Half Full Glass - Positive Perspective

July 07. Hey Friends. Its already the start of wednesday & I am having a pretty great week. I think alot of it has to do with perspective, because there is not a whole lot that other people would consider good going on. Tuesday was interesting, I caught up on some sleep & hung out with mom during the early day. I had to chase the neighbor's goats out of our yard twice & lock them up. Like my dad says, they are laughing at me cuz I can block one hole they get out of & they know a hundred others if they really want to get out. It's been hot & hard to get cool so I got a haircut too. Later in the evening I had dinner & headed out for my meeting which was pretty good. I didn't get to see my sponsor but alot of other good friends were there to compensate having someone to keep up on telling on myself. We did talk later on the phone though which was good, just as I was getting to my cousin's house to hang out with him for a couple hours. He & his wife went out with me for a little while & we had fun. So here I am ready to rest up for my day tomorrow, which I am psyched about because I am going to the movies with a friend & kids. That type of excitement didn't exist in my life before sobriety, in fact it was a grueling nuisance to have to do anything with anybody else besides take trips to big cities for drugs. Thankfully I have been restored to sanity, for the most part, by my higher power & with the help of many.

I told someone tonight that was miserable, a complete stranger who was disgruntled & hating the world, that I am sorry they feel that way but MY GLASS IS ALWAYS HALF FULL. They really were in shock, almost like I was swearing at them or calling their mother names. I chuckled inside but kept my composure on the surface, some people just don't see life how I do today. I find that out more & more as I go on, that there are MANY who do not have a positive attitude. I don't want to guess at saying half the people I encounter, because lately I keep myself around other positive people on purpose, but if I were to just walk around the general public being cheerful not as many people as you think would respond. It's the positive attitude & optimism that has made all things in my sobriety possible today, that is why I go the extra mile to keep it a part of my life. How you might ask? Well one major thing is prayer & meditation to grow closer to my higher power & have a functioning relationship in my life that no human can change like with social relationships. I have not yet mastered meditation & may never be great at it, but I can get into that calm & empty place, where thought is totally random & does not dwell. It's a nice place to be when one thought moves to the next & you do not have to be focused on anything. I used to primarily focus on the negative, but today there is too much positive to be ignore.

Another way I keep positive is to have gratitude for all things good in my life & all things that I don't understand yet, because of their potential good later in my life. I do this by talking about it in every way I can, even on my social networks online. The ultimate way to do this though is to write & keep a gratitude list. Updating it gives us a chance to look back at things we may have forgotten. I stick with the winners so to speak these days as well. Meaning I try to surround myself by sober & positive people & even if someone close to me is drinking, I'll catch up with them next time when their sober. There is no need for me to expose myself to the negative affects of my past, even if its someone else being affected & even if they are not an alcoholic or addict like me. Bottom line is that all of these little things & chances to be positive in a day are cumulative. They add up to an overpowering force that requires me to go against the grain & think negatively for quite some time to get rid of it. Some people would say being stuck on the positive will make a person ignorant or to ignore the "bad" things in their life that need to be addressed. I do not agree, because if a negative issue is that pressing in someone's life, they will tend to it & hopefully in a positive manner. I never want to be one of those people who brings someone else down & if I ever am shame on myself. Staying positive keeps me close to spirituality, they are almost related but spirituality goes deeper into an almost action phase & proactive positivity. If you don't believe that it works & can change your life, just try it for a week straight. First you have to find your higher power if you haven't already, but then use the prayer & meditation. Make that list. Avoid those negative people & delete their voicemails on the first word they say, don't listen to their crap. See what happens by the end of the seven days & see how many more positive people are in your life that next week than were in it the week before. What do you have to lose besides your negativity? And we all have negativity, mine comes when I am financially or emotionally strapped, strained, or suprised. I'll have to work on that, maybe we can all work on being positive together. Thanks for blogging in. Good Night.. Good Morning.. <3 Jimmy