Daily Motivator - December
 

December 1

Glowing on the inside

How can you fill the day with ambition and focused action without erupting in stress and anxiety? Care greatly while also not caring at all.

Give personally without taking it personally. Involve your body, mind, spirit in the effort while detaching your ego from the result.

Do that, and challenge becomes a good thing, great in fact. Do that, and you’ll eagerly seek to jump into even the most demanding work.

The way to trap yourself in a giant blob of stress is to make it all about you. Fortunately, you never have to do that.

Be there, be involved, be a part, be effective, but don’t let it define you or dictate your attitude. Let what you do flow from who you are, from how you choose to feel, rather than the other way around.

Do the hard stuff, the complicated, difficult and rewarding stuff, without letting it be so hard on you. Keep peace, love, goodness glowing on the inside, and you can gracefully make great progress on the outside.

— Ralph Marston

December 2

Difficult but not impossible

It’s difficult to get back up and get going again when you’ve been repeatedly knocked down. It’s difficult, but not impossible.

It’s difficult to move forward with enthusiasm and energy when much of what you encounter is negative and discouraging. That’s certainly difficult, yet not impossible.

It’s easy to know what you must do. It’s much more difficult to actually do it, yet it’s not impossible.

There are a lot of very worthwhile things that are also very difficult. Just because they are difficult is no reason to shy away from them.

The very fact that something is difficult probably means it is worth doing. Those who achieve great things are those who are willing to do the difficult stuff.

Sure it’s difficult, yet you can do it. When you do, you’ll be adding richness, options, value to your life and your world.

— Ralph Marston

December 3

Adventure calls

Shake off the dust that has settled on your sense of adventure. Today is your chance to inject new energy into life.

Venture a few steps away from what’s comfortable and familiar. Remind yourself you can handle it, then venture out a little bit more.

You really don’t want to waste this once-in-a-lifetime day by living it just like all the others. Whatever your situation may be, you have countless ways to add new, challenging, interesting substance.

Turn down a road where you’ve never gone. Listen with curiosity and respect to a viewpoint that’s thoroughly different than your own.

Reconnect with someone you haven’t talked to in years. Form a new friendship with someone decades older or younger than you.

Don’t let yourself take this unique day for granted. Now, while you can, put some delicious adventure into it.

-Ralph S. Marston

December 4

Choose the best assumptions

You can’t think through every little decision every time. So you make assumptions.

Those assumptions often serve you well, and you’d be overwhelmed without them. However, many of those assumptions could also be holding you back.

Some of your assumptions may have never been accurate in the first place. Others may have ceased to be true a long time ago, so it pays to regularly examine and question them.

There are things you assume to be impossible, for you, or for anyone. But are they really impossible, or is your assumption just serving as a convenient excuse?

There are things you assume you need, to get your work done, to be happy. But do you really need them, or are you sticking with them just because they’re comfortable and familiar?

You can’t completely eliminate assumptions, yet you can make sure they don’t hold you back. Take a look at your assumptions, and choose only the ones that best reflect and enhance the life you wish to live.

— Ralph Marston

December 5

Quick recovery

Disappointment hurts, yet with enough time you can get over it, and get back to a more positive frame of mind. But do you really need all that time to make a recovery?

Interruptions and distractions shatter your focus, and yet you can eventually regain that focus. What if you could shorten eventually to immediately?

It’s a fact of life that you’re going to be disappointed, interrupted, frustrated, and nudged into negativity. Fortunately, you never have to stay there long.

You cannot reasonably expect to never get knocked down. Yet you can always choose to make a quick recovery.

Decide that you won’t give the negative things time to establish momentum. The moment you know you’ve gotten off track, give power to the intention of re-establishing your positive focus.

Instead of getting upset over what went wrong, use all your energy to get quickly back to what you were doing. Make it your intention, and you’ll find yourself making it happen.

— Ralph Marston

December 6

Now you are free

If a thought is not serving you well, release it. Give yourself permission to let it go.

Is there a thought that has you stuck in fear and worry, that’s keeping you awake, blocking you from positive action? You no longer have to hold on to it.

You can stop fighting the thought. You can stop providing it a place to exist, stop giving it a reason to be.

You have the power right now to let that thought dissolve into nothing. Choose to clear it from your head, from your life, never welcome to return.

Breathe in the fresh air of a fresh beginning. Feel the power of peace as it expands into your entire awareness.

Now you are free to think higher thoughts with a clear mind, with positive purpose. Now you are free to live your best life.

