Posts tagged with “happy”
You Can Make a Difference: Just Open Your Eyes
“Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.” ~William James
My mind wasn’t able to percieve the reality around me. It had been ten days since I’d woken up with a feeling of constant energy flowing through my whole body.
It was so intense that I didn’t want to let it go. But I wasn’t ready for it. It was way too much for my unprepared body and mind. I didn’t even know what it was back then.
Everything had happened so fast. I was on the way to Chicago with my friends after seeming to check …
How to Find Your Purpose When Your Life Is a Mess
“What is my purpose here and how may I serve…in the midst of all this confusion?” ~Wayne Dyer
Your life is a mess and you can’t do anything about it, right?
Wrong.
You may be closer to the answers than you think, even while right in the middle of the chaos that showed up.
You ask yourself, “What happened to the life I had where I knew my purpose?”
All you know is that a rug you didn’t know you were standing on was pulled out from underneath you, leaving you in a heap. You want a magic carpet to …
You are Enough: A Tiny Manual for Being Your True Self
“Waking up to who you are requires letting go of who you imagine yourself to be.” ~Alan Watts
When I was in third grade, I loved to hang upside down on the monkey bars on the playground of my all-girls school in Philadelphia.
I would lock my little pale knees over the gray steel rods and then carefully let my hands go to swing upside down, like a pendulum in a pleated skirt.
This meant I had to bravely trust that my normally feeble strength would be sufficient to suspend me.
It was always a victorious feeling when the backs …
The 3 Pieces of Recovery from Addiction or Depression
“I now see how owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do.” ~Brené Brown
When I started graduate school, it was safe to say that I was running away from things. I’d recently ended a nine-year relationship and I wasn’t planning on dealing with it.
Upon the birth of my nephew, my father, a long-term addict, had begun rekindling his relationships with his three daughters. I didn’t recognize, though I should have, that this needed dealing with too.
I began school so that I’d have something to pour my …
Why We Lie to Ourselves and How It Creates Tension
“That I feed the hungry, forgive an insult, and love my enemy…. these are great virtues.
But what if I should discover that the poorest of the beggars and the most impudent of offenders are all within me, and that I stand in need of the alms of my own kindness; that I myself am the enemy who must be loved? What then?” ~Carl Jung
Mornings are delicious in the desert. In a summer climate that pushes above 100 degrees day after day, you learn to appreciate lingering cool gifts of pre-dawn hours.
I’m typically awake by 5am these days. …
It’s Not Over: Failure Is Success in the Making
“A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.” ~James Joyce
Everyone has a story of failure and disadvantage—those things we wish were done differently, better, or not at all. Take these stories for instance:
A speaker intending to be unifying and encouraging onstage leaves the audience disappointed and bored instead.
A lone manuscript is rejected by publishing houses over twenty-seven times, dismissed as too fanciful, fake, and “never gonna sell.”
A poor eleven-year-old boy, deprived of toys his entire childhood, trudges through sleet and snow on his newspaper route in order to help support his family.
An author struggles to …
Free Yourself from Regret and Transform Your Life
“The practice of forgiveness is our most important contribution to the healing of the world.” ~Marianne Williamson
I always had a hard time accepting all of me. As early as I can remember others defined me by saying “You are so weird.” Not in a malicious way but more in a “you don’t fit into our familiar box” sort of way.
I spent most of my teens and twenties attempting to conform to others or numbing myself to a point of not caring what they thought. If someone would have told me that forgiveness and compassion would lead me to …
There’s a Gift in Every Problem: Finding the Good in the Bad
“Every problem has a gift for you in its hands.” ~Richard Bach
I bought the magazine because it had pizza on the cover and the headline read: “Yes, you can eat pizza.”
At that point, the idea that I could eat pizza was as absurd to me as the thought of finding a tiny dinosaur living in my flowerbeds.
But oh, how I wanted a slice.
At thirty-two years old, I’d been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. It scared the hell out of me, and I was determined to take perfect care of myself so I could be the best …
When You Fear Things Might Not Work Out: 3 Helpful Tips
“Your belief determines your action and your action determines your results, but first you have to believe.” ~Mark Victor Hansen
This summer, after three years of dreaming, my daughter and I moved from the city I’ve lived in all my life to my dream city six hours north.
The season of summer is known as a time when plants fruit, grow, and bloom. In order to harvest new crops we have to have a clear field and clean soil to plant in, right?
