Daily Gratitude: What makes me happy won’t necessarily make you happy and vice versa. Waiting for something to happen is not the way to be happy either. Don’t start the year off (or any part of a year) with “when I lose 10 pounds, I’ll be happy”. That never works. Start with “I am the master of my happiness and I choose to be happy no matter what”. Once you put your thoughts straight, you’ll be able to accomplish so much more. Remember that happiness is not conditional . If that person lost 10 pounds but lost their job, would they be happy? I think not. Make the decision that you are happy and do everything from deep within to change your thoughts to happy ones and you’ll end up happy. No one can take that from you. You can use gratitude to assist you. It’s hard to he depressed and sad while you’re being grateful. Why not make your next resolution about being happy and grateful? And don’t wait until New Year’s Day for it to start.

Daily Gratitude: OK here’s a bit about outlining. Basically outlining is listing in detail exactly HOW you want something to happen. If you have a goal, you’re told to be specific about what you want. That is true. But what you don’t want to do is determine the exact way you should achieve that goal. Let’s say someone decides they want to “buy” a fancy and expensive new car. Depending on that person’s financial situation, they may be subconsciously realize that there’s no way this is going to happen because they don’t make enough money. Instead of realizing the power and expanse of the universe, they remain within their own limitations and set themselves up for not achieving that goal. If they simply decided they wanted that car (providing details of the car like color, heated seats, etc), and then holding it out to the universe, the car and/or money can come to them in any number of ways- auction, inheritance, winning the lottery, repayment of old loans, etc. I have written about my wanting to help people get hearing aids and that’s exactly what I wrote. But even though I really wanted to help, I didn’t know how I could possibly start a foundation etc so I gave up on it. But I never crossed it off my goal list. Then I went to a follow-up appointment for my hearing aids, had to wait to be seen, went to sit down and right there in the seat was a brochure that had info about an organization that helped people afford hearing aids. There it was right in front of me. Thinking I had to create a foundation was outlining. Just wanting to help was not. These examples should not get you to thinking that you don’t need to take action because you do. When you want something, you need to figure out the steps and take them. But be open to humbly accepting that the universe may have a better plan than you do. I think we repel so much good by blocking out other ideas of how something may come about. Hope this is clearer.

Daily Gratitude: If you’re tired of hearing me talk about your goals, just scroll on by. But…. Here’s what I did to assess my 2024 goals. I have mentioned that this was the first time I’ve actually written them out and it’s a practice I will continue. Here’s what I found. I had 13 items on my list. I completed 8 of them in toto. 3 were partially completed and 2 I “thought about” but didn’t do much, if anything on them. That’s a pretty good percentage. What did I notice? I realized in some instances I needed more details and in others I just needed to let it happen. For instance, one said “complete all 3 major races”. I didn’t list them so it was hard for the universe to give that to me since it didn’t know what I thought was major. That’s important. I’ve talked about the hearing aid one before, but here is what I wrote: “help people with hearing aids”. This, actually, was a good goal because, although, I didn’t define how I wanted to help but just that I did, it allowed the universe to provide me with the surprise of an easy way to help. One interesting one was: “decide about new car”. This really isn’t specific enough but once again, it worked for me. I should have listed out all the things I wanted and/or needed and whether I wanted a new or used car. But as it has before, universe presented me with a few options and then just put what I wanted in front of me. It was another “everything always works out for me” but I’ll save that story for another day. Anyway, hopefully you get the idea, as I did, that I needed to provide more details but not too many specifics. Maybe tomorrow I’ll write more about outlining