Daily Motivator - January
 

January 1

Now is pure possibility. Live joy fully in its newborn splendor.

What seem to be limitations consist mostly of faint echoes from a reality that no longer exists. Now is as fresh as the breath you just drew in, vibrant with energy and richness.

You transcend another year, and another. The timeless purpose and love at your center, grow in abundance as they flow out from you.

Gather new beauty and carry new hope as you skip across the moments. Embrace the miracles your mind cannot explain and your heart cannot deny.

Celebrate the pure possibility of now by transforming it into new goodness. Jump at the exhilarating chance to invest your thought, action and passion.

Here, now, time and beauty, love, possibility, energy and abundance all converge. Feel the immensity of opportunity, honor it and draw upon it in every choice you make.

— Ralph Marston

January 2

Make new progress

After disappointment, take positive action. After success and achievement, take positive action.

What matters now is not what has already happened. What matters now is that you can focus your energy, your awareness to make new progress.

Discouragement is never the best choice, and neither is complacency. Whether you’ve failed miserably or succeeded spectacularly, don’t keep yourself stuck there.

This new moment glimmers with fresh potential and opportunities never seen before. Take up the unique challenge that is now, and make new progress.

Don’t let your ego lock you into a sad, small box where it’s all about you and what you’ve already done. Utilize your past not as a place of refuge, but as a springboard from which to jump into new levels of effectiveness.

The rewards and tokens of achievement are nice, yet you never stop longing for the act of achievement. Go ahead, satisfy that longing, for now is when.

— Ralph Marston

January 3

Give goodness to life

Maybe no one will notice the good you do today. Or perhaps thousands, even millions will take note.

Yet what matters is not whether anyone knows about it. What matters is that you do it, that you make a difference, that you add value and substance to life.

It’s easy to get distracted by the trophies and accolades, the drama, intrigue and glittering edifices. But such hollow tokens will not satisfy your deep longing to make a difference.

Today is your opportunity to give goodness to life. You have the time, the skills, the resources, wisdom and desire to be a beneficial influence in the world.

You have the chance to arrive at the end of this day knowing you contributed to it in a positive way. Today you can accrue treasures in your heart that never go away, adding warmth to all your days.

Let love, purpose, kindness and generosity drive you to give goodness to life. And create richness in your world that can never be diminished.

— Ralph Marston

January 4

Insist on achievement

The easy things allow you to become bored, complacent, soft. The difficult things push you to be strong, interesting, passionate, accomplished.

Many of life’s necessities can now be obtained by simply tapping on a screen. That’s all wonderful, impressive, efficient, yet you desire and deserve much more challenge than that.

Insist on achievement from yourself today, not just activity. Seek out meaningful challenge, and let it pull great work out of you.

Creativity and ingenuity have eased many of the challenges of everyday life. That gives you the opportunity to tackle bigger, more difficult, fulfilling challenges.

You are here in this amazing moment to do more than just get through the day. Summon your strength, engage your creativity, and discover a new way to show life how great it can be.

Feel your desire to achieve as it wells up in you, fed by gratitude, wonder and love. Let it push you into action, doing the work to make life great in your own special way.

— Ralph Marston

January 5

Life clutter

When your desk is cluttered your work suffers. When your mind, emotions, awareness are cluttered your experience of life is diminished.

Clutter is what you repeatedly deal with that wastes the time, effort, thought and resources you expend on it. What forms of clutter have settled into your life?

How much do you say, buy, read, store away, watch, select, handle, that has no meaning to you? What elements of your life are doing little more than adding to the clutter?

You can work to rid the clutter from your garage, pantry, computer desktop, closet, and see immediate benefits. You can also drop many other kinds of physical, informational, emotional, habitual clutter, and free up vast amounts of life space.

Dig the truly meaningful aspects of your life out from under the clutter. Stop hoarding all those tired old things that don’t matter, and let them fall cleanly away.

Devote your energy to all you love, not to the worthless stuff that just gets in the way. Rid your life of the clutter, and make room to richly live.

— Ralph Marston

January 6

Beyond the doubt

Doubt is sometimes a sneaky way to be lazy. When you doubt your abilities you don’t have to go to the trouble to use them.

Go ahead, challenge yourself, your ideas, beliefs, perceptions, skills, with the intention of making improvements. Be careful, though, about doubting yourself too much.

Stay away from the kind of doubt that results in giving up. When you feel such doubt beginning to seep in, respond by renewing your commitment to persist.

