I am not talking about such sleeping problems where you would be able to seek help professionally or through self-help by making changes to your lifestyles. Before I misled you further, please allow me to rephrase my sentence to make it clearer, “Do you sleep with a peace of mind at night?”

I believe most of us can sleep peacefully without waking up in cold sweat to nightmares at night. I remembered Richard Branson said something along this line, in one of his books, “Don’t do things that will cause you to have problem sleeping at night.” I couldn’t remember the exact words but I gathered he meant we must not do anything bad or against our conscience lest we will be troubled in sleep at night; we always have a choice.

As the saying goes, “To err is human.” Most of us would have made mistakes or errors in our lives. Some of them big, and continue to haunt us for life. Some of them small, and we readily forget. When we made mistakes, we must learn from them and be brave enough to face the consequences; running away is not an option.

Apparently not all people share the same thought and they will flee at the first chance. Dr. Silviu Ionescu, former Romanian diplomat in Singapore, linked to two hit-and-run accidents which killed one and left two injured is one such person. He was believed to be drunk driving when it happened. He was requested to return to Singapore for a coroner’s inquiry. However, Dr. Ionescu said his failing health was the main reason he may not return. He claimed that he could die as a result of his illness, believed to be diabetes.

He firmly denied having anything to do with the accident that killed one, or another later that day that left two people injured.

In remarks to the newspaper, Dr. Ionescu said: ‘I read in newspapers that prosecutors (in Singapore) were accusing me long before they had the right to. They should have done a preliminary inquiry first. It was clearly a sign that I shouldn’t come back.’

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman said that they were puzzled by Dr. Ionescu’s comments. According to the spokesman, “…no charges have been made and no judgment has been passed on Dr. Ionescu. … He should take the opportunity to give his account of the events in order that the true circumstances surrounding the accidents may be determined.”

Was he the one? I have no wish to discuss or pass judgment here because he is the only one who knows. If he was not the one, then all the more he should stand up and clear himself. If he was, then he should return to Singapore to face the consequence.

I am appalled how one can do something like that and yet sleep peacefully at night. How can he/she face others and look them in the eyes? And how can one look at himself/herself in the mirror?

High-Mindedness is a concept which I read from the book, Calm and Compassionate Children, by Susan Usha Dermond. It is the practice of focusing our thoughts in a positive direction. Although the book explores the usage of this concept in parenting, I believe we can adapt this concept in our everyday life.

Practicing high-mindedness is to focus on uplifting moments in everyday life by paying attention to the positive energy surrounding us. The book shares, “Paying attention to the beauty and kindness surrounding us develops sensitivity and gives a calmer outlook on life because it brings our focus to the moment, away from anxiety about the future or past,”

What we can do, as shares by the book, to practice high-mindedness is noticing, which is an activity to share simple joy of uplifting moments with others; for example, the freshness of the morning breeze, the wind rustling the leaves, the smell of a freshly baked loaf of bread or the cloudless blue sky. When we noticed these simple joys, we shared them with others by bringing it to their attention.

Noticing not only helps us to focus our attention to uplifting moments, but also helps us to count our blessings and be grateful for them. Inevitably, we will also be happier when we are finding more time to notice and rejoice in life’s little blessings.

Noticing is one activity which we can carry out with our family and friends. What is being proposed in the book is for family to share gratitude moments at dinner every evening, where everyone shares something from the day that they are grateful for. It will be challenging and may seem unnatural at first, but practice makes better; eventually everyone will find it easy to share moments from the day they are grateful for.

Practicing high-mindedness through noticing will allow us to focus in the positive direction, to appreciate the simple joys in life and to be grateful for the daily blessings that are coming to us. Through that feeling of peacefulness in gratitude, comes happiness.

This was a quote which I came across yesterday while I was compiling some love quotes by Barbara de Angelis. I knew it instantly that this is one quote which I want to share with you. This quote is in line with the ‘Rewriting Life with Different Choices‘ post, which I did a about two weeks ago.

One of the things which upsets me, is seeing people using their phone (without a hands-free) while they are driving. Now they are even checking their text messages and texting while driving.

Then there are always the inconsiderate few who decide that they prefer to throw trashes on the floor when the bin is less than a feet away.

It really doesn’t make any sense in letting these people upset me. Can we really be in control of our happiness? I believe we can. As the saying goes, “It is not what happened but what we do or how we react to what happened that is most important.” There are people or things in life that are constantly upsetting us … but only if we allow them to.

There is something which I believe we all know; Whenever we let someone or something upset us, we are letting the person or the thing control our happiness. Why should we be allowing others to decide if we should be happy? Since being happy is essential for the well-being of one - be it mentally, physically or spiritually, shouldn’t we be in control of our happiness?

If life is like a book we received at birth as what Dorothy mentioned in her blog, how are we writing each chapter? Our parents had already helped to write the introductions for us and now it is up to us to complete the rest of the chapters in the book.

Is the book going to be one that grabs the readers’ attention and keeps them going from one chapter to another? Or is it going to be one the readers will put down after reading the first chapter and know exactly what they can expect in the following chapters or even the conclusion?

Whatever it is, it is up to us what we want to write in the book. And since we are stuck with the writing, why not make it an exciting one - starting from today! We cannot erase what had already be written, but we sure can start writing the most exciting and colourful story from today.

How our stories will turn out depend on the choices we are making each day. From a past training I went to previously, the trainer was telling us not to look at the current status in our lives and decide that are how we would be in the future. He stated that our current status in life are the reflection of the choices we had made in the past. So if we are unhappy about our current status in life, we have to start making different choices now.

Just as what Albert Einstein said, “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” If we change our choices, we can hope to create a new future.

Life has always been about making choices. Even if we refuse to make any choice, it is still a choice we made in not making any choice. There are times we may feel that we are not in control of how some situations are turning out and yes we cannot always control what goes on outside. But we do have the power to control what goes on inside us. Tap on that power inside us to make the choice.