Day 74: Taking a no brainer day

Sometimes we need to have a "no brainer" day. A "no brainer" day is the type of day where you don't want to have to think more than you ultimately have to. It's the kind of day where you go about doing things during the day that you normally would do out of habit but don't require you to analyze and make major decisions. For me, I want that day to be today. A "no brainer" day is important for all of us to have. We need to be able to step back from everything going on in our lives and just "be." We need the days where we don't feel we have to work hard at anything or finding flaws in our life. Today is that day for me.

Why do I need it today? Just because. Is it because I couldn't think of anything else? No. I have a few ideas of what else I could have put in here but for some reason I felt it necessary to have a no brainer day.

It's important to have these kinds of days. Otherwise, like emotions, we can struggle to find balance and it can bring us to physical problems. After crazy stressful days its sometimes important to have these days. By giving ourselves no brainer days it allows us to the rest our brains and everything else in our lives and rejuvenate. Sometimes on no brainer days I don't even want to listen to the radio, email much, or do anything where I have to make a decision.

So...today is a no brainer day and I am stopping there.

Day 73: Controlling emotions

I know that I have talked in the past about control issues but this one is definitely an area I need to work on. Controlling my emotions is something I need to work on. In the past if I got upset enough I liked to find an unmovable, unhuman or animal object...many times a tree...and I would get to the point I needed to punch it. After a few bruised hands and knuckles and even a slight break across the top of my hand I knew I needed to work on my anger emotions. But this is not just about anger. It's about working on all the emotions.

What happens when I feel sorry for myself or when I am excited? I often times take each of those emotions to an extreme. When I feel sorry for myself I tend to retreat and get very tearful and it really affects my sleep. When I am excited I tend to want to tell everyone. I think it even verges on bragging. So how do I find a middle ground? That I am not sure of.

Sure, I have been blogging on here for 73 days now and I usually have an answer. Today I don't. Mentally, its taking alot on me as I know that this has been an issue that I have wanted to work on but wasn't ready to deal with. So how do I balance emotions without going to an extreme? How do I not hold in everything (which of course can cause physical problems) while also not going overboard on the emotions? It's a struggle that I think alot of people deal with.

It's a new beginning today. It's now about figuring out how to begin it.

Day 72: Hold you heads up high, Bulldogs!

Last night I sat, although I had not intended to, and watched the NCAA Championship game of Duke vs. Butler. After an intense extremely close game, Duke won by one basket in the last minute of the game. As the game ended, I was impressed to see the dignity and sportsmanship that the Butler team displayed. They didn't start cussing or crying like babies. They went forward and congratulated the Duke players and coach. They became a lesson to dignity to all out there who watched last night.

While most people will think that sportsmanship is just something that you have when you are playing a sport or a game, it actually is important in our everyday life. How often have I been jealous of someone who achieved higher than I did at something? How often did I walk away and sulk? Why could I not let the other person enjoy their glory? I noticed, after watching the game last night, just how often I step in and try to achieve attention when I should be allowing another person to enjoy the glory. I sulk and I don't walk away holding my head up high. Rather, I hold a grudge. I pout. I am a poor sport about it.

Today, while I am supposed to be working on the positive things in my life that I accomplish, I am going to work on being a good sport to others. I am going to allow others to enjoy the limelight for their accomplishments.

For now, congratulations Butler Bulldogs for being such good sports. Keep holding your heads up high. You may not have a trophy to place in a cabinet, but remember that your dignity will not gather dust like that trophy will.

Day 71: Is my arm long enough?

Just a couple of days ago I spoke about making sure that I write on this blog about the good things I do in my life...the positives of my life. As I sat thinking about that this morning I realized how much of a challenge that would be. I have a hard time talking about the things I do well in my life as I don't like to be a bragger or anything like that. Soon I realized that the only way to boost my self-esteem and make it through the rest of the days of this blog was to acknowledge the positives. So, I will try to pat myself on the back...the question is, is my arm long enough?

One of the things in my life that I feel is a positive in my life is my creativity. I sometimes can be the kind of person who gets cramped always thinking "inside the box." I enjoy changing things up after awhile. (I hate keeping our furniture in the same spots all the time...) I tend to try and do it creatively and out of the norm. A few years ago when we started painting our living room from the boring white to a mix of a couple colors I decided I needed to paint it more than 2 colors. When I took the risk of it possibly looking horrendous, it turned out to look wonderful.

