Category Archives: Growing

Rolling With the Changes . .

02 Tuesday Jun 2015

Posted by in Attitude, Change, Choices, Conquering Fear, Contentment, Courage, Growing, Joy, Lessons

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I’m rolling with the changes . . otherwise the brakes of resistance I try to apply wear out from fighting against the natural state of things. Life is ever-changing and though we might believe ourselves easily rocked by all the change we experience, we are only able to truly grow and develop when we’re forced out of our comfort zones. Change is life!  Persistence-and-Determination

We begin as babies incapable of fending for ourselves or appraising our own course; were we not to change, we wouldn’t even understand that we had life! So why does it often become harder to accept all the change of life by the middle or perceived end? I suppose it is our awareness having awakened us to the realities of life’s abruptness and unfiltered truths. Life can seem so hard once we understand loss, brevity, failure, fear, doubt, worry, anxiety, lack, need, and all the emotions which push upon our souls. But at the same time, life is supposed to have prepared us each step of the way for exactly what comes next, known or unknown. We should know by now that we’re not invincible, infallible and that our time is not infinite here on earth; but we should also believe ourselves successful at having made it this far!  Socrates-Quote-on-Change

We’ve learned, grown, developed, overcome, strengthened our minds, bodies and spirits for the journey yet to come! Why then be reticent when changes happen? Without change there can be no actual growth or development in us or around us, in which we might take great pleasure in having mastered another life skill or challenge! Life wouldn’t be much at all were we to remain as we once were. If we keep applying the brakes to our life as it changes around us – hiding or diverting from the changes we fear, dread or imagine – we risk stalling, crashing or disabling our own lives in the process. In the end, life is really the sum of all that we met and overcame in pursuit of some level of contentment, inner peace and joy within our souls! We should welcome the changes as new tests and testimonies for having stood tall and strong in this life!  

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It’s a Hard-Knock Life . . Making Mistakes

21 Saturday Feb 2015

Posted by in Attitude, Character, Choices, Confidence, Growing, Lessons, Maturity

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The problem with some mistakes – we keep making them! That is until we learn what we need to from them, in order that we recognize the situations leading us to make the same choices; as well as the necessity and reasons for us to no longer do the same things or think the same way! Mistakes aren’t inherently bad for us, IF we do take the lessons we’re presented through each one by which we learn, we make changes, we develop and grow beyond. But many of us only accept the mistakes repeatedly by making the same types of choices, often complaining that things don’t go our way, aren’t right for us or offering us much in life. images goals 3

We just haven’t learned the process of viewing everything which happens to us in life, including mistakes, hard lessons and painful episodes, as the impetus for our own personal development. We stay in a rut comforting ourselves with our lack of confidence, our low sense of self-worth, our agony over life’s seeming unfairness, our hurt feelings, our wounded pride, our insecurity, our anger over the way things are, our fear of change, our stubborn refusal to let it all go and/or our continual self-pity party. Perhaps we’ve learned that we get more attention wearing the negative circumstances of our lives like badges of survival and courage; rather than viewing them as minor steps in the process of our personal development which lead us to the real badges of honor, those of having successfully managed and maneuvered through this thing called life!  imageschange

Only when we realize that we could do better, we should do more as we’re responsible for our own lives, so we might want to make changes because we have loftier expectations for ourselves, do we begin to see situations with the light of our own honest appraisal and recognition. It is only when we value our own life enough to not settle, to not accept less, to be fully responsible for all the goals we’ve made and met,  and to accept every outcome and circumstance as part of the process of life’s continual school of learning and self-development that we truly become our own life’s manager. All circumstances of our life are then viewed as potential lessons intrinsic to our development and growth through the process of choice, adaptation, learning and correction so that we become more – even with each mistake we make!  Signature02

Living Takes A Will . .

23 Friday Jan 2015

Posted by in Choices, Commitment, Conquering Fear, Courage, Dreams, Faith, Growing, Success, Trials

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Living takes a will . . one courageous, trusting and hopeful enough to overlook fear, the “what-ifs” and the scrapes of falling in failure. We cannot dare live, with our eyes closed, behind our protective walls and within our safest confines. Living means we face our fears with courage, we endeavor to meet our challenges head on and we keep climbing no matter how many times we slip or fall from this rung or the next. Living isn’t easy, without obstacle; and it surely isn’t done in the safety of our mind’s making. It takes faith, hope, trust, perseverance as well as a surrender to our inability to control every detail and every outcome. But living is worth every scraped knee we endure, each failure, all of our attempts, each broken heart or broken dream. For in getting those, we lived!  images success

