Daily Motivator - February
 

February 1

Living action

Live richly for the sake of doing it. Experience for yourself the highs and lows, the pains and pleasures, the wonders, joys, disappointments and satisfactions.

Embrace every opportunity to go, to learn, to see and hear and know and connect. Give courage and action to your curiosity and let it push you to new levels of participation.

Refuse to enslave yourself to what other people think. Set forth to fulfill the robust potential that lives within you, not to impress but to magnify life’s richness.

Respect your fears, listen to what they have to say, but don’t let them prevent you from living fully. Treasure all you already know and always be eager to experience more.

Consider, evaluate, plan, and prepare, but don’t stop there. Put your ideas, your intentions, your dreams into living action.

Your life is a real and beautiful miracle, not just a concept. Feel the immense, unique value of you, and take an active role in fully bringing the richness to life.

— Ralph Marston

Happy February Tammy and Kracker, thanking
God for safely bringing us through the month of
January one day at a time. This is the day the
Lord has made let us rejoice and be glad in it.
May God's blessing be upon you and your family
during the month of February and beyond.
https://youtu.be/p8Pj8EVcvLg

February 2

Value where you are

See the value in where you are. Consider the benefits of what you have, who you’re surrounded by, the knowledge and skills you possess.

It’s easy to envision better scenarios than the one you’re currently in. Yet the reality is, you are where you are, and there are certain good things about that.

If it’s possible to complain about your situation, it’s also just as possible to find what you can appreciate about it. By focusing on the good aspects and by making use of them, you can multiply and expand on them.

Imagine looking back on this day five years from now. What will you be thankful you had today?

More importantly, what will you be thankful you were able to do? Now is your opportunity to follow that path, to seize upon those positive possibilities.

Fix your attention on what is good, what you can use, what you can do, and resolve to do your best with it all. See the value, see the potential, see the way forward, and put your time and effort into making it happen.

— Ralph Marston

February 3

Opportunity of now

Today is not perfect yet it’s perfectly usable. What good results do you choose to create with it?

The temptation is strong to let important work slide another day, or two, or twenty. Imagine the power and positive consequence of saying no to that temptation.

Sometimes it’s easy to rationalize that the efforts you make won’t make much of a difference. Yet the moment you do act, the moment you do create value, that kind of thinking goes quickly away.

Life’s shallow, fleeting pleasures can be enjoyable for a moment. But they’re nothing compared to the deep, abiding joys that come from creating real value.

Right in front of you stretch precious, potent minutes and hours. You can work to mold them into meaningful and enduring achievements.

Reach inside and reinforce your connection with purpose. Embrace the opportunity of now and let its fulfillment unfold in all you do.

— Ralph Marston

February 4

Feeling stuck

Are you feeling stuck where you are? That’s great, because it means you’re ready to get moving in a more rewarding direction.

Within you is the desire to move away from some specific aspect of your current situation. You can harness that desire and transform it into progress.

From your feeling of being stuck, you can extract energy, motivation, and effective action. To do that, look beyond where you are and decide on the direction you wish to go.

There’s passion in the feeling of being stuck, but it’s a negative passion that won’t lead to anything other than resentment and despair. Yet you can choose to reshape it into passion for a positive purpose.

When you’re feeling stuck, ask yourself why. Develop a clear and detailed picture of what you’re being prevented from doing, being, feeling, or expressing.

Then you can take whatever actions get you moving toward what you desire. Turn the intense feeling of being stuck on its head and use its energy to push you in a positive, fulfilling direction.

— Ralph Marston

February 5

Painful lessons

You’re painfully aware of what you should have done and what you should not have done. Now is your opportunity to get something good in return for that pain.

Last time, and the times before that, you learned your lesson. Now, put that lesson into positive practice.

Before you act, consider this. A year from now, what will you wish you had done, and what will you wish you had avoided?

There’s a good reason the painful lessons are so painful. The purpose of the pain is the make sure you remember.

Yet remembering is not enough. You must also adjust your actions to avoid the same pain again.

What should you have done last time? This time you have the good fortune, and a powerful, memorable reason, to make sure you do it right.

— Ralph Marston

February 6

Trust matters

Who do you trust? Who places their trust in you?

Where there is trust there is great value, and the potential for much more. Trust removes friction from interactions and enables highly effective collaboration.

