Category: Inspirational

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Inspirational Samuel

Staring At a Stranger Until They Smile

I recently read a funny challenge on one of my favorite blogs (life listed by Danny Dover).  The challenge was actually a set of small items to complete in 1 month, and 1 of the items (stare at a stranger in public until they smile back at you sounded like it would be a lot of fun).  I also thought it would be pretty easy because I smile at people and they smile back all the time. Well my first attempt at doing this challenge didn’t go very well.

 

Attempt 1. I’m in line at the grocery store and see this lady with 2 kids behind me. She looks to be in a pretty bad mood, and the 2 hellions that she appears to be raising or at least purchasing food for look like a total nightmare (watching the entire scene I remember thinking to myself, man I am glad I don’t have any kids lol).  So anyway I thought you know this lady could use a smile, now is a good time to try this stranger challenge. So I attempt to catch eye contact with her for 30 seconds or so…. fail. She is just watching these kids and telling them to settle down.  Ok I need to step up my game and get her attention. She has her cart placed in between me and the rack of snacks that they have just before you check out… you know all the bad stuff you shouldn’t eat but they force tempt you with right before you leave.  So what I decide to go with is I will ask her to hand me some gum, give her a big smile and she will be forced to smile back at my pearly whites…. all that ends up really happening is she (slightly annoyed) hands me a pack of gum (which I didn’t even really want) and I now am checking out with an unwanted pack of gum, and the laborious task of grabbing the gum has clearly annoyed stranger lady even more…. by this point I’m starting to get my items rung up by the cashier so I don’t have much more time left…. never one to bow to fate I decide that I will do a last ditch effort to just stare at her smiling while the cashier rings all my food up…. the end result of this smile blitzkrieg is that the cashier finally taps me on the shoulder and asks me to please swipe my credit card…. so now I have 1 extra pack of gum, 1 slightly more annoyed lady, and 1 slightly annoying cashier…. I decide its best to cut my losses and try this whole make a random stranger smile some other time.

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Inspirational Julia

Even the Terrible Things: A Book Review

“Even the Terrible Things Seem Beautiful to Me Now” is a collection of articles written by a Chicago Tribune columnist, Mary Schmich, and anyone who ever lived in or wants to live in Chicago should read it.

The first section of the book is about Mothers and the very first story made me cry as I read it in the book store while I was deciding if I was going to buy the book or not. in such a relatable way. The way she describes a powder blue bike that her dad gave her even though he didn’t have much to give, made me think about cruising on the city streets at dusk, swerving to avoid car doors and feeling free with the wind on your face and in your hair.

She talks about tragedy and strength in the same sentence as she describes how a Chicago judge, who’s husband and mother were murdered, comforts her children and ends up going back to work.

Schmich is able to take a normal life, a normal story, and show it for the incredible gift that it is. She says her mom told her, in her old age, that looking back across her life she could only see good. She said that even the terrible things seemed beautiful to her now. How hopeful is that for every reader? That life gives you what it will and in the end – somehow- everything looks beautiful.

Book Review Grade: A

Writing style: Frank, honest and raw

Mood: while there is a lot of sadness in this book, there is a prevailing theme of hope and strength and survivorship

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Inspirational

Getting What you Want

I’ve been working a lot on figuring out what it is I want, and the internet and great writers’ insights have been helping me to try and figure things out. I haven’t read this book, but  I did pull a quote from it that I really think is important to remember when in the process of trying to figure things out for yourself and your life.

From Alain De Botton’s The Pleasures of Sorrow and Work:

“One of the interesting things about success is that we think we know what it means. A lot of the time our ideas about what it would mean to live successfully are not our own. They’re sucked in from other people. And we also suck in messages from everything from the television to advertising to marketing, etcetera. These are hugely powerful forces that define what we want and how we view ourselves. What I want to argue for is not that we should give up on our ideas of success, but that we should make sure that they are our own. We should focus in on our ideas and make sure that we own them, that we’re truly the authors of our own ambitions. Because it’s bad enough not getting what you want, but it’s even worse to have an idea of what it is you want and find out at the end of the journey that it isn’t, in fact, what you wanted all along.”

