See? There I go. So let’s talk about something else that involves making choices. Read on…

What to Do?

From the time we’re old enough to start thinking for ourselves, even a little bit, we begin to make choices.

At first these are little choices about little things. You know… like whether we want to eat the food our parents give us, whether we want to do what we’re told to do, whether we make our bed or not. And the list goes on. Not very major things for sure.

As we grow older, though, we start being faced with choices that will make a difference in the direction of our lives.

We decide whether we will excel in school or just coast by. We decide if we’re going to rebel against our parents or not. We decide if we’re going to conform to what our peers want us to be or not. Choices everywhere.

The older we get, the more important these choices become. By the time we’ve reached 15 or 16, we have started to plot the map of our future, whether we realize it or not.

Once we finish high school (if we do decide to finish high school), we have either built our future on solid ground, or we’re on shaky ground, all because of choices we’ve made. It’s at this time that we start to see the affects of the decisions we made during the past 5 – 7 years.

If we don’t like what we see, is it too late to make changes? Absolutely not! It’s never too late to make adjustments and we can always better ourselves and change the path we’re on. We just have to have the guts to make that decision and the ambition to follow through with it, even when we’re confronted with obstacles.

See, we can sit back and watch the world pass us by, or we can grab hold of it and take charge of our lives. We do have that power, regardless what some people might say, to change our lives. We can take what seems like insurmountable bad and defeat the odds, coming out of a trial with victory in our lives.

I know this from personal experience. Just like everyone else, I have faced some trials in my life. Some of them have been tough. I could have laid down, whined and cried and begged for someone to fix it for me. But I didn’t do that. I chose to try my best to make something better come out of those trials.

I don’t say this to sound smug, because I can tell you honestly that there have been days when I wanted to throw my hands in the air and give up, but I never gave in to those feelings. And you don’t have to either. You can make a choice to change your life and make it better.

It’s not always easy. In fact, sometimes it might seem impossible to do, but it can be done, no mater who you are. The key is to understand that sometimes these changes come in little tiny pieces.. increments that can sometimes be almost invisible.

Once we understand this, it makes it easier to keep pushing forward when we’re only seeing small results.

All in all, these little gains that we make will add up to make bigger gains. The important thing is that we’re gaining!

So what will you do today? Will you lay down and cry when something tough comes your way, wishing that someone would make it all better for you? Or will you make the right choice and choose to do something about it?

It’s up to you. You have the freedom of choice.

The thing is, although so many people are hurting, it seems like there are two distinct groups among these hurting people. One group keeps pushing forward, finding as much good as they can in everything, despite their hurt. The other group uses their hurt to justify being angry all the time, lashing out at people and becoming extremely bitter and judgmental.

Based on my experience with so many people over the years, it seems that a lot of this huge difference is caused by a couple of different things.

The first thing is the personality type of each individual. Some people have the type of personality that makes it easier for them to let the bad things kind of roll off of them. It takes a lot to rattle these people. Whereas other people have a natural tendency to see things a little (or a lot) more negatively to begin with, so when more negative things come along, they just add it to their blackened snowball of discontent and roll it along to make it even bigger.

I have to admit that my personality type makes it easier for me to see the negative in a lot of things. But I’ve learned over the years that dwelling on the negative produces nothing good whatsoever. Nothing.

The second thing that has a big effect on our outlook on life is what we have been through… the bad things we have endured. This can vary tremendously from one person to the next.

Some people have some terrible things happen to them, while others seem to suffer only minor setbacks in their lives. Now I know that some people might disagree with me on this, and it’s your right to do so, but I’ll tell you very plainly that no matter who we are or what we’ve been through, we still make a choice as to whether we’ll be happy or miserable. It’s really that basic.

Is this cold and unsympathetic? I don’t believe it is. I believe it’s just realistic and brutally honest. Those people who like to be negative will say I’m harsh and cold, but those who have a more positive outlook will agree with me. It’s all in your outlook on things.

So there comes a time in each of our lives when we need to choose the path that our life will follow. Will it be the path darkened with negativity, anger and bitterness? Or will it be the path of happiness, regardless of what comes our way?

If you choose the darkened path, I promise you that your life will be miserable. And it won’t be because other people make it that way. It will be because YOU make it that way. Like it or not, this is just plain truth.

Each day we have a choice when we wake up and get out of bed. We can see the good in our lives and be thankful for it, or we can see the bad and let it eat away at us.

If we choose the negative life, your life will show it in every aspect. You will be outwardly miserable. You will almost never smile. You will spend a lot of time alone because nobody will want to be around you. You will never be satisfied or content. You will feel terrible most of the time. You will get depressed easily. You will suffer from physical ailments like high blood pressure, headaches, high stress levels, etc. Eventually it will take its toll on you. This is a proven fact.

If you choose the path of joy and happiness, your life will also show it. You will have peace. You will smile a lot. You will be content. You will be fun to be around. You will learn to take one day at a time and enjoy each one of them, because you will be thankful for each day.

I don’t know about you, but I personally don’t want to waste my life being negative and bitter. It’s just not worth it. Life is short, and I don’t say that to be cliche’. It really is shorter than most people realize. And it’s up to us to make the most of it.

So take your pick… misery or joy. Which will you choose?

We’ve had some really good experiences and we’ve had some really bad ones. I’ve learned that some people love truth and they readily embrace it, while other people will refuse to see or hear truth when it’s staring them in the face.

This can be pretty hurtful when it’s the latter. Knowing what it is true and what is in your heart, and trying to convince someone that this is the case is very hard when the person you’re talking to has convinced themselves otherwise, for some reason or another.

This week I had the unfortunate incident of standing face to face with someone and trying to talk to them, trying to share the truth about a situation that had taken place, but they absolutely refused to listen or hear me. They had made up their own version of what happened, in their mind. And they were 100% convinced that their version was the truth, even though it was far-fetched and there was much to indicate that his version was a figment of his imagination.

When this happens, there’s not much you can do except walk away knowing that you did your best.

What’s more hurtful, though, is when that person becomes vindictive, and based on their perception of reality they begin to try their very best to make things difficult for you.

I’m a black & white person. I prefer to put everything on the table and have no secrets, so when something comes along that’s not clear-cut, I like to talk it out and get past the disagreement. Putting disagreements behind you and moving on with life is always the best thing to do. But I’ve learned lately that not everyone wants to resolve conflicts. Some people like it this way. Some people like to be angry and negative, holding onto everything bad that’s ever happened to them in their lives. They like misery and holding onto this stuff gives them a reason to feel justified in their misery.

Sooner or later, though, this catches up with that kind of person. They become so bitter with life that they start to see the effects of this on their health. Bitterness, envy, hatred and strife will eventually take a person down, unless they change their ways.

The good news is that it’s never too late. If you’re angry or bitter, you can always choose to do something about it. Talk things out with people. Be reasonable. Realize that you’re not always right. Don’t be judgmental, looking down your nose at people all the time.

There is not a single one of us who is right 100% of the time, even though we’d like to think that we are.

Lighten up and enjoy your life. It’s the only one you have!

I updated it with very little consistency. To be honest with you, it was because I wasn’t really very passionate about becoming another IM guru.

As of the last few months I’ve taken on some new directions with my career and my life in general, so I wanted to start with a clean slate here to reflect those changes.

I don’t know how often I’ll update this, or even what the content will be related to, but It will not be related to internet marketing; I can say that for sure.

Stop back by sometime if you feel like it. Hopefully some of what I write will inspire you to do something bigger and better with your life