No amount of money or power can buy trust or force it to exist. Your trust in others, and their trust in you, can only be built with time, with diligence, with honesty.

Over time, the choices you make have a crucial effect on the amount of trust in your life. In each encounter with someone else, you can either be building trust or impeding trust.

Any deviation from honesty and authenticity, no matter how insignificant in the moment, can shut out trust in the long term. Your genuine commitment to truth, respect, and dependability, on the other hand, gives trust a place to grow.

Trust matters in pretty much every area of life. Make the choices, day after day, that enable trust to flourish.

— Ralph Marston

February 7

Faith is a promise

You cannot know all the answers. Yet you can have faith that the answers you seek do exist.

Faith can keep you going when logic and reason alone have failed you. Faith gives you deeper, more sustained access to strength than would otherwise be possible.

Faith is often conflated with belief in a supernatural power. But it’s actually trust in a higher power that’s entirely consistent with nature and reality.

Faith humbly acknowledges that there are more possibilities than you can imagine. Faith instills the truth that a significant number of those are possibilities for goodness.

Faith is not a certainty that can be verified by the current facts you have at hand. Indeed, it is quite the opposite.

Faith is a promise you can embrace in your most intimate realm. And often, such a promise is exactly what you need.

— Ralph Marston

February 8

Structure and possibility

The structure in your life provides essential support. Yet to do this it must necessarily confine and restrict you.

You benefit from the order, resilience, and predictability provided by structure. You also benefit by regularly freeing yourself from its confines.

Within your supporting structure you can work with effectiveness to achieve what you desire and reach toward your dreams. Outside that structure is where you can bring desires to the surface and use them to clarify those dreams.

Go out now and then into unknown territory. Expose yourself to the chaotic onslaught of raw possibilities and bewildering experiences.

Then bring some of the possibilities back to the relative safety and security of your home. Go to work on those possibilities, and enrich your world with the best of them.

Great adventure is to be found in balancing chaos with order, existing structure with novel possibility. With courage, with purpose, with love, keep bringing the adventure to life.

— Ralph Marston

February 9

The good you choose to do

You have what it takes to make a positive impact on this day, this place, this world. Do what is necessary to give the best you have to give.

Your whole life has positioned you to bring new value into being in your own unique way. Now is your time to act on that potential, that obligation.

You don’t know everything but you know enough. You don’t have limitless power but you do have plenty of ability, and opportunity, and genuine care about the quality of life.

Look at the world around you, at the people living in it, and ask yourself this question. How can you be of service?

Long years, decades, centuries from now, that’s what will matter. And as soon as this next moment you can feel the power of the good you choose to do.

Open your eyes as the sun comes up and a priceless new day of life emerges into being. Greet it and live it with the resolve to make it the most useful and generous one yet.

— Ralph Marston

February 10

All you can achieve

Identify a modestly ambitious objective you wish to achieve. Divide it into twenty five roughly equal parts.

Each day, set aside some time to work on completing just one part. Each week, give yourself a one-day break from the effort.

After a month of such measured, persistent effort you’ll have the thing done. Not only that, you’ll also enjoy the satisfaction of knowing you did it.

When you expect to accomplish a task all at once, you’re in danger of feeling overwhelmed or of quickly burning out. But spread it out over a reasonable period of time, and you can make it into work you actually look forward to doing.

Imagine what you could achieve in a couple of hours if you broke the task into five-minute parts. Think of what you’d be able to create over the course of a year by working on it for three hours a week.

Give yourself something specific and meaningful to do, and you turn what likely would have been wasted, unfulfilling moments into lasting value. Set a goal you can reach step by step by step, and be amazed at all you can achieve.

— Ralph Marston

February 11

Solid focus and effort

You have a little bit of time and a lot to do. That’s not a good reason to be in a frantic rush.

Do your best to focus all your attention on one task and get it done before moving on. Worrying about what you need to do next won’t help what you’re doing now or what you’re doing next.

Few people ever have as much time as they would like. Even so, many people are able to accomplish all sorts of amazing things with the time they do have.

You can too, right here, right now. Just give good, quality attention to the work at hand.

Conditions are not ideal, perhaps you’ve been put in an unfair position, the task is difficult and complicated. Yet you have the ability to set aside all those factors you can’t control.

When you do that, the results can be almost magical. Without the frantic rush, with no agonizing over the difficulties, with solid focus and effort, there’s much you can achieve.

