I Want to Live Like Animals

This may sound silly but do you remember the Savage Garden song from quite a few years ago now that said, "I want to live like animals, careless and free." Well, this was a beautiful song and while I was talking to a good friend of mine the other day it occurred to me that there are some fundamental differences in feelings between animals and humans that make us less likely to be "careless and free," so to speak.

While animals feel pain, pleasure, fear and love (some would debate this, but I am sure from my own experiences with my cat that they do feel love), there are two emotions animals lack: guilt, and regret.

It is true that humans are capable of some of the strongest and most beautiful emotions like love and trust, but the flipside is that regret and guilt are both very strong emotions too, and if we do not keep them in check, theye can become hugely self destructive. If only we could learn to have no regrets like the animals. If only somehow we could make our brain understand that at any point in time in our lives we make the best decision we can with the knowledge that was available to us in that situation.

If we only understood that hindsight is useless and self-berrating. We always do whatever we can with the circumstances available to us at our then present time. If we fully understood this, then we wouldn't need to regret because we would know that we did what we could. and nothing less. However, unfortunately we are obsesssed with hindsight. We become obsessed thinking about the past and what we think we should have done, we waste time regretting our actions or worse - feeling guilty about them, which is not only pointless, but also a waste of our precious time and is damaging to our emotional well-being.

When you find yourself regretting something, or feeling guilty - please try to remember: there are no wrong decisions in life - there are just experiences and lessons to be learnt. Please lets all try to live a little "like the animals," and set your soul free.

Paniyiri

This weekend is Paniyiri weekend! For those of you that haven't a clue what I am talking about, Paniyiri is Greek for "festival." So this weekend is Greek Festival weekend in Brisbane!

Ever since I was a kid I've loved, enjoyed and looked forward to Paniyiri. Most years I either dance or sing, many times the same repertoire as the year before.

One of my friends asked me how I can still be enthusiastic after more than 20 years of attending. I thought about this question and I asked myself, "What is is about Paniyiri that year after year makes me excited and happy?" "Is it the food?" Sure the food is great, but its not the drawing point. "Is it the Greek wines?" Hmmm, the Greeks aren't really the best wine makers! Surprise surprise, its actually the music!

At Paniyiri, a live band plays all my favourite Greek songs - new and old, and the atmosphere created by the live band - up there high on that big stage - is incredible. And its not just me that feels it. Every year I watch (and dance with) hundreds of non-greeks on the big grassy dance floor. They haven't got a clue what the song lyrics mean or how the dance is danced, but they feel moved by the music and the atmosphere and they feel compelled to dance. Its a wonderful thing to witness - so many people so happy and feeling so great that they just want to move.

That is what brings me back ever year.

So if you live in Brisbane, and you've got nothing else planned this weekend, head down to the Paniyiri at Musgrave park and have a dance - you'll feel so much better for it!

Singing for the Soul

The band that I sometimes sing with asked me to sing last Friday night at the restaurant at which we often perform. I had had a hectic week from hell and, come Friday afternoon I still had a squillion things to finish before I could call it a week.

Yes, I was tired, in fact, that's probably an understatement: I was exhausted. However, eventually I went home and started getting ready for the gig at the restaurant.

My husband came home and saw me getting ready, despite my fatigue and weariness, and he asked me why I bother going to sing at the restaurant. He said, "You are hardly paid anything for it, and its not like you need the work." All of what he said is true.

However, if I were singing merely for the money - well, I would probably never sing! I explained to him that he had missed the point entirely. I dont sing because I'm paid to: I sing because it makes me feel wonderful.

Have you ever noticed that when you are particularly happy that you whistle, hum or sing a tune? It is no coincidence: happiness and singing are interrelated. Singing can lift your spirits. It is liberating and satisfying as you are using your very own unique instrument to make your very own music. If you have a voice, then you have the potential to be a musician! What a gift!

But apart from making you feel better, Doctors have also advocated singing for health, saying that it encourages good posture and deep breathing. So really, its almost a form of meditation. If you have ever been in your car, or in the shower or in your room and you have played and/or sung the same song over and over again, you will understand just how meditative music can be. When you are listening to, and singing a song that you love, you are thinking about nothing else but the lyrics and the sound that you are producing. Two of the purposes of meditation are to establish a good breathing pattern and to make the mind focus on one thing only, at the exclusion of everything else. This is an exact description of me when I'm singing - and for many of you too, I imagine.

To read about the benefits of singing for mental health, check out this article by Wendy Moore published in The Observer. And finally: just keep on singing your way to good mental health!