Without any pomp, here's a little stream-of-consiousness stuff I've learned from personal experience and observation. If someone else said it before, they get the credit for the big salad!
Laugh! Forgive for real! Love! Be Grateful!
Surround yourself with folks who love you when you can, and when you can't, surround yourself with folks you want to be like. You are rich if you have the same loved ones in both camps.
If you don't feel the right way, act the right way and your feelings will follow. Know between you and God that you did the right thing even if no one knows or understands.
If your thinking and feelings are right, always act selflessly when opportunity strikes.
Look at smiling faces. Smile and others smile back. Bless the sour face, and picture them smiling when you leave their presence.
Look at real faces in store lines, not magazine covers.
Have a game night. Start a book club. Learn a new recipe. Volunteer. Go for a walk. Look at nature. Talk less and be amazed more!
Leave work at work, except to tell a positive story. Even then temper it with other interests.
Listen more to other's stories, and find at least one positive thing that impresses you, then express it.
Seek counsel from trusted friends. Pay experts for counsel if you have to. Figure some stuff out, and move along. If others don't see what you value in your life, give them time. Life tempers us all with grace.
Look the person in the eye who is giving you grief, even if only in your thoughts. You will see someone whom Jesus cares about deeply.
Disconnect with toxic people or certain toxic conversation topics for a short season, but only to return someday a better person. But do return!
Offer help more, control/avoid less.
Create more, destroy less and avenge never.
Correct with caution and humility, and always with the other's well-being in mind.
Say "yes" to the things God has for you, and "no" to the things that keep the first category from working.
Thrive and smile whether order or chaos are your method of operation (m.o.), and give others leeway to be who they are when their m.o. doesn't match yours.
Pray more, worry less.
Listen more to the wisdom from admirable books or having coffee or a meal with loved ones. Decide at the outset that you will find joy in it all, even when you learn that you did or are doing some stuff incorrectly!
Be loyal, and be there with a smile if nothing else.
Forgive those who want more of you than you can give.
Forgive those who don't believe in your abilities and dreams.
Forgive those who sought to encourage you only to fall on their faces and misunderstand you.
Be happy and grateful for those who get things you never got-it will make you twice as happy!
Sit quietly with the grieving, and don't draw them out, or you will push them deeper into grief. Note to self: See the ineffectiveness of Job's well-meaning friends.
Love the critic and consider the lesson, without letting that person control you. No one can control us except we let them. God is in control. I am either on the calms or the roller-coaster. In it all, it's all good!
Move your body as much as possible every day! It lights up the brain and keeps you vital and strong.
Love, love, love your closest relations, getting to know them for what they will allow you to. If they have disappointed you, talk to them, or move on. But don't neglect them, especially when they want to stay in touch and are happy for you!
Kick guilt and shame in the pants when they combat your joyful spirit. True contrition is one thing, but it's momentary, not monumental. Guilting and shaming others to control them is absolutely wrong, and neither let them do it to you!
Fortune was given you to enjoy and share. And if misspent, learn the lesson and get on to the next opportunity.
Lean in more deeply to the love that covers all wrongdoing!
That's it for now, my friends.
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