A piece of advice from a guy who still forgets to blow out candles at night:

When things don't feel right, or perhaps when your stomach is in a navy knot due to worry, stress, or things outside of your control follow this advice:

Take a walk around a park with your IPod.

For some reason I found myself parked in front of a lake at a park this morning.   I really do not ever really wanting to go, but some part of my brain took over as I was driving by.  I sat there in my hooptie for a few minutes trying to decide if I really was the kind of guy who went on walks.  I am more of a sit and drink Starbucks guy,  I usually left park walking to the heroes and senior citizens of the world. Immediatly the excuse machine turned on: It was cold out, I was tired, and I had some things to get done.  I had the sniffles, my new shoes were giving me blisters, and I had no weapon to defend myself in case a Dingo came out of the brush to eat me.

Then I noticed that I had my IPOD in my pocket...I had grabbed it when I was at home.  I never, ever take it with me...so I thought well since I have some music maybe it will make the walk more "tolerable". So I opened the car door and like a kid on his way to get a cavity filled I shuffled slowly to the walk way.  I set my IPod to random song list and set out....

Within the first ten feet I knew this was a fantastic idea.  My lungs loved pushing out all of the old air and replacing with the crisp cold O2 that was hanging around.  The scenery was wonderful, there was still snow on the trees, and the lake was half frozen.  I have been in this park hundereds of times...but for some reason this morning it felt like I had never been there before. It was as if I was notcing all of it for the first time.  Everything my eyes fixed themselves on was beautiful and just the way it should be...within my first twenty feet I was completly relaxed. The sun was breaking through a paper thin veil of clouds that were hanging low in the sky, and I even had a cliche moment where I said to myself that it felt as if the sun was beaming just for me.  What a good idea this was.  I was having such a good time that I had almost forgotten to turn on my music.  Once the tunes started playing my experience changed from being a nice relaxing walk through the snowy trees to one of true spiritual significance. 

Each song that randomly played through my ear pieces spoke directly to me.  Almost as if there was a divine DJ Jazzy Jeff at the helm the music took me on a reflective journey through my own life.  Since these were songs I had loaded into my own player they were obviously not new to me.  But like the park it felt like these were songs that I had not really paid that close of attention to before.  Song after song challenged me, forgave me, inspired me, and reminded me of everything that I love about living.  Before I knew it I had already walked around the park twice (which is nearly the equivilant to two miles..which for my out of shape body it may have well have been 20 miles) but I gave it no mind.  I was having a direct conversation with God.  I pray all the time....but this was different...this felt so much better.

There was a moment where I had to stop and try to convince myself that although this was a nice moment these songs were just coming to me randomly, and I over-reacting to the kind of spiritual moment I was having.  Then the song that is on my profile played...and ended my rationalizing.  I sat down on a bench and just listened to the words as if someone was talking to me. 

I will not go into what happened after this....I probably should not have a metaphysical moment and tell   I will encourage each of you to try this.  Take a walk.  Bring some music.  See what happens.  At the very least....the very least you will get some good exercise and maybe notice a tree you have walked by a thousand times.  At the most maybe the great beyond will speak to you through some Lionel Richie lyrics.

I am beyond grateful for the morn I have had so far.....