Tag: optimism

The Glimmers

I read about a good technique yesterday attributed to a writer and psychotherapist named Deb Dana. She says that the opposite of our “triggers”, are our “glimmers”, and it is equally important to know both. We all know our triggers pretty well: “Oh ugh, there’s that annoying neighbor . . . . let me run back into the house or dive into a different grocery aisle. Oh, Negative Nancy is calling . . . . I’ll let that one go to voicemail. Oh, this is a really sad movie that reminds me of a really sad time in my life. Time to turn it off.”

When we know our triggers, we can devise ways to avoid them or to remove them from our lives, but sometimes the negative feelings from the triggers remain. What’s the remedy for the feelings that come from “triggers”? The remedy is to switch to our “glimmers” which are thoughts that make us happy. “Glimmers” can be vacation memories, or thoughts of our children or our pets, or a scene from a show or a movie that makes us laugh out loud. Unfortunately our brains our biased towards negativity (in primitive times, this kept us safe), so it is vitally important to know what our “glimmers” are, when we need to switch out of our triggered state.

List your current glimmers and make it a purpose to find some new ones today. When you find yourself triggered, have your glimmer list handy.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

2298. Do you think crying is a sign of weakness, or strength?

Monday – Funday

If you want to make people exceedingly intrigued by you, and perhaps even envious of you (although this is not advised – when people are at their most envious, they are often at their worst) you don’t need millions of dollars, a perfect body, a beautiful face, a loving relationship, amazing kids, and a fancy car. You just need to be “happy.” Choose to be happy every single day. You will absolutely glow. Unfortunately, happiness is something that is available to all of us, but we make it so hard. There are people I have known who had all of the things listed above, and they were some of the most miserable people I have ever known. Happiness truly is an inside job. A happy optimist isn’t in denial. The happy optimists recognize that there is a lot that needs to be different in the world. So they choose to work at changing these things, or they choose to accept these things. And then the happy, optimist goes on to savor the myriad of things that are completely wonderful in this world. Don’t make happiness elusive. Don’t make happiness contingent on what you have or what you don’t have. Don’t compare others’ happiness to your own. Like love, happiness just is . . . . And happiness really is available to all of us. Happiness is a peaceful contentedness that is still there in the background, when sad feelings arise. It is the peaceful contentedness that is still there, even when fear is at its height. Happiness is living life in gratitude and appreciating the stories about the experiences of the moments. Why have we chosen to make happiness such a rarity? Is it smarter to sound sad, angry and bitter? Does it really matter how “smart” anyone is? Be happy. Today, choose happy at all costs. You’ll be amazed that you had the power to be happy within you, all along. And you’ll also be amazed at how magnetizing a power that true happiness can be.

“Whoever is happy, will make others happy.” – Anne Frank

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1629. How are you still similar to your younger self?

Take It Soft

I am having a rare case of writer’s block. I have my mind on too many things. I like this post made this morning by the Wise Connector on Twitter. It’s so easy to hone in on the “bad” things that have happened over a time period. Part of this might be because “bad things”, thankfully, are more rare than the good or even neutral things in life. My own summer, I could dwell on my youngest leaving the nest and how much my life has changed, and the health problems of loved ones, and the unrelenting heat, or I could be delighted that my daughter acclimated well to college and that my husband and I were able to enjoy some wonderful one-on-one summer trips together – something we haven’t been able to partake in, in quite some time.

I read a quote from a book about escaping slavery by Francis Bok. He said, “No matter what happens, try to take it soft.” To me, this means to remain hopeful. It means to understand that life will always have its ups and downs, so breathe and stay in the moment. Another thing I read over the weekend was a quote from Mark Nepo. He says, “The antidote to pessimism is admiration.” If you look out of your window right now, you will see a heck of a lot of things to admire. Don’t hone in on the garbage cans, instead, be overwhelmed by the plants, and the trees, and the flowers, and the sunshine. Try this with anything. You will be feeling more optimistic in no time.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

All Good

Image
credit: Think Smarter, Twitter, @WakeupPeople

In the last couple of months, which have been a pretty hairy time for me and my family, because our son’s epileptic seizures had been out of control, I would notice my knee-jerk response to anyone who asked me, “Hi. How are you today?”