No one ever experiences anything worthwhile when merely existing. Push yourself to go beyond today and every day you get by purposefully living rather than merely existing through them. How do we do that and what is the difference? Living means we are already outside of whatever comfort zone we may have set up for ourselves; it means we dare to realize our dreams, to attempt to make our desires reality and it means we don’t give up on ourselves! Living, as opposed to just existing, means that when faced with challenges, we don’t hide, run or flee. We aren’t going to outrun all of our challenges, so the sooner we learn to step up to the plate each one represents, the better. It is life-affirming, confidence-building and esteem-igniting each and every time we take life’s challenges on for the sake of passing the tests and trials each represents to us. If we run, hide, seek to escape or let others do the heavy-lifting in life, we never learn to trust in ourselves, to believe in ourselves or to have faith and hope in our future!  images5Y99UUMF

Just like with our first steps, our first developmental stages through infancy, life never ceases to present to us challenges and learning experiences which we must overcome and pass in order that we may grow and develop into new stages! And each of those new stages brings more of the same by way of tests and trials which we must learn to pass successfully in order that we grow and develop for what lies ahead. Imagine if we had chosen in our toddler years to remain helpless and infantile? No one does that because adulthood represents an promising period which prompts our desire for more. All children seem to want to leapfrog through their development, eager to grow up before their time. Why then do we suddenly find our scraped knees, fears and failures so overwhelming at some advancing age, that we wish to halt our own progress? Keep pushing through challenges, obstacles and all the mess life brings! The only person you really hurt when you let fear, doubt, insecurity or apathy win is you! Make it your goal to live today, with a will, courage, faith and hope. Don’t let life beat you back, down or out.    Signature02

Overcoming . . The Driving Force Within

05 Friday Dec 2014

Posted by in Choices, Commitment, Conquering Fear, Discipline, Growing, Lessons, Strength

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Overcoming . .  why do we doubt our own abilities to attempt, to persevere and to ultimately overcome? Fear, anxiety, worry, regret, and all the other obstacles we perceive before us shouldn’t stop us from pursuing the life we desire; especially if we learn to give ourselves credit for all the overcoming we’ve already done! It even started long before we became aware that overcoming was what we were doing!!!

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We overcame the process of childbirth, since we’re here. We then overcame the years of helplessness, in infancy and toddler-times, when we depended upon so many others to get us through. We survived that! And we then overcame growing up into childhood, one long and often painful step at a time. We went from not even being able at some point to hold up our own heads, to one day plunging forward into learning how to walk. It was a long process of persevering through missteps and teeters which resulted in stumbles or even falls; but we wanted to learn so much more than the weight of our own reasoning, fears or doubts! Then we were sent off to school and had to learn many more ways to overcome by learning and by growth. And every day since, we’ve learned to overcome something just to get where we are today.

Life is all about overcoming, surviving and thriving regardless the challenges which are inherent in the process! Humans seem to be the only living beings which give so much credence to their emotions and feelings, so that we can actually think or feel our way out of challenges essential to our development! We learn through life to process fear, worry, anxiety and doubt with more weight than we knew to give all of that in our childhood. Adulthood often enables people to learn some bad and/or negative ways to not overcome. But overcoming is what we’re supposed to do! All through life, until our death, we’re meant to move forward, to learn, to develop, to change and to grow.

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When we let fear, doubt, worry, anxiety, apathy or any other negative we perceive hold us down or back, we are only hurting ourselves! Each of us is given things to challenge the inner muscles of overcoming all through life; were we to keep our distance from all those challenges, all of life, where would we be now?? I guess the baby would have chosen to stay in utero, the child in the bliss of the crib and the youngster in kindergarten. But we weren’t able to render ourselves stagnant then, why should we endeavor to do that now??

Seize the power found within your spirit of overcoming! It is there to propel you through all the challenges and tough times in life! Be your own best friend, don’t talk yourself out of development, growth or forward movement, just because it represents a challenge or tough times ahead. You’re already an overcomer! You just need to believe that is the truth about YOU!

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Growing Pains . .

28 Tuesday Jan 2014

Posted by in Change, Character, Confidence, Faith, Growing, Life, Opportunity, Second chances, Success

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Forgetting-50Don’t you feel growing pains when something gets wasted? Like when you buy a container of berries but forget to enjoy them before the mold sets in. Or if you lose that lottery ticket you bought, always wondering what might have been or maybe, and  more importantly, you hurt someone – losing their friendship which you valued highly. And all the waste beyond, lives, lost jobs, major losses which hurt beyond measure, we don’t even like to consider those. There is so much waste in the world, the possibility for regret is astronomical. But consider them all as growing pains….
The worst waste of all each & every day is that of our infinite potential as humans . . we linger it away or don’t accept it as ours to begin with by doubting our own uniqueness, our own ability & our own potential. We waste it, unaware of the chance we had to make a difference, to change a heart, to improve our journey or to grow vastly beyond where we now are. They are all growing pains…
We have talents, gifts, desires & hopes, all firmly dwelling within us, but we often become so disengaged from living with developing those as our goals, focusing instead on the past, or some hurtful event, or the pain of living each day . . we grow fatigued in the very process of growing & let the driving force of life become secondary to idling in the traffic of nothingness. Think of them as growing pains…
We often tell ourselves that in growth lies too much potential for pain, so we stop where we are, we give up on pushing ourselves a wee bit harder, we let our fears or our doubts take from us our forward drive! I urge you to focus on every opportunity you get today to call forth your own uniqueness, your own talents, your own passions & your own hopeful dreams! Don’t live in the impossibility of a void, but remember the possibility of all life around you! Don’t let the risk of what might happen on the way to what might be stop you from discovering the glory of all that you’ve yet imagined! Accept that with living comes growth, growing pains & change . . accept that as life, for with it all comes our ability to become the very best of ourselves!
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Deep-Water Living . .

