Happiness

A Walk Through
The Best of Meant to be Happy
With Expanded Versions of Articles from M2bH!

Authored By: Ken Wert
www.meanttobehappy.com
A Walk through Happiness
Ken Wert
Email Address: ken.m.wert@gmail.com

Legal Disclaimers
Please feel free to change this text as needed or remove it completely.
All contents copyright 2010 by Ken Wert and meanttobehappy.com. All rights reserved. No part of this document or
accompanying files may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, electronic or otherwise, by any means without the
prior written permission of the publisher.
This ebook is presented to you for informational purposes only and is not a substitution for any professional advice. The
contents herein are based on the views and opinions of the author and all associated contributors.
While every effort has been made by the author and all associated contributors to present accurate and up to date
information within this document, it is apparent technologies rapidly change. Therefore, the author and all associated
contributors reserve the right to update the contents and information provided herein as these changes progress. The
author and/or all associated contributors take no responsibility for any errors or omissions if such discrepancies exist
within this document.
The author and all other contributors accept no responsibility for any consequential actions taken, whether monetary,
legal, or otherwise, by any and all readers of the materials provided. It is the readers sole responsibility to seek
professional advice before taking any action on their part.
Readers results will vary based on their skill level and individual perception of the contents herein, and thus no
guarantees, monetarily or otherwise, can be made accurately. Therefore, no guarantees are made.
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Ken Wert

Table of Contents
Legal Disclaimer......................................................................................................................... 2
Foreword ................................................................................................................................... 4
Section One: Growth and Development .................................................................................... 6
A Satisfying Life is Good Too ................................................................................................................................................... 6
Are You Really Good Enough? ............................................................................................................................................. 8
Perfectly Imperfect ................................................................................................................................................................. 8
10 Practical Ways to Develop Self-Mastery .......................................................................................................................... 13
Live Instead of Die................................................................................................................................................................. 17
The One-Word Solution to all your Problems....................................................................................................................... 22
Section Two: Overcoming Obstacles ........................................................................................ 24

Enduring the Unendurable.................................................................................................................................................... 24
22 Lessons Learned When Sorrow Walked with Me ............................................................................................................ 31
13 Ways to Forgive Your Parents for Doing such a Crummy Job of Raising You ..................................................................36
The Two-Edged Sword of Stress............................................................................................................................................ 42
Section Three: Creating Happiness .......................................................................................... 46

13 Easy Steps to Unhappiness ..............................................................................................................................................46
The Cost of Happiness........................................................................................................................................................... 48
Pursuing Happiness One P at a Time ............................................................................................................................. 50
Epilogue: The Time is Now!...................................................................................................... 53

About the Author..................................................................................................................... 57
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Ken Wert

Foreword
A Walk through Happiness is a work of the heart. It is the product of a love affair with happiness, a commitment
to joy that has been two decades in the making. It is a history of my discovery of those traits and characteristics
that most lend themselves to happiness.
There are plenty of reasons not to be happy. There are wars and economic difficulties. There are personal
histories of past abuse and neglect and negativity. The news is filled with car crashes and rapes and murders.
We know more about celebrity mess-ups than we do about our own next door neighbors. We live in a culture of
complaint and critique. People have made lucrative careers criticizing others and their work.
Politics is contentious at best, violent where things have escalated precipitously or over centuries. Starvation
and desolation and world poverty, disease and the like all drain us and sap us of energy and happiness.
And who could blame a person for being unhappy today?
And yet
And yet there are still sunrises and sunsets and beauty that surrounds us. There are good people doing good
things all around the world. At the center of every war and every famine and every disaster is a retinue of
people volunteering their time and means to help lift those suffering most from their suffering. Love is on the
move. It reaches into every corner of the globe.
Compassion and kindness are not dead. They are alive and well. According to the U.S. Department of labor
just Americans (only 1/5 of the worlds population!) over 26 million Americans volunteered in 2010. And
that number has risen slightly each year over the last several.
And you likely know people in your own circle of family and friends, perhaps you, yourself, who are engaged
in doing good to others for no other reason than that it is the right thing to do or from a motivation of faith or
human decency or love.
There is immense good in the world even if all the bad sells the news. Look at your own life, for example.
Think about it seriously. While you may have experienced profound pain in your life, and while you may have
been deeply abused in a variety of ways, for most of you, I bet the majority of your life has been pleasant. The
horrible days may pull all your attention from the good, but there is likely more good than bad.
And yet the bad looms largest in our minds.
But heres the point, or one of many: They dont have to! Our pasts dont necessarily equal our futures or
even our present nows. That they often do is no indication that they must. It is only an indication that allowing
them to is easier than changing that fact. But it certainly doesnt feel better!
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Ken Wert

This, my first e-book, is a compilation of articles meant to walk you through to a life you were meant to live,
one of heart-pounding love for others, for life, for yourself. One of deep resonating joy. One of profound
appreciation for life, for all that buzzes around us every day, usually taken for granted. A life of wonder and
accomplishment, of inner peace and confidence. One of joy and one of character and one of lasting, abiding,
consuming happiness.
I now invite you on this journey of discovery. If you follow Meant to be Happy, you may be familiar with some
of the articles. They have all been reworked, however, so they are not identical to the blog, even if very similar
to some. Still, you may wish to pick and choose which article to read. This is fine. You can read cover to cover
or randomly. A Walk lends itself to either approach.
Why the title?
A Walk Through Happiness is both literal and figurative. I have selected articles and grouped them by section
in such a way as to take you on a walk through my blog, getting a taste for a good sampling of my work.
It also is a metaphor for life. So many of us get into the early habit of sprinting impatiently through life. We
forget to bend and see life from another perspective or to stop and notice that the weeds of life also produce
some pretty exquisite flowers. Productivity can be an important pursuit. Rushing isnt.
A Happy Life is learned one step at a time, at your own pace, perhaps at a jog, perhaps running, or perhaps at a
more leisurely pace, walking, if you will.
The principles and habits, the traits and techniques laid out in the pages that follow are meant to guide you
forward, one step at a time, here a little and there a little, at the pace that works best for you, but always just one
principle, one day, putting one foot in front of the other, one at a time.
So come take the next step, and walk through happiness with me. And then let me know what you thought of
the scenery as we walk together, picking up a tip or two along the way.
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Ken Wert

Section 1: Growth and Development

A SATISFYING LIFE IS GOOD TOO
Personal-growth bloggers like to motivate readers to stretch and become more than they have settled for, to live
epic lives of human possibility. And thats fine. Theres nothing wrong with encouraging the best from us. I do
the same on my blog (and will do some of that in this e-book as well).
But in our enthusiasm, we may risk making some of our readers feel guilty about living an already richly
enjoyable life of deep meaning and purpose just because they arent roughing it in the Amazon, blogging their
way to a seven-digit income, fighting poverty in Somalia or climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro barefoot.
In all our efforts to move forward, to discover our purpose, to rise to the top, experience the passion of life, to
overcome and break through and accomplish, achieve, develop and become all we can become, there may be an
understandable misperception that we therefore shouldnt feel satisfied with a life of relative ordinariness.
It may seem that somehow, if you wake up every morning and smile, knowing the day will be enjoyable, not
exciting necessarily, not epiphany-filled and illuminating in some profound breakthrough sort of way, but
simply enjoyable, rewarding, even soothing, that life is then being squandered, that we are living less than our
potential, that we are stuck in a rut we must break free from in order to start truly living.
But arent we all different? Dont we have different interests? Arent we motivated and
inspired and excited by different things?
What if you like your life as is without bungee cord jumps, live coal walking, and rock star lives of
incredibleness?
What if you even prefer waking up to the heart-warming mundane sameness of kids slamming bathroom doors
and wrestling in hallways every day before school?
What if you believe you are doing something profoundly important by taking them to school, visiting friends and
neighbors, cleaning your home, and loving your spouse?
What if soccer practice and dance class and piano lessons and church activities are the things that fill your heart
with warmth and joy and satisfaction?
You see, not everyone wants to climb mountains and jump out of airplanes. Some like predictability. Some
cherish peace and quiet. Some deeply enjoy the routine of their lives.
And who are we to say they are wrong for loving their lives that way?
Heres the obvious answer:

Then you are living profoundly already! You are living a deeply meaningful life right now, as is, without
needing the adrenaline rush of breakneck comfort-zone-dislodging challenges. Period.
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Ken Wert

Joy in life is developed in part by continued growth. Stagnant living, dormant existing, plateaued lives dont
produce much happiness. But growth can look very different from one person to the next. This is the case in
part because we are all different people with different needs and priorities. But also because we choose to work
on different issues because of those priority differences.
To one person, personal growth might be simply learning the art of couponing to save money for the family.
To another it might mean taking a family walk around the block each evening to get some exercise while
spending quality time together.
To some, personal growth might mean working on a vital relationship by folding laundry together as you talk
about the day and the kids and work and home and friends and each other.
And another will be working on patience or forgiveness or gratitude or humility or self-confidence or optimism.
Not everyone will need to challenge themselves by skiing the Alps or scuba diving with sharks or taking that
barefoot climb up Mt. Kilimanjaro.
In the end, you are the one, the only one, who will ever live your life. So live it slow and quiet in a richly
rewarding peace and ignore the calls to get up and do more and run faster and build higher and grow greater, if
thats the life you enjoy. Dont apologize for it ever!
Still
Ill keep encouraging readers to rise to the occasion and live with more passion and love life and living and
experience it with enthusiasm, doing more, laughing more, loving more, serving more, carving out a life of
amazingness with deeper purpose and meaning and joy and happiness.
But if you love your life already, well then, congratulations on an on-going project done pretty darn well so far!
The point to life is, after all, to put one foot in front of the other in our own personal development journey.
If that comes in the form of swimming in a cage surrounded by hungry Great Whites, so be it. Stay the course as
you live a marvelous adventure of challenge and growth on your personal journey through life.
But if, instead, it comes in the form of learning more patience with your little one as you teach him to throw a
ball in the backyard, well then, stay that course as well and keep learning and growing!
That, after all, is the bottom line of life.
So live it well no matter how that growth is experienced.
And accept no calls to feel ashamed for such a life well lived.
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Are You "Really" Good Enough?

Given the title of this chapter, you are likely expecting to hear
me tell you that you are good enough right now just the way you
are. That seems to be the trend. But I cant necessarily say that.
Dont get me wrong, you may very well be good enough, at least
in some overall Jesus-loves-me sort of way. But some of you
reading right now are decidedly not.
As I said, many books and blogs speak of everyone being good
enough, right now, as is, no second coat of paint necessary, thank
you very much!
Some have even criticized personal improvement blogs in
general as implying a lie: that we are not, in fact, good enough
already. We are perfect, they claim, so no need for selfimprovement because the design is already flawless.
But wait a minute. What does that mean?
Indecency is not Good Enough Ever!

Some people right now, as youre reading these words, are
engaged in the act of cheating on their wives. Is that good
enough?
Some lie and steal, robbing their fellow hard-working neighbors
of their hard-earned property. Is that good enough?
Some people beat their kids. Others verbally abuse their wives,
damaging their sense of self-worth.
Some women humiliate their husbands in public. Still others sell
heroine to children in back alleys. Good enough?
Ive seen out-of-control drivers darting dangerously through
traffic, tailgating, cutting people off, jeopardizing life and limb,
even flipping off other drivers who dare honk at their selfish
recklessness.
I dont know about you, but I dont think thats good enough
at all. Its not even tolerable! I want such people off the streets,
away from those they choose to endanger, hurt, threaten or
terrorize.
Ken Wert

Perfectly Imperfect!
No one is perfect. Thats just the tall and
short of it. But we dont need to be perfect.
If we are walking in the right direction most
of the time, we are living a pretty decent life.
There will always be improvements to be
made. Never stop growing. Once you stop
growing, you start emotionally and
spiritually and morally atrophying.
But the movement is important, not so
much the position you find yourself in today.
But measure your growth in 6 month or year
periods of time, not in weeks or days. We
will fall and stumble and get stuck from time
to time. If we look at our growth in too short
a time lapse, we will more likely see the
stumbles and the scraped knees rather than
the growth that comes as a result of those
challenges.
So take a more distant perspective as we
measure our new selves against the
backdrop of our old selves.
There is a human tendency we should be
aware of, however. We tend to compare the
worst in us against the best of that trait in
someone else. We rarely measure the total
us against the total somebody else. We pick
and choose what we perceive as the best in
a variety of people and measure our
individual traits against them.
In other words, we measure our nose
against the perfect nose on one person, our
personality against the perfect personality in
another person, our parenting skills against
who we perceive as the perfect parent and
so on, never measuring up to anyone
because we are forever comparing our worst
to a variety of others individual bests.
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Ken Wert

There are cops who abuse suspects, suspects who abuse the law, politicians who abuse power, doctors who
abuse patients, CEOs who abuse the environment and child molesters who abuse children.
We simply cant call such people good enough. Theyre not. I want them to change, to transform, to stop
abusing and hurting and robbing and selling and befouling and otherwise being very indecent people. And I
want them to stop it now.
Of course, I have no direct control over any of that indecency. But I do have control over the words I use to
describe such behavior.
To tell such people theyre good enough is to condone, even culturally enable, such indecent behavior.
Instead, lets call a spade a spade, an apple an apple, and indecent people indecent.
I know what you may be thinking: Such people are not likely reading self-improvement blogs or e-books and
are therefore not the people being spoken of.
Well, I bet we would all be surprised at the private lives of some of the readers of self-development material.
But lets assume most are not. Theres still a problem with proclaiming everyones good-enough-ness.
How Good is Good Enough?

