Tag: maine blogs posts

Maine Simple Living | Get Stronger, Don’t Expect Easier.

Find Answers In An Unspoiled Four Seasons Setting Like Maine.

“Happily ever after”, that how any of us would like to live from here on out.

Until “The End”. But life is not a story book ending. And maybe life would not be so hard if we did not expect or hope it would be easier. Do you desire a life without the heavy lifting on Earth? Think you deserve, are entitled to one that just plays out free and easy, on it’s own and more like Heaven?

The way you approach and react to events, other people in your life speaks volumes on how you were raised.

How you are built, wired mentally, spiritually. Your inside, outer viewpoint when something joyful happens shows the true depth of your gratitude. Do you expect the good to just unfold, think you deserve it because of your “good works”?

Your own effort, dedication, skills, talents and attitude can help shape your self image. But giving yourself the center stage under the blistering hot, blinding spotlights may not be where all the credit is due. Your mate, God, kids, everyone you come in to contact around you helps lift you up. Contribute to your good fortune, sunny days of happiness, getting ahead.

Or maybe what you consider good fortune, a success is your ability to see the small joys that another might miss.

What someone else would say is not enough to tip the scales from a bad day to a good one. Because there is not silver lining for them but is for you as you gain wisdom and understanding. That you are able to take away from painful, hurtful circumstances and come out the other side stronger for it.

There is a purpose behind every problem. Embrace them, don’t run from them. Good lessons for you, your mate, family and all around you that you love and are suppose to inspire. No matter how difficult, confusing, your patience, persistent, attitude can improve you. Help you understand yourself.

It starts with you, then rubs off on others.

Find someone that takes the time to understand you, improve you, that is brutally honest. Tells you what you don’t want to but need to hear.

We live in a fast paced society with quick fixes desired. Wanting, throwing money at “not now but right now” fast complete solutions. Thinking “there, that problem’s eliminated”. Or was all the other person’s fault and I am free. Not so fast. Happiness is an inside job and expecting those around you to provide it is selfish, self centered. Exhaustive for those running in circles to stay in your blessings.

Thinking others around you are irritating, not meeting all your needs or helping you to be happy misses the point that they have struggles too. And some of your expectations are only obtainable, possible through God alone. Your mate is not able to to provide them. Yet. Much of what you need, expect, want is independent of you or your mate. It is not a case if they worked harder, you could be happier. A merry go round of replacing those people that seemingly offend you is not the key to inner peace, contentment. Same problems follow you as junk in your trunk.

The “I’ll be happy if…. ” or “I’ll be happy when…” means your happiness is postponed, on hold.

You are waiting for other people or events, circumstances to come around more to your way of liking, thinking. The “ifs” and “whens” may not turn out the way you hope and dream. But trusting, obeying can alleviate all your difficulties in life and lower your expectations to something more realistic.

Just be happy, jouful yourself first rather than expecting your mate to provide it.

Don’t adopt the “I will love you if” or “I will love you when” critical spirit that comes with a price tag. And when it is not delivered out of exhaustion, lots of frustration, silence, resentment happens. Which leads to low self esteem, your mate feeling like a failure, inadequate, unloved. It all snowballs, avalaches back and forth as the relationship loses unity, oneness.

In time with prayful dedication, daily work, you can get stronger and not just expect life with someone else would be easier. Using setbacks as life stepping stones. Tools to tackle the areas of your life you need to change. Skills to learn to accept those you can not. And less than loving ways all of us display because we all sin, make mistakes and often just don’t keep being the light in the darkness that comes from only one source. Reflect that love you gain with knowing God.

Use the painful situations you suffer through as boot camp to get closer to God.

As a challenge to learn more about yourself. You have choices, it’s your life and don’t listen to anyone that tells you you are no good. Or that you have very few skills or talents. You and I have lots of good qualities and can put them to work for God’s purpose.

Don’t question some people’s need to beat you up, bring you down. Instead, come out the other side of struggles, difficult situations better than you were going in. Take ownership of your mistakes.

Keep your eyes on your own paper and work on having better character traits. But realize others in the relationship sin too. Not intentionally but because of praylessness. A log in their eye. Being too busy with the wrong priorities. Too sensitive from needs not met that you think the other should automatically be able to. Realize that they are struggling with meeting your needs but out of love try. Failing misserably. Or just because of spending too much time being defensive, trying but missing the mark completely. There are major changes going on inside my heart.

The most real, genuine, interesting people are ones who have endured dark days.

Came out of the pain, suffering in a seemingly hopeless situation with a strong, greater faith. Because they were broken, abandoned, with no ones arms to hold them and no where else to turn but God. Who made you, understands you and will direct you if you let him. We need God in our lives.

God does his best work when you and I surrender. Reach out to him, keep him close all your life. The greatest life lessons are taught under fire and being tested, stretched. Realizing you and I are far from perfect. Never will be nor should we strive for total perfection. Not going to happen. But we can improve. Be happy with that, strive for that.

