Daily dose of encouragement and hope

[nandm]

As I suffer from depression, PTSD, and chronic anxiety disorder there are many days I struggle to find something positive in my day. What I have benefited from over the years is reading a lot of motivational and positive books. I am trying to get back in the habit of starting my day with a positive thought that I can refer to as the day goes by anytime I start to lose my focus and feel blue. Since this is something that has helped me I am hoping some of you will also find it beneficial. Please feel free to add any thoughts, quotes, stories, or anything else you find useful in helping change you attitude to a more positive one.

Lets start with this thought:
Don’t worry about the world coming to an end. It’s already tomorrow in Australia.
— Charles Schulz

[nandm]

Ok one more for today.

EIGHT Things To Do Early & Often

1. Let go of the drama.

2. Forgive yourself.

3. Trust the process.

4. Move forward.

5. Forgive others.

6. Accept what is.

7. Accept what isn’t.

8. Accept what will be.

Encouragement Always

[1963comet]

Just maybe... We were supposed to meet the wrong people before meeting the right one so that, when we finally meet the right person, we will know how to be grateful for that.

Just maybe... It is true that we do not know what we have until we lose it, But it is also true that we don't know what we have been missing until it arrives.

Just maybe... The happiest of people do not necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way.

Just maybe... the brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; After all you cannot go on successfully in life until you let go of your past mistakes, failures and heartaches.

Just maybe... You should always try to put yourself in others shoes. If you feel something could hurt you, it will hurt the other person, too.

Just maybe... you should hope for enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human, enough hope to keep you happy.

Just maybe... Giving someone all your love is never an assurance that they will love you back. Do not expect love in return; just wait for it to grow in their heart; but, if it does not, be content that it grew in yours.

[nandm]

Thanks Comet, that was great!

1. You are pefect, precious, beautiful and miraculous.

2. There is more to you than the crazy stuff you think about.

3. How you feel is a reflection of your thoughts.

4. It’s up to you to give yourself what you didn’t receive as child.

5. You are safe, healed and whole.

[nandm]

Three Reasons to be Encouraged


1. The harder you fall, the higher you bounce. (Horace)

2. Every moment of your life is infinitely creative and the universe is endlessly bountiful. Just put forth a clear enough request, and everything your heart desires must come to you. (Mohandas S. Gandhi)

3. What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from. (T.S. Eliot)

[nandm]

Livin` A Dogs Life

When loved ones come home, always run to greet them.

Never pass up the opportunity to go for a joyride.

Allow the experience of fresh air and the wind in your face to be pure ecstasy.

When it's in your best interest, practice obedience.

Let others know when they've invaded your territory.

Take naps. Stretch before rising.

Run, romp, and play daily.

Avoid biting when a simple growl will do.

On warm days, stop to lie on your back on the grass.

On hot days, drink lots of water and lie under a shady tree.

When you're happy, dance around and wag your entire body.

No matter how often you're scolded, don't buy into the guilt thing and pout... run right back and make friends.

Delight in the simple joy of a long walk.

Eat with gusto and enthusiasm. Stop when you have had enough.

Be loyal.

Never pretend to be something you're not.

If what you want lies buried, dig until you find it.

When someone is having a bad day, be silent, sit close by and nuzzle them gently.



My goal for today is to see life through the eyes of my dog

[TiredMama]

These are great!!

[nandm]

Look Within To Find Happiness

A close friend said' "If I could only figure this out, I think I could find happiness." I have heard this before and will hear it again I am sure.

Many people want to believe that finding happiness is all about finding something else they want. Not many have ever found long term happiness by achieving another goal. The answer to finding happiness is to look within.

In other words, happiness is completely an inside job. The most important piece to finding happiness is to comprehend happiness is a choice and not the result of an experience. If all happiness could be found as the result of an acquisition, meeting a goal, or having anything, then a person's happiness would always be subject to something else.

Remember this: one definition of happiness is simply the absence of an opposite emotion whether it is pain, sadness or something else. If the opposite emotions are never experienced then happiness can never be experienced either. Think about it like this: bad times allow you to appreciate good times; hunger allows you to appreciate food; and sadness allows you to appreciate and experience happiness.