Human decency and good-enough-ness is on a continuum with uncertain ranges. Mother Teresa is on one end.
Hitler is on the other. One is certainly good enough. But the other is at least as certainly not. Most of us are
sprinkled somewhere in between, likely quite a ways away from either, huddled somewhere in between,
hopefully a bit closer to Mother Teresa than Hitler.
So at what point along that continuum of human decency do we become good enough?
Truth is, I dont know. Each of the extremes is a no-brainer. But where along that continuum away from the
Hitlers of the world do you fade into the murky middle of good-enough-ness? Again, Im just not sure. You see,
I have no way of knowing. Most of those in the murky middle are good enough in some ways, but ought to
reach a little higher and push a little harder in other areas of their lives.
A man who loves his kids but cheats on his taxes is good enough in one area, but not the other.
But heres the larger issue regarding this issue: Some peoples not-good-enough-ness looms so indecently that it
discolors the totality of the person even when other parts of their lives are otherwise indeed good enough. A
man who gives millions away in charitable causes, for example, by making millions selling heroine or running a
child prostitution ring is, on balance, not good enough at all. He may be wonderful in many areas of his life, but
that one part is so profoundly ugly, so completely evil, that it consumes the rest of who he is. Hitler, after all,
got the trains running on time and loved his dogs.
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Ken Wert

Perfect Potential and Completeness in the Now

Some may argue that it is our perfect human potential thats good enough, that we have everything we need,
however dormant it may be in our lives right now. But thats the whole point of personal development blogs and
churches and psychotherapy, for that matter. Its to help us reach that potential, to grow into it. We cant be
called a thing that hasnt yet been reached. A table isnt a table when it is still an unassembled pile of wood. It is
a potential table, but is not yet a table.
I can accept that we are all potentially good enough right now, but there are many who are not yet. They are still
the unassembled table sitting in a heap by the backdoor of their decisions and attitudes and habits.
Many people, in fact, are so far away from what that potential is, that to call them good enough is to rape the
definition of good of all meaning.
Some may say that we are good enough here, in the now, as the only person we could possibly be, and therefore
already complete as is. But thats like saying an extension bridge that is only half completed is good enough for
the very reasonable fact that it is all it can possibly be at that moment. But most would agree that, as a bridge, a
half-completed one is very incomplete.
A human beings purpose is to be a completed human being, one of character and decency and kindness and
love and compassion. Those who are only half-completed works whose construction crews have been laid off
and gone home, is, like the extension bridge, not yet good enough.
This may sound harsh, but its not even really a judgment, per se. It is merely a recognition of an obvious
condition, a state of being. Its a willingness to call a thing what it actually is. Hitler, to go back to the most
obvious example of indecency, was not good enough even though he was all he could be at that moment, given
his past, his interpretations of the conditions of his life, his attitudes and beliefs and all. But what does that even
mean to say a man is good enough because he is who he is?
Good Enough = Done.

If Im working on a project and get to the point where I stand back and say, Alright. Thats good enough,
what I mean is, by definition, Im done. The project is complete. I am finished working on it. Theres no more
that needs to be done. Finally, I sigh, good enough. And so I put down the hammer, clean up the paint and
put my tools away.
But I will never be finished with the project of my own life. There will never be the finality of a period at the
end of the sentence of my growth.
Some part of me will always need tweaking and re-tweaking. I will always have character traits to work on,
personality issues to reconcile, emotional idiosyncrasies to adjust, obstacles to climb, and relationships to
improve and deepen. But thats just life. Thats simply the way things are for all of us as we clumsily navigate
the waters of living well.
The sculpture of my life will never be completed. And heres the thing Im perfectly fine with that!
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Ken Wert

We can accept our not-good-enough-ness and still love ourselves, still accept ourselves, still cherish ourselves
and enjoy being ourselves and be proud of ourselves without pretending we are more than we are, completed,
finished, done.
I dont have to be a perfect concert pianist to enjoy playing the piano and loving the instrument and like what I
can play. I dont need to rise to the level of perfection as a writer to be proud of the words that I put to paper.
Im not compelled to be the perfect anything before I can feel good about the things I do ever so imperfectly.
My lack of good-enough-ness in no way hinders the joy I have in living.
However, what of those who beat their kids and mug people in back alleys? If they were equally fine with their
imperfection, wouldnt that be a problem? Dont we want the moral barometer of guilt to eat away at their sense
of decency until they act on those prompts to change? Wouldnt we be undermining goodness by sending the
message that all people everywhere are already good enough, excusing them of the gnawing pang of guilt that
keeps enticing better behavior?
I know that my conscience is alive and well and Im thankful for it. When I fall short, I dont tell myself its
okay, Im good enough. I tell myself I have to improve and do it better next time. Having a conscience doesnt
unalterably lead to self-flagellation either. It just pricks my heart and pushes me in the direction of decency and
kindness and love and compassion.
You may wonder how readers who are depressed might be taking this. And thats fair to wonder. Wont they be
irreparably harmed by reading my argument that they may not be good enough?
I sincerely and even desperately hope not. Gladly no one is forced to read any of this and can simply stop
reading once they sense this is going in a direction that will hurt more. I hope thats not whats felt though.
There is another way to deal with the claim of not-good-enough-ness. And this is the message I want people
who are depressed or otherwise beat themselves up for their mistakes to internalize: I want them to accept their
humanness.
Accept Your Murky Middleness in all its Glorious Imperfection!

You see, the problem isnt the reality of our imperfection or not-good-enough-ness. The problem is in our
perception that it matters that were not quite there yet. It isnt that we arent perfect, its when we think we are
inadequate and inferior for not being perfect or failing to fit comfortably into some self-imposed shape and form
of good-enough-ness within some self-imposed time-line.
But its not the truth that is hurting us. Its the perception that it means we are therefore worthless or
undeserving or worse.
In other words, we can be incomplete and happy. We can be joyously imperfect. We can live a fulfilling and
wonderful life in the midst of our shortfalls.
And the proof is in the fact that no one is perfect at everything in their lives and yet there are gobs of happy
people walking around every day, working toward improving, but liking themselves in that process.
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Ken Wert

Ours is not to reshape reality to make people feel good about themselves. It is to encourage the reshaping of our
perceptions to more closely fit reality.
Its to help people accurately see reality and let go of self-imposed perceptions and definitions of inferiority or
shame or self-disgust because of old scripts written by misguided parents (or whoever) and accept the reality of
their condition: an incomplete work in progress, imperfect, flawed, not yet good enough, but improving and
growing and loving themselves nonetheless.
That, it seems to me, is a healthier reality to accept and promote.
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Ken Wert

10 Practical Ways to Develop Self-Mastery

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master.
~ Abraham Lincoln
Slavery may be dead as a formal institution of human bondage (in most places, anyway), but it is alive and well
in the hearts, minds and lives of too many people who have the ability to loosen the shackles that bind them, but
havent exercised the courage to do so yet.
While Lincoln famously said, I will not be a slave, the second half of the sentence is the historically important
part:
So I would not be a master.

No one should ever be a master of another man or woman. Except one. Learn to master yourself!
But with the end of the U.S. Civil War in 1865 and the immediate disappearance of the slave-owning class, we
should pause here to define what I mean by the term:
Master: One having authority over another; one that conquers or masters.
~ Merriam-Webster
All of us are either internally or externally driven. Or we are some combination of the two. But the point here is
that the locus of control comes either from within or from without. External control is slavery. It may be
voluntary servitude, of course, but it is being subservient to a dominating influence nonetheless. We relinquish
control to the environment or to something or someone in it, enslaved to external conditions.
There are untold millions enslaved to tobacco, alcohol, porn, fame, power, anger, anxiety and fear. Others are
enslaved to the rush of being needed and so they marry alcoholics or prisoners or withdrawn people who have
no business being in a loving relationship yet.
I know high school students who spend hours and hours feeding their game addiction or Facebook addiction the
night before their final exam. They know what they should be doing, but feel compelled to feed their addiction
instead. They even deeply regret it the next day, exam on desk, pencil in hand, and only other peoples trivia
from Facebook in mind. Not that it is morally comparable to the horror of human slavery of the past, but it is a
form of slavery, none the less. Their addiction is the whip and chain that binds them and prevents them from
pursuing those things that will help them live better lives in the long run.
The other option, of course, is that we master ourselves. We find the internal locus of control and harness the
will to steer the ship of our own lives to the shores of our own choosing. Self-mastery puts us at the helm. Not
only do we choose the destination and the route to it and the number of stops and detours along the way and our
cruising speed in the process, but most importantly for our happiness, as masters at the helm of our own lives,
we can choose how we will interact with, and interpret and respond to life on the open seas.
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Ken Wert

Its true, however, that we dont control what is in the water as we plot the courses we travel. And storms can
develop very suddenly and very unpredictably. But masters decide how they will deal with those storms and
what the storm will ultimately mean to them and how they will be affected by them.
Slaves are stuck to a predetermined course of panic or collapse, avoidance or self-denial. They dont have the
wherewithal to take charge, to make course corrections, to work through the difficulties of the moment because
they have never developed that kind of discipline.
But what if you have spent years trying to master some aspect of your life but fall short every time? What if the
will just isnt there? What if you try, then give in, almost like clockwork, predictably?
The answer is, in part, to see your will, your self-mastery, as though it were a muscle: If you exercise it, it will
grow.
Following are ways you can exercise the muscle of self-mastery until it is strong enough to overcome any selfenslaving, self-defeating trait or habit that is currently a stumbling block to your joy and happiness.
10 Simple Suggestions for Learning to Master Yourself

1. Go on a budget. The self-discipline needed for living by a budget can help develop self-mastery. Believe me,
I know. You have to deny yourself some pleasures for the good of the budget and your financial soundness. It
requires self-discipline not to buy the Twinkies or newest gadget when it isnt in your budget. Many people
wander all over their budgets. Dont do that. Make one and keep it. Make adjustments as needed if you over
allocate or under allocate funds to certain budgeted needs, but keep at it. Make the commitment and work at
keeping it.
2. Develop a talent that requires daily practice. The commitment to a consistent and regular practice schedule
needed to improve and develop a talent builds inner resolve and strength that can help overcome the pull of
surrender in other areas of your life. Aspects of practice or moods you get into will make it difficult to go on.
Do it anyway. It will build resolve. It may even be helpful if you schedule a particular time every day. This
way, you have the added benefit to discipline of keeping to keep to a schedule, not simply practicing when you
get around to it or when theres nothing better to do.
3. Fast. Fasting a meal or two or more (get your doctors clearance first) can help develop deep reservoirs of
self-control and self-mastery. The physical desire for food, the hunger to be satisfied, will be weakened over
time, becoming subservient to a higher part of you. Buddhist monks regularly fast for purification purposes and
for clearing their minds. Hindus fast to better concentrate during meditation. The Bible speaks of fasting for
more spiritual power. Fasting can help you build bigger, stronger self-mastery muscles as well, as you choose
when to eat instead of being told by your appetite.
4. Meditate. The ability to calm the mind, clearing it of thought also builds self-mastery. It requires focus and
practice and discipline. Doing it daily adds strength to that discipline.
5. Pray. Similar to meditation, prayer requires focusing the mind as well, keeping your thoughts from drifting,
staying present, addressing Deity. While youre there, you might as well throw in a request for improved
mastery over whatever issue is of most concern! I believe in the power of prayer. But either way, it wont hurt!
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Ken Wert

