A Beautiful Morning at Johnson's Beach

photo of Johnson's Beach, Perdido Key, FL by Peter Good (my wonderful husband)

23 Inspirations

I woke up to a grey, rainy morning and needed to get some inspiration for my day. I came across this:

No matter what you do for a living, the key to success is motivating yourself, each and every day, according to Geoffrey James, author of Business Without the Bullsh*t.

"Most people don't realize that motivation mostly emerges from minor changes in your own behavior," says James.

Here are some tips on how to remain inspired, even when the going gets rough:

1. Realize that YOU are in control. You cannot control the outside world, but you can control your emotional reaction to it.
2. Accept where you are. Life is like those signs that read "You Are Here." You can get somewhere else only if you know where you are now.
3. Adopt a positive vocabulary. Use strong adjectives (e.g., "fantastic") to describe what's good and weak words (e.g., "annoying") to describe what's not.
4. Condition your mind. Train yourself to think positive thoughts while avoiding negative thoughts.
5. Condition your body. It takes physical energy to take action. Get your food and exercise budget in place and follow it like a business plan.
6. Avoid negative people. They drain your energy and waste your time, so hanging with them is like shooting yourself in the foot.
7. Seek out the similarly motivated. Their positive energy will rub off on you, and you can imitate their success strategies.
8. Have goals—but remain flexible. No plan should be cast in concrete, lest it become more important than achieving the goal.
9. Act with a higher purpose. Any activity or action that doesn't serve your higher goal is wasted effort—and should be avoided.
10. Take responsibility. If you blame (or credit) luck, fate, or divine intervention, you'll always have an excuse.
11. Stretch past your limits. Walking the old, familiar paths is how you grow old. Stretching makes you grow and evolve.
12. Don't expect perfection. Perfectionists are the losers in the game of life. Strive for excellence rather than the unachievable.
13. Celebrate your failures. Your most important lessons in life will come from what you don't achieve. Take time to understand where you fell short.
14. Don't take success too seriously. Success can breed tomorrow's failure if you use it as an excuse to become complacent.
15. Avoid weak goals. Goals are the soul of achievement, so never begin them with "I'll try…" Always start with "I will" or "I must."
16. Treat inaction as the only real failure. If you don't take action, you fail by default and can't even learn from the experience.
17. Welcome obstacles. You can't grow stronger if you're not lifting something heavy, so savor your problems.
18. Get perspective. Take the time and effort to step back, reexamine your assumptions, and find truths that you missed before.
19. Appreciate being alive. Never neglect to marvel at the miracle of conscious existence, which is all too soon over.
20. Relax more often. Spend at least one hour every day doing something that's just because you enjoy doing it.
21. Experience wonder. Take pleasure in the unexpected and unusual because without them life would be tedious and boring.
22. Be playful. The joy of a child still lives inside you; let that child out at least once each day.
23. Give thanks. Experience deep gratitude for all the wonderful things in your life: family, friends, work, and play.

"Getting and keeping motivated puts you in control of your actions and your career, thereby lessening stress," says James. "Even implementing a handful of these changes can have a major effect on your health and your attitude."

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Adapted from Business Without the Bullsh*t: 49 Secrets and Shortcuts You Need to Know by Geoffrey James.

Weather

Here's to stormy weather.

Who Knew?

Grains of sand magnified 250x
Just think, this is what you're walking on at Johnson's Beach, millions of little gems underfoot. Miraculous!

MAUI SAND GRAINS ARRANGEMENT #2 This image is a handful of sand grains selected from a beach in Maui and arranged onto a black background. The colors and shapes of these tiny grains of sand are surprisingly different and astonishingly beautiful, each with it’s own individual in character

PUFFY STAR - Sand grains from Okinawa, Japan are made from the skeletons of single-celled forams that produce these beautiful little shells

 

all images from A Grain of Sand - Natures Secret Wonder by Dr. Gary Greenberg

Do more digging at sandgrains.com

See you at the beach,

Susan

Winter at the Beach

Photo, PihaLightOnSea by LeonieGirlinTheWorld

The days are short
The sun a spark
Hung thin between
The dark and dark.
 

~John Updike, "January," A Child’s Calendar, 1965

Happy 2014

If you're going to be in or around Pensacola this New Year's Eve, check out the Pelican Drop in downtown Pensacola. Quite the party! Times Square has nothin' on us!!

Happy 2014!

Wild Geese

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting 

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

from Dream Work by Mary Oliver

Happy Memorial Day Weekend

Moonrise over Pensacola Beach

"Hand in hand 

on the edge of the sand, 

they danced by the light of the moon."

-from The Owl and The Pussycat by Edward Lear

And Again! Lowering 4/20 - 5/11/13 Price to $1100!

OK! We're lowering the price again!

April 20 - May 11 (Saturday through Saturday) on SALE for $1100 per week all inclusive 
(please add $100 per pet) 
That's over $500 off for the week!

We're giving first dibs to our Facebook and Blogger friends,
after 4/20 we'll put it on craigslist

Call 773 474 2456 or email info@goodhavenhouse.com

On Sale!

We have a couple of weeks empty this spring. April 20 - May 11, 2013.

