Attitude is choice...

My daughter came into my office over a year ago now, and wrote a little note along the side of my whiteboard. It read, "A bad day doesn't exist without your letting it." (she looks every time she comes in to see if it's still there!). But the truth is, she's absolutely right. There isn't one situation, one day, one encounter in life that doesn't come down to a choice that we, as individuals, make, and control. We can control our attitude, we can ultimately control whether we are happy, or sad, or angry, or content... Yet all to often we just give up that control, we allow others, or circumstances, or unwanted emotions to control us and the quality of our lives. Every day we choose to wake up in a good mood or bad, often subconsciously, for the habit is ingrained from years of not making conscious choices; each situation, each encounter we choose our reaction. John Ortberg once taught that there is a quarter-second of realized thought before we react, in any situation. He called it "our life changing quarter-second", for we all have the opportunity to change that instinctive, ingrained negative response before actually responding... We can choose to be negative, or look for the positive side, we can be angry, or choose to smile, we can control our attitude. If we make a conscious effort to be aware of our reactions before actually reacting then it becomes a choice, an exercise of personal discipline, and something we now control instead of being controlled by life, and our attitudes or emotions... We can raise our standard of life by reducing or removing the negativism of our attitudes... Ultimately, life is choice, and we control our choices, either consciously or sub-consciously, either good or bad. If you aren't happy where you are right now then you have the power to change it, for you can choose a different course, a different path, a different response. The only thing in life we can control or hope to change is ourselves. We can't always control others or situations in life; we can only control our attitude and reactions to them.