Thanksgiving

You know those days when your mind starts racing and for whatever reason you are worrying about everything that is not within your control? Those things that you can't do anything about? Why are we not friends anymore? Why is this person so selfish? Why is traffic so horrible? Why didn't I run today? I hate those days.

I hate those days because my life is great. And one small negative seed gets planted somewhere in my brian and it takes 24 hours to get it out. To distract me from focusing on the negative, I keep going back to the resolution list.

• Stop trying to plot giving; do it spontaneously, and often.
• Pick a new, favorite charity.
• Every time you food shop, buy 2 extra cans of nonperishable items and donate them to a food bank.

I don't know why it popped in my head, but it did, to organize donations to the Denver Rescue Mission, I spontaneously reached out to my friends and coworkers. I have learned that sometimes just having the information in front of people will motivate them. The Denver Rescue Mission is close to where my good friends live and takes care of those in need that are so close to my home.  I can't ignore the reason for the Mission. Thanksgiving is a great time to remember how lucky we really are and help those that are less fortunate. I am trying to make it a year round thing.

So while I continue to work on these resolutions:

• Shift perspective on your situation once every day. Take five minutes to look at a situation, relationship, conflict, or so-called problem ongoing in your life from a completely new perspective every day. Hopefully, issues will not be so frequent that you’ll need to every day — but such a positive perspective-shifting practice as “reframing” helps us to break bad habits of thinking and realize that everything ain’t so bad after all.
• Lose expectations. On purpose. And stop expecting specifics. We tend to believe that knowing, wanting and even demanding specifics will be the fastest path to seeing results. The truth, as I’ve learned, is that expectations actually hamper achievement and, maybe ironically, that decision-making without expectations is the real powerhouse of positive growth and forward momentum

I keep smiling at the good things in life. Happy Thanksgiving!