Tag: Change

Moving Forward

“Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes. In order to be free, we must learn how to let go. Release the hurt. Release the fear. Refuse to entertain your old pain. The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life. What is it you would let go of today?”

― Mary Manin Morrissey

         We often find ourselves saying it’s time to move on, that we’re ready to move forward toward something better. But yet we find ourselves stuck time and time again. Why? Maybe we’re asking the wrong questions. Maybe the right question is, “what is tethering us to our current situation…what is preventing us from leaping with both feet?” When you can answer these questions, you can begin to break free of the chains binding you to the past. In order to truly move forward, you must first release the pain and regrets of yesterday to make room for the rewards of tomorrow.

Play On

“Laugh, even when you feel too sick or too worn out or tired.
Smile, even when you’re trying not to cry and the tears are blurring your vision.
Sing, even when people stare at you and tell you your voice is crappy.
Trust, even when your heart begs you not to.
Twirl, even when your mind makes no sense of what you see.
Frolick, even when you are made fun of. Kiss, even when others are watching. Sleep, even when you’re afraid of what the dreams might bring.
Run, even when it feels like you can’t run any more.
And, always, remember, even when the memories pinch your heart. Because the pain of all your experience is what makes you the person you are now. And without your experience—you are an empty page, a blank notebook, a missing lyric. What makes you brave is your willingness to live through your terrible life and hold your head up high the next day. So don’t live life in fear. Because you are stronger now, after all the crap has happened, than you ever were back before it started.”

By Alysha Speer

        No matter what you’re going through in life, you always have to play on. Even when things are going horribly wrong, you can’t stop – you have to push through. Even when there is no hope, you have to carry on. No matter what storms life brings your way, you must continue to sing your song. For this is what it means to live and not simply exist.

Follow Your Own Path

“I believe in going with the flow. I don’t believe in fighting against the flow. You ride on your river and you go with the tides and the flow. But it has to be your river, not someone else’s. Everyone has their own river, and you don’t need to swim, float, sail on their’s, but you need to be in your own river and you need to go with it. And I don’t believe in fighting the wind. You go and you fly with your wind. Let everyone else catch their own gusts of wind and let them fly with their own gusts of wind, and you go and you fly with yours.”

― C. JoyBell C.

        Each of us has our own path that we must walk alone. No two paths are the same. What’s right for you may be wrong for someone else. But it is important that you listen to your own inner voice, your own inner compass to steer you towards the trail that was meant for you to blaze. You have to block out the voices of the naysayers and those who will lead you astray. Because when it comes down to it, every person you encounter will likely have an opinion on how you should live your life. But in the end, the only voice that matters is yours. So make it count.

Your Future has Yet to be Written

“A bad beginning does not keep you from a good ending.”

― Matshona Dhliwayo

          You know the old adage that when it rains it pours. It often feels like things are doomed before they really start. But it is at these times you have to remind yourself that although you cannot change what has already been written, you can change what has yet to come….at any moment in time you have the power to decide this IS NOT how your story will end.

Life

Some Thoughts on Life by

Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”

       Life isn’t meant to be a cake walk. It’s supposed to be messy, painful and downright heartbreaking. You are here to experience the joys AND heartaches of living. When you take chances, you will inevitably fall and stumble, but that’s part of your journey-your story. So, embrace the fact that life will remain a roller coaster that has its ups and downs, along with its twists and turns before you reach the end.

Try, Try, and Try Again

Explore. Dream. Discover!

― H. Jackson Brown Jr., P.S. I Love You

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”

        I’m so tired of hearing people say – “Oh, that’s too hard.” “Why bother, the likelihood of success is so small.” “You know it’s not going to work out, so why are you doing this again?”  So often in life, we give up without even trying because we automatically assume that we won’t succeed.  But, as I was telling someone the other day when they mentioned that it’s difficult to get a book published. . .I’m like, “I know, but I’m going to try anyway and at least I can say I gave it my best effort and then I can move forward to the next thing.”  For every experience you go through in life, you learn, you grow and evolve.  I firmly believe that years from now when my expiration date gets closer, I will not regret any of the chances I took, but only regret the chances I was too afraid to take – the times where I gave up the fight before even entering the ring.  So, the moral of the story is to try, try, and try again – especially when you think you won’t succeed.  For one day, you may regret never being brave enough to lose sight of the shore.

Out of the Darkness

“A ship doesn’t sink because it is in the ocean in the midst of a storm. It only sinks when the hull is breached, and the ocean gets inside it.”