— Ralph Marston

December 7

Change and endure

Seek change, embrace change, encourage change. At the same time be wary of change, careful about how you make it.

Change exists at the heart of life, forming the very definition of life. Yet there is more to life than mere change.

Life has meaning, beauty, worth because it can transcend change. There is an essential, treasured part of you that is the same as it ever was, and will always be.

Life changes and at the same time, endures. As such, in that glorious contradiction, there is nothing else like it.

Seize opportunities to change, to grow, improve, move forward. At the same time, refuse to compromise those fundamental, enabling values on which your life is built.

Change, but not just for the sake of change. Change in order to better express the meaning, the purpose, the essence that is always you.

— Ralph Marston

December 8

Enthusiasm gets results

Your level of success depends on your level of enthusiasm. But your level of enthusiasm does not necessarily depend on your level of success.

Even when the results are not what you wanted, choose to go forward with enthusiasm. Because that will empower you to create the results you do want.

Enthusiasm pushes you to continue failing long enough to arrive at success. Enthusiasm expresses your belief in what you’re doing in a way that’s compelling and contagious.

When you’re cynical and dejected, even the best strategies, tools, resources won’t work very well. Yet when you’re enthusiastic, you’ll find plenty of ways to get the very best out of whatever you have to work with.

With enthusiasm, you see opportunities that would otherwise be invisible. With enthusiasm, you attract other enthusiastic, effective people to support your cause.

Even when the situation offers no reason to be enthusiastic, there’s a great reason to be enthusiastic. Because enthusiasm gets results.

— Ralph Marston

December 9

The wonder is yours

Live in wonder of the wonder. Refuse to let your aliveness grow complacent.

See that in each new moment a whole new world is born. Be dazzled by the beauty, inspired by the possible.

Laugh at the worries as you recall how foolish they are. Smile at the opportunities as you find new joy bringing them to life.

Keep your spirit always young, delighted and amazed at every little thing. Warm your skin in the sunlight, cool your face in the breeze.

Never stop discovering again how much you have and how little you need. Never stop making new richness from it all.

The wonder is yours, now, here, always. Live it, love it, share it, be it.

— Ralph Marston

December 10

Broaden your perspective

Is it really so important that you get your way? Is it really so important that you prove your point?

Life is about more than making an impressive appearance. Life is about more than getting the last word.

The things that matter are not the things that boost your ego. A fulfilling life is impossible if you value yourself above all else.

By all means assert yourself when the situation calls for it. Remember though, that most situations, most interactions do not call for it.

Value is built through understanding, and understanding arises from respectfulness. Achievement requires cooperation, and it is humility, not pride, not vanity, that brings about that cooperation.

Let go of the narrow, superficial concerns that create unnecessary barriers, that hold you back. Broaden your perspective and get much more from life than merely getting your way.

-Ralph S. Marston

December 11

Inspired by action

The work is not easy. But that is no reason to avoid it.

You’re not clear about what to do. But that is no excuse to do nothing.

What you must do is get started. What you must be is committed to seeing it through.

Begin the task, take the first step, and your effort will illuminate the next step. Stay with it, keep going, and your purpose and passion grow strong.

If you wait for inspiration, and do nothing, the inspiration has no place to take hold. Instead, get busy, and with each effort your work becomes more inspired.

Invest yourself, commit your time, your action, your focus to the progress you desire. Go ahead, do, and you’ll be inspired to do much more.

— Ralph Marston

December 12

Value in every experience

You are always experiencing something, so fill all those experiences with value. Make it your intention to bring quality and enrichment to every experience.

The nature of the experience matters not so much. What you put into the experience, that’s far more important.

You don’t have to wait or hope or strive for conditions to be a certain way. You can make anything you do into a worthwhile, fulfilling experience.

Don’t waste the experience fighting against external factors with anger, resentment or frustration. Instead, visualize yourself emerging with a stronger, more positive purpose, with peaceful inspiration, wisdom, and new energy.

Every experience is filled with opportunities to make life richer. Embrace those opportunities, allow that new richness to grow from your attitude and your actions.

Recognize the great value in this experience, and the next, and the next. Give your best, whatever the situation may be, and add that value to the experience of your life.

— Ralph Marston

December 13

Better

Quantity is easy. Quality is better.

Transactions are efficient. Relationships are better.

Free is popular, enticing. Challenge, effort, paying the price, are better.

Fleeting fame is widely celebrated. Quiet, lasting achievement is better.