Why do we have to look outside of the box once in a while? If we don't, we become so stagnant and it can turn people off. Plus...when I change around the furniture we can get all the dust and hairballs we normally miss in our regular cleaning and dusting episodes! While thinking inside the box is important as well, in order to get ahead you often have to think outside the box and be creative. Creativity motivates me. So...I pat myself on the back this morning for my positive attribute of creativity.

Day 70: We are family...

Today's blog just happens upon Easter this year. Easter is a holiday I use to hate, primarily for non religious types of reasons. Instead of gifts that lasted very long like Christmas instead you got candy. And generally, that candy was gone within a few hours to a few days. We ate eggs and had food that I had a great dislike for (except for that wonderful Polish sausage) and the church service was such a long service on a Saturday night. Yikes!

As I have grown older, the candy concept has become less a part of my life, especially as a childless couple, and maybe out of habit my liking for Easter has remained fairly the same. I realize its the culmination of my religious faith and all and that Jesus died for our sins..I don't dispute that. But the excitement isn't there.

This year, today specifically, Easter is about family. Today most of my family will be getting together at my brother and his wife's house. My sister-in-law has already prepared and hidden the eggs for the kids to find. The thoughts of the joy on the little one's face as they look for the eggs is what motivates me today. Nothing is more innocent then the life of a child.

As I say that, I begin to think that Easter is about more than Jesus dying to save our sins. It's about re-birth or even new birth. It's about the innocence that we all have the ability to have again in our life. It's about forgiving and forgetting and moving forward. It's about family.

So, while not everyone will be there, most of us will. And today I will remember how my past sins and misgivings are forgiven and how I am able to be like a child again. (But it didn't hurt that my husband bought me some Dove chocolates this year!) Happy Easter everyone.

Days 68 and 69: Did you miss me?

I am sure that some of you who normally read my blog may have missed yesterdays blog. You might have even thought that I finally snapped and gave up...that I failed. I did not give up. I didn't fail. I did it intentionally.

The other day I started to re-evaluate the tasks I had set forth over the last 65 days and on day 67 I started to look at the tasks that I needed to work on more. I realized that it meant taking a break and stepping back and looking at why I am doing this blog. Was the reason that I started this an continued on for the right reason? Was I truly wanting to change and make a difference? What was I doing?

So, yesterday I took a break and and looked at my life. So much has been going on that now I have a headache today! I want to change but maybe I need to evaluate how I am doing it. There aren't 365 tasks in my life that I need to change. But what I hadn't been doing that I need to start doing is also blogging the things that I am good at in my life...the things that are positives in my life. If I look at only the negative things I need to change and not look at the positive things in my life that I have to continue then I am not making the right changes in my life and its easy to become bitter and negative.

Life is a series of balances....a yin and a yang. This is what I need to do with my life and the changes that I need to make in it. I need to change the negative and reinforce the positive. So, starting today I will pat myself on the back when necessary (although not to be conceited though) and I will acknowledge my faults and flaws. From this point forward I will balance. I will have the yin and the yang.

Thank you for all being here and being readers daily to this blog and supporting me.

Day 67: Looking back at what I struggle with most

As I write this today I am being reminded of the last 67 days. As I looked back at all the tasks I have written about over the last 67 days I was amazed at how I could critique almost each task I had written....how I saw how I had failed at nearly all of them. Maybe it wasn't a good idea to evaluate myself. No...it was a good idea. It's a good idea because I need to work on these areas...that's the whole reason for the blog.

One of the areas I noticed that I need to revisit here in the future is my ability to step back and take a breath. Back in February that was one of my tasks. It followed shortly after letting go of grudges and trusting others....two other tasks that I seem to be challenged by daily. Anger...another area I need to work on. (If you could have only been in the car with me when I nearly got run off the road two days ago you'd have heard words that don't come from the mouth of a former nun!) What is it about these areas that are so challenging?

I believe that partially the problem with all of the areas that I haven't been super successful at is that I was falling into my old bad habits at times. It's important that I remember that this is a journey. I want to see a difference in the end. We don't start diets with the idea of "maybe I will lose weight." Rather, we enter those types of things with a hope that there will be great change. Should working to change my life a day at a time be any different? No.

Some of you may be disappointed that this blog today is short. Re-evaluating the past 67 days is alot more than I thought it would be. With it being holy week, tomorrow I will be more likely not talking about the good, but following up more with the areas I need to work on. It's alot more in depth than I thought it would be. So hang in there with me everyone.