Our thoughts are so powerful that they can become our reality. That is why when we continue living in the negative, it can be so easy to find our daily lives worse than they should. Likewise, when we choose to live in the positive, we can transform our lives. Helping us find a new perspective, Lucy Forsting, host of Synergy Connection Radio, joins this episode to talk about her new book, The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company. She shares a ton of lessons that can help people of all ages, encouraging us to have positive thoughts in order to create the kind of reality we would like to live in. At the end of the day, all of us have the capacity to either jump down that rabbit hole of despair or go into our own mini paradise. What separates them are the thoughts that occupy the space inside our heads.

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Finding A New Perspective With Lucy Forsting

On the show, we will be speaking with Lucy Forsting, author of The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company and the host of The Synergy Connection Podcast. We explore her book and discover a ton of lessons that can help people of all ages take a look at life with a new perspective and I’m sure all of us wouldn’t mind that. Sit back, relax and get ready to Live Forever Young.

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I’m here with Rollie Culp.

How’s it going?

Our guest is Lucy Forsting. Welcome, Lucy.

Thank you.

Lucy and Rollie, you’ve known each other for a few years.

We work together for a while.

Lucy, I’ve known you for a number of years as well. Lucy is the author of this amazing book called The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company. Lucy is going to be telling us about this book. I hope you might tell us about your partner who’s an illustrator and made these beautiful types of illustrations. Lucy, you also are the host of Synergy Connection Radio. How long have you been doing that?

Since September 2018, it is a podcast. It is now up on Spotify, iHeart Radio, Google Radio and Apple Podcasts. It’s now an official podcast that is available to people.

It’s on all those platforms.

What made you decide to start Synergy Connection Radio?

I will make a little correction here. It’s referred to Synergy Connection and not Synergy Connection Radio anymore because the podcast makes it a little bit different. The Synergy Connection Radio started two years ago in September of 2018 because a gentleman who had Tampa Bay FM Radio interviewed me and said, “I would love to have you do an hour show for my radio station.” I had done radio in Green Bay, Wisconsin and it was back in the days when it was brick and mortar buildings and it was WGEE.

I went there and they would do an official countdown. It was a question-answer people could call in but it became a, “5, 4, 3, 2, 1, You’re on,” and we did an hour show. I also had some live television shows there because I owned Synergy Counseling Services. People in Green Bay, like any place else in the world, have issues that arise from normal everyday life and things that are going on nationally and internationally. As a result, there were a lot of people that would call in with questions like, “How do I manage this,” and I got to be the one that thought of the answer quickly.

Tell us a little bit about Synergy Counseling Service. I understand you had three full-service clinics and you went to college and university for counseling as well.

We all are nothing more than vibrational frequencies. Click To Tweet

I have a Master’s degree in Counseling. My background started as a family therapist more than anything else. I’m working with children and adults. One when I was in St. Louis because that’s where I got my Master’s degree. I worked for a children’s home and it was where parents would drop off their kids if they were no longer able to take care of them. It was a highly stressful job but I got to meet a lot of amazing people and we did try reunification cases where we could do that. Monsanto Corporation funded a recidivism program that I started called the Thinker’s Edge and it was to help reduce recidivism with first-time offenders.

As a result of doing that, I got a little more national recognition, then I moved to Green Bay from St. Louis. I worked with a psychiatrist, psychologist and a couple of other therapists and we decided to start Synergy Counseling Services because of my basic personality, I’m organized and have a tendency to be able to carry things through. If I start something, it’s going to get finished. They made me President of Synergy Counseling Services. Part of my day would be in the community, Chamber of Commerce events and things like that. Part of the day would be seeing highly professional individuals. I did get to work with some of the Green Bay Packers and they became friends after I worked with them. I got to go to Super Bowl games.

What was the last Super Bowl did you go to?

The last one that we won that I went to was with New Orleans. In fact, I was commenting to somebody that I went to the playoff game with San Francisco and it was about 32 degrees. I had on four layers and it couldn’t decide whether it wanted to rain, sleet or snow because it would vary right around that 28, 29, 30. It depended. There was not a dry article of clothing on my entire body. We went into the restroom when we could and I would ring out my gloves and they had those little warmers in there. I’d pull those out, ring them out, put them above the blow dryers. They weren’t going to get dry but to warm up the inside of them. Now that the Packers are my team, they’ve got to buy. We don’t know who.

That’s because of your psychological health.

