Daily Gratitude: They may not be the same wonders as we see in the external world but they are even more amazing and spectacular! If, when you’re feeling down or troubled, think about everything that happens inside of you that you’re not even aware of. Take an organ or system a day and ponder the miraculous way it operates by itself….and as part of a system. Each cell, each nerve, each everything is connected in some way to others and there usually is no competition, no rivalry, no interference. The problem with this arises when we get out of sync emotionally and clamp down on our emotions. Don’t be like a volcano and keep things buried until they erupt (like i did). Emotions are chemicals. They are molecules and energy. Unregulated emotions can disrupt this beautifully working bit of machinery inside of us. Can you think back to a time when something in your life was disrupted and your emotions had to he buried. Did you start to feel less well in some part of your body? Did your gut act up? Did you “get a cold?” How about a headache? Take some time to talk to parts of your body. Start with your heart or lungs and then move to the cells. Pick an Individual blood cell and follow it around your body thanking each organ it visits. If you don’t see the wonders inside when you’re done, I’ll be surprised. Then look around you and see what wonders you can spot in your immediate surroundings. I imagine it will look a lot different than before you started your inner trek.

Daily Gratitude: You’ve seen funny video after funny video about some animal that has intense focus. Maybe it’s a dog in its crate staring through the bars at its favorite toy (or if your dogs are anything like mine were, they are coveting that scrap of food they see on the floor next to your chair). Then they decide they are going to get it. No matter what it takes they work and work to get themselves out of their crates to be united with that special object. I have been amazed at the confines my contortionist Siberian huskies were able to escape. Have you ever been like that? Have you ever been in a situation where you see nothing else but that goal? Nothing can stand in your way and you reschedule everything on your calendar so you can devote every moment to that thing. That is focus. The more you focus on it, the better you get. An obstacle comes along? No problem. You’ve got it covered. You’ll find a way around or over it, just like my huskies. The more you work at achieving this one thing, the more it takes over your life. Then the more it takes over your life, the more invested you are. Nothing will stop you now! Then “all of a sudden” (which really isn’t all of a sudden if you look at it objectively), what you were working for appears in your life. What is your focus in life right now? Are you happy with that? Are you easily distracted? What will it take from you to bring your focus back to where it belongs? You must answer this (and other) questions. It takes great effort and desire to break the inertia of sitting around wondering “what should I do?”. You have to have something that makes you want to bust through the inertia and make you focus. Find that, get a support system, and there will be no stopping you!