In the past, I have done these Friday “secret” posts – posts about things or “secrets” that I have found help me enjoy life. Please note that quotation marks around the word secret.  It’s a bit of tongue-in-cheek.  Most of these things are things that I have known for a long time, in fact, I would say, we all know them. And more often than not, they are not complicated at all and cost little to no money.  The problem is that we just don’t actually do them. Me, included.  The trick is going to be my incorporating these ideas into my daily life and an understanding that these are the things that will help me to be happy. With my new plan to post weekly (again, ARGH!!!!!), I think I am going to make the fourth Friday of every month be about a secret. You can check more of my “secrets” by scrolling down to the bottom of this post and clicking on the tag “secrets”.

The first “secret” of the year is to get something green in your space.  And by green, I mean something that’s alive like a plant or flower. It is amazing how a little greenery instantly perks up a space and makes it look and feel a lot happier.  And in turn, I feel happier also.

Now, I know some of you are going to say, “I don’t have a green thumb; I have a black thumb.” And believe you me, I had one also.  But over time, I took my mom’s advice to try a plant and if it dies, so what? You can always get another one and try again. And eventually, you get better and better.  Five years ago, I probably had three or four plants.  Now, I have three or four around this window alone. And I want more.  I am basically turning into a plant lady.

The benefits of house plants are well-known but I will recap of few of them for you. They act as an air filter, cleaning out pollutants and changing the carbon dioxide that we exhale into fresh oxygen that we can breathe. The humidity that they emit can help reduce the effects of dry air we often have during the winter.  And there is a reason plants and flowers are the first things that people take to recovering patients in hospitals. A study done by two professors at Kansas State University, has shown that patients with plants and flowers in their room had lower blood pressure, lower ratings of pain, stress, anxiety, and fatigue, and higher satisfaction with their rooms AND the hospitals employees than those in similar rooms with the same care. Wow!

So, get some plants in your home, your work space, wherever.  You may be surprised at the results.

enjoy life…