Love and Big Hugs - marykatekopec.com

Focus On What You Can Do

Dear Gorgeous Souls!

Focus on what you can do, and you will feel a happier and healthier difference in your life!

Here’s you walking along in all your sunshiny potential …

…when suddenly, DRAMA!

It could be you caught a news clip. Or you got some bad news. Or someone is mean to you. … This list can unfortunately go on and on, as I’m sure you know. Life can be like that. But drama happens with you willingly engaging in it, or with it [drama] trying to force itself on you.

Either way … drama is not good. It’s a downward spiral that can lead to stress, which leads to inflammation, which leads illness, disease, and even for some, death. Wuuuuut????

The bottom line: Unhappiness hurts you!

But there is a solution here. It’s easily said, but if you are a drama junkie, it’s not so easily done. Drama is eye catching. It incites the senses. It irks you. Compels you to engage and respond. You’ve got experiences. Opinions. Facts. Feelings. And the energy drama can stir up inside you can’t stay in there. It needs to get out of you. You need to express yourself. Be heard. Be important.

The problems is that a lot of the time, how we express ourselves in the midst of drama isn’t always helpful. It doesn’t fix the problem. It doesn’t resolve the issue. And we end up going around and around with our drama and the stress it creates, and the downward spiral goes even deeper.

Thank goodness we have the power of choice in our own lives! And the “simple” solution that we can choose:

Focus On What YOU CAN DO!

If it’s a situation, relationship, a moment in time, or an experience happening around you, near you, or with you stuck in the middle, ask yourself: Is this something I can personally fix? Is there something I can do to help resolve this situation or make it better? Do I really need to be around this person? Do I really need to do this thing?

If the answer is NO, get out of there! If you can’t help, but you are engaging anyway, you are putting yourself into a moment that will make you feel helpless or inert or some other negative something … but if there’s nothing you can do, except be in the middle of whatever it is, you are taking on an unnecessary stress burden. And the negativity you gain from it is something that you will then have to deal with for yourself. Why do that to yourself?

If the answer is yes – FANTASTIC! You can make a difference, and that can make you feel really good! You can have a positive impact and feel useful! So then:

figure out what you can do
make an action plan
do your action plan
then get out of there!!!

Be effective! Make a difference! Then move on!!! And heal yourself from any lingering stress that came from the efforts of helping resolve or fix the drama!

If it’s informational, ask yourself this: Is this something I need to learn or know? What do I need to learn from it or know about it?

If the answer is NO, get out of there! If you don’t need to know it; if it won’t grow you, help you become a better person, etc; if it isn’t something that will help you become more informed so you can make better choices, then … honestly … you don’t need to know it. It’s information that will only burden you unnecessarily.

But if the answer is yes – FANTASTIC! It’s an opportunity to grow you, become a more informed person … all you have to do is handle the difficulty of whatever the dramatic informational moment is. So:

learn it
know it
then get out of there!!!

So let’s take a quick moment to talk about how to activate your choice. How can you focus on what you can do? Well, start by asking yourself the questions above, and then, if you find yourself having to engage in the drama – set limits and establish boundaries. And if you don’t have to engage in the drama, then eliminate it from your life entirely.

Setting limits and boundaries comes in handy for negative or toxic people or situations in your life you are not prepared to stop engaging in yet, or that you don’t know yet how to stop engaging in.

When you have to engage in the drama:

set your limits and boundaries
stick to them (Value yourself. Love yourself. And be strong for you!)
get in, get done, get out
then self-care and TLC yourself back into wellness!

Eliminating the drama entirely from your life comes in handy for easier, less complicated dramas … like when the media jerks us around like string puppets, playing on our emotions, over sensationalizing the mundane or insignificant, etc. We really don’t need that in our lives, so tuning out, turning it off, and ignoring it is a great step to protecting ourselves: emotionally, mentally, physically … the whole of us.

For self-care, remember to do things like:

yoga
smiling
walking
eating something nutritious & healing
journaling
deep breathing
taking magnesium supplements
practice gratitude and POSitude
use your happiness toolbox
doing whatever positive, self-loving thing you can to help you heal!

As a general intention to help you be happy and healthy, separate yourself from all of the drama you can. And whatever you have to deal with, find positive ways to manage, cope, heal, and recover. Here’s the important thing about drama. It’s drama. It’s a conflict of intentions that creates an emotional response. If it is not drama that you need to or want to experience, then get it out of your life. Because drama creates stress, which causes inflammation, which leads to illness and disease. And you are an important person. You are valuable and irreplaceable. When you are happy and healthy you function better for yourself and for those around you. You are worth your love and self-care. And you are far more important than so much of the drama we experience every single day. So focus on what you can do, and you will feel the happy, healthy difference it makes in your life!

YAY!!!

Until next week …

Loving you so big and brightly!!! I’m sending you light and love to hug you the biggest!!!
May your days be drama-free, and when they can’t, surround yourself with people who will love you, support you, help you, and be the best with you!

Love and Big Hugs,

More Happiness from Mary Kate

Find more happiness, love, big hugs, support, gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care in these POSitude cards!

Needing some self-care, love and support? Wanting hugs? Treat yourself or someone you love to these Big Loving, Big Hugging daily inspirational, motivational, and empowering POSitude cards! They really can make a big difference in your day!!!

