31 Cheap and Fun Date Ideas for Couples - Part 1 of 2

BY AMANDA BRADBURY

Spending quality time together with another person doesn’t need to cost that much, after all love doesn’t cost anything. Sometimes the most fun you’ll ever experience costs little to nothing. If you’re low on money or just tired of the same kind of dates over and over again, then try these ideas for a fun inexpensive change of pace.

 1. Go on a virtual vacation together.

Take a 3-D virtual tour around the world together with 360 Cities. Pick a different city to explore once a month together. You could even plan out a vacation together; even if you don’t go, it’s still fun to plan something together and spend time finding out what you and your partner would like to do or see.

2. Watch funny YouTube videos.

Compile a list of funny YouTube videos to share together or take a look at some lists people have already put together online: YouTube’s 50 Best Videos according to Time magazine, Top 20 YouTube Videos, 50 Funniest YouTube Videos of All Time.

3. Stargaze while laying on a blanket outside.

Grab a blanket and go outside in your yard, snuggle up together with some hot chocolate and watch for shooting stars. Use the free Sky Map app to see which constellations and planets you’re looking at in the night sky in front of you. This is an especially great idea whenever there’s a meteor shower to watch.

 4. Grab some water guns at your local dollar store and have a water gun fight.

Or you could always opt for water balloons and pelt each other with them. This is a fun outdoor activity in which you can play hide and seek, run around like kids, and generally have a fun time.

 5. Picnic at a local park.

Pack a lunch for the two of you and be sure to bring some bread to feed the ducks if there’s a pond. Enjoy a nice day outside walking around the park and pick a spot to sit down and share lunch. You could even bring a game along to play after you’ve enjoyed the park.

6. Game night with stakes.

Have a game night with stakes set ahead of time. The stakes could be anything you want, like something your partner has to do for you if they lose, or it could be something around the house, like they have to do all the chores for a week, or perhaps something a little frisky, like they have to undress for you and do as you say. You could play anything, a game of cards, board games, or even a video game.

 7. Share a milkshake, a Frosty, cookies, dessert or some other snack.

Grab just dessert together somewhere. It could be a cheap Frosty from Wendy’s, a milkshake that you share with two straws, two cookies, or a large piece of pie. Grab something that both of you like and split it with each other. Remember whipped cream on top of anything makes it even better. You could even go to the store and grab a small dessert or ice cream to indulge in together.

8. Have a spa night at home giving each other a massage.

Be sure to include candles, massage oil, and essential oils. Feathers make for a great add-on to a massage; just rub them over your partner before, during, or after the massage.

9. At home themed dinner and a movie night.

Choose which cuisine you and your partner would like to make together (Mexican, Italian, Asian, Thai, etc.) and pick a dish to make at home. Watch a free movie at home using Popcorn Time, or Hulu or Netflix if you have a subscription, or pick up a movie from Redbox (you can get codes for free or discounted rentals all the time).

10. Write a piece of fiction together.

Sit at a coffee shop or at home together and take turns writing lines.

 11. Volunteer together.

Make DIY homeless care kits or volunteer with a local organization.

 12. Do something together outdoors like walking, running, hiking, biking, or swimming.

Get outside and get some sunshine and fresh air together. Being active together and/or exercising together can help both of you.

13. Movie marathon weekend.

Pick a trilogy or a series to watch and marathon it all weekend.

 Source:

http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/31-cheap-and-fun-date-ideas-for-couples-2.html

Elena Long - Pushing Away Negative Thoughts

Use your amazing, powerful mind to create positive vibrations!

Elena Long - Successful Relationships

Contact me at:

visionlifedesign@gmail.com

Your Daily Quote - Filter Your Thoughts

Negative thoughts and feelings – anger, sadness, regret - are like junk food to your mind. And they don’t even taste nice… Push them away by replacing them with affirmations and gratitude.
Elena Long

When You Are Not Sure Which Way Next

When you are not sure what direction to take next in your life, try one (or all) of the following:

1. Close your eyes and spend 5+ minutes in quiet contemplation. Note where your consciousness (or the subconscious) takes you.

2. Spend 20 minutes writing down everything you think you want to achieve in life. Then see which theme(s) come up most often.

3. Seek advice from the person in the mirror. What do you see in their eyes? What is the next step? What do you see their potential to be?

