spiritedstrider – Appreciation Magic

Spreading Tips for Living a More Joyful Life

What is your mission?

Today’s prompt asks about my mission in life. It wasn’t always clear to me for most of my life. Major life changes helped me to reach within and work on myself until it came to me that I am here to help spread tips on living a more joyful life. By using the tools and techniques I’ve learned through various teachers, my journey as Barbara, The Spirited Strider, began over 14 years ago.

It started with a Memory Walk for the Alzheimer’s Association and I called my team of walkers “Team Spirited Strides.” That quickly led to my first blog and so many connections with new people. It led to learning many techniques from classes and workshops, to creating my website and a small business in coaching. While I no longer have my main website, having lost it earlier this year, I am appreciative of everything I learned while building it.

We often don’t realize the effect our words and actions can have on other people. It was through a powerful moment of inspiration that I knew that I am here to serve in love, one person at a time. I’m reminded of a sermon I gave once as a Certified Lay Speaker and a couple of years later, I returned to that church and an elderly woman came up to me to tell me how much that sermon affected her in a positive way. We often don’t get that kind of feedback about ourselves, but when we do, it’s such a good feeling to know that we made a difference in someone’s life.

For me, it was an affirmation that I’m doing something that is of value to others. I know my mission for myself and for others. Life is meant to be filled with joy and I appreciate that I can contribute to it in my own small way.

All is Not Lost

I’ve been gone a long while from here. That doesn’t mean that I haven’t been appreciating, as I do it everyday. It’s become a daily habit and my “go to” for feeling good most days.

Yesterday I discovered that I lost my entire website for my small business. I became so involved with my other life endeavors that I forgot to renew my hosting account. While I started the business in late 2018, I had been blogging since 2007, so there was a lot of material there. I had redirected my former blog posts to the website when I created it. Now, I cannot currently access any of it!

I was initially upset. I have to admit that I’m still not feeling 100% fine with it. However, I did make a decision that I need to find something to appreciate about all of this, so here goes…

I appreciate all the years of blogging and connecting with people. The connections I made from blogging were life changing. All is not lost.

I appreciate that a fund raiser for Alzheimer’s research led me to the initial blog, the name of my business and to my branding as “The Spirited Strider.” All is not lost.

I can appreciate that this is an opportunity to re-think and create something new. While I’m not so sure what exactly I’ll do, there really is no rush and I know that my inspiration will come when it comes. All is not lost.

I also appreciate that I may have a back up of the old blog on my laptop. I haven’t looked yet, but if it’s there, I will be able to see some posts that I made years ago. I am feeling the excitement of that, when I decide to dig and look. I have options and all is not lost.

I appreciate a Facebook and Twitter friend who suggested the archives online as a way to see if any of my posts are there. I don’t have the time now to pursue that for a few weeks, but it’ll definitely be a larger project that I’ll dive into later. I appreciate his help and suggestion! All is not lost.

That’s right! All is not lost! It’ll be exciting to see where I’m at a year from now! Meanwhile, I intend to be more active here once again.

Turn On Love

There’s been a lot of talk about love this week. With the Supreme Court decision legalizing same sex marriages in all 50 states, we’ve seen the hashtag #lovewins all over social media and the internet. I appreciate this celebration of love. I appreciate that I have found ways to love myself, too, which allows me to love others. I appreciate authors like Louise Hay and Catherine Ponder for their beautiful words on love. I appreciate poets like Maya Angelou and Rumi for poetic and empowering words about love. I appreciate Jesus for loving us unconditionally. Regardless of your religious beliefs, how can you argue with love? Everyone deserves love. This world of ours would be a better place if we all could “be” love more often. The Beatles were right when they sang “All we need is love.”

Today I’m celebrating that I love myself enough to know what’s the best for me. I’ve made some recent decisions for myself that have been acts of self-love. Self-love is the best kind: for when we are loving ourselves, we are more apt to spread our love to others.

I’ve seen the hateful remarks on social media against the recent Supreme Court decision. I’ve seen the internet reports of southern black churches being burned since the racist terrorism in Charleston. This is the time for love to shine forth. As hard as it may seem, we can see people spreading love in these horrific situations. By choosing love and loving actions and words, we spread more happiness into our lives and to others.

These times call for new habits in each of us that serve us by operating from a place of love. I’m reminded of a practice that Catherine Ponder recommends where she suggests we “turn on love” in her The Dynamic Laws of Prosperity book. Basically, it goes like this:

Meditate on love and affirm “I let the divine love now be made alive in me.”
Turn on love in your daily life by affirming silently to everything: “Let divine love be made alive in thee.” Do this with all things -clothes, car, job, people, and even to your dreams that haven’t manifested yet.