POSitude Cards. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs! Found at Etsy

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

What beautiful souls like you think about their POSitude cards!

These cards are colorful and cheerful! They stay on my desk at work and have made for great conversation with colleagues. I look forward to choosing my daily pick me up. I reflect on my current mood or what inspiration I need for the day. I do have a few favorites that I’ve used more than once or have displayed longer than just a day.

These cards remind me to stay positive and believe in myself!

Stephanie Shay, 4th grade teacher

I love my POSitude cards! I pick one to display on my refrigerator for the week. Reading the card makes me happy and gives me a variety of ways to stay positive in my daily life. It has also become a conversation piece for all who enter my kitchen.

Karen Henry, Retired 4^th Grade Teacher, Personal Assistant

The Positude cards have made a difference for setting the tone during meetings. I have set them in the middle of the meeting table and while we are settling in, people pick them up and read them. This small gesture makes a huge difference in the quality of the conversations we have during our 1:1 meetings.

Mary Freer, University Research Department Administrator

I love my POSitude cards! They are so cute, and the messages are very uplifting and inspiring!

Mary McMurtry, Retired Bookkeeper, Mom, Grandmom

Get inspired every day with a deck of my new POSitude cards! Each deck has 35 different full-color, fun, happy POSitudes (36 cards total, with one card sharing suggestions on how to get the most out your POSitudes.) Available in my Etsy shop. Check them out and learn more, now!

You can find these POSitude cards in my new ETSY shop!!!

Looking for self-care to share love and big hugs for all ages?

How a treasured friendship lost gave me something life changing to be grateful for! Lub's Very Happy Day! Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Lub’s Very Happy Day! is filled with delightful brightness and big huggy smiles!

Lub is the happiest, PINKest, most love-filled monster, Ever! Her big, PINK heart is always with her, and it beams brightly in everything she does!

Lub loves you!

Join Lub as she shares with you her love and very happy, monster-ifically delightful day! Feel playful and bright, smile big, and be happy! Have fun and be cheerful!

You can find copies of Lub’s Very Happy Day! to adopt at Amazon!

The only relationship in my life that I have complete control over is the relationship I have with me.

My relationship. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Hello Beautiful Blossoms,

I don’t know if what I’m about to say is going to resonate with you or not, but I hope so, because I believe it 100% through and through from my heart to my bones and back!

The only relationship in your life and this whole wide world you have complete control over is the relationship you have with yourself.

I can love me. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

You can choose to love yourself. And like yourself. Or not. But I hope you do. I know this isn’t always an easy thing. Especially when you’re down and going through rough times. But if ever there was a time when you needed yourself more, I don’t know when that is.

Find something. Anything that you like about yourself and focus on it. Grow it until it glows inside of you. Until it’s something you love about yourself!

And if you can’t even think of one thing, then think of something that you’ve always seen in others, something that you like and want to be. And find a way to be it. Grow it. Live it. And you will have something you love about you!

I can like me. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

It’s a great place to start!

And if you already have a list in your head of all the things you like and love about yourself – wonderful! Write it down! Remind yourself often! Trust me, the reaffirmation is a GOOD THING!!!

I can take care of me. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

I know so many people who can say that they are their own worst enemy, or their harshest critic. I used to be one of them. Why do we do this to ourselves. To make ourselves better? To challenge ourselves? To force ourselves to reach higher limits?

I stopped treating myself this way, because it’s such a negative way to try to accomplish growth. And I’ve learned, negativity in gets negativity out. When we criticize ourselves to improve ourselves, the improvement comes with a shadow founded in something akin to self-loathing. How can that ever be loving growth for ourselves?

I can respect me. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Taking care of ourselves requires a willingness to invest in who we are and who we want to become. Do we want to be happy? Do we want to be healthy? Will will care enough about ourselves to build happiness and healthiness into our lives? Will we respect ourselves with positive reinforcement, reaffirmation, and acknowledgement of our strengths and give ourselves patience for the things we need or want to work on?

I can be the me I want to be. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Will we be brave enough to grow ourselves into the lovely people we want to be? Can we find kindness in our hearts to be kind to ourselves and give ourselves room to grow and learn and live, one moment, one day, one heartbeat at a time?

I can be kind to me. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

And when we get stuck, or have trouble, or fall, or even fail when trying on something new, or trying to grow ourselves and our lives stronger, will we see that we are human and perfection is impossible (and exhausting)? Will we respect ourselves, love ourselves, be kind to ourselves, and forgive ourselves, so we live and learn, and grow and move on to become brighter blossoms?

I can forgive me. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Will we set goals that we empower ourselves to reach by:

thinking each goal through
determining what steps we need to take to make each goal a reality
and then activating an action plan to take the necessary steps to make each of these goals a reality?

Or will we set ourselves up for failure, by putting expectations on ourselves with no course of action to achieve them?

I can be my own best friend. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

In the simple truth that is:

The only relationship in my life that I have complete control over is the relationship I have with me, we each have choices. And as undeniable facts go, there is simply no one in your life you will spend more time with than you. Everywhere you go, there you are.

Every waking moment. Every sleeping moment.

Every happy moment. Every sad or angry moment.

Every accomplishment and triumph. Every failure.