6. Exercise. Running, walking, cycling, hiking, playing a sport, martial arts, any kind of regular workout builds
inner strength. Our resolve to act in the face of the urge to sit, to rest, to watch TV, to take the path of least
resistance, can be a great source of inner mastery. There will be times your body aches or your mind resists.
Exercising anyway can help build strong reserves of self-control. Again as with anything you do, the committed
regularity with which you do it helps as well.
7. Stop eating before youre full. The self-control necessary to do this will benefit you elsewhere in your life
too. Its been said that if you cant control how much you eat, you will not likely be very successful at
controlling other areas of your life. The urge to eat past feeling filled, comfortable, is difficult to master. Just
look at our widening culture! So work at stopping long before most of us do and you will be strengthening your
resistance against the binding condition of self-slavery.
8. Give up something you like for some set amount of time. Faithful Catholics do this every year for Lent.
Try it. Dont eat refined sugar for a week or a month. Dont gossip for a set period of time. No pizza or potato
chips for a week or two. It will strengthen your will and inner conqueror. I know people who have given up
negativity or complaining for 30 days and claim it was the best thing they ever did. Of course, you could also do
it directly with the thing youre addicted to. This way, it may loosen the grip the addiction has on you, build
your confidence in being able to conquer the thing and develop more self-discipline in the process. Three
benefits for the price of one!
9. Perform feats of difficulty. Heres the principle: To attain self-mastery over selfishness and desire, Hindu
and Buddhist and even Christian ascetics have been known to subject themselves to extreme challenges and
deprivations like going a month or longer with one arm raised above their heads or hopping on one leg for a
year or taking vows of silence or isolation or meditating by an ice-cold river nearly naked, dipping blankets in
the icy water and throwing them over their own shoulders as they meditate. Apparently, it works. Good news is
that we dont need to go to such extremes to benefit from the principle embedded in those extremes.
Heres a (fairly) practical guide to applying the principle:
Climb a mountain
Ride your bike to work for a month (you just might keep doing it!)
Run a marathon
Train for a decathlon
Overcome a fear (heights, speaking in front of others, spiders)
Read the dictionary
Go back to school and get a degree
Learn yoga
Learn a martial art
Again, the point is to do something difficult, thereby strengthening the inner over the outer being, conquering
and subduing the physical and carnal to the spiritual and moral. My list should be considered only a starting
point to begin considering ways of mastering that part of our natures and harnessing the strength that rests
dormant or underdeveloped in many of us.
10. Start small and build on small successes. The momentum each small victory will generate, no matter what
kind of success or how tiny the success might be, will build more confidence to tackle even bigger issues. This
way, step by step, you will become the master of your vessel.
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Afterthoughts
But what if you fail at every one of these 10 suggestions for building self-mastery? It really doesnt matter. It
may hurt a bit, especially for the fragile-ego types, but the very effort extended to try to complete any number of
the items on this list will itself work for your good. You may feel defeated, but try not to. You dont need to.
Most people will never do any of these things for the purpose of developing self-control. Your effort puts you in
a class of very few people in the world. Thats to be applauded!
You are taking steps, after all. Think about the alternative: You dont try. Yes, you will be much more
successful at not trying. Its easy not to. But it will take you nowhere good. The effort expended, even if you
fall short every time, will be effort well spent. It will take you perhaps only by baby steps at first, but steps
nonetheless toward your ultimate goal of self-control.
As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. Lincoln stated well a moral principle that the U.S. was
slow to accept in law. Lets not be so slow to accept the idea that neither should we be slaves to outside forces,
circumstances and urges. Instead, lets learn to conquer ourselves, learn self-mastery. Happiness will be had in
greater abundance because of it.
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Live Instead of Die Practical Ways

Here is the test to find whether your mission on earth
is finished. If youre alive, it isnt. ~Richard Bach
I have a question I want to ask you. It is important that you take a moment to answer truthfully: Are you fully
living life? I mean, are you truly ALIVE?
If youre not, you know what Im talking about. There is a part of you that does not feel fully awake, that is
shrinking little by little or is hiding or perhaps dying inside you.
Your life feels like its drifting aimlessly, as one day fades into the next, indistinct and inseparable from any
other. You may not be able to put your finger on the pulse of whats missing, but something is, in fact, missing.
You can feel it.
Or maybe its even worse than that.
Perhaps you feel like your life is being sucked dry of passion and purpose. Like the medieval practice of bloodletting, you feel the vitality of your life slowly dripping, one self-defeating decision at a time, down the drain of
daily numbness. It has left you with an indescribable ache in the pit of your gut.
But be assured, there is more happiness, greater joy, the possibility of deep and rewarding growth and a more
abundant life waiting for you. It is. Its there, just beyond your current ability to see it, perhaps. But just like the
Promised Land was far removed from early explorers ability to see it, it was there nonetheless, waiting to be
discovered.
Most of life has at least two options, often mutually exclusive. And theres usually a clear cut difference
between the two. There may be a personality or emotional pull toward one, but the better choice the living
choice will almost always be the harder climb in your pursuit of happiness, personal growth and a more
abundant life. We can usually identify the better choice even if we choose not to climb that uphill path. But the
choices are stark and lead in very different directions with wildly different results.
Below are just a few examples of what I mean
1. Climb instead of Sit

Life isnt lived at the summit; it is lived in the climb up to it. Human nature may seek the path of least
resistance, but sitting idly in the valley or on a spiritual plateau for long periods of time, wont cause growth.
And stagnation cannot improve your happiness, skill set, or well-being either. You have to climb. And in
climbing, you build muscles you didnt realize were so weak. Then the next mountain in life is an easier climb.
Not because the mountain has changed, but because your capacity to climb has.
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2. Learn instead of Cram

Resist the temptation to cut corners on things that matter. Im a public school teacher by trade and see students
cramming for tests all the time. Some even pull all-nighters, cramming as much information into their frazzled
and over-loaded brains as possible. And, in truth, some do quite well on their tests and even in the class using
this method.
But ask them a question just a few days later, and its clear that cramming is not the same as learning.
Life is the same way. As with learning, cramming just doesnt work well with those things that matter most.
You cant cram a marriage, for instance. You cant ignore your spouse for years on end and then, last minute,
cram as much love and attention in as possible for a beautiful and fulfilling relationship. It just wont work.
You cant cram on friendship either. There is no cramming on spirituality or character development or on your
happiness, for that matter. Some things in life simply require the leg work, a step by step process of learning
and growing, of evolving and overcoming, to make anything worthwhile out of it.
3. Laugh instead of Cry

Learn to find humor in life. Learn to laugh at yourself as well. Learn to laugh at mistakes and idiosyncrasies.
Instead of crying over the milk because it was spilt, laugh about it. See the humor in it, the utter ridiculousness
of the situation. Too many people take themselves way too seriously. Loosen up. Take a chill pill. Breath in,
breath out. And then grin, chuckle, and laugh out loud at all your foolishness.
Learn to watch your life as if you were watching a Charley Chaplain or Jim Carey movie, even as its being
lived. Youll laugh about it later anyway, so you might as well laugh now and save yourself the stress and
frustration of a more serious reaction to lifes many follies.
4. Swim instead of Tan

Have you ever gone to the beach, lake, or pool, rubbed oil all over your body, and instead of jumping in the
water, you laid down, closed your eyes, and started cooking your skin? Sounds crazy worded that way, but isnt
that what we do?
Too many people are too caught up in presenting themselves, in creating a public image with shaved body
parts, hair dye, nips and tucks and skin baked to a golden brown. And then they beat themselves up comparing
themselves to a standard that doesnt even matter.
Instead, forget all that silliness and stop caring what others think. Stop comparing yourself to a manufactured
image meant to create unsatisfied customers who then buy bottles-of-beauty to enhance their ugly lives.
Instead, start thinking of beauty as the radiance that glows from the countenance of a person of character, who
lives a life of love and goodness. That is the only beauty that matters anyway. Spend your time working on
beautifying your soul and just maybe your countenance will begin to reflect that inner peace that accompanies
such inward work.
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So stop your tanning and, instead, jump in the pool of life and start swimming and splashing about!
Its a much better way to live.
5. Hear instead of Listen

How many times have you been listening to a friend or spouse or to your children without really hearing a
single word they say?
Have you ever been listening to a friend tell you about their day when they abruptly stop talking and stare at
you with that accusing glare? Trying to save face, you mutter something vague, hoping it is general enough to
be relevant to whatever the heck they were just talking about as your brain scrambles to piece together words
and sentence fragments you think you might have heard.
Many of us do this with our own internal conversations as well not really hearing the dialogue going on inside
our own heads.
But if you want to live life on purpose, filled to overflowing with amazing opportunities and experiences, with
rich and close relationships, then turn down (or turn off!) the internal noise and start really hearing what youre
listening to. It will make a difference in what you choose to keep listening to and in how you interact with the
world once you truly begin to hear it.
But be warned: You just may be surprised to hear what is really being said!
6. Throw instead of Catch

Be on the pitchers mound of life, pitching strikes and pitching balls as well but still pitching. Some
choose to stay safe behind home plate, masked, padded, crouched, umpire right behind, catching and retrieving
balls others throw at them.
Instead, take off the gear. Walk to the pitchers mound. Wind up. And start throwing!
Throw caution to the wind. Take a chance. Risk failure or humiliation. Just go, act, do. You will learn more
from falling down and getting up than by walking unimpeded down a long stretch of good fortune. Great things
happen only when risks are taken. No one ever learned to fly by staying on the ground. The leap is required.
With it are risks, for sure. But safety means keeping your feet firmly planted. You have to decide if the reward
is worth the risk. But dont be fooled; all successes will require some.
Throw a curveball instead of doing everything the way it has always been done before. Look at the problem or
issue or project from different vantage points. Turn it upside down and inside out and flip it backwards and see
if new solutions to old problems dont show themselves. If you keep doing what youve always done, the old
saying goes, youll keep getting what youve always got. So change it up. Do something new. Dare to be
different.
Throw a party as you celebrate being alive! Celebrate the simple and the daily as well as the awesome and
spectacular. Choose to love life if for no other reason than for the climb it provides and the challenge it
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presents. Have a Happy Monday Party with your family. Thank God youve been given another day to live. Be
proud of your little accomplishments along the way to your bigger ones.
7. Create instead of Destroy

Create peace by loving and forgiving and accepting instead of destroying it by anger and frustration, judgment
and criticism.
Create opportunity by being prepared and always learning, becoming the best at what you do instead of
destroying opportunity with procrastination and the fear of change and negativity and pessimism.
Create happiness by seeking the good in others and seeking the positive amidst the negative by being grateful
for all that fills life with amazement instead of destroying happiness by confusing it with temporary or
conditional pursuits like pleasure or fun or fame or wealth.
8. Reach instead of Withdraw

Have you been seriously hurt before? Has life slapped you so many times that you find yourself flinching and
pulling your hand away too quickly? Do your fingertips still burn from the flame of disappointment and failure?
Resist the urge to withdraw! Risk getting burned again. Risk challenge as you rock the boat of lifes sameness.
And step up and keep going, persevere, reach higher and break through as you learn and develop and grow and
become! Too many people go through life with their hands in their proverbial pockets. Well, take them out!
Stick them into everything of value.
Reach out and touch others lives. Reach out and lend a hand. Reach out and learn something new. Reach out
and take advantage of an opportunity. Reach out and love someone. Reach out and believe in someone. Reach
out and grow. And remember what happens to us when our hands are in our pockets and we fall. It will hurt a
lot more than if our hands are prepared to brace us when we stumble.
9. Rise instead of Shrink

Dont shrink into the shadows. Dont shrink in shame or guilt or embarrassment. Dont shrink in cowardice.
Instead, rise to the occasion. Rise to full stature. Rise and be counted. Rise early and get started. Rise and act
and do and become. Shake things up a bit. Learn something new. Do something you havent done before. And
grow. And keep growing. And rise. And keep rising.
Fear shrinks us into paralysis. Procrastination shrinks our possibilities. Anger shrinks our relationships. Gossip
shrinks our trustworthiness. Dishonesty shrinks our credibility. So avoid shrinking and start rising. It just feels
so much better.
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10. Run instead of Walk

Some do just enough to stay out of trouble or to just get by. Others are driven to do amazing things. Some
meander half-heartedly through life. Others run as though to live life fully. Some waste their own and others
time and procrastinate and delay and wait. Others dont. Instead, they are full of energy and vitality and passion
and excitement and life.
Its easy to see which lives a life of greater wonder and beauty and satisfaction and joy. So get off the couch and
start running!
11. Walk instead of Run

And yet some never slow down enough to enjoy what theyre doing, what theyre creating or the people who
stand at the sidelines of their lives hoping to be noticed once in a while. There are so many examples of highly
successful people whose children are estranged, whose marriages are dissatisfying, whose home life is
unrewarding. So be sure to slow to a walk sometimes too. Its best to hold hands with someone you love while
you walk and talk and simply enjoy the path youre on and just be.
12. Live instead of Die

Dont allow your heart to wither and die in the throws of anger and fear.
Dont allow your mind to die on the trash heap of mindless filth and garbage.
Dont allow your soul to die a death of neglect and apathy.
So many of us live a sort of living-dead, zombie-like existence. We walk and we talk, but we do it from behind
masks and half-truths. We hide in the shadows and shrink from the spotlight. We feel inferior and unworthy and
so cut ourselves short of pursuing the things in life we truly want. But laying down in your own casket, lowered
into your own grave before the end is surrender. And surrender in life and surrender to death is to forfeit the
rewards of a life truly lived
So
Live your dreams. Live your passion. Live with meaning and significance. Live your highest self. Live purely.
Live simply. Live with love and compassion. Live life fully and on purpose, with joy and with more happiness
than you know what to do with.
That, my friend, will be a life well lived.
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The One-Word Solution to all your Problems