This is the time to “turn on love” when we read, hear and see hateful comments and behaviors around us. It’s the loving thing to do. Love wins!

Starting My Morning

How See the light1 do you start your morning? Do you begin with appreciation for another day, a prayer or are you still stressing out over the worries of the day before? Or maybe you’re one of those people who is always running late, and you jump out of bed, hurriedly thinking about all the things you need to get done that day.

How you start the day can pave the way for how your day develops.

I’ve found that the way I start my morning really affects how the rest of my day goes. I intend to see the light in everything and in everyone each day and that includes how I start my morning. I appreciate learning this simple technique and discipline that really has made a difference in how I experience my life. My morning start begins like this:

When I wake up, I am thankful for another day. I find things to mentally appreciate before getting to the bathroom. Often I verbalize them out loud. There is power in saying things out loud. It doesn’t even take a minute to do this, and I often find myself smiling. It feels good to smile and appreciate, no matter how tired I may be in the morning.

It’s that simple. This simple tip can pave the way for more things to appreciate as the day goes on. It puts me in a good mood. It affects how I relate to other people. This practice has led me to other practices, including this blog, journals, meditation and pre-paving my day as I go along. I really appreciate that I start my morning with appreciation!

Today’s Funnies!

I appreciate laughter and the joy it brings in my life and others. Laughter is so contagious, too, so it’s good to spread it around.

One of my friends on Facebook shared this video of a prank. I don’t always find pranks funny but I really loved this one. It shows how impatient we can get! Sometimes you just have to laugh at ourselves. I appreciate that I can do that often. Hope you enJOY the video!

https://youtu.be/QGYI8q4GQg0

Summer is here!

I appreciate everyday, I really do! You wouldn’t know it by my absence from this blog, though. lol Today is the fir broccoli spouts on their way up st day of summer and I just love summers. I love the hot weather, the green in all the plants and the vegetables and flowers that flourish. I love the sound of children playing, the smell of grilling in the backyard and the longer days than winter.

Today is the first day of summer and I appreciate I’ve got some vacation time this week. I’m experimenting with sprouts in the kitchen and some new flowers on the porch. I love gardening and while I’m a bit behind this year, I appreciate the thrill of planting and watching it grow. It’s going to be a great season for sure!

Appreciating Fun!

Are you having fun in your life? We all could benefit from having fun everyday, don’t you think? I made this video with that in mind: to stay loose, drop your worries and concerns and just decide that you’ll have more fun.

I really appreciate fun in my life. I have fun at work and at play. I can have fun just thinking about a fun time in the past, or anticipating a fun time in the future. Fun gives me a feeling of freedom- that feeling of childlike playfulness that just makes me smile. What about you? Are you having fun yet?

Appreciating My Life

Today I made my newest video, called “I Appreciate My Life.” While I haven’t been posting here or on any of my blogs regularly, I do practice daily appreciation. Sometimes it can be a challenge, when going through perceived “hard times.” Yet that’s the thing: “hard times” are really a perception and I can change my perception about events and my feelings about them at any given moment. I can’t make anyone or any circumstance the source of my happiness. Happiness is an “inside job.”

Today I just got to “work” and re-affirmed that “inside job” to myself, and this video came out as a result.

I Appreciate These Past 41 Days – Day 41

Today is the last day of my 41-day challenge and I appreciate that! As part of my Facebook group on “41 Days of Appreciating Rampages,” I committed to blogging here for 41 days with photos. I am feeling quite good, now that the 41st day is here.

I started the Facebook group ten months ago and have done several rounds of “41 days.” After a break when I let myself get a bit too busy, I decided 41 days ago to be more deliberate through this blog on the next round of 41 days. I’m so glad I did! While this is not the end of my daily appreciation habit, there’s something about reaching the completion of something that feels really good. So today, I’m appreciating these past 41 days, the new blogs I’ve discovered from people commenting or liking my posts and most of all, the joy that comes from this daily practice of appreciating.

All are invited to join my Facebook group and post your joys as your inspiration leads you. There are some wonderful people in the group! I love them all and find reading their posts very uplifting.

I Appreciate Journaling – Day 40

I have always loved to write. Journaling is something that I’ve done over the years, through tween days, college, and mid-life. I appreciate the power of writing something down, of scripting scenarios as if they were already true, of jotting down a poem that rises from my heart, of daily appreciation journaling, or a burst of inspired ideas that creatively flow onto the paper or onto my blogs. While there are online journals and other electronic ways of writing, I really appreciate the simple pen and paper the best. I love collecting lots of different journals and choose the one that feels just right for my next writing endeavor.

Recently a friend of mine gave me a bunch of journals she was going to donate and I really am appreciating them. Not only are they beautiful, but the fact that they came as an unexpected gift from my friend makes them extra special! Thank you, my friend!