23 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by in Character, Choices, Commitment, Confidence, Courage, Growing, Inspiration, Lessons, Life

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Deep-Water Living

Deep-Water Living

So many people choose to live their lives in the shallow waters, never venturing out deeper where  faith, hope,love, commitment, courage, growth, challenge & everything that pushes a human to live as more are found. Going further & deeper helps us to grow up.  But it’s as if some feel more comfortable without the weight of too much emotion, the increasing burdens often fraught in real human entanglements & the messiness of growing up. They want to have fun, to enjoy life, to focus all their energy on whatever it is that brings them money, fame, power, joy or some other outer-body measure sans the hassle of going deeper & further. So they choose to make a life without any challenge to their spirit or soul. They learn to live so singularly for themselves that they don’t even see those choices, that reticent need to stay comfortably where they are & to not grow up, as narcissistic, selfish & self-involved. If we don’t allow ourselves to claim responsibility for our own messes, to feel for others compassionately, to entangle ourselves in the messes of life & to grow up through the challenges we have opportunity to take on, we never become much of anything in the world but an aging shell of a human being. As the noted poet Maya Angelou has said: “Most people don’t grow up. Most people age. They find parking spaces, honor their credit cards, get married, have children, and call that maturity. What that is, is aging.” Human beings are called upon to develop, not just physically, but also to mature emotionally & spiritually. What a shame to be so one-dimensional that we might focus all our energy on just staying happily in the shallow waters, never venturing out to where the real challenges of life might take us nor appreciating that great strength when we do find it in ourselves or when we see it in others! Taking the easy way isn’t necessarily taking the best way. And often times, staying where we’re comfortable means we miss more of what we could never even imagine in the way of true joy, inner peace & burgeoning self-esteem!

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Flexing All Your Muscles . .

23 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by in Character, Choices, Faith, Faithfulness, Gentleness, God, Goodness, Growing, Joy, Kindness, Love, Patience, Peace, Self-Control

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Flexing All Your Muscles….

FruitMusclesPeople are capable of amazing & wondrous things in life . . it just takes a heart braced in awareness of what fruits lie within! Inside each one of us are the fruits of our spirit . . nine essential qualities or traits which we already have in ample supply, which merely require our awareness & our determined effort to flex like muscles. We might not use them, they might turn to mush, but they’re there regardless, just like other physical, fleshy muscles in our bodies. They’re just as real to a human as flesh & bone. We prove to ourselves that when we use our flesh-muscles, when we practice with them, strengthening them, purposefully flexing them, we make our bodies healthier & better able to cope with life. So if we do the same with the fruits of our spirit, we in fact make those traits stronger in turn, preparing us for life in this world filled with people, giving us the much-needed support & help to face life head-on! Flex all your muscles, those of flesh & those of fruit, learn to use what you have or lose the potential for what you might be! Developing the fruits of your spirit truly is just a disciplined effort to be a better human being . . one who lives in the world wearing their heart as a banner & exuding the following essential traits:  love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. The fruits of your spirit are nine muscles within you which empower a lifetime of amazing gifts!
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How To Swim!!!

13 Saturday Jul 2013

Posted by in Change, Conquering Fear, Courage, Growing, Success

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Newswimmers50To learn how to swim, we must be willing to risk leaving the sanctity of the shallow waters & the safe havens. We must be willing to go where we’re not sure we can, to work for what we want & to risk everything sometimes to endeavor to achieve that end goal! Swimmers don’t stay in one place, they don’t cling to the railings, they don’t hover on the steps. They let go & move forward into the watery depths, trusting themselves to learn how to overcome any fears, to develop the necessary techniques & to grow in ability. With each practice session, the swimmer grows more accustomed to the depths & expanses in which their stroke will take them. They learn to trust in their own intuitive awareness of ability against conditions faced. Eventually, a swimmer can become so accustomed to being a part of a foreign environment of water & less oxygen, that they seemingly develop gills of proficiency! But that only happens when they first have the courage to let go of the railing, to propel from the wall & to venture out into the depths which challenge them! Life is never fully lived on the steps, clinging to the railing . . it’s comfortable there perhaps, but it won’t let you realize many dreams! Only when we endeavor, when we dare, when we let go of what is safe & when we pursue in earnest . . only then can we truly develop something new within us!

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