― Arthur Jackson Jr., Out of the Darkness

        The storms we encounter throughout life do not in and of themselves destroy us.  It is when we allow the rains and heavy winds to seep inside our very soul that our spirits take a beating.  Never forget that we may not be able to choose what storms we face in life, but we do control whether we allow ourselves to succumb to the darkness.

Take Accountability for Your Life

Relinquish Excuses

― Alaric Hutchinson, Living Peace

“Isn’t it funny how we make rational excuses for being out of alignment?

We say, “Well, this ____ and that ____ happened, so it makes perfect sense for me to be feeling like this ____ and wanting to do this ____.”

Yet, to this day, I have never met a happy person who adheres to those excuses. In fact, each time I – or anyone else – decide to give in to “rational excuses” that justify feeling bad – it’s interesting that only further suffering is the result.

There is never a good enough reason for us to be out of alignment with peace. Sure, we can go there and make choices that dim our lights… and that is fine; there certainly is purpose for it and the contrast gives us lessons to learn… yet if we’re aware of what we are doing and we’re ready to let go of the suffering – then why go there at all? It’s like beating a dead horse. Been there, done that… so why do we keep repeating it?

Pain is going to happen; it’s inevitable in this human experience, yet it is often so brief. When we make those excuses, what happens is: we pick up that pain and begin to carry it with us into the next day… and the next day… into next week… maybe next month… and some of us even carry it for years or to our graves!

Forgive, let it go! It is NOT worth it! It is NEVER worth it. There is never a good enough reason for us to pick up that pain and carry it with us. There is never a good enough reason for us to be out of alignment with peace. Unforgiveness hurts you; it hurts others, so why even go there? Why even promote pain? Why say painful things to yourself or others? Why think pain? Just let it go!

Whenever I look back on painful things or feel pain today, I know it is my EGO that drives me to “go there.” The EGO likes to have the last word, it likes to feel superior, it likes to make others feel less than in hopes that it will make itself (me) feel better about my insecurities. Maybe if I hurt them enough, they will feel the pain I felt over what they did to me. It’s only fair! It’s never my fault; it’s always someone else’s. There is a twisted sense of pleasure I get from feeling this way, and my EGO eats it right up. YET! With awareness that continues to grow and expand each day, I choose to not feed my pain (EGO) or even go there. I still feel it at times, of course, so I simply acknowledge it and then release it.

I HAVE power and choice over my speech and actions. I do not need to ever “go there” again. It’s my choice; it’s your choice. So it’s about damn time we start realizing this. We are not victims of our impulses or emotions; we have the power to control them, and so it’s time to stop acting like we don’t. It’s time to relinquish the excuses.”

          We are all guilty of making excuses for our actions, behavior and words.  I’m willing to admit that I am guilty of this.  It’s not something I’m proud of and it’s something I work on each day.  It is so easy to rationalize your choices and somehow make yourself the victim in every situation.  It’s so easy to “justify” your feelings . . . but at what point are you going to say, “Enough is enough” and start taking accountability for your life?

There is no Perfect Ending

“I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next.  Delicious Ambiguity.”

― Gilda Radner

          Life is a crazy, beautiful disaster.  It is messy and unpredictable.  But for everything life isn’t, it remains an incredible journey that we are privileged to experience.  People so often say, life is hard – hard compared to what?  Maybe we need to spend less time trying to create this perfect life that society constructs for us – the perfect marriage with the 2.5 kids and white picket fence – and spend more time actually living our lives.  Maybe life isn’t about having all the answers.  Maybe life is truly about appreciating each moment of every day, for tomorrow isn’t promised.  So, today, spend a little less time focused on living for a future that has yet to happen and focus on embracing the present moment, for you will never get this time back.

Align Yourself With Love

“There is no excuse good enough to ever be out of alignment with love. You’re going to get hurt, and you will feel pain. Yet your purpose is to keep loving, anyway. Keep moving forward with an open heart. Love is a Divine gift given to humanity. Wasting it is no longer an option. Love is what brings light to a dark place. Love is what transforms a dying world into a thriving planet.”

― Alaric Hutchinson, Living Peace

      Life is about learning to love yourself and sharing that love with others. Undoubtedly, when you open your heart, you will get hurt. Love is painful, but it is also the greatest gift you can give and receive. So, you should strive to ground every action and decision in love. And imagine what this world would look like if each person were to do this.