attitude

This has to be the biggest word in life. Well … perhaps not the biggest. Perhaps LOVE is an even bigger word. Love and attitude, closely followed by energy, enthusiasm and curiosity are all intertwined and are huge words to live by.

   attitude
                   love
                            energy
                                         enthusiasm
                                                             curiosity

attitude

I think this word should be written up in the sky.
It should be up there, every day, drifting in and out of clouds like a huge message banner being pulled by an airplane.

You know what I mean by the cup being either half full or half empty. The same damn thing, thought of different ways can make a HUGE difference to the way we perceive the world. consequently our stance to everything that impinges on our consciousness will be coloured by our attitude. Everything.

I’ve seen people fall into the trap of choosing what they don’t want rather than what they want. you may think that I am being unreasonable here … what’s the big deal you may wonder? What’s the big deal about saying - I don’t want to go there rather than I want to go here?

This is the thing: slowly and surreptitiously these thoughts can take us over. By looking at what we don’t want directs us to focus on the negative and keeps that negative aspect in our minds and we could dwell on it and chat to our friends about it and think about it over a cup of tea. I don’t know where I heard the saying ‘That to which you give your attention, grows’ but it’s true. By thinking negative we become negative.
If only we would be thinking of what we want, be thinking of something positive, then these thoughts would give us impetus and energy and happiness. So I try to choose the path I want and try quickly to let go of negative things. For instance, when I get a parking ticket, I pay it immediately - the very next day if I can. because the longer I see that ticket on the table the longer it’ll bug me and it’ll keep bringing my thoughts to reproach myself of how stupid I was not to put money in the meter and so on.
I pay it and it’s done.

This morning i met someone in my fav cafe, les co’pain d’abord café on Boul Mount Royal
We had such an interesting discussion. it went on for hours and one of the things that we discussed was motivation. How do we motivate ourselves? Should it be - We are not trying hard enough, we need to try harder? Or should it be - We are doing great, even though we haven't yet reached our goal, let's keep trying?

I like the way that this is tackled in a that little book entitled: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach. In the book an elder seagull Chang is teaching Jonathan, the young student seagull and demonstrates by example what he means:
Chang moves a distance from Jonathan in an instant - without apparently moving a muscle (or a wing :-)
Jonathan is amazed and asks Chang how did you do that? Chang replies:
“To fly as fast as thought, to anywhere that is” he said, ”you must begin by knowing that you have already arrived”

I personally prefer this way of thinking and I believe this can also motivate us.