Morning Coffee May 10

Build Personal Resiliency
 
by Jane Powell 
 

“Cultivate your sense of humor.”
 
A sense of humor is recognized as one of the key attributes that build personal resiliency. It’s instrumental in helping us cope with change and other challenges. It’s not really surprising. We all know how much better we feel after a good laugh! It releases tension, puts things back in perspective, and generally helps us take a more positive attitude.
 
Seek ways to bring out your sense of humor. Rent comedies, read the comics, watch children at play, and spend time with friends who see the funny side of life.
 
Laughter is wonderfully contagious. Why not spread some yourself?

Today I can:

Encourage someone who needs encouragement–or even someone who doesn’t seem to need it.
Make a promise to a young person. . . and keep it!
Not criticize anyone for anything, but instead look for the sense that I may not understand in things that other people do.
Make myself do without something that I may want.
Make it the first day of my new diet, or exercise program, or reading program; or I can register for a course in college or at a community center.
Buy a copy of a song I’ve wanted to hear for ages, and sing along with it.
Start a book that I’ve been meaning to start reading. . . or writing.
Give thanks for the day and all the beauty and wonder that it contains–and try to see all of each that I can.
Recognize that everyone is going through their own trials and realize that I can have no idea at all of what they’re feeling–what kind of pain they’re in, or what kind of sorrow they feel. And I can feel and show compassion for them all.
Listen to someone else without putting my two cents’ worth in.
Enjoy the day for the truly precious gift that it is, and enjoy the other people in my world for the truly precious gifts that they are, whether I see their gifts or not!
Thanks Marcella
 

Feel that way
 
What would your life be like if you were living at the most meaningful and fulfilled level you can imagine? If you want to be that way, then choose to feel that way.
 
Your desires are yours because of the way you expect they will make you feel. Yet no matter what your outside situation may be, your inner feelings are yours to choose in any flavor, at any time, in any circumstance.
 
By choosing the feelings that resonate with your dreams, you give real substance and life to those dreams. By deciding to feel that way, you become that way.
 
Though it may seem sometimes your feelings simply come over you, that’s not the way it happens. Whatever you feel is what you have, by habit or by intention, chosen to feel.
 
So instead of feeling hopeless, decide to feel empowered. Instead of feeling angry or bitter, frustrated or fearful, choose to feel determined and effective.
 
Allow your most positive, affirming feelings to fill your awareness. And ride along with those feelings as they find real expression in the substance of your life.
Ralph Marston