— Ralph Marston

February 12

Something new

You feel something new today. It’s a level of confidence you have not felt before.

You have a sense that life is going in a more positive direction. Your purpose is stronger, the possibilities are more clear.

When sunshine breaks through the clouds, it looks a little brighter than you’ve noticed lately. Instead of being annoyed by the cool breeze, you welcome the fresh experience of it.

Accept that this positive feeling is real. Then step forward and do something with it.

Certainly the world is not perfect. Yet today you have the very real opportunity to do something good and useful and meaningful with what you have.

Grab that opportunity, embrace that hopeful feeling. Though it won’t always be easy, step forward and fulfill its best promise.

— Ralph Marston

February 13

Ask yourself

You can either find an excuse or you can find a way. Which will it be?

Possibilities emerge from every direction, all the time. Which ones will you focus on and invest yourself in?

From your attitude, your intentions, your choices, and your actions come the results you get. To what specific results are you committed right now?

The world throws obstacles, burdens and disappointments at you on a regular basis. What inner positive purpose do you carry that will compel you to push through all those difficulties.

Ask yourself challenging questions such as this and give yourself truthful answers. With those questions and answers, remind yourself why you do what you do.

Great opportunities await you today, as do menacing pitfalls. Prepare yourself to be your best by asking questions that bring all your strengths to the surface.

— Ralph Marston

February 14

Unresolved matters

There will always be unresolved matters in your world. Live your life anyway.

Perhaps it would be nice if you could find an acceptable answer to every question. Of course it would be great to have a detailed plan for every dilemma.

But that’s not going to happen. So don’t put your life on hold just because a few aspects of it are uncertain.

Do your best work to resolve the uncertainty, to find the answers, to formulate a plan. And while you do, go on ahead with all the other parts of your life.

Every day is filled with opportunities for rich experience and satisfying fulfillment. Don’t let those opportunities pass you by just because a few issues are pending.

Your life’s journey will always have some uncertainty. Even so, you have plenty of joy, meaning and fulfillment waiting to be found at every step along the way.

— Ralph Marston

February 15

Ambition

Most of the systems and conveniences that support your daily life have been brought to you by ambition. Every technological advancement, from your flush toilet to the back-up camera on your car, came from someone’s ambition.

It’s often considered selfish or greedy for a person to be ambitious. And there certainly is an element of self interest in ambition.

Nonetheless, everyone benefits greatly from the accumulation, century after century, of the fruits of ambition. Without it, life for many people would be a grim, dismal experience in almost every moment.

Ambition is not perfect, and is definitely not the entire point of life. But neither is it something you would want to be lacking in your own life or in the lives around you.

Yes, ambition can resonate with greed. Yet that is far outweighed by the fact that ambition is also the basis for discipline, focus, persistence, creativity, and responsibility.

Ambition connects deeply to the drive that keeps you alive. Feel it, follow it, and let it push you to make life better than it otherwise would have been.

— Ralph Marston

February 16

Small opportunities

The small pleasures are enjoyable, and easy to come by. The small victories are helpful, and close at hand.

A small kindness requires very little time or effort. Yet it may well be remembered and appreciated for years.

A small improvement is simple to make and can provide benefits that continue day after day. The small accomplishments, as inconsequential as each may seem, can add up to major achievements.

Sometimes the things you do will have a big impact, and that’s wonderful. But don’t overlook all the opportunities to have a small impact.

Many of those small opportunities are here in front of you today. Within a matter of moments you can be well on your way to making life a little better.

Feel the gentle breeze as it signals a fresh new moment. In a small yet significant way, there’s goodness to be lived.

— Ralph Marston

February 17

Not knowing

What I know, what you know, what anyone knows is only a small fraction of the way the world works. That’s a good thing to keep in mind.

Anyone who pretends to always have insight into everything that could possibly come up is doing just that, pretending. Someone with a firm grip on reality is someone who willingly admits to not knowing.

It is a whole lot smarter to admit you don’t know than to pretend you do. Such pretense fools no one and even worse, it sabotages the opportunity to learn, to cooperate, to gain trust.

When stumbling forward in the dark it’s helpful to have the modest light of a small truth. That small truth is the fact that you don’t know the entire truth.

Fortunately, you can always learn. You can shine that small, honest light of humility and curiosity in more and more places.