Being coddled is effortless. Freedom and responsibility, with all the work and messy situations they entail, are better.

The meme of the hour is trendy. Thinking, choosing for yourself, living with intention is much better.

— Ralph Marston

December 14

What already is

Desire what already is. Love, be thankful for, enjoy, find fulfillment, meaning, peace and hope in what already is.

Do not cheat yourself out of life by delaying your living of it until some idealized future. Now is when you are, when everything is, when the reality of life is.

Right now you can laugh, cry, learn, work, fall down, get up, and laugh some more. Right now you can bring to life your highest hopes, strongest values, and most treasured dreams.

Yes, by all means imagine where you can go. And extend that imagining all the way to now, when you can actually do something positive about it.

You have arrived. Here is the real world, your real, miraculous life, filled with every possibility.

What already is, is infinite abundance in every direction. Embrace it, benefit from it, do great things with it, now.

— Ralph Marston

December 15

New fulfillment

Push through the fog of doubt and hesitation. Today rewards you with great endeavors to pursue.

Shake off excuses that have long ago grown stale. Discover once again the thrill of your own effort, the joy of your own effectiveness, the satisfaction of your own good action.

Raise up into reality your best ideas, dreams, intentions. Drink in the soul-nourishing elixir of achievement by your own hands.

Plunge into challenges, daring them to reveal how strong you truly are. Experience life at its highest level as you transform raw abundance into meaningful value.

Today exists as a vessel to be loaded with new fulfillment. You gaze upon opportunity that stretches beyond the horizon, and grow determined not to let anything stand in your way.

Get swept up and carried along by that determination, even further than you thought you could roam. Latch on to the best possibilities, here, now, and don’t let go.

— Ralph Marston

December 16

Stop and start

Stop caring so much about things that don’t matter. Invest your time, effort, energy in the things that do.

Stop pretending to yourself and others that you’re perfect. Your shortcomings make you real, authentic, and besides, nobody believes you’re perfect anyway.

Stop obsessing over who is to blame for the problem. Start working to create a great solution.

Stop putting things off until conditions are ideal. Start to work from where you are, with what you have, doing all you can do with the situation as it is.

Stop complaining that there’s not enough time. Start making full use of the time you have, right now.

Stop cheating yourself with excuses, procrastination, doubt and fear, out of the great life you deserve to live. Start giving all you have to joyfully lift up all there is.

— Ralph Marston

December 17

The benefit of your action

Escape the stale confinement of wishing, waiting, wondering. Refresh your day with action.

Shake off the excuses and rationalizations, the second guesses, regrets and indecisiveness. Energize your life with action.

Not every action will bring the results you desire. Yet the more you take action, the more effective you become at achieving what you choose.

Every time you act you create valuable experience. Besides producing results, that experience builds on itself, boosting your confidence and competence.

Is there something you wish you had done sooner? Or is there something you’ve been trying to decide how to start?

Give your attitude, your life, your world the benefit of your action. Do yourself a favor today, and get it done.

-Ralph S. Marston

December 18

Focus on the goodness

Choose words today that encourage. Choose actions today that assist, empower, unify.

Live today with generosity, gratitude, wonder and enthusiasm. Be slow to anger, quick to forgive, understanding and patient with yourself and others.

Offer your smile, offer your kindness. Give your respect and your positive presence.

This is the world you live in, the day you have to work with. Make it your intention to make it a good, supportive time and place.

Many good people are going to do many good things today. Take the opportunity to add your own beneficial actions to the mix.

What you focus on gains power and influence in your life, in your world. So focus on the goodness, and watch as that goodness spreads.

— Ralph Marston

December 19

Brand new ground

It doesn’t matter so much where you are. What matters is where you think you are, how you see yourself.

Where you’ve been can be interesting, inspiring and highly instructive. What’s much more relevant, though, is where you’re headed.

The past is finished, sealed into history, unchangeable. Put its victories, shortcomings, assumptions behind you.

Give yourself the extreme advantage of a positive, empowering attitude today, here and now. Whatever you did or failed to do, or thought or said before, now you have brand new ground to cover.

Wrap yourself around the fresh new opportunity that is right now. Give your best efforts, your highest values, your most fervent energy to the moment you’re now living.

Acknowledge that this time right now is on track to be the most successful time you’ve ever known. And everything you have, everything you are, will push you to make it so.

— Ralph Marston

December 20

Great things you can do

Go ahead and make it happen. Forget about what others might think.

