If you’ve never failed, then you’ve never taken a risk. You’ve never had a dream and put your heart and soul into achieving that dream. The opposite of failure is success. We cannot succeed with failure. We learn from failing. We must fail and fail often in order to have progress.

Failure doesn’t have to be a bad thing. It doesn’t mean that we don’t get a second or third or fourth chance. Obviously failure in some industries or some tasks will have varying results. Failing to make a pizza properly on your first attempt is a safe failure. Failing on your first test flight as a new pilot isn’t a safe failure. But then again, it’s all about what we consider success and by extension what we consider to be failure.

In moments of failure, I like reminding myself how we can learn from it and what it all means by turning to quotes on failing. Enjoy!

I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.
Thomas A. Edison

Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.
John F. Kennedy

I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.
Michael Jordan

Sometimes by losing a battle you find a new way to win the war.
Donald Trump

A failure is not always a mistake, it may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances. The real mistake is to stop trying.
B.F. Skinner

Success is not built on success. It’s built on failure. It’s built on frustration. Sometimes its built on catastrophe.
Sumner Redstone

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
Thomas A. Edison

If you’re not failing every now and again, it’s a sign you’re not doing anything very innovative.
Woody Allen

Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.
John Wooden

I’d rather attempt to do something great and fail than to attempt to do nothing and succeed.
Robert H. Schuller

On May 17, 2001, the worst thing that could have happened, happened in the lives of me and my family. My mom died.

For about the next 10 years, I was in so much pain and I was so scared to love again that I would tell myself that I loved someone but I would never let them get close enough. I meet so many amazing people but there was no chance for anything to happen because I was so broken. I had many moments during those 10 years of grieving where I felt like I was healed but then something would happen and remind me just how broken I was.

In about 2011 I finally was at the point where I felt like I had healed enough to let someone in. But I still didn’t know who I was or where I was going. The three years from 2011-2014 have been the most revealing, beneficial, productive and eye opening in my life. I finally feel in a place where I was before mom died. I finally understand the path I’m on. I know how other people, especially women, need to be treated. I see things as they are and am more choosy about how I spend my time. I have been humbled by the friendship of my best friend, a dog, in Davy Whippet. I have been honoured to realize a few huge dreams and I have committed to having many more dreams and going after them.

I’m reminded by this quote:

It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.

However, life isn’t always about being better. It’s about learning, connecting, sharing and doing our best.

Let me submit this revision of the quote:

Life is about loving and losing. That’s inevitable. But we must keep having faith. We must keep loving. We must not give up. We must keep moving forward.

Life isn’t easy. Everyone is dealing with their own thing. But we’re all in this together. As much as we need to worry about our own happiness, let’s try to be aware of how that affects someone else’s. If we don’t feel the same way as someone else or want the same things, be honest about it. It’s impeding our happiness along with theirs.

I’ve hurt far more people in my life than have hurt me. I didn’t always know what my actions meant. I have said words that I thought meant one thing but later on realized they didn’t. I have tried to apologize to anyone I have ever hurt because that was never my intention. I was trying to do the best I could with where I was at and with the information I had at the time. I have changed and grown a lot over the years but it doesn’t change what I’ve done in the past.

As a wise friend recently told me, imagine that everyone has their own emotional bucket. For every positive act, you add a bit to your bucket and to that other person’s bucket. For every negative act, you remove something from their bucket and your own bucket. When our bucket is empty, it doesn’t add to our bucket to take something from someone else’s. And vice versa. So let’s respond to negativity with positivity. Let’s respond to deceit with honesty. And let’s respond to hate with love.

I hope you have a very blessed Merry Christmas with those who are special to you – whether that be family or friends.

I will end this post with my favourite Christmas song, Happy Christmas by John Lennon:

Not often do I watch a movie that makes me feel sometimes opposite emotions but after watching Interstellar, I can say that it made me cry, laugh, be confused, be inspired, be hopeful and be amazed. Interstellar is easily one of my top 10 movies. Easily. I won’t tell you much about it because honestly I can’t do it justice. It’s worth watching and taking from it what you will based on your own past experiences and knowledge. From reading some sci fi novels, much of the movie made sense to me – especially the parts about space time – but it was everything else that made my mind explode with fascination. The possibilities of mankind and of the universe, which as you’ll see in this movie, are very much tied together. Check out the trailer below and let me know what you thought of it once you’ve had a chance to watch it.

Also, there is a game for Android devices: http://goo.gl/knoaYw.

Check out this great blog post on TED Ed explaining the science behind Interstellar: http://blog.ed.ted.com/2014/11/13/the-science-of-interstellar.

And more science explained through an infographic from Space.com: http://www.space.com/27692-science-of-interstellar-infographic.html.

And if you are an educator, they have lesson plans that link together with the movie to help enhance your classroom’s knowledge of the universe including learning about Morse code, designing their own planet, how far away things are and much more. It’s definitely worth checking out here: https://interstellar.withgoogle.com/for-educators.

This year compared to any other in my life has seen me on the road more than ever. From January 1 – October 1, I was home for a total of about 5 weeks. It was hard being away from home, driving tens of thousands of miles, most of them by myself. When I’m on the road, with my own vehicle, I love listening to my XM satellite radio. BPM, 90’s on 9, AltNation, Faction and Raw Dog Comedy have taken me to many faraway places and provided me many hours of entertainment.

However, sometimes I will tire of music or if I’m in a rental car, I won’t have XM so aside from putting music on my phone or bringing cd’s, what are my options?

