Daily Motivator - November

[bluidkiti]

November 1

Give it a shot

Go ahead, give it a shot. Even if all you do is learn what not to do, that’s progress.

Devise a plan, gather your resources, commit yourself to action, and go. When the obstacles and disruptions arise, keep going as best you can.

Nobody ever did anything perfectly on the first attempt. Yet nobody ever did anything at all without making that first, imperfect attempt.

Some people will call you foolish for setting out to do what you’ve never done before. But what’s really foolish is to do nothing and remain stuck where you are.

Seek advice, listen to the criticism, find morsels of truth in it, then move forward. Feel the doubts, let them prepare you, but don’t let them stop you.

You have good and valuable things to do, things that will challenge and stretch you. Remind yourself what a great opportunity that is, seize it, and run with it.

— Ralph Marston

[willbe275]

Happy November the 1st Family.. Thanking God for watching over us during the month of October one day at a time

[bluidkiti]

November 2

Know courage

Courage does not exist in a vacuum. Where there is true courage, there is true purpose driving it.

Courage is not something you obtain for its own sake. Those times you act with courage are the times you have a powerful enough reason to do so.

Courage arises when you connect your actions to your purpose. Courage is an affirmation of how much you care.

Do you find yourself hobbled by fear? To function well in the face of danger and risk, connect more robustly to what matters and why.

Don’t bother asking yourself how to have more courage. Seek instead to live with genuine purpose, and you’ll discover the courage that’s always been there.

Enable your purpose to be bigger than your fear. Know what you care about and you will know courage.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 3

Never forget

See the beauty that is this day. Feel the miracle that is your life.

Against all probability you are here to experience now. Give to the experience its full due.

Stand in awe of the fact that you can stand in awe. Contemplate the wonder of your ability to wonder.

Listen with care and love to the softest whisper. Gaze intently at the brightest star.

You can choose what to do and then act on your choice. You can question, learn, understand, and explain.

Never let yourself forget how much richness and mystery and possibility there is. Always live to give unique expression and meaning in the best way you know how.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 4, 2021

Potential for greatness

Here, today, as you are, with what you have, lives the potential for greatness. Get out of its way, let it fill you, guide you, inspire you to action.

You cannot know all of which you are capable. Yet you can discover, adjust, refine, improve in every action, every moment, every word.

What do you really, truly want in your heart of hearts? Look in that direction, see the love, see the goodness, kindness, forgiveness, understanding.

Keep looking in that direction because the direction you look is the direction you’ll go. Carry your life, your passion, your energy toward what is good for you, what is good for all.

Stop holding yourself back, stop corrupting your whole world by giving in to the easy allure of temptation, indolence, and deception. Surrender instead to your potential for greatness, for truth and diligence in all things big and small.

You cannot swindle or outthink or hide from your potential, from life’s potential for greatness. You must let love guide you in bringing it more fully every day to life.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 5

A life that’s real

Don’t strive to be efficient just for the sake of efficiency. Seek first to be authentic.

Avoid chasing what’s merely easy, for you’ll gain nothing from it. Immerse yourself instead in challenging and meaningful pursuits.

Notice the obvious but don’t dwell on it, don’t waste your time congratulating yourself for seeing it. Do the work, spend the time to discover what’s not so obvious.

Be driven by curiosity. But avoid spreading your attention so thinly that it becomes fleeting and superficial.

Do what must be done, create the value you’re able to create. And care not at all about what it looks like you’re doing or what others think and say about you.

Call forth the strength, do the work, abide in truth, in goodness, in authenticity. Live a life that’s real, with substance, fulfillment and deep, sustaining value, today, tomorrow, and always.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 6

Intentional interactions

How many of your daily interactions are chosen, rich, substantive and thoughtful? How many are annoying, distracting, meaningless and superficial?

The quality interactions add greatly to your life. The junk interactions can collectively waste vast amounts of your time.

Information technology has exponentially expanded the kinds and the quality of your interactions, and the trend keeps accelerating. That makes it more important than ever to exercise intentional control over those interactions.

It’s healthy and helpful to be serendipitous, open to diverse and unexpected experiences. But you must have a strategy to avoid being overwhelmed by all the interactions coming your way.

Become more intentional about your interactions and the result will be a more intentional and purposeful life. Take steps to improve the quality and substance of those interactions, so as to deepen your focus and strengthen your values.

Notice your interactions, take intentional control of them, expect more quality from them. Make it your choice to gain value and benefit from all the time you spend interacting with life.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 7

Think and feel

I feel I have a good answer, and you think you have a better answer. Even though we disagree, both of us are right.

Life is about what you feel. It’s also about what you think.

Your feelings give richness and color and meaning to your thoughts. Your thoughts impose a measure of discipline and reality on your feelings.

A thinking approach often seems at extreme odds with a feeling approach. Yet both approaches seek to make the best of the same situation, so they’re not really so opposed.

Has the conflict between thoughts and feelings pushed you into a disagreement? See if you can adjust your own balance of thoughts and feelings to achieve a better understanding.

Intellect and emotion do not have to exist in opposition. Take a step back, work to get them into harmony, and make the best of the whole person you are.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 8

Better alternative

Are there certain habits or behaviors that lead your life in a negative direction? Come up with positive and compelling alternatives to them.

