February 6th, 2017
Is this relationship worth it? All throughout our life we are in relationships. We have relationships with people, companies, governments, etc. Today, let’s talk about our people relationships.
Whether we are in a work, friend or significant other relationship with another person there are constantly millions of dynamics at work. Sometimes they work seamlessly and sometimes they don’t. When they do, it’s a little slice of heaven. When they don’t, the upsets can be catastrophic to your well being on every level.
If you are going to walk away every time a relationship upsets you, you are going to have an infinite number of very, very short relationships and you will never know the joy of a deep, give and take relationship. However, if you are going to put up with upsets let’s have some rules.
Rule#1- Physical violence or even the threat of physical violence is instant termination, no warning necessary.
Rule#2- Bullying, verbal abuse, outright or in the guise of “I was only joking”, instant termination after one and only one warning.
Rule#3- Being drunk or high is never an excusable reason for treating you badly. Instant termination after one warning unless rule #1 is breached than no warning is due.
Rule#4- You don’t have permission to be a jerk because they are a jerk.
Rule#5- You may be real, real close but you are not them and they are not you.
Rule#6- People change. That includes you.
Rule#7- Sometimes it is nothing in particular. It is just time to move on.
Rule#8- NEVER count on changing someone else! You will never get a cat to bark and trying only frustrates you and pisses off the cat.
Rule#9- When it is really LOVE, you won’t have to talk yourself into it.
Don’t expect or, heaven’s forbid, demand perfection in a relationship and remember that all relationships should be beneficial to both people. One-sided relationships are awful. If it’s good, enjoy every moment. Who knows, it could last a lifetime. If it’s bad, don’t wait too long to jump overboard. It is never a good idea to go down with the ship.
Review your relations every now and then to make sure that you haven’t gotten too comfortable with less than you deserve. Reviewing also helps to know if you are getting lazy and taking the other person for granted. Ask yourself often “Am I loving and present to my full potential?” and “Is our relationship as good as it can be?” and “How can I be better at this?”.
Relationships are everything you can imagine and so much more. Be realistic about your role and what you want in the other person. Be as loving, caring and supportive as you can be all the time and never, ever, ever expect the cat to bark.
Sundrops On Life -Better Thoughts. Better Days.
Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
December 12th, 2016
As I walked around the cardiac care unit (again!) showing that I was fit enough to leave, I looked into each room as I passed and in every room I saw people who were alive. I don’t mean alive versus dead. I mean people who were very aware that this wasn’t just another day. I didn’t talk to any of them but I was thinking as I walked by that their last New Year’s Eve’s plans for the new year didn’t include this. Mine sure didn’t. And that’s when it hit me!
I didn’t have any plans. Sure I wanted to go camping and hiking and traveling more but mostly and dominantly, after all I have been through, I just wanted nothing bad to happen to my loved ones or myself. I had slipped into survival mode. Now survival mode is a great place to be when survival in questionable but it is NOT a place to just hang out and watch life go by. Firstly, it’s very stressful because when you are in survival mode you are always consciously or unconsciously considering the opposite. Secondly, survival mode is the illusion that if I don’t stick my head up I won’t get shot. In other words, the cosmic entity that doles out hardships won’t be able to see me!
What a bunch of organic, grass fed manure I was believing! There is no certainty. This is life and life is a mystery. Unless you are in quicksand get out of survival mode. Survival mode is nothing more than a semi comfortable prison with an unlocked door. You keep praying that nothing bad will come in and so you keep hyper focused on that door to the exclusion of everything else life has to offer. That’s not living! Walk out that unlocked door. Engage the world. You are strong enough to handle anything out there. Go for the summit! You’ll never get to see the view from the top of the mountain if you hold up in a cave on the way up.
Yeah, I’m going to make some plans for 2017. You betcha! They are going to be audacious and magnificent and wonderful. Every day I am going to focus on being alive and being dialed into and open to all kinds of new possibilities. I don’t want life to be safe any more. I want it to be a trip again. I’m trading in safe for AMAZING.