Do any of the following scenarios ring true for you?
I want to be fit (lose weight, have bigger guns, a flat tummy, maybe even a six pack, lower my cholesterol count
or blood pressure, whatever). But theres just no way I can do it! Im just too this-that-or-the-other-thing. So
really, it would be a waste of time even trying.
It would be amazing to play the violin (or guitar or drums, or paint, or write poetry or a book, or throw a curve
ball, or fix a radiator, whatever). But who am I fooling? I dont have that kind of talent! Besides, I just dont have
the time to learn.
If only I could overcome that self-defeating habit! But truth be told, theres no way I can stop smoking
(drinking, cursing, flirting, Facebooking, gambling, viewing illicit material, gossiping, whatever). Ive been
wrestling with that problem forever! So whats the use?
I want to be a better person (happier, kinder, more courageous, humbler, smarter, more compassionate, loving,
forgiving, patient, gracious, whatever). But give me a break! Ill never be those things. Plain and simple truth is,
thats just the way I am, I guess. You just cant teach old dogs new tricks!
Time after self-condemning time you have committed and recommitted, set new resolutions, made a pact and
set out to conquer your demons once and for all. And time after self-defeating time, you have abandoned the
effort to save your sanity. So much guilt and self-esteem-sapping failure. So why on earth would you ever set
out to self-destruct yet again?
Caveat: Some of us work just wonderfully with a more traditional time-lined goal setting plan. This idea is for
those who have struggled for a long time and have just about given up trying anymore.
Theres an Easier Way

There is a simple solution to every one of those problems. The solution to all our seemingly insurmountable
obstacles to personal growth and change, to success and happiness is really only one word away.
But dont be fooled: The solution is simple, but not simplistic. Frankly, it is quite profound in its simplicity.
The 1-Word Solution to All Your Troubles?

Step.
Just take a step; its really that simple. Move one foot in front of the other. Plant it on dry ground and shift your
weight forward to that foot. Then move the other one not too far out in front just enough so that you will be
a little further forward than you were a step before.
And thats it.
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Just One Step at a Time!

Do you see the simplicity? Do you see the power in its simplicity? It really is little more than changing the way
you see life, your obstacles and goals. Your problem is not the huge issue you think it is. Most likely it is a
whole lot of very little ones little steps that have not yet been taken, or steps that may have been given up on
long ago.
So just take one. Just one little step forward. Today. It doesnt matter how small the step is, so long as you take
it. You will thereby step onto that road that will begin to end the trouble or create the dream you desire most.
You are not winning a marathon. You are only taking a step.
You are not overcoming years of obesity. You are simply taking a step. Just one. Then take the next. Not the
whole flight of stairs in one leap forward. Just a step.
You are not eating the whole elephant of success or happiness or depression or weight loss, or your anger or
drinking problem. You are only taking one step. Once you take the step, that spot then becomes the new
position from which to step once more.
But what if I fall back, you ask. Well, frankly, it really doesnt matter much. You are not conquering the world!
You are only taking a step. So if you fall back, stand back up and brush yourself off. Then take a step.
Then another.
No-Brainer Disclaimer: If your habit involves hurting others in any way, it needs to stop now. Check into a
facility that can help. Today. That is the step you must take.
Reinterpreting Change
You see, by reinterpreting how you view goals and growth and change, incorporating this powerful simple
concept into that interpretive framework under which you think and function, you stop condemning yourself for
slipping up and falling down. You no longer really pay that much attention to how many times youve fallen or
for how many years youve been falling. You are not even measuring success by how close you get to your
goal, or by some arbitrarily imposed timeline. You are only asking yourself one question: Am I taking steps?
If you are not. Start. Just one.
If you are, great! You are stepping toward your goal. That is one step closer than you were the moment before
the step!
The Power of a Step
Baseball games are not won by the game. They are won one hit and one run at a time.
Mansions are not built as a mansion. They are built one brick at a time.
Success is not had in one fell swoop. It is had one step, one practice, one habit, one decision at a time.
Happiness is not had for the wanting. It is developed one principle, one trait, one step at a time.
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So, take a step. Just one. Decide what it is out of life you want and step towards it.
And then take the next step after that.
And then the next.
Final Thoughts
The point here is to start moving. Build small pockets of momentum. Along the way, assess the steps you take.
In other words, ask yourself this follow-up question: Am I taking the right steps?
Over time, hits turn into wins. Bricks turn into mansions. Steps turn into miles. And life becomes filled with
more meaning and greater happiness than ever before again, just one step at a time.
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Section 2: Overcoming Obstacles

Enduring the Unendurable
Sometimes Life Crashes
Tsunamis destroy. Diseases ravage. Terrible accidents happen. We make mistakes. We age and wrinkle and fall
apart. Governments oppress. Wars rage. Economies falter. People betray or disappoint. Marriages fail. And
parents are sometimes horribly, horribly flawed.
There are times, Im sure, when it feels like life is crashing down on top of you, smothering and choking you,
breaking and thrashing you about as it scrapes and gouges at the soft flesh of your heart, burying you deeper
and deeper under the rubble and debris of a life that seems at the brink of collapse.
Does this sound familiar? Have you been there? Is it happening now?
It hurts! There is an indescribable ache that throbs in every beat of your lonely or troubled heart. It sometimes
feels like you want to just throw in the towel and call it quits. We all understand the desire.
All I can ask of you is please, dont. There is hope. There is hope. Please believe me when I say to you, straight
from my heart through this page to your soul, there is, in fact, hope that lingers in the reality of what life was
meant to be and who governs the process we experience living it.
Whatever the specific trial you happen to be going through right now, however much pain youre having to
endure, the sorrow can recede, the heartache can fade, the personal trial can be given meaning and purpose
and can start to make sense no matter how dark and despairing things seem to be right now.
When Life Smacks you Upside the Head, Youre Left with One of
Two Very Stark Choices
1. Lie down, just accept it, be a victim, give up, curl into the fetal position and let circumstances run over you again
and again and again as you wait for the end. Or
2. Scramble to your feet best you can, stand as tall as youre able, look your trial in the eyes and persevere while
taking steps to overcome and transcend, to learn and grow from the experience.
I invite you to begin that process of standing and facing and transcending today, right now, with the reading of
these words, if you havent already started that journey. You will learn how to better overcome, endure, and
transcend your challenges and trials and begin living once more.
Inspiration for this Article

I once spoke to a group of 46 + year old single adults. Some were widowed. Others never married. Some were
disabled. Some, divorced. Most were in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. A few were in their 80s or more.
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This post is the nuts and bolts of what I shared with them that evening. I was told by many in attendance that it
was tremendously helpful. If you find yourself in such circumstances, I hope it will help you too. If you are not
yet in such circumstances, the Boy Scout motto will prove a blessing to you one inevitable day: Be Prepared!
5 Ways to Endure the Unendurable

1. Create Meaning
Dr. Victor Frankl had the misfortune of being a Jew in 1942, Nazi Germany. It was that year that he and his
family were rounded up and shipped to a Nazi extermination camp. He would end up in 5 different camps,
including a short stint at the infamous Auschwitz.
In all, he spent 3 years as an inmate in the most horrific experiment in evil ever perpetrated against humanity.
The isolation from loved ones, the fear and anxiety, the severe deprivation and hunger, the reduction of an
identity to that of a number, the random brutality and systematized horror, the insanity and inhumanity of it all
is beyond comprehension.
And yet, after being liberated, he would write a book called, Mans Search for Meaning, and make this
statement in it:
Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms to choose ones
attitude in any given set of circumstances
And there were always choices to make. Every day, every hour, offered the opportunity to make a
decision, a decision which determined whether you would or would not submit to those powers which
threatened to rob you of your very self, your inner freedom; which determined whether or not you would
become the plaything of circumstance, renouncing freedom and dignity to become molded into the form
of the typical inmate
Fundamentally, therefore, any man can, even under such circumstances, decide what shall become of
him mentally and spiritually. He may retain his human dignity even in a concentration camp.
Out of the experiences he lived and witnessed as a survivor of the Holocaust, Dr. Frankl developed a new form
of therapy he called logotherapy. Logotherapy operates on Nietzsches idea that all we need to endure any
hardship is a big enough reason why. In other words, if significant meaning can be attached to the thing we
suffer, then the thing we suffer can be endured.
What meaning can be attached to your suffering?
Following are 6 questions you can ask yourself as you create meaning and purpose in your trials. Other
questions can be asked to direct your thinking too. But these are a good start:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
What is this challenge trying to teach me?

What can it teach me about life?
What does it teach me about me?
What weaknesses does it reveal?
What lessons am I being taught about my values and priorities?
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6. How can my pain be used to help others?
In this way, question by insightful question, meaning and purpose can be created for why we are called to so
struggle with life.
If while going through financial difficulty, for example, you frequently lose your patience with your kids or
mercilessly criticize your spouse, then there are lessons that can be learned about what ticks inside of you.
Trials dont only build character in us, they reveal our true character to us as well.
2. Discover Meaning
There are two ways to approach making sense of your trials and pain. One is to attach meaning to it (as
mentioned in #1). The other is to discover its inherent meaning by backing up a bit and viewing your trial with a
more eternal perspective.
With celestial sight, trials impossible to change become possible to endure. ~ Russell M. Nelson
C.S. Lewis explained that our trials and suffering are ways God reaches down to build something better than the
raw materials we were to start with. I think his explanation will have value for many of you. Heres what he
said:
Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps you can
understand what He is doing.
He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you know that those jobs
needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way
that hurts abominably and does not seem to make much sense.
What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one
you thought ofthrowing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers,
making courtyards.
You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage; but He is building a palace.
Such an understanding of our trials can lead to renewed perseverance as we contemplate the person God (or
life) is making out of us.
The purpose of life, then, is to learn and grow. The purpose of our trials is to get us to fulfill the purpose of life.
Rather than simply passing through trials, we must allow trials to pass through us in ways that sanctify
us. ~ Neil A. Maxwell
Life is meant to test us and help us grow. That cant happen on the cool green of a grassy knoll. It only happens
in the sweat and challenge of the uphill climb. It finds us and yanks us around a bit to see what were made of,
or, more accurately, so we can discover what were made of ourselves.
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That uphill climb provides us with opportunities to build moral and emotional muscle as well. No one ever built
muscle lifting air. There has to be resistance. When we lift weights we are actually damaging muscle. The body
overcompensates as it repairs the damage making the muscle bigger and stronger. We experience that process as
larger biceps and broader shoulders and more physical strength.
Life does that too as we climb our mountains of trial and difficulty: we build moral, spiritual and emotional
muscles in the processes. So you see, the trial you are going through, while maybe not of your choosing and
maybe not even necessarily the will of God (or life or the universe), it is nonetheless an opportunity for you to
lift heavy weight and build your muscles of character and compassion and forgiveness and perseverance.
Too often, our challenges are squandered. They are wasted when we simply go through them, not learning the
lessons, not growing because of them. When we complain and whine and kick and moan and groan under the
weight of lifes difficulties, we lose the chance to put them to use, to benefit from them.
3. Stop Staring so Close at the Rock in your Hand

I brought a black stone from my garden to that singles conference I referenced above. It was in my pocket as I
spoke. About 10 minutes into my presentation, I took it from my pocket and gave it to a woman sitting in the
front row.
I asked her to hold it at arms length and tell me what she saw.
The rock, she answered matter-of-factly. The crowd laughed. I did too. I asked her why that was all she saw.
Because Im looking at it, she said just as matter-of-factly as before and we laughed again.
But what do you mostly see? I pressed.
The rock! she insisted.
Why?
Because thats what Im focusing on.
Exactly! I said. Now keep the rock in your hand and focus on me, I continued. What do you mostly see
now?
You.
Why?
Because thats where Im focusing.
Ahhh! I sighed. The look in her face said she was starting to see where I was taking her. But I wasnt done.
Now, close one eye and start pulling the rock closer and closer to your open eye until it either touches your
eyebrow or the bridge of your nose. She did. What do you see now? I asked her.
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Nothing but the rock, was the quiet answer. I heard someone near the back release an audible, Ohhhh!
And that is what we do, my dear friend. If you incessantly think about your trial, complain about it, pray on it,
cry over it, tell others about it all the time it is no different than doing what the woman did with the
rock. And you will see what she saw: Nothing but rock. Nothing but pain. Nothing but trial and difficulty.
Notice that the shape and size and weight of the rock never changed. It was only her perspective of it, dictated
by how close she held it to her face.
If you go around wearing dark sunglasses, everything will look dark and dreary. If you focus only on the pain
and suffering in life, life itself will eventually take on those same characteristics.
So take off your shades and put your stone away in your pocket and begin to notice the rest of life still buzzing
around with activity and vitality and start living yours too!
4. Dont become your Pain

You are not your trial. You are not your pain or sorrow. Some so strongly identify themselves with their
particular set of challenges that the trial becomes an extension of the personality and character of the individual.
Words are very powerful things. They not only reflect our thinking, they help shape it as well. The words we
use to describe ourselves also tend to lock us into a role or free us from it.
I am a cripple.
I am a widow.
I am a sinner.
Such words lock and trap us into an identity and attitude that reflects that role. Instead, disassociate the obstacle
from who you are. Think of yourself this way:
I have a disability.
I lost my spouse.
I committed a sin, or made a mistake.
This way, your pain loses its ability to define who you are. It becomes something that has happened to you or
that you did, rather than a reflection of who you are. It frees you to identify with higher parts of you, not the
lowest parts.
Overcoming outside conditions or external obstacles is a lot easier than changing the very nature of your being
even if it is only artificially true by the identity we create and assume.
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5. Get on with Living!

