Thankful Attitude

"Blow, blow, thou winter wind! Thou art not so unkind as man's ingratitude." -Shakespeare

There are people you have met in your life that never seem to be thankful of what they do have. It always seems having even the smallest of things is never good enough. It may be having a good job at a good wage but always complaining about the boss and the size of their paycheck. Maybe something simple as a door being held open for them yet irritated that it wasn't held open far enough.

Not being thankful or not having gratitude for things one has leads to never having the fullness of your potential. There are people I know that have this going on in their lives. They will fail at some point to realize their full potential. They will fail to impact others in a positive way. They will succeed though in bringing others down with them.

There are others that I know that do have gratitude for those things large and small in their lives. Thankful for the goodness that touches them but also happy for the lessons in life brought on by failures. It is this attitude which anchors us so that we see everything from a positive and meaningfull viewpoint. Say to life, "bring it on, good and bad". Be thankful for that which happens and learn from it. Life is good when you can be thankful.

Wisdom, Courage and Strength

Visited with a friend last night whom I hadn't seen in quite some time. I've known this fellow for nearly 20 years. We worked together out in the Dakotas and have continued our friendship through the years. A lot has happened over those years in our lives and I've always considered him to be a touchstone for me.

This man went through a lot in life before I knew him and his life turned around. Sure, he has his everyday 'life' issues like all of us. But he embodies virtues that are good for all of us. These are virtues I strive to capture in my daily life. I believe I learned these from Phil Pringle and keep them written in a place where they can be easily retrieved.

• Wisdom - ability to discern right from wrong, to know the right thing to do in any situation.
• Courage - doing what is right, no matter what the consequences are.
• Strength - capacity to continue doing the right thing, to carry through to the end, to finish what you started.

Wisdom, courage and strength - three essential virtues to have in life. It would be neat if we could put it into some neat acronym, but they are easy enough to remember.

“The power of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special efforts, but by his ordinary doing” - Blaise Pascal

Try A New Way

“If you want to succeed you should strike out on new paths, rather than travel the worn paths of accepted success.”

- John D. Rockefeller, whose son John D. Rockefeller, Jr. built the Empire State Building.

Gone In Sixty Seconds

“For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Did you realize that you have a higher chance of getting injured when you are angry. In fact, a study published in the "Annals of Family Medicine" suggests that your chances are quadrupled when angry. You can see the story in a USA Today article. But what is anger?

Anger is "an emotional state that varies in intensity from mild irritation to intense fury and rage," according to Charles Spielberger, PhD, a psychologist who specializes in the study of anger. But I'm not here to talk about anger itself and again, you can read about it at Controlling Anger -- Before It Controls You.

What I am here to say is that for every minute you are angry, you lose those sixty seconds of happiness that Emerson talks of. Anger may release stress, but happiness will produce results more often. Happiness can create greater self-esteem in oneself.

Low self-esteem plagues many outwardly successful people (Self-Esteem: Paradoxes and Innovations in Clinical Theory and Practice by Richard L. Bednar and Scott R. Peterson). There is disagreement about the overall benefits of a high self-esteem. But many do believe it makes us more confident.

"Definitions of self-esteem vary...but all agree that high self-esteem means that we appreciate ourselves and our personal worth. More specifically, it means:

we have a positive attitude
we value ourselves highly
we're convinced of our own abilities
we see ourselves as competent, in control of our own lives and able to do what we want"

-From the BBC Health website.

Regardless of the clinical theory, feeling happy makes us feel better and we tend to have a better life. Being angry takes away from those happy times. Don't lose one minute of happiness.