Wherever you are, whatever you do, the only person who will always be there with you, will be you.

Wouldn’t it, sweet wonderful blossom and dear love … wouldn’t it be wonderful, if for all of these moments you could share time with your best friend, biggest supporter and fan, the love of your life? Someone who makes you feel happy and good and loved. Someone who cares completely about you. Someone who would drop everything to be there for you.

Well, the good news is that you can. Because you can choose to be your own best friend!!!

Be my own best friend POSitude. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs. — Total excitement! Here is a preview card from my upcoming new deck of POSitude cards! Get some more POSitude in your life! Stay tuned for more details!!!

Here’s a happy opportunity to have a self-caring chat with yourself. Take this quiet moment to acknowledge yourself. Share with yourself the goodness you see in yourself, or the goodness you want to grow in you. It can be a starting point. A moment of reaffirmation. Whatever you need it to be. All you have to do is click on the image below and print, and you can write to yourself your thoughts and words. It’s a moment just for you!

And honestly, here’s the thing:

YOU ARE WORTH INVESTING IN YOU!

Writing myself a love letter. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

All you have to do is choose you!

Choose to be your own best friend!

And if you missed last week’s post, “I am worthy of my love, kindness, and patience: starting the year off right!” please check it out. I share with you a self-care-check-in that only takes moments, but helps you make meaningful moments to change your life for the happier and healthier better!

Until next week …

Loving you so big and brightly!!! I’m sending you light and love to hug you the biggest!!!
May you spend your day hanging out with your best friend!

Love and Big Hugs,

More Happiness from Mary Kate

Find more happiness, love, big hugs, support, gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care in these POSitude cards!

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

What beautiful souls like you think about their POSitude cards!

These cards remind me to stay positive and believe in myself!

Stephanie Shay, 4th grade teacher

Karen Henry, Retired 4^th Grade Teacher, Personal Assistant

Mary Freer, University Research Department Administrator

I love my POSitude cards! They are so cute, and the messages are very uplifting and inspiring!

Mary McMurtry, Retired Bookkeeper, Mom, Grandmom

You can find these POSitude cards in my new ETSY shop!!!

Looking for self-care to share love and big hugs for all ages?

Lub’s Very Happy Day! is filled with delightful brightness and big huggy smiles!

Lub is the happiest, PINKest, most love-filled monster, Ever! Her big, PINK heart is always with her, and it beams brightly in everything she does!

Lub loves you!

Join Lub as she shares with you her love and very happy, monster-ifically delightful day! Feel playful and bright, smile big, and be happy! Have fun and be cheerful!

You can find copies of Lub’s Very Happy Day! to adopt at Amazon!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Dear Bright Stars and Happy Holiday Hearts!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Pauli and I celebrate Christmas, and if you celebrate Christmas, we wish you a very merry holiday! For those of you celebrating Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Winter Solstice, Las Posadas, Diwali, Chinese New Year, HumanLight, and Newtonmas, we also wish you a very happy holiday! We wish you all love-filled days!!!

We hope you will celebrate with us in sharing our joy in love, kindness, fostering positive relationships, giving of our hearts, happiness, healthiness, POSitude, gratitude, self-care, peace, and earth-care!

Living Like Lub! My bright star is shining brightly with love! Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs!

Each of us are bright stars with light and love to give and share! We hope you shine brightly, always!

Loving and Hugging you BIG TIME with our whole hearts!!!

ps: If you find yourself all up in the stress, drama, sadness, and/or hectic chaos that can happen during the season, please remember to take a moment for yourself, take a deep breath, find a quiet healing space, relax, find calm, just be. Remember, we’re here for love. Love and big hugs, and positive, happy time spent together will go further than any other gift. You and your heart – that’s what is important and what they love! So give yourself precious time to self-care and feel your own goodness. You are wonderful and beautiful and bright! You are a bright star!!! And you are loved!!!

Until next week …

Thank you for being here with me! I am filled with gratitude for being able to share my love and big hugs with you, and for spending this time with you! You are wonderful, and I wish you peace, light, love, laughter, healthiness, and happiness in abundance. May your days be filled with kindness, goodness, and gratitude!

Love and Big Hugs,

More Happiness from Mary Kate

Find more happiness, love, big hugs, support, gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care in these POSitude cards!

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

What beautiful souls like you think about their POSitude cards!

These cards remind me to stay positive and believe in myself!

Stephanie Shay, 4th grade teacher

Karen Henry, Retired 4^th Grade Teacher, Personal Assistant

Mary Freer, University Research Department Administrator

I love my POSitude cards! They are so cute, and the messages are very uplifting and inspiring!

Mary McMurtry, Retired Bookkeeper, Mom, Grandmom

You can find these POSitude cards in my new ETSY shop!!!

Looking for self-care to share love and big hugs for all ages?

Lub’s Very Happy Day! is filled with delightful brightness and big huggy smiles!

Lub is the happiest, PINKest, most love-filled monster, Ever! Her big, PINK heart is always with her, and it beams brightly in everything she does!

Lub loves you!

Join Lub as she shares with you her love and very happy, monster-ifically delightful day! Feel playful and bright, smile big, and be happy! Have fun and be cheerful!

You can find copies of Lub’s Very Happy Day! to adopt at Amazon!

