{Series Part 3–The Ant and the Elephant: Commit to Cultivating Positive Dominant Thoughts
Last week in the series about chasing your dream, Brio the owl taught Adir the ant how to CLARIFY HIS VISION. This week (week 3) I will introduce the second step needed to accomplish your dream—COMMIT TO CULTIVATING POSITIVE DOMINANT THOUGHTS. If you haven’t read week 1 or week 2, I encourage you to take a minute to go back and read them and familiarize yourself with the basic ideas. Brio started by reminding Adir that the worthiest goals take time and energy. Often it is hard for us, who are going through the process, to see the change. He explained, “Sometimes we need to trust that we are closer to…
{Series Part 2}–The Ant and the Elephant: Clarifying your Vision
Welcome back to part 2 of a 6 part series about chasing your dream. Last week I began a conversation about the concept of a dream and talked about why dreams are important. I also introduced a few characters from a book called “The Ant and the Elephant” by Vince Poscente. If you haven’t read week 1, I encourage you to take a minute to go back and read it and familiarize yourself with the basic ideas. For the next 5 weeks we are going to focus on how to make those dreams a reality. At the end of week 1 we learned that in order to achieve our…
{Series Part 1}–The Ant and the Elephant: Learning How to Chase Your Dream
Have you ever seen the movie “SING”? It’s a story of a bunch of animals who have a dream to sing and perform. The animals want something (singing on stage); they struggle to get it (no family support, relationship struggles, lack of confidence, etc); then achieve success (putting on a great show). It’s the perfect example of Dream, Struggle, Victory. I’ve always struggled with the concept of having a dream. It seemed so abstract. I’ve heard a lot of people talk about the importance of chasing a dream, but I couldn’t wrap my head around it. What is a dream? How do you chase it? Why should you have one?…
5 Tips for a Stronger Marriage
Jonathan and I have been married for almost 18 years. We’ve had our ups and downs (as all marriages do) but we have grown more in love every year. It’s hard to even think that we could love each other more than when we first got married, but that was just a drop in the bucket compared to now. We’ve grown in so many ways and through the years have created a pretty good marriage. Having a strong, healthy relationship takes work and means doing a few things consistently. You can have a successful relationship by following just a few simple tips. Here are 5 relationship tips anyone can follow: …
My Daily Routine
I don’t even remember what it was like before I was married and had kids. Did I have a daily schedule? I’m sure I did because now it’s such a big part of my life. But I also could have learned about the importance of routines on my journey of personal development. Who knows what I was like 20 years ago, but now I have a pretty solid routine. Yes, it’s changed over the years as my needs have changed. Yes, I’ve learned about the different kinds of schedules and had to find the one that worked best for the kids and I. We add and take away as needed…
5 Simple Ways to Get Inspired
Do you ever have days (or weeks) when you feel un-inspired? I’ve been feeling that way all week. Usually I have ideas of what to write about for this blog or what to post on Instagram and Facebook. But for some reason I’m just not having the great a-ha moments I want and the plan I made just isn’t feeling right. So what can you do when you’re lacking inspiration? Here are a few simple ways to get the creative juices flowing. GET INSPIRED WITH MUSIC There is something magical about a good song. I have a playlist of a few songs that pump me up, get me moving, and…
100 Reasons to Love Yourself
On a scale of one to ten, how in love with yourself are you? How come we are so quick to believe people when they say unkind things to or about us, but reject all the amazing and kind things others say? I believe it is because our feelings of self-doubt are stronger than our self-love. So, if that is the case, how do we overcome these self-doubting beliefs and increase feelings of self-love? #2 I consistently exercise 5 times a week #5 I listen to podcasts when getting ready in the morning Life coach Jody Moore teaches that it is OUR job to love and approve of ourselves, NOT…
Teaching Commitment
Our homeschool group did another activity where we focused on a hero attribute. The goal with these activities is to help the kids (and moms) become everyday heroes. Commitment was the attribute we focused on, but we started by reviewing a few others from our list of 12.Karma—you get back what you put out thereKindness—be kind to othersGratitude—being grateful for what you haveBelief—believing in yourself, the good of others, and a higher power I asked everyone to define commitment. I got answers like doing what you say you will do and being dedicated to finish a task. My favorite was doing what you said you would do even when you…
8 Quotes that Inspire Me
I love a good inspirational quote. My journals are full of them from conferences I’ve attended or podcasts I’ve listened to or books I’ve read. I love to share them on Instagram and Facebook or write them on post-it notes and stick them on the walls and mirrors around my house. I want to inspire others and myself with the ideas encapsulated in the quotes. Here are a few of my favorites. Our challenges make us strong. They are what make us who we are so we can do what God has called us to do. Just last week, I was exhausted and ready for bed, but I hadn’t done…
Divine Discontent and Habits
I gave a little presentation at a church activity last week about creating habits to bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be. A lot of speakers call the feelings we feel in the gap “divine discontent”. Divine discontent comes when we compare what we are to what we have the power to become. Brian Tracy, in his article Listen to Your Divine Discontent, compares our emotional state to our physical state. He teaches that our physical bodies express pain when something isn’t right. In the same way our emotional bodies express unhappiness when something is awry. “Just as the natural physical state is health…
