Tag: hope

HOW TO MAKE LIFE CONSISTENTLY AMAZING

We will get to why this question is indeed one of the most important questions in just a minute. First, I would like to share with you an event that got me thinking about this. A gentleman I see occasionally at my day job paid me one of the most unique, but meaningful compliments. He told me what he most admired about me was my consistency of character. How despite outside circumstances, I remain upbeat and treat everyone I meet with kindness and compassion. I would love to tell you this is true all of the time, but it is not. It is true enough that a gent would notice and compliment me on it. So what is my secret? How do I remain upbeat and always treat others kindly? How can I do this despite what my outside circumstances are? More importantly, how can you manage to do this as well?

The first step is to answer what good old Albert said was the most important question. Is the universe a friendly place? Here is the tricky answer. Whatever we decide the answer is, we can find corresponding evidence for it. If we look for examples that the universe is a terrible place with people only out for themselves, there is no shortage of that. If, however, we are brave enough to believe the universe is a wonderful place with people showing kindness and compassion towards others, we will find that too. We may have to look a little harder as that kind of news does not sell as well. They are both there. I am here to tell you life will be much more rewarding and joyous if you decide the universe is a wonderful place to be.

One good way to do this is to find a guiding quote that speaks to you in that regard. Although not an overly religious person, that quote from the bible is one of my favorites. Whether you are religious, spiritual or not, find one that speaks to you. If you decide that the universe is is a friendly place, than even when things seem to be going sideways, you will understand that it is ultimately for a good purpose. This may sound like a bunch of B.S., and it is. Belief system that is. If your belief system is that the world is generally a good place, you will understand if the dark and the challenges bring their own blessings.

Does that mean your life will suddenly be rainbows and unicorns? Of course not. You will, however, begin to see the gifts that challenges bring. You will find yourself saying things like, “Boy this person is testing my patience. By testing my patience, it will help me strengthen it.” This could be to yourself or out loud. By developing this mindset you will be able to be more consistent in how you are living your life. This not only can apply to the overall purpose of your life, but to specific areas as well.

Recently, a friend mentioned how they struggled to keep a positive attitude about the business they started. When you are excited about your business and nobody seems to come through the door, how do you stay excited? That is a challenge. If you have a firm belief in what you do and why you are doing it, view those ‘down’ times as a test of your dedication to your business and an opportunity to learn different ways to attract customers and improve on that which you are now doing. My third book did not go over nearly as well as I had hoped. Instead of viewing myself as a failed author, I took that opportunity to examine how I bring my message to people, how I promote my books and what I could do better with my upcoming fourth book.

The secret to a consistently amazing life is to decide that your universe is a friendly place, or whatever goal you are pursuing is worthwhile. If that is the case, then how could anything not be working towards your greater good? Put both the victories as well as the challenges to work for you. The more you do this, the more life will be amazing and the easier it will be to be consistent in all you do and who you are.

THE BEST DIET FOR SUCCESS IS EATING ELEPHANT 🐘

Everyone is looking for the next fad diet. Whether that is for more energy, more muscle or less weight. Here is a diet for more success! That’s right. If you want to get ahead at work, in your health or even in your relationships – start eating elephants!

Of course we are not advocating eating actual elephants. I’m rather fond of the big guys. No, it is a reference, as you see in the first picture, to tackling a big problem. Many of us, myself included, will approach a big goal or challenge and become overwhelmed.

This could be getting in shape, getting out of debt, cleaning up your diet, or even cleaning up the house. We see eight million things we have to do and can’t imagine getting them all done. Instead, we should focus on getting one of them done. You couldn’t eat an entire meal at once, nor can you do much of anything all at once.

Our good friends in the wonderful country of Jamaica are struggling to repair the damage brought by hurricane Melissa. The damage can seem overwhelming. I can only imagine what they are facing. The story is the same. The way to build back is clearing one tree at a time. Helping one family at a time and taking one day at a time.

Even if all you are dealing with is a house that looks like it was hit by a hurricane, it is still one step at a time. You got this!

JUST REMEMBER YOU COUNT

It is a sad fact that many people today feel like they do not count. That could not be further from the truth. We all matter despite what others and the world may tell us. In my own life, when I begin to feel down and like I need a reminder of my significance, I found the best way to accomplish both of those is to be a blessing to others. By doing so, I not only feel valuable knowing that I brought good to the life of another, but I know from all of those who bring good to my life how much that matters.

Being a blessing can happen in so many ways. For a few ideas, read our last post, 3 steps to paradise. You can inspire someone with your thoughts. This can be a simple prayer for someone or just sending them some good vibes. Feeling grateful for someone can put a smile on your face as well. Another way to be a blessing is to vocalize these thoughts. Sharing a kind word with others is such a blessing these days. Kind words can be rare making them not only valuable, but a true blessing. Lastly, you can do a good deed for someone. Buy a coffee for the one you love, give someone a card for no reason. Even a welcoming hug a sharing a smile with a stranger can be more of a blessing than you know.

