Keep Your Coins

Today, your life is going to change. The change might be monumental or it could be minimal, but today will be different than yesterday and tomorrow will be different than today. How are you going to react to this change?

Maybe you will be scared of the change. Maybe you will run and hide and hope nothing really changes. Maybe you will do everything in your power to keep things exactly as they are. Maybe you like the way things are and even if your life isn't exciting or passionate, you are content. Maybe you will shirk from opportunity.

Maybe you will embrace the change that comes along. Hell, maybe you will encourage the change and cause your own changes to happen. Maybe you will realize life isn't meant to be played safe. Maybe you will take risks. Maybe you will try new things. Maybe you will run with whatever life hands you. Maybe you will be excited for something new.

No matter what you do, today is going to be different. Tomorrow will too. Each day to come will be different than the last. Since change is already going to happen, wouldn't it be great if we learned to embrace it? Wouldn't it be great if we could welcome it and work our asses off to actually change things for the better?

Well, what exactly are we waiting for?

What Will Make This Week Better?

It's Monday morning and as you are getting ready for the week ahead, what are you going to do to make it better? What are you going to do to make this week different? What are you going to do to step out of your comfort zone? Here's a short list of ideas to get you going:

• Do something that scares you
• Go out of your way to make someone happy
• Learn something new
• Start a new project
• Make time to read
• Focus on smiling
• Meditate
• Exercise
• Make "to do" lists every morning
• Volunteer
• Buy a homeless person lunch
• Start a conversation with a stranger
• Get enough sleep
• Eat a healthy meal every day
• Listen to people

In all honesty, it doesn't really matter what you do, just as long as you are doing something. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Stop wasting time and start doing what you need to do to live the life you want. Start today. What are you going to do?

Be Curious, Not Judgmental

Take a minute and think about something really stupid you have done. For all of us, this should be really easy. I know I have done tons of stupid things in my life and I could come up with way more than I would like. How would you like to be continually judged for this stupid thing? How would you like others to spread around what you did to other people, some you know and some you don't, who would also judge you by this stupid thing? 

My guess is you would hate it. You would think it was unfair and wish people wouldn't judge you by one stupid thing you did. We all would. Knowing this, why do we continue to judge other people based on a stupid thing we know they did? If it is something we wouldn't want to happen to us, why do we continue to do it to others? Quit being so damn judgmental.

We all make mistakes. We all do things that are incredibly stupid. Every one of us has something in our past we would be happy to forget. We learn from what we have done and become better because of these lessons. Would we prefer to not do some of these stupid things? Of course we would, but we can't change the past and just have to move forward while learning what we can.

For some reason, we have a hard time letting other people do this. When they do something we consider stupid, we have a hard time letting it go. It may because we want to believe we are better or smarter than these people and we think judging them will make us feel better about ourselves. The truth is, when we constantly judge other people, we don't feel better about ourselves and we look like big assholes. We like to think we would have done something different and better in the same circumstances, but we really don't know because we haven't been there. Your judgment assumes you know everything and you don't.

We are going to do something stupid. Hell, we'll probably do lots of stupid things in the time we have left. Knowing this, we have to remember to not judge other people for the things they do. When you see someone else being judgmental, call them on it. Think about how much better you would feel if you weren't being judged by the people around you. If you would feel better, wouldn't other people feel better if you weren't judging them? It's simple really, just quit being so damn judgmental.