100 ideas for you and the family

By Sarah Fellows

1. Get overboard! The salt water rejuvenates both the body and the soul.

2. Start spending time with the right people. – These are the people you enjoy, who love and appreciate you, and who encourage you to improve in healthy and exciting ways. They are the ones who make you feel more alive, and not only embrace who you are now, but also embrace and embody who you want to be, unconditionally.

3. Build a sand castle. Use your imagination, not just any sand castle...

4. Sunset to stargaze... Make a party of it.

5. Start facing your problems head on. – It isn’t your problems that define you, but how you react to them and recover from them. Problems will not disappear unless you take action. Do what you can, when you can, and acknowledge what you’ve done. It’s all about taking baby steps in the right direction, inch by inch. These inches count, they add up to yards and miles in the long run.

6. Rearrange your bedroom furniture. Put away and clean up, you will be surprised how good it makes you feel...

7. Go to Botanical Gardens and smell the flowers.

8. Start being honest with yourself about everything. – Be honest about what’s right, as well as what needs to be changed. Be honest about what you want to achieve and who you want to become. Be honest with every aspect of your life, always. Because you are the one person you can forever count on. Search your soul, for the truth, so that you truly know who you are. Once you do, you’ll have a better understanding of where you are now and how you got here, and you’ll be better equipped to identify where you want to go and how to get there. Read The Road Less Traveled.

9. Visit our 10 main bridges in Bermuda and take a selfie.

10. Meditate (Quiet Time). Make a time with yourself to meditate (find a peaceful spot) each day.

11. Start making your own happiness a priority. – If you don’t value yourself, look out for yourself, and stick up for yourself, you’re sabotaging yourself. Remember, it is possible to take care of your own needs while simultaneously caring for those around you. And once your needs are met, you will likely be far more capable of helping those who need you most.

12. Invite friends over for a game night. Oldie but goldie board games and a good game of crazy eights are always so much fun with friends and family...

13. Make a bracelet or necklace with your Cup Match colors.

14. Plant a herb or flower garden and nurture it every day.

15. Start being yourself, genuinely and proudly. – Trying to be anyone else is a waste of the person you are. Be yourself. Embrace that individual inside you that has ideas, strengths and beauty like no one else. Be the person you know yourself to be – the best version of you – on your terms. Above all, be true to YOU, and if you cannot put your heart in it, take yourself out of it.

16. Visit our art galleries on island.

17. Go fishing off the rocks.

18. Start noticing and living in the present. –Right now is the only moment guaranteed to you. Right now is life. So stop thinking about how great things will be in the future. Stop dwelling on what did or didn’t happen in the past. Learn to be in the ‘here and now’ and experience life as it’s happening. Appreciate the world for the beauty that it holds, right now.

19. Play golf at one of our golf courses; tennis at one of our many courts; cricket and football in the back yard.

20. Get the summer homework done early or any other chores you have been putting off.

21. Go swimming with the glow worms.

22. Start valuing the lessons your mistakes teach you. – Mistakes are okay; they’re the stepping stones of progress. If you’re not failing from time to time, you’re not trying hard enough and you’re not learning. Take risks, stumble, fall, and then get up and try again. Appreciate that you are pushing yourself, learning, growing and improving. Significant achievements are almost invariably realized at the end of a long road of failures. One of the ‘mistakes’ you fear might just be the link to your greatest achievement yet.

23. Blow bubbles. Make your own.

24. Paint your vision on canvas...

25. Go Fly Boarding.

26. Start being more polite to yourself. – If you had a friend who spoke to you in the same way that you sometimes speak to yourself, how long would you allow that person to be your friend? The way you treat yourself sets the standard for others. You must love who you are or no one else will.

