You choose

Happy Wednesday,

How is everyone doing on this amazing Wednesday morning? Hope you are all doing well. Not too much to report here. I woke up, thanked God for another beautiful day, took a little walk, now, I’m feeling extra blessed being able to spend some time with you.

I’m excited to head out to Arizona this weekend. Going to spend some time with an extra special friend who is more like my sister. We’ve climbed a lot of mountains together and I’m sure, we’ll climb a few more, but for now, we’re sliding into life one foot in front of the other and enjoying the journey.

Today, I thought we could chat about choosing. We have so many choices each and every day. We choose to get out of bed. We choose to eat breakfast or pass on it. We choose what we’ll wear and we get to choose our mindset. We can stay focused on the negative, perhaps even seeking it out, or, we can look for the positive. Our choice.

On my walk this morning there was this older gentleman I ran into. He stopped me and asked, “did I see you already this morning?” I said yes. You see, I walk the neighborhood and it’s a big circle I make and I saw him when I first ventured out.

The older man put his head down and said, “okay,” then began to walk. I told him I wished him a great day. He stopped again and said, “I hope so, that would be nice.” I asked him if everything was okay, did he need anything. He said no, then proceeded to share that he’s struggling with life right now. I asked again, is there anything he needed and again, he said no. Then he looked up at me, as his head was still looking down to the ground and said, “maybe you could pray for me. I just want my life to get better.”

Done! I did ask him again if he needed me to walk with him, or call someone, he said no, then thanked me and said, I’ll see you again.

This made me so sad. On a selfish note, it made me think, I need to get my booty over and get my business cards made up. I’d love to give him my card, with my contact information on it, along with blog sites. I think he could use some positive and spiritual reading from time to time.

This older man made me think about how blessed I am to be able to write my blogs and in some way, I felt it was God telling me to keep writing, because I am able to help people without even knowing who they are. Sometimes I think we all need the reassurance we’re doing the right thing and for me, it confirms I’m on the right path, at least for now.

My brief encounter with the older man really touched my heart. It made me think of my neighbor, Mr. Chuck who will be 90 years young in a few weeks. He lost his wife a couple years back and he has expressed how lonely he gets. I need to really go and sit with him more. He’s got a wealth of knowledge in his stories and I’d hate to miss out on hearing any of them.

When I stop and think about our older generation, it makes me appreciate even more the gift of life I receive every day. Life sure gets hard at times and right now, life is coming at me balls out. I stress everyday about the what if’s and though I’m trying to calm my thoughts, I still struggle, but like I told you the other day, I am working through those struggles and I am more conscious of my thoughts. I do my best to focus on my many blessings, because all those what if’s, they rob me of the ability to enjoy the moments.

“With everything that has happened to you, you can either feel sorry for yourself or treat what has happened as a gift. Everything is either an opportunity to grow or an obstacle to keep you from growing. You get to choose”-Wayne Dyer.

We’ve all faced difficult times and some of us are in the eye of the hurricane of difficulties right now. How will we choose to take on those hard times we are facing or have faced? Will be find something good in them and use that as a lesson to learn and grow, or will we succumb to what’s been dished out in our life and allow it to define us in some negative way?

John and I sometimes talk about the what if’s and when we do, we always come back to the same conclusion. If either of us had done the what if in our lives, we never would have found each other. What if he chose the job in Virginia? He wouldn’t be here and we wouldn’t be together. What if I moved to Wisconsin or Oklahoma? We wouldn’t be together.

Life would be on a different course for both John and I and we’d never know it, because that would be our life’s journey. It would be different and we’d never know what we would have missed out on with our beautiful love story.

When I was 17, I chose to get married to an older man. Was it a mistake? No. If I thought of my life and all the things that happened to me as mistakes, I wouldn’t have been blessed with my sons. They are the gift that came out of my tragedies, my abuse. If I hadn’t suffered from the time I was young, through my marriage and through life, I wouldn’t have them.

If I didn’t face all the struggles with leaving my husband and literally leaving with the clothes on my back, I wouldn’t have found my way to writing. Through every obstacle I’ve faced, God has pulled me from the depths of self destruction and shown me the gifts of my life. I am so appreciative that he’s never left me. He’s let me struggle a time or two, but he’s never been far. His hand has always been extended out to me when I needed it.

I’ve felt sorry for myself. I’ve hated that I gave in and I don’t have a home I own anymore, but, I can choose to feel sorry for myself, or, I can choose to be thankful for where I’ve landed. Within the bubble of where we live, we’ve found friends who’ve become family. We’ve found a community of love and support and I learned to become an even better writer with the brief opportunity I had to write for our local paper.

How do you look at each day? From the time we get up, there will be something that is in our way of easy, which is a good thing. With each challenge of today, we get to choose how we react. Perhaps we have a co-worker trying to elevate themselves with their look at me I’m so great attitude all while trying to toss us under the bus. We choose to let that ruin our day, or we choose to decide how to handle the situation and move forward without allowing them to make us feel inferior.

Today we will be faced with choices. We can sit in the muck of anything negative we face or hear, or we can rise above and learn and grow. Your choice. My choice.

We choose how to take on each day. Hopefully, we all choose to learn and grow, instead of letting the negatives define us. We never know when our last moment on this earth will be. We can’t take back those negative actions should we choose them. We can’t take back those hurtful words we spoke out of anger. There are no do overs. So, hopefully, we learn to look for the opportunities of growing and learning over the feeling sorry for ourselves or turning everything into an obstacle.

It’s time to let go of those negative thoughts, focus on the opportunities in our life and treat life as a gift. How will you choose today? Me, I’ll keep reminding myself that there is always something to learn from each situation I’m faced with. I might not see it, I might not want to accept it, but I’ll sure as heck do my best to choose to find the gift and opportunities I’m presented with throughout today and everyday moving forward.

Thank you for spending some time with me today. Until next time, don’t forget, Love Life++ Hugs