How do you start your day? Do you use an alarm clock then press snooze a couple of times?

Are you irritable until you have had your first cup of coffee? Do you think about all of the things you must do during the day and feel overwhelmed?  

These are all attitudes.  

So often we are not aware of the various attitudes that we present to the world.  We can have different attitudes with our family, our friends, our coworkers, our neighbours and so on.

Where did our children go? As a grandmother I still find it so hard to comprehend that the mothers of my grandchildren were once my little babies.

Where did my little children disappear to? When did they disappear? It’s like looking at a long straight stretch of highway that has a slight curve in the road many km away. You can see the cars for such a long distance down the road, and then they reach the point in the curve of the road, where they vanish out of sight.

Cuddles with Papa so Long Ago

You pull out of your garage, get to the end of the driveway and then which way do you turn?
It all depends on where you are going. If we want to head North to visit with our youngest daughter we would turn right out of our driveway, but if we wanted to go to Southern Alberta to visit our eldest daughter then we would turn left.

Next month I am heading to the West coast? Why? To visit with my daughter who will be ready to deliver her second baby our sixth grandchild.

The first most important question to ask your self is … Where am I going? And the second most important question is Why?

Circumstances are the biggest stumbling block to our achieving anything great in our lives. More than any other single factor, we let circumstances get in the way of us moving forward and we let our dreams become shattered and lose sight of our goals. Instead of giving it our all, we give up, we allow circumstances to block us from doing what we know we should be doing.

Live Fully! It is easy to say to people, but have you really thought about what it means to live fully? My first thought sounded something like this… ‘when’ money is flowing steadily into my bank account, and I am helping others in every way that I can, and travelling the world …..

Then I heard a loud ‘STOP!’ in my head.

If this is ‘living fully’ then I may never get there. How can I live fully right now in this moment. Then I realized, that was it!! To live fully meant to live each moment to its fullest, no matter what that moment was. It could be a joy filled, happy moment of rejoicing, or it could be a tragic, sad, sorrow filled moment.

Before you leave on a journey you first choose a destination and a reason for going. If you have never been there before then you do some research and decide the best route to get there and possibly the best time of year to travel. There are usually maps and travel books involved in the planning, tools to help make this adventure a successful one.

The day you were married began the first step of your journey together as a couple. It was the day you became a family. Did you have a destination in mind and reason for achieving it?

September is the month where parents in the Northern Hemisphere are now back into the swing of things. Children are settled back in school, and life takes on the familiar routine. A routine that most of us had for 12 or 13 years it is a routine that was mine for 17 years of my adult life.

There is something about September that stays with you all your life. New beginnings, the smells of Autumn, and a sense of excitement and expectation. It’s almost like a rebirth.We are filled with a renewed desire to do better than last year. So we make new plans. This is the year that lunches will be ready on time, our meals will be healthier, we will get up earlier and enjoy the morning.

There are times in our life when we need to stop and take a deep breath. We need to find out where we are and where we want to be heading.

So just where are you in your life? Are you where you want to be? Can you see the path before you and is it in the direction that you want to go? Do you need to make any changes? How about the people you associate with most often, are they helping you along your journey or pulling you into paths that you really do not want to be on?

One of the most important steps in our programs is for parents to create a vision of the family they desire to have. If you are already living your dream family life, congratulations! Make sure your vision is written down with daily action steps to keep you on the right track.

If you are not living your dream family life right now then this message is for you.

What is a dream family life? This vision may look different for each family because each family is unique.