue. We would all like to think we love unconditionally yet as humans we will fault. I think there are two necessary components to loving and being loved in this manner. First is shedding all expectations. We naturally expect certain things from our family and friends. We expect respect, love, generosity and much more. When we do not receive what we expect from people, which we not always will, we become angry, disappointed and sometimes vengeful. If we learned to shed all of our expectations and accept our friends and family members for who they are we would never have to experience the anger and disappointment which comes from our expectations. Second we absolutely must learn not to judge. Everyone is equal. No one is better or worse than anyone else. We have to put ourselves in others' shoes. How do we feel when we are judged? Live and let be. Allow people to live thei...

Photo taken by me @ Ocean Beach in San Francisco While writing for Today.com through the beginning of last year, I had a series of short articles on topics related to living a happy and contented life. I've decided to re-introduce this series on this blog. Now mind you I am not an expert on these subjects, however, these topics were written based on my own experiences. Some of you who know me from Today.com have already seen some of these articles yet with so many new readers I wanted to again share them with all of you. Being Independent Being independent is seen sometimes as being different in today’s society. If we find ourselves taking a different path than others we are seen as the “odd” one. Yet do we really want to have someone else thinking for us or making decisions for us because it’s the popular thing to do? Just because your friends are taking drugs or drinking and driving does that mean that we have to adhere to that same behavior? In high school and college...