Address your concerns, but don’t let them stop you. Consider your doubts, but don’t turn them into excuses.

Don’t let apathy and inactivity slip in through the back door in the form of doubt. As burdensome as the challenges and setbacks may be, you can always respond with positive action.

When doubt arises, see it within the larger context of all the great possibilities open to you. Then step beyond the doubt, into action.

— Ralph Marston

January 7

Act your commitment

How do you extract rock-solid commitment from yourself? Start, and don’t stop.

Commitment is not built just with goals or affirmations. Commitment is constructed with action.

The more effort you put into the endeavor, the more commitment you have. To get real commitment, get going, and keep going.

Commitment is more than just making a promise. Commitment is honoring that promise by investing your time and effort.

What does real commitment feel like? It is the experience of watching yourself take action in the service of a meaningful purpose.

The power of commitment is yours when you take the first step forward, and the next, and the next. Act your commitment into being, feel the power, and reap the rewards.

-Ralph S. Marston

January 8

Focus intently

Now is ripe with opportunity to make a difference. Seize that opportunity in its entirety.

Whatever is sure to come later can wait for later. Whatever might interrupt you can wait until it actually interrupts you.

Let go of all thoughts about what will eventually happen, about what could happen. Focus all your awareness on the work you’re now doing.

At some point your phone will ring. Yet there’s much good work you can get done before it does.

Experience how right, how powerful you feel when you focus intently. Make full use of it while you can, whether that’s another three minutes or four hours.

Don’t let yourself be distracted by the distractions that haven’t even arrived yet. When you have the opportunity, focus intently, and let your purposeful focus bring new value to life.

— Ralph Marston

January 9

Wish and do

Wishing is informative, but not transformative. Wishing is an excellent starting point, yet it is not a viable strategy.

You must forge your wish into a commitment. Then express that commitment with your energy, effort, time, ingenuity and resources.

Take note of your wish, feel it, let it set your direction. Then get up, move in that direction with action, and persevere in your action.

Anything you can imagine, you can wish for. What you actually achieve is whatever you’re willing to work for.

When it means enough to you, a wish feels powerful, almost inevitable. That power you feel, though, is not the wish itself, but your own potential to achieve it.

You’ve had the wish, clarified your direction, and you can sense your great potential to make it happen. Now, fulfill that potential by doing the work to bring your wish to life.

— Ralph Marston

January 10

Power of action

The task is what it is. Labeling it as difficult or undesirable only gets in the way of getting it done.

See it instead as empowering. See it as the opportunity it is, the opportunity to make a difference, to exercise your influence.

If you evade, procrastinate, or descend into self pity, you’re mainly hurting yourself. Yet you can choose a much more positive path.

You have what it takes to do what you must. Put the power of action on your side.

Confidence is there, waiting for you to claim it. Achievement is in sight, and you can act to make it yours.

Right now, you can set in motion the power of your action. Without hesitation, go ahead and get it done.

— Ralph Marston

January 11

Feelings are yours to use

It’s not a gaping chasm or a concrete wall. It’s a feeling, and you’ll get beyond it.

More specifically, it’s your feeling. And you can choose what to do with it.

You can choose to hold it, treasure it, despise it, let it launch you into unstoppable energy or melt you into pure mush. And when you choose, you can let it go, move on.

The feeling is strong, yet you are stronger. The feeling may last for a minute or a month, while your purpose persists beyond every feeling.

There are feelings you once felt would never end, that you now cannot even remember. Feelings are awful, feelings are wonderful, feelings are yours to use, to embrace, to change.

Let the feelings fill you, teach you, move you, make you a thousand percent alive. But don’t let them stop you from being the best you can be.

— Ralph Marston

January 12

Dissolve the tension

You can avoid much pain by simply allowing life to not be perfect. You can achieve great, beneficial outcomes when you begin by accepting the world as it is.

Expect to do your best, and expect the best of others. Expect also to be disappointed from time to time, and decide to never take it personally.

Remind yourself how foolish it would be to turn a small setback into a week-long binge of resentment and self-pity. Remind yourself to greatly benefit yourself by quickly, peacefully letting it go.

Tires will go flat, people will disrespect you, and the rules will be changed for no logical reason. Take a deep breath, smile, and know that all is well.

All is well because you, propelled by positive purpose, can adapt, adjust and thrive. Even when the world gets crazy, you can be smart, calm, confident, effective.

Dissolve the tension, melt away the stress. Life is not perfect, and you are doing just fine.

