Happy New Year

The New Year is a time of new beginnings.  A time to forget the old and start anew.  There are many rituals that help one to do this.  The Burning Bowl Ritual is where you write on a piece of paper any regrets or any thing else negative that happened to you during the old year and put it into a bowl and burn away those negative experiences to open yourself up to the good that the new year will bring to you.

Another ritual is the Grape Ritual which I learned about from JB Glossinger the founder of MorningCoach.com.  It is a custom that is traditionally from the Hispanic culture.  This ritual is where you eat a grape each time the bell strikes at midnight. This is done for good luck and prosperity in the New Year. JB twisted it up a little bit in that you eat a grape for each goal you want to accomplish in the New Year.  You write your goals on a piece of paper and after you eat the grapes you put the goals in a special place so that at the end of the year you would look at the paper to see what goals you actually accomplished.

Of course there are the food rituals.  In the South of the US, eating black-eyed peas ,collard greens, and corn bread for good luck and prosperity. In the Asian culture eating of long noodles, which represents long life.  In China eating fish represents abundance because the word for fish in the Chinese Language is similar sounding to word for abundance.

My New Year Rituals are The Grape Ritual and eating black-eyed peas and corn bread.  I don't eat collard greens because I don't like the taste.  Anyway whatever New Year Ritual you do wishing you and yours a wonderful and prosperous 2014. 

Shawn

Why Rainbow Pennies?

Welcome to my blog about my personal growth in 2014.  I choose the title Rainbow Pennies as a reminder of hope and thing will get better. 

Why do I see hope and things will get better in those words?  Because one day I was walking worrying about finances.  The car broke down and I was thinking how were we going to pay for it among other things.  I was feeling overwhelmed and trying to think of different solutions.  When I looked down and saw a penny on the ground. I felt a little a better and then I walked a few more feet and I looked up and what did I see, a very pale rainbow in the sky.

I saw these two things as signs that things would get better.  So when I decided to write a blog about my growth in personal development this year; I wanted to name it after that moment that meant so much to me and so that I will remember it during the hard, difficult times that will occur as I move forward to a better place in my life.

Will this be a positive blog?  Honestly I don't know.  I just want to write and keep tack of what 2014 will bring. Whatever that may be:  Positives or negatives.  Triumphs or frustrations.

How often will I write?  Again I don't know.  It all depends on what happens.  I just want this to be a fun record of what happens in my life during 2014. 

I am excited to see what 2014 will bring and 2014 will be a rocking year.

Shawn