Mikes Blog

A beautiful day
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Make a beautiful day by deciding it will be. Make a beautiful day by embracing what is and giving your best to it.

A beautiful day does not require any particular circumstances. Each day is what you make of it, and you can make a beautiful day out of any day you choose.

A beautiful day depends on you, not on what is provided to you. Today has plenty of potential for beauty even though it is not perfect.

A beautiful day is more than you can imagine beforehand that it will be. A beautiful day largely comes from all you allow and enable it to be as it unfolds.

You don’t have to try so hard to live a beautiful day. You don’t have to be shackled by the fear of what might or might not happen.

Just be beautiful in your very own way. And live yourself a beautiful day.

— Ralph Marston

Live as who you are
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Some people will agree with you and some people won’t. And in most cases, there’s nothing you can do to change that.

Some people will like you, admire you, respect you, and others won’t. That will be the case no matter what you do.

Yes, you can strive to impress and accommodate people in an effort to gain their favor. But such overt desperation is unlikely to earn any agreement or genuine respect.

Your best option is to simply be your authentic self. You cannot force everyone to admire you, but you can enable people to see who you truly are.

Some people are never going to resonate with you. Yet many people will appreciate and admire you for being open and honest about who you are.

Do and say what’s real, what’s true, what’s in line with your values, your preferences, your passions. The most impressive thing you can ever do is to live as who you are.

— Ralph Marston

Good for all
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When you oppose, you oppose yourself too. When you love, you love yourself too.

Conflict is sometimes necessary but that doesn’t make it preferable. More often than not there’s a much better option.

You are interconnected with everyone and everything else in ways that are obvious and ways you’ll never know. Every action brings consequences that go far beyond where it’s directed.

You cannot win by seeking to cause loss. Seek instead to create value, and its benefits will flow through all of life.

Appreciate the connections you can see and respect the ones that remain hidden. Make good use of the energy and sustenance that all those connections bestow.

Genuine joy, freedom, and peace are desirable wherever and among whomever they exist. Do what enables life to be good for all, and good for you.

— Ralph Marston

Better possibilities
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What do you want for your life, for all of life? How can you be sure there’s not something much, much better?

Could you be seeking some particular thing so single-mindedly that you fail to see other, more desirable possibilities? Might you be sabotaging your own fulfillment by envisioning fulfillment in a far too limited way?

It’s all well and good to get what you desire. But perhaps it’s even better sometimes when you don’t get what you desire.

When your path to fulfillment is blocked, you’re forced to consider other paths. That’s not such a bad thing.

Surely there are possibilities you’re not aware of. Be careful not to let your obsession with just a few possibilities blind you to all the others.

Clarify your intentions, set your goals, and go for them. But never let that stop you from being open to everything else that is possible.

— Ralph Marston