Holiday Door Decorating Contest?
Challenge Accepted!

Hello Happy Holiday Hearts!

So. Story time. LOL. Pauli comes home from work about a month ago and says, “They’re having a holiday door decorating contest at work …”

No need to finish that statement. “Challenge ACCEPTED!!!”

Challenge Accepted!

In under 90 seconds I’d grabbed the nearest writing implement (a blue highlighter) and a piece of paper, then super scribbled up my instant idea. Pauli was eating BBQ at the time, and he smiled as the ink spread. A couple of drops of BBQ sauce later, and he nodded. He loved it!

“So we’re in?” he asks. “We’re SO in!”

LOL.

The Power of a Smile – Our Purpose!

You know I’m all about the power of a smile! Smiles make people feel happier. And happier is healthier. And happier and healthier at the holidays means we can eat more chocolate with less guilt. LOL. Let’s be real. I never feel guilty about eating chocolate! Chocolate is filled with powerful phytochemicals and antioxidants and it comes from the cacao plant … so it’s salad at its most delicious!

Back to those smiles! It’s the holidays, and the holidays can be stressful for many. Even unhappy for some. I want to do everything I can to make the holidays have smiles and happiness as much as possible for all!

So. Let’s get to decorating the happiest, smile-inspiring door yet!

Planning Stage!

For planning purposes, I knew I wouldn’t be able to doodle-art all the elements on my computer … my printer doesn’t print door-sized art … lolz … so I decided to get bulletin board paper and paint the larger scene, then doodle-art the detailed fun bits (like Santa and Rudolph) on my computer to be printed out on cardstock, cut out, and mounted with mounting squares to the painting for a 3-D effect. … oooooh, giddy clapping … sounds squee!

I ordered the bulletin board paper, and while I was waiting for it to come in, I started doodle-arting!

My Doodle-arting Begins!

Quick trip through clipart searches for some style inspiration, and voila, I was off and doodle-arting to my heart’s content! (Doodle-art time is so calming and peaceful, and it makes me feel really happy! Gets my brain all destressed and relaxed. Love it! Hope you’ll give it a try … even just for fun. It’s really good for you!)

To give you an idea of what my doodle process looks like:

For my design plan, I needed multiple door smile-making happies: Santa, a sleigh, Rudolph, some stockings filled with LOVE, a Christmas tree, a snowhuman, and a wreath!

Next up, the door painting. The bulletin board paper had arrived!

I’d had Pauli take a whole bunch of measurements of his door and surrounding area to help guide me. His door isn’t quite 3 feet wide, and I’d found 2 feet wide white paper for the painting … and by awesome luck, we found some amazing nighttime looking paper with stars – PERFECT for the outdoor scene portion of our door. OMG-Totalloo SQUEE!

A few years ago for Christmas, when I was first getting my digi-doodlebug skills going, I made a Christmas pic to share with my peeps on social media. I used it for my inside scene inspiration. Here it is!

Time to Paint!

Pauli helped me hang the bulletin board paper up, and I got to sketching in the outlines.

All doodle-sketched in, I grabbed my paint brushes and my acrylic paints and got going on the background first. (The nice thing, to me, about acrylic paints is that they blend well, and they dry pretty quickly. So it’s fairly easy to keep layering in each bit and layer. Also, they’re water-soluble, so super easy cleanup!)

And then, layer by layer, my doodle-art started coming to life! Every new color brought me happiness and big smiles to my heart. And Pauli got more excited with each stage – especially when I got the fire all done … he loves the fire in the fireplace!

Door Assembly Time!

All the while I was painting, Pauli got to cutting out all of the 3-D decorating bits. Scissors and exacto-knifing it up. I’d be painting in my studio room, and I’d hear him out in the living room … “You’re kidding, right? You don’t really expect me to cut around all these little lights on the antlers, do you?????” LOL. I’d smile and keep painting, and he’d get back to exacto-knifing the details. His poor little finger is still hurting. But a partner-project is a partner-project, and sometimes we just have to take one for the team … Getting people to smile isn’t always the easiest of work. LOL (No worries … I’ve been TLC’ing his little finger back into happiness. In all fairness, cutting out is really hard work, and Pauli did an amazing job!)

With everything painted and all the cut-outs cut out … it was time to assemble everything! Pauli went to work armed with the night sky paper and mounting squares. He did a great job getting the sky in place!

Now for the painted house scene parts! After work, Pauli came home to get me … sweat pant p.j.’s, silly hair, and all, but ready to go! And off to Pauli’s work we went. Once there, assembly was pretty straightforward. Each bit is its own piece: the roof with chimney, the second floor windows with candles, the Happy Holidays banner, the first floor fireplace, and the fireplace rug (bottom of the door finisher).

Finishing Up & The Big Reveal!

All we had to do was double up the mounting squares to add depth and use them to add the final happy, smile decorating bits!!! Oh, and a lil bit of white paint for some smoke coming out of the chimney! And here it is the … the big reveal …

A cool and fun unanticipated location artifact is how the hallway lighting outside Pauli’s door lends perfectly to the scene setting with the inside of the house being all lit up, and the outside of the house being dark, like at night.

But so you can see the details all come together, I asked Pauli to take a picture with the flash. It over brightens the door, but you can see Santa and Rudolph so much better!