The dictionary defines happiness as enjoying, showing, or marked by pleasure, satisfaction or joy.

How often do you hear... "I'll be happy when"? When I get that job, I'll be happy. I'll be happy when I find a life partner. I'd be happy if I had more money.

These, and all the other "if I had", scenarios are following the same reasoning; that happiness is based on external circumstances.

If you base your happiness on external circumstances, you will continuously fail to find happiness. There will always, always be another external circumstance. There will always be another dollar, another job, another house, or another partner. Better, more, else.

To break this vicious cycle, we must find our happiness somewhere else. That somewhere else is within. We have been given everything we need to be happy.

Allow yourself to choose happiness. If life was perfect would you be happy? Life is perfect because we create it with our choices. Since we can create life, we can create happiness - and how much better can it get?

When we can accept that life is perfect as it is and that our lives are the sum total of everything that has happened to this instant, only then can we accept the joy and happiness we deserve.

I realize that this concept is very difficult for some to accept. However, the alternative to being happy now is to spend the rest of our lives seeking happiness as if happiness was an item to be bought or found.

It's not. Just remember the saying - Don't worry - be happy!

[nandm]

Believe in Yourself


Sometimes people come into your life and you know right away that they were
meant to be there. To serve some sort of purpose, teach you a lesson or
help figure out who you are or who you want to become.

You never know who these people may be but when you lock eyes with them, you
know that very moment that they will affect your life in some profound way.
And sometimes things happen to you at the time that may seem horrible,
painful and unfair, but in reflection you realize that without overcoming
those obstacles you would have never realized your potential, strength, will
power or heart.

Everything happens for a reason. Nothing happens by chance or by means of
good luck. Illness, injury, love, lost moments of true greatness and sheer
stupidity all occur to test the limits of your soul. Without these small
tests, life would be like a smoothly paved, straight, flat road to nowhere.
Safe and comfortable but dull and utterly pointless.

The people you meet affect your life. The successes and downfalls that you
experience can create who you are, and the bad experiences can be learned
from. In fact, they are probably the most poignant and important ones.

If someone hurts you, betrays you or breaks your heart, forgive them because
they have helped you learn about trust and the importance of being cautious
to whom you open your heart.

If someone loves you, love them back unconditionally, not only because they
love you, but because they are teaching you to love and to open your heart
and eyes to little things. Make every day count.

Appreciate every moment and take from it everything that you possibly can,
for you may never be able to experience it again.

Talk to people you have never talked to before, and actually listen. Let
yourself fall in love, break free and set your sights high.

Hold your head up because you have every right to. Tell yourself you are a
great individual and believe in yourself, for if you don't believe in
yourself, no one else will believe in you. Create your own life and then go
out and live it.

"If you take your eyes off your goals, all you see are obstacles."

[1963comet]

Very uplifting read. Thank's

[nandm]

Inner Strength


If you can start the day without caffeine,

If you can always be cheerful, ignoring aches and pains,

If you can resist complaining and boring people with your troubles,

If you can eat the same food every day and be grateful for it,

If you can understand when your loved ones are too busy to give you any
time,

If you can take criticism and blame without resentment

If you can ignore a friend's limited education and never correct him/her,

If you can resist treating a rich friend better than a poor friend,

If you can conquer tension without medical help,

If you can relax with out adult beverages,

If you can sleep without the aid of drugs,


....Then You Are Probably The Family Dog!


Gee....this pretty much describes me. Maybe I could get adopted by a rich family as their pet.

[nandm]

If You Try...

The next time you think you don't
measure up or that you can't do it,
remember:

Albert Einstein's parents and teachers
thought he was retarded.

He couldn't speak until he was 9-years old.

He couldn't tie his shoes.

A teacher in Munich wrote in his school report,
"You will never amount to very much."

This just goes to show that no one is perfect,
and that you can go far if you try.

The key is believing in yourself
even when others don't believe in you.

[nandm]

http://pixiesplace.com/trainride/

[nandm]

Mother's Day Thoughts

...