Maybe. It’s amazing how many people are professional athletes. You know this because of your niece. Many of them can be perfect specimens of human beings athletically but if in their heads, their brain is still, “You’re not good enough, what if you get injured,” and they’re living a fear-based emotion. That’s how I got into the picture. They would come and see me and we’d figure out, “What can you begin to do differently to change this up so that you’re not sending yourself such negative messages?” That’s how they would get injured.

Lucy, you’re also a Reiki Master. Can you tell us about that a little bit?

Reiki energy is unique. We all are nothing more than vibrational frequencies and I know you understand that better than most people. I have the ability, more so than most Reiki Masters, to send energy into an animal or a person and create healing, vibrational frequencies. I’ve told the story on my own podcast about my husband, who is now deceased years ago, who was in ICU and his oxygen level was only 78%. They told me he had an hour and a half to live. I do get messages from, I call them, my angels or my guides. They said, “Put your right hand on the top of his head, put your left hand on his heart.” I did that. I get quiet because I know I’m channeling energy.

It took 30 seconds to change his oxygen level from 78% to 98%. The doctors ran down the ICU corridor and they said, “What are you doing?” I said, “Energy work.” They said, “Now, we can take him to surgery.” He did live another three and a half years. That is what Reiki energy is. As I said, it is like all doctors, not every doctor has the same capabilities. I have a unique skill for sending energy in and making a difference. I’ve worked on Rollie, so he knows.

I’ve had headaches and shoulder aches and I can feel it. You could feel the change.

That’s like a tingling for most people.

You can feel it and then it moved. The pain I experienced had moved and she chased it. It’s funny, it’s trying to get away from that.

Lucy, speaking of your book, The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company, what gave you the idea to write this book?

The book started many years ago. It was based upon the fact that I was already seeing people, whether it was through the Thinker’s Edge Program or people that were coming into my office because I was brand new as a therapist but I was beginning to see that they were living a life of limitations based upon their thoughts. I began writing a couple of ideas and my son was Brian in the book. His description is exactly what my son looked like. Nick, at that time, was beginning to ask questions like, “What can I do to make my life better? How do I get to play soccer? How do I get to make straight As?” Something like that.

I thought, “This all is based on thinking.” As we think, we create and as we create, that is our life. I didn’t do a lot with it initially. I had a lot of notes but the title came about because I was visiting my parents in California. I went into a store that was named Twiggs and there was a mouse. The mouse that was in there was this adorable handcrafted mouse. It was Christmas time. I had already spent a ton of money getting there on gifts. I told myself, “You can’t have that mouse.” I didn’t buy it but the owner of the shop said, “If you come back the day after Christmas, everything will be 50% off.”

I went back, the cupboard and the shelves were simply bare and yet I knew she was in the store. This is a unique skill that I have. I told him, I said, “She’s above my head. What do you have up there?” He looked at me and he went, “That’s where we do our accounting, billing and other things like that.” I said, “Somehow, she got put up there. Could you go and check?” He did. He came down with her in five minutes and he said, “I have no idea how she got up there.” I said, “Now I have the title of a book that I’m working on.” He said, “What’s that?” I said, “It’s going to be called The Adventures of Ms. Twiggs & Company.” I borrowed the name of his store from the fact that she was there.

Where was the store again?

Santa Monica, California. That’s where my parents lived.

Does it still there? Do we know or no?

I don’t know. It was the most fascinating little store. It was on a corner street of Montana Boulevard.

There’s magic in that store.

There definitely is magic in that store.

We have to look it up and see. When was this, Lucy? When did you start writing the book?

The actual book was in 1987. It’s been a while ago. In 2013, I put it away. Part of the reason that I put it away is I had somebody who did channel information and he’s now deceased but his name was Ron Scolastico. Ron and I were friends and he was in California. I asked Ron, I said, “Is this a good time for my book to come out?” He channeled and he said, “No. You’ll know when the right time is but people aren’t ready for a chat.” I literally boxed everything that I had done and I put it away. I thought, “I need to focus on what I need to do.” As the ideas would appear, I would make a note and then put it in the box but I didn’t work on the book anymore.

I started working on it in 2012 and it came out as an eBook in 2013. Everybody that read it as an eBook said, “I want to hold it. I want to have it in my hand. I don’t want to read it on a tablet.” It’s expensive, by the way, to create a book, especially one that’s illustrated. Mike Woodcock is the Assistant Director at Universal Studios. That’s why the artwork is great. It was not an inexpensive proposition for me to bring it out as a book and I had to wait a little bit but the timing was right, so here it is.

