Always be a first-rate version of yourself, never be a second rate version of somebody else.  

 

It takes guts to stand for something. May God bless you with courage to take a stand on whatever it is you can do to make the world a better place for humankind. Get gutsy for a cause bigger than you alone.

 

By Hannah Brenchner
 

It might be time for you to just start. To not waste any more moments. To not wait on perfection. But to just get up from the floor, with wobbly knees, and start where you’re at. 

I cannot tell you how many iPhone note hoarders and keepers of secret blogs I’ve met throughout the years. They’re a select breed of writers who have something to say but they keep all the words pent up in draft form because they’re afraid. They’re afraid of what people will think. They are afraid of publishing something and then wanting to take it all back. They’re mostly afraid of not being perfect, of putting something out there that means something to them and then not being successful in the end.

This is most of us. Somewhere in our younger years, a lot of us learned to carry this expectation that we would be successful. We’d be good. We’d be excellent. We’d do all the right things. We’d be perfect.

Perfect isn’t possible but we try for it anyway. We tell ourselves, “If perfection isn’t a realistic expectation then I will just be as close to perfect as I can be.”

And soon enough, you become a secret blog keeper. Or someone who always wanted to paint but never picked up the brush. Or the one who wanted to go to back to school but their internal dialogue kept them back. 

I call this internal dialogue my inner critic. Last year, I decided to give my inner critic a name because I figured it would be easier to address her/him if I had a name to go by. I named my inner critic Sid because all I can think about when I picture the critic in my mind is that kid from Toy Story who stirs havoc all over the neighborhood and cackles and is really just a pain in the butt. He blows stuff up while wearing this obnoxious skull t-shirt. Don’t ask me why I knew instantly that my inner critic was to be called Sid... sometimes we just know these sorts of things.

Now that Sid has a name it is much easier to address him. Whenever fear sprouts up or self-loathing is rampant, I am usually able to say, “Chill out, Sid” or “Back down, Sid.”Isn’t it funny how much easier it becomes to face something when you’ve given it a name...READ MORE

 

HEALTHY BABY BOY
 

The second thing I do every morning is read the little piece at the top then read the prayer you share followed by the story. The first is a "Good morning God." I write to thank you for your website.