Guest Bloggers – Page 29 – Disney Leadership Keynote Speaker

Give it up, by guest blogger Lorie Sheffer

Sometimes we have to be willing to step back and allow someone else to shoulder the burden. In order to do so, we must accept that they may not do things exactly the same way we would do them. This doesn’t make it wrong, it just means things may be done differently. If we want to be relieved of some of the stress and worry in our lives, we have got to learn how to turn over our troubles to someone else.

A friend of mine wonders why her adult daughter is so reluctant to help her. When her daughter does offer to help, the criticism of how she is doing things always stops her in her tracks. Yet my friend wants things done “the right way”, and cannot seem to give up control. This past week I had a difficult situation to deal with. Already trying to manage more stress then I can handle, I asked my husband to please take this one for me, which he agreed to do. People who are aware of the situation started to question me as to whether I felt he was doing what I wanted, and how I wanted it to be done. This amazed me; when you ask someone to handle a situation for you that you clearly don’t want to be dealing with, you need to step back and allow him or her to do it their way. If you micromanage every move someone makes when they are doing a favor that you asked of them, don’t be surprised if the next time you ask, the answer is “no”.

There are times when all of us need to ask someone else to step in and help us carry the load. Knowing when you need help is not a sign of a weak person; it is a sign of strength; of knowing your limits and having enough self-confidence to admit when you need assistance.

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Something old, something new… by guest blogger Lorie Sheffer

old things — something old, something new (photo: Lorie Sheffer)

Whenever I mention my elderly relatives, someone will ask me if I have ever picked up on secrets to their amazing longevity. I had a great uncle who was very overweight and smoked and drank in excess, yet lived to be well into his nineties. My 101-year-old great aunt is the deadly apple shape, which is supposedly the telltale clue to early death. My aunt, who turned 90 today and who looks amazing for her age, is the most health conscious of the group. She can usually be found at a fast food restaurant. While much of their astounding fortune at playing health roulette was probably just genetics taking over for their horrible habits, I refuse to play that game. While I am far from being a gym rat, and I very likely will never be found in the petite department shopping for my clothing, I have paid close attention to something they have all done right. They love trying new things.

When we think of a typical old fogy, we think of someone who is grouchy, stubborn and set and in their ways. One way to keep our brains sharp and our outlook young is to try new things. So what if we make a total fool of ourselves! It’s not like we haven’t survived looking stupid in the past. In recent years I’ve added things to my “new” list; refinishing old furniture, photography, yoga, trying recipes using ingredients I’ve never used or heard of before, and writing this weekly guest blog post for a childhood friend. What’s the worst that can happen? Something I was going to take to the curb anyway has to be taken to the curb because I mess it up; a photograph is blurry or doesn’t look quite right; I realize I’m not as flexible as I used to be; I cook something and don’t like the way it tastes; I write something that stinks. So what? Really, that’s what not succeeding at something new boils down to: So what? Unless skydiving is on your short list of new things to try, the risk of failure pales in comparison to the thrill of doing something new or outside of your comfort zone. Trying new things seems to be what has kept some very interesting old folks I know from becoming bored with life. It has kept them excited about the prospect of living another day.

Spring cleaning, by guest blogger Lorie Sheffer

This year Spring came early to the Susquehanna Valley. In some ways I feel as if this has given me a heads up on warm weather chores. I’ve started pulling weeds before they can produce seeds, and I have thrown open every window in the house. With that comes the annual ritual of Spring Cleaning.

This week found my husband and I digging into long forgotten boxes that were tucked away into the dark recesses of our basement. We had no clue what most of them contained until we opened them. I found a very horrible Halloween decoration that our daughter crafted when she was about 12 years old. I felt sad about getting rid of it, but when I showed it to her she laughed and asked why I had kept something so ugly for so long. My husband found athletic ware from not only college, but also high school. When our grandson saw a pair of “Grampy’s” old track shorts, he asked, “Were they yours when you were a baby?” We filled our dumpster and the garbage man hauled it away this morning. We are thrilled to have disposed of or donated so much stuff.

My parents are starting to watch their friends sell homes and move into retirement communities. Their new favorite thing to keep saying to my brother and me is, “Some day you’ll have a job cleaning out this house!” They fret over adult children who hire professionals to do the job when parents pass away, and wonder what will happen to their stuff when they are gone. My father has always been so organized that he literally woke from a month long coma and was able to direct me to things in his house and garage from his hospital bed. It takes me an hour just to find a screwdriver in my own house. Yet he and my mother have lived in their home for almost 60 years and organized as it is, labeled and boxed and shelved, they have accumulated lots of stuff.

The new subject of Schedenfreude seems to be compulsive hoarding. There are TV shows and books on the subject, and it seems to be all the rage; the trend du jour. I have seen actual, severe hoarding close up and personal. In comparison, it makes my disorganized basement and garage look like a page from Martha Stewart Living. After the hoard was professionally cleaned and sorted and laid out in an auction house, I went to see it; rows and rows and rows of stuff. Not only the stuff from my own relatives’ hoard, but also the stuff of so many other people. There were collections that must have taken years to amass. There were rooms filled with furniture, appliances, toys, clothing, gadgets, artwork, dishes, silverware, glassware. Stuff that the owners “needed”. Stuff that held memories and emotions. And yet, it was now just stuff. We all have it. We all hang on to things that we feel holds some magical memory for us. If a famous person touched it then it is worth more, monetarily. If someone we loved once owned it or gave it to us, we sometimes find it irreplaceable.