Now that it’s out and published, during the process of writing it, how did you change yourself?

I would say that I didn’t change my thinking because my thoughts have always been that you create your reality. What I became more aware of is that all of us can jump down that rabbit hole of despair. When we do then we begin to create the thing that we don’t want so I knew better. That part changed for me. It’s recognizing how we can sabotage ourselves, even if we do know. That part of my awareness level for me became greater and I could see it happening every place I looked. I didn’t want to be like, “You’re doing this, don’t do that anymore,” but I was still a therapist, I learned to say, “What do you think is causing this particular situation for you?” Let them do the homework. “I don’t know. Let’s look at that a little more closely. Could it be that? This is something that I hear you saying a lot. Could that be a part of what’s causing this?” The recognition for them began. That’s how people have to learn. You don’t learn by having somebody tell you something or at least I don’t think most people do, you learn by experience by having to go through something and then go, “Now, I see.”

On your method of creating the book, you said you had a box that you collect your ideas up over the years. The way that you would do that would almost make you put more thought into it when you finally pull it out twenty years later after you started boxing it up. You have a lot of time for those thoughts to marinade and make good connections. As you collected, I’ve never heard anybody write in a book that way. It’s quite unique.

Our thoughts have always been creating our reality. Click To Tweet

I have four in the works now.

With little boxes?

Not with boxes anymore. I put them in file folders. I use the computer a lot now.

That’s the same method.

It is the same method and it keeps the concepts separate. I have one where I was at a local park. It’s a Cypress tree and there’s a growth on the Cypress tree. In fact, I talked to Rollie about this but as I came around the corner and I saw the growth, I looked at it and I went, “That’s Emmanuel.” The name was right there. He’s a Christmas dragon. All of the ideas that are coming through me, when I see things and I think about things, I shoved them into that folder because I’m not sure which book is going to be the next one. When I do have time then I’ll be able to go ahead and pull everything from that. What we basically do and I think all writers do this, I don’t think I’m unique is we download. We gather the information from life experiences and from things that we see using senses. When the time is right, you don’t have to do a whole lot of research anymore. It’s all there and it writes itself.

Have you seen the book called Emmanuel’s Book?

I have not.

There are 2 or 3 of them and it’s channeled works from a woman who’s channeling a spirit guide named Emmanuel. It’s beautiful, so keep that in mind. You might want to read Emmanuel’s Book.

In mind, he has to do twelve little miracles. The reason he was placed on the tree is that he was very impatient. He didn’t listen. They decided that they needed to slow him down and he would have to do these twelve little miracles. When he’s done them, then he’ll be able to leave.

Lucy, in the book, The Adventure of Miss Twiggs, one of the characters is reading Don Quixote throughout the book. You don’t say anything about Don Quixote or Don Quixote’s adventures during the writing but similar to the miracle dragon. Don Quixote was like that because he always had these fantasies in his mind that he was trying to live out during his created adventures. He was pretending he was this chivalrous knight and the like. Even the word quixotic came from Don Quixote, which is people that have almost like delusions of fancy dreams that are coming true. It’s almost like a negative word where it’s categorizing somebody or characterizing someone as unrealistically fantasizing. In your books, that fantasizing is encouraged in the sense that these positive fantasies and positive thoughts are what’s creating your reality. In a sense, you are saying it’s okay to be like Don Quixote and you’re going to create your own reality with your mind. It’s the opposite of discouraging people from living out a life that is a creation of their choosing.

It’s well-meaning parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, teachers but children have such sponge-like minds. Quite often, I worked in schools for a lot of years too. If you say something that’s discouraging to a child, they’ll remember that more than they’ll remember the attagirl or attaboy. They dwell on what they’ve heard that was you’re not living up to. I have a friend whose teachers said to him on a very regular basis, “We’re disappointed in you,” meaning that you’ve got a reputation you can live up to that’s much better than this.

He had ADHD. He was all over the place. They were reminding him that, “You’re not making my life easier. I’m disappointed in you because you’re not doing your best that makes my life a little bit better too.” Those messages stay with you for a lifetime. A lot of the people that have read this particular book, they’re adults and they come back and say, “I could see me in the book. Now I understand more of what I need to do now in order not to continue to live the life that I was living.”