You matter. You are a blessing. We all are. Let us be blessings for others today.

COME TOGETHER…🎵🎵

This is a picture I took at the Wisconsin State Fair. As you can see, there are lots of people gathered together in the name of fun. It would make sense that statistically they would differ in race, politics and religion. Probably in a host of other categories as well.

Later in the night, Margie and I hosted our weekly DJ show as well. Same story, only on a slightly smaller scale. Many different people there, but all gathered to have fun.

My question is this – If it works for a DJ show and for the great Wisconsin State Fair, why can’t it work for life in general? Can you imagine if we all were focused on how to gather and have as much fun in life as we could? People sharing their secrets for having fun on the morning commute or going to the dentist? Life would be amazing. Just a thought of what is possible.

ALWAYS REMEMBER 🤔

How true is this statement? In everyone’s life, there have been moments that seem so dark we want to give up. It can feel like our life is over, that there is little hope. If we hang in there, things can turn around to a surprising degree. It can start with a Crack of light in the darkness, or dramatic like a sunrise.

The cliche that it is always darkest before the dawn rings true for a reason. Maybe it is the dark that allows us to appreciate the light more? Perhaps it encourages us to be more attentive to what we should be grateful for? Regardless of the reasons, we can experience some of our greatest moments after our darkest days.

Next time you find yourself in the bottom looking up, think of the cliche about it being darkest before the dawn. Clichés become Clichés because there is some truth to them. I’ll leave you with this quote from one of my favorite poets.  Think of yourself as that bird.

LET THE FLOWERS REMIND US 💐

It rains a lot here this time of year. Fairly gloomy and uninspiring. This is what happens as winter turns to spring. As we venture outside, we can be greeted by a cold spring rain and overcast skies. Hard to feel motivated and energetic in that situation. All you want to do is go back to bed.

Life can be like that too. Problems can seem to crop up one after another. Your job can feel like a dead-end. Just like the gloomy sky in our weather example. All you want to do is go back to bed.   Then just when you have no energy or motivation, another problem comes at you out of nowhere. Just like that cold spring rain.

As the season moves along, we start to see a little more of the sun. Before long, the temperature begins to slowly get warmer and one day you wake up and it seems the world has bloomed! Beautiful shapes and colors fill the land where once there was the gray drab of winter remained.

To people like my good friend Shannon, who loves plants, this must seem like heaven. To me, who hates winter, this feels like freedom after the prison of winter. To Margie, who longer has to put up with me, it must feel like she is free from her own punishment. Seriously, it is a magical time.

Life is also like that. After our rain and gloom, flowers start to bloom. When we look back, we see the rain was necessary for the flowers. Without the rain, they would never bloom. Without facing some of the adversity we face, the joy in our lives may never have bloomed. When we see the spring flowers, let them remind us the rain was necessary.

JUST 1 DEGREE 🌡

While I continue to celebrate ice melting as winter turns to spring, I thought this quote was a great one to meditate on. It is the end of the week. It may have been a tough one. Things in the world are pretty crazy right now. There are lots of lives being turned upside down daily. The temptation to quit has never been greater for many. Sometimes just hanging on can seem like quite a struggle. Change and improvement can see like a far off horizon we cannot even see.

Think of the fact listed above. The shift of just one degree turns water, a liquid, into ice, a solid. One degree transforms it into something else entirely. I have heard this same advice applied to hitting a golf ball. Your swing can seem terribly far off, but if you just make a one millimeter change in the way you hit the ball, after going the distance, your ball will land in an entirely different area. The change is small. The result is huge. Can you see how a slight change in angle can result in an entirely different landing? How one degree can turn a liquid into a solid?

This is true is matter such as water and ice. It is true in golf and the effect of changing your starting angle. Do you know what else it is true in? Life. It can seem like everything around you is collapsing, and it might be. You might still be just one degree, or one millimeter off from a complete transformation of your life. Think of decisions we have made in our own life. Just like our examples above, the change was obvious right away, but given some time and distance, dramatic change will occur. Water takes a bit to freeze after you hit the temperature. That golf ball as to travel after you hit it at the new angle.

Think of decisions you have made. Maybe you decided to quit smoking. The change may not have happened by putting down that last cigarette, but making that decision can radically improve your life. Same with starting a new morning habit like meditation. You may not notice something on the first day, but after a month your days will feel radically different. How about writing in a gratitude journal at night? Once again, the first day may not yield any new results, but by the end of the month your life will be different.

Life may seem very overwhelming at the moment. Don’t give up. You might just be one degree, one millimeter or one decision away from an entirely different life.

YOU MATTER ALL OF THE TIME ⏰️

Here is a very important message all of us need to see. Yes, you reading this matter. It does not matter if you just accomplished the biggest goal of your life, or just made the biggest mistake of your life. You matter. If you are on top of the world, how you treat others who might not be there yet, or who can do nothing for you can tell a great deal of your character. Plus, how great does it feel when someone you think is further along in life than you, stops to compliment, encourage or help you? I know that makes a world of difference to me. You also serve as an example of how hard work and perseverance pays off. That could really help the determination of others who are struggling.

