Thoughtful Thursdays-#306 November 2nd The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Take It One Day At A Time

I read a book years ago that someone gave to me in a particularly hard time in my life. It was my recruiting manager at a job that I was assigned to when I lived in downtown Milwaukee. The reason I bring up that seemingly irrelevant piece of information is because when we are awake, we might be the difference in someone’s life no matter how involved we are in that person’s life. And the simple act of someone giving a book to me, made a huge impact in my life at the time.

The book was How To Stop Worrying And Start Living by Dale Carnegie. I still have that book and it’s highlighted and filled with notes. I come back to that book and those highlights from time to time to just look over their knowledge. In the first chapter he talks about “living in day-tight compartments”… meaning we should only live in the space from when we wake until we sleep. Not worrying about the past or tomorrow, but taking care of today. And he asked 5 important questions that really resonated with me. They hit such a chord with me that I typed them out on my computer. I then printed out several copies to post in places I would have to stop and really notice them.

One place was on the wall right in front of the toilet when you sat down. That’s where most people do their best thinking. The interesting thing is, I would always have house guests ask me about those questions…so I like to think a visit to my bathroom was life changing for my guests but not because of the toilet paper I supplied. But those 5 questions Dale asked in his book, were about closing the iron doors on the past and living in day-tight compartments. And I’d like to share them with you as well… without having to go into my bathroom:

• Do I tend to put off living in the present in order to worry about the future, or to yearn for some “magical rose garden over the horizon”?
• Do I sometimes embitter the present by regretting things that happened in the past—that are over and done with?
• Do I get up in the morning determined to “Seize the day”—to get the utmost out of these 24 hours?
• Can I get more out of life by “living in day-tight compartments”?
• When shall I start to do this? Next week?...Tomorrow?...Today?

This book literally changed my life. It was a hard time in my life where I was seriously considering suicide, but the kindness of a stranger noticing me was the first part in my change…the second part was reading these chapters and printing these questions out in the first chapter. They really helped me to stop theorizing about all the sadness in my life and to begin asking how I could live in the moment. It’s an easy thing to say “be mindful”, to not worry about the past or the future…but it’s another thing to have questions that you ask yourself everyday if you are truly living in “day-tight” compartments.

There’s only one moment we can live in…the present moment. But we get so lost in our heads with what we have to do still, what we missed out on, or getting stuck in the anxiety of tomorrow or the regrets of our pasts. However, those times aren’t real…this moment is the only one we have… so are you focusing on a magical rose garden in the future, or are you focusing on the regrets of the past that are over and done with?

Now it’s not that we can’t ever look at these things, but I’ve come to see that we don’t just think about them…we overly focus on them. We become addicted to thinking this way, and thus it leaves no room for living in the present moment. It leaves no room for us to find joy in what we do have by focusing on how we aren’t where we want to be. So, let us live in day-tight compartments. Let us see how we can get the utmost out of these 24 hours…living from when we wake until we sleep…focusing on one day at a time. Just like the old saying of how do you reach a goal? The same way you’d eat an elephant…one bite at a time, or as one of my students says…getting help...but that’s another matter altogether. So let us live one day at a time

Today’s Personal Commitment:
Write down those 5 questions and post them in multiple places in your home, your car, your work, and any other place that will make you truly focus on living in the day. Write out your answers when you first look at them, and make it a habit to read them every day for the next month and answer them in your head.

I Take It One Day At A Time

 

 

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

 

 

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
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