Seeds of Success I How Looking Backwards Reminds You Who You Are I Barbara Christensen

Looking Backwards

This morning I was on the computer and looking for something in the old backup server and I came on the old life coaching site from over ten years ago. What a blast from the past. I was doing more business coaching then, and life coaching was more about image coaching rather than that deep sort of program that I use with clients now. But what I found was by looking backwards I found more of myself. Parts of myself that I had forgotten long ago.

I found a page of my old coaching website that was called Seeds Of Success and I wanted to share it because I think we are so quick to be hard on ourselves within the journey we are on.

"Where You Are... Isn't the place where you are going to stop, but should be remembered. " ~ Barbara Christensen

Seeds of Success - 

I give thanks for this day. I know that I have not yet accomplished all that I can and if that is the reason I am bathed in the fresh dew of another dawn, I am most grateful. I am prepared at last to face today’s challenges.

I will forget yesterday with all of its trials and tribulations, aggravations and setbacks, angers and frustrations. The past is already a dream from which I can neither retrieve a single word nor erase any foolish deeds.

I will resolve, however, that if I have injured anybody through my thoughtlessness, I will not let this day end before I make amends and nothing I do today will be of greater importance.

I will not fret the future. My success and happiness do not depend on straining to see what lurks dimly on the horizon but to do this day what lies clearly at hand. I will treasure this day for it is all I have. I know that its rushing hours cannot be accumulated or stored like precious grain for future use.

I will live as all good actors do when they are on stage, only in the moment. I cannot perform at my best today by regretting my previous acts mistakes or worrying about the scene to come.

I will embrace today's difficult tasks, take off my coat and make dust in the world. I will remember that the busier I am the less harm I am apt to suffer, the tastier will be my food, the sweeter my sleep and the better satisfied I will be with my place in the world.

I will free myself today from slavery to the clock and calendar. Although I will plan this day to conserve my steps and energy, I will begin to measure my life in deeds not years, in thoughts not seasons, in feelings not figures on a dial.

I will remain aware of how little it takes to make this a happy day. Never will I pursue happiness because it is in not a goal just a by product and there is no happiness in having or getting only in giving.

I will run from no danger I might encounter today, because I am sure that nothing will happen that I am not equipped to handle. Just as any gem is polished by friction, I am certain to become more valuable through this day's adversity and if one door closes, another will always open.

I will live this day as if it were Christmas, I will be a giver of gifts and deliver to my enemies the gift of forgiveness, my opponents tolerance, my friends a smile, my children a good example. Every gift will be wrapped with unconditional love.

I will waste not even a precious second today in anger or hate or jealousy or selfishness. I know that the seeds I sow I will harvest because every action good or bad is always followed by an equal reaction. I will only plant good seeds this day.

I will treat today as a priceless violin. One may draw harmony from it and another discord, yet no one will blame the instrument. Life is the same in that if I play it correctly it will give forth beauty, but if I play it ignorantly it will produce ugliness.

I will condition myself to look at every problem that I encounter today as no more than a pebble in my shoe. I remember the pain so harsh I could hardly walk and recall my surprise when I removed my shoe and found only a grain of sand.

I will work convinced that nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. To do anything today that is truly worth doing I must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and danger but jump in with gusto and scramble through as well as I can.

I will face this world with goals set for this day, but they will be attainable ones not the vague, impossible variety declared by those who make a career of failure. I realize that life always tries me with a little first to see what I will do with a lot.

I will never hide my talents. If I am silent I am forgotten. If I do not advance I will fall back. If I walk away from any challenge today my self-esteem will be forever scarred. If I cease to grow even a little I will become smaller. I reject the stationary position because it is the beginning of the end.

I will keep a smile on my face and in my heart even when it hurts today. I know that the world is a looking glass and gives back to me the reflection of my own soul. Now I understand the secret of correcting the attitude of others and that is to correct my own.

I will turn away from any temptation today that may cease me to break my word or lose my self-respect. I am positive that the only thing I possess more valuable than my life is my honor.

I will work this day with all my strength content in the knowledge that life does not consist of wallowing in the past or peering anxiously at the future.

It is appalling to contemplate the great number of painful steps by which one arrives at a truth so old so obvious and so frequently expressed. Whatever it offers little or much, my life is now!

I will pause whenever I am feeling sorry for myself today and remember that this is the only day that I have and I must play it to the fullest. What my part may signify in the great whole I may not recognize but I am here to play it, and now is the time. I will count this day a separate life. I will remember that those who have fewest regrets are those who take each moment as it comes for all that it is worth.

This is my day, These are my seeds. Thank you for this precious garden of time...

Adapted from Og Mandino's Mission: Success!