Quotes of the Week from Me:

“The days are long and the years are short… and the naps are shorter.”

“Making someone feel seen, heard, and understood is the best way to love them.”

“What does self-care mean?”

“Your current habits are direct indicators of your future results.”

Quotes of the Week from Others:

“People run in packs because they don’t feel safe alone. I run alone because I don’t feel safe in packs.” – Muhammad Ali

“One day in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful.” – Sigmund Freud

“I have learned to seek happiness by limiting my desires, rather than by trying to satisfy them.” – John Stuart Mill

Quick Optimism

What are your good habits? What are your bad habits? Asking yourself questions like this, point blank, will give you a real chance at assessing, understanding, and improving your life.

Mental and physical activities are our happy place.

They fortify good mental health.

They strengthen our body and mind.

They improve confidence and well-being.

They remind us of what we can control and work on.

What are your good active habits? What are your bad active habits?

Full Newsletter

What a week for optimism. What a week for needing it.

Remember that scene from Rocky Balboa (2006) when Sylvester Stallone said, “It ain’t about how hard you get hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward”?

That felt like this week. But again, when you focus on the wrong things, life gets hard. I hope you enjoy the list of catastrophes that just kept rolling this week. What I actually learned is what an incredible teammate and partner my wife is through thick and thin. How lucky I feel to have such a great best friend and support system.

All within the last week or two:

1. Maggot infestation in the garage. The trash can lid was open by about a centimeter. Just enough to welcome some new friends into our home. I am talking full garage clean out and bleach spray session. Life is a game of inches.
2. Dog rash. We got hammered by storms recently. House didn’t take it too well, neither did the dog. The humidity led to a bad skin rash needing steroids and antibiotics. See ya later $400.
3. I mentioned the house not taking the storms too well. The house got a rash too. Mold in the basement. Everywhere. Baking soda party. Vacuum party. Repeat.
4. Drove home to a new garden in our gutter the other day. When we bought our house originally, we cut down a big branch that would’ve fallen on our house. It fell on it anyway (oops). The gutter is dented and debris tends to build up every couple of months. I guess with kids running around it was long enough for some plants to grow on our roof like on a city skyscraper. That wasn’t and isn’t our goal though. Not a big fan of ladders but I survived.
5. Went to go on the boat last week and was surprised to see we had a white boat cover instead of a blue one. No, it wasn’t a surprise gift from friends or family. More of a collage of hundreds of gifts from bird friends and family. Some dead fish bones too. Smelly.
6. My wife and I bought Beckett some reusable water balloons for his birthday. They are actually really cool and very fun to play with. They open like a plastic Easter egg, attached by one small piece of rubber and then they seal shut with magnets. All you have to do is drop them in the water and they fill up. Well we brought them on the boat after our boat cover returned to its state of blue, and dropped them in the water. Unfortunately, they continued dropping and were never seen again. Turns out they didn’t float. I’d like a moment of silence for having to open Amazon for the 12^th time that week. We had to replace them immediately.
7. The exhaust leak in my truck came back. I keep “solving the issue” for 2 weeks at a time. But it’s really stubborn. When I drive around I sound like a teenage driver who asked for a custom, “make me sound like an a**hole” exhaust “upgrade” for his birthday.
8. Came home to a tripped circuit breaker. Found out our GCFI outlet on the porch had a leak in the “waterproof” box so our entire kitchen and living room lost power. We made a miraculous recovery after running some errands. When we got home everything just worked again somehow. Big momentum shift seemingly.
9. Finally, I accidentally detonated a pen bomb in the dryer with several articles of my wife’s favorite clothes. I am talking ink everywhere. “The clothes still work” wasn’t one of my better comments in an understandably frustrating scenario.

The good news is there were only 9 things on this list and not 10. Avoided double digits which is always nice!

The maggot infestation turned into exhausted laughter with my wife. The dog rash led to more cuddling between our son and his favorite pet.

The mold led to a quality cleanout of the basement, my office looks better than ever.

Same with the gutter. As clean as ever, and the drainage is working really well again.

The boat cover has more bird poop on it, but now we can actually use it instead of having to clean it for an hour or two beforehand.

We now have 6 reusable water balloons instead of the original 2-pack. I’ve played with them about an hour per day since Beckett’s birthday on July 18.

It still sounds like I intentionally altered my truck to be as loud as possible, but hey, now people know when I’m coming.

I don’t want to jinx ANYTHING regarding the circuit breaker so not bringing that up again.

Finally, we moved on from the pen bomb in the dryer and have found several uses for our permanently dirty clothing. I think I owe Taylor a shopping spree soon too.

That’s all for the week. No philosophy or solving world problems. Just another crazy, fun, exhausting, and irreplaceable week that I loved reflecting on.