The thing about campfires, though, is that they’re not that easy to start or keep going. Everyone who’s ever complained about unsuccessfully building a campfire is sure to receive a barrage of surefire instructions on how to start a campfire in response. I have collected some tips to start a campfire, and I must say they’ve always worked for me.

First of all, you have to clear a flat area for the fire. This fire pit needs to be screened from the wind, out of range from trees, tents, and anything combustible and is 2-5 feet wide. Ensure the space is clean and free of debris before building your fire barrier. This is to ensure that your fire doesn’t go wandering. Build a ring of flat stones approximately 6 inches high and 2-3 inches away from the center of the fire. Ensure that there are gaps in your firewall (aha!) to allow air to pass through.

To fuel your campfire, gather only dry, combustible materials. This means using twigs and branches that snap easily. Collect as many as possible. To start a campfire, you will also need tinder such as paper or very small twigs. Tinder is flimsier than firewood but more combustible to ensure the fire gets going. It may be tempting, but gasoline is a bad idea.

One of the tips to start a campfire I never forget to use is to construct the fire properly. I lay the tinder in the center of the fire pit before arranging the fuel on it in a crisscross fashion. The key is to layer increasingly large pieces of fuel as you build the foundation. Light the tinder using a match or lighter. If the fire doesn’t immediately kindle, add more tinder gradually till it does. Add larger logs gradually to build up the fire and enjoy!

Building a campfire can be good fun, but always make sure to fully extinguish it after you’re done!

Human beings seem “born to run”. But if you are not very experienced with running, it’s not as simple as it seems to be. So here are some running tips that you can use to make sure that once you start running, you keep running. It’s persistence that gets you all of those health benefits mentioned above.

* Start slowly and advance quickly. When you first start running, it will be hard for you. Make no mistake about that. You are going to push your body in ways that you probably never did before. If you try to start out too fast, you risk both serious injury and total burnout emotionally. Start out just running moderately for only 12 minutes at a time. After a week, increase your run time to 25 minutes and do that for a week. Don’t worry about speed at all for these first two weeks; the important thing is that you keep the pace, go the distance, and do more than just walk. (However, if you ever feel that you “must” walk for a little while, do it.) After the first two weeks, shift your focus to actual distance. First, run for three to four miles at a time. Then when you feel ready, increase that to five miles, then six, etc. You will naturally build greater speed during all of this–let it happen naturally, don’t force it.

* Run at least five days every week. Running less frequently than that doesn’t get you all the benefits you want, plus it makes it too easy for you to fall out of your rhythm. Running must become an addiction for you.

* Mix it up. Running can become monotonous and boring if you just run the same route every day. Have several different routes that you run. Make some go through the woods, others go down the highway, etc. Keep things new and your mind will stay alert. That’s very important because running is more mental than it is anything else.

* After your first 30 days, create a workout schedule a week in advance. Make one or two days of the week “heavy” days where you try to go a very long distance, such as eight to 10 miles. Make a couple of other days “moderate” runs where you just go out for four or five miles. And then have at least one “light” day where all you do is run for maybe two miles just to keep your motor charged up. These change-ups allow you to avoid injury and avoid burning out.

* Have high quality equipment. This means: running shoes; running socks; and weather-appropriate running outfits.

* Always stretch thoroughly after you are done running.

* Stay hydrated, preferably with water.

I hope these running tips will prove beneficial to you. When you start running, you are going on an amazing journey. Those who start running are not doing something easy; they are taking on a challenge. Be proud of yourself. That may be the best of all running tips!

You see this was the fourth time a relationship had failed for me and I thought if I didn’t cling onto it I would never realise my dream of growing old with some one at my side. My future looked very bleak and lonely so I just had to cling on until my girlfriend realised how much she loved and missed me. Yea, yea that was going to happen. Of course, 6 months turned into a year and there was still no chance of her coming round, in fact she avoided me like the plague but I remained hopeful.

During all this time I compared every girl I met with my ex and in my mind none of them would do. I refused to date in case my ex heard about it; I thought dating would definitely put the seal on my delusion that she would come back. What a torturous life I was leading.

It all turned on its head one day when something happened that made me see things from a different angle. I few friends were going snow skiing and asked me to go along. I had no experience of skiing and the idea scared the hell out of me; mainly because I didn’t want to look foolish falling all over the mountain. I went along and as I expected I spent the first three days face down in the snow. It was all very humiliating especially when five year old tots were skiing past and making innocent remarks about “the man with one ski lying in the snow”.

The funny thing was that I slowly but surely made progress and with each new achievement I found my negative emotions being replaced with pride at my successes. I then started dreaming of getting off the nursery slopes and up the mountain with my friends. As each day passed I became more confident in my abilities and enthused about the prospect of skiing down the mountain. I had one final skill to master and it looked like it was going to be the undoing of my plans; I had to learn how to turn without falling flat on my face.

“Its easy you just have to lean downhill and your skis will follow”, you must be kidding me. Every survival instinct in my body was telling me to do the opposite, lean up the hill. Surely if I lean down the hill I will go head over heals all the way to the bottom; it was a long way to fall and I was having none of it. Eventually half way through the fourth day I got it; I faced my fears, looked down the precipitous slope and leaned down. Wow I couldn’t believe it, my skis swooped my round and I was traversing the slope in the opposite direction. I had cracked it.

So besides learning to ski I learned one other very important life lesson; sometimes we have to do the scary thing to get results. When I came back from that holiday my whole outlook had changed, I let go, started dating and became my old self. Guess what? A few months later my ex started communicating with me again, suddenly I had become attractive again but unfortunately for her I really had moved on by then.

Go on make that scary decision, let go, move on and start living again. Life is too short to spend lamenting about what we have lost.

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