Mikes Blog

Never forget
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See the beauty that is this day. Feel the miracle that is your life.

Against all probability you are here to experience now. Give to the experience its full due.

Stand in awe of the fact that you can stand in awe. Contemplate the wonder of your ability to wonder.

Listen with care and love to the softest whisper. Gaze intently at the brightest star.

You can choose what to do and then act on your choice. You can question, learn, understand, and explain.

Never let yourself forget how much richness and mystery and possibility there is. Always live to give unique expression and meaning in the best way you know how.

— Ralph Marston

The sooner the better
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The sooner you tackle the problem, the better. The sooner you face the challenge, the better.

The sooner you put forth effort, the better. The sooner you make a commitment, the better.

Some situations are difficult, uncomfortable, and even painful to deal with. But putting them off until later makes them even worse.

There is no easy way to handle life’s inevitable challenges. Yet you can make them much less difficult by meeting them head on.

Don’t waste your energy avoiding reality. Acknowledge the hard truths and direct your energy toward making life good within those truths.

You have what it takes to discipline yourself, to meet the challenges, to transcend the difficulties. The sooner you do so, the better.

— Ralph Marston

Defuse the situation
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The answer to rude behavior is not more rude behavior. Retribution doesn’t get you anywhere good, doesn’t create anything useful.

An insult in return for an insult is predictable and ineffective. You have the opportunity and the skill to be much more innovative and constructive than that.

You can be the person to rise above it. You can chart a new, more beneficial path.

Be the original and intentional person you are. Put forth a positive perspective rather than just reacting to a negative one.

Yes, someone else has said or done something objectionable. But do you really want to create additional incitement for doubling down on that?

Be the strong one, the reasonable one, the one who defuses the situation. You’ll vastly improve the possibility that something good will come of it.

— Ralph Marston

Question your needs
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Question your needs. Stop being burdened with needs that exist only because of your assumptions or self-deceptions.

Some of your needs are authentic. Others are merely choices you’ve allowed yourself to characterize as needs.

Seek to be more honest with yourself. Is every need real, or are some of them fabrications?

There are plenty of desirable things you can have, and use, and enjoy, and benefit from, without needing them. Indeed, you can improve the quality of those things in your life by making them choices instead of needs.

Look for opportunities to live more by intention and less by compulsion. Examine the differences between what you assume you need and what you actually need.

Refuse to operate at the mercy of needs that are not really needs. Take responsibility for your choices and you will greatly improve where those choices lead.

— Ralph Marston