We're putting them (Saturday through Saturday) on SALE for $1300 per week all inclusive
(please add $100 per pet)
that's over $300 off for the week!
We're giving first dibs to our Facebook and Blogger friends,
after 4/15 we'll put it on craigslist

Call 773 474 2456 or email info@goodhavenhouse.com 

Hope you're all having a wonderful spring!!!

Hugh S. Branyon Backcountry Trail System

View from Catman Road

At Good Haven House we're lucky to have the Hugh S. Branyon Backcountry Trail system just 16 miles/25 minutes down the road. The Backcountry Trail System is made up of a dozen square miles of wooded and marshland habitat mostly contained within Gulf State Park in Orange Beach, AL. Six trails among six distinct ecosystems make up more than 11 miles of the complex that's just made for a days biking and hiking.

The trails are a bird watcher's paradise and other commonly seen animals are armadillos, racoons, deer, coyotes, otters, foxes, wild boar, bob cats and American alligators.

Snowy Egret

Click HERE for lots more information about the Hugh S. Branyon Backcountry Trail.

The entrance to Gulf Oak Ridge Trail is located next to the Orange Beach Sportsplex north of Gulf State Park

click on the map above for trail maps and directions

1st, 2nd, 4th photos and map from joeybike.com

Happy (and peaceful) Friday

Arlo Guthrie during a 1969 show at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts

Photograph by Bettman/CORBIS

A new National Geographic book, Peace: The Biography of a Symbol by photographer 

Ken Kolsbun and journalist Michael S. Sweeney, takes a look at the famous sign.

The peace symbol was the brainchild of a British designer, Gerald Holtom, seeking an emblem for an anti-nuclear-weapons march in London in 1958. It superimposes the semaphore signals for N (nuclear) and D (disarmament) and has become known the world over.

The book is interesting and the pictures, as always from National Geographic, are stunning and thought provoking. A timely reminder for our world right now.

See more pictures from the book and

buy it here

☮

Oyster Season

What's one of our favorite things about staying at Good Haven House? 

Getting to eat lots of fresh oysters! Celebrate oyster season with 

Garden and Gun's Southern Oyster Guide. 

Check it out at http://gardenandgun.com/oysters

New Year

“For last year’s words belong to last year’s language
And next year’s words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.”

 

T.S. ELIOT

 

 

Lemons, Lemons, Lemons!

Our lemon tree is heavy with ripe fruit right now. 

Here's a great idea to preserve some of that lemony goodness, make limoncello. 

Limoncello is an Italian liqueur, traditionally served chilled after dinner.

It's delicious and easy to make.

 Limoncello

Yeilds about 1 1/2 quarts

  10     lemons, organic or pesticide free 

750     ml bottle of pure grain alchol (Everclear 151) or high proof vodka

    3     cups water

1 1/2  to 2 cups sugar

1. Wash and dry lemons. Zest with a microplane zester or peel and remove pith (white part) as it will make your Limoncello bitter.

2. In a large glass jar, mix the lemon peels with the alcohol.

3. Seal jar and put in a cool, dry place to steep for anywhere from 2 weeks to 3 months.

4. Unseal and bring water and sugar to a boil for 5 minutes. Let cool completely. 

5. Mix sugar syrup with alcohol and lemon peels.

6. Return jar to the cool, dry place for another 2 weeks.

7. Strain the mixture through a coffee filter. You can strain several times for a clear Limoncello or leave it cloudy. Either way it's great!

8. Store the Limoncello in the freezer and serve chilled.

Cin Cin !

from Sweet Paul Magazine - Winter 2012

Summer Every Day

“One day, you will learn how to give

and receive love like an open window 

and it will feel like summer every day.”

Sierra DeMulder

 

 

Happy Halloween

Hope you're all having a spooky Halloween!

-Susan

Labor Day Week on SALE!

One more week left this summer so we put it on SALE!

Labor Day Week 9/1 - 9/8/12
$1300 all inclusive
(please add a $100 per pet fee (if applicable))
(we have a 3 night minimum and rent Saturday through Saturday in summer)

that's over $350 off for the week!

We're giving first dibs to our Facebook and Blogger friends,
after 8/24 we'll put it on craigslist

Call 773 474 2456 or email info@goodhavenhouse.com 

SALE July 28 - August 4 2012

Yikes! We've been so busy we forgot we have one empty week
Saturday, July 28 - Saturday, August 4, 2012

We're putting it on SALE for $1300 all inclusive
(please add $100 per pet)
that's over $300 off for the week

We're giving first dibs to our Facebook and Blogger friends,
after 7/11 we'll put it on craigslist

Call 773 474 2456 or email info@goodhavenhouse.com 

Hope you're all having a wonderful summer!!!

Thanks

A Wish for Plenty

Hunger feels like pincers,

like the bite of crabs,

it burns and has no fire.

Hunger is a cold fire.

Let us sit down to eat

with all those who haven’t eaten;

let us spread great tablecloths,

put salt in the lakes of the world,

set up planetary bakeries,

tables with strawberries in snow,

and a plate like the moon itself

from which we can all eat.

For now I ask no more

than the justice of eating

from “The Great Tablecloth” by Pablo Neruda