you is kind

Choosing to be positive and having a grateful attitude is going to determine how you’re going to live your life. – Joel Olsteen

 

Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity.  Successful men act as though they have accomplished or are enjoying something and soon it becomes a reality. Act, look, feel successful, conduct yourself accordingly, and you will be amazed at the positive results. – William Jam

I am SURE this is hard to believe, but I am really hard on myself.  Like, harder than I should be.  Like, tell myself things that I wouldn’t even utter to my worst enemy.

Like:

You aren’t good enough

You aren’t smart enough.

You aren’t pretty enough.

You are damaged goods, no one will love you.

So many people have already given up on you, don’t you think God has too?

And it’s not just every once in a while.  I find that it’s constant white noise in the background.  This incessant dogging of myself isn’t triggered by something specific!  It’s just THERE.  Whispering things to myself that I wouldn’t ever say to an enemy, because they are the types of things that you can’t get back.  You don’t forget someone calling you fat, no matter how SKINNY you get.  It’s always there, especially when you don’t eat perfect or your pants feel tight one day.  And the older I get, the WORSE it gets.  Especially when you start to focus on any and all failures in your life.

BUT.

THIS YEAR.

It Stops. For good.  Not just for today, not for a month.  But for the entire year.  I promise myself that I will not be negative.  And despite the fact I don’t always believe in it.  I will be nice to myself.  Polite.  Respectful, even!

Goal 3 – Turn All Negative Phrases into Positive

Lord knows I am going to fail more times than I succeed in this practice.  Positive ANYTHING has got to be better than Negative Nothing, right?  So as most things in life, this is just about a habit.  I don’t believe in what I am saying yet.  But for example,

A positive attitude causes a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events and outcomes. It is a catalyst and it sparks extraordinary results. – Wade Boggs

I REALLY want this year to be a positive year.  I want to achieve some very big things, and in order to do that, my attitude has to start that journey.  So I have been telling myself the following things daily:

• You CAN do this.
• You work hard every day – you look great!
• Chemistry isn’t that hard and you ARE smart enough to do this.
• Your backside is not too big – its just the way God made it.

These are just the top 4 things I hear myself say over and over.  And let’s be honest – I totally do not believe it.  Yet. But positive attitude fosters more positive attitudes.  So, where this isn’t a life-changing goal, it might just change my life.

 

make it yours.

Over the next couple of weeks, I will be sharing goals with you and will WELCOME comments and encouragement!  I am attending a Goal Workshop tomorrow night, and I hope that it will spur me on to really thinking about what I fully want.  Not what my parents think I should have, not what my friends are doing, not what my peers judge me into doing.  What Ruth Wants To Do.

Over the last few months, I really have been rolling that around in my head – what is it that I really want to DO with my life.  In my early 20’s, it was to get married and show people that I didn’t have to have a degree to get anywhere.  I was SO adamant about that point.  SO!  And I still think it is crazy for something jobs to discount experience for time spent in college.  After all, I technically spent 4 years and PLENTY of credit hours.  But in this world, I can’t force people to think the way I do.  So, I am caving and getting a degree….10 years after the first time I started.  10.  Full.  Years.

GOAL 1 in 2013 (to be completed by December, 2013)

Graduate college at UAB with a Marketing Degree.

That means I have to take eight classes in 2013.

That means this spring, I am taking three classes.

That means this summer, I need to take two or three classes (depending on what is available)

And that means hopefully just two in the Fall of 2013.

And while that sounds like a lot to most people, to me, I just have to stay focused.  I’m Broke As A Joke, so travelling doesn’t hasn’t been an option.  And I have spent the last 10 years being (relatively) footloose and fancy-free.  I’ve had worse.  So what is one really tough, busy, mentally hard year.  I will tell you what – it seems like NOTHING compared to the emotionally hard years of 2008-2010.  Mental strength, I can find.

 

This goal is a perfect example of falling down 7 times.  I really haven’t EVER been public about this – if you point-blank ask me, I would tell you.  But I certainly don’t even like to tell people this piece of information.  It automatically prompts two responses: I thought you had one or Why didn’t  you finish?  The first statement making me feel inadequate about lack of education albeit PLENTY of hardcore experience.  The second question is just never fun to answer…but it usually goes like this:  I was supposed to graduate a semester early as I came into college with 14 credit hours (a full semester) based on my High School education.  I wanted to take off a semester and work or do SOMETHING other than school because I was freaking out about being 21 and having to get a full time job.  At the time, I was fully advised (told straight-up) just to finish school and get it over with.  And in one of my better bits of rebellion, just decided to fail school instead.  Go ahead.  Just read that again.  To be honest, I don’t really know if it was a conscious decision or one I just let happen, but  I received a 68 in a class that I had to have a 70 to graduate.  The best part?  If I had just attended class, if I had JUST SHOWED UP to class, I would have graduated.  My sorry a$$ decided that I didn’t want to.  So I tried talking to three teachers and no one would help me (I don’t know that I would have either).  It is one of a HANDFUL of regrets that I have.  Not one that I focus and morn every day, but one single event that if I could go back and change I would.  But let’s be honest….would I go back to being 21?  Uhhh, NO.  I can’t think of a worser time to go back to!  I happen to like 30, and graduating college NOW is going to mean something that graduating then NEVER would have.

So.  Here on my 8th time getting up, let’s graduate college, shall we?