A man found a cocoon of an emperor moth. He took it home so that he
could watch the moth come out of the cocoon. On the day a small opening appeared, he sat and watched the moth for several hours as the moth struggled to force the body through that little hole.

The moth seemed to be stuck and appeared to have stopped making progress.
It seemed as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no farther.
The man, in his kindness, decided to help the moth; so he took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The moth then emerged easily. But its body was swollen and small, its wings wrinkled and shriveled. The man continued to watch the moth because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to and able to support the body, which would contract in time.

Neither happened! In fact, the little moth spent the rest of its life crawling around with a small, swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly.

The man in his kindness and haste did not understand that the struggle required for the moth to get through the tiny opening was necessary to force fluid from the body of the moth into its wings so that it would be ready for flight upon achieving its freedom from the cocoon. Freedom and flight would only come after the struggle. By depriving the moth of a struggle, he deprived the moth of health.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If we were to go through our life without any obstacles, we would be crippled. We would not be as strong as what we could have been. Give every opportunity a chance, leave no room for regrets, and don't forget the power in the struggle.

~ Author Unknown ~



You cannot protect anyone from themselves; you cannot protect anyone from life. You cannot spare a loved one the confrontation with their own mortality, their own stupidity or their own emptiness.

Indeed, to take on the burden of sentry, guarding another person's borders, is to interfere with that person's life lesson. If we are the sum of everything that happens to us, to limit a person's experience is to limit their growth.

~ Dr. David Viscott ~

[nandm]

"I Wish You Enough"
Bob Perks

Begin Again

When people facing difficult life challenges ask me for advice, I have two simple words for them.

To begin again means that you won't give up.
To begin again means you're trying.
You can either start over and live your life
Or spend the rest of your life slowly dying.

It is never the falling that makes us fail.
It is never the pain or the crying.
You can never fail in life, my friend,
Unless you give up trying.
--Bob Perks

It seems lately that more and more of my friends are facing some seemingly insurmountable challenges in their lives. A few have lost their jobs and some have failed marriages. All too many have health issues or are battling cancer.
I don't know if it is desperation that causes them to turn to me for advice or whether they have come to value our friendship. But it is difficult, to say the least, to offer words of hope when all they feel is hopeless. They expect answers, some magic waving of a wand, or a roadmap to get them back on their feet again.

I have often struggled with what to say. Mostly because I have faced many of the same challenges in my own life, I remember how empty I felt after someone cheerfully offered words like, "Keep your chin up!" "Things will get better!" "Hang in there!" "It's always darkest...," etc.

Yes, even those who were quick to quote the Bible to me found me quite unreceptive at the time.

Now, as an inspiration writer, being thought of as a resource of hope or a good (or bad) example of what to do in life, I have even more people contacting me.

So, what do I say?

"What can I do, Bob? I've lost my job. What do you suggest?"

"Begin again."

"He walked out on me. My whole world just ended. What should I do?"

"Begin again."

"Bob, I know both your son and your wife had cancer. I found out my wife does, too. What did you tell them?"

"Begin again."

It almost sounds too simple. I imagine in the darkest hours of one's life, those words would seem useless or uncaring. But it is indeed the answer.

All life challenges bring about an ending--and the chance for a beginning. A job loss presents an opportunity to start over somewhere else and maybe even in another career.

A failed marriage does not mean you are through loving or being loved. It means there are others just like you needing to be loved. Find them.

A life-threatening disease does not mean giving up. It means starting a new path to recovery and discovering within yourself the ability to fight back and win.

And if you are a person of faith, even death does not mean it's over. It means "to begin again."

[nandm]

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that frightens us. We ask ourselves 'who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?'

Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.

It's not just in some of us; its in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

Marianne Williamson
From her book Return To Love

[nandm]

A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream. The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food. The hungry traveler saw the precious stone and asked the woman to give it to him. She did so without hesitation. The traveler left, rejoicing in his good fortune. He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime. But a few days later he came back to return the stone to the wise woman.

"I've been thinking," he said, "I know how valuable the stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious. Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me the stone."

"The Wise Woman's Stone"
Author Unknown