“Fine, thank you. How are you?” or even sometimes, “Great! How’s your day going?” were my pat responses, and always said in overly chirpy and in overly zealous, zippy tones. The worst I ever said was, “Pretty good.”

Now, of course, this is what we all do. The clerk at my grocery store does not honestly want a play-by-play of my sh*tshow of a day/week/month/year, and I don’t want to have an emotional collapse, in public, while purchasing some milk, bread and broccoli, in front of a bunch of hungry strangers. But still, at those times, I was honestly feeling really rotten. For the first time in a long time, I noticed my answers to those socially polite questions, and I noticed how false my fake answers rang out to me. I was lying through my teeth. Yet, just like Think Smarter states above, maybe my answers held some truth. “Fake it, ’til you make it.” Who knows how things in our lives on Earth are going to turn out, until the very end? And even then, the collective belief seems to be that after our lives on Earth, most (if not all) of us will all transition to an even better place. How many terrible, rotten, no-good experiences, in retrospect, after bringing you to your knees, brought you to new heights in your life, in ways that you could never have imagined? We all have had our rising-from-the-ashes Phoenix moments, oftentimes more than once.

So, with that in mind, how are things for you?

“It’s all good,” at my corner of the Earth. “It’s all good.”


Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

I’m Positive

“Staying positive doesn’t mean you have to be happy all of the time, it means that even on hard days you know that better ones are coming.” – FofF (Twitter)

I think one of the added tricky elements of the holiday season, is that you often feel the onus to feel cheerful, happy and blessed, from morning until night. And on the days that you aren’t in slap-happy mode, you feel the need to berate yourself, more than ever, for not being/feeling grateful, productive, and glistening-ly excited. You put yourself on your own naughty list for not being overjoyed, every second of the day.

I consider myself to be a mostly upbeat person. I have a sunny, friendly disposition most of the time. Because of this, I think that I feel an expectation from others, (and truthfully, mostly from myself), to be in a jubilant way, all of the time. However, as we all know, the demand, “Be Happy”, doesn’t work like a switch. You can’t just magically turn “Happy” on. “Happy” can be as inconsistent as our strands of Christmas lights, working beautifully one second, and then the next second, turned off, for no particular rhyme or reason.

These last few days, three of my kids have seemed particularly stressed, preparing for, and taking their final exams. My husband and I have been prodding them along with, “It’s almost over. Christmas break is right around the corner.” For some people, the holidays, themselves, stir up so much turmoil and fuss, that their mantra is, “It’s almost over. The new year is right around the corner.” That’s being positive. That’s being hopeful that there will be a happy release, just around the corner, from anything that is tying you up in knots right now. So, “happy” is just a fleeting emotion, and like all emotions, “happy” comes and “happy” goes. Being a positive person, however, is a state of being. It is the looking for the silver lining, the understanding that the clouds will always pass, and the faith in yourself and in your Highest guide, that whatever you experience in life, you will manage it, learn from it and grow, and you will survive it. And that whole process just described is called thriving. Thriving is what positive people do. “Happy” is the cheaply made, not so reliable strand of twinkling lights. “Positive” is the Star of Wonder, faithfully shining in the skies of our hearts, every single day. Even when we can’t see it, we know that the star is there, guiding us along our journeys in Life. And it will see us through to our destination. I’m positive of that fact. Absolutely positive.

Promise Yourself

Does an optimist, hoping for a certain outcome, believe that the desired outcome is going to happen? Or does an optimist just believe that whatever is meant to be is going to happen, and what happens IS the best outcome, no matter how things seem?

I like to think of myself as an optimist, but I also don’t like to get my hopes up. Perhaps being an optimist, means always being able to see the bright side of things, no matter what happens. Maybe being an optimist, one just lets things happen, and sees the silver lining in everything that does happen.