Elena Long

Your Coach to Success

Your Daily Quote - Life

Life is a song - sing it. Life is a game - play it. Life is a challenge - meet it. Life is a dream - realise it. Life is a sacrifice - offer it. Life is love - enjoy it.

Sai Baba

432 DNA Tuning and the Nazi-ization of Music

by Brendan D. Murphy
It’s blatantly obvious to me, after over a decade of investigation, that humankind is the (largely unwitting) victim of a frequency war on our consciousness that has been waged for decades, if not millennia. The goal has clearly been to keep us as sheep-like, gullible, and subservient as possible—through multifarious means. In modern history in particular, there has been what Dr. Len Horowitz has referred to as the strategic “militarization” of music. This happened in 1939 when the tuning of A=440 Hz was adopted in the world of music. In 1910 an earlier push to effect the same change was met with limited success. Three decades later, the British Standards Institute (BSI) adopted the A=440Hz standard promoted by the Rockefeller-Nazi consortium—“at the precise time WWII preparations were being finalized by the petrochemical-pharmaceutical war financiers.”[i]

It is interesting, also, to note that in October 1953, despite the British and Nazi push for the arbitrary A=440 standard (which is “disharmonic” vis à vis the physico-acoustic laws of creation governing reality), a referendum of 23,000 French musicians voted overwhelmingly in favour of A=432Hz.[iii] Many, many musicians, through recent centuries have expressed their strong preference for the A=432 reference pitch. “This tuning was unanimously approved at the Congress of Italian musicians in 1881 and recommended by the physicists Joseph Sauveur and Felix Savart as well as by the Italian scientist Bartolomeo Grassi Landi.”[iv] 

According to preliminary research, analysis, and professional discussions by Walton, Koehler, Reid, et al., on the web, A=440Hz frequency music conflicts with human energy centers3 (i.e., chakras) from the heart to the base of the spine [the lower four]. Alternatively, chakras above the heart are stimulated. Theoretically, the vibration stimulates ego and left-brain function, suppressing the “heart-mind,” intuition and creative inspiration.[v]

For the full article, go to:

http://globalfreedommovement.org/432-dna-tuning-and-the-nazi-ization-of-music/

Thomas Edison - Homeschooled by His Mother

After Thomas Edison’s school teacher called him addled or mentally ill in a letter, Edison’s mother hid the letter from the young inventor and homeschooled him so that he could reach his full potential.

Truth or Fiction?

The Truth:

Many details of an inspirational story about Thomas Edison’s young life are accurate, but they’ve been used to form a fictional narrative about young Edison’s struggles as a student.

The inspirational story begins by recalling how Thomas Edison’s grade school teacher wrote to his mother that Edison was “addled” and wouldn’t be allowed in school anymore. When Edison asked his mother what the letter said, she supposedly replied:

His mother’s eyes were tearful as she read the letter out loud to her child: Your son is a genius. This school is too small for him and doesn’t have enough good teachers for training him. Please teach him yourself.

After many, many years, after Edison’s mother died and he was now one of the greatest inventors of the century, one day he was looking through old family things. Suddenly he saw a folded paper in the corner of a drawer in a desk. He took it and opened it up. On the paper was written: Your son is addled [mentally ill]. We won’t let him come to school any more.

Edison cried for hours and then he wrote in his diary: “Thomas Alva Edison was an addled child that, by a hero mother, became the genius of the century.”

While the idea that Thomas Edison’s mother hid the fact that a schoolteacher had called him “addled” so that he could reach his full potential is inspirational — it’s also false.

First, Thomas Edison was dyslexic, which would have made it difficult for him to succeed in an 1800s classroom. Research on dyslexia didn’t begin until the early 1900s, decades after Edison had left public schools, so little was known about it at the time.

Thomas Edison’s struggles in school have been well documented over the years, as have his teacher’s view that Edison was “addled.” But the idea that Thomas Edison didn’t know that he’d been called addled is false.

The Foundation for Economic Education reports that Edison was well aware of his teacher’s diagnosis, and that he was enraged by it:

In 1854, Reverend G. B. Engle belittled one of his students, seven-year-old Thomas Alva Edison, as “addled.” This outraged the youngster, and he stormed out of the Port Huron, Michigan school, the first formal school he had ever attended. His mother, Nancy Edison, brought him back the next day to discuss the situation with Reverend Engle, but she became angry at his rigid ways. Everything was forced on the kids. She withdrew her son from the school where he had been for only three months and resolved to educate him at home. Although he seems to have briefly attended two more schools, nearly all his childhood learning took place at home.