27. Take bike rides or strolls for fun on our beautiful tracks...

28. Read a book out loud with the family. Awesome family time for all.

29. Make fresh lemonade.

30. Make a kite and go fly it...

31. Start enjoying the things you already have. – The problem with many of us is that we think we’ll be happy when we reach a certain level in life – a level we see others operating at – your boss with her corner office, that friend of a friend who owns a mansion on the beach, etc. Unfortunately, it takes awhile before you get there, and when you get there you’ll likely have a new destination in mind. You’ll end up spending your whole life working toward something new without ever stopping to enjoy the things you have now. So take a quiet moment every morning when you first awake to appreciate where you are and what you already have.

32. On a rainy day, teach grandparents internet skills. (The majority of parents need the lessons too....)

33. Master a new skill together. Learn to juggle 2 or 3 balls...

34. Grown your own vegetables.

35 Start creating your own happiness. – If you are waiting for someone else to make you happy, you’re missing out. Be the change you want to see in the world. Be happy with who you are now, and let your positivity inspire your journey into tomorrow

35. Make your own popsicles or impress friends with ice cube boats. (Cup Match colors of course!)

36. Find a new place to play... For the adventurous build a tree house.

37. Take a stroll on a beach you haven’t been to before. Allow the sand to naturally exfoliate your feet.

38. Make ice cream or go the extra mile and make an ice cream cake.

39. Travel the island by ferry for the day.

40. Visit Spital Pond.

41. Start giving your ideas and dreams a chance. – In life, it’s rarely about getting a chance; it’s about taking a chance. You’ll never be 100 percent sure it will work, but you can always be 100 percent sure doing nothing won’t work. Most of the time you just have to go for it! And no matter how it turns out, it always ends up just the way it should be. Either you succeed or you learn something. Win-Win.

42. Keep a sketch diary or journal.

43. Make your own rain. Douse everyone with the hose or sprinkler and make a fun slide for the garden.

44. Visit a local farm and pick your own... strawberries, tomatoes..

45. Start believing that you’re ready for the next step. – You are ready! Think about it. You have everything you need right now to take the next small, realistic step forward. So embrace the opportunities that come your way, and accept the challenges – they’re gifts that will help you to grow.

46. Play golf in Dockyard under the stars.

47. Climb a tree or even better plant a tree!

48. Start entering new relationships for the right reasons. – Enter new relationships with dependable, honest people who reflect the person you are and the person you want to be. Choose friends you are proud to know, people you admire, who show you love and respect – people who reciprocate your kindness and commitment.

49. Visit a historic house. There is so much untold history on our island.

50. Play marbles.

51. Watch a movie under the stars.

52. Make s’mores on a camp fire.

53. Learn to snorkel or scuba.

54. Visit a family member and learn a new recipe.

55. Start competing against an earlier version of yourself. – Be inspired by others, appreciate others, learn from others, but know that competing against them is a waste of time. You are in competition with one person and one person only – yourself. You are competing to be the best you can be. Aim to break your own personal records.

56. Enjoy a family barbeque

57. Have an adventure climbing the rocks and searching in the rock pools.

58. Set a goal and complete a personal project.

59. Start cheering for other people’s victories. – Start noticing what you like about others and tell them. What goes around comes around, and sooner or later the people you’re cheering for will start cheering for you.

60. Have fun one weekend and create a scavenger hunt for the family.

61. Take it in turns to cook for the family. Summer recipes can be fun and healthy at the same time.

62. Make photo albums on line and send them to family.

63. Have a garage sale. “One person’s trash is another person’s treasure...)

64. Play charades.

65. Start looking for the silver lining in tough situations. – When things are hard, and you feel down, take a few deep breaths and look for the silver lining. Focus on what you have, not on what you haven’t.

66. Color with chalk on the pavement. Play hopscotch.

67. Make music – find instruments or play the ones you already know.

68. Start forgiving yourself and others. – We’ve all been hurt by our own decisions and by others. Forgiveness is the remedy. It doesn’t mean you’re erasing the past, or forgetting what happened. It means you’re letting go of the resentment and pain, and instead choosing to learn from the incident and move on with your life.

