Maximizing Your Potential!

“When we begin to take our failures non-seriously, it means we are ceasing to be afraid of them. It is of immense importance to learn to laugh at ourselves.”
- – Katherine Mansfield, 1888-1923 New Zealand Writer

Boy, is that ever true and thanks to my wonderful husband and fantastic friends I get to laugh at myself practically every day.

Laughter is powerful medicine, it is cathartic. There are laughter clubs that have sprung up in the last few years, similar to comedy clubs. There is also a type of yoga which has to do with laughter.

I love summer days at home/ As I work at home on my computer I get to listen to the laughter and shouts of the kids behind us as they play in the swimming pool or on the swing set.

When they go away for vacation I get lonesome and look forward to when they will be in the backyard again hanging out with their friends in the afternoon or evening.

So, curl up with your honey and watch a little comedy or go out for a night of laughter at the local comedy club or just go to a playground and watch the children as they laugh and play and don’t be suprised if you develop a new found spirit of play.

“One of the things I learned the hard way was it doesn’t pay to get discouraged. Keeping busy and making optimism a way of life can restore your faith in yourself.”
- – Lucille Ball, 1911-1989 American Actress and Comedian

That is a very interesting quote. Sometimes I feel we are lead to believe that we have to have faith in someone or something else to make our lives better.

What Ms. Ball seems to be telling us, or maybe it’s just me, is that one has to take personal responsibility for how one feels about their prospects and whether they cry in the stands or get the show on the road and make something happen.

It does not sound like she was content to be the victim and wring her hands.

Action is the key to results. If you aren’t doing something actively to make your goals happen, they won’t so get up, get busy and watch good things gravitate toward you.

Make it an awesome week.

“Optimists are the elixir of life. They constantly remind the pessimists that life isn’t as hopeless as they think. They are the extra ingredient that makes life bubble.”
- – Sara Henderson, b. 1936 Australian Outback Station Manager and Writer

Pretty funny. They certainly provide a few pessimists I know with a good reason to grouse.

The fact of the matter is that it is the optimist who makes the world go round in spite of any and all obstacles. Having read several quotes by Thomas Edison it’s pretty evident to me that he was an optimist.

I’d also have to say that George Washington was an optimist or he would never have survived the American Revolution.

I had the pleasure of reading Joe Montana’s book, “Audibles” and I must say, he was an optimist, too.

So turn on your optimism, and if you happen to be a pessimist, get busy accomplishing some things in life so that you become optimistic, too and we will make this world a better place for everyone.

“Expect to have hope rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again.”
- – Sarah Ban Breathnach American Writer

We all heard the adage, ‘in to every life some rain must fall.’ The point is not to get all hung up in that fact to to keep your eyes to the future and know that things will get better.

When we are little kids, we seem to know this instinctively. We ask our parents for a Radio Flyer for Christmas and when it does not materialize we move on to something else. Or, we try to bake a souffle and it falls as we take it out of the oven so we just get in their and try it again.

But as we move forward in life we seem to accumulate more and more of these loses or failures and have a tougher time recovering from them.

My biggest advise is to follow the above and get busy doing something you know you can accomplish and get your mind entirely off of what you failed to achieve or analyze why you failed to achieve your goal and discover what you could do differently in the future to avoid the same outcome.

Whatever you do, do not sit around moping or wringing your hands.

Get busy and make something great happen in your life!

‘I am an optimist, unrepentant and militant. After all, in order not to be a fool an optimist must know how sad a place the world can be. It is only the pessimist who finds this out anew every day.”
- – Peter Ustinov, b. 1923 English Writer, Actor and Dramatist

Isn’t that an interesting quote. He is saying that an optimist is aware that the world can be a sad place but continues to have hope and confidence about the future, whereas the pessimist is surprises or chagrined daily by the fact that the world is a sad place.

One is affected by this the other chooses not to be.

It’s all about choice, whether one will remain upbeat and positive in spite of everything, or be gloomy and morose about it all.

I hope that you will make the choice to be optimist and make good things happen in your life.