Daily Mood Quote - January 9, 2012

 

Daily Mood Quote

Day 235 – January 9, 2012

“We don't live in our fears, we live in our hopes.”

~Mike Tomlin – Head Coach for the Pittsburgh Steelers

Yesterday, I watched the playoff game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Denver Broncos and Phil Simms an NFL game announcer commented on his interview with Mike Tomlin about some past decisions that were made regarding Ben Roethlisberger, the quarterback for the Pittsburgh Steelers and whether or not he should have played the last two games of the regular season with his injury. Mike Tomlin commented “we don't live in our fears, we live in our hopes.” My thought after I heard that, “wow, what a profound statement and accurate too.” How many of us live with fears, regrets, the “woulda, shoulda, and coulda's” of our lives?

I know I have even asked the question, “what if I would have done this differently or said this instead of that” figuring the outcome may have been different. But, you know what, it doesn't matter, what is done is done and we need to stop stewing in the past and move ahead with the hope that is waiting for us. Failure to see hope, or believe in hope, takes away the belief that there is a tomorrow, with new possibilities. Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” So why fear something that is already in the past; we cannot touch it, we can not see it, and we can not taste it, because the past no longer exists. It seems foolish to be afraid of something, or allow that something that is no more, to have so much control over us, that it dictates life to us.

Fear is a distressing emotion that has its only purpose in the “now” (as in supplying the rush of adrenalin you might need to escape an onrushing fright train). When allowed to hang around and fester, it can really mess up a day, a week, a month, a year and even a life. Especially, if we allow it to take control of our thoughts and actions. Hope, best described by Dictionary.com as, “the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.” I believe to gain a positive future, we need to suppress our fears, try and have a little hope. I also believe that is what Mr. Tomlin was talking about. You see Ben Roethlisberger has a high ankle sprain and really should have been on the injured list, but Big Ben is tough and chose to play in the “HOPE” of putting the Pittsburgh Steelers in a better position for the playoffs. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. This time it did not pay off, but I admire the Steelers for trying, for having hope. I know many Steeler fans are disappointed about this, but as my father use to say, “there is always next year.” That's the promise that we all share; For the teams who are finished this year and tomorrow for those of us, who have hope.

I know what you may be thinking, “It's easier said than done ” and for many that's true. Anyone who has had a significant, or repeated trauma may need a bit of help separating the tangled mess fear leaves in its wake. Our human minds, however evolved we wish to believe, still have a long way to go in learning how to put old fears in their proper place. That's why hope in the possibilities of tomorrow exists. It is the counterbalance to fear. Some things just take more time than others. However, a caution, our time on earth is not endless, we all only have a certain amount of time to work with and what you do with that time, that hope, those possibilities is up to you.

What hope will you have today?

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Daily Mood Quote - January 6, 2012

Daily Mood Quote

Day 232 – January 6, 2012

All men commend patience, although few are willing to practice it.

~Thomas Kempis

I have been a mom, a “parent” for 27 years and one thing that has changed in me for the better is my level of patience. Granted, it took the reading of many books on parenting, patience, motivation etc... to get here, but I did. Okay, there are some days (menopause related) where my patience, or lack there of can be embarrassing. We all have them, but it's when we exhibit impatience on a regular basis that can land us in trouble. As my husband would say, “on average you've become a really patient person.” Let me explain: In the world I grew up in, my family wasn't really known for their patience. Instant gratification, rage and anger was usually how things were handled, with the notable exception of my father (I'll circle back to him later). It was like living with a welfare version of a daily soap opera. Everything was a drama, every problem was somebody else's fault and everything must have been some kind of conspiracy. All of which was of course balderdash and really quite exhausting.

As I grew, I watched how this lifestyle generated far more problems than it ever solved and so I decided that I would not be like that. It was a conscious decision turned into an emotion driven cause. Twenty eight years ago, when I realized that I would soon be having a child, I furthered that cause by reading everything I could on being a parent. And wonder of wonder, they all said basically the same thing, love, patience and consistency. Okay, that's an area where aside from my Navy job, I had zero experience. I had to learn and apply a whole new set of skills, they are still a work in progress. I think patience is a lifetime learning curve and no matter who you are, its something that must be consciously applied daily to take root and grow. Some people, like my father, whom my husband says is “the most patient man he ever met,” start with a bit more patience. If you knew my mother, you would understand. They have a natural gift of letting life’s issues roll off them like water off a duck's back. That gift of natural patience however, is not given to all and the rest of us have to consciously apply the brakes, when life gets rolling. That's me.

