You declutter your home and your office, but head and heart space needs to be cleaned, cleared and organized on a regular basis too.  

  What you carry and keep in your head and heart can stop you from being all that you can be (or just plain happy.) If you are miserable and can’t figure out why, it may to be time to declutter your mental space.

1. Learn to let go of old grudges. Life’s too short and uncertain to take grudges to the grave.

2. Unload or step away from your burdensome friends. Take an honest look at the people in your life. Break ties or change the friendship rules with those who don’t support you, or who are incompatible with your values and goals.

3. Take a break and stop being judgmental.Being judgmental can close you off from learning something from others. Don’t judge so quickly; listen to the whole story first.

4. It is OK to be wrong. You have to be willing to be wrong. Don’t be afraid to make the occasional mistake. When you do, acknowledge it. You can waste a lot of energy trying to be perfect or alway right.

5. Be willling to say I’m sorry.  Loosen up on stuborness. Don’t let a misunderstanding cost a  a relationship with a family member, friend or customer because you can’t say I am sorry.

Positive thinking alone does not ensure success, but it’s a good and important start.

Those who know me, know that I follow the teachings of a former co-worker who unwittingly became my mentor. She once told me, “Every morning I look in the mirror and say to myself, ‘You are beautiful.’” I don’t recall how I felt or what I said to her at the time. I was a 20-something and had other things on my mind. For some reason, that conversation has stayed with me. At some point I began to realize how powerful that statement is. Beauty is not just about the physical and if you don’t believe in yourself, you’ll have a hard time persevering against the obstacles, setbacks and naysayers, you’re likely to encounter.  When someone says  you will never be able to do that,  or you are ugly, fat, skinny, etc., ignore them and their negativity, just look in the mirror and say, “You are beautiful.” 

Maintaining the right attitude in the face of adversity:

Use positive language. Use words that emphasize happiness, strength and success.

Create the right mind-environment. Don’t spend too much time on downbeat things or negative people. 

Appreciate your life. Focusing on what you don’t have can crowd out appreciation for what you already possess.

Let go of mistakes. Just about everyone fails at some things; don’t obsess over them. Learn what you can and move on instead of beating yourself up time and again.

Know that success at life is just as important as success in business.

Have you ever thought of building a garden that will become home to dozens of beautiful butterfies? All it takes is a little know-how and patience. Your reward will be a blaze of color, fragrance and butterflies.

Plant your flowers in a sunny section of the garden, butterflies love light and sun. You will want plants that grow at different heights. That will assure that your visitors will find needed shelter from heavy rains. Male butterflys, however, will welcome the wet soil from the rains, the mud provides certain essential salts which is necessary for reproduction.

Plant flowers in colorful patches since butterflys are drawn to an abundance of color. Ask your garden shop expert which flowers are the most fragrant.

The flower list* below attracts many butterfly species. Choose several that are easy to grow in your own area:

Aster
Black-eyed Susan
Butterfly weed
Coreopsis
Daylillies
Goldenrod
Hibiscus
Lavendar
Lilac
Marigold
Orange-eye
Butterfly Bush
Oxeye Daisies
Phlox
Pink Azalea
Purple Coneflower
Redbud
Rosemary
Verbena

I am sure that there are other flowers that will attract butterfliess, you just have to do your homework. Your garden shop is just one source for information. Visit your library, browse book stores and don’t forget the Internet.

See the related links below for more garden information. Very often informational sites will list other sites and sources for additional data.

• The Garden Helper: Growing Zones USA
• Yankee Gardener: Flower Planting Chart USA

Once your garden is abundant with flowers, fragrance and butterflies, be sure to share your treasure with friends, family and neighbors. You may also want to Attract hummingbirds to your garden

*Source: University of Kentucky Department of Entomology

Article from Work & Family at BellaOnline with author approval.

Three simple words for a better life?  Improving your life starts with your attitude.

It does not matter if you think Wayne Dyer is a guru or simply hokey, one thing is true, “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” Dr. Wayne W. Dyer.

Make 2010 the year you use some of these three-word phrases more often:

__ I thank you.
__ Please forgive me.
__ I trust you.
__ Let me help.
__ I believe you.
__ I forgive you.
__ Maybe you’re right.
__ Count on me.
__ I understand you.
__ I’ll do it.
__ Go for it.

And finally, Yes I can.

Some great quotable quotes from well-known people. It all boils down to, “Persevere to reach your goal. Find happiness.” Now that sounds like a plan, I wish good health and good fortune to everyone in 2010.