You learn skills, get “schooled” and unlock answers in suffering when you get stripped to the bone. Your heart ripped open, exposed. Your pride, ego, vanity get pushed aside in pain and that is where real life lessons get learned.

My Dad’s University of Maine commencement speaker told the graduating class wearing those strange square hats he hoped they all had major set backs early in life.

Better earlier than later to save future heartache. So they could benefit from mistakes in the beginning of their journey of making a living, marrying, having kids and developing better relationships.

We all need to fall on our face, to not take ourselves so seriously. To relax, just let the life current pull the canoe, kayak, boat along. Stop paddling upstream. Adjust your sails and use life’s lessons to improve. Take full advantage of your troughs, valleys and don’t just expect mountain tops all the time.

Soar higher, freer and believe more in yourself even if others you love and trust don’t.

Everything that happens in life is already known. Playing out right on time, on schedule for a reason that often defies logic. See the spiritual gain that can happen, strengthened you rather than crying out for life to get easier.

Not feeling sorry for the predicaments you often put yourself in is a sign of maturity. And creates a greater awareness to see the warning signs to keep them from happening over and over. Everyone has struggles, pain and suffering too… it’s not just you. God loves us, is in complete control. Get closer to him, learn from him. He made you, understands you and me.

Open up your heart, let him come in to your life. Let him work, improve your “insides” despite what may be going on in your “outsides”. Look up, not down. Don’t try to skirt the roadblocks, or sweep them under the rug blaming others for not measuring up. Or letting you down. The patience, dedications to get on your knees is the source of your strength for greater self esteem, sense of worth and purpose. Don’t waste an opportunity to learn, improve your character. Get stronger, don’t expect easier.

Maine, make the trip. Come for a day, stay a life time.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

April 15, 2012
Maine Blog Post | Your Outlook On Life, Death.

Are your parents still alive?

Have You Seen This Lady? Know Where She Is?

Do you see them much because you live close to them?

Or are you NOT in the group of half of us in this country that live with in fifty miles of where we grew up?

Some people have parents they don’t enjoy or connect with regularly.

A few are resentful, blame their parents and folks around themselves for any unpleasantness, unhappiness. All that is wrong in their life with sometimes too high of expectations of others, too low of themselves.

But I fall in to the group that are grateful, appreciative for my parents who are now deceased from this Earth. Were they perfect, heck no. Neither are you or I. But being respectful for the parents you had if you were not an orphan or just had bad to the bone parents is important.

Maybe you don’t know where they are, who they were.

Or someone else stepped in to help raise, shape you. Maybe it was the entire Maine village from little league coach, teacher, pastor or extended family members that were by your side. I appreciate my parents even more the older I get because of years being able to add, see their wisdom with sharper 20-20 vision of just how lucky I was.

When you grow up on a Maine farm, run a small family business, you see, spend a lot of time with your parents, siblings.

And during the work, labor you exchange ideas, share and communicate about life, family, hopes, dreams.

Kids learn the value of hard work, develop a greater sense of their place and importance in the family. They feel needed, have worth, are more responsible, more mature and secure with a purpose in their live, the family.

And what you saw, experienced growing up if it was good, healthy means those traditions, habits, rituals shape the way you raise your kids.

Outline the game plan for day to day in the family relationship if you are priviledged, blessed to have kids of your own. And if dysfunctions exist, abuse or neglect happens, then the adult child is going to have to work harder. Really have to think hard about the right way to do it when they did not witness it first hand in their own childhood.

Maine is a neat state to grow up and raise a family, make a living, get community involved. The great outdoors with a lower population and more nature, wildlife can not help but add to the experience of life. We are connected, look after each other when the population is lower in a rural state like Maine. Everything is home grown and nothing is stronger than the heart of a Maine volunteer. That puts his, her all in to an act of kindness, something they believe in strongly. They step up to the plate. All the time. This is there purpose in the community.

Death is not viewed as the end all in Maine either.

In just Houlton Maine alone, a town of about 6700, there are a dozen churches. You can view the abundance of places to worship God in a six by six mile town many ways. That prayer driven good down to Earth people abound. On their way to a better, final place. A real home.

That various, distinct versions of worship exist because not everyone is on the same page on what the right way to do it is. Or that we all are basically doing the same worship process but don’t all get along. See eye to eye.

Maybe because there are specks, logs in them? Or we just have not gotten to a more mature, serious level of worship. And church hopping happens to find the right fit. You should not be comfortable in your worship. Being happy is not as important as being holy either.

Hopefully you can embrace other religions without being threatened with your own.

Take the time to study them all is the best advice right? Don’t judge others, their worship experience. All are wired, plugged in to hopefully sooner than later in life really bottom out, get on their knees and open up their hearts. To cry out, ask for forgiveness of sins, start repentance, reconcilation.

Death can mean the beginning of real living in a better place and our short time on Earth is just a staging area to prepare us for the real event. Where we are reunited with passed on loved ones that departed before us. Death is part of life. Should not be feared and kids should be made to respect it, expect it and not worry about it.

