Easy to say, Hard to do...

Relax my friend!! I got what you meant. I actually had to go back and re-read what I had wrote and I agree it sounds kinda funny.
Heidu

Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.
~ Carl Bard ~

I want to write a book too. I feel like I need to find more answers first though, so I'm not just writing about pain and problems with no solution. I do think that the solutions are out there. But in the mean time, I am taking some pretty big steps actually towards doing what I want to do with my life. Going back to school is a major part of it. It might have been easier to wait until my kids are older, but I don't know if I would have hung on that long just sitting it out. I had to make some life changes or this winter would be just like last winter and it would all just continually get worse.

<font color=blue>Life is filled with tragedy; if you let it overwhelm you, you cannot enjoy life's innocent pleasures. -Robert Heinlein</font color=blue>

That's awesome about going back to school, (((Wendy))) - wonderful = good for you!! Respectfully, Peanut

<font color=blue>HI FROM PEANUT </font color=blue>

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>

what you've done is made lemonade from lemons... healed the dragon to some extent.

<hr></blockquote>

I did, Darrel??? How??


<font color=blue>This above all: To thine own self be true. --Shakespeare</font color=blue>

IMO the dragon's purpose is to make us feel so irritated by some injustice until we fight back. Not against the dragon, but against what made it. Writing the stories for your grandkids is fighting back against the abuse you felt from your own mom. Fighting back with love... proactive and beautiful

"Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but rising every time we fall." Confucius

OOOOOH! teehee I'm missing the boat all the way around today.

Thanks, Darrel. You're words are very encouraging.

<font color=blue>This above all: To thine own self be true. --Shakespeare</font color=blue>

Tying threads together...

I'm tying this one with the post I just made on Anxiety...

"I think I can, I think I can, I think I can..."
I can do this. I can do this. I can do this.
I finally get my day in court!
I AM intelligent
I AM capable
I AM calm
I AM confident
I can get through this
I can do it!
"I think I can... I think I can... I think I can..."

mmfff!! SIGH!

"I think I can... I think I can... I think I can..."
I can do this... I don't need to stress so much... I've been waiting for this day for three years... Here's my chance... I can do this!

:::crossing fingers:::

help?

<font color=blue>This above all: To thine own self be true. --Shakespeare</font color=blue>

Oh yes you can!

If you can have disability, go get it! You deserve it.
Sure wish I could.

Take good care! You can do it!

Forgoten

I didn't really read this thread the first time around ...

Love to all,
Fuzzy

PS nightdream where are you

I, too, somehow missed out on this excellent thread. Thank you, September Morn, and others who have kept it alive. I'm wondering if there's any one more motivated than I who might make a list of the good suggestions here as a kind of summary. I'm also wondering if there's any way to rename the thread so it would be clearer that it's about sharing tips and insights into Getting and Staying Motivated or some similar descriptive subject line.

I empathize and feel in my bones just about everything that's already been said -- about fearing rejection, where perfectionism comes in. Now, I'm gonna add my two cents:

<font color="blue">First, isn't rejection a realistic view of life?</font> Some of us have been so battered by life at this point that "rejection" isn't some vague imagining but what has happened? In the past year, I've been rejected by my employer, my longtime life partner, my ex-husband, my brother, and every prospective employer -- two or more a week since February. In the course of my lifetime, I've also written three books. The last one was rejected by 50 publishers and 30 agents. Rejection isn't something I imagine -- it's what life has handed me.

<font color="blue">Second, some of us also are battling various physical ailments</font>, in addition to depression -- which can hurt so much, it feels like a pain in one's body. In my case, an illness causes fatigue, as does depression. It's hard for physicians to sort it all out. Plus, bec. of alcoholism and digestive disorders, it's hard to prescribe anything that works. Yes, I can see the inertia in myself that is NOT part of the physical symptoms, but I'm not sure how much is physical and how much is emotion-related depression -- and I'm not sure my docs are either.

Third, the book Psychological Self-Help (www.mentalhelp.org), distinguishes between <font color="blue"> long-term and short-term rewards</font>.Often I chose sort-term rewards that offer comfort -- eating, watching TV, in my case, endless e-solitaire -- over the long-term rewards that would build my self-esteem -- sending out more resumes, networking, exercising, developing a routine that helps me to accomplish more than I do. But even knowing this, I make the choice for the short-term reward. Why?

<font color="blue">Another dimension is believing that one's life has meaning. </font> One T had me read Man's Search for Meaning by (I think) Victor Frankl. He discusses three things that give life meaning -- enjoying beauty/taking pleasure (whether nature or art, etc.); creating; of bearing one's suffering with nobility, as the concentration camp survivors did. He believes that the ones who died were almost always people who just gave up and couldn't take it any more. I KNOW I would have been among those who gave up. Heck, my life is pretty good by comparison -- I got nothing to jawbone about -- but I'm sad, unmotivated, feeling helpless and hopeless most of the time. And this gets back to my first point -- if one has a real history of rejection, failure, unfulfilled hopes and dreams, it can be pretty hard to get and stay motivated.

How one develops the belief that one's life has meaning and purpose eludes me.

My blue-collar family doesn't worry about such thing. Shoulder to the wheel, nose to the grindstone, soldier on. I think I was like that -- although probably soldiering on with low-level depression a good deal of the time. I'm not sure what I remember what it feels like to feel good.

I agree that this thread deserves to live on. Very helpful. Thank you all who posted.