It’s a choice. To be positive and free, or to be imprisoned by your own negativity. To live in the past, or to be hopeful about the present.
With 2018 now behind us, I’m sitting here on the eighth anniversary of a dear family member’s passing, thinking about the last conversation I had with her. With a soft, weak voice she told me her only regret was that she didn’t appreciate every year with the same passion and purpose that she had in the final two years of her life, after she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. “I’ve accomplished so much recently,” she told me. “If I had only known, I would have started sooner.”
Her words have been a pulsing wake-up call to me ever since. And today, I hope they help change your perspective too.
As Kurt Vonnegut once said, “Of all the words of mice and men, the saddest are: “It might have been.”
So with a New Year upon you, realize that you have a priceless opportunity! Forget the past year. Forget your age and what could’ve or should’ve been. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. At the end of it, let there be no excuses, no explanations and no regrets.
Here are 15 great ideas to get you to December 31st, 2019 with a smile on your face and a sense of accomplishment in your heart…
- Be the leader of your own journey. – There are far too many capable people who don’t pursue their dreams and goals because they let their fears, or others, talk them out of it. They give up before they even try and simply let life’s river flow them downstream. Choose to be stronger than that. Choose to swim upstream when you have to. Choose to do the things in life that move you. Let others lead small lives. Let others argue over small things. Let others cry over small wounds. Let others leave their future in someone else’s hands. But not YOU.
- Embrace uncertainty. – Sometimes what you don’t want is exactly what you need. Sometimes what you’re most afraid of doing is the very thing that will set you free. Some of the most incredible chapters in your life won’t have a title you feel comfortable with until much later. [Read more…]