Being Thankful For A Successful Future

Yesterday, we talked about what we are thankful for in every single day of our lives.  I got to thinking about this “attitude of gratitude” and I remembered the idea of practicing affirmations to sort of “fake it ’til you make it”. 

Basically, I would venture to assume that practicing affirmations can lead you to success in whatever field you are practicing.  Not only would you live in the present with joy, but you would succeed with your dreams by practicing gratitude for your future success.

I also remember a wise man saying “You don’t do things for what you’ll get out of it.  You do them for who you will become!”  If you’ve been following me for very long, you know that’s an Elliott Hulse quote.

So in all respect to reality, you may not be successful.

…at least not on your first attempt.  But if you dedicate yourself to a mission and practice gratitude, you will find that you are growing into a different person through the challenges and tribulation.

So what does this mean?  Why would we practice affirmations?

While I can’t say that you should do something, I can offer up my own experience because(although it is limited) it’s all I have at the moment.  I mentioned in yesterday’s post, where I listed 5 things I am thankful for(click here to read the post), that I am mostly thankful for the experiences I have gained in this past year alone.  I am 21 and so far 2015 has been the best year of my life.

..not because it was easy!  Because it was hard.  I went through a lot of problems this year, faced a lot of adversity, cut off a lot of harmful relationships, and began a journey of self-improvement.  This year was the best year of my life thus far because of the all of the challenges that I had to overcome, so that I could become someone new.

..and throughout this whole year, I couldn’t have had as many small victories if I had not practiced positive affirmation.  I constantly told myself I would succeed at any small SMART goal I had, and I did!  As I said, this year has been all about self-improvement and I am a lot healthier, stronger, happier, and wiser than I was a year ago.

..and while I’ve done so well this year, I have to remember that we all have humble beginnings.  I am still certainly not where I want to be in any of my long term goals, but I am working to achieve them.  2 quotes come to mind as I think about this journey, or change, that we should all attempt to go through as we constantly affirm that we will succeed:

• One is supposedly a Native American quote.  I’ve seen it on Facebook several times and when I looked it up, I couldn’t find who actually said it, but here it is

 

• I also want to mention a Bible verse, Matthew 26:24, as it seems to be implying the same thing.  It’s interesting how two completely different cultures stressed the same sentiment.

My point is you could challenge yourself so that you can grow and be the type of person you would be proud of, and to guarantee your success you could practice affirmations.   Thanks for reading and my challenge for you today is to not only think of 5 things you are thankful for,

but also 5 things you will be thankful for when you succeed at whatever your goal may be.  Whether they’re materialistic things or a better character, I’m interested in reading your responses.

 

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To Be The Best You Have To Sacrifice

Is there anything in this world that you want more than everything else? Then you must be willing to place it above everything else. 

That just seems like common sense, right? Let’s say you want to be the best boxer in the world, and you want to be as good as boxing legends such as Mike Tyson and Muhammed Ali, but you aren’t willing to give up drinking three out of 7 days a week. I promise you, you will see results but they will remain subpar compared to giving it your all and giving up drinking Thursday through Friday.

I was driving home and I thought about my own journey with lifting weights and nutrition. I personally want to be the best I can be with these things, and I have pretty much given up hanging out with friends and trying to get girls. This probably sounds crazy, but that’s how badly I want to be the best. I work out for almost 2 hours every day except Saturdays, I eat well, I spend at least an hour a day reading books on nutrition, and in the remainder I write new posts for my blog so you have new motivation and content to read.

During my drive home, I remembered someone else who said something similar although on a much higher level and this is strictly metaphorical to my own journey and yours. I thought about Jesus in a passage I read from the Bible. There was a rich man begging him to enter the kingdom of heaven, and Jesus more or less told him that if he wants to be the best follower of Christ he can be and enter Heaven he has to sell all of his belongings and follow Jesus. In a way, you probably think Jesus sounded nuts. However, when you look at it in a context that is metaphorical to whatever you are passionate about, you realize that if your heart really wants something badly enough, Jesus is saying you’ll give up anything for it.

Most of us would never take that step and we would have looked at Jesus like he was crazy, but again it’s all about how badly you want something and the rich man told Jesus he would do anything to enter heaven. Jesus quickly proved that the rich man definitely would not do anything for it, considering he wouldn’t part with his wealth. His wealth was where his heart was.

My heart is with my fitness, and I challenge you to go all in for something you are passionate about. If you want something bad enough, you’ll truly do whatever it takes. Thanks for reading.

By the way, as a disclaimer, you don’t have to quit your job and go out of your way to do these things. I’m simply making the point that your results will be far beyond what they could be if you do go to the extremes and do what it takes. Also, about the point in dropping a job, you may need a job to have the revenue to pursue your dreams so don’t quit absolutely everything people. Again, thanks for reading, and have a great day.