Sometimes people see optimists as dumb “Pollyanna” type characters who don’t face life with realistic views. I wonder if there is a middle ground character between optimists and pessimists. I guess the middle characters would be considered to be “neutralists.” These are the people who hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. They never get too high with the highs, and too low with the lows.

Then there are the spiritualists that tell us to stay away from duality. They say that there really isn’t “good” or “bad”. Things just are. Life just is. These spiritualists say that it is our stories and perspectives that we place upon events, that turn these events into epic stories of good versus evil. They tell us to try to live our lives by just experiencing it, without judging it.

“Promise Yourself

To be so strong that nothing
can disturb your peace of mind.
To talk health, happiness, and prosperity
to every person you meet.

To make all your friends feel
that there is something in them
To look at the sunny side of everything
and make your optimism come true.

To think only the best, to work only for the best,
and to expect only the best.
To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others
as you are about your own.

To forget the mistakes of the past
and press on to the greater achievements of the future.
To wear a cheerful countenance at all times
and give every living creature you meet a smile.

To give so much time to the improvement of yourself
that you have no time to criticize others.
To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear,
and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

To think well of yourself and to proclaim this fact to the world,
not in loud words but great deeds.
To live in faith that the whole world is on your side
so long as you are true to the best that is in you.” 
― Christian D. Larson, Your Forces and How to Use Them

Criminal Level of Optimism

“I’ve been driven all of my life by a spirit of adventure and a criminal level of optimism.” – Quincy Jones

I just read the above quote this morning and it made me smile with recognition. I didn’t think it described me exactly, although I do consider myself to be a mostly optimistic person. It reminded me of a person I worked for and befriended, a few years ago. This person is a very enthusiastic person who is always teeming with new ideas. She is unbridled with an almost child-like belief that whatever she sets her mind to, she can get and frankly, she usually does. She is almost 60- years-old.

When I was still working for her, in a position that ended up evolving into being like an assistant/cheerleader/sounding board, she would often come into the office with a new idea or direction that she would be taking her life into next, and I would dutifully listen, usually stifling my concerns and/or what I considered to be, my practical skepticism and realism. I first started with the stifling because she was my boss and she’s the one who gave me my paycheck, but then, I continued reserving my concerns, because honestly, she constantly proved them to be wrong. In short, I became a believer in the very potent power of her enthusiasm and optimism. The most hare-brained ideas (in my mind) ended up happening for her, anywhere from negotiating fabulous vacation rentals down to hardly any expense, to eventually creating an intricate app for our phones, that serves as hope for other people. Keep in mind that both of us were so tech-illiterate when we worked in an office together, that we took hours trying to figure out how to scan something on her new printer. This woman, then in her mid-fifties, soon after, created an app and a huge website that touches people’s lives, all because of a dream that she had on Christmas Day. She felt the divine need and calling to fulfill that dream and nothing would stop her.

Sometimes people come into your life and they help you to reflect on your own sense of self. Compared to my boss, I realized I wasn’t nearly as optimistic and filled with innocent enthusiasm, as I liked to think that I was, in my life. In fact, in some ways, I was sometimes downtrodden and victim-like, in my thinking. That was shockingly, eye-opening for me. Sometimes I would feel smug in my intellectualism and my “sanity”, when trying to keep my boss/friend’s expectations firmly on the ground. But somehow, it never failed, that her hope and persistent optimism would lift both sets of our feet off of the ground and into the skies, when another one of her visions would manifest itself into reality.

I don’t know if I’ll ever be as optimistic as my boss/friend/example of hope. But because of her example, I’m more convinced of the very strong power of positive thinking, against all odds. Optimism, left unchecked, is probably what has evolved every dream ever had, into the beautiful manifestation of all of the good things that we enjoy in our lives, this very day.

“Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.” – Helen Keller

“I believe any success in life is made by going into an area with a blind, furious optimism.” – Sylvester Stallone