Begin with the accurate assumption that you don’t know it all. From that point, you can learn much and go far.

— Ralph Marston

February 18

Engage with existence

Possibilities dance around you, tempting, warning, inviting. Pick the one that best serves your purpose right now, and go with it.

Don’t settle for merely wondering what might have been. Engage with this magnificent existence you’re part of, and discover what can be.

Is the weather cloudy, sunny, stormy, hot or cold? Are the people around you disagreeable, helpful, distant, or kind?

Whatever the situation, there’s something good you can do with it. A few short steps away is a new experience ready to be lived.

In the next few hours you can transform potential into concrete value. You can pull some particular and meaningful form of richness from your imagination and bring it into reality.

Give yourself a big, healthy dose of the satisfaction that comes from participating fully in life. See what great things happen when you embrace the good fortune of being here right now.

— Ralph Marston

February 19

This is when

Whatever else you have or do not have, you have now. You have the experience of this moment.

Perhaps it is painful, or maybe it is comfortable. Most likely it is somewhere in between.

Yet no matter the nature of this moment, of this experience, it has value. Now, and only now, is your chance to live that value.

Step away from any thoughts or feelings that push you out of the moment. See right now for the opportunity it is, for the depth of life it contains.

This is when you can understand, this is when you can experience, this is when you can act. This is when you can live.

The past is gone, the future is a mere concept, and all that is, everything you are, is right now. Be here fully in the best way you can imagine.

— Ralph Marston

Thank you God for the here and now.

February 20

Intentional input

The quality of the question shapes the usefulness of the answer. The quality of the goal determines the value of the achievement.

What you put into this day has much to do with what you get out of it. Though you can’t guarantee success you can always make it a whole lot more likely.

Your expectations exert influence, and that influence is greatly multiplied when backed up by action. Ask yourself, what do you expect, and what are you doing about it?

If you expect to have endless rewards heaped upon you just because you desire them, you’ll be disappointed. Expect instead to give your best no matter what the challenge, and you’re sure to find fulfillment along the way.

Each choice opens up other choices, and every effort creates opportunities for further efforts. That’s why your intentional input matters so much, because it drives your choices and energizes your efforts.

Consider the intentions you are truly committed to following right now. Whatever you put in has a lot to do with what you get out.

— Ralph Marston

February 21

Goodness is always there

You quickly notice what surprises you. You fail to notice much of what you were already expecting.

Precisely for this reason, almost all the news you learn about is bad news. News outlets are rewarded for getting you to engage with their content, and that means they must surprise you.

But that news does not accurately portray all that happens in the world. It mostly highlights what is shocking and unusual.

Every day there are thousands of airplane flights that do not crash. Every day there are billions of people who live routine and relatively untroubled lives.

Certainly everyone’s life can benefit from some improvement. Still, there’s a massive amount of goodness in life that goes completely unnoticed because it is so commonplace.

Even though you cannot possibly notice it all, remind yourself how very much of life’s goodness is always there. And be inspired to create even more.

— Ralph Marston

February 22

Empowering vision

What helps you to cope with the difficult, oppressive people in your world? One important way is to maintain a vision for your life that far transcends any harm those people could inflict on you.

That vision is not easy to come by. Yet it is worth whatever you must do to identify, develop and fortify it.

The challenges you voluntarily take on not only strengthen you, they show you who you are, what you value, what you desire. With each challenge you work through, your overarching vision gains power and becomes more refined.

That vision empowers you to live beyond the present. You’re able to see to the other side of setbacks and difficulties, and work your way there.

If your course has no clear purpose, even the smallest negative comment or incident will knock you off that course. Yet with a strong and well-integrated vision, nothing can stop you from moving in the direction you intend to go.

Focus intently on what matters and why. And you’ll have the wherewithal to successfully deal with all the other stuff that doesn’t.

— Ralph Marston

February 23

Good living to do

Your problems will not all be solved by tomorrow. Yet by tomorrow, you can make consequential progress toward getting many of them solved.

You won’t arrive at the life of your dreams by the end of next week. Yet you do have plenty of meaningful options you can act upon to bring those dreams closer each day.

Life is not perfect, and will not be perfect anytime soon. Even so, you have much good living to do today, tomorrow, and all the days that follow.

Many of the good things in life take time. The sooner you start to move toward them, the longer you’ll be able to benefit from them.

