Inspiration…Some people have it and some people do not, but the great thing is, it is always readily available to everyone. I had one person ask me the other day and I will quote, “Rich, why is it that you are always so upbeat and positive? Why is it that you can see only the good in everything and let the bad slip on by? How do I become happy and inspired to live a life of happiness and joy? I feel as though that whatever I do or start to do to become happy, it fizzles out before the fire even starts to burn. Help me get a better understanding on how to not only become inspired, but maintain that inspiration so that little fizzle of a flame will become an never ending inferno. Thank you, Rich”
I love these kind of questions because they are so very easy to answer. I am so upbeat and positive because I “CHOOSE” to be. Every day I wake up, I make the choice to let nothing stand in my way of becoming inspired and instilling that inspiration into whomever will listen. I choose to see the good in everything because the “GOOD” is the prize, and that prize will allow me to see through the bad and not let that bad situation steal my joy or my peace. There is good and bad in everything and sometimes I ask myself why so many people would not only allow themselves to focus on the bad, but dwell on it to the point where miserableness sets in and becomes a fixture on the walls of their hearts. I got sober almost 7 years ago and when my journey started, I knew that I needed to do what the sober people did, I wanted what they had!!!!! They had all of what you ask me about, happiness and joy, and not only inspiration, but a towering inferno of it!!!!! I had to (in desperation) follow their every move and for lack of a better term, copy it into my life. I needed to eat, sleep and breathe how they did and when I thought about going back to being the miserable person I once was, I would hit myself with a bat(a fictitious one) and bounce myself back to reality. If you want what I have regarding happiness, joy, and inspiration, just do what I do, choose happiness, joy, and inspiration over anything else and when you feel as though the bad situations are too strong to overcome, fake it till you make it. I encourage you to think higher thoughts and turn your positive thoughts into positive actions. Another realization that helped me to become who I am, is the act of being grateful for everything in my life and accepting responsibility for the things I do, or have done wrong. When I am grateful for everything, it does not allow selfishness to creep into my life and rear it’s ugly head and when I accept responsibility for the things I do or have done wrong, it allows me to learn from my mistakes and can create peace in a tense situation.
All in all and to sum it all up, we have choices. We have choices that we need to make every day and like an airplane taking off on a cloudy day, we must burst through the clouds of negativity and allow the blue skies of life to take hold of us so that we can be a beacon of light to others and set the tone in not only our lives, but hopefully in the lives of others as well…….
Rich Barnes