Big Smile*

Acting As If You are Full of Cheer

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No matter what looms ahead, if you can eat today, enjoy today, mix good cheer with friends today enjoy it and bless God for it.

— Henry Ward Beecher

After my post on being cheerful, a friend of mine decided that being cheerful was a good idea.  For a couple of days, she bopped along and then, on the third day she said, “I don’t know what’s wrong – I’m losing steam on being cheerful.”  When I asked how she was putting her new cheerfulness into practice she told me that she kept telling herself to Continue reading » Acting As If You are Full of Cheer

Cheerful Givers at the Walk For Justice 2006

How to Become Consistently Cheerful

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We are what we repeatedly do.  Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit.

— Aristotle

If Aristotle is correct, and I believe that he is, then the key question is “What habits do I need to develop to improve my life?”  I could answer this with things like:

  • Walk 30 minutes every day.
  • Get eight hours of sleep each night.
  • Eliminate sugar, salt and anything that tastes good from my diet.

Although doing any of these could be good for me, if I truly want to improve my life, I need to Continue reading » How to Become Consistently Cheerful

A Funeral Flag, American Veteran Soldier, The Red, White, and Blue, Stars and Stripes, Patriotic, Memorial Day 2009, Cemetery

Growing Up Means Figuring Out How to Do the Hard Stuff

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It’s so curious:  one can resist tears and ‘behave’ very well in the hardest hours of grief.  But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window, or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed, or a letter slips from a drawer… and everything collapses.

— Colette

Last week, one of the women at work lost her 93 year old grandmother.  It wasn’t entirely unexpected and they had been very close since my friend was a little girl.  Expected or not, when someone we care about dies, it is always difficult.

Sending a sympathy card or note is what we do when a friend suffers a loss.  That’s why Hallmark was invented, to help us say what we don’t know how to say ourselves.  When a friend loses someone close to them, we instinctively want to provide comfort.  For me, what I want is to Continue reading » Growing Up Means Figuring Out How to Do the Hard Stuff

Where do we go from here? (The Unknown)

Beam Me Up!

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Ready to toss in the towel on all those New Year’s resolutions?  Already???

Try a “resolution makeover” this year. Thinking outside the box can help turn old patterns around. Free your mind and lighten your life.

— Clarissa Caldwell

Resolutions ≠ Express Lane to What We Want

New Year’s Resolutions, like advertising copy, often tend to be filled with hyperbole and unwarranted optimism… and instead of striving to achieve our dreams, we end up playing doubting Thomas to our abilities.  Martha Beck, author of Finding Your North Star wrote about this in Oprah Magazine when she recommended changing the grammar and Continue reading » Beam Me Up!

push-me pull-you

Habitual Beliefs Rule (You)

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Habits are stronger than reason.

— George Santayan

Do you ever feel like you’re an imposter and someday everyone will figure it out?  I know I do.

For most of my adult life I’ve wanted to change my beliefs.  You see, I tend to believe some very disempowering stuff about myself – not at a conscious level, you understand, but at a subconscious level.  Because I struggle every day to overcome what I “know” is true about myself, when I succeed, it’s in spite of myself.

Like many people, I believe that if you all knew how much I struggle to:

  • write a post
  • lose weight
  • maintain a positive attitude
  • you name it

– you would think I was an imposter.  Some of you probably identify with that belief.  On some level, I know that you aren’t going to Continue reading » Habitual Beliefs Rule (You)

Cup o’ Inspiration

cup with steam swirl

Take a short break and consider the following:

“After every storm the sun will smile; for every problem there is a solution, and the soul’s indefeasible duty is to be of good cheer.”

William R. Alger

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