Time for a little positive energy around here.
Kids are in school and learning a whole bunch of life defining skills- including school bus survival. I kiss and hug them and tell them every morning to go out there and knock ’em dead. To hold their head up high and believe in themselves. My husband tells them every night how proud he is of them, how much he expects of them, how worthy they are. They are learning life lessons- that you don’t get what you don’t earn- and no one hears the whining.
It’s time I went on a little positive mental attitude reinforcement trip of my own. And that includes clearing out the cobwebs some creepy little negative energy spider threw up when I wasn’t looking.
Beliefs start early, from what you see in your home, to your mentors at school, to what you fill your mind with, from reading and music and film, to your guidance at church. I am thankful for growing up in a strong, healthy, loving family, for my unerring faith in God, for my husband and children who both need me and make me feel loved and wanted, for my encouraging yet competitive writer pals, and of course the strong women friends I have found in Georgia. This is the longest I have lived anywhere, and God must really think I have my act together, because he’s been giving me a whole bunch of tests, just to keep me on my toes.
I don’t welcome them- who would want trials? But, as a writer, a wife and mother, I see every experience as something to grow from, to use as a metaphor, as a character’s motivation, as a teaching tool for the children, as something to enrich and build my marriage, as something to let me know ME better.
I’ve run into some snags along the way, as I believe in finding the good in everyone, in giving them the benefit of the doubt, of forgiveness and of unconditional love. My husband will look at the bum with the dog and say he’s faking his broken leg and I’ll want to give the bum lunch, wash his dog and hear the whole story of how he came to be here on this corner.
It’s not always easy. I still have a problem going back to stores that mistreated me, or dealing with repairmen who took us for a ride around the block- an expensive ride around the block.
Sure, it may take a bit of grousing and a few mumbled but-why, or we should have- scenarios before I get over the whole thing. But I get there.
Life is too precious, and for some, too short to spend it wallowing in negativity, surrounding yourself with doubters, accusers, and judgmental critics.To allow your own belief system to be soiled by those who don’t get it yet.
(I won’t call them haters, or evil, or wrong, or bad or even toxic- a term thrown around lately, because then, aren’t I lowering myself to their standards?)
I’ll just delete the unfitting comment or post, forward the email to a prayer group and walk away. Into a very pretty sunrise in a very blessed place, where a whole new day of good things awaits.
I know there are more days that are coming that I will not want to read what is written about me. Already, I have my dissenters, but I have learned that it’s not me. It’s their issue. It’s their unhappiness, their belief system that broke down. I can’t let their problem become my own.
In this house, we don’t say, “can’t.” We don’t say something is too hard or impossible. We see only the finish line, not all the pebbles in the path, and we never ever stop believing, because we want a mural, a panorama of life.
“The thoughts we choose to think are the tools we use to paint the canvas of our lives.”
Louise L. Hay