There are plenty of challenges, obstacles, things that could go wrong. But none of that has to stop you.

Prepare yourself well for what you intend to do, then do it. Step forward, keep going, and persist until the job is done.

Yes, you’ll make mistakes, suffer setbacks, experience your share of frustration, inconvenience, and discomfort. But that’s no reason to shy away from the good things you know you can accomplish.

The temporary pains of your effort are nothing compared to the permanent pain of regret you’d have if you let the opportunity pass you by. So jump in, meet the challenges, give the best you have.

Don’t leave yourself always wondering what might have been. Use this opportunity to show yourself and the world all the great things you can do.

— Ralph Marston

December 21

You can do this

You can do this. Though the resistance inside you is strong, that strength doesn’t matter when you let the resistance go.

You can make this happen. Your energy begins to increase the moment you put it to use.

You deserve to achieve. Make the effort, pay the price, do the work to give yourself what you deserve.

You can take the first small step. You can know the thrill of making a difference, and you can build on that momentum.

You can rise above the meaningless noise, confusion, distractions. Feel the power of your focus as you make great progress.

You can set your intention, make the choice to do this and then, you can do this. Go ahead, fulfill the potential that’s already yours, and claim the achievement you’re here right now to create.

— Ralph Marston

December 22

Make your thinking intentional

The quality of your thoughts from moment to moment greatly impacts the quality of your life. From your thoughts flow your choices, your actions, the way you look at life, the way you respond to whatever happens.

You wouldn’t drink water from a filthy cesspool. And you wouldn’t want to derive your thoughts from the mental equivalent of a cesspool.

Make your thinking, and the source of your thoughts, intentional. Don’t sit endlessly in front of a screen and allow random thoughts of dubious origin to be fed to you.

Yes, pay attention to what’s going on in your world, and consider the perspectives of others. Yet make your own thoughts, the thoughts that fill your mind throughout the day, of your own choosing.

Select your thoughts based on your purpose, your values, your dreams, what you love and care about. Choose thoughts that empower, impassion, inspire and energize you.

Take care not to let your thoughts be dominated by those who do not have your best interests at heart. Take active responsibility for your own thoughts, making use of their great power to move your life and your world positively forward.

— Ralph Marston

December 23

Follow through

Follow through on your possibilities. Follow through on your dreams, no matter how old they are, or how long they’ve been dormant.

You had the idea, you had the inspiration, and you have the potential to make it happen. Now, follow through.

Something caused you to put it off. Now, pick it back up.

The desire has grown stronger, and your ability has grown even more. Take out your dream, dust it off, and do it.

Fulfill the potential you know you have, and make good on the promise you made to yourself. You had a good reason to make that promise, and now you have an even better reason to see it through.

Life may have gotten in the way, yet now is a new opportunity. Get it done, follow through, and make it happen.

— Ralph Marston

December 24

Allow peace to be

Let go of the troubles and let peace into this moment. Allow peace to be, and let your life give new life to it.

Breathe in the fresh air of possibility. Feel the energy of love deep within you.

See that most of the things that seem so urgent are not really that important. Choose right now to focus your life, your awareness, on what truly matters.

In this moment, there is no stress, no conflict, nothing you need. For you are here, aware, experiencing the beauty, wonder, goodness of existence.

Stay for a little while and feel the part of you that is always you. Feel how your essence transcends time and circumstance.

Sink deeper into the peaceful presence and absorb its positive power. Then, step forward and share that peace with all of life.

-Ralph S. Marston

December 25

Give of yourself

Give new peace to the moment. Give new hope to the day.

Give laughter, kindness, understanding. Give your time to be there with those you love, to listen, to share the beautiful experience of simply being.

There are hearts you can warm today. There are burdens you can ease, joys you can share.

Give of yourself, and add treasure to your heart that will always be there. Give birth to new richness, and let it spread through the lives around you.

Experience again and again how right it feels to make the world a little brighter. Lose yourself in a generous spirit, letting worries and concerns and judgments melt away.

Give the best of who you are. And who you are gets better, along with all of life.

— Ralph Marston

December 26

Linger long enough

It’s good to live and work with a sense of urgency. But that doesn’t mean everything must be done in a rush.

Life has a certain rhythm and pace. If you attempt to race ahead of the moment, you miss its richness.

Making your efforts faster does not necessarily make them better. Being always anxious about what’s coming next, prevents you from giving your full focus to what’s happening now.