Holiday door decorating contest? Challenge accepted! We hope you love our door! We hope it makes you smile and feel a delightful spark of happiness! We wish you a very happy holiday season filled with love, happiness, laughter, and kindness!

More from Mary Kate

This was a pretty big art project. It took Pauli and me a week to do. If you like the idea of Arting It Up for happiness, but don’t want to take on a big project … I’ve got the happiest little activity sampler for you! It’s a 7 day Arting It Up challenge. Instead of doodlebugging everything out from scratch, I’ve given you daily cute, happy, little coloring scenes that only take a few minutes to color, but give you precious moments of peaceful, restful, relaxing time to yourself. And I’ve added in some space for you to have gratitude and love yourself for something you’ve done each day. In short, it’s simple happiness for you that will also help you feel healthier. And it’s FREE … just click below!

Ready to take my Arting It Up for Happiness and Healthiness: Color Me Happier 7 Day Challenge?

Arting It Up for Happiness and Healthiness Color Me Happier 7 Day Challenge Mary Kate Kopec Love and Big Hugs

Each day support your healthiness with feeling less stress, less anxiety, more happiness and more positivity!

Easy, fun, happy, silly, adorable, and totally supporting you!

7 days of Love and Big Hugs!

Delightfully cheerful & colorful art will lift & brighten your smile!

11 loving, big hugging, and supporting pages include proven happier and healthier promoting strategies:

Smile-making, positivity-promoting, happy coloring blocks
Gratitude Acknowledgements
Self-acknowledgement Reaffirmations
Includes “how to get the most out of this challenge” intro page & a summary reflection page

Arting It Up for Happiness and Healthiness Color Me Happier 7 Day Challenge Mary Kate Kopec Love and Big Hugs get button

Find more gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care from me at Etsy!

You can also check out my new ETSY shop!!!

Looking for a gift that will put a smile on your face and help you feel happier? Treat yourself or someone you love to these Big Loving, Big Hugging daily inspirational POSitude cards!

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

Get inspired every day with a deck of my new POSitude cards! Available in my Etsy shop. Check them out and learn more, now!

Until next week …

If you start to feel overwhelmed this holiday season, love yourself and take the time you need to breathe and heal. Feel love and happiness, take time to laugh and breathe, share kindness, and know that I’m hugging you with the biggest BIG LOVE so tight!

Love and Big Hugs,

How a Treasured Friendship Lost Gave Me Something Life Changing to be Grateful for!
(… and how it’s made my life a happier and better place to be!)

How a treasured friendship lost gave me something life changing to be grateful for! Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Hello Beautiful Blossoms!

I have a Thanksgiving story of Gratitude-Giving to share with you. It’s all about how a treasured friendship lost gave me something life changing to be grateful for, and how it’s made my life a happier and better place to be!

Treasured friendship lost

Has it ever happened to you? You’ve had a friendship with someone who simply brightened your heart with so much happiness and big smiles, who made a positive difference in your life, but then time, distance, circumstance … life … happens and your friendship is lost, but the love is still in your heart?

It has happened to me with great sadness. I will miss my friend forever, but I am grateful for every wonderful, life changing gift I got from our friendship.

I know I’m not alone in this as I’ve talked to other gorgeous souls who have experienced friendship loss as well. We talk about how great it was when we had our friend in our lives, and invariably the conversation always drifts to wondering … What went wrong? What happened? Why did our friend let go? Sometimes we get answers. Sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we can reconnect. Sometimes we can’t.

My thoughts for my friend-lost and my shared wisdom to the gorgeous souls I talk to … I take from the book/movie Eat, Pray, Love … send them your light and love and wish them well wherever they are in the world and in whatever they are doing. I feel this truly and deeply in the depths of my soul. Yes! For as much as I miss my friend, there is a reason I miss her so much – she was a delight in my life – and I wish her goodness, healthiness, and love in all that she does, even if it means without me.

For as much sadness as I’ve felt from the loss of this friendship, I have so much to be grateful for, and especially as it is Thanksgiving and a time for Gratitude-Giving, I want to share with you the amazing life changing gifts I received that made this friendship so worth the pain of losing it.

Life changing gifts

To start, I am grateful for every single day I got to spend with my friend … for all our laughter, shared love, shared wisdom, shared goals, shared philosophies, supporting one another … the absolute delight of feeling fully connected to another person in this giant lonely world and getting to spend time with her. What a gift!

And she gave me another gift; one I never saw coming. It changed my life, forever. She gave me the gift of encouragement. It helped me grow a new confidence in myself I’d never had. She saw a creative talent in me that I didn’t feel was worthy of sharing. She disagreed. She told me my art looked like me. It had all my happiness in it. That my art was a visual embodiment of my voice.

Then, she gave me the gift of knowing … she taught me how to use Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator.

I started out slowly. Figuring out the digi-tech part of art. Playing around. Birthing a new craft. And as my confidence grew, I tried new and bigger things.

Living my gifts

And this is how Lub’s Very Happy Day story came about!