69. Put on a drama performance for the family and neighbors.

70. Press summer flowers or find some treasures at the beach and make cards for friends.

71. Start helping those around you. – Care about people. Guide them if you know a better way. The more you help others, the more they will want to help you. Love and kindness begets love and kindness.

72. Start listening to your own inner voice. – Be true to yourself. Say what you need to say. Do what you know in your heart is right.

73. Get wet under the sprinklers in Dockyard.

74. Visit our historic forts and take a selfie.

75. Visit Crystal Caves.

76. Visit the Aquarium.

77. Slow down. Breathe. Give yourself permission to pause, regroup and move forward with clarity and purpose.

78. Go camping with family or friends at Ferry Reach.

79. Go paddle boarding.

80. Start noticing the beauty of small moments. – find happiness in the small things that happen every day. Noticing these small pleasures on a daily basis makes a big difference in the quality of your life.

81. Make a date on the Wild Cat.

82. Start accepting things when they are less than perfect. – Remember, ‘perfect’ is the enemy of ‘good.’ One of the biggest challenges for people who want to improve themselves and improve the world is learning to accept things as they are.

83. Spend a day at the museum in Dockyard and see the dolphins whilst you are there...

84. Start working toward your goals every single day. – Remember, the journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. Whatever it is you dream about, start taking small, logical steps every day to make it happen. Get out there and DO something! The harder you work the luckier you will become. While many of us decide at some point during the course of our lives that we want to answer our calling, only an astute few of us actually work on it. By ‘working on it,’ I mean consistently devoting oneself to the end result.

85. Start being more open about how you feel. – If you’re hurting, give yourself the necessary space and time to hurt, but be open about it. Talk to those closest to you. Tell them the truth about how you feel. Let them listen. The simple act of getting things off your chest and into the open is your first step toward feeling good again.

86. Make a date at the Concerts in the Park.

87. Support Farmers Market.

88. Start taking full accountability for your own life. – Own your choices and mistakes, and be willing to take the necessary steps to improve upon them. Either you take accountability for your life or someone else will. And when they do, you’ll become a slave to their ideas and dreams instead of a pioneer of your own. You are the only one who can directly control the outcome of your life. And no, it won’t always be easy.

89. Enjoy the County Games.

90. Start actively nurturing your most important relationships. – Bring real, honest joy into your life and the lives of those you love by simply telling them how much they mean to you on a regular basis. You can’t be everything to everyone, but you can be everything to a few people. Decide who these people are in your life and treat them like royalty. Remember, you don’t need a certain number of friends, just a number of friends you can be certain of.

91. Dance with the gombeys.

92. Enjoy Harbor Nights.

93. Start concentrating on the things you can control. – You can’t change everything, but you can always change something. Wasting your time, talent and emotional energy on things that are beyond your control is a recipe for frustration, misery and stagnation. Invest your energy in the things you can control, and act on them now.

94. Sign up for a sailing class.

95. Start focusing on the possibility of positive outcomes. – The mind must believe it CAN do something before it is capable of actually doing it. The way to overcome negative thoughts and destructive emotions is to develop opposing, positive emotions that are stronger and more powerful. No, you can’t control everything that happens to you, but you can control how you react to things. Everyone’s life has positive and negative aspects – whether or not you’re happy and successful in the long run depends greatly on which aspects you focus on.

96. Clean up a beach close by.

97. Host a watermelon calving competition.

98. Recycle a pallet – you will be surprised how versatile they can be.

99. Host a “Cup Match” theme party at home for friends and family.

100. Start noticing how wealthy you are right now. Even when times are tough, it’s always important to keep things in perspective. If you didn’t go to sleep hungry last night. You didn’t go to sleep outside. You had a choice of what clothes to wear this morning. You hardly broke a sweat today. You didn’t spend a minute in fear. You have access to clean drinking water. You have access to medical care. You have access to the Internet. You can read. Some might say you are incredibly wealthy, so remember to be grateful for all the things you do have.