— Ralph Marston

January 13

Let the beauty brightly shine

See that wherever life may find you today is a beautiful place to be. Realize that whatever you have to work with is everything you need to make new richness in this moment.

You can create value right now that will always be with you. You can experience joys today that can change your life forever.

You are surrounded by life’s richness. Possibilities stretch out in every direction.

Wherever you may choose to go, the first step is ready for you to take. The journey toward any destination you can imagine begins right here and now.

Recognize the beauty in every detail and appreciate the value in every challenge. Feel the purpose that springs from deep within you, and follow its lead as you move through each day.

Allow the sparkling new abundance that is born every moment to fill you with its warmth. Right here, right now, with life as it is, take it all in and let the beauty brightly shine from you.

— Ralph Marston

January 14

Learn through challenge

You can do plenty, and yet you are not superhuman. Be realistic about what you can and cannot do.

It is by recognizing your limitations that you begin to transcend them. It is by admitting your weaknesses that you find ways to overcome them.

Being fully aware of your strengths is just as important. It enables you to engage those strengths, to build on them and add to them.

How do you know what you can and cannot do, what your strengths and weaknesses truly are? You learn all this and more by encountering challenge.

Challenge puts you to the test. Challenge shines a bright light on your advantages and shows you exactly where you can use improvement.

The more you challenge yourself, the more you know yourself. And that is an extremely valuable thing to know.

-Ralph S. Marston

January 15

Positive expectations

Start the day expecting good things. Go through the day living up to your expectations.

Expect effective, sustained, purposeful effort from yourself. Expect kindness, patience, understanding, curiosity, energy and persistence.

Expect to run into challenges, and expect to successfully work through each one. Expect for circumstances to change, and expect to successfully adapt.

Don’t hide from life, don’t fear what the day will bring. Get a jump on the day by firmly setting your own positive expectations.

Expect to occasionally stumble, and expect to quickly get back up and get going again each time you do. Expect to run into a few disappointments, and expect to respond by becoming more determined than ever.

Expect opportunities, setbacks, joys, discomforts, distractions, inconveniences, delights and wonders. And expect to make the very best of everything you encounter.

— Ralph Marston

January 16

Faster is not always better

A few things are genuinely urgent. Most things are not.

Being more impatient does not make you more important. In fact, when you rush dramatically through life you miss out on much of its richness.

Just because you can do something quickly does not mean that’s the best way. Just because you can dispatch an instant communication does not mean you should avoid a long conversation.

Sure, you want to be efficient. Of course, you seek to get the most value out of every moment.

But your purpose is not to merely check off activities on your list. Your deeper purpose is to add meaningful substance by investing yourself in life.

Take a long, slow breath and remind yourself that faster is not always better. Give your moments the time they deserve, and add new richness to your life instead of more stress.

— Ralph Marston

January 17

Where life has faltered

Weakness carries the opportunity for new strength. Ignorance creates space for new wisdom.

Be honest with yourself about the strategies you employ to hold yourself back. Use that understanding to develop and deploy new strategies for propelling yourself forward.

Don’t curse the shortcomings in your life, or fight against them. Draw energy from them, and transform them into triumphs.

There is much you don’t know, and in every bit of it exists the opportunity to learn. Fears haunt you, and by acting with courage in the face of those fears, you can change your world.

Let the burdens point you toward the possible blessings. Let the failures create a pathway to success.

See clearly those places where life has faltered, and be thankful for the chance to turn them around. Then step forward with love, confidence, courage, determination, and make life as great as you know it can be.

— Ralph Marston

January 18

Future consequences

Long after this day is over, you’ll be living with the consequences of what you do with it. Now, while you are living this day, you can make those future consequences positive and beneficial.

Every choice in every moment matters, and continues to matter after the moment has passed. Make the choices now that will make life increasingly good as time goes on.

Live this day well, enjoy its possibilities and pleasures. But don’t sacrifice the quality of future days in order to do so.

The choices you make today will echo through your life for a long time. Act in a way that will make your future self thankful again and again.

Right now, you have leverage over your entire future. Even the smallest nudge in a positive direction can create major benefits as time goes by.

Summon the strength to make that nudge, and live today as if your choices, your actions will influence the rest of your life. Because they will.

— Ralph Marston

January 19

Own your circumstances

Stop thinking of it as somebody’s fault. Start treating it as your responsibility.

You’ve learned there’s nothing to be gained by looking for something or someone else to blame. You know you have everything to gain by taking responsibility, by doing something good and useful.