Whenever you attempt to not do some particular thing, the attempt is likely to fail. That’s because you focus on the undesired action, and your very focus pushes you toward that action.

A more effective strategy is to wholly replace the unwanted action with something completely different. Make it so you don’t even have to think about whatever you’re seeking to avoid.

You are intended for action, built for action, experienced at taking action. So put all that to good use.

Rather than deny yourself action, improve the quality of your actions. Instead of pushing to avoid a bad habit, replace it with a beneficial habit that makes you completely forget about the old one.

Give yourself a better alternative. And you won’t even think to miss the negative behavior you’ve given up.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 9

Move life forward

Life is a continuing series of opportunities to make a difference. Because of that, valuable outcomes are always possible.

There is a way to get from where you are to where you want to be. There are ways to improve your life and the lives of others, no matter the burdens, no matter the challenges.

The path forward is never a straight line, but that path always does exist. The journey is not easy, yet the goal is within your ability to reach.

At every turn you have the chance to provide beneficial, useful input. No matter what happened in the previous minute, you can work to make some sort of improvement in the next minute.

In this way, little by little, you move life forward. In this way, day after day, you continue to inject hope, meaning, purpose, and achievement into your world.

Even in the darkest moments, the opportunity for progress always exists, always renews itself. Seize that opportunity now, and again and again, for doing so is precisely what makes life so very much worth living.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 10

All you’ve lived

Every day has added some unique measure of richness to your life. Every experience represents value that you have accumulated.

Through the joyful moments and through the difficult times you have grown. You’ve gained knowledge, strength, perspective, friendship, wisdom, faith, persistence, and so much more.

You’ve learned what works well and what doesn’t. You’ve felt pleasure, pain, excitement, disappointment, love, dismay, hope, and inspiration.

It has all added greatly to who you are, to what you can do, and to how much you care. With every experience, every thought, every turn of events, your life increases in value.

Though some hours and efforts might have felt wasted, the entirety of your life is available for you to use right now. And right now, more than ever before, you have a good sense of how and why to make use of all you are.

Remind yourself of the great value embodied in all you’ve lived, in all you continue to be. Keep enabling life to benefit greatly from all the goodness you can give.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 11

Precisely

You encounter a problem. What’s the first thing you must do to have any hope of correcting that problem?

You must precisely define the problem. Only when you are clear about who, what, where, and why can you proceed to remedy the issue.

Effective physicians do not treat illness until they have a clear diagnosis. Acting on the basis of a vague complaint can be just as likely to cause more harm as it is to bring healing.

It’s not enough to cry and pontificate about how something is wrong. And it’s certainly not helpful to assign blame before you understand all the details.

Take the time and put forth serious effort to precisely see the situation. Only then can you devise and implement a specific, workable response.

When you’re faced with a problem, do what’s necessary to figure out exactly what it is. Be clear, be precise, and give yourself the deep understanding you need to get the problem behind you.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 12

Life itself

Life itself arrives here, in you, today, all around. Color, texture, motion and aroma fill your senses, energize your spirit, activate your thoughts and feelings.

What does it all mean and how is your role best played? Is now any different than before, and from which direction will come whatever is to be?

What feels so certain can explode with surprise. Concealed within impossible mystery you find a strangely familiar reassurance.

Life itself is not just a concept, is more than a fleeting weightless image, and not merely the pixels onto which it is commonly imposed. Life was itself before you could name it, and extends far beyond anything ever imagined.

Yet life exists because you know it, live it, uphold it, extend and continue it. In every blast of snow, in each cricket that chirps, in all fibers of the sheets that ease your sleep, life embraces itself, and you.

Never forget to return that embrace. You are life itself, and how wondrous it is to be.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 13

Experience meaning

Find meaning not by searching for it. Make meaning in your life by making yourself useful.

That doesn’t mean allowing yourself to be taken advantage of. That doesn’t mean buying into some grand utopian scheme to save the world.

It involves making steady, incremental improvements to whatever situation you’re in. It means enriching the lives of people who are close to you.

Meaning is not contrived by thinking about it or studying it. Discover and experience meaning by living generously and authentically.

Right now, within your reach, someone can benefit from your encouragement, presence, sincere attention, your kindness, your smile. You can offer helpful words, a sympathetic ear, skillful action, an understanding heart.

A rich sense of meaning is as close as your next act of generosity, you’re next moment of usefulness. The more you give your best, the more profoundly you know how much your life means.

— Ralph Marston

[bluidkiti]

November 14

Disagreement

Disagreement is not what keeps people apart. What keeps people apart is the refusal to acknowledge, explore and resolve their disagreements.

Indeed, in every disagreement is the potential for agreement and cooperation. The pathway to that cooperation is respectful engagement.

The fact that you disagree on a particular issue means that at some level an agreement already exists. Because you and the other side already agree that the issue is important.

Acknowledge that starting point and work your way forward. Agree that you disagree about something meaningful, and begin to discover other ways in which you can agree.

Disagreement is possible only when there is somehow, somewhere, some common ground. Persist in identifying and respecting that common ground, and then persist in building upon it.

When you are sincerely passionate about your position, make positive use of that passion. Do the difficult work to find and to implement new ways to agree and cooperate.

— Ralph Marston