How about you?
Sundrops On Life -Better Thoughts. Better Days.
Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
November 16th, 2015
What are you going to do about the atrocities and the injustice in this world? Are you going to tweet about it? Are you going to condemn it? Change the color of your profile? None of this changes anything!
In our quest to make symbolism synonymous with substance, we put up another rainbow or pink or tricolored bumper sticker or touching post and consider it done. Nothing could be further from the truth.
When we see a child starving on the other side of the world we can’t reach out with a sandwich but we can look around our circle of acquaintances and see if they or any member of our immediate community is hungry and feed them.
When we see people killing other people through some warped sense of beliefs we can’t shield them from harm but we can take an objective look at our beliefs and see if our beliefs have estranged or even hurt those we profess to love unconditionally.
When we see racial or economic subjugation of a people we can’t ride in on a white horse and save them but we can start responding to the cashier the same as we would a professor and begin to treat people as equals in feelings and needs.
When we see the sick and the infirm we can’t just wave a magic wand and make them healthy but we can look at ourselves and take inventory. Are we living the healthiest life we are capable of living?
We are all connected as living beings but that doesn’t mean we are all the same. Tolerate those who are different but never tolerate those who are hurtful.
We can’t help everyone individually BUT we can help the whole by being better at everything we do. A glass of pure water makes a polluted lake a tiny bit better. A sticker saying that we believe the lake shouldn’t be this bad does nothing.
Be the best you can be. Be conscious of the needs around you. Add to the light in this world with every word that comes out of your mouth. Add to the peace in this world by being strong. Add to the healing in this world with a good example and a supportive attitude. Add to the betterment of this world by striving to be better on every level. Above all, walk in beauty and gratefulness for that alone makes a difference.
(c)2015 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
September 28th, 2015
Should you move, break a relationship, quit your job, go back to school, buy a drum set? When the idea of changing your life surfaces it isn’t because there is something terribly wrong with your life. It is because you want more. You want more adventure, more challenges, more newness. You want to feel more alive.
The key to success is to change before you make the change. What that means is to act like you would in a new place before you make the move. Look around you. Is this the way you want to live in the new place? Change it now. What it would feel like to have a certain someone no longer in your life. Is there freedom or sadness? Imagine it happening now.
We warm up before exercise. We prepare before going to bed. We put on seatbelt before we drive. We prepare for what we are going to do but we jump right into life changing situations and consider ourselves brave.
Whenever you are faced with a big change, take it for a test drive first! Act as if the change has already taken place. How does it feel to sit for endless hours in a classroom? How does it feel to hit a drum like a three year old instead of Ginger Baker?
Change is great! It is highly recommend. Lights come on in the areas of your brain that were dark and dormant. Change is aliveness! BUT make the changes that help you to live a bigger, better, happier life. Change just for the sake of change is a recipe for regret and depression and a fear of making any more changes.
Go ahead and make changes. Make small changes and big changes. Make them first in your thoughts and then in your imagination and then in your life. Right now, look around. What do you want to change? …..Think about it.
(c)2015 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
February 23rd, 2015
Into every life, indecision will descend like a thick fog completely obscuring our clarity. We beg, plead and pray for a sign, any sign. We ask friends, loved ones and Google to help us make the right choice. Paralysis starts to creep in. Weeping may come but won’t help. A full range of emotions comes but the fog persists.
It seems that the more important the outcome, the stronger the indecision becomes. Do I? Don’t I? It consumes you after a while and finally you reach that moment when you must decide and ….you still don’t know!
First of all, know this. You CAN’T make the wrong decision. Even no decision isn’t the wrong decision. EVERY decision you make or don’t make is another building block in your life. You are going to make decisions that don’t turn out the way you expect and you are going to find strength you didn’t know you had in order to make it better (Growth). You are going to make decisions that turn out right but you are going to brag about it and lose friends (Growth). You are going to forego making a decision and regret it (Growth). You are going to make decisions and they will be the best thing that ever happened to you (Growth). You are going to influence the way others see you with the way you decide(Growth).
