Be Present

Three weeks ago I wrote a post about how I need to escape the negativity in my life and try and focus on all the positives. I was finding that my life was so full of information that was not even related to my own life. I was allowing others to dump in to my circle and I was carrying their luggage around with me in my day to day life.

I had this grand plan of checking in every day to try and remind myself of leaving their rubbish at their door and focusing all of my time and energy on my own life. However, midway through week 1 of this great idea of filling my positive jar up, I came down with an awful bout of mastitis and I stopped writing. I then got carried away with living life that I just didn't make the time to check in.

That is not to say I wasn't refocusing my energy into the right areas of my life like I had originally planned. I have made a huge, conscious effort every morning to remind myself to block out the dark and let in the light. I have put in a lot of effort to ignore the text messages, or the comments or the phone calls that are full of bitching, whinging and whining.  

Whenever my girls have become irritable, instead of falling victim and becoming irritable with them, I have taken us all outside into the sunshine and gone for a walk. Resetting my mind and my attitude in the right direction. 

I have chosen, in most situations, to be happy, friendly and open. I have noticed that in doing so I am being greeted with more smiling faces and more conversations with strangers. I said in my original post that happiness is a choice. These last few weeks have proved this to me. You can wake up in the morning and just not feel right, but you can choose to put that mood back to bed and move on with your day with an open heart. More often then not, you will find that the day will progressively become more enjoyable... if you let it.

My tips for staying positive and avoiding those negative traps have been to have the conversation with the people that you are in the habit of bitching with. Tell them you cannot talk about those damaging topics. Get out into the sunshine as much as possible. Exercise little but often, to maintain motivation. And stretch! On the mornings that I have woken up feeling particularly glum I lay on my bedroom floor and I stretch as many muscles as I have the time for. I take my time and slowly but purposefully breathe and stretch. At the end I always feel so rejuvenated.

The last three weeks, even with that terrible illness, have been full of sunshine, calm and peace. Rather than just have this as a 31 day task, I will be maintaining this line of thought and making this my new way of life. Walk away from the people who bring you down and open up your hearts to the areas of your life that encourage smiles and laughter and love.

Be present... and enjoy