Saturday, 14 January 2012

Loved

Loved
Dictionary meaning: (as a verb) to have love or affection for, to have profound, tender, passionate, affection for.
The meaning of this word is endless it seems, also personal and should be looked up by everyone.
Synonyms: tenderness, warmth, passion, adoration, liking
Antonyms: hate, dislike, detest

 I sit here with “loved” as an emotion on my mind. What to write, I wonder, what to write, and how oh how do I do it “right”? Is there really a right way to explain how to love or feel loved¿ I doubt it, so let us go with this:
My daughter picked out my emotion a few days ago and I asked her what she thought about “loved”. “Is it something you get or something you give away?” I inquired. It took her about two seconds to come up with a reply, “both.” she said. Straight from the mouth of a babe, you cannot go wrong with that.
It has been days since I first wondered how to go about writing this and I believe that in order to spend a day with this loved emotion at my side I must first give love away, for only in giving love away will one be capable of knowing how to receive it. We all have moments when our hearts ache at the thoughts we have of being unloved. We dwell on feelings of self-loathing, loneliness and hate. We remind ourselves of all the times in the past when we have been wronged, disrespected, rejected, and walked on. And what is it that we cry out while allowing ourselves to feel all of these negative things, oh that`s right, we shout, No one loves me. Could it be that we are not really loving others, I mean really, how can we be loving when what we are recalling is hateful. Remember the opposite of hate is love and consider this; when something is not working for us, we change it, often doing the opposite of what we have grown accustomed to. If we are suffering from hate the only thing left to do is love.
Today I choose to give love away. I will complete all tasks with love, giving particular attention to the details that satisfy the people in my life. I will reach out with a loving hug to those I feel impatient with, and I will smile when I feel like frowning….I am eager to receive the love that awaits me.
Love is a never ending journey; Live your journey LOVED.

Rule One: To feel loved you must first learn to give love.
Rule Two: A small loving gesture means more than a large expensive gift.
Rule Three: Hateful thoughts believe in themselves. Do not let hate in, do not let hate win.

Tuesday, 10 January 2012

Motivated

Motivated
Dictionary meaning:  to provide with a motive or motives; incite; impel
Synonyms: give incentive, innerve, inspirit, set afoot, spark, trigger, pique
Antonyms: depress, disconnect, discourage, dissuade

The best thing I can do when I am feeling disconnected, discouraged or even depressed is to find myself some good old fashioned motivation. “Easier said than done,” you say. “Oh, believe me, I know.” But really, isn’t life just a series of habits we develop along the way? Some are good habits, such as making the bed as soon as we get up in the morning. Some are bad habits; chewing our nails. Some are destructive; choosing to feel discouraged, and some are healthy; like choosing the apple over the hot fudge double chocolate brownie. I wonder….how will I choose today?
As I dropped my daughter off at school this morning I found myself anxious about my plans to write today. The truth is that I am afraid I won’t follow through and I am really tired of letting myself down. By the time I got back this morning my mind was already busy looking for excuses as to why I should wait until tomorrow to put all of my thoughts on paper. So I went about it in a whole new way. I reminded myself that this writing daily thing is new to me, and I cut myself some slack. Not everything I write needs to make sense, in fact nothing needs to make any sense to anyone but me. I find I write best when I stop looking for perfection. Who is perfect anyway? I feel motivated when I allow myself the idea of failure. I am walking motivation when I give myself room to learn and lots of space for error.
I am thinking about my daughter now and how she goes about her day, “J” as if motivation were her middle name. Children are not born making excuses or putting off what needs to be done “now”. I suppose that if I did not remind my daughter that it was time for her to get dressed for school in the morning that some days she may sit around in her pyjamas watching TV all day. But in her world however, there are rules (followed most of the time) and I believe that it is in following those rules that she stays motivated. Note**sometimes rules need to be broken, what fun would life be otherwiseJ. I wonder though how many of us are lacking in the motivation department because we are breaking “the rules” too often. Personally I have let this bad habit of feeling discouraged consume me for too long so today I will write myself a new list of rules. My emotions are my choice and I choose to be motivated not discouraged. Motivated is the emotion of the day! May we all feel this motivated all year through!

Rule # 1: Choose to feel motivated.
Rule # 2: If feeling discouraged, see rule # 1.
Rule # 3: Do not forget the rules.