Life is all about growth and growth is the product of every decision. When faced with a decision, go ahead and make it. Make it with gusto. Make it with certainty whether you feel it or not. If you are wrong you’ll learn humility. If you are right you look like a boss. Either way you’ll grow. Every single person, pant and creature on this planet is born to grow. You will never be an exception to that. Go ahead make a decision. You can’t get it wrong. On your mark, get set, GROW!
(c)2015 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
September 29th, 2014
Imagine you go to the gym and hire a trainer and his plan is for you to never struggle even the slightest bit in any exercise. How fast would you reach your goals? Imagine that you come upon a friend when you are out shopping and they tell you that they have worked out every single day for several years. They also tell you that five years ago they couldn’t lift three pounds and now they can. Is that progress?
Most of us have this terrible equation embedded in our thoughts. That equation is struggle, struggle, reward and finish struggling. It may sound good as a fantasy but it isn’t life. The correct equation is struggle, grow, struggle, grow. That’s life!
You struggle with a cold as a child and your immune system grows strong enough to defeat a more serious one years later. You struggle through a bad relationship so that you can grow in wisdom. You struggle with finances so that you can grow in your vision of the worth of things. You struggle with school so that you can grow your earnings.
Seeing someone moaning and crying at the gym because they have to lift a weight would lead you to believe they weren’t serious about growth. On the other hand, watching someone struggle and then smile at their reflection in the mirror tells you that they are pleased with their results of their struggle.
Don’t moan about your struggles. Gratitude isn’t just for the bright, shiny things in your life. Gratitude is also for the struggles that make you a better, stronger person. Embrace your struggles. Give thanks for your struggles. Reap the wisdom and strength that you know is coming from your struggles. They are not knocking you down. They are building you up.
(c)2014 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
May 26th, 2014
Like billions and billions of hot air balloons hovering just a few feet above the ground, we float along knowing that we are capable of going much higher but not knowing exactly how. We look down and feel sorry for those who are still on the ground and we jealously look up at those who have soared much higher than us.
Maybe we need to have more stuff we tell ourselves. So we get more of everything and yet following this line of thinking we seem to actually lose altitude. Maybe we would go much higher if we were in a different place so we move again and again and still no higher.
Finally, we tell ourselves that we were meant to fly only this high because of our mistakes or shortcomings. We tell ourselves that we are just not the type of person that soars any higher and that we should be filled with gratitude that we are not on the ground. From then on, we soar a few feet higher and we celebrate. We lose a couple of feet in altitude and we get depressed.
One day, if we are lucky, we realize that we are not alone in our balloon. We look around and we see the people who have hurt us, the people who have embarrassed us, the ones who put us down, the ones who betrayed us and if we are strong we order them to leave and lo and behold we start moving higher. When they have left we see that there are beliefs and baggage that have been weighing us down too. Over the side with them! And we move higher still.
Soon we are soaring with those who travel lightly in their emotions and memories and we will have learned two of the greatest lessons; ONE, good people are to be kept, idiosyncrasies and all, toxic people are to be tossed away even if they are bejeweled and TWO, good experiences are to be kept, wrappings and all and bad experiences are to be tossed away keeping only the lesson learned.
Lighten up and soar!
(c)2014 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
November 18th, 2013
Sometimes you look around and you know that you should just be grateful for all of your blessings. You know you should feel satisfied with all you have but there seems to be a something that isn’t there, something missing. Maybe your health isn’t exactly perfect or maybe it’s your relationship or your job or your dreams. You can’t exactly put your finger on it but you know there is something that you need to add to your life.
With that in mind, you set about adding. Maybe some shopping will do it. Maybe a new book will do it. Maybe a seminar, a therapy session, a massage or maybe a new friend will do it. More often than not, none of this does it. There is still that nagging sense that things could be better and you know what? YOU’RE RIGHT! You are absolutely, positively right.