Growing up my family made regular visits to the cemetery.

I did the same thing with my kids. It was not a morbid place or only reserved for graveside services during a burial. We visited not just during a loss, sad times of mourning. And to learn our connection to other family members, to know we are part of something bigger, other generations. And to hear stories about deceased family members to pass on. And for perspective on ourselves. Because history is sometimes your best predictor right?

My kids would ask me what my uncle this, aunt that were like.

I feel bad for folks that are lost, have no family or have cut off the one they had. By not any action of their own or just out of plain necessity. And I remember one time during spring that the wire trash receptacles were full of plastic and silk flowers removed with replacement life flowers added to the graves at Evergreen Cemetery.

My oldest daughter Elizabeth noticed some graves were all decked out, some looked like no one had visited for decades. While the boys and I were studying one family grave, Elizabeth took the better plastic flowers out of the garbage can and used them to spruce up the shabbiest grave, after removing some grass, applying some housekeeping skills.

It hit me as kids know a better sense of justice, fairness, kindness than we adults do.

They don’t want anyone left out. They champion the underdog. We lose that child like honesty, goodness and need them around for reminders of gentle loving ways to treat others.

We become better people teaching them too because they keep us honest.

You can not tell them one thing, and do the other and feel good about it as a parent. Consistency is key. Bible based direction is an absolute to get it right. Have a solid plan.

I am glad my four children, two step children got to know my parents, Nana and Buppy. Kids are better for the time spent with grandparents on all sides of a family. Tap in to yours if they are alive. And especially if they live local. Don’t waste a valuable resource of experiences, wisdom and strive to be closer to family. Embrace them, learn from them.
Maine, simple living for powerful results.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

April 14, 2012
When You Live In Maine, You Are So Spoiled.

Maine, Four Seasons, Not One We Are Not Outdoors.

Vacationland is what is stamped on the bottom of every Maine license plate and yes we are so spoiled to live in a four season outdoor paradise.

Most Mainers are pretty darn excited, grateful to be so close to natural unspoiled resources. But it is easy to fall in to a false security, lull of it must be this way everywhere. NOoooooo. It is not.

If I head a mile and half in any direction from my intown home, I am in the country.

No wall to wall people, no need for a taser or to worry about my property, my personal security.

People wave at each other, help each other out. Are friendly. Pitch in and volunteer.

Folks that live in Maine has lives with purpose. They volunteer. Pick the passions they love and year after year you can count on them to put their shoulder in to making local community events happen. Everyone benefits. And it causes other individuals to think what they should step up and do. To look and find a place in the local Maine community for them to give back.

The volunteers raise their kids to do the same in Maine, or wherever they move to. If you live out of state, you would be hard pressed to find a harder working individual than someone that grew up in Maine.

Lazy is not a word used to described 99% of Mainers. And if someone is, that is the worse opinion you could have of someone.

Can over look a lot, but not lazy.

No reason to be a bump on a log and just take take take. Give back to the area you live to make it a better place because you live, work and play there.

Helpful links to lots of places to have fun in Maine year round.

Maine, big state, friendlier people, wide open space.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

June 23, 2011
Maine Is Simple, Real, Natural, But Not Always Black And White.

Maine Is Sea Coastal Towns Like Bar Harbor But…

You know how on line, down at the diner, the lodge and in society everyone has an opinion?

Needing more than ever to be heard. But the tendency to make events, news, blog posts black and white does not mean you and I are built, wired that way. John M Grohol PsyD states there is “nothing in this world that is simply black or white”.

So how do the shades of gray shine through? When it is not always a case of one extreme or the other being settled on, agreed to easily? When folks are overbooked. Lead 200 mile per hour and escalating even faster lives. Looking for Monarch or Cliffs Notes. Taking the easy to digest, quick route. Or someone else’s word for it that seemingly has spent, invested the time to research the issue, topic. Some blog posts SEO machined too.

The tendency of the media is to take a complex issue, try to capture a sound bite, video loop to make it memorable, succinct, to the point.

Basically in too small a time frame, manufacture each article, news story in to a cookie cutter comic book.

Some call it bumper sticker politics, thinking. “The Truth is Out There (It’s Just Not Very Well Indexed)”

So how is Maine not black and white? It is a big state parked up here in the upper right hand corner. Not all rugged coastlines, lobsters and light houses. But mountains, wooded lands, fertile fields, blueberry barrens, 6000 lakes. All with down to earth people proud of their home towns, cities of the Pine Tree State, Vacationland. And Mainers don’t hibernate winters, we get outdoors all four seasons.

Out spoken, not candy coating it is another persona Mainers are often cast as possessing, radiating. The “you can’t get there from here” helpful directions when a tourist asks for local guidance. But with a sense of history “as Maine goes, so goes the nation” there is respect for the simple, basic common sense. Maine is less than one percent of the short sale, foreclosure, real estate repossession market. 46th lowest in the nation in this department. Maybe other parts of the country could learn from our simple, pretty straight day to day living.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com

October 22, 2010