Some of the teachings at the beginning of the book, they’re coming from the little mice. Miss Twiggs is this very forward, brave little mouse and she has two companions. One who’s also brave and the other one was shyer. At the beginning of the book, they are the characters that are teaching the lessons. As the book goes on, there are lessons being taught by a particular man that works at the train station. In turn, one of the young boys starts to take the aura of being a teacher himself. This is set in 1945, while World War II is still going on.

The beginning of the book is a preface and that is in 1945 as the war is coming to a conclusion. You find out that Mr. Wagner, who was the station depot master, was visited in 1945 after his wife was killed in a bombing in London. The book itself for the most part is from 1946. The little village in Derbyshire County is called Mount Pleasant and Mount Pleasant picking is itself up. People’s lives have been shattered like in any war. They’re all trying to get their life back on track again.

We’re already in 2021 and we experienced in 2020 challenging times. Most people would say with COVID, the lockdowns and so many people becoming unemployed. Some people say this is the worst time since World War II. Part of the lessons in the book was, even though part of it is during the war and then the recovery after the war, that people can still manage their own thoughts by focusing on happiness and joy as opposed to fear. Even in the midst of chaos, one can create this mini paradise of their choosing within the chaos. Is that essentially what Miss Twiggs is beginning to teach people?

To a major degree, that’s true. What we’ve said, especially with COVID-19 and looking now into some of the things that are happening politically or health-wise into 2021 is you can either dwell on what you can’t change and get frustrated and stressed or you can say, “How can I make my life a little bit better.” Usually, it’s done by reaching out and making somebody else’s life a little bit better. Changing the mindset like turn off the news. If you’re a person that’s addicted to what Trump has said lately or how many people have died from COVID, turn it off. Go out and pug a tree. Pick up a paintbrush and paint. Read a positive message in a book.

For some people, it might be picking up their Bible and reading the Bible again. Find something that makes you want to get out of bed because now, an awful lot of people have stayed by themselves so much that they’ve become almost like hermits. They’ve not focused anymore on life. They’re focused on, “How do I say stay safe?” They’re fear-based living instead of living. The radio show that you’re doing now, this particular program is all about life but it’s not living in fear. It’s, how do we find a way to live life for happiness and joy truly?

That’s an awesome thing to remember, especially with what’s going on.

They say in difficult times, keep your mind focused on the good things you’re going to do for other people. Another one of the lessons that Miss Twiggs was teaching and which they noticed in one of the boys that they were helping teach, he was walking with his head held higher like he had a purpose. I think that’s what you were mentioning earlier. People have to have a purpose. If you can get out and about to do things with a purpose, the lessons from the book are that love is the power that drives everything. With that, as your primary representational attribute, you can then have an attitude that’s very positive that will then drive your thoughts. It’s those thoughts that create your reality. Set the sequence.

If we are looking for affirmation and we are living a fear-based life then we seem to find fear in almost everything. It’s a confirmation like, “The world is falling apart,” but if we switch it around and we say, “It’s a beautiful day. The breeze is amazing. Listen to the birds. I’m beginning to look at spring flowers. I want to get into the garden.” Something that is productive and positive then we will begin to hear more of that. It happens magically.

You get what you focus on whether you want it or not.

That’s true, so be careful what you wish for.

Another lesson in the book was to make a picture in your head of your desired self and your desired life. Can you tell us about that making a picture in your head? I guess you’re making it in your mind.

I’m a visual person. You’ve been in my home so color, texture and beyond in general. Part of that might be the artistic quality of a writer or maybe somebody who paints and I do both. For me, if I’m beginning to create what I want, I see it. I can hear it, I can touch it, and I use all of my senses. As a result, if I’m creating in my mind, I’m going to start with a background. What does my background look like? What colors are involved in the background? What things do I want to put into the scene? If I’m creating a home, a new car, a perfect job or a relationship, I began to see exactly what is there. You do want to be confident that your visualization process is going down a road that is going to give you the desired outcome because if you have tentative thoughts about it like, “Maybe or I’m not so sure,” then that gets cloudy. You need to be clear as to what it is you’re trying to create and then go down that road.

Miss Twiggs was also encouraging to feel what it’s going to be like when you achieve this anticipated outcome. The feeling of it, in addition to seeing the picture, it’s, “How am I going to feel being in this picture and manifest in this.”

