Accepting Finite Disappointment

So it's been longer than I would normally want to wait between blog entries, but I can honestly say I tried. I've made a commitment to not allow this blog to just be a diary of memories but a collection of positive affirmations to remind me that frustration and hate, even while being vented, is negative. So for what it's worth, I'm trying a new approach instead of my quickdraw response to fly off the handle when I'm angry or stressed. I gave myself a few days to fight the urge to rant and rave. To my amazement, I found my center. Now, on to more positive things.

I have finally found the source of my lack of motivation. I'm normally a very good housekeeper but sometimes no matter how spotless and front page of "Better Homes"-worthy my home is, it can somehow be a disaster within 24 hours. It's always been a mystery to me how this is possible and even more so how I manage to give up so easily when it does. Same goes for homework. Some days I am a caffeine-fueled workaholic who studies parts of textbooks that I'll never even be tested on. Others, I can't be bothered to even get off the couch from an impromptu, 8 hour long West Wing marathon.

This may not be news to a lot of people, but it was a miraculous discovery to me when I realized it was success that motivates me. Not the possibility of it, however, but the already gained kind. If I make a 100 on a pop quiz somehow my ability to take notes, study for a test, and think of nothing else but the subject at hand excels me to academic excellence. I miss so much as one question on a previously well-prepared for exam and I martyr myself to failure. I'm completely driven by my own positive outlook. Disappointment, which normally fuels motivation, is my achilles heel.

My all-time favorite Baptist once said "We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope". I don't know why I always forget that. Disappointment is always temporary and so far it has never meant the end of the world. Hard work, however, has always shown a 100% success rate. How do I keep giving up, even if it is momentarily, with such great odds like that? I've seen proof that I am capable of greatness and hope can be infinite if I let it be.

So now with my homework done, a clean house, and this newly completed entry in my blog, all the things on my to-do list for the day are happily checked off. With the rest of the evening at my disposal, I can breathe a sigh of relief while focusing on the lighter yet equally satisfying side of life...

...which at the moment happens to be my two stupid dogs growling ferociously at the children playing three stories below who are, according to them, posing a dangerous threat to our little castle.