Dont get stuck in the rut of your difficulty. The rut you get stuck in can quickly become its own trial. You
dont need to add fuel to an already consuming fire! So get on with life!
Does it hurt to be out with others? Im so sorry if it does. Get out with others anyway! Do you feel
overwhelmed by the pain? Watch a movie and laugh out loud anyway. Go to a concert. Sit on the beach. Read a
book. Do some gardening. Learn a skill or pick up a hobby. Paint or play piano or write poetry or swim.
Anything will do.
Dont wait for the perfect thing. Experiment. Explore. Learn. Develop. That is the stuff of life. So stop sleeping
past noon, turn off the TV, and get outside and live! Take the first step toward life and living.
The only time youre allowed to stop living is when youre dead. If youre reading this post, youre not yet.
So stop acting like you are and get off the couch and go do something!
Afterthoughts
We will all have Mountains to Climb
Some have climbed them already. Some are climbing them now.
And some haven't even spotted mountains anywhere on their
horizons yet. But mountains are there and will have to be climbed
eventually.
If you feel like you are all alone, like there is no way out and no
way around and no way you could possibly go through your
difficulties, please just take it on faith that you are not, in fact,
alone. Others have successfully walked where you are walking
now. There can be a measure of strength in knowing that.
All of us will, at some point and to some degree, feel the stab of
pain and sorrow. We will have mountains to climb and burdens to
carry and roads to travel that are difficult, long and sometimes
lonely.
But as we find meaning to our trials, keep them in proper
perspective and keep living a life of purpose and significance, our
trials will shrink to a manageable size as we learn and grow and become in this life.
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22 Lessons Learned "When Sorrow Walked with Me"

I walked a mile with Pleasure;
She chatted all the way;
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.
I walked a mile with Sorrow;
And neer a word said she;
But, oh! The things I learned from her,
When Sorrow walked with me.
~ Robert Browning
The Purpose of Pain

We have all gone (or will go) through difficulty, challenge and sorrow. The loss of loved ones, the loss of
personal health, of economic security, of love, or some other form of trial and tribulation that will someday
stick like a thorn in the side of your life, poking and hurting and bleeding at least for a time.
There are lessons to be learned in such circumstances -- lessons about life, about you, who you are, what
makes you tick, what traits are strong, which ones need fine-tuning, and which ones need a full overhaul. They
teach us lessons about relationships and goodness and challenge and priorities and life.
The following list is by no means conclusive, but can help us focus on the positive side of pain in those times in
our lives when it is most difficult to see the forest through the trees of our physical or emotional anguish.
It is easier to endure hard times, after all, when we can recognize some purpose or meaning behind the difficulty
we are going through. Below is just such a list of lessons (purposes) we can learn from the trials we experience.
22 Lessons Adversity Teaches

1. Patience
Enduring a difficult period of suffering not only requires patience of us, but builds it in us as we exercise that
often-neglected moral muscle. Sometimes all we can do is endure a trial. Sometimes thats the only solution
available. So in enduring, other things less painful become more easily endured patiently.
2. Empathy
The pain we have to endure helps us recognize the pain in others lives more readily. We feel for them,
remembering the pain we suffered. It is a more accurate walk in another persons moccasins. We empathize
because we can relate.
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3. Tolerance
When we experience deep pain in life, the smaller stuff can become easier to tolerate. When you have lived in a
box as a prisoner of war for 3 years, a cranky attitude from a store clerk is no big deal. Whats a sprained ankle
to a woman who has undergone triple bypass heart surgery?
4. Humility
Lifes trials can have a humbling effect on us. We realize we are not almighty or self-sufficient; that we cant
do all things at all times relying on the strength of our own backs. We come to see the interdependency and
importance of support from family and friends and God. Trials tend to soften the rougher edges of the proud.
We are brought literally or proverbially to our knees and in that position, we see the world through different
eyes. They are open to the strength and compassion of others. We often look above for strength we thought we
already possessed.
5. Inner strength
As we persevere and endure, we discover an inner strength we didnt know we had. Sure, there are breaking
points for most of us, but so much more inner power resides deep in the grit and fiber of our deepest selves than
most of us are aware of at least until life calls on us to discover it! The human capacity for enduring pain is
impressive. Of course, some never learn it because they never buckle down and try to endure it well. But when
we do, we often discover something unexpectedly strong inside.
6. The importance of laughter

Have you ever been in the middle of a storm when suddenly the clouds part for an instant and the sun peeks
through as if to say, Hold on a little longer, this too shall pass? This is what often happens with our personal
storms as well, as the sunshine of laughter takes on new significance. Such seemingly insignificant moments
can make all the difference in our ability to hold on and persevere another day. Laughter, at times, truly is the
best medicine. It relaxes us and is even renewing. It also allows us to see things in perspective. We pull a few
steps away from taking everything too seriously. Laughter has repeatedly been proven to reduce stress and
prolong life. Allgood things to have when we are experiencing trying times.
7. The importance of friendship

Our trials and tribulations are often all-consuming. As such, they can strain even the best of relationships. But
when we have friends who stay the course, we start to realize the depth and sacredness of friendship. A deep
almost inexplicable gratitude seals the bond of friendship. There is a bond of knowing when someone else has
descended with us to our lowest lows and were there as we climbed back up.
8. The importance of family

Often when life has become uprooted, families pull together and focus their attention on a common enemy
(cancer, natural disaster, loss of a child, financial collapse). Even when friends cant be there, family often is. It
is in those moments that the importance of family can suddenly transcend the memory of fights and contention,
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offense and rivalry. We see that behind it all, we are related, tied by a chord that is often too strong to sever
easily.
9. The importance of being surrounded by positive people

Have you ever fought with all your heart, might and soul to keep your thoughts positive while you faced the
monstrous giant of adversity? It is a tough ride. We are just so fragile when every ounce of energy is focused
laser-beam-like on one goal emotional or physical survival. Just one negative pessimist can pull the tower
down. It becomes crystal clear at such times just how important it is to surround yourself with positive people.
10. The importance of positive thoughts

Dark periods of our lives often bring out our darkest moods. But this just exacerbates the problems we face. Our
own thoughts become much more clearly linked in a cause-effect relationship to our ability to navigate troubled
waters. We can clearly see how negativity shows up on a heart monitor, how we fail to follow up with calls to
rebuild our finances, how the marriage further deteriorates. We can see more clearly the need for a positive
attitude and a good dose of optimism when everything else looks dark and foreboding. Such attitudes focus our
thoughts at the successful end. It lifts our spirits and strengthens our immune system and creates an expectant
drive and momentum forward that works to increase the likelihood of a successful exit from the pain and
difficulty.
11. Compassion
Our hearts can be made both larger and softer when squeezed by circumstance. We can very quickly learn to
appreciate the decency of others. We remember the pain we felt and the unexpected bright light others emitted
when they showed compassion to us in our darkest hour. We empathize and then reach out to help others past
what we have found we can, in fact, endure.
12. Gratitude for the small things

When life is at its bleakest and it feels like everything is crumbling at your feet (or on top of you!), a flower
blooming from a crack in the sidewalk takes on new significance, meaning and beauty. Open your eyes to the
little and mundane things of life. Pay attention to what surrounds you that you usually dont think to be grateful
about. Discover what you have long taken for granted anew. And feel what it does to how you feel about the
world you live in.
13. Life is too precious to waste on petty resentments

When crippling life circumstances threaten everything, the petty things we store up in our hearts can suddenly
seem as ridiculously trite as they usually are to begin with. So what if someone didnt hold the door or your
significant other was grumpy this morning or the newspaper boy tossed your paper under the car. Does it really
matter in the larger scope of the universe? Let the little stuff go. Life truly is too precious to waste a minute of it
angry and disgruntled at the foibles and idiosyncrasies of other flawed human beings doing their best.
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14. The small stuff doesnt matter much

Have you ever gotten so angry at someone you just couldnt see straight, and then took a step or two back from
the situation and realized how foolish it all was? Being confronted by lifes hurtles can have the same effect,
drawing us into deeper moods of contemplation, causing us to see more clearly the pettiness of far too many of
the things we ordinarily would have taken more seriously.
15. The big stuff does matter

But family and friendship, God and character, integrity to cherished values, attributes such as love and courage,
compassion and forgiveness suddenly seem more immediately important than they ever did before, often to the
point that the smaller stuff gets squeezed out of our hearts and minds. Thats as it should be. Let go of the little
annoyances and embrace the big issues. Make them big in your life. Magnify them.
16. The importance and power of touch

When life is churning around us and we feel ourselves sinking, a hand, a hug, a caress, a touch can be magical.
When my mom was in the hospital for double bypass and mitral valve replacement surgery, touch truly helped
her. She was in pain, medicated to the hilt and arthritis in her lower back was killing her. It was the soothing
magic of touch that got her through it. On less dramatic levels, touch can be wonderfully relaxing and
comforting as well.
17. Perseverance
Each moment of pain is preceded by a previous moment of pain. Each moment of pain precedes a following
moment of pain. That loop can begin to feel extremely heavy and like it will last an eternity. Thats when hope
begins to fail and other more permanent thoughts of escape begin to seem preferable. It is a noble act of
profound courage in perseverance to take the next step in life anyway. And that lesson of endurance in suffering
can prove invaluable to those who have gained it on the bumpy terrain of life.
18. Life is fragile

As we feel crushed by our particular set of challenges, we can gain a better appreciation for just how easy life
can slip away. If this lesson is learned well, so much more of life will be lived with passion and joy. It can also
be lengthened by a renewed commitment to better health.
19. Time matters

Lying in a hospital bed for days on end or a lengthy bout of unemployment has a way of focusing our attention
on the issue of time. The glimpses we gain into the fragility of life can lead us to value the seconds that tick
away day after day in frivolous pursuits so much more so much so that we finally start to fill that time with
greater meaning and significance.
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20. Prevention is a good investment

Theres nothing much more instructive of the need to brush your teeth than the loss of them. There is nothing
more instructive of the importance of food storage like a natural disaster. There is nothing more instructive of
the need to live below ones means like an economic meltdown. Calamity has a way of motivating preparation
for the next possible eventuality.
21. Procrastination doesnt work

Similarly, we quickly come to realize that putting off the inevitable doesnt change its inevitability and
usually makes what was already inevitable much worse than when we first noticed the need to take care of it.
Procrastinated tasks have a way of snowballing into bigger adversities as overspending turns into deep debt,
high cholesterol turns into stroke and a flirty attitude at work turns into a destroyed marriage. And the pain of
the adversity often acts to poignantly underscore the lesson learned so that the next problem is recognized
earlier and dealt with before it grows into something much more devastating.
22. The importance of living every day with purpose, joy and meaning
When we lie at deaths doorstep -- or even sit on the curb in front of the house of lifes non-lethal challenges -all the wasted hours and days and weeks of our short lives start to add up to something much more significant
than it seemed at the time. We realize so much more could have been done with those fleeting moments, but
wasnt. We regret the love we didnt express, the forgiveness we didnt extend, the humanitarian project we
never took action to begin, the lives we could have touched but got too busy to make the effort. Time starts to
acquire a sacred quality once adversity squeezes us a bit.
Two Stories to Consider