In the instant gratification and hurry up world of today, patience seems to be becoming something of a lost art. But, it is necessary to really gain, or develop anything of true and lasting value. The old saying goes, “Rome wasn't built in a day” may be a bit understated. It is still being built and rebuilt some 2,700 years after things started coming together on the isthmus. That is real patience and it's something we need to remember to employ as we forge ahead into the future. The internet, for better or worse, has made an unbelievable amount of information, some true and a surprising amount of random fiction, available to everyone, all the time. Digital communities spring to life in days and sometime hours, but they lack the foundations that true communities need. The shared effort and sacrifice over time is the glue that bind communities and cultures together for the long haul. The children of the digital age lack that kind of perspective and I fear that they will not have the staying power, the patience, to make real and lasting positive change, or decisions as history unfolds. I hope I'm wrong here, only time (no matter if you believe in the concept or not) will tell.

The point is, I believe, that like anything of real and lasting value, patience and its rewards are earned not given and impatience is usually rewarded with things going astray. I have seen on the news case after case of everything from auto wrecks to CEOs and NFL coaches and managers being kicked to the curb (even if they were doing a good job and the right thing), due to lack of patience in our society. This trend “can only lead to tears” (thanks Bartok the bat from the movie Anastasia). The zero to hero back to zero curve has gotten too short for real positive and lasting change to take hold. The same is true in our political arena, where presidents are judged on whether they can solve decades old social and political issues in the first two years of their administrations. As they say on the ESPN Monday Night Live, NFL football show... “C'mon man!” Lack of patience is a key component in allowing those issues to continue, as we continually play musical chairs with the people at the top, while leaving the same old perpetuators, or should I say perpetrators, in the House and Senate, because we are too impatient to do some research and choose our candidates based on that; instead of name recognition and some vague promise to “make things better.” For them maybe, but really not for the people who were foolish enough to just push button “A” because its there.

No patience equals no reward. That's just the way it is. There is so much more to say about patience, but like life and patience itself, it will have to come in time.

How will you build patience today?

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Daily Mood Quote - September 18, 2011

 

Daily Mood Quote

Day 138 – September 18, 2011

Argue for your limitations, and sure enough they're yours.

~Richard Bach

So, the other day I'm sitting on the sofa watching Jeopardy with Alex Trebek and words came across the screen that I could not see. My first reaction was to feel sorry for myself. Stupid limitation...Then, I began to wonder about the limitations that others experience. Some physical limitations can't be helped, like my eyes. It would not have taken much to get up from the sofa, walk over to the television, and read what was scrolling across the bottom of the program. Instead I became frustrated and stopped myself from achieving what I wanted to do; read the words. I paid more attention to my limitation than my goal.

I believe a lot of people make that mistake and so goals are not achieved. It's not a limitation that others are putting on me, its a limitation that I chose to define me for just a moment. True, diminishing vision is not something to be taken lightly, but I have the opportunity to overcome it and achieve more. Cavett Robert said, “Any person who selects a goal in life which can be fully achieved, has already defined his own limitation.” That's another way of saying your reach should exceed your grasp. The point is your reaching and pushing forward, not sitting back saying “woe is me” that just doesn't cut it.

In the movie Rudy, Rudy (played by Sean Astin), was told by many that he was too small to play college football. Determined to not allow the limitation of others stop him, he went out for the team at Notre Dame. After two years of playing football Rudy was told by Fortune (Charles S. Dutton), “You're 5 foot nothin', 100 and nothin', and you have barely a speck of athletic ability. And you hung in there with the best college football players in the land for 2 years. And you're gonna walk outta here with a degree from the University of Notre Dame. In this life, you don't have to prove nothin' to nobody but yourself. And after what you've gone through, if you haven't done that by now, it ain't gonna never happen. Now go on back.” Maybe not the King's English, but it gets the point across. We all are capable of achieving the things in life we truly desire, maybe not to be the “very best”, only one person can be that, but to “hang in there”, be the best you can be and like Rudy achieve bigger things in life. It's what we need to prove to ourselves that drives us toward excellence. When we let others define those goals, or tell us we can't, we are only letting our dreams fade on the shelf and letting our best selves fade right along side them.

That's how I view my vision situation (punny I know). I am achieving in a post-graduate program that has humbled many and many never even try. Not because its somebody else's idea of what I should do, or be, but because its a goal that burns inside. We all have limitations, some physical, some financial, some self made and all too often limitations put upon us by other's attitudes. The key is to look toward the goal and not at the blockers in front of you. And when you see an opening, go for it with all you've got. Rudy did. There is a fellow who plays for the New England Patriots (Danny Woodhead, from tiny Chadron State College in Nebraska), who is only 5'8” tall and he is succeeding among giants. Miniature running back dominates in the NFL, bumblebees fly, and anyone with a goal that burns inside can achieve. It's when you push past your “limitations” that amazing things begin to happen.

What goals “burn” inside you today?

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Daily Mood Quotes - August 29, 2011

 

Daily Mood Quote

Day 118 – August 29, 2011

People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses, or the problems of modern society.

