DEAR ME

Dear Me,

It has come to my attention that I have an excellent chance to codify my New Year's Resolutions for 2010. this current year, as I never have been able to do before! Making the resolutions has been an anticipated part of my usual-only-child-new year's-festivities for as long as I can remember, beginning with the teen years during Casey Kasem's top forty music countdown, and culminating this very year, with my little red book of Resolutions and prayer lists. They range in scope from my spiritual life and health goals to my over-all behavior and attitude. As in most years, I hear a smattering of my beloved old-family-friend Lillian Alltop (Mama Top, to me) along with the futile remonstrations of my own mom, who sadly never had a clue about who I was/am ever in her life.

So. . .here goes my list for 2010.

I FIRST CHOSE MY GUIDING PRINCIPLE;
True contentment is a real, even an active virtue--not only affirmative but creative. It is the power of getting out of any situation all there is in it.
==G.K.Chesterton==

ACTUAL RESOLUTIONS FOR 2010:

1. START EACH DAY WITH A SPIRITUAL QUIET TIME
--bible reading
--prayer time
--view hopes, plans for day, and daily schedule already written in daytimer
--choose memory verse for day
--pray with specificity, asking for desires and thanking for my blessings

2. BE POSITIVE AND PROMISING

3. BE THE WOMAN I EXPECT MYSELF TO BE
--a person I can admire and look up to; a person able to find good in everything and expect good out of every situation

4. THINK BEFORE I ACT OR SPEAK OR WRITE

5. REMEMBER TO ONLY TO TRY TO "EAT THE WHALE" ONE BITE AT A TIME
--the rest of the methods give you heartburn and a headache!

6. PLACE LESS SELF-IMPOSED STRESS AND TENSION ON LIFE
--enough comes free with each day!

7. MAINTAIN HEALTH, DIET, STRENGTH AND PEACE OF MIND
--to be a "grateful liver" (my special term of gratitude)

8. TO BE PART OF THE SOLUTION, AND NOT PART OF THE PROBLEM

(b) 9. TO VIEW LIFE AS A LANDSCAPE PAINTED WITH A BROAD COLORFUL BRUSH RATHER THAN DRAWN AS A DARK, RIGID LINE THAT HAS TO BE TOWED
--with joyful, thorough living
--to live like there is more than enough love, time and happiness to go around!

{b|10. TO MAKE REAL AND HONEST PEACE WI TH MY PAST, HEALTH, AND FUTURE POTENTIAL
--peace with people, places and decisions

11. DEFY MY BELIEF OF MY SET DESTINY; INSTEAD, ASPIRE FOR BETTER
--figure out what the essence of what I want to be is; then seize it gently from behind and don't let it wriggle off!

12. REWARD INSTEAD OF CRITICIZE WHENEVER POSSIBLE