Story #1: There once was a man who lived his life in the vain pursuits of self-indulgence. He was at the end of
life when he suddenly realized his mistake. Guess what he did. He filled his remaining days with love and joy,
happiness and meaning. And guess what happened! His remaining days were joyful, happy, meaningful and
filled with love.
Moral of the Story: It is never too late to start living life in a way that reflects these lessons learned. Was the end
of his life short? Was it long? Does it matter? It was filled with love and joy! And thats the bottom line of it.
Story #2: Three men walked to town together in the dim light of the early morning. The first man was talking to
the second and fell into a hole. The second man noticed what had happened too late and fell in with him. The
third man, seeing what happened in time, avoided the fall. After doing their business in town, they returned
down the same path, this time in the dim light of dusk. The first man fell in again. The second man remembered
the hole just in time and walked around it. The third man walked behind the two until the first fell in, so easily
avoided the fall once again.
Moral of the Story: What is the difference between the 3 men? One was foolish; he never learned the lessons
taught by his mistakes. The second was wise; he learned the lesson his own earlier mistake taught him. The
third man was truly enlightened for he learned from others mistakes and avoided them altogether.
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Whether you have fallen in the holes of life or not, the lessons pain teaches are still lessons to be learned with or
without the stinging delivery pain provides its students. I invite you to learn them and avoid needless holes we
may otherwise find ourselves lying flat on our bruised backs looking up from.
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13 Ways to Forgive Your Parents for Doing such a

Crummy Job of Raising You
Children begin by loving their parents; after a time, they judge them; rarely, if ever, do they forgive them.
~ Oscar Wilde
Childhood Pain
Have you been holding onto childhood pain? Do you harbor deep-seated resentment for the way your parents
raised you? Do you blame them for the circumstances of your life today?
Obviously, not everyone has been blessed with a happy home with patient, loving, attentive parents.
If you are one of the oh-so-many who harbor pent-up feelings toward mom or dad and those pent-up feelings
affect you today, you are not alone. Nor are you condemned to a life plagued by the energy-sapping,
happiness-stunting emotions of deep-seated anger and resentment.
Its time to let go and move on! And not because your parents necessarily deserve it they may not! At all.
But YOU do! You deserve to be free of such emotional poison. Its time to let it go and take the next step in
your personal growth.
13 Ways to Let Go and Move on

Following, are specific steps you can take to unpack the baggage of blame, anger and resentment and,
perhaps, begin to establish a new kind of relationship with your parents, or at least be able to let the past be
buried in the past so that you can begin moving forward untethered to the pull of yesterday.
That, after all, is often the first step on the path to happiness. Sometimes the greatest obstacle is less what we
havent done now and more what we havent dealt with properly from our personal histories. And perhaps
now is the appropriate time to start removing an obstacle that has, for too long, stood between you and
happiness.
1. Redefine Your Relationship

Allow people to evolve and change. And remind yourself that parents are people too. Some parents were
horrible at parenting but not so bad as friends to their adult children. So be it. Let that be the redefinition of
your relationship. Try not to judge the current reality against the context of the past. Instead, try to accept
things as they are today.
This might be extremely difficult if the offending party never takes responsibility for past treatment. But it
doesnt necessarily have to be that tough. Imagine yourself playing a game (doesnt matter what it is
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football, volleyball, chess, checkers, tag, whatever), when the rules abruptly get changed on you. But as you
play and try to adjust, you realize the rules actually make the game more enjoyable.
At this point, you have a few options:
1. You can mire yourself in the past and refuse to let the rules change. Every time its your turn, you
simply play the game as though the rules were as they were before.
2. You adapt to the new rules but resent the other players for ever having made you play by the more
difficult rules.
3. You let the new game become the new reality and act relieved the old rules no longer apply. It was a
dreadful game that way. And now the game has improved.
Let the game improve and play it now for what it has become.
2. Be Grateful for the Blueprint of what NOT to do Raising Your Kids

We dont come with owners manuals. And yet, we are far more complex than any piece of furniture or
computer program we have ever had to put together or install.
We are also all-too-familiar with the problems that can arise with do-it-yourself projects. Pieces dont fit.
Installations fail. Its at those moments we are glad there are trouble-shooting instructions or FAQ pages
provided.
Well, guess what! Your parents mistakes are now effectively your trouble-shooting guide and FAQ page.
What happens if I scream and shout at my kids? you might want to know. Oh yeah, my parents did that to
me. I know exactly what happens! You can, at least, be thankful for that.
Certainly this one is not the silver bullet to put your pain to rest. But remember, you dont just take a single
vitamin if total long-term health is your goal. You have all kinds of vitamins and minerals rolled into one mega
multivitamin. Let this be one of those elements in an overall strategy for moving past the pain of childhood
into the joy of a new way of dealing with and experiencing the past.
3. Forgive Them for Being the Only Thing They Knew how to Be
Impatient, unkind and punitive parents arent impatient, unkind and punitive simply because you were
unworthy of their patience, kindness or compassion. They were that way because they are impatient, unkind
and punitive people. In other words, how you were treated is all about them, not you.
So, heres the point Im trying to make: All our parenting is done out of the context of who we are and what
we know. Each one of us is limited in giving love by the limits to our capacity to love. Your parents were
likewise limited. That understanding can lead to compassion which can lead to forgiveness.
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4. Recognize they are likely Products of Their own Parents Mistakes and Flaws
We reap what we sow. And we also reap the traits that our parents sowed as they raised us. We are
products of both parental successes and mistakes.
And while we can always learn and grow, most people seem to live on automatic pilot. So, most of us are
something within a stones throw of our parents behaviors, attitudes and habits. Likewise, mom and dad are
products of their parents parenting too. Forgive them of that.
5. Write it Down
Sometimes we burry our feelings where they fester and decay, and then begin to infect other parts of the
psyche as well.
Sometimes, like the body expelling poisons, the soul also needs to vomit emotional toxins. Doing this on paper
helps sort out feelings and make sense of things. There can be a cleansing quality to putting pain to paper too.
Its there, on the paper, all out of me now, no longer bottled up inside festering, rotting, devouring.
Be as explicit and detailed as you can. Dump everything onto the page. It may take several days to get it all
out. Thats okay; take the time.
When youre done, read it as a solemn recognition of the past. Then light the thing on fire and burn it. Let its
ashes float away on the wind or up the vent. As the smoke lifts, feel the emotional baggage float away with it.
Feel it rise with the ashes and smoke and disappear and be gone.
Or bury it or cast it out to sea. Whatever seems most appropriate to your circumstances. The point is NOT to
mail it. You are not seeking revenge or to set things straight or to establish a sense of justice by outing the
obvious. Rather, you are using the letter to pour your guts into the open, to articulate what you feel and how
the past has affected you. To put a name to the pain, to write it down as a declaration of fact, no longer
something hidden in the shadows of your own darkened memory. Thats all.
By burning or burying it, you are giving the past its due nod and sending some part of it to its deathbed too.
What part of it? The hostility and anger and hatred and all the festering, malignant ache it has for too long
wrapped itself in.
And then be done with it. I would suggest this be a one-time expulsion of pent-up emotional poison. Doing
this repeatedly can have the unhappy effect of amplifying, rather than muting, the pasts continuing influence
as you keep swimming in that polluted pool.
6. Learn from Parental Strengths and Weaknesses

Your parents were not just your parents. They, like all of us, are complex beings with a mixed bag of character
strengths and flaws. Perhaps you ended up on the receiving end of their flaws. But they are not likely without
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redeeming qualities as well. See that in them. And commit to learning from both their strengths and
weaknesses. And be grateful for the life-lessons learned.
One of the things this does is to humanize those who may have become dehumanized somewhere along the
way. Sometimes parents are pinned to a display board like a dead insect, labeled one particular thing, stiff and
frozen in a particular stance. They become caricatures of hate and ugliness. Granted, some people live very
closely to such caricatures, but most likely, your parents were some mix of good and bad. Allow them that. It
will be easier to forgive a flawed human than a dead monster from some sci-fi movie.
7. Read the Book, A Child Called It, then be Grateful

If youve read this autobiographical work by Dave Pelzer, you likely know your parents may not have been all
that bad after all. Be thankful they at least had something going for them.
This idea is something reminiscent of the principle so powerfully reflected in the Persian proverb: I wept
because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet. So too, we weep for having flawed parents until
we read books like A Child Called It and see that at least ours had some feet.
The point here is not to feel guilty for loathing your parents. Dont guilt yourself into pitying them. Rather,
truly come to see that there were some redeeming qualities in that since others had it worse, they could have
been worse and werent. That is no small realization.
8. Let the Work You do in Your Own Home be the Salve that Heals the Wounds in
Your Heart
If you grew up without love, smother your children with it. If you grew up with family secrets, dont have any.
If you grew up with harsh criticism and ridicule and impatience, then be sure to compliment, love, and
exercise patience with your children.
Let the example of decency and compassion you share with them be the focus of your emotional healing. But
be sure not to commit the sin of overcompensation. Your role here is to love, not spoil.
In a sense, you will be parenting yourself with the love and compassion you wish your parents had shown you
as you shower it on your own kids, in some way, making amends for what your parents failed to provide.
In other words, parent yourself vicariously through parenting your own children. Extend to them what your
parents failed to extend to you and allow the love flowing from you to your children to heal the wounds from
the lack of love flowing to you as a child.
9. Take Responsibility for Your Life

This can be a hard pill to swallow. Still, its important to stop blaming your parents for current problems. Did
they lay the foundation for the problem? Perhaps. But its yours now. Thats the inescapable bottom line of it.
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You make the decision every day to hold on or let go. Thats your decision only. Accept that as fact. Own it
completely and release your parents from the responsibility youve pinned to their shoulders for too long.
Dont get me wrong, here. I am not suggesting your past is your fault. Im saying that your present is the result
of choices you have made, as you have allowed your past to influence them.
This step is admittedly difficult, but it is empowering and liberating once its fully accepted and internalized.
I am who I choose to be. I feel what I choose to feel by choosing what thoughts I choose to harbor and how I
choose to think about things. I choose to learn ways to change my thinking and interpretations of life or I
choose not to. These are all my choices. And they are yours too.
Final word on this point: Your parents may be responsible for creating the emotional context. You are
responsible for keeping that context alive. So stop feeding it and let it wither on the vine.
10. Talk to Them

Not out of rage or to guilt or shame them. Just talk. Be dispassionate. Simply ask them what in the world
happened and why. Then listen. Lets be clear, though, it may make things worse. But then again, it may lead
to some kind of resolution.
Of course, you know your family dynamics; I dont. So use good judgment as to whether this would be a viable
step, but consider it. Depending on circumstances, a neutral location such as a restaurant might be a
preferable place for the talk. But try to listen and question without judgment.
Remember, youre not there to vent. Thats what friends are for occasionally. And thats what a journal or
diary or the letter writing technique I suggested above is for. Youre there to learn and understand and seek
closure. Venting will put your parents in a defensive posture and will not likely meet your purpose for
arranging the talk in the first place. So exercise restraint over the understandable urge to throw it all at them
in angry (and perhaps deserved) rage. That will, again, defeat your purpose.
11. Stop Putting so Much Stock in How You were Raised

Instead of constantly peeling away the scabs of life to see how things are healing underneath, decide what you
want out of life, what traits are required to obtain what you want, and then act. Work at overcoming
emotional obstacles and other personal obstructions without worrying so much about where they came from.
Just get on with the work of living well.
The past is the past. Let it die there, and stop unburying the dead and move on. Trying to drag the corpse of
yesterday through life will make each moment of today a bit more difficult to manage. So find purpose and
passion in life and move forward, looking back only long enough to learn from it, keeping your attention fixed
on the moment while travelling a road to a life of abundance.
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12. Assume Good Intent

Assume the best motives behind what very well may have been the worst practices. But assume they did the
best they knew how (similar to #3).
We sometimes have the habit of ascribing pure motives to our own flaws and evil intent to others. Instead,
try being as magnanimous about their flaws as we hope others will be about our own. When we assume good
motives behind misguided practices and weak wills, it is often easier to overlook and forgive their failures
even if we were on the receiving end of those failures.
13. Stop identifying with the past

Sometimes we can so strongly identify with the pain and suffering of the past that were unwilling to let go of
it. We hold on tight and feel threatened when someone even suggests letting go or even loosening our grip.
Perhaps its out of a sense of justice. They did this to me and they must pay! Perhaps your hatred is the way
youve chosen to punish them. But who is also being punished? You are. So let go and allow your anger to
dissipate.
Afterthoughts
Sometimes out of a sense that justice must be served, or anger at the unfairness of how we were raised, we
keep the pain and anger center court, at arms length, always in view. Its time to stop. Its time to grow. Its
time to forgive and let go and be free!
Perhaps some of the tips listed above dont apply to you. And maybe you have tried one and it hasnt had any
effect. But remember, simply eating more spinach wont make you healthy either. It is a combination of
activities: eating the right foods in the right amounts, avoiding the wrong foods and moving your body in
particular ways for particular amounts of time and frequency. So use as many of the tips as will help in your
effort at removing the thorn of the past and freeing yourself for more joy and happiness.
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The Two-Edged Sword of Stress

Stress has gotten some bad press lately. And not without good reason, I suppose. Nonetheless, while stress can
cripple and debilitate and end life prematurely, it is also a necessary component of life. Stress is truly a twoedge sword.
The Joy of Stress