So do it. Break free from the useless need to blame, from resentment, from excuses, and break through into action.

Own your circumstances. Whether they are mostly of your making, or mostly not, step forward and make a positive difference.

Rehashing what this person could have done, what that person should not have done, will only drag you down. Get over it, and focus all your attention on what you can do now.

Own your circumstances, no matter what they are, or how they came to be. Own your circumstances, and from them you will make great progress.

— Ralph Marston

January 20

Appreciate what is

For a moment, for a day, for a lifetime, appreciate what is. Whatever may happen, whatever may be, choose to see it with a perspective of gratitude and appreciation.

Not every day is filled with blue skies and sunshine. Not everything you undertake turns out the way you wanted.

Even so, you always have much to appreciate. There is always value to be found, always goodness to be lived.

Always, when you decide to find something to appreciate, you will. Have faith that there’s a positive way forward, and you’ll see it.

Although the weather may turn nasty, and people may disappoint you, there’s no cause to be dismayed. For somewhere in the day, somehow in the situation is real value.

Remind yourself to appreciate what is, and you’ll see that value. Appreciate what is, and position yourself to make the very best of it.

— Ralph Marston

January 21

Break free

Pull your mind away from thoughts of yourself. There is a whole universe out there to consider and experience.

Ego confines your thinking. Love, gratitude and generosity expand your awareness and multiply the possibilities.

When it’s all about you, the options are few. Raise yourself into the limitless realm outside your narrow self-concern.

Inside the walls of your own ego, problems seem to have no solution, and opportunities lack a path to fulfillment. Break free, be free, and operate from a powerful perspective where fears dissolve and abundance intensifies.

As beautiful and unique as you are, living only within your own perspective is lonely and limiting. Extend your focus, widen your horizons, experience joy and wonder you never could have known on your own.

It is simple to let go of your ego. And amazing what that simple step will do.

-Ralph S. Marston

January 22

Change of mood

You have an important task to do, and you’re not in the mood to do it. But whose mood is it, anyway?

It is your mood of course, and you’re in control of it. At any time you choose, you can adjust that mood to suit your purpose.

There are times when the best things, or the most necessary things, will not wait until your mood happens to be right. There are times when it is in your best interest to put yourself in the mood for what must be done.

When you’re not in the mood for some specific task, there’s a quick way to get there. Just visualize, clearly, richly and in full detail, how great you will feel to have the job done.

The more you don’t feel like doing it, the more you will want to have it done. You’re not in the mood to do it, and that is precisely what can motivate you to go ahead and get it over with.

You’ve spent your whole life changing your mood, so put that skill to use in a positive, intentional way. Go right ahead and put yourself in the mood to do what’s best for your life and your world.

— Ralph Marston

January 23

Greater purpose

If you wish, you can immerse yourself fully in this moment. Or if you choose, you can focus your awareness beyond the moment and transcend this moment entirely.

At any and every point in time the choice is yours. With this choice you shape your life, your experience, and the world around you.

You decide what gets in and what is left out. You decide which notions, stimuli, experiences are amplified, enshrined in memory, acted upon, and which are attenuated until they are forgotten.

This great power is yours. With this power, you manifest your intentions into reality.

What drives all this, what makes it work without breaking down into utter chaos, is your clear sense of purpose. And that comes from being completely honest with yourself about yourself.

Live to love all that you love, to support all you value, to care for what matters most. You have great power over your life, so be sure to direct it with even greater purpose.

— Ralph Marston

January 24

Opportunity of this day

You have plenty of ways to begin this day on a positive note, if you choose. And keep in mind, days that start well have the best chance of going well.

So go ahead, take one little action right now that helps bring your dreams into reality. Wait not a moment longer to begin living life on your own terms.

Sure, there are obstacles and complications to get in the way. Yet within you is a strength of purpose that enables you to push through those problems and give life to your dreams.

Feel that purpose, feel its goodness, its authenticity. Let that good feeling flood your awareness and spark you into action.

Decide to no longer be encumbered by doubt. Choose instead to be energized by the possibilities.

Remind yourself of the good fortune you have to be right here, right now. Wrap your arms, your thoughts, your focus around the opportunity of this day, and make it the most rewarding one yet.

— Ralph Marston

January 25

Outlast every failure

If you’re making your best effort, you’re making progress. When that effort doesn’t bring the results you want, keep going.