A few years ago, while we were still friends, I decided to create a children’s story and share it with her as a prezzie. She – like me – loves children’s picture books to fall asleep to. … You know how life can be stressful? Well, at nighttime, you want to fall asleep, not being stressed. You need to let go and relax. You want to go to bed with good juju running around in your head so you can have happy dreams, not stressy ones. A novel, although a very happy escape … if you get sucked in (we’re talking hours of awesome reading), you lose sleep and rest. So to help us calm down, me and my friend love to read happy kid’s books. They’re quick. Cute. Fun. Often silly and squee. And help you calm down and sleep sweet.

So I thought, hey, why don’t I write a cute, happy kid’s book for us to enjoy before sleepy-time? I wanted it to be filled with happy images of favorite things. So that’s exactly what I did.

I love cute monsters – so of course Lub would have to be adorable.

I love PINK – so, lol, of course – Lub’s the PINKest monster, EVER!

I love LOVE. Love in all it’s kindness. Giving and sharing. Compassion. Big Heartedness. Playfulness. Silliness. All of it!

I love nature and being outdoors. The sunshine. The woodland creatures. Adorable buggy boos. The flowers and the trees. And oh how I love bright, sunny, warm blue skies with fluffy cotton ball clouds floating by … and all the imaginary shapes I can see!

I love reading, creating, playing, eating healthy snacks.

I love spending happy time with friends and loved ones.

So of course, Lub’s Very Happy Day! is inspired and guided by all this love and happy goodness. It’s filled with delightful brightness and big huggy smiles! (It’s self-care in picture form!)

I can’t look at Lub & her picture pages without smiling so big! For me, she has that silly something that just makes me feel better instantly. :0)

Lub was born from all my squeelightful monstery pink-hearted happiness and giddy clapping to brighten our days and sweeten our nights! Her very presence on paper is a silly monsterification of all the giddy love in my heart! And she’s been keeping me company at bedtime ever since.

Not too long ago, a friend – who is also a retired elementary school teacher – was visiting me, and we were in my studio. She saw Lub’s book, and she smiled huge (Lub will do that to you!). My teacher friend asked me about Lub; what her story was; and how it came about. She started flipping through the pages, and page after page, her smile grew bigger. She told me I should publish the story. That she thought it was really good!

I was all like, “Really? … Like share with other people kind of good?” I had written it for fun and bedtime positive imagery, never thinking to put Lub into the world.

But my friend insisted.

I was moderately convinced. My artwork in my personal copy was from my first days in the digi-painting world. My doodlebug fingers hadn’t grown their confidence bones quite yet, back then. So I asked around to other school teachers I know. Every single time I got the same thing. Share Lub! She’s adorable and so happy and so fun!!!

Fueled by all the excitement of how easily other peeps were falling in love with Lub, I decided to update the artwork. For as much as I loved her and everybody else seemed to be loving her, too, I knew my art could be cuter with my improved and more experienced doodlebug digi-skills.

Along with redrawing and updating all of Lub’s artwork, I learned that Amazon print services requires a minimum of 24 pages. Lub’s story fell short, as I hadn’t written it to meet any page requirements. I thought about the power of creativity and coloring and art to sooth, heal, detress, reduce anxiety, and relax, so I decided to add in some Lub coloring and activity pages for fun.

And voila! Here we are today. Lub’s Very Happy Day is a story come to life to share happiness and love with like-minded and pink-hearted monsters who are giddy clapping for more POSitude and happiness to brighten their days and sweeten their dreams.

My life: a happier and better place to be!

This is how a treasured friendship lost gave me something life changing to be grateful for! And how it’s made my life a happier and better place to be! I have learned how to be a digi-art doodlebug! I’ve grown my skill with experience. And I’ve gained confidence in my doodlebug digi-art skills and having a visual voice to share my love and happiness with you! I feel this is a gift that pays forward. Now that I’m digi-art doodlebug, I have another medium to share all my Love and Big Hugs with you, and this makes me so very happy!!! Especially as, let’s face it … most of us are visual people. A picture is worth a thousand words. And my art is me all over the page sharing all the PINKness in my heart to help you feel better, more loved, happier, and healthier. And this is gratitude in my heart!!!

I hope you give yourself the gift of Love and Big Hugs all day long today on this Thanksgiving day! And every day. May your day be filled with love, happiness, and healthiness, and may you be surrounded by peeps who get you, love you, and cherish you for all the goodness in your heart!

Lub is the happiest, PINKest, most love-filled monster, Ever! Her big, PINK heart is always with her, and it beams brightly in everything she does!

Lub loves you!

Join Lub as she shares with you her love and very happy, monster-ifically delightful day! Feel playful and bright, smile big, and be happy! Have fun and be cheerful as Lub lovingly models healthy behaviors, like:

Being happy

Smiling big

Having fun

Being kind

Spending fun time with oneself

Having independence/self-reliance

Being imaginative

Having positive friendships

Napping

Eating well

Having compassion

Enjoying silliness

Valuing companionship

Being grateful

Watch your child’s face brighten with big smiles at every adorable page turn. Kiss them goodnight with happiness floating in their heads and big smiles filling their hearts!

Additional Features of Lub’s Very Happy Day:

Adorable, bright, full color, happy art and images spark big smiles

6 Delightfully fun coloring activity pages included

Positive, lighthearted, and encouraging

Fun to read and experience

Feel Lub’s love, happiness, and fun! Bring her home to share now!

Find more gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care from me at Etsy!

You can also check out my new ETSY shop!!!