In the biography, “Thomas Alva Edison: Great American Inventor,” Louise Betts goes into more detail about why young Edison had problems with Reverend Engle’s teaching style:

For a boy who was used to learning things his own way and to playing outside by himself all day long, sitting still in a one-room schoolhouse was pure misery. Tom did not like school one bit. His teacher, the Reverend G. Engle, and his wife made the children learn by memorizing their lessons and repeating them out loud. When a child forgot an answer, or had not studied well enough, Reverend Engle whipped the unfortunate pupil with a leather strap! Mrs. Engle also heartily approved of using the whip as a way of teaching students better study habits. her whippings were often worse than her husband’s!

Tom was confused by Reverend Engle’s way of teaching. He could not learn through fear. Nor could he just sit and memorize. He liked to see things for himself and ask questions. But Reverend Engle grew as exasperated by Tom’s questions as Mr. Edison did. For that reason, Tom Learned very little in his first few months, and his grades were bad. 

Years later, Tom would say of his school experience, “I remember I used to never be able to get along at school. I was always at the foot (bottom) of the class. I used to feel that the teachers did not sympathize with me, and that my father thought I was stupid.”

Then, after Thomas Edison told his mother that his teacher had referred to him as addled, the two of them went to the school in search of an apology, according to his biography:

“My son is not backward!” declared Mrs. Edison, adding, “and I believe I ought to know. I taught children once myself!” Despite her efforts, neither the Reverend nor Mrs Engle would change their opinion of young Tom Edison. But Mrs. Edison was equally strong in her opinion. Finally, she realized what she had to do. 

“All right, Mr.s Edison said, “I am hereby taking my son out of your school.” Tom could hardly believe his ears! “I’ll instruct him at home myself,” he heard her say.

Tom looked up at his mother, this wonderful woman who believed in him. He promised himself that he would make his mother proud of him.

Later in life, Edison said, “My mother was the making of me. She was so true, so sure of me: and I felt I had something to live for, someone I must not disappoint.”

However, there’s no record of Edison’s quote from the inspirational story, “Thomas Alva Edison was an addled child that, by a hero mother, became the genius of the century.”

So, it’s true that Thomas Edison’s teacher called him addled or difficult, that his mother defended and homeschooled him, and that she had a big impact on the man that he became. But the inspirational account of Edison’s mother hiding the teacher’s letter from him and lying about why he was being homeschooled to help him reach his full potential is false.

Source:

http://www.truthorfiction.com/after-a-schoolteacher-called-thomas-edison-addled-his-heroic-mother-stepped-in/

Your Daily Quote - Stress

“I was a little excited but mostly blorft. "Blorft" is an adjective I just made up that means 'Completely overwhelmed but proceeding as if everything is fine and reacting to the stress with the torpor of a possum.' I have been blorft every day for the past seven years.”
-Tina Fey

“We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie.” 
― David Mamet

The law of 33% - Tai Lopez TED talk

Be humble, persevere, read more, toughen up.

Your Daily Quote - Formula for Success

“I can't give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.” 
― Herbert Bayard Swope

Raise Your Standards, Take Action

Whatever areas of your life you want to improve, if you want anything to change, you have to raise your standards right now!

So take a moment, make a decision and prepare your lists on:

1.       Things you will no longer tolerate in your life

2.       What you expect of yourself and what you will do instead (instead of No.1).

Make a list of ten items, and start acting on them. In two weeks increase to 20, and start implementing the changes.

Because the small steps you take today, the humble, or more brave, degrees you start raising your standards by, will multiply the results month by month, year by year. Think of the amazing outcomes you will have achieved in 10 years! All starting with a small list of ten items – ten things you will no longer tolerate, and TEN that you aspire to.

Elena Long

Your Coach to Success

Your Daily Quote - Your Choice

Quite often we choose not to change, to stay in our “comfort zone”, because we are afraid – of the unknown, of the pain. The truth is, pain is part of life. Suffering, on the other hand, is optional.

