*Everything* Contributes to Your Advancement

Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude. – Emerson

On the heels of yesterday’s post, let me ask:

What are you rejecting?

What do you wish hadn’t happened?

Or, what situation or circumstance do you wish were different?

Because, as Emerson so eloquently describes, everything that happens contributes to your advancement.

***

(What are you resisting, that is persisting?)

***

But wait!

You protest: “Emerson said ‘every good thing that comes to you,’ not everything.”

Actually, read closer (as I needed to initially… ) the first half of the second sentence clears it all up:

“And because all things have contributed to your advancement . . . ” [my emphasis]

Being grateful for everything that has happened doesn’t mean you want “bad” things to happen again, or regularly, only that by rejecting certain parts of your experience, you reject parts of who you are (i.e. the stuff that has helped “make” you).

Be grateful for it all – and learn from it all – but seek to repeat and strengthen the best stuff.

Similar Posts

  • Beyond Command-and-Control

    I’ve included a blog post from Seth Godin (in its entirety, at the bottom) to get you thinking. Please read Seth’s words below and rejoin me for a couple questions. *  *  * You’re back? Great! If you invoke the Platinum Rule (treat others as they would like to be treated… ), which approach (or…

  • Who Is Really Successful

    The successful man is the average man, focused. – Ralph Waldo Emerson So many people think that anyone who is successful is different in some way. Better genetics, or up-bringing, or work ethic, or friends, or discipline, or education, or . . . . It’s not true. People who are successful work harder, longer. True,…

  • How To Live, Really Live

    People die of fright and live of confidence. – Henry David Thoreau Fright, dread, (dis)stress, angst, anxiety . . . fear is caustic, it’s poisonous, it’s not good for your soul. Confidence, hope, joy, determination, self-assurance, faith . . . love is life-giving, it’s what feeds your soul. What matters here is focus. What you…

  • Stop Not Being Awesome

    I just read an article by a mentor of mine that got me to thinking. The article talked about why one of his clients was having such a hard time, whether or not his past success was a fluke and if he could create it again going forward. His client conceded that he was, at…