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

Get inspired every day with a deck of my new POSitude cards! Available in my Etsy shop. Check them out and learn more, now!

Until next week …

Happy Thanksgiving! I am grateful for you! Big loving you and hugging you tight!

Grow your happiness with smiles!

Happiness: Grow yours with smiles! Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Hello Sweet Beautiful Rays of Sunshine!

Today, you get to ask yourself a powerful question: Do I want to be happy? … Don’t let this scare you off. I know I was super direct. But it’s a real and worthy question. That can sometimes be a bit scary. Please don’t be scared. I’m right here with you!!! We can do this together!!! Cuz I love you Big, and I’m holding you tight!!! We can grow your happiness with smiles!

I don’t need to tell you – I’m betting you already know: there’s a lot of unhappiness in the world. And it’s impacting so many of us. Even the brightest of souls can get hit. If you are a soul that has been feeling unhappy a lot, or even a little, lately, and you want to feel more happiness in your life again … the first step is acknowledging you are ready to feel happiness again.

So … are you ready to feel happiness again?

If so … let’s talk Smiles!

Now, I’m not gonna sit here and try to sell you on a smile, telling you it will fix everything. I, mean, come on, let’s be real. Life can deal some serious blows. Bigger things than a smile alone can heal and fix.

But, a smile is POWERFUL!

Grow your happiness with smiles. It’s been proven and shown in study after study after study to make big POSITIVES happen in your life. The simple act of smiling can lift your mood, alter your brain chemistry, lower your stress, boost your immune system. Umm … yes, please … to all of this!

Here are just a few of the articles written about it … in case you want to check it out for yourself.

Neuroscience Says Doing This 1 Thing Makes You Just as Happy as Eating 2,000 Chocolate Bars

Smiling can trick your brain into happiness – and boost your health

Smile! It Could Make You Happier

But really … do we need to skootch off to read about it? Why don’t we just try it? Like right now? You know. Smile, and see how it makes you feel.

Here, I even have a POSitude to share with you to guide you through it. LOL. Like, you’ve never smiled before. (Althooooough … maybe???? … Just kidding.)

Actually, in this POSitude, I take it up a notch … I like doing that. I try to get as much bang as possible for my happiness investment bucks. So I’ve added a little moment of self-reaffirmation to go along with the smile. Give it a try … it’s feel-good in like 5 seconds … it’s deliciously delightful!

Happiness: Grow yours with smiles! POSitude. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs. — POSitude card from Mary Kate’s deck of POSitude cards available at Etsy

So. Here we go. Ready? SMILE!

How’d it go? How are you feeling? … Little bit better? Maybe even a smidge better than a little bit better?

Well, we’ll take that, won’t we?!!!

Grow your happiness with smiles. A smile is one of the ways we can improve our happiness – and it’s a powerful one! If we practice smiling (and even taking it up a notch with a little extra self-reaffirmation) throughout the day … each day … every day … we can build a happiness and healthiness habit that can accumulate goodness, happiness, and healing in our lives.

With this, you can add SMILES to your Healing Toolkit of Goodness to be used daily and even more for extra tough times.

Remember. Happiness doesn’t come from the absence of darkness or bad things happening in life … although sure, that could help SO MUCH!!!! The thing is, life is gonna happen. It’s just how it rolls. But happiness comes through in us in how we deal with life. How we cope. How we approach life and choose to be.

If you want to be happy, you can be! Step by step. Practice by practice. Habit by habit. And smiling is a great and powerful place to start!

Grow your happiness with smiles. I love smiling. I love how it feels. I love how it sparks smiles in others. And I love how easy it is to do. I love how quickly it brightens my face and lifts my heart and my mood. I love how it grows my happiness and helps me heal! I love that it’s a quick and easy practice like Practicing Gratitude to help me grow and heal and feel happiness in my life. I hope sharing these practices and habits with you will help you grow and heal and feel happiness in your life, too!

Create and Grow Your Self-Care!

Want to dig even deeper into your Self-Care? Snag your copy of my “Mary Kate’s Be-Kind-to-You Interactive Self-Care Love Letter to You!”

Mary Kate'es Be-Kind-to-You Interactive Self-Care Love Letter to You!

When you find yourself feeling low, negative, unhappy – doubting yourself – maybe your confidence has taken a bit of a tumble & your self-worth is low …

Grab my Be-Kind-to-You Interactive Self-Care Love Letter to You!

You can start feeling better and start smiling again!

Filled with empathetic & supportive Love and Big Hugs!

Delightfully cheerful & colorful art will lift & brighten your smile!

14 loving, big hugging, and supporting pages include proven feel better strategies:

Reaffirmations & Positive Self-Talk
Gratitude Acknowledgements
Smiling POSitudes
Additional supporting ideas to help you find your calm and happiness again through self-care and self-love
Bonus Love-You Supports and Resources section

MKs Be Kind to You Interactive Self Care Love Letter to You Get Now button

Find more gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care from me at Etsy!

You can also check out my new ETSY shop!!!

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

Get inspired every day with a deck of my new POSitude cards! Available in my Etsy shop. Check them out and learn more, now!

Until next week …

I’m smiling big and brightly and sending you the love in my heart! I’m holding and hugging you tight! May your day be filled with BIG Smiles, lots of love, and some giggles sprinkled in!
Love and Big Hugs,

Practicing Gratitude for the win! Do it! Feel better!

