Daily Gratitude: We can learn so much from trees. On my walks, I often stop and gaze at them. They have such wondrous patterns, as group as well as individually. I’ll see many trees leaning in one direction and you know that the wind normally comes through in the same direction and forcefully. The trees have adapted and their trunks have moved so that their bushy tops (branches and leaves) are not blown off. They are not feeling “self-conscious” and aren’t worried what other trees will think of them. They are surviving and in most cases thriving. Just like the trees, we have to be flexible and bend and sway when necessary. Often we try to keep straight upright and feel we’re not supposed to bend. Once we realize that bending and swaying is a sign of intelligence and strength, it becomes easier. How does this apply in your life?

Daily Gratitude: This is about courage as much as it is about every day life. We can choose to sit around and feel like (and act like) a victim wailing “what’s going to happen to me?” Or we can see that things appear to suck and then say “what action am I going to take?” Another quote I saw was by General Mattis – “Never think you are impotent. Choose how you respond.” You may not come up with an answer right away but if you put that question in your mind, you will come up with an answer- the action you’re going to take.

Daily Gratitude: I don’t think I would have realized the immense value of this concept until this past week. On Friday I got some not so great news and as we so often do, I spent too much time thinking about it (but I’m proud to say not nearly as much time as I would have in the past) until I was journaling about all the cool things that had happened during the week. All of a sudden it was as if I was hit over the head and realized two things: 1) I liked the feeling I got when I thought about those things a whole lot more than the feeling I had when I thought about the not so good news; and 2) It was stupid of me to essentially invalidate all the wonderful things that happened during the week. So I started listing all the good things and sort of reliving each one as i wrote about it. Amazingly (but not really amazingly) I started to feel fantastic and guess what – not thinking about that other thing so much. The other benefit of this realization is that I had been “trying” to develop the habit of having a pm journal, too, but just couldn’t get into it. There was nothing that got me into buying into it. But now I see a definite purpose for what i am going to journal about. And that’s a daily inventory. If I write the good things (even if all I have time for is a bullet list), then when I’m down or something else doesn’t go great, I can leaf back through those pages (yes I still write things out) and read them to make me realize how blessed I am. This will recreate those good feelings and help negate anything else that might be rolling around this head of mine. Writing them down every day insures I wont forget them because during times when you’re not on the top of a mountain, your memory might not be that helpful. But your journal will be. Try this for a while and see what you think. I know I am excited!