Well, about 4 months ago, I starting looking into Audio Books. I’ve avoided buying a Kindle or other ereader (including buying books and reading it on my phone, which is basically a small tablet – Samsung Note 3) because I don’t like reading on a tech device – I still prefer books. Although books aren’t the most convenient when traveling due to space limitations and they take up a lot of shelf space at home (my den has become my frisbee and book room), I cannot read while driving so audio books just made sense.

I checked out a few apps but the clear winner for me was Audible. Not only is it free to join, but every month they give you 1 credit which is good for a free audio book. They regularly run promotions and many of their titles are frequently on sale so if you don’t want to pay full price for a book (or avoid paying entirely, it’s easy to do so).

I wanted to also explore new books and avoid getting the audio book version of books I already owned. In searching around, I stumbled upon Douglas Preston, who is a sci fi author, with a huge collection of titles. I also checked out a new Stephen King book I hadn’t heard of and found out another series by Janet Evanovich, which seems to have potential based on the first book I listened to her.

I have also found that as much as I enjoy a certain author, I also really enjoy a certain narrator. So far, my favourite narrators are Scott Sowers, David Colacci and Scott Brick.

I will be updating this post with all of the books I have currently listened to while on the road (and more recently, listening to while doing cardio) and for the books I really loved, I will be writing individual reviews because let’s face it – a good book ignites your imagination and you can’t put the book down (or in this case, turn the speakers off).

 Completed Books

• Stephen King – Mr Mercedes
• Janet Evanovich – Top Secret Twenty-One
• Douglas Preston – Tyrannosaur Canyon
• Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – Relic
• Douglas Preston – The Kraken Project
• Douglas Preston – Blasphemy
• Douglas Preston – Impact
• Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – The Ice Limit
• Jeb Blount – People Buy You
• Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – Mount Dragon
• Charles Duhigg – The Power of Habit
• Tom Rath – How Full Is Your Bucket?
• Matthew McBride – A Swollen Red Sun
• Lincoln Child – Deep Storm
• Steven Levitt & Stephen Dubner – When to Rob a Bank
• Douglas Preston – Beyond the Ice Limit
• Janet Evanovich – Smokin’ Seventeen
• David McCullough – The Wright Brothers
• Tim Grover – Relentless
• Gail Blanke – Throw Out Fifty Things
• Aija Mayrock – The Survival Guide to Bullying
• Stephen King – End of Watch
• Stephen King – Finders Keepers
• Janet Evanovich – Explosive Eighteen

In My Library

• Robert Pirsig – Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
• Christopher Chabris – The Invisible Gorilla
• Neil Gaiman – The Graveyard Book
• Dale Carnegie – How to Win Friends and Influence People
• Simon Sinek – Start With Why
• Susan Cain – Quiet
• David Graeber – Debt
• Harry Beckwith – Selling the Invisible
• Andy Weir – The Martian
• The Hound of the Baskervilles
• George S. Clason – The Richest Man in Babylon
• Neil Rackham – SPIN Selling
• Douglas Preston – The Codex
• Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – Fever Dream
• Douglas Preston – Gideon’s Corpse
• Douglas Preston – Two Graves
• Douglas Preston – Gideon’s Sword
• Douglas Preston – Blue Labyrinth
• Douglas Preston – The Lost Island
• Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – Cold Vengeance
• Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child – White Fire
• Douglas Preston – Extraction
• Lincoln Child – Utopia
• Lincoln Child – Terminal Freeze
• Lincoln Child – The Third Gate
• Douglas Preston – Cemetery Dance
• Lincoln Child – Death Match
• Jeffrey Deaver – The Starling Project
• A.G. Riddle – The Atlantis Gene
• Tim Krieder – We Learn Nothing
• Hans Christian Andersen – The Snow Queen
• Oren Klaff – Pitch Anything
• Jack Schafer – The Like Switch
• Ryan Holiday – Ego is the Enemy
• Chuck Klosterman – Eating the Dinosaur
• Ken Blanchard – The One Minute Manager
• Thich Nhat Hanh – Savor: Mindful Eating

I first heard about the movie “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” just through some online ads and short teasers on Youtube but I always skipped over them. Then during a flight from Chicago to Calgary in May, I happened to see it under the available movies. I figured why not since I had nothing better to do.

Well, I was blown away. Honestly, this is one of the best movies I’ve ever seen. Definitely in my top 5. And if I hadn’t been on a plane full of people, I would have loudly sobbed at the end of the movie since it’s one of the best endings I’ve seen.

This movie will make you feel happy, hopeful, light, relaxed and overall just make you smile. Watch it.

Why is love like karate?

If you look at how the ranking system works in karate, there are different colours of obis (which is like a belt) which represents the level one has achieved.

The most widely practiced style of karate, shotokan, uses the following ranking system (from Wikipedia):

Each belt colour represents the level that one can achieve in karate and it represents hard work, dedication and commitment to the art of karate.

We can compare love to karate in this way because one could say that love represents hard work, dedication and commitment between two people.

6 Questions to Ask Before You Tell Someone You Love Them

Obviously there are more elements to love but as a person trying to understand what love might mean, I think this can be a useful analogy.

If you meet someone and they tell you that they love you, think about what level that love might be at. Is it very new? Maybe it’s an orange belt kind of love. Have you been together for a while? Maybe it’s a brown belt kind of love.

I think that once you get to the black belt level kind of love, that is such an advanced level representing the highest level of love – engagement, marriage, a lifelong partnership.

Some people get scared when they hear the “L-word” but in reality, love can represent a whole wide range of levels.

So the next time someone tells you that they love you, think about what colour of belt they’re wearing.

Beautiful.

Sad.

Real.

Haunting.

Inspiring.

Tragic.

The moral of the movie…

Happiness [is] only real when shared.