Practicing Gratitude. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Hello Gorgeous Blossoms!!!

Life happens. And sometimes it happens to not be nice about it. We can feel stress, frustration, anger, … a whole range of negative emotions … none of which are actually helpful. Most are usually hurtful, in fact.

It can be so easy to give into the negative emotions. So incredibly satisfying. When we’ve had a really bad day. Our boss was crap. A human we had to interact with was an aaaabbb-so-lute jerk. A relationship we’re in is in trouble. Sometimes there’s nothing better than a GINORMOUS VENT. Or even a hard cry.

Processing emotions is vital and important to our well-being: emotional, mental, physical, … all of it.

I’m no saint. Even with all my positive determination, I have things happen to me that take me down. Some harder than others. I have to process what has happened; how it makes me feel; and what it takes for me to cope, get through it, grow, and move on.

I’ve learned, being an active processor (with a toolkit of positive strategies) helps me to work my way through difficult times, crap moments, and mean people. It also helps me avoid the negative downward spiral and negative self-talk that I can be an expert at heaping on myself. It also helps me simply live a happier, healthier, more resilient life.

And one of my favorite toolkit strategies is practicing GRATITUDE!!! I practice it daily. Plus, it’s in my Healing Toolkit of Goodness for when I take a hit in life, big or small.

Practicing Gratitude

Give the gift of gratitude. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Practicing gratitude has been shown to actually alter your brain chemistry (for the better) & improve your mood and life!

“According to UCLA’s Mindfulness Awareness Research Center, regularly expressing gratitude (the quality of being thankful and readiness to show appreciation) literally changes the molecular structure of the brain, keeps the gray matter functioning, and makes us healthier and happier.”
Thrive Global

“In positive psychology research, gratitude is strongly and consistently associated with greater happiness. Gratitude helps people feel more positive emotions, relish good experiences, improve their health, deal with adversity, and build strong relationships. People feel and express gratitude in multiple ways.”
Harvard Health

With practice, you can make gratitude a habit and experience positive, long-term effects on your happiness, healthiness, and your life!

So. What are you waiting for??? Let’s get you Gratituding like an expert!!!

Practicing Gratitude is really easy. All you have to do is think of something you are grateful for today; focus on it for a lil’ bit; maybe smile while you’re thinking about it; and if you want to take it up a notch, take a deep breath in and then let it out slowly while you are doing your positive gratitude thinking!

And that’s it. Like. Not hard. So easy.

gratitude invocation Mary Kate Kopec Love and Big Hugs

Here’s me … one of my gratitudes … I’ve actually turned it into a daily gratitude intention, and I keep it in my Healing Toolkit of Goodness. And I have little reminder print-pages that I keep handy on my desk, and on the fridge. And actually, I often try to go for at least 3 gratitudes a day. I know. Whoa – being adventurous. LOL. I’m big like that.

All I’m saying is, there are a lot of ways you can work to change your life for the better, efforts you can make (things like eating better, getting more exercise, sleeping longer, etc.), but practicing gratitude is one of the easiest and least time consuming ways you can do it.

I mean, seriously, how long does it take to think a happy gratitude thought and smile and breathe while doing it? In the big scheme of a whole day … about a breath. And for 3 gratitudes and a few moments really focusing on them. Coupla minutes?

So really, likely the only thing holding you back from increasing happiness and healthiness in your life, is maybe the know-how (which I’ve just shared with you) and the willpower to do it daily.

Practicing Gratitude Print Page. Mary Kate Kopec. Love and Big Hugs.

Come on, print out my lil’ reminder print-pages. Set them on your desk. Put ‘em in your kitchen. … Wherever you’ll do them. And then … Do Them Daily! Voila!!! Gratitude is the gift you can choose to give yourself! I hope you will!!!

Create and Grow Your Self-Care!

Want to dig even deeper into your Self-Care? Snag your copy of my “Mary Kate’s Be-Kind-to-You Interactive Self-Care Love Letter to You!”

When you find yourself feeling low, negative, unhappy – doubting yourself – maybe your confidence has taken a bit of a tumble & your self-worth is low …

Grab my Be-Kind-to-You Interactive Self-Care Love Letter to You!

You can start feeling better and start smiling again!

Filled with empathetic & supportive Love and Big Hugs!

Delightfully cheerful & colorful art will lift & brighten your smile!

14 loving, big hugging, and supporting pages include proven feel better strategies:

Reaffirmations & Positive Self-Talk
Gratitude Acknowledgements
Smiling POSitudes
Additional supporting ideas to help you find your calm and happiness again through self-care and self-love
Bonus Love-You Supports and Resources section

Find more gratitude, POSitude, and Self-Care from me at Etsy!

You can also check out my new ETSY shop!!!

Get Your POSitude On!

Feel happier! Supported! Loved! Hugged!

Bring brightness and goodness into your day, and into your life!

Get inspired every day with a deck of my new POSitude cards! Available in my Etsy shop. Check them out and learn more, now!

Until next week …

Today, I am grateful for you! And all the love and kindness that comes into your life!!! May your day bring you heartwarming goodness and be filled with positive energy!!!
Love and Big Hugs,