Healthy Tasty YUM

The healthy choice, be it eating or exercising or even thinking, can seem unsavory.  “I don’t wanna eat a salad.  I want eight-layer chocolate cake.”  That is how I felt earlier today anyway.  ‘Nothing tastes so good as skinny’ may be true, but what is confirmed is feeling healthy feels good.  Hollywood appears to desire the majority of the female leads to look like Holocaust survivors.  When I lived in Los Angeles, I knew women who literally consumed practically nothing (except for copious carb-free! alcohol; OR promptly barfed anything they did eat) and ran on the treadmill a minimum of an hour each day.

The art of making healthy choices is one which requires practice and becomes easier with Time.  Moderation, when it comes to processed food I crave, is a word I live by.  I admit to a mental block when free food is present causing me to think I have to take advantage because it’s “free”.  One tool I utilize is telling myself a few facts: “Katrina, there will always be more croissants in the world.  When you have earned a croissant the French bakery will have it and the quality will undoubtably be superior to this random, probably half-stale, non-flakey undesirable version.”  When I choose to not remind myself of these facts, most often I am disappointed and wish I had not consumed the good looking, though tasteless, treat.

Rather than spending the now $8.05 at the Factory which makes Cakes of Cheese, I did delight in a homemade spinach salad with sliced Vidalia onion, green/red peppers, topped with a simple dressing and half of a perfectly creamy avocado.  I enjoyed a beautiful afternoon sitting on the grass admiring the trees feeling good about my choice.  The truth is, I usually feel guilty after eating a 1,200 calorie piece of a B-E-A-U-tiful cake late at night.  On the other hand, the serene peace I embraced today in the company of a lovely butterfly with orange tipped wings feels like a win.  And tomorrow it will still feel like a win because I won’t feel compelled toward self criticism when I do not take an hour run.

Yield to Light

Sometimes I can be a perfectionist, to a point beyond procrastination.  Optimum performance is attained when I am busy enough to require a wise use of time. However, when the point is tipped and more is taken on than humanly possible- through putting everything possible on a ‘to do’ list ‘now’ or due to outside sources-  I all but collapse in despair. To not be perfect.  To not get it all done. To not have life going my way.  I cringe at accepting sub-par.  To do the best job, is that too much to ask?  It is when the cost is spending so much time on one project that the starting of the next equally paramount endeavor is sacrificed.

One friend posts a blog nearly every day- I don’t know how he does it.  I struggle to get one out a week: second guess word choices, scrutinize sentence structure, “no more than six” to each paragraph, squander time on what to write about.  As if it will be the cure to cancer, save all the starving children, rid the world of landfills, AND create free teleportation for all!  This little blog is something I do; it makes me feel better.  I have created something here.  Hopefully it has direction, thankfully someone reads it.  Truly, as soon as I have combed one over satisfactorily and published- I have Peace and Joy and Happiness smiling through me like the brightest Light bulb.

I will not even begin about the last one; it’s in the past, I posted it, and there it remains.  At the moment I typed those words of discontent- a fellow artist commented on said post.  Amazing, when we choose to acknowledge (fore it is always there), how the Universe delivers exactly what is needed at the precise moment it is deemed quite appropriate. Feeling such gratitude is worth bottling to sprinkle on myself and strangers to remind us, you and me, we ARE safe.  I shan’t stop, nor shall I wait for a green light- there are no cops in my head.  I shall remain determined, to merge at light-speed, as an experienced grown-up and appreciate the power.

Voices in My Mouth

During eight years living in Los Angeles, I had the great pleasure to perform voices for a prolific writer of radio plays.  Once every month or two he would schedule a read through and studio time to record.  A gathering of about eight artists with rich vocal instruments and the vivid imaginations required of good actors would unite.  There is a freedom bestowed upon one performing in a room full of wonderfully gifted voice actors, each with their own mic and music stand before them, which electrifies.  One arrives wearing comfortable clothing and clean non-camera ready faces, preparations focusing more on the voice(s) and active energy infused into a character whose sole life resides in your ability to create through a spoken voice.

Occasionally there were more than one character to distinctly articulate. !AN OPPORTUNITY TO PLAY WITH AN ACCENT!  I absolutely LOVE to speak with a different sound in my mouth- imagining I have traveled and lived in all the worldly destinations I aspire!  Often, my standard voice evokes praise for clarity of elocution from multiple professionals, teachers, and even near deaf people with hearing aides who appreciate the intelligibility, pitch, and tone of my speech.  This is a grand starting point for incorporating a dialect- which I am equally applauded for an ability to voice numerous accents realistically.  Some are more challenging than others, notably Italian and Scottish, and these be the tests I revel!

As with everything, “practice makes perfect”.  Utilizing worksheets, accent/dialect instruction CDs, and recordings of native speakers, I practice in my home and car, repeating or talking to myself and any family who thankfully endure hearing.  Graduating to speak with confidence in public to strangers, I regularly pass as a foreigner and delight in the same attention lavished upon others when I detect a little something different in their utterance.  It takes more bravery to speak around people you know in an altered cadence, because they are the ones that will giggle and mock.  However, when you live with a voice in your everyday speaking, rather than merely exercising through the dialogue written, it becomes a part of you – therefore strengthening.