Stress is woven into the fabric of life. It is part and parcel of the act of living. And heres a secret you may not
know: Stress and happiness are not necessarily mutually exclusive experiences; they can, in fact, exist in the
same person at the same time!
Heres what I mean: I can feel the stress of a deadline and still feel joy in my work. I can feel the stress of
becoming a new parent, and still feel an amazing connectedness to the little life I hold in my arms, filled with an
intense kind of love and joy and wonder. I can feel the stress of anticipation at the start of a ballgame or a recital
and still passionately love the game or music Im playing ... even while I'm feeling the stress.
The amount of stress, of course, is decisive heresomewhere in the range of "enough" stress, and our senses
are on alert. Too much, and we feel scattered, disconnected and overwhelmed.
The Definition of Stress

According to Dr. Hans Selye, the late endocrinologist who was known as Dr. Stress for his seminal work on the
subject, referred to stress as the nonspecific response of the body to any demand made upon it. With that
definition, there is really only one way to completely remove stress from our lives remove life from our lives
not a happiness-producing prospect!
Marriage and parenthood, the effort and desire to be a good employee or parent, buying your first home, hiking,
working out, even sex can all produce nonspecific responses of the body to demands made upon it. And yet all
such activities and experiences can be related to our happiness.
Stress can keep us at peak performance, ready for exigencies, alert, prepared in the moment to dodge the bullet,
shift gears, cut left, think on the run, and be passionate about the thing we are doing that caused the stress to
begin with.
The Biology of Stress

Heres what is happening below the surface:
An external stressor in the form of a real or perceived threat (to body or psyche) is experienced. The brain tells
the adrenal gland to dump hormones into the bloodstream. This has the effect of increasing the heart rate and
blood pressure, raising the respiratory rate as well. Glucose is released from the liver increasing blood-sugar
levels as pupils dilate and blood vessels constrict, readying the body for fight or flight. All this happens without
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thought or plan. It is instantaneous and is an adaptation of the human body to keep it living in case a tiger
should jump from the underbrush.
Peak performances are thereby often accompanied by such releases of hormones and sugars into the body. The
only problem is the relocation of the human family away from the jungles and underbrush into the cities where
more perceived dangers are experienced than real ones.
So stress sits inside, weighing down and building up, with no apparent or immediate release available.
The Misery of Stress

There is, therefore, a much better known downside to what Hans Selye called distress. And while stress (or
distress) can compromise our health and happiness, happiness is still not the result of a stress-free life. Remove
too much of lifes stress and youre left with boredom, a lack of challenge or growth all ingredients to
unhappiness.
Still, while the long-believed link between stress and cancer seems to be non-existent, there is nonetheless a
very diverse array of illnesses very closely associated with the silent killer. Hypertension is positively, though
indirectly, linked to stress. Stress is also positively linked to anxiety and asthma. Insomnia, headaches, neck
aches and other body aches and pains are also related to frequent and high stress levels.
The effect of stress can also lead to high-risk behaviors such as smoking or heavy drinking that, of course, carry
with them their own problems.
The Solutions to Stress

Ten Random Ideas for Your Stress-Reducing Consideration
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Get enough sleep. Your body (and often stress level) will tell you when you are getting enough.
Take vacations. Have fun. Play.
Work out. Run. Briskly walk. Lift weights. Play a sport.
Plan in advance to avoid hectic scheduling or bottlenecking activities.
Do a little at a time (work, home, whatever your responsibilities are). Break down and chunk steps to make tasks
more manageable.
Get started early (dressing, driving to work, dropping off the kids, whatever)
Meditate. Take a yoga class. Stretch. Perform relaxation exercises. Pray.
Visit nature. There is a uniquely and contagiously calming and renewing quality to the great outdoors.
Write in a journal or diary. Organizing your thoughts into written expressions, venting anger or disappointment
or hurt can be very cathartic, releasing pent up hostilities and resentments and getting to the point where there
is acceptance and peace.
Change your thinking. Learn to look on the bright side. Be optimistic, assume things will work out. Our fears that
they wont work out will add stress to the moment. Look for the good in the bad.
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Bottom Line
Some stress is not only unavoidable, it may even be important to living life well. But there are also levels of
stress, and frequency of feeling stressed that is decidedly unhealthy. In such cases, happiness is compromised.
There are ways, however, of reducing stress in the short run. The methods are generally relatively easy to
master. Long term stress, however, is more difficult to reduce because it requires lifestyle changes or tweaks in
the way we habitually think about problems and challenges and potential conflicts. Still, such changes can
occur. They are accomplished by taking small but decisive steps toward the goal.
But in the end, it really is about finding balance. So go to work developing new habits of thought and behavior
that will help you manage the stress you experience to acceptable levels. In the meantime, a little stress seems to
be inevitable and even good for us. So dont stress over feeling a little stress in your daily pursuit of a happy
life.
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Section 3: Achieving Happiness

13 Easy Steps to Unhappiness
Comparing Opposites
Below, are those traits, characteristics, behaviors and attitudes that combine to guarantee a miserable time here
on planet earth. They paint a dark picture, a sort of negative of the snap shot of the happy life.
By seeing the mirror-opposite of what happiness is, the qualities of happiness are underscored, like looking at a
star against the backdrop of night. Stars are still there in daylight, but light is easier to recognize when set
against dark.
Likewise, goodness stands out so starkly in Nazi Germany precisely because of the dramatic contrast Nazism
created to it. Happiness, then, can also be seen more clearly when viewed against such a stark backdrop.
The Path of Least Resistance

Unfortunately, unhappiness is much easier to acquire than happiness. Happiness may create an easier life, but it
takes work, self-discipline, developing traits and characteristics that promote it.
Unhappiness is the path of least resistance. It is the muddy puddle that gathers at the bottom of the hill. Falling
and sliding have always been easier than climbing. Happiness requires hiking boots. Still, as mentioned, there is
value in viewing the negative to the goal that is everyones aim.
So lets have a look:
Unhappiness in 13 Steps
1. Be quick to anger. Stay angry. Be easily offended. Rage. Hold a grudge.
2. Complain. Be negative. Be pessimistic. Whine. Frown. Put others down. Put yourself down.
3. Yell. Criticize. Be impatient. Be intolerant. Judge harshly
4. Be inflexible. Demand. Nit pick. Be controlling. Manipulate others.
5. Confront. Hate. Despise. Be spiteful. Seek revenge. Be greedy.
6. Assume. Suspect motives. Doubt others. Be distrustful. Expect the worse. Look for the worse. Worry. Worry
a lot. Fear. Fear change. Fear failure. Fear criticism. Fear the unknown. Fear the improbable. Fear whats out of
your control. Be cowardly. Hide. Be timid. Run away.
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7. Refuse responsibility. Shirk work. Procrastinate. Wait. Dont try. Leave it to others. Be lazy. Watch lots of
TV. Stay inside. Look for shortcuts. Just get by. Aim low. Dont aim. Be aimless. Stay up late doing nothing.
Wake up late and do nothing. Dont set goals. Take the path of least resistance.
8. Stay away from people. Isolate yourself. Dont get involved. Shun others. Lock yourself behind a closed door
and a closed heart.
9. Blame mom. Blame dad. Blame your brother. Blame the government. Blame the majority. Blame the
minority. Blame life. Blame the world. Blame the universe. Blame God. Blame luck. Believe in luck. Wait for
luck to change.
10. Excessively drink and smoke. Take pills. Medicate your life. Be addicted. Overeat. Undersleep. Dont
exercise. Ignore your health.
11. Lie. Cheat. Be duplicitous. Be selfish. Be prideful. Dont change. Dont learn. Dont grow.
12. Lack self-control. Be insatiable. Give in to lust. Give in to urges. Give up on life. Give in.
13. Doubt yourself. Judge yourself harshly. Call yourself names. Condemn yourself. Despise yourself.
Afterthoughts
These, then, are the warning signs. They are the hazard lights and warning lights flashing on the dashboard of
life, signaling the need to check under the hood, replace the tires, realign the system, replace the filters, tune and
lube and make some serious adjustments to your life.
Some of the list of traits and practices are more cause than effect of happiness (impatience and hate). Others are
more effect than cause (frown and sleep late). Some are both in roughly equal amounts (complain and
isolation).
But all detract from or prevent happiness. The more of such traits or practices plague your life, and the greater
the degree to which they do, the more they will dampen your happiness and negate your joy.
Needed adjustments can be very difficult to make. But start. Start with just one trait. Then two. The trick is to
begin and then take the next step and then the next and then the next after that building momentum
in self-improvement one day, one principle, one step at a time.
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The Cost of Happiness

There is an economic principle known by its acronym, TINSTAAFL. Written out, it states that There Is No
Such Thing As A Free Lunch, meaning, of course, that nothing is free, that everything of value has a cost.
It is also a principle of Happiness.
The Cost of being Happy

Happiness takes work real work! It requires change and moral growth and developing qualities and traits
that may not yet be fully formed. It requires overcoming some bad habits of thought and behavior and
developing some new ones. And we all know how difficult breaking bad and forming good habits can be.
Happiness pitfalls have to be identified. Principles that produce the joy we seek must be implemented. Personal
characteristics must be learned and worked on to begin to feel the quiet stirrings of inner peace and joy and
happiness where they may not have been felt for a very long time.
And while its true that we all want to be happier, far fewer are willing to pay its price, just as there are fewer
willing to do the work of losing weight and living healthy, eating healthy food and working out regularly than
those passively wishing to lose weight or tone up or get healthy. The lip-service is easily paid; the commitment
falls woefully short.
There is little in life of value that doesnt come at the end of a trail of blood, sweat and tears. Happiness is no
different and in many ways, even more difficult.
3 REASONS HAPPINESS REQUIRES SUSTAINED EFFORT

1. Happiness requires doing things differently. It may require stepping out of your comfort zone. It may
require making friends or reaching out in service to others. It may require slowing down or speeding up
(depending on where you are to begin with!). It may require that you laugh and smile and learn something new
or do something youve never done before.
Happiness requires action and change and the strength to overcome and transcend and endure and persist. It
calls us to move forward, to climb and stretch and reach and become. And in that becoming, we sometimes have
to kill parts of our old selves as we give birth to new parts. And both death and birth can be painful.
2. Happiness requires thinking things differently. Attitudes are difficult things to change. Patterns of thought
can be very stubborn. Optimism and a positive attitude are just two such required traits that are not easy to
acquire. What you think about and how you habitually think about it determines levels of happiness. Negativity
is a product of the mind. Worry and fear and stress are largely products of the way we habitually think.
Changing such patterns takes sustained effort over time. Happiness can require more creative thinking, looking
for the good in others, filling life with an attitude that reflects a habitual kind of gratitude, or inclination to see
the silver lining around every difficult set of circumstances.
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3. Happiness requires living differently. Happiness is dependent upon sound character. It requires developing
moral traits that affect happiness. Patience and faith must be worked on. Kindness and selflessness and
compassion and decency are all moral qualities needed to live truly happy, peace-filled lives of moral
conscience. Happy people are giving and loving, determined and humble. And that, of course, requires lots of
inner-work if we are to acquire such moral traits and overcome some of our character flaws that stand in the
way of our happiness.
Summary
Creating a richly meaningful life, for example, requires new ways of doing things (acts of service, smiling more
often), new ways of thinking about what is done (interpreting life differently, focusing on whats good about life
over whats not) and new ways of living (developing love and overcoming bad habits that depress or
disappoint).
Final Thoughts
Life is an uphill climb. Sometimes its an outright battle. Happiness is why we climb at all. Happiness will be
the reward at the end of that climb if we take the path that leads to it. But it will also be sprinkled liberally with
moments and growing degrees of joy along the way as we do the work necessary to get at it.
But the cost of a happy life lies at the heart of the person seeking it. It hides in the hidden chambers of the soul.
It sneaks behind closed doors of the human mind. It is, in fact, the byproduct of the condition of the heart, mind
and soul.
And that is the reason why the cost of happiness is a difficult one to pay. It requires regular attention and regular
effort and a degree of patience that can be extremely difficult to sustain. But you can be happy.
You can increase the joy of living. You can experience the swelling motions of a happy life as the principles of
happiness are learned and applied. It is then that the effects of such principles applied correctly can be felt as
joy and peace and a sense of confident happiness. You can rise above the obstacles to happiness and begin
living a beautiful and rewarding life if youre willing.
It is my sincere desire that you come here willing to get to work, willing to take the necessary steps to inch your
way to a happier, more fulfilling and richly rewarding life one day, one step, one trait at a time.
The reward will be well worth the cost paid. So go ahead and roll up your sleeves. Its time to get to work!
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Ken Wert