The example where you’re at in the book is for somebody who is a little nervous about taking a test. If they were fearful, they were going to get a C or a D or fail it then they’re going to go that direction because their anxiety will make them choose incorrect answers. If you have the conviction that, “I know this stuff, I’m going to ace this,” and then you’re looking at those same questions, your attitude is different and you’re going to pick the correct answer naturally. How do you feel about getting an A would be awesome like, “I’m proud of myself?”

We have a video that addresses that exact issue with the emotional freedom technique. There’s a character that was created that is a little boy named Johan that teaches EFT for making sure you don’t get nervous taking a test.

It’s a little short cartoon but it’ll help run that idea.

Even in the midst of chaos, one can create this mini paradise of their own choosing. Click To Tweet

It’s SchoolTestPrep.com. Lucy, in regard to this visualization that you then are going to have feelings for, it was also encouraged to think about gratitude. If you are experiencing good feelings about this desired future that you’ve made a picture of, if you can focus on being grateful for its accomplishment in the field before it becomes accomplished in three-dimensional reality, you can think about each of those little aspects of it. You were saying the texture, the color and maybe even the sounds and different parts of it. They say the longer you lingering gratitude for your anticipated future, the sooner it becomes materialized. That is important as well. I wanted to ask you this, at one point in the book, Miss Twiggs and company present a crystal. Can you tell us about that part of the book?

I’m going to give you a little bit of a long background as far as crystals are concerned. I have crystals throughout my home. Every room has certain crystals in them because they send off vibrational frequencies. The way I do this with a book is that you have a series within your body of six different chakras and each chakra has a different color. The root chakra at the base of the spine is red. The color that Mr. Wagner received when the mice visit with him, the crystal that they leave with him to remind him of their visit and what he learned was blue and that coordinates with the throat chakra. He always has it on his desk at the train station as a reminder that he needs to speak his truth and he needs not to be afraid of his emotions because he was angry after she died. He hated everybody and he wasn’t a happy person.

With Brian, the mice were leaving him a yellow crystal and the yellow crystal is for the solar plexus. That is where you discover who you are. Brian is beginning to search for, “Who am I, what’s important to me, what’s my life all about as an eleven-year-old.” The yellow one will help him understand the lessons that he’s learning about creating the reality that he wants because that is who he is. If he creates the reality that is best for him, it’ll be best for everybody. That whole understanding of joy, happiness and purpose is what we are all about is we’re here to experience that.

If we let other things in then we’re not doing what we’re here for. I was mentioning to you that Sanjay Gupta who’s a medical doctor in neurosurgeon has created a brand new book. We’re talking about creation and the brain here, what he said in the book is that, “The brain itself is sole purpose is to make you happy and joyful. A happy brain is a healthy brain,” as the comment that he makes. At any age, we can grow brain cells. If we begin thinking that the old adage of after 24, your brain is beginning to decline. If you buy that then by the time you’re 60, you’re already thinking, “I’m old.” People that are in their 80s and 90s can have a wonderful youthful, exuberance about them but they have to understand that it is created by their thoughts. How do you feel about who you are at any age?

Some people will say that person is having a senior moment, which implies that because they’re old, they can’t remember momentarily. To me, a senior moment would mean something insightful. Something coming from years of experience that results in wisdom, confidence and purpose. A senior moment we could all decide is a great thing.

That’s a smart idea.

Our Live Forever Young Radio senior moment has now been transformed into something good.

It’s a moment for reflection and insight.

It’s experience, love and kindness.

I don’t think there’s a single guru out there in the world that is twenty that I know of. Usually, they’re elderly but everybody comes to them because they are wise.

Lucy, another part of the book talks about putting limits on yourself. Tell us about that.

Unfortunately, I do believe that we get these messages starting at an early age. Back when I would have been a child, girls went into nursing or they went into teaching. There wasn’t a lot of us that signed up for engineering. Some became doctors some became veterinarians but the majority, if you went off to college, you were majoring in careers that were identified with women more than they were anything else. Men studied things that were identified with men. Now, it’s blended so we have taken the limitations off, if you will. We’ve said, whatever you can conceive that you want to do, you can have. If you can conceive it, you can have it. We have many males and females that are venturing into areas that were not even thought of in the past as a typical career for somebody and they’re inventive and fun.

