Forgive yourself. Do it now. Then move on. I keep finding that as I write a weekly newsletter I should take my own thoughts into consideration. I often struggle to ease up on myself after a mistake or failure of any kind. So, as you read on at Practice Optimism, please know that some of the topics I choose are not necessarily strengths, but things I am working on too. They make me think as much as I hope you…
“Everything in any way beautiful has its beauty of itself, inherent and self-sufficient: praise is no part of it. At any rate, praise does not make anything better or worse.” – Marcus Aurelius I do not typically begin a post with a quote from someone else. Some great advice I got in college: nobody can capture your thoughts or words better than you, only use the words of others to support your claims. Today is a bit different because I…
Time is the most valuable measurement. Appreciate it. Acknowledge it. It is priceless. Time measures many aspects of our lives. It measures our tasks and dictates our due dates. It also measures our relationships and in some ways our health. Time to go. Time to eat. Time to not eat. Time to move on. Living for more time can mean you lived well or lived a healthy life. Time can influence our emotions and actions. It keeps track of our…
That Friday Feeling, On A Monday? TGIM, thank God it’s Monday. Hold on, we need to rewind a bit, right? Who thanks God that it’s Monday? Last Friday, I witnessed a typical sigh of relief as my neighbor’s shoulders dropped to the spoken thought of two consecutive days without work. Friday always feels lighter and brighter; another week of hard work had reached its peak. The carrot of a workless weekend dangled in front of us. Friday represents the end…
History sits in silence. The history of humankind is young and at times naïve. It has always fascinated me and its chronology is complex and wonderful. As a student, I enjoyed learning about the progression of history, its brilliance, and how we eventually arrived in “modern” society. Thousands of years ago, humankind established cultures built from ideologies in the form of art, communication, architecture, and social infrastructure. Empires rose, ruled, and fell. But history sits in silence. Thousands of years…
Monday, November 7, 2022 You must envision your future to plan for it effectively. Is this true? Quick tangent: Writing in 2022 presents the unique challenge of trying to create original material. The millions of people writing millions of ideas on millions platforms can make it difficult to put a fresh spin on things that really do bring value to readers. That’s all I want to offer in this newsletter and on my website. I want to offer you value…
Monday, October 31, 2022 This week’s newsletter is a bit of a wild ride. Enjoy! “A mask tells us more than a face.” -Oscar Wilde We are, or will become, what we think of ourselves. We are, or will become, how we present ourselves. We get to decide. Decisions aren’t limitless. They are actually quite rare. We don’t get to decide our level of athleticism or intellect. We don’t get to decide our facial structure or height. You might be…
Monday, October 24, 2022 Emotion is a natural, instinctive state of mind that is typically influenced by external circumstances. Emotion is feeling, and although it is a reaction to the external, it originates internally from our thoughts and interpretations. We may know some things to be true, especially when they are based on logic and fact. But we are constantly surrounded by questions and challenges that make us feel strongly that logic and fact cannot define all of our reality….
October 17, 2022 Our greatest developments come from execution with intent. The concept is direct and broad but it opens a wonderful conversation about who we are now, who we want to become in the future, and how to get there. A lot of us confuse execution with goal setting and intent with intention. Execution acts as a catalyst for intent in the present, while goal setting and intention shift the focus to the future. This relationship is complex, as…
Monday, October 10, 2022 Repetition is as important as it is popular. The most popular topics are often paraphrased or reworked to emphasize something that is already known or accepted. But even when we come across new or innovative ideas, they are inspired from past events and external influences. Rarely do we acknowledge the fundamentals that shape the foundation of innovation. Fundamentals are boring, but boring is effective, and often simple. The space race of the 1960’s tracked the progress…