What about when you are seemingly on the bottom of the world? You may have messed up at work? Perhaps you made a mess of things at home? You certainly matter then. How you manage to treat people when you are hurting or struggling will not only speak volumes about your character, but inspire others. How valued do you feel when you know someone is really hurting but they still go out of their way to be nice or support you? You not only feel really loved, but your opinion of that person goes through the roof. When my beautiful lady still puts together a delicious meal even after a long day of making cakes, it has me loving her, and appreciating her more than ever.

When you are down on your luck, how you pick yourself up, and dust yourself off, can really inspire others. It also happens to be a great jazz song, but that is beside the point. We love reading stories of people who were down on their luck and came back. Why not have your story be one of them. Not only will you inspire those who know and love you, but looking back you may just inspire yourself.

You see, no matter who you are, or where your life is at, you matter. You can make a big difference and you can inspire others and yourself. Never give up. As cliche as it may sound, rock bottom makes a great foundation to build upon. Many great stories started with a very tough beginning. Yours may be the next great story.

THE POWER OF CANDLES 🕯

This quote and picture are obviously not just about candles. Before we get into what this means in our daily life, let us look at it from the point of a candle. You are in a dark room and you have a lit candle. It gives off a certain amount of light. Someone else walks in with a candle. The room becomes twice as bright. If you were to walk over to them and blow out their candle, the room would become darker. In addition, your candle would not burn twice as bright to make up for the loss of light. Suppose there were other unlit candles in the room. If you were to use yours to light them the room would continue to get brighter.

This all seems rather obvious from the point of candles. What the light of the candle really signifies is the light inside all of us. Some get jealous when they seem another person’s light shining and look to extinguish it. As if that would somehow make their light shine brighter. In only results in making the room, or this case the world, a darker place. Conversely, if you were to use your candle to light as many other candles as you could, the room would continue to get brighter and brighter. What this translates to is using your gifts, and the light inside of you, to brighter the lives of as many people as you can. If we fill the world with happy people, the world only becomes a brighter place. Just like the more candles you light, the brighter the room.

Next time you brighten someone’s day, know that you are really doing so much more. You are making the world a brighter place. The more people you do this for, the brighter the world becomes. Remember there are lots of people blowing out candles. They put people down, they are cruel and unkind. Therefore, you may have to light the same candle more than once. It takes a continued effort to keep all of the candles around us lit. It requires us always looking to empower and uplift each other. Let us work to make the world as bright as we can.

HOW TO FIX THE WORLD 🌎

There is a lot of apprehension in the hearts of many people. It seems there is a great deal of concern that people with little care or concern to treat others with dignity and respect have been put in positions of power. As someone who has made it their life mission to leave the world a little better place than I found it, I can totally understand this. We were taught as children to respect each other, including those we differ with. We were taught that it is right to disagree with someone in a respectful fashion. Even on the elementary school playground we were taught that it was not nice to call people names just because they were different or held different opinions than us. Hopefully, these are the same lessons that we taught our children.

It is therefore understandable to be concerned when those who are supposed to be examples do the very opposite of this. Will the world become less caring and callous? I would be lying if I would tell you that some less-informed souls may view this as permission to act that way in their own lives. What can we do about all of this? Surprisingly, quite a bit. It is easy to feel hopeless and despondent about the whole thing. The more constructive action would to be to intensify our acts of kindness and compassion. Recently, I wrote a letter to the Dalai Lama, who is a master at teaching compassion. If you want any lessons on how to stay compassionate in an often cruel world, I recommend listening to some of his talks. Many are available on YouTube.

Many people view this solution as ridiculous or think of themselves too small to make that big of a difference. Nothing could be further from the truth. Let me break this down for you. How many people on average to you interact with on a daily basis? If you work in retail, this could be close to 100. Even if you don’t, you probably run into at the very least 10. Let’s just say 20 as an average. If you do your best to treat everyone you contact with kindness and compassion, maybe even say a few empowering words to them, do you think that would make a difference? What difference would 20 people make in a world of 8 billion? Let us do the math. 20 people a day, on average, for every day of the year equals 7300 people. If we went for the person in retail who sees 100 people a day, that number goes up to 36,500! Can you see the power we hold? You could be a beacon of hope for so many people. An example of goodness in the world. A reason to believe.

If only 20 retail employees did what we are discussing, that would bring us close to a million people shown kindness and compassion. When you add words of empowerment, that could be a million lives you positively impact. What do you think those people would go on to do? You can see the power of the ripple effect here. It works in reverse too. If one person decides they are too insignificant to make a difference, that is between 7300 and 36,500 people who will be negatively affected. Do you see the power your one example can make? What if you are a teacher? A boss or a leader of some other fashion? The impact of everyone makes a huge difference. Do not let an election or a sometimes hard world make you believe otherwise.