Before we can grow new things, we need to look hard at what isn’t working for us, …
7 Ways to Cope With the Grief of Heartbreak
“Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.” ~C.S. Lewis
Shock. That was the first feeling. Shock and disbelief.
This isn’t really happening. Denial.
Look into her eyes. Slow realization. I’m not dreaming. Fear.
Wave upon wave of torrential sadness. Messy.
We’d been in a long-distance relationship, and as far as I was aware, everything was inutterably perfect. I was as happy as I’d ever been; I was in love.
For months, I’d been planning to travel across the country to see her. …
4 Massive Motivation Killers and How to Overcome Them
“Better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing flawlessly.” ~Robert H. Schuller
For the entirety of my life I have had an external source of structure.
I’ve very much thrived when both guided and held accountable by others. You could say that I’m a “systems” friendly person and have always felt safe and secure when I can simply follow the guidelines or instructions and then arrive at the intended destination.
The only problem is that I didn’t always create the “intended” destination. In fact, it usually wasn’t even where I wanted to be. It was where I thought I …
15 Reasons to Start Following Your Dream Today
“One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it’s worth watching.” ~Unknown
Do you have a dream? A wish? A desire?
Do you ever wake up and wonder: What would it be like to love life?
People can tell you “follow your dream,” but is anyone really doing it?
Not someone in a TV show or movie—a real, living, breathing human, just like you?
Is it possible?
The Depression
Three years ago I couldn’t sleep. Night after night, I’d lie awake at 2am. My heart would pound in my chest.
The anxiety overtook me. I welcomed it. …
Why Accepting Your Imperfections Is a Gift to the World
“The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.” ~Anna Quindlen
Being yourself seems like it would be an easy thing, right? Just be! But when you’re someone who has lived their life seeking the approval of others constantly, it’s not such an easy thing.
You have to attempt to move past years of trying to appear this way, wondering if people will judge you if do that, or doing your best not to cause waves and avoid conflict.
When you don’t fully understand who your “self” …
When Following Your Passion Makes You Miserable
“The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now.” ~Robert G. Ingersoll
It seems that in recent years people have really started waking up to the fact that they can do what they love, which is great. But what’s not so great is when it makes you miserable.
Finding your passion can become another goal to be achieved in the future.
Suddenly you find yourself believing that if you could just find that perfect passion, your life would be perfect and then you’d finally be happy. But life doesn’t work that way.
You already …
Why Letting Yourself Feel Broken is the Key to Feeling Whole
“Life always waits for some crisis to occur before revealing itself at its most brilliant.” ~Paul Coelho
I spent my twenty-fifth birthday crying alone at the foot of a mountain. While I had always found solace in spending time by myself, in that moment, I did not recognize my “self.” Without my self, I had nothing.
I was utterly alone.
Three weeks earlier, a man was shot just feet away from my front door. My then-boyfriend and I performed CPR until an ambulance arrived, but the man had been killed on impact. The police left my home at 3 a.m.; …
A Simple Technique to Solve Problems Before They Get Bigger
“As he thinks, so he is; as he continues to think, so he remains.” ~James Allen
It was a beautiful day as we drove down the Desert Road two days after Christmas. The Desert Road is a stretch of highway in the North Island of New Zealand.
On one side of the highway, three magnificent volcanoes provide the only break to the bleak, stark landscape. Otherwise, the ground is covered in dry grasses, rocks, and a straight highway to the horizon.
During the drive, my husband and I were discussing the New Year and what would be the next adventure.…
Are You in Love with the Idea of Being in Love?
“When we can no longer change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” ~Viktor Frankl
“But no. We can give it another chance; I know we can. We just have to try harder…” were my desperate words to him as he was breaking up with me for the second time.
As I am reading those words out loud, I feel a little sting in my heart. It’s been a while since I revisited this experience and for some reason, it feels bittersweet.
It’s been about nine months since he told me that he didn’t see a future for us, …
10 Ways to Start Living and Loving Life Now
“I never want to arrive. I love the ride.” ~Coco J. Ginger
This is what life should be, a wonderful journey of living and loving each moment.
I was born in India to a loving, caring family. My mother and my grandparents gave me the world. They kept me hidden from the truths of life and, therefore, life was sweet, as I felt like the most loved child in the world. Now after 38 years of existing (not living) I reflect on where everything went wrong. Why have I felt so lost, broken, and regretful?
I came from a successful …
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