Plus, the value of any improvement begins long before the improvement is complete. Just knowing that you’re working in a positive direction can add a very real sense of fulfillment to each moment.

The future favors those who take the time and trouble to invest themselves in it. Right now is when you can do precisely that.

— Ralph Marston

February 24

Your choice now

You’ve had numerous successes in your life and you’re destined for more. In matters large and small, when you make the choice you make the effort.

So the question to repeatedly ask yourself is this. What will you now choose?

How will you make the most meaningful and fulfilling use of the time and resources available to you? Which of the many pathways will you now decide to follow?

Over and over again, when you truly commit yourself to a goal you’ve been able to reach it. If something is important enough, if it is an authentic priority, you know how to make it happen.

So what priorities will you choose right now? Upon what will you focus your proven powers of achievement?

Whatever you make into a priority has a decent chance of becoming real. Choose your priorities right now with care, because you are indeed choosing how your life will soon be.

— Ralph Marston

Sobriety will always be my top priority.

February 25

Yours today

Whatever you are, however you are, own it. Whatever you do, engage in it fully.

Live every moment with authentic intensity born of gratitude, wonder, kindness, love. Marvel at all that’s available to you, at all you can do with it, and transform that feeling into action.

When you don’t know, admit that, and then you can learn. When you do know, make good use of that knowledge, apply it toward positive and meaningful purposes.

Begin each day early, ready and willing to make a positive impact. Persist in your effort, long after you’ve worked on through the initial impulse to give up.

Recognize the unique position you occupy. Understand the richness of time and opportunity with which you’re endowed, right now.

Do, think, dream, feel, with everything you are. Life is yours today, and well worth all you can give.

— Ralph Marston

February 26

Choose the best attitude

Is your attitude holding you back? You have permission, and you have the ability, to adjust it, to improve it.

You don’t need to get angry with yourself or disappointed in yourself about the way you see the world. Simply choose to see the world in a more creative, productive, useful light.

There’s nothing necessarily wrong with the way you’ve been, with the way you are. Still, you can pull yourself up right now to a whole new level of awareness and effectiveness.

Imagine you’re standing at a door, and on the other side of that door is everything necessary to get great work done. Would you choose to walk through that door?

In exactly the same manner, your more beneficial attitude is just a quick and simple choice away. Make that choice without delay.

Your attitude plays a major role in the way you feel and in the way you live each moment. Choose the best one possible right now.

— Ralph Marston

February 27

Your thoughts show

What if the people around you could see your every thought? Would you be proud of those thoughts, or would you be embarrassed and ashamed?

In fact, the world can see your thoughts. Because your thoughts do eventually make themselves known in the way your life plays out.

If you carry around hateful, angry, cynical and destructive thoughts, those thoughts will infect your life with misfortune, disappointment and emptiness. When most of your thoughts are thankful, loving, creative and joyful, those thoughts will be expressed through your life as success, achievement, and good fortune.

In each moment, you are able to choose your thoughts. As the moments build on each other, those thoughts you have chosen become clearly apparent in the details of your life.

Your thoughts are yours to create, control and direct, to hold on to, to let go of. By increasing the positive value of your thoughts, you bring real, positive substance into your world.

Choose thoughts that you’d be pleased for all the world to see. And those thoughts will lead to a life that is impressive indeed.

— Ralph Marston

February 28

Firmness with flexibility

Anything that is too rigid can be quickly fractured by sufficient force. By contrast, anything that is flexible can experience blow after blow from every direction and still keep springing back into place.

When you’re willing and able to bend, you’re much less likely to break. By adapting to changing situations, you can successfully make your way through even the most difficult challenges.

Being flexible does not mean giving in or giving up or being any less firm or being any less committed to the outcome you seek. Being flexible means being more understanding, more creative, more open to new and better ways of achieving the results you wish to achieve.

A tree that bends with the wind does not get carried off by the wind, but in fact stands firmly in its location. Flexibility enables you to remain strong, to remain true to your position, and to successfully handle whatever challenges come along.

If you’re overly rigid, you may appear strong on the surface, yet any kind of strength that is not willing or able to adapt is extremely vulnerable. Seek to develop real and lasting strength, the kind that is flexible enough to respond to a wide variety of challenges.

Be steadfast about your most treasured values, and flexible about how you express and fulfill them. With a firm will and a flexible approach, truly great things are possible.

— Ralph Marston