Yes we can is a three word phrase that was coined by the now President of the United States of America – Barack Obama – during his election campaign. All of us can but how many of us actually do?        

Are you one of those people who watch the evening news and says “I wish somebody would fix that.” I was.  The next time you catch yourself saying “I wish somebody would fix that” I want you to have the courage to stop dead in your tracks and ask yourself “What if that somebody is me?” People who wait for the world to change may have easier life but the people who act to change the world will experience more joy than their hearts can contain – I know this from person from personal experience.

A leader changes the world and a follower waits for the world to change. Which one are you? It’s never too early or too late to lead because I truly believe that change = caring + action.

Have you even met someone that you just could not get along with no matter how hard you tried? I have. Have you ever wondered why you don’t get along with the people you don’t get along with? I was one of those people who thought it was the other person’s fault when I didn’t get along with him/her.

In the past I really thought my opinion was the only one that mattered and more often than not I thought my opinion was the right one and because of that I accidentally infringed on other people’s right to have believes and opinions that were different from mine and looking back now I realize that that was why I didn’t get along with many people back then.

All human being are different – we are of different races and religions – but all of us – regardless of race or religion – want to be heard and understood.

We as women are often overly critical of ourselves so today I am going to list all of the things I absolutely LOVE about my myself not because I have an overly-inflated ego or because I love writing about myself – truth-be-told this is the most uncomfortable thing I have ever done but I do believe that when a woman knows her own worth she won’t allow herself to be treated with anything less than what she believes she deserves so here goes:

• I am loving
• I am kind
• I am trustworthy
• I am generous
• I am caring
• I am emphatic (almost to a fault)
• I  am honest
• I want the best for the world and the people in it
• I am forgiving
• I see myself as beautiful because God made me
• I am inspirational
• I am faithful to God
• I am perseverance personified
• I am smart
• I am humble
• I am compassionate
• I am a great writer
• I am a great granddaughter  
• I am a good daughter
• I am a great sister
• I am a great niece
• I am a great cousin   
• I am a great friend
• I am a great human being

I truly believe everything I wrote on this list to be true. If you had to create a list what would be on it. Try it and find out!

“Life is not the amount of breaths you take; it’s the moments that take your breath away.”Alex Hitchins (aka Hitch).  How many moments have taken your breath away today?

Today morning I wake up and went about my day as usual – ate breakfast, brushed my teeth and changed my clothes – then I emailed Brian’s mom Lisa just to see how she was doing – I wasn’t entirely sure how she would react and while I was typing the email I didn’t much care either all I knew was that she had lost her son less than a month ago and that she was probably feeling lost and lonely. A few hours later, Lisa sent me a reply – I won’t share the entire email – but five words in that email “Nisha! You made my day” took my breath away.

Lisa taught me that a great life is made up of a thousand moments of kindness so every time you open your mouth or type something on your keyboard keep in mind that you could potentially make someone’s day.

When I started writing this blog I promised myself that I wouldn’t use it to comment on the lives of celebrities because I know that in spite of all our differences there is a deeper yearning in every human being to live a happy and fulfilled life but day before yesterday when I was watching the evening news and the story of Paris Hilton’s arrest received more attention than the FLOOD in Pakistan I was LIVID and knew that I had to give you my two cents worth on this hot topic.  

I’ve never met Paris Hilton so I will refrain from making comments on her character however I will say that all of us as human beings have done thing that we wish we hadn’t – I know I have – and keep in mind that Paris didn’t grow-up like most of us did and for that reason she probably has a sense of entitlement – all of us have been guilty of feeling entitled at some point in our lives – but I don’t think that Paris realizes that with a platform such as she as she has comes a greater responsibly to live her life with  dignity and grace because if she did I don’t think she would be making the kind of choices that she is making right now.       

Although I am neither an heiress nor a star of reality TV I feel a great sense of empathy for Paris because when I make a mistake – which I do on a daily basis – I can just learn from it and move on but when Paris makes a mistake – and she has made some reprehensible ones –   it is splashed all over the media and recorded for posterity so all I’m for is that you see her – not as an heiress of the heiress of the Hilton Empire or as a star of a reality TV show –   but rather as a fellow human being who has made a series of bad choices in her twenty-nine-year life.

