A Choice to Be Positive

      I'm sure there are people out there who look at each new day as a new chance to live a happy life, or save the world, or be a better person. They are the perpetually optimistic souls who make the rest of us want to puke.  (Just kidding, sort of, lol.)  I, on the other hand find optimism a challenge at best. It doesn't come naturally.  I don't wake up in the morning thinking "Another beautiful day!" 
     Optimism is a choice.  For me, it's something I have work at. So many events and people in my life have tainted my ability to look at the bright side of a situation.  It would be easy to be cynical and bitter, and I'm tired of having to work so hard at everything.  Still...this is life. I face each day trying to suppress my inclination to believe that whatever can go wrong, most assuredly will. Instead, I search for my inner "Mary Sunshine" and try scrounge up the few tidbits of hope and faith that are stuck under the cushions of my couch.  Hey! Maybe I'll find that winning lottery ticket there too. (Well...let's not get carried away...)  But seriously, if there's a chance that tomorrow will be horrible, there is just as much chance that it will be fantastic. I have to remind myself of that once in a while.  Sometimes it only takes a hummingbird outside my window; or one of my kids saying something silly, or my dog sleeping upside-down with his paws in the air. It's those little things that remind me how to smile. It's those blessings that help me get through the pain and frustration in my life.
     I'm not always successful at being that positive person, but I try...and I dream of the morning I'll wake up and say "Another beautiful day!"....and mean it. Who knows? It could happen.

Just when you think...

You know how when doctors tell you to take a test and they say "I'm sure it'll be nothing..." and you believe them?  Inside you know that, obviously, once in a while it's not "nothing",  it's "something".  You always assume however, that the "something" will be on someone else's test results...not yours, and not someone that you care about.   Still it happens. Life sucks that way sometimes. It's hard but we get through it, one way or another.  Everyone gets through it in different ways: we grieve, we shout, we cry, we laugh, we blame...and in the end, nothing changes except us.  We still have to go through the pain, make the decisions, live past the difficult times.  My mom used to say "This too, shall pass." I hope she's right.