~Vince Lombardi

I love American football, the NFL, in my opinion it is one of the greatest team sports, because it requires every one on the team to work together to achieve an end goal, hopefully a win. I watched my favorite team play a game yesterday (preseason) and was pleasantly surprised at how well they worked together, like a well oiled machine. It was something that seemed to be missing in the first two preseason games. Maybe this year, maybe this year...another Super Bowl run...we'll see.

Much like football, life requires people to work together, Vince Lombardi also said, “Football is like life it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work, sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority.” I wish I could say I have seen a lot of that. Even in work place teams, I have found difficulties between co-workers because of differing opinions, agenda, self-interests, beliefs and backgrounds. Often the project suffers because of the inability to put differences aside and work together to achieve a common end goal. Maybe this is why I enjoy football so much. It doesn't matter where you came from, how tall or short you are, color of your skin, or your family history; if you can run (fast), throw, catch, kick, and understand teamwork, you will have game time. Everyone on a team has different skills, those skills make-up the team. It takes variety and diversity to be successful, so to in life endeavors. One person can't win the game all by themselves, even though many may try.

I said it before and I'll say it again, “Life is a team sport,” people around you count. So surround yourself with quality people. Quality meaning, people you can trust, you can depend on, who can depend on you (it is a two way street). Much like a quarterback and a receiver, when you work together and apply your skills, success is inevitable, or in the case of football, plus six on the board. Yeah Team.

In the movie The Blind Side, a story about the life of Michael Oher, an outside tackle for the Baltimore Ravens, Leigh Anne Touhy (played by Sandra Bullock) said, “Now, y'all would guess that more often than not, the highest paid player on an NFL team is the quarterback. And you'd be right. But what you probably don't know is that more often than not, the second highest paid player is, thanks to Lawrence Taylor, a left tackle. Because, as every housewife knows, the first check you write is for the mortgage, but the second is for the insurance. The left tackle's job is to protect the quarterback from what he can't see coming. To protect his blind side.” Teamwork, plain and simple, or you get crushed. The world is full of “LT's” with one thing on their mind...get the ball from you... and without teamwork, well your pretty much “duck-soup” as they say. The point is, “life is a team sport” and we all are the quarterbacks, the receivers, the tackles and occasionally the punters. Its up to us to play our positions in the spirit of cooperation: “win-win” beats “win” by 100%.

How will you apply teamwork principles today?

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Thank you for reading

Daily Mood Quote

Daily Mood Quote

Day 76 – July 18, 2011

“I read and walked for miles at night along the beach, writing bad blank verses and searching endlessly for someone wonderful who would step out of the darkness and change my life.  It never crossed my mind that, that person could be me..”

~Anna Quindlen

I like this quote because it reminds me that everyone has the ability to be the wonderful person they need in their life. The great thing is we don't have to wait for someone else to figure it out. We just need to accept the greatness in ourselves and step out of our self-manufactured darkness and into the light. Sometimes, I forget this.

It is so easy to just want to give up on ourselves, especially when someone lets you down. That's the problem, we think that someone, pick anyone, is responsible for our successes or failures, our happiness, our troubles and our self-worth. Our western culture is built that way and in many cases this point-of-view has been past down from generation to generation, to generation. It is always “those people” and never “us.” It doesn't matter how rich, gifted or talented you are, or poor and uneducated, we seem to blame others for, or expect others to change, our lives. If you think I'm kidding, just look at what has happened in the NFL this year, between the players and the owners. They are fabulously wealthy on both sides of the table, gifted beyond all imagination and college educated. Yet, each side points fingers and blames the others for their problems. “Woe is me!! I'm being held down, held back, and held on the line of scrimmage.” All because they want to believe someone else is responsible for their problems. Yet in a moment's notice they will take credit for their success and happily pick the fan's pockets for every last dime.

Don't get me wrong, I love pro football and look forward to the season every year. I just can't stand to watch grown men whine about money, when they are already ridiculously wealthy. Tens of millions of people in this country are unemployed, struggling to pay their bills and to put food on the table. Still, these guys remain completely out of touch with that reality, just like Congress. (Whoops, said that out loud again, didn't I?) Well anyway, with that off my chest, the point is we are the masters of our destiny and the future is unwritten. We are the “someone” that is required to transform our own lives.

In the movie Heart and Souls, with Robert Downey, Jr. (Thomas), Kyra Sedgwick (Julia), Tom Sizemore (Milo), and Charles Grodin (Harrison), Thomas said to Harrison, “No offense, Harrison, But you died a failure because you never tried.” We are at the start of a new week, lets change our lives by stepping out of our self-imposed darkness, “try”, and be the “someone” that makes the difference in your life.

Will you be that transformational someone that changes your life?

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Thank you for reading

(The second “F” in the series will be released on Sunday, July 24)