You are not greedy or selfish by wanting more than you have because the fact of the matter is that there really is something missing. That missing something is zest. You need zest. No, not the outer layer of a citrus fruit! You need enthusiasm. Every segment of life is improved with the addition of enthusiasm. You can’t buy, beg or borrow enthusiasm. You generate it.
You say your generator is broken? Or maybe you misplaced it? Balderdash! Your intent to be enthusiastic is all that is necessary. Your generator is automatically turned on the moment you decide that you are going to be more enthusiastic about your life.
So go ahead, fantasize, dream, imagine. Think about anything that excites you. Thought always precedes manifestation. Get excited about the possibilities in every area of your life. Enthusiasm gives you the strength to attempt the impossible. Enthusiasm is the boredom destroyer. Enthusiasm is the stress destroyer. Enthusiasm is the super hero of emotions and it’s yours any time you want it. Get excited about something and then about everything and don’t look back.
(c)2013 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
October 28th, 2013
Contrary to popular opinion, most people do have goals and plans. Some plans are vague and some are very specific but in the vast majority of cases, if those goals and plans don’t work out there is one specific cause, one common missing link. The missing link here is what powers our dreams and imagination. It is the essential ingredient for success in any area of our lives. It is irreplaceable in business, relationships and especially in regards to our health. It is…
ENTHUSIASM!! (USC band starts playing, confetti and balloons shower down, people start hugging each other and jumping up and down!) YES! That kind of enthusiasm. The higher the level of enthusiasm and the more prolonged the feeling of enthusiasm, the better the chances of success. Not only that but the happiness indicators go through the roof.
What happens when you first fall in love? It’s like Gene Kelly dancing in Singing in the Rain. Over the top joy and enthusiasm. How about a wedding, birth, promotion, visit from a loved one, a joyous holiday, a graduation, the final payment on a house, the planning of an adventure. All of these thing spark our enthusiasm for a great future. And when we are enthusiastic about our future, all is very, very well.
We can reverse engineer this too. If we start smiling and we adopt an everything is possible attitude and we put on our rose colored glasses and we tell doubt and worry to get lost, we can bring enthusiasm into anything we do and with enough enthusiasm, our world changes quickly.
The root of the word enthusiasm is from the ancient Greek word “enthous” meaning possessed and inspired by God. Does that sound like a good fit for you and anything you want to accomplish? Let’s get a little rah-rah about our work and our health and our future. Let’s stop talking about that hand basket and it’s fiery destination and let’s get ourselves enthusiastic about our life, our possibilities and our blessings. Ready for a change?
(c)2013 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life
October 21st, 2013
“I’ve talked until I’m blue in the face and nothing changes.” It doesn’t matter if you have said this about a boss, an employee, a coworker, a friend, a parent, a spouse or a child. What does matter is that you are making yourself upset because you forgot the first rule of living on this planet. You can’t change someone else if they don’t want to change.
It doesn’t matter if you have the very best intentions or if you are doing it out of a deep love and caring for the other person. You can’t change someone else if they don’t want to change. You can guilt, bribe, ignore, threaten or shame but the result will be temporary at best.
“So what am I suppose to do? Just sit idly by and let them ruin their lives, their career, their relationship, their health, etc.?” Emphatically NO! You are not suppose to sit idly by. You are suppose to follow the second rule of living on this planet. You are suppose to work on you.
You are supposed to aspire and work toward excellence in every aspect of your own life. Your duty is to become loving, caring, compassionate and even-tempered. Your duty is to embrace all that is good and project the optimism that comes from living a spirit centered life. In other words, you are to become the best example of what you talk about.
If someone is inclined to change, your example will be their blueprint. Your words may be ignored or forgotten but the image of who you have become will never leave them. If, every day, you work on your happiness, honesty, love and being non-judgemental you will become worthy of being copied. That’s your reward. If someone in your life tries to change themselves because of your example, that’s a bonus.
(c)2013 All Rights Reserved, Patrick McBride
www.PatrickInspires.com
Facebook – Sundrops On Life