I first met Lisa – a.k.a    @AbuseBites on Twitter – when my friend Chris – a.k.a  @safeworld4women on Twitter – retweeted Lisa’s heart-warming tweet – after I read Lisa’s story and understood that I would never be able to understand the depth of her pain I knew that I had to do everything in my power to help Lisa complete her son – Brain’s  last mission – to end bullying forever – and it occurred to me that one of the ways I could do that was to share her story with the world so here it is : )    

Let’s help Lisa finish what Brian started!

Lisa’s son, Brian, was born with Asperger’s Syndrome and a rare congenital heart defect. He was bullied and abused all through life. Yet he forgave the bullies, lived his life to the fullest, and was passionate about helping others so they wouldn’t have to suffer the pain he did.

After Brian passed, they found a jar of “change” he’d been saving and that’s where they came up with the idea to help others who are being bullied and abused by having a “CHANGE of HEART” for BRIAN and donating “change” to stop bullying.

“Our family’s goal is to buy an RV to travel all over the USA to stop abuse, bullying, violence. So we’re hoping to raise enough money to go forth on this mission in Brian’s honour.” -Lisa

If you would like to help Lisa turn her tragedy into a catalyst for change then log on to the website below, click on the ‘Donate’ button and make a contribution.

 http://www.takeabiteoutofabuse.com/change.html

Justice, mercy and grace are words that we hear on a daily basis but does anybody know what those words really mean. I’ve always thought of justice as something that happens in a courtroom, mercy as something that happens in a hospital and grace as something that happens in a church and as it turns out I was wrong – DEAD wrong.  

I’ve heard many sermons over the course of my life – all of which had taught me something about myself about myself – but there was one sermon in particular that I will carry with me from the rest of my life. The sermon was entitled   Justice, mercy and grace and was administered by Joyce – who was the guest minister at our church that Sunday –   and in it she said, “Justice is when you get what you deserve, mercy is when you don’t get what you deserve and grace is when you get what you don’t deserve”.

Carrying the spirit of the sermon forward I would like to ask you to punish those who’ve wronged you justly, forgive those who’ve wronged you mercifully and forget all the sins committed against you graciously because they will come a day when you will want someone else to do that for you and I believe you cannot get what you are unwilling to give.

“Not everyone can be famous, but everyone can be great in service” — Martin Luther King, Jr. Young girls today say “I want to be like Paris Hilton” and although there is nothing wrong with that however, I do believe that having money and a reality  show doesn’t necessarily make someone great and it also doesn’t mean that they aren’t either.

Who is great? A person who does something nice for someone else when they do have to is great, anyone who takes the time to fix a problem that isn’t theirs is great and anyone who smiles at you when your aimlessly walking down the street is great because greatness is simply the awareness that you have the power to change someone’s life by virtue of a simple gesture or by the utterance of a couple of words that are spoken from the heart.

The journey to anybody’s greatness begins with knowing that you have the power to change the world and having the courage to take the first step.

Perception: an attitude or understanding based on what is observed or thought. Our eyes can perceive shapes and colours, our ears can perceive sound, our nose perceives smell but I truly believe that how you perceive the situations that arise in our life is far more vital than how you perceive external stimulus.

One day when I was 17 I found myself laying on my bed crying because my back was hurting and all my muscles were stiff I remember asking God: Do you love me? Do you hate me? Do you even know I exist? Why me? A gentle voice replied: Why not you? That was like a slap in the face because I always thought that God had it in for me and that response made me realize that the world didn’t revolve around me. I paused for a moment before I asked: Why am I here? The gentle voice again replied: To show the world that anybody can make a difference and change the world and from that moment onwards I begin to see my disability as an opportunity to challenge people to be better than they think are.

Your life will start to change when you see whatever challenge you’re facing as an opportunity to inspire others because I believe that in order to change your reality all you have to do is shift your perception.

We live in a time where we are defined by what we wear, the cars we drive, the house we live in, the places we go on vacation and yes sometimes even the company we keep. We are so desperate to find who are as people that we burry ourselves in things we don’t need in the hopes that it will brings us closer to who we really are and maybe just maybe even to God.

But, I think that all that we are doing in quest to find God and live a fulfilled life is having the opposite of the desired effect – with each new possession we acquire we grow further and further apart from God and his dreams for us. I believe there are two kinds of people in the world: the givers and the takers – the givers are those who look to give of themselves in every situation they find themselves in whereas, the takers are those who look for what they can get out of every situation with no regards as to the effects it has on anybody else but, themselves.

There is a decision to be made but, ultimately it is up to each and every human being on the planet to decide what kind of person they want to be: a giver or a taker.