Avoiding effort?

Many people try to find happiness by avoiding effort.  But what if effort was the secret to happiness?

Without effort, we don’t get better or stronger.  Without effort, we don’t learn and become who we were meant to be.  Without effort, we don’t make any contribution to others, as many have made for us.  Without effort, there are no real victories and personal satisfaction.

Effort is how we become our best selves, and in that, is true happiness and contentment.

Ancestral Mathematics

In order to be born you needed;

2 parents

4 great grandparents

8 great-grandparents

16 second great-grandparents

32 third great-grandparents

64 fourth great-grandparents

128 fifth great-grandparents

256 sixth great-grandparents

512 seventh great-grandparents

1024 eighth great-grandparents

2048 ninth great-grandparents

For you to be born today from 12 previous generations, you needed a total of 4094 ancestors over the last 400 years.

Think for a moment – How many struggles?  How may battles?  How much ambition and desire?  How many love stories?  How many expressions of hope for the future you are living in right now?  How many years spent working to make tomorrow better?

Invest in your body

When you eat a raw plant instead of a cookie, you are making an investment in your body.

When you work out or get your heart rate up with exercise, you are making an investment in your body.

The body houses the mind and supports one’s life.  

It’s far easier to have a good life when you have a body that works well.

Can we agree on that?

The wild card is always dealt

It could be something unpredictable that causes havoc, or something positive for you to use as an advantage.

Move forward as if the normal results from solid positive effort will play out – and at the same time know the unexpected is coming…

When the wild card is dealt, play it well.

"A hundred sunny years"

“Ok so here’s the deal Lar.  You are 56.  You’ll never be 56 again.  Next year you will be older.  57.

Nothing is guaranteed.  You have your health and faculties and ambition.  Use it now. 

What do you want to do before you are done?  What are you waiting for?  Will 57 or 62 or 66 be a better time than now?  No.  56 is the best time.  So, get to it.  Schedule it on the calendar.  Cool right?  Get ready…Can’t wait!”

I have to remind myself with this conversation…and you do too.

"Fear death, but not life"

You can’t sacrifice your life to ward off death.  It’s coming.

What would be a real tragedy is to arrive at death without having lived.

This is your chance. 

Your only chance.

Down, but still breathing.

When you get knocked down, as long as you don’t wake up in the morning with a chalk line around you, you’re ok.

I’ve been knocked down a time or two in the last 8 years, but I’ve learned that so long as you don’t give up, that it’s a blessing if you work to make it so. 

You probably won’t recognize it as anything good while you’re going through it, but keep working to make it better and not worse, and you will find that a cleansing had to happen to make an opening for something better.

Get up, and get to work to make it better. 

Forward with faith – that’s the way.

"Throw your napsack over the wall."

“Throw your napsack filled with beliefs and actions over the wall of your dreams.” – Marie Forleo, Book – Everything is Figureoutable”.

Decide, then commit.

Should, or could?

“Should is damaging.  Could gives us a chance.” – Louise Hay

Do you tell yourself that you should do something, but don’t?

How about I could, and I will?

Self-discipline is the bridge between who we are, and who we could be.

Are you "normal"?

“Normal is not something you aspire to, it’s something to move away from.” -Jodie Foster

“It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” – Jiddu Krishnamurti

Are you normal?