Personal Meditations no. 190

“If there is no joy, then what is the point?”

Embrace the Within.

LIfe can be the utmost mess and misery that we can find OR it can be a wonderful joy that you get to experience daily. This all is determined by your perspective. When this all started fourteen days ago, I was a mess physically, mentally, and spiritually. I knew that in order to impact my mental state that I had to do something about my physical state. So, I started a routine of getting up every day and exercising my body and my mind. As the days rolled on and I started caring more about what I was doing and became more intentional, I started to gain more knowledge about how to get better at the routine, what to use as fuel, how to lose fat, how to think better about my life, and eventually how to get myself aligned. There is a great deal of joy in my alignment. I don’t wake up needing pots of coffee and cigarettes. I don’t wake up dragging myself out of bed hungover. I don’t wake up exhausted and looking for a reason to call off from work. I finally reached a place where I am happy about my life and I enjoy even the messiness and stupidity that comes with living in the world today.

There is a lot of mess and stupid out there that can bog me down. I can choose to let those things enslave me and rule my mind and spirit. BUT, I would rather choose to be joyful and live a better life every day. And that means getting up daily and working on making me better and no one else. It isn’t about changing the world or changing my neighbors or changing the laws or changing the leaders or changing the school or changing anything else BUT me. I get to change me daily and I have to take that part seriously.

I can complain and live a less than life. I can walk around a total mess and feel like a total mess while eating garbage and thinking it’s going to change or I can be the change every day. I get to choose that and no one else. Getting things together this late in my life is probably a midlife crisis BUT it is an effective midlife crisis that didn’t have me focus on buying a fast and flashy vehicle, it didn’t have me focus on leaving my family and finding something or someone else . . . . I started with focusing on what I could change and going from there.

I can change what I eat. I can change if I work out daily. I can change what I think about. I can change what I read and hear. I can change how much importance I give to things in my life. I can change my physical routine. I can change my mental routine. I can change my spiritual routine. And I can choose to make that change every day or I can choose to not.

I cannot lead a life that is without joy. That is not what I am choosing for myself, my family, my community, and my world any longer. There are enough miserable people out there and I am not going to be one as well. I get to choose joy. And I choose that joy daily.

Have the day you want. I hope you find whatever you’re looking for.

#ThinkBetter #BeBetter #NoGodsNoMasters #MyBodyMyChoice #MakeYourselfGreatAgain #EmbracetheWithin

Personal Meditations no. 189

“Can you smell the Friday?”

Embrace the Within.

Made my list on Tuesday for the weekend in case you were wondering how this week was feeling. And I added a few more items to the list last evening after finally getting my car back from Mary Anne. Sophia also learned how to change out a headlamp so that was a bonus win for the list. That list never gets too short or disappears. There is always something else to be done most days that I need to push until the weekend, however, that is what Saturdays are for getting done this week.

But Friday just has a different smell to it than other days of the week. You don’t want to smell the Thursday. That’s just like sniffing an old couch. And definitely do not smell the Monday. That’s just asking for trouble. BUT Fridays are the smell of hope and optimism. Fridays smell like a muted Saturday. I can smell the dirt and water and outside BUT from a distance. And that is the appeal of the Friday. It’s not the overpowering smell of Saturdays BUT the hint that Saturday is right there around the corner.

So, look forward to a lot of pictures this weekend from the plantation. There is a lot to be done and a lot already happening. And I am thankful for the opportunity to get to work on that list this weekend. Enjoy the Friday and breathe it in. Smell the Friday!

Have the day you want. I hope you find whatever you’re looking for.

#ThinkBetter #BeBetter #NoGodsNoMasters #MyBodyMyChoice #MakeYourselfGreatAgain #EmbracetheWithin