It’s your choice.

Do you choose to lift your game?

Contact me today for a free discovery coaching session!

Elena Long

Your coach to success

Your Daily Quote - Success

I never dreamed about success. I worked for it.

Estee Lauder

30 QUESTIONS TO ASK YOUR KID INSTEAD OF “HOW WAS YOUR DAY?”

by Sara Goldstein

When I picked my son up from his first day of 4th grade, my usual (enthusiastically delivered) question of “how was your day?” was met with his usual (indifferently delivered) “fine.”

Come on! It’s the first day, for crying out loud! Give me something to work with, would you, kid?

The second day, my same question was answered, “well, no one was a jerk.”

That’s good…I guess.

I suppose the problem is my own. That question actually sucks. Far from a conversation starter, it’s uninspired, overwhelmingly open ended, and frankly, completely boring. So as an alternative, I’ve compiled a list of questions that my kid will answer with more than a single word or grunt. In fact, he debated his response to question 8 for at least half an hour over the weekend. The jury’s out until he can organize a foot race.

Questions a kid will answer at the end of a long school day:

1. What did you eat for lunch?
2. Did you catch anyone picking their nose?
3. What games did you play at recess?
4. What was the funniest thing that happened today?
5. Did anyone do anything super nice for you?
6. What was the nicest thing you did for someone else?
7. Who made you smile today?
8. Which one of your teachers would survive a zombie apocalypse? Why?
9. What new fact did you learn today?
10. Who brought the best food in their lunch today? What was it?
11. What challenged you today?
12. If school were a ride at the fair, which ride would it be? Why?
13. What would you rate your day on a scale of 1 to 10? Why?
14. If one of your classmates could be the teacher for the day who would you want it to be? Why?
15. If you had the chance to be the teacher tomorrow, what would you teach the class?
16. Did anyone push your buttons today?
17. Who do you want to make friends with but haven’t yet? Why not?
18. What is your teacher’s most important rule?
19. What is the most popular thing to do at recess?
20. Does your teacher remind you of anyone else you know? How?
21. Tell me something you learned about a friend today.
22. If aliens came to school and beamed up 3 kids, who do you wish they would take? Why?
23. What is one thing you did today that was helpful?
24. When did you feel most proud of yourself today?
25. What rule was the hardest to follow today?
26. What is one thing you hope to learn before the school year is over?
27. Which person in your class is your exact opposite?
28. Which area of your school is the most fun?
29. Which playground skill do you plan to master this year?
30. Does anyone in your class have a hard time following the rules?

Source: 

http://parent.co/30-questions-to-ask-your-kid-instead-of-how-was-your-day/

The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success - Deepak Chopra

No. 7 The Law of “Dharma”, or Purpose in Life

Everyone has a purpose in life. A unique gift, a special talent to give to others. And when we blend them with service to others, we experience the ecstasy and exultation of our own spirit, which is the ultimate goal of all goals.

Apply this law in your life by committing to the following steps:

-       Today I will lovingly nurture the god/goddess embryo that lies deep within my soul. I will awaken myself to the deep stillness in my heart

-       I will make a list of my unique talents. Then I will list the things that I love to do while expressing my unique talents. When I use my talents in the service of humanity, I create abundance – in my life, and the lives of others

-       I will ask myself daily: “How can I serve?”, “How can I help?” The answers will allow me to help and serve others with love.

Your Daily Quote - Your Choice

The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success - Deepak Chopra

No.6 The Law of Detachment

In detachment lies the wisdom of uncertainty. In it lies the freedom from the past, from the known, which is the prison of conditioning.

When we step into the unknown, into the field of all possibilities, we surrender to the creative mind that orchestrates the dance of the universe.

Apply this law in your life by committing to these actions:

-       I will allow myself and those around me to be as they are. I will not rigidly impose my idea on how things should be.

-       Today I will factor in uncertainty as an essential ingredient of my experience; solutions will spontaneously emerge out of the problem.

-       I will step into the field of infinite possibilities, in excitement and anticipation while I’m open to an infinity of choices.

Your Daily Quote - Determination

Courage, sacrifice, determination, commitment, toughness, heart, talent, guts. That's what little girls are made of.

Bethany Hamilton

Your Daily Quote - Leader

"If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, then you are an excellent leader." 
Dolly Parton