A lot of companies are developing fun atmospheres where creativity can flow and it doesn’t have that mindset of limitations. “This is your job and this is what you do for eight hours.” It’s not that way anymore. Where my son out in Colorado, a lot of the companies are playful. They take a break and they might play a video game. They might play something else. They might be in little think tanks. It’s something that breaks it up so that it’s not eight hours of the same old, same old. I do believe we’re taking limitations off of our identities as to who we are and what we can be.

We’re taking limitations off of careers. Certainly, COVID has taught all of us that we can work from home. We don’t have to be in brick and mortar buildings. One of the big things that are happening especially out in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Denver, major Metropolitan areas like that is these buildings are empty because everybody is working from home. That’s very expensive real estate. They’re thinking about how to use them better for homeless people because they’re already in existence. You can change up a few things and now you can get people off the street and you can begin to reeducate them. Let’s think outside the box and that does take those limitations off.

Not only your limitations, we’re looking at things from a different perspective.

It doesn’t have to be, “Use this way.” It can also be used in several other ways.

Lucy, you also worked with us at Boomers Forever Young Nutrition Company. At Boomers Forever Young, our version of limitless is to create nutrition products that slow people’s rate of aging and allow them to be much healthier for many more years. There’s research that shows that people who are positive thinkers versus negative thinkers live about seven and a half years longer than people thinking positive that live seven and a half years longer. That’s a lot. Also, we are now seeing from actual results in people’s biomarkers that they can also live a lot healthier and a lot longer by reducing their C-reactive protein and increasing their vitamin D levels.

A lot of this came forward during COVID when the research was showing that you had to get your vitamin D level and vitamin C level up and you need to keep your inflammation down. That’s what you help people with during the day when you’re not writing. You have a few days a week get to help people. This continuing you’re helping career. It feels to me you’ve been doing this ever since you went off to college. You get to continue doing this by counseling people and helping people with their health.

I like to use the word reinventing because you can have a career, which I did but I still see people in terms of some counseling that I do. I still do Reiki, I write and each one of these areas is reinventing me a little bit.

It’s like you’ve been collecting everything up in a little box like you have for your books and you’re unleashing them all at the same time. I keep going back to the boxes.

Have you been asked about having The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company being made into a movie?

I have.

Are you going to be doing that anytime soon?

It’s being considered, let’s put it that way. A lot of it depends. COVID has shut down doors left and right. One of the fun things that I am looking forward to is we have Marjorie Rawlings State Park that’s up by Gainesville. Marjorie Rawlings won a Pulitzer Prize for The Yearling many years ago. She’s an amazing writer. She had a lot of wonderful friends that were authors that visited her at her home. It was donated to the State of Florida and became a state park. It’s a very fun place to go and visit. The docents and the rangers up there were in touch with me and they said they wanted to have me come up as the only children’s author that has ever been invited to come to the state park.

COVID shut it down in 2020 for me to go but in 2021, we’ll have enough of the herd immunity or whatever they want to call it and we’ll be able to do that. I think that reinventing who we are at any given age. I had a friend who was a mentor and when I met her, she was already about 84. She was the first female attorney for the State of Wisconsin. When she met me, she asked me in our conversation what my discipline was. I had never heard that. I was like, “My discipline. I’m not sure what that means,” and it was my degree. She knew that I had a degree by talking to me but I didn’t know what that meant.

She was instrumental in my life for almost fifteen years. She died close to 100 but she was brilliant and she never stopped learning. That taught me something. You never want to hang it up. You never want to say, “What am I looking forward to now? What’s on television or where can I go for the early bird special?” That is not going to be life. Life is going to be about, “What do I want to learn? What do I want to experience? Who can I meet with where I can either be a benefit to them or they might be a benefit to me?”

Lucy, as we finish up here, is there going to be a sequel to Miss Twiggs?

Miss Twiggs goes to Hollywood, right?

In difficult times, keep your mind focused on the good things you're going to do for other people. Click To Tweet

No.

Are we allowed to have a little sneak peek into what she’s going to do next with her buddies?

Derby from Derbyshire is a cat and that was my cat. He was a 22-pound Maine Coon. He is Mr. Wagner’s cat. At the end of the book, Brian, who’s the eleven-year-old boy, has discovered that animals can talk if you learn how to listen. He has now learned how to listen. He has experienced that with Zacharia, who is now his pet bunny, so he has somebody to communicate with at home. His parents don’t know that he and Zacharia talked to each other in human language. As he leaves the train station going to school in the last chapter of the book, he has placed Miss Twiggs, Mortimor and Penelope in the grass. They’re going to be catching the train back to their home in Weardale. As he passes Derby, Derby asked him, “Are you going to be back after school?”

