Ouch, first of the year and I’m already off to a bad start with blogging. It feels like there is always just a mountain of things to do. But, I know from looking back on my past blogs, the importance of keeping up to date for me is there, so I will just pick up and keep going.
We’ve had a couple of quotes of the week that I wanted to capture:
Our first one of the year:
“Tomorrow is the first blank page of a 356 page book. Write a good one.”
We talked about this one on New Year’s Eve. Even though the older guys had places to go out, we had some Chinese food and had a nice dinner together first. We spent some time reviewing our past year, and then talked about the New Year. There’s something so refreshing about starting a new year. I know it’s a just a date, but you do sort of feel you can start fresh. So, that’s what we encouraged everyone to do.
The rest of the night the big kids headed out to some friends, and the two little guys hung out with us and we played some Apples to Apples and watched the NYC countdown. On New Years day, we pulled out our New Years goal books and wrote our short and long term goals in them. This year, I also had us each write a letter to ourselves that we will read in 10 years (Dear 10 years older me). We then wrote a 5 year letter too (to remind ourselves that we had 5 more years to do all the things we promised in our 10 year letter!!!) We also spent some time thinking about some people that we admired and relationships that we admired so we could see if we are on the path to becoming like the people we admire.
The next quote:
“Giving up on a goal because of a setback is like slashing your other 3 tires because you got a flat.”
Josh made a point with this one, that you don’t even have to slash tires; he suggested just getting out of your car and sitting by the side doing nothing because you have a flat is just as bad. Setbacks will happen. You just need to change that tire and keep going. Sometimes you have the spare tire in your trunk, sometimes you need to walk miles to get it. But there is always a spare that you can get somewhere. So go get it!
Finally, this week’s quote:
“You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.”
An oldie, but a goodie. Life is just so much easier when faced with a smile, rather than a frown. If you choose to be positive instead of negative, you will find yourself in a better space most of the time. If you choose to laugh, rather than become defensive. If you look for the good, rather than the bad. If you choose to be happy, you will find much more happiness. Now, life will throw curve balls, you will encounter unforeseen and unfair circumstances. You will be blindsided, and you will be angry. You will likely stomp your feet, cry a few rivers and curse many around you. But overall, you can choose the approach and view you take in life. And if you choose to use honey, your life will be so much sweeter.
