Thoughts and Teaching into Action

 

     Many times we read scripture, or positive writings only to fail when it comes to implementing these practices in our daily lives. Positivity is like a muscle, it only gets stronger when consistently used. I have been working on this in my life for several years. It is human nature to view incidents in our world from the negative perspective and fail to see anything positive. However with intentional, purposeful practice this bad habit can  be changed. My morning reading today was from the Your Best Life Now Journal by Joel Osteen. Step Three, Discovering the power of your thoughts and words Day 1 is called Digging a new river. It talks about your thoughts being like a river and running in the same direction for years. Your thoughts, much like a river tend to only go in one direction, the deeper the thoughts of pessimism, the deeper the river bed, accelerating the flow. But you CAN dig a new river, going in a positive direction. Ah... easy to say, not so easy to do. Over time it gets easier and this weekend was proof positive for me. Travelling as much as I do I joke that I never look at my itinerary until the day before. I ended up glancing at my hotel reservations and not double checking them, I ended up in a shuttle, I had to pay for, that took me to the wrong hotel. After waiting in line about 15 minutes the front desk informed me that in fact I was at the wrong hotel. Yup..so I spent a moment kicking myself, then quickly got a taxi to the correct hotel. Remaining calm I though about the driver, most likely with a family to support and figured, maybe I am supposed to be a blessing to him today. My cab fare was not the usual 10-20 dollar fare. No, it was 38 and I tipped him on top of that. Quickly recognizing my error may have been a blessing I was able to turn a negative into a positive within minutes. I also forgot a ring I had just purchased in Miami a few weeks ago. It was not expensive, rather it was a 3 dollar ring I purchased at a church gift shop. It had the Lord's prayer written around it in Spanish. As I took a moment feeling sad, I immediately thought, there must be a housekeeper that needs this ring more than I do. Another possible blessing. So with practice I have become lightening fast at letting go of the negative,  pity party and joined the positivity tribe. With consistent, faithful practice it becomes a way of life :)