We feel best when we create. No amount of food, video games or any self-destructive habits will fill that hole. So why fight it?!? Create something, even if it’s as small as a little sketch or poem. Grow a garden, bake a cake. Start a business! Whatever your beautiful heart desires.
Happiness: Someone (or some creature) to love, something to do and something to hope for. Don’t get too caught up in the rat race, money doesn’t mean you’ve arrived.
Default to "nice guy." Meaning it should require something significant for you NOT to be nice. Give people the benefit of the doubt. Cut them (and yourself) some slack. Life is hard. We're all in this together.
Spend 20 minutes a day watching a show you like in Spanish (or whatever your target language is) with reactionary subtitles. You’ll pick it up in no time!
My ballet teacher used to punish us by making us sit on the floor and hold our arms up. It hurts! But you learn how to sit with pain. You learn how to endure and how to use your mind to make your muscles really don’t want to do.
That uneasy, uncomfortable or even downright painful feeling you get when you’re faced with something that challenges you ... resist the urge to run away from it. Take a breath and just sit with it for a minute. That feeling you’re feeling is growth. Growth always hurts a little bit. Give yourself a beat to get adjusted before you decide if you want to stay or turn back.
Always clean from clean to dirty. Wash glassware first, greasy dishes last. Sink and tub first, then toilet. Then floor. Top-to bottom is another general rule.
Work the problem backwards. Start with the solution (desired outcome) and count down from there each step. Some steps will be small, some big. But you’ll get there!
Consider the source. Consider whose company they are in. You may not know much about issue xyz but look and see who endorses them. If people you trust place trust in them.
Favorite bible verse: Psalm 143:8 “Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have placed my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life.”
Don’t get discouraged in how slow change comes. Keep fighting for good. Some people will say it’s naive but they’re wrong. Every good thing we have in America is the result of good people fighting a seemingly impossible fight.