This helps me remember to not covet what it appears that other people have, and to remain focused on myself and my own shit. It also strikes a little bit of fear (the good kind) in me to really be motivated to find the work I love to do and the life I want to live, and just live it. As to not end up like someone who may strive hard for what they think others want for them or what they think success is- only to find in the end,  it doesn’t make them happy.

 

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Inspirational

Song of the Day

Several of my friends and I have started a ‘song of the day’ text and its made such a difference to my workday.

One my my ‘song of the day’ songs, that my younger sister introduced me to, pumps me up at work when I am stressed by feelings of inadequacy and in the gym when I am working out and want to stop. It’s totally 80’s sounding but the beat is fun and the lyrics are so great.  I love all genres of music and what makes me love a song are the lyrics, so even if flash-back to 80’s style pop is not your thing…and I know it’s not my co-contributor’s thing AT ALL…I urge you to listen to this song and tell me you don’t feel a little pumped up.

‘Falling’ by Haim

What else is great about this song of the day with my friends is the want to send them a happy song, and so often when left to my own devices I go for sad and slow or sad and fast. Its nice to be recommended and to recommend, happiness.

Happy Monday.

 

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Inspirational

Simple Joys

Sometimes little things can really affect your day for the positive or the negative. I have written a list of simple activities that bring me enjoyment.  When you find yourself in a bad mood think of your list of simple joys and try to do one:

-running hot water over my hands

-taping my hockey stick

– Playing Hockey, Playing Golf, Lifting Weights, Biking

– Watching the Ryan Oreily summer workout Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fitSz07EFEw

-speeding up so that one of those police signs on the side of the road stops showing your speed and just blinks (slow down)

– Doing an exotic Hill Jog real late at night

– Eating a legend club from legrands with a bag of billy goat chips and a twisted tea

– Watching the St. Louis Blues or St. Louis Cardinals play

-Watching construction workers build or tear down a building (watching a wrecking ball tear something down is an especially good treat)

-Watching anyone do a physical activity really well and really focused.

-Foam rolling with Hanna Corbin

– Vacuuming the floor, hearing all the little crummies get sucked up, and knowing that I won’t feel them on my socks later.

-being the first person to cross at a crosswalk and having everyone follow

-running on moving walkways (mainly the ones at the airport)

-looking up at the stars

-writing on this blog

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Inspirational Samuel

Dreams

Dreams have always been very interesting to me. I’ve always been confused when I have a particularly weird dream what it could mean, if it means anything at all, and what caused me to have the dream…. One such dream happened to me last night and when I woke up I wrote as much of it down as I could remember:

Dream starts:

Nelly (the rapper/singer) walks up to a stage. I’m sitting in the library….. wait what the hell is Nelly doing on a stage in the library. He then proceeds to perform a silent concert. Everyone in the library has his microphone linked to their laptop/computer/tablet and can hear what he is singing through their headphones. I take my headphones off for a second to hear if he is really making noise and disrupting the library, magically he is not. I put my headphones back on and rock out to must be the money.

Once the concert is over I stop by the stage and take a photo with Nelly and thanked him for the great concert. I told him he may not know but that was such a big deal and so helpful to many people because we were stressed out about school (what I have not been in school for 4 years?)

We then got into a discussion about Nellys charity in Africa and how he was getting down that he could not affect more positive change in the area. In particular the road infrastructure was lacking and he could not transport drilling rigs to drill for water wells fast enough. He was also trying to get food and medicine to lots of cities but it was taking forever due to the bad roads…. I tried to inspire him and left him with the advise of “opportunities are often disguised as problems ” which he really enjoyed.

 

The next time you have a crazy dream try to write down as much of it as possible right when you wake up.  I know for me I forget details quickly so leave a pen and paper by your bed for a few nights and record what your crazy mind comes up with.