To get it right, you’ll probably go through many iterations of getting it wrong. Success happens when you’ve worked through enough failures.

Give yourself enough time to fail, and to fail again. That’s how much time it takes to succeed.

Give yourself permission to fail. That’s how you develop the confidence to succeed.

You know where you desire to be, what you desire to create. With every disappointment you’re smarter, more focused, closer to the goal.

Learn, adjust, innovate, adapt, and keep going. Outlast every failure and you’ll end up with success.

— Ralph Marston

January 26

Inside the problem

You won’t solve problems by complaining about them. You won’t solve problems by running from them or shouting angrily at them.

To successfully deal with the problems, you must get inside them. Familiarize yourself with the problems, and you’ll find plenty of ways to work through them.

If life is not going well, identify one clear, specific outcome that would improve your situation. Then go to work and make it happen.

From a distance, as a looming, hazy concept, any problem will feel intimidating, overwhelming. What you must do is get inside, get details, get clarity.

March right into the problem, take a look around, and make note of what you see. Something you see will lead you to a strategy for making the problem go away.

Get inside the problem, and there’s plenty you can do. Get inside the problem, and you’ll find it filled with opportunities.

— Ralph Marston

January 27

Relentless and flexible

You can’t ever make more hours in the day but you can always make more of the hours you have. You can’t ever change what’s already happened but you can always choose what to do with it.

Some options are simply not available, yet that doesn’t have to stop you. Because you have plenty of other options to choose from.

If your path is completely blocked, don’t descend into bitterness, retribution or self pity. Instead, use all your energy to find another path.

Plan well, but don’t get so attached to the plan that you abandon the goal when the plan doesn’t work. There is another way, one that will get you there.

Remind yourself why reaching your goal is so important. Stay solidly connected to your purpose, and you’ll more readily see the alternate options.

Be relentless about achieving the goal, and flexible about how you do it. In a world of endless possibilities, you’re sure to find a way.

— Ralph Marston

January 28

Be there

Sometimes words are not necessary for encouragement. Sometimes words can even get in the way.

Sometimes the kindest thing you can do is just to be there. Sometimes your loving, authentic, accepting presence is what someone else desperately desires.

Be there, and be you. Be there, be present, listen, see, share.

In every person is a longing to connect in a meaningful way. Your presence is one of the best gifts you can give.

Communication technology is wonderful, allowing you to exchange thoughts, information, sounds and images in amazing ways. Yet none of that replaces the value of being there.

When you can, if you care, make it your business to be there. Your presence can make all the difference in the world.

-Ralph S. Marston

January 29

Inspired by the difficulties

Do you want to complain about not being able to get it done? Or would you prefer to actually get it done?

Do you seek to have an impressive sounding excuse? Or would you rather have a real, substantive achievement?

The world pushes against you often, that is true. Life is not fair, and disappointing results are all too common.

You can be offended by that, and use it as an excuse. Or you can accept the challenge, and transform it into an inspiration.

Nobody cares why you can’t. What makes people stand up and take notice, is doing what you can.

So go ahead, and instead of being excused by the difficulties, be inspired to act. Do what you can, every chance you get, and you will surely get the job done.

— Ralph Marston

January 30

New choice

Nothing continues about the way you are, unless you allow it to continue. Your future begins now, and you decide how to be, how to act in it.

At times you’ve disappointed yourself. But now, that disappointing behavior does not have to continue.

Habits, worries, fears, compulsions bind together into a powerful momentum. Fortunately, you are even more powerful.

You can make your choices now based on all you love and treasure and value. Feel your inner beauty, your inner purpose, as you turn cleanly away from all you’ve employed to hold yourself back.

What has served you well, build upon. What has created regret and dismay, let go.

Today, breathe new life into yourself, your dreams, your world. Today is a new choice, and you are positioned to choose very well.

— Ralph Marston

January 31

No regrets

Effort is inconvenient, uncomfortable, time consuming. But regret is much worse.

You can make the effort now, get it done, get it over with. Or you can endure the regret later, when it’s too late, with nothing you can do to rid yourself of that regret.

Today you have opportunity. But the opportunity will soon expire, and you wouldn’t want to miss it.

Today, with your focused, purposeful effort, you can transform opportunity into achievement. That’s a whole lot better than letting opportunity degrade into regret.

Seize the opportunity while it’s yours. Make the effort, as demanding as it may be, while the option is available to you.

Make the choice that will make you thankful for years to come. Act now, carry much value forward from this day, and no regrets.

— Ralph Marston