Be careful not to reduce your life to just a meaningless blur of activity. Give the things you do the time they deserve, at a pace that’s most effective.

Give yourself the time to fully experience each moment. Give others the time to share meaningful conversation, presence and companionship.

There’s much more to life than just quickly checking the boxes. Realize the great value of right now, and linger long enough to make all that value yours.

— Ralph Marston

December 27

Live with goodness

The worst response to the pettiness of others is with pettiness of your own. You’re bigger than that, with much better things to do.

Someone else’s selfishness is not a good reason for you to be selfish. Let it serve instead as a powerful reminder to be more generous, kind, considerate.

You will not find any lasting fulfillment by propagating a lot of manufactured drama. Set your sights higher, much higher, seeking with humility and respect to make a genuine contribution to every situation, to every person you encounter.

All sorts of people will in all sorts of ways attempt to offend you. But you never have to be roped into their fruitless games.

Choose to let the shortsighted behavior of others bounce right off you. Concern yourself with being your best, with living your highest values, with benefitting the lives around you.

Stay strong, grow stronger, responding always by aligning your focus on positive purpose. Persevere in your choice to think, to act, to live with goodness, kindness, and love.

— Ralph Marston

December 28

Getting upset

Getting upset about the problem does not solve the problem. It does, however, burn up time and energy, and poison your attitude.

Fretting is a poor substitute for action. Let go of the fretting, and opt for the action.

As natural as it may feel to get upset by life’s setbacks, you do have another choice. Instead of getting mired in dismay, you can decide to quickly pick yourself back up.

Just because you have something to get upset about, doesn’t mean you have to get upset. Getting upset doesn’t make you feel better, and it doesn’t accomplish anything, so there’s really no point in it.

What does move you forward is a positive perspective, and that’s something you can choose any time you wish. What does move you forward is focused, determined, effective action.

If you feel yourself getting upset, remind yourself that you have much better options. Choose a positive response, and get quickly beyond whatever was threatening to pull you down.

— Ralph Marston

December 29

Whatever you expect

Once you decide you can do it, you can do it. Once you decide you will do it, you’ll find yourself taking the necessary actions.

Get your own expectations on your side. You’ll suddenly have a powerful ally.

Those expectations reach deep into every decision, every moment. It’s far better to have them constantly working for you than to fight against them.

Expect to get the work done in two weeks, and you’ll get it done in two weeks. Expect to get it done by next Thursday, and you’ll have it finished by next Thursday.

Before the achievement, must come the genuine and unquestioned expectation. As that expectation remains strong and present, the achievement solidifies into reality.

Choose wisely what you truly expect from yourself. Because whatever you continue to expect is precisely what you’ll do.

— Ralph Marston

December 30

New possibilities up ahead

Everything you’ve ever achieved was done with less knowledge and less experience than you possess today. Now that you’ve learned more and done more, just imagine what great things you can do next.

You’ve worked your way through all kinds of challenges. From each one, you’ve emerged with new strength.

Going forward, you’re able to put that strength to good use. Live and work with all the confidence you’ve already earned, and as you do, you’ll build even more.

You’ve taken many steps to get where you are, ready today to step into your future. Every past moment has prepared you to live that future with the best you have.

The joys, disappointments, discoveries, setbacks, challenges and victories all still live inside you. Let them push you, inspire you, inform you, enlighten you as you encounter the new possibilities up ahead.

Your future is ready to begin, and there is much you have to offer it. Make good and meaningful use of it all, and make it the best time ever.

— Ralph Marston

December 31

Extraordinary purpose

Live the ordinary days with extraordinary purpose, and you achieve great things. Remember often enough where you intend to go, and you absolutely will get there.

A New Year is upon you, filled with days, with moments, with opportunities. Commit yourself right now to take those opportunities, to live the upcoming days with positive purpose, with enthusiastic energy, with the highest expectations.

You deserve to live a life that’s rich with meaningful experience, a life that matters, that makes a difference. And you deserve to be the person who makes that life unfold in your own unique way.

You have skills you don’t yet know you have, and resources you don’t even realize are available to you. The way to discover all the great things you can do is to constantly push yourself to act, to constantly be reminded of your best possibilities.

Imagine what will happen this coming year when you funnel all your energy, feelings, joys, passions, dreams into purposeful action. Imagine how great you’ll feel, knowing you’ve made full and loving use of all the moments available to you.

Imagine it, then make the choice to make it happen. The New Year awaits, and you’ve already begun to live it with extraordinary purpose.

-Ralph S. Marston