He’s like, “What? You talk to me.” He’s now realizing that he’ll be able to communicate. One of the things that I will share with you is a deer is one of my totem animals. I was in Georgia and we had wild deer that came to the cabin that we were staying in. The first morning that we were there, I had apples with me that I brought up. We cut the apples when the deer appeared and we took the corn out but I took out some of the apples. This one female dough and she’s about 100 pounds. She locked eyes with me and I do know that I communicate with animals. She started walking slowly towards me. As she walked, she would lower her head.

She never took her eyes off of me but she bowed and then take another step until she reached my hand and she took the Apple out of my hand. I think that there’s so much that we can learn about plants, animals and life in general. The next book that’s coming out has Derby carrying the mice, whereas they would have been enemies because Derby looked at him and was like, “You look like you might be delicious.” Now, they will be able to work with him and he will become part of the vehicle for transporting them.

It’s not always going to be in a boxcar that they have to climb up a rope to get to. The little girl that’s in the next book, her name is Isabella and Isabella has asthma. Back in the 1950s, asthma was pretty serious. It still is but we have better ways of managing it. Back then, it was to keep them quiet. Her life was limited and we were talking about limitations before. The mice and Derby teach about taking limits off, limits with friendships, limits with ideas about who we are and what we are so that she can live a life that has many more dimensions than what she currently believes.

She’s started us masquerading as a little girl as our Miss Twiggs and her friends start us masquerading as animals. They have the sense that they were created from the same loving God force that created the whole cosmos in that spark using them. Therefore, they don’t feel any limits. They jump on the train, go on grand adventures and go back home without any worries about if people think they’re crazy, they go ahead and give their advice. Does that sound like somebody you know, Rollie?

That sounds like somebody that’s maybe in the room. It’s a good thing to teach people. That’s something that you shouldn’t have to teach people but sometimes because of our society, the things we’re taught and the things we buy into, we don’t know what it’s like until you let go of the limits and you change that perspective.

That’s when you get a chance to reinvent who you are. You can rewrite that old script that was keeping you tied down, release it and say, “I can be anyone that I want to be.”

Lucy, do you think in the third book you write, Miss Twiggs could teach the emotional freedom technique to children?

That’s a possibility.

Lastly, can you describe to us this library you were telling me about that’s up at Crystal River? What’s the size of this and is it indoors or outdoors? Tell us that story.

It’s outdoor. I had seen some very cleverly done, they’re called little libraries and they’re all over Florida. They’re all over the world. What happened was I woke up from asleep and at the forefront of my mind was the Crystal Beach is a Northern Pinellas County Park. It’s a little community but this park is there and it has been magical in my life. There have been things there that have happened that should never have happened including three manatees that came in and we took pictures of that. It would blow anybody’s mind because these manatees should not have been where they were. We’ve talked to people about it and they’ve said, “That’s impossible.” Waking up, I heard the message that we were to donate a little library to Crystal Beach.

That’s what I talked to my friend. I said, “Do you want to build it?” He said, “I could build it or we could buy it on Etsy.” There had been two little girls that read the book and I knew their dad. He’s a retired police officer from Tampa. I knew that he was also doing woodworking. The next message I got was to talk to him. I sent him a text and I said, “Could you meet us over at the park and I’ll explain the concept.” He said, “Let me build it,” because he teaches his daughters that every Christmas, it’s not about receiving, it’s about giving. This would be an opportunity for them to learn how to be stewards of something but also to help create it, not buy it.

He had them sand, paint and do all kinds of things. We dedicated it on December the 26th and it’s now registered worldwide as a Little Library so that people that are traveling from foreign countries sometimes like to look for them. It’s like a little scavenger hunt but it’s a beautiful piece of work. People are using it like crazy. One of our challenges is keeping it stocked because there was a lady that walked away with six books. The concept is bring one, take one but hopefully, she’ll read them and bring them back.

Maybe she brought six then took six.

I don’t think so. If somebody wants to do a project that to me, it encourages literacy for it, certainly but it’s all ages. We have children’s books, motivational books and inspirational books. I’m donating a lot of my own personal books there, including The Adventures of Miss Twiggs.

Someone might find The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company at the Crystal Beach Little Library.