Pursuing Happiness one P at a time

The 8 Ps of Happiness
Pursuing happiness is a full-time job. Following, are those essential characteristics to a happy life. Try
incorporating them one at a time. Or work at them simultaneously. But whatever you do, dont ignore them.
Your happiness counts on it!
1. Progress
An idle, listless life is an unhappy one. Happiness requires growth and improvement. The very act of improving
and developing skills or talents or your character is perhaps even more important than where you are in your
ability or character at any given moment. There is happiness in the pursuit of noble goals, even more than in
their attainment.
When we grow, we see and feel the growth, the expansive powers at work within us. We feel good about where
were headed. We are proud of the steps being taken. We are accomplishing something important, worthy,
reshaping the person inside, creating a new gift to give the world.
2. Purpose
A life of purpose and meaning is a life that matters. Its a life that is worth living. Its a life to feel good about.
Its a happier life than one that is meaningless, without purpose, that doesnt really matter much. This is not to
suggest that only certain lives lived in certain ways have worth. Rather, Im suggesting that if we dont FEEL
we matter, no amount of philosophy about the worth of souls is going to make a difference to our happiness.
So go and live a life of meaning. Do things that matter, that build and lift and create and grow. Serve others.
Make a difference. Love charitably. Do what fills your life with richness and passion and creativity and joy.
And learn to do what you must with more purpose and meaning too. Look for whats positive in what you do. If
you hate doing dishes, for example, but do them anyway because, well, you want clean dishes, then focus all
your attention on the fact that you are serving your family or keeping them from getting sick or beautifying a
corner of your home or any number of things you can concentrate on instead of the mundane act of putting
sponge to dish.
3. Perspective
How you see and interpret the world largely determines the shape and form the world takes experientially. If
you look for misery, you will find it. If you seek beauty, youll find that too. The perspective by which you
view life will create or destroy the joy of living. Both exist in this world of ours. We have murderers and those
who dive in front of busses to save little kids. We have both weeds and flowers. Roses have both the rose and
the thorn. There are winters and springs. It is what we decide to focus on that determines which fills our minds
and hearts and souls.
So focus on the good and positive. See the flower despite the thorns. Be grateful for the springs despite the cold
winters. Think about all the good and decency, the opportunity and advantage, even though there is its opposite
too. Youll be happier for it, guaranteed.
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4. Passion
A life lived with passion is a happier life. A passionless life is a listless one. It is mundane and drone and
repetitive. Granted, we can feel invigorated and excited about repeated acts of passion, but those who feel
nothing in what they do, engage in the activity without engagement. The activity becomes monotonous and lifesapping.
People who can get excited about what they do about their families, a cause, about anything live a more
rewarding life. So fall in love with what you do or find something to fall in love with. Explore life. Get
passionate about it! You will find that a more abundant life of greater passion is also a happy life of greater joy.
5. Peace
Peace comes from many sources. Theres the peace of mind that comes from living in the present, enjoying the
moment, smelling the proverbial flowers alongside lifes highway. Theres the peace that comes from destressing life through exercise and sleep and relaxation and spending time in nature. Holding grudges, being
hateful and judgmental all work against peace. Overcoming those peace-robbing attitudes and conditions will
also help restore an internal equilibrium. But there is a confident peace of mind that is uniquely the result of a
clear conscience from living true principles. And from that peace comes yet again a greater portion of
happiness.
6. Probity
A forgiving heart, decency and kindness, patience and honesty and courage are all personal ideals important to
living a life of happiness. Personal probity, ones integrity and uprightness, then, is an essential component to
happiness. Think of someone of low morals, who is dishonest, deceitful, and unkind. Sound happy? Not to me
either.
7. Prioritize relationships
There is no enduring happiness if life at home is a wreck. If you always prioritize wife or husband and kids as
2nd or 3rd or 5th or 10th, home life will be bland, at best. It will be missing the spark and zest that a happy home
provides.
But to have a fulfilling and happy marriage, for example, you must spend the time necessary to send the
unmistakable message that speaks to the heart of your spouse: You are important to me! And then follow up
that message with love and patience and kindness and tenderness and forgiveness and interest and laughter and
intimacy.
8. Play
Rest and recreation are important parts of living in a stress-filled world. All work and no play doesnt only
make Jack a dull boy, it makes him downright miserable. We need time to rejuvenate, to relax and remove
ourselves from the rat race, to prepare to be happier as we jump back into the game. Play adds fun and joy to
life. It comes as accents in the day or week or year.
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Afterthoughts
Any one of these characteristics will add joy to your life. Master them all, and the happiness you will
experience will make a heaven of the life you are currently experiencing. It doesnt matter where you are
currently in life, what youre doing or how happy or unhappy you are today. What matters is that you take steps
to move in the direction of living with more happiness than before.
As you take those steps, developing those characteristics that are part of the happiness quotient, you will begin
to feel a sort of stirring in your soul as your life opens up to increasing degrees and durations of that universally
sought-after condition
the condition of a happy life.
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Epilogue
So, you have finished the book. Now its time to put it all into action!
The Time is NOW!

Have you been resting too long on a plateau? Have you fallen asleep in the afternoon of your life? Have you
made progress, then sat down to enjoy your success, but forgot to stand back up again?
Its Time to Take Action Today!

Its time to awake, to stand up, to stretch those tired, aching muscles and move. It is time to take the next step.
Whats holding you back? Whats in your way? Are there external barriers? Are there internal ones, such as fear
and doubt or laziness?
Well, it is time to act anyway.
Its time to shake off and overcome and break through the walls that stop you, that shut you down and prevent
you from moving forward.
Its time!
Are you still hanging on to that habit?
Are you caught in the eternal delay of procrastination?
Are you waiting for the perfect time to begin? For the weather to clear or the children to move out?
Are you waiting for a sign or a voice or a message to tell you the time is now?
Let these words, this day, right now be that sign, that voice, that message. You can feel it in the beat of your
heart, the swelling motions in your soul. Your mind knows. Your heart knows. Your soul knows its time to
take action today. You feel it, dont you? You feel the need to take that first step in the direction of a happy life.
The truth is, its ALWAYS been time. Now is the ONLY time you have ever had. So get up and take that step.
Just get up and do it.
Dont form a committee. Dont put it under a microscope. Dont get a third or fourth or fifth opinion. Just get up
and act. Decide what most stands in the way and start chipping away at its base. Decide what you most need to
develop and start stepping your way toward it. All finish lines begin with a first step.
So do it! Take it. Today. Now. Its time.
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But what if I fail?

Every single day you dont take action, you fail one moment, one day at a time, slowly strangling your dreams
in the dark and hidden back-alleys of your fears and doubts. Day after day, your hopes bleed a little more,
draining life from the muscle fiber of your passion.
So why not give it all you have for one HUGE potential fail and get it over with? Why drag out failure every
single day of your life as you decide not to take action yet again and let your dreams whither and dry and die
over and over again, a daily death of neglect?
Imagine if you dont fail! Of course, you will stumble here and there, but with every stumble, your footing
becomes that much surer. Yes, failure may hit hard. But will it hurt any less if you fail daily by your inaction,
by self-inflicted suffocation?
Does one big fail hurt more than hundreds and hundreds of daily little failures that prick and stab at your heart?
Does one big wound bleed any more or less than hundreds of little ones?
I know you can feel it deep down inside your soul. Its the empty ache of incompleteness. So complete it! Fill
the void with action, with steps toward doing what you have always felt called to do. Stop delaying your
purpose. Stop procrastinating joy. Stop putting off the day of your deliverance as you wake to the inner tick of
your life.
It is time. Today. Now.
No more self-afflicted blood-letting. No more leaking your life into the puddles of inaction one day after
another. No more. Say that out loud: No more! Say it with feeling: NO MORE!
Now act on that mantra. Let it beat in the chambers of your soul with every thump of your heart and every
breath that fills your lungs. No more! No more! No more!
Take the next step. From wherever you are currently, in whatever part of your life you have paused. Accept the
probability of the possible and move in that direction. Determine what constitutes the next step, and just simply
take it!
Failure is not Failure

To put your all into something and fail is no failure at all. Its living. Its living boldly. Its living passionately.
Theres more than one way to die, after all. We also die one breathe at a time as we refuse to exhale our passion
onto the world and refuse to breath in the crisp air of our potential.
Besides, failure is nothing less than an investment in your own potential. If life is the university and experience
is the classroom, then failure is the lesson being taught by the professor of life. It is the instruction. It is the
heart and soul of the classroom.
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Your Step
Is your marriage lackluster? Change it. Today. Take the next step toward improving matters.
Is your business faltering? Change it. Today. Take the next step toward improving matters.
Is your character built on sand? Change it. Today. Take the next step toward improving matters.
Is your spiritual life isolated, distant and cold? Change it. Today. Take the next step toward improving matters.
Is happiness still an elusive unattainable dream? Change it. Today. Take the next step toward improving matters.
You know what Im talking about. There is something you have always wanted to do. Something you have
always wanted to take care of or something youve always wanted to master.
What that next step is, is less important to your happiness than that you take it, any step, so long as it takes you
closer to your potential, closer to your dreams, closer to what courses through your veins with every beat of
your heart. Once momentum is built, you will have plenty of time to figure out which steps are best and in
which order they should be taken. But for now, just move.
Now is the time.
It doesnt matter what it is. It can be a book youve always wanted to write. A business you always wanted to
start. An instrument you wanted to play. A relationship you wanted to heal. A person you wanted to forgive. A
trait you wanted to develop. Whatever it is, if its a worthy destination of itself, its worthy of your bareknuckled action to get there.
The process of getting there is only one decision away. Just one.
Will you stand up or stay seated? Will you wake up or sleep another day? Will you take action or continue to
wait and wish and age and regret?
The time is now. Stand up. Decide. Commit. Take that step.
There will always be another missing piece of the puzzle, another bit of vital information you simply must
discover first before starting.
Stop!
You know exactly what youre doing. You know its just another way to keep yourself from taking the leap off
the pier into the murky waters of what if. So stop pretending the next book or post or article you read will
finally be the point after which you begin. You already know thats a lie you tell yourself to stay on the grassy
knoll of life, immobile, unchallenged, mediocre.
A Call to Boldness, not Stupidity

This is not a call to abandon common sense or to live with reckless abandon to parental or other responsibilities.
Rather, its a call to stop hiding behind fear and doubt and a litany of self-defeating excuses that bind you to a
life lived somewhere south of your true potential and joy.
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Ken Wert

Stop the Excuses!

So stop making excuses for your procrastination. Avoid the regret that will stain the memory of your life as you
look back on it. You were not made for mediocrity! So get up and take action!
Today may not be the fix. But today is the step. The first of many. You are not likely going to experience
success in the next couple steps of your life. But you are going to step anyway because stepping is the ONLY
way to get down that road. And in stepping, you have already succeeded by choosing to live, to truly and deeply
come alive and live profoundly! And that, my friend, is not failure.
Its time.
Today.
Now go and be happy.
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About the Author

Ken Wert is a high school teacher, student of happiness, passionate liver of life, seeker of wisdom and blogger at
www.meanttobehappy.com. He yearns to reach out and touch lives. He is motivated by love and service and a desire to
help others learn how to help themselves take the steps necessary for living well.
He has been married to his dear love, Jane, for over 2 decades and has two children. One teaches piano lessons and is
married to the founder of YourMusicLessons.com. One is a rambunctious and adorably precious little boy who keeps
Ken limber and active.
For additional insight into who Ken is or into the drive behind his blogging, follow the links to his About pages by clicking
here or here.
Contact Ken
Email: ken.m.wert@gmail.com
Twitter: KenWertM2bH
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A Walk Through

The Best of Meant to be Happy

With Expanded Versions of Articles from M2bH!

A Walk through Happiness

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A Walk through Happiness

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Section Two: Overcoming Obstacles ........................................................................................ 24

Section Three: Creating Happiness .......................................................................................... 46

Epilogue: The Time is Now!...................................................................................................... 53

A Walk through Happiness

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A Walk through Happiness

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A Walk through Happiness

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Section 1: Growth and Development

Heres the obvious answer:

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A Walk through Happiness

Are You "Really" Good Enough?

Indecency is not Good Enough Ever!

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A Walk through Happiness

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How Good is Good Enough?

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Perfect Potential and Completeness in the Now

Good Enough = Done.

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Accept Your Murky Middleness in all its Glorious Imperfection!

A Walk through Happiness

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A Walk through Happiness

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10 Practical Ways to Develop Self-Mastery

So I would not be a master.

A Walk through Happiness

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10 Simple Suggestions for Learning to Master Yourself

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A Walk through Happiness

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A Walk through Happiness

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Live Instead of Die Practical Ways

1. Climb instead of Sit

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2. Learn instead of Cram

3. Laugh instead of Cry

4. Swim instead of Tan

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5. Hear instead of Listen

6. Throw instead of Catch

A Walk through Happiness

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7. Create instead of Destroy

8. Reach instead of Withdraw