One woman, who is a compulsive hoarder, said that her possessions help her to relive past events. And I wondered, isn’t that why all of us hang onto our stuff?

They’re magically delicious, by Lorie Sheffer, guest blogger

Irish dinners — traditional Irish St. Paddy's Day dinner. (photo: Lorie Sheffer)

“Maybe you can make us a traditional Irish dinner for Saint Patrick’s Day.”

My husband and I are going to have our grandson overnight. I was thinking carryout, but Gary was going by what usually happens in our house when there is a major or minor holiday, special TV show, event in someone’s life, or time when I am feeling creative; we have some kind of ridiculous theme dinner. Back in the years before I became bored with American Idol, I hosted a finale party that was both over the top and greatly anticipated by my guests. I’ve made Halloween food that included cheese goblins, stromboli snakes and shrunken apple heads floating in hot mulled cider. This past December I threw a Hanukkah party; we’re not Jewish. My latest project was baking 90 black and white cookies, 4 inches in diameter each, to save my daughter $135 had she ordered them from the bakery. Doing these things can be tiring, but it is something that is fun for me.

That being said, sometimes when we hit midlife, we woman tend to become ever so slightly unpredictable. I’ve discussed this phenomenon with my same age friends, and we came up with a few possible theories. Perhaps it’s the lack of sleep from the all-too-common complaint of insomnia. Maybe we’re just burned out from years of doing it all. Could it be that we are now too smart not to know that we can just go get ready-made food or let someone else take care of the work? We’re pretty sure that Hilary Clinton has better things to do than make baked brie en croute in the shape of a football, or fret over the blueberries being in a straight line on her July 4^th flag cake. Yet we wonder, does she sometimes board the plane and sit there in her seat, exhausted, and wonder, “OMG! Do I have to do EVERYTHING around here?”

And so what was an innocent suggestion, “Maybe you can make us a traditional Irish dinner for Saint Patrick’s Day”, ended with me slamming a box of Lucky Charms and a bottle of Guinness onto the counter. Sure I dug out my recipe for shepherd’s pie and homemade dinner rolls. But what is served will greatly depend on which Me wakes up on Saturday morning.

Day trippin’, by guest blogger Lorie Sheffer

pretzels — pretzel capitol of the world? (photo: Lorie Sheffer)

Mid Life should be a time when we are finally able to carve out a little “me time”. Yet statistics show that it is a time when we are often struggling with multiple responsibilities. We may still have children at home. Sometimes those children are, in fact, children. Sometimes they are adult children who for whatever reasons have had to move back in to our homes. Or maybe we don’t see our kids as much as we wished we were able to. That empty nest can be a lonely place. Our parents are aging and perhaps need our assistance. Retirement plans may have collapsed along with Wall Street, forcing us to use that traveling money for everyday expenses. At the point in life that some time away would do wonders for our mental health, we find that our disposable income has to be used for the necessities.

Last week I found myself in desperate need of a change of scenery. Even though our retirement accounts have been recovering rather nicely, we are still being careful of our savings. I am responsible for my father’s nursing care four days a week, and even though he has been rapidly regaining his independence and my duties don’t take up much time, I still have to commit to being there. The answer? Day trips! It’s amazing what a day trip can do to relieve stress and give you a fresh perspective.

Living in South Central Pennsylvania has its advantages. Just over an hour west of my home is Gettysburg and the beautiful surrounding mountains. About an hour to the south is Baltimore Maryland, with its lovely harbor and wonderful neighborhoods, each with their own distinct personality. We have Hershey to the north, and Amish country to the East. This day I decided to head across the Susquehanna River to Lititz. My husband was unaware of where I was taking him. The drive was lovely, and the town itself was charming. Interestingly, though we had driven through we had never stopped and looked around. We ended up going to the historic pretzel factory. It’s really no longer a factory, but a gorgeous old house that is now more the museum for the original factory. The working factory has been modernized and is currently producing pretzels in Reading. We acted like kids on a school field trip, taking the tour and learning to roll our own dough. We sat outside on a bench, in the unseasonably warm March sun, and ate fresh from the oven pretzels. Then we drove a few blocks to the Wilbur Chocolate Factory. The smell was enough to send me into a state of nirvana. Our little trip only lasted a few hours and cost us under $100, including bags of take home pretzels and chocolates, but the benefits were much greater than I expected. We’ve decided to take turns planning mini surprise trips, destinations unknown until arrival. The planning of said trips and their itinerary is in itself a way to mentally escape stress.

While it’s good to “think big”, maybe sometimes we get so stuck on that all or nothing idea that we miss the little things. I’ll admit that I would love to go on a long weekend escape, but until life allows for that to happen, it seems a shame not to take advantage of all the little treasures that are well within a few hours drive from home.