Forward to Happiness

I saw a meme that I shared, today, that said that if you are only looking at what you lack, then even your past reflections will see absense, only.  Instead, you should look at the good that exists.  I think that is a very good challenge for myself.  There was good in the past...lots of it.  There will be good in the future.. including some of the good of the past.  However, those are other posts.  For this one, I am going to focus, exclusively, on the good that I have in this moment...  - I am alive, and therefore have hope of a future. - I am able to see, hear, walk and run, and enjoy other activities of a functional body. - I have two sources of income at the present moment and until the end of September.  If that remains to be true, I will have over 10 thousand saved up, after paying off debts, as well. - I have a car that I own, without having  to make payments. - I have more books than I can read in several years. - Even in my current e...

One thing I've been learning for years is how important it is to know yourself.  It is important for several reasons, not the least of which is that you need to understand yourself in order to love yourself.  But, it is also important in things like career goals, seeking and operating in relationships, and more.  There are several ways of understanding yourself, and I will discuss a few with myself as an example.  However, one way that you do NOT understand yourself is feeling you should be like someone else.  Your journey is your journey.  You were made a miracle, whether that be from God or from just the process of living on the planet.  There was a line in the book that I was reading last night that comes to mind.  In Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett, dead but not dead character Poons is trying to understand how cities would develop things to protect themselves, like every animal that develops poisons or spike or other things.  In the book, i...

What is your foundation?   I've lived a long life and have experienced a lot of change over the decades.  I won't be going into the details in this post and plan to try to get away from mentioning specific details about others in my posts, particularly because life tends to change, so much. However,  my life has generally had a lot of changes in it.  So, while I have many different types of experiences and things I have learned over my life (see my updated About Me page), one thing that has been very true in almost every year of my life is my ability to bounce back from being broken down.. sometimes down to almost nothing.  I guess you could say I took the book of Job and made it a lifestyle.  But, going through all of that, I have learned many things that are important in rebuilding your foundation that might be useful to others. 1.  Aside from God, your foundation is YOU.  I'd even wager that even God would have you make your foundation be...

 "Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.” - Dr Seuss This quote is something that I have had a lot of experience with in the past with regards to my wonderful time raising my kids.  Those memories are etched forever in time, pics, and my mind, as well as Facebook memories, very often.  It also applies to my wonderful romance of this year.  Though that is over, it was objectively one of the best times of my life, and I will forever be grateful for the opportunity to have experienced it.  I gained so much and changed so much in my experience with her that I will carry with me into my future paths.  I hope to maintain a connection to her to have future grand memories in the future, as friends as well.    However, as I reflected on it all over the past weeks, I realized something that is true by extension.  There is something good to maintain from so much of our lives that we often just sweep under the rug, because those rel...

Feeling your feelings is important.  It is important to value the feelings of others.  Everyone's feelings are valid.   Life has taught me that life changes. When life changes, we think we have to understand it to respond to it.  The reality is that we can never fully understand our path or why it changes.  That does not mean you shouldn't have feelings.  But, I would caution you against letting the feelings have the driver's wheel.   Many times... most times in my experience... this is where you have the most power over your life.  There are pressures on you on how to respond. There are not only emotions but societal norms on how to respond.  Well, the last time I've noticed, society is messed up, and hormones often cause more problems than they resolve. I am someone that defends freedom, but I've also in the past posted on how true freedom is freedom from yourself... from those natural responses that try to write our script. ...

My engagement and relationship is over.  I will do one paragraph on it and then move forward (in writing.. my heart will take time to recover).  There is a line in the movie You've Got Mail where Meg Ryan's character says.. "People are always telling you that change is a good thing. But all they're really saying is that something you didn't want to happen at all... has happened."  This was one of those things for me, and even though I understand and adapt to change (I've had a lot of experience doing that), it will involve a period of re-centering, focus on my positives, and rebirth.  I do not wish her any ill will.  I hope for us both to heal, together, as friends.  The rest of this post will deal with things I've learned from life that relate to change. Today, my Facebook came up with a reminder of ten years ago and showed a picture of my kids and me.  I do not have the close relationship with them that I did at that time, now.  So, that was dep...

I was sitting in a church pride LGBTQ service the other day, and they were singing appropriate and great worship songs.  Some spoke of God's ability to save and power.  However, most spoke of God's love, and that contrast was an important and helpful thing for me reflect on and write about. I've noted over the years the various trials that I've had to endure.  Over those years, I wondered why God didn't come to save me from them.  In some cases God did by literally removing me from them or driving me to remove myself from them.  However, the powerful arm of God to save is something I've not often seen.  Indeed, the Bible writers also didn't see it often, as the Psalm writers begged for it, and the New Testament writers would endure many hardships and death. However, God was present to care for them and me.  Even in my struggles... especially in them.. God's heart was very near to me.  That helped me remain steady and empower me over the years to k...