It’s outside in the park and this is in Northern Pinellas County over towards the Gulf of Mexico.

That’s true. Crystal Beach is an incorporated community but it’s close to Palm Harbor and it’s close to Ozona. If you were going North of Ozona and it’s still in Palm Harbor but you’re on the water. They could look up Crystal Beach and they’ll get the latitude and the longitude. I had to put that in for the world definition of it.

I was in Ozona for dinner when I came back from playing golf. I’m going to look for it next time I go up there.

One of the things that I do want to mention to people as far as finding the book, it’s on Amazon. It has five stars but one of the things to look for too is going to www.MissTwiggs.com.There is a link on that website that takes them directly to Amazon and it makes it easier if they want to order the book.

Are there things on that website that are in addition to the book or is it a place to buy the book?

There is a lot of information on the website. Talk about channeling, one of the cool stories is when I was doing some background work after the book was written and I was working on the preface because people said, “How did the mice ever decide to do this?” I found out that the church that I had the mice born in is called St. John’s and there is a St John’s Church in Weardale, England. I knew there’d be St. John’s Churches. That’s a common name but what was cool is that there was a man who carved every single pew in that church and he put a mouse on every single pew. I had no way of knowing that.

It’s on the website. What’s the website again?

It’s www.MissTwiggs.com and you can see the pictures. His concept was that he was as poor as a church mouse. That was his identifying logo, if you will. Those pews are still there. The mice did get born underneath those pews.

Rollie, did you have any more questions or comments before we want to close up?

I want to say thank you. I enjoy it. I’ve known some of the backgrounds but knowing it this way is nice. Hearing you talk about the lessons and the things being taught in it is great. I appreciate you sharing that.

You’re welcome. If one person reads the book and learns something to do differently, that’s holding them back right now. By reading the book, they go, “I can change that little part and now my life will be different.” That’s all it takes.

You’re never too old to get started.

Never.

Lucy, thank you. I enjoyed our talk. Thanks for coming on the show and we’ll look forward to having you back in some time. We also look forward to your next article for the Boomers Forever Young Newsletter on aging with grace and vigor. A lot of the articles for that newsletter have been written by you. We’ll be talking to you soon and thank you. Thanks, everybody, for joining us.

Have an awesome 2021.

Important Links:

• The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company
• The Synergy Connection
• Lucy Forsting – LinkedIn
• Spotify – The Synergy Connection Show
• iHeart Radio – The Synergy Connection Show
• Apple Podcasts – The Synergy Connection Show
• Synergy Counseling Services
• Emmanuel’s Book
• SchoolTestPrep.com
• Boomers Forever Young
• The Yearling
• www.MissTwiggs.com
• Amazon – The Adventures of Miss Twiggs & Company (The Adventures of Miss Twiggs and Company)

About Lucy Forsting

As a child growing up in rural Indiana, I became aware of loss and unfilled dreams watching our pets die and various family members live frustrating and anxious lives. I knew I couldn’t “fix” these issues as a child but I found myself trying to soothe adults and peers by focusing on what “could be” rather than what was.

After undergraduate and graduate school, I worked with both corporate America and higher educational institutions where I began to understand how a person’s thought process could potentially sabotage their entire life. I was also able to educate funeral directors across America helping them see the process of grief goes on long after the burial of a loved one.

Establishing a full-service mental health clinic with two satellite offices in NE Wisconsin provided additional evidence of the patterns of “faulty” thinking where a person could go down the proverbial rabbit hole of despair and loneliness. All that was necessary in many cases was to show the person a better way to navigate their life.

Additional training as a Reiki Master allowed me to combine energy work with my therapeutic training to help people see the true complexity of who we are as human beings. Once the foundation of our life is in place, we begin to build the “energetic doors, windows, walls and electrical systems”. The design which then emerges has the potential of becoming the amazing and fulfilling destination every person deserves to live.

Connecting the dots between the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual components of our life is critical in order to actually “live your best life” which is the focus of the “Synergy Connection” show. It is my hope and belief that through this show, people of all ages, ethnic backgrounds, religious beliefs, educational levels and genders can find a way to live happier and more fulfilling lives.

Finally, in order to benefit schools and readers of all ages, I have written a children’s book called “The Adventures of Miss Twiggs and Company”. The book helps the reader understand how we truly create our own personal reality. More information on this book can be found at www.misstwiggs.com or on Amazon Books in the children’s or inspirational divisions.