The Joyfulicity Blog

One day at a time. One step at a time. One breath at a time. One task at a time. This is your life. Be there.

Your value does not decrease based on someone else's inability to see and appreciate your worth. It makes zero actual difference what anyone else thinks at all. Stay close to those who know that you are a unique gem, and help you to believe it too.

It is about THANKS and GIVING. Hugs. Smiles. Love. Let's take some time this week to refocus our lives on these beautiful principles. Life changing in their simplicity. And make a commitment and a plan as to how to incorporate them into the rest of the year as well, so they become part of our very beings. Gratitude is the foundation of joy. You can't really have one without the other.

After a couple of months taking ballroom dance lessons, I have come to a surprising realization. The hardest part for me has not been the steps or the rhythm as I had expected. Those have been coming fairly naturally. As it turns out, the thing I have found most challenging is learning how to follow.

Ahhh the proverbial elephants in the room. You know - those things we don't talk about that continue to grow until they finally force our attention.

Learning to create and exist in the quiet is well worth the effort. To truly hear what your heart has to say, when you take the time to listen. It may surprise you.

It is often from emptiness that beauty is born, and only empty arms are free to give a hug to someone who needs one. Empty bank accounts, wine glasses and gas tanks can all be refilled. Souls can be too.

To me the ocean, in essence, is a place of love where my inner child laughs and plays. And that, above all, is where its true magic and beauty is found.

Single parenting is not for sissies. It's really tough. So I want you to know today that you are seen. You are known. You are loved. I understand, because I am in the trenches beside you. Most of us didn't plan to become single parents. Life took turns we didn't expect, but yet here we are.

What have YOU been putting off and waiting for? It's never too late to believe in your dreams, even the ones you haven't nurtured for awhile.

What does that look like when we are doing more than we can? How do we recognize when we have crossed the line?

The internet is great for facts, figures, amusing anecdotes and research. We can even find self-help information, motivation and a form of connection on its pages. But spiritual inspiration, advice from loved ones and intuition are important resources too, when seeking answers to the questions that matter most. Love and pure wisdom on a real, personalized level are not found on a computer screen, and I don’t believe they ever will be.

I don’t know who needs to hear this today, but YOU ARE ENOUGH. Let that sink deeply into your heart, and believe it.

We never can eliminate all possible problems or sources of angst, but we can live a life full of joy in spite of them. Happiness can be a powerful antidote to fear if we allow it be.

By “normal” I really mean “necessary,” because sadly it probably actually is the norm for people to continue to live with hurts and disappointments, even when they don’t have to. Lasting change is hard, and takes long term determination and commitment, but it’s so worth it to feel the joy of the difference.

Halloween is not the only day of the year that you get to decide how you want to look, act and be. That is your choice anew, every single day of your life. Masks are fine for occasional fun, but don’t wear one every day. The face of your true self is beautiful - so I challenge you to find it, embrace it, and let it proudly shine.

Jealousy cannot stand in the face of gratitude and love for others. So let's retrain that impulse to envy into an impulse to be overjoyed when others succeed. In fact, to help them to do so as often as possible. Let’s turn that envious moment into a gratitude fest and watch how fast that changes our feelings. With this mindset the answer to “are you sure you’re jealous?” will almost always be NO!!

There are a couple of lies we frequently tell. I am speaking of myself primarily of course, but these are actually pretty common. Almost universal. We proclaim these falsehoods in an effort to excuse all sorts of behavior. We tell these lies to others, but even more destructively we convince ourselves that they are true.

On a rainy day we can see the inconvenience and gloomy clouds, or we can see how beautiful the mist looks floating through the trees. We can look forward to how green the grass will be after the much needed moisture. Both perspectives are accurate. But one makes you feel happy, while the other does not. So which one will you choose??

The more you practice the easier it becomes to stop negative thoughts in their tracks and replace them with positive ones instead. Even if it feels forced at first, stick with it and you'll be amazed at the outcome. You can't always change other people's minds, but it is always within your power to change your own. You can't always change your circumstances, but you can always choose your reaction to them. This is the miracle that gratitude offers us, if we will just accept i