Rules for Life’s Journey

• Take time to be quiet;
  1. Try to silence your thoughts for a moment.
  2. Make quiet moments throughout the day and keep a quiet spot within yourself.
  3. Be quiet and savor your meals.
  4. Avoid those events and people that drain energy.
• Take time to be grateful:
  1. be open to the beauty and abundance of life;
  2. be receptive to what the world and others have to offer; and
  3. express your gratitude through charity.
• Choose to be positive. We cannot control what happens; we only control how we react. All stress is internal.
  1. Choose to see/find beauty, abundance, growth.
  2. Allow life to unfold naturally.
  3. “Wag more, bark less.”
• Choose not to worry.
  1. Let curiosity replace fear.
  2. “Worrying does not take away tomorrow’s troubles; it takes away today’s peace.”
  3. “Worry is like riding a roller coaster…it scares the heck out of you and you always end up right where you started.” — Ziggy [cartoon]
• Choose to distinguish between desires and needs:
  1. “A wealthy man is one who has enough.” (Laozi)
  2. To get through it, do it (Randlett).
  3. The happiest person is not the one who has the most but the one who makes the most of what he/she has.
• Choose to just be better:
  1. “It’s faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living.” B Oliver Wendell Holmes
  2. Take small steps towards big accomplishments;
  3. Seek to be flexible; bend with the wind; flow like the river; and
  4. Release:
     1. the need to be approved,
        1. Treat both praise and criticism as twin imposters.
        2. You can say: I don’t know; I can’t afford it; I’ll pass; I don’t agree; I don’t want that.  Berdansini
     2. the desire to be superior and
     3. the desire to be right.

• Choose a direction rather than a destination:
  1. Be open to all possibilities; live detached from the outcome.
  2. Life, purpose and happiness are a dance. One dances for the pleasure of the movement not to arrive at a specific spot on the floor.
  3. Aim your goals at learning new skills rather than reaching a set outcome.
  4. Keep moving.
• Choose the loving response.
  1. Apply the golden rule to your thoughts as well as your actions.
  2. When dealing with life’s irritants, “cut them some slack.”
     1. “Resentment is like taking poison and hoping the other person is going to die.”
  3. If something is wrong, ask can it be corrected in a loving manner and is it your duty/role to make the correction; if not, move on.
  4. Nonetheless, do not ignore evil. The universe has room for all things, both good and evil.  But an angry, hateful or violent response to evil diminishes your own self.  Therefore, seek a solution that provides a loving response to the greatest number and act with that love in your mind.
• Seek unity. Everything in the universe is linked at the quantum level.
  1. Purpose found in serving others serves oneself.
  2. Be what you want the world to be.
  3. Listen.
  4. Give:
     1. Be loving
     2. Be generous
     3. Give every person/creature you meet appreciation and a blessing if only a wish for their health and happiness.

• Only persistence is omnipotent. (Paraphrase of Calvin Coolidge statement)