~~ “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and, above all, confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.” —Marie Curie

~~ “The road to happiness lies in two simple principles; find what interests you and that you can do well, and put your whole soul into it—every bit of energy and ambition and natural ability you have.” —John D. Rockefeller

~~ “Every day you may make progress. Every step may be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending, ever-improving path. You know you will never get to the end of the journey. But this, far from discouraging, only adds to the joy and glory of the climb.” —Winston Churchill

~~ “The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one often comes from a strong will and the other from a strong won’t.” —Henry Ward Beecher

~~ “The discipline you learn and character you build from setting and achieving a goal can be more valuable than the achievement of the goal itself.” —Bo Bennett

~~ “One only gets to the top rung of the ladder by steadily climbing up one at a time, and suddenly all sorts of powers, all sorts of abilities which you thought never belonged to you suddenly become within your own possibility, and you think, ‘Well, I’ll have a go, too.’” —Margaret Thatcher

~~ “If I were asked to give what I consider the single most useful bit of advice for all humanity, it would be this: Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life, and when it comes, hold your head high, look it squarely in the eye, and say: “I will be bigger than you. You cannot defeat me.” —Ann Landers

~~ “For every failure, there’s an alternative course of action. You just have to find it. When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.” —Mary Kay Ash

~~“It’s a helluva start, being able to recognize what makes you happy.” —Lucille Ball

~~ “Happiness often sneaks in through a door you didn’t know you left open.” —John Barrymore

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turn what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.”  — Melody Beattie/

Like me, you may have heard this fable in your house of worship when you were young. You don’t always ‘get it’ when you are young. But as a business person it is something worth remembering at all times. However you heard this, the moral of the story is the same; be mindful of opportunities that come your way–they do not always come labled as such.

~Missed opportunies and a lesson learned~

A man was in his house and there was a really bad flood, houses were floating, cars were swept away. He was sitting on the roof of his house when he was spotted by a man in a boat, the man offered to take him to safety, but he refused. He said no thank you, God will save me. Soon after a helicopter spotted him and threw down a rope for him to climb to safety, the man gave the same answer, he had faith and he was waiting for God to save him.

The winds grew and the man was swept off his roof and drowned. When he opens his eyes, he is in heaven and angels around him. He asks to see God and is taken to him. When he sees God he asks what happened, why didn’t God save him, surely his belief was strong enough. God looks at him, shakes his head and says, I can’t explain it, I just don’t know what happened–I sent you boat and a helicopter.

It seems that truly creative people have certain characteristics which we can all put to work and use for ourselves, our careers and our home business.

After a friend and I spent a leisurely afternoon at Thomas Edison National Historical Park in West Orange, New Jersey, I am a confirmed Edison groupie. The main building is amazing, not only are there glorious cubicles for his key engineers, there is a small corner with a single bed–Edison often slept there while working on projects. He held more than 1000 patents. OK, the man was a genius and he was creative, but you can sharpen your creative skills by strenthening a few traits.

• Curiosity. It should be obvious, however, it is often forgotten in the rush of daily routine. Stop and ask “Why?” about the issues and problems (and solutions) you encounter.

• Energy. Not running around in circles energy. Just put real effort into collecting facts and thinking about the problem you’re trying to solve.

• Focus and concentration. Take time to stop and focus on what’s in front of you, tune out distractions, annoyances and other actions and activities that are not relevant to the problem at hand.

• Make the connection. Look for links between elements; often ties that bind don’t appear related at first glance. Seek the connection by finding some order in the havoc. Break down ideas to discover what they have in common. Talk to a person to brainstorm. Anyone who has seen actor’s Rock Hudson and Thelma Ritter in the bar scene of the movie Pillow Talk will understand how a small connection can help.

• Playfulness. You work is serious, but you need to be able to stand back and adopt a naïve, even childlike attitude toward the world around you. This helps you ask questions and find connections in things everyone else takes for granted.

• Persistence. Even the great geniuses of our time don’t expect success overnight. Practice self-discipline, so you can stick to your idea until it’s successful. “I never did anything by accident, nor did any of my inventions come by accident; they came by work.” Thomas A. Edison. If your persistence does not create gold, think positive; “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Thomas A. Edison.

For more information on Thomas Alva Edison visit Save Americas Treasures Organization Keep in mind that this project has been completed, the Edison site and his home are open for visitors.

Everyone tells you to think positive, but no one tells you how. “Positive thinking” is not always easy. Negative thoughts can creep into our mind, and jump out our mouths, when we least expect them. The trick isn’t to fight them, but to manage them so they don’t paralyze you.

1. Identify the “naysay” thought triggers. When you have a negative thought (“This will never work . . . I’m a total failure”) stop and ask yourself what’s bringing it on. You may be tired or stressed out, or worse you may be affected by someone else’s perspective. If you can locate the cause, the thought itself won’t have as much power over you.
2. Focus on the now rather than what was. You don’t have to be a philosopher to realize that worrying about the past or the future isn’t very productive. When you start chastising yourself for past mistakes, or seeing disaster around every corner, stop and take a breath and ask yourself what you can do right now to succeed. Giving yourself something to do will distract you from destructive thoughts.
3. Replace negative thoughts with a positive thought. If you find yourself plagued by a recurrent worry, train yourself to think of something else.  When you catch yourself in a negative thought, immediately with a positive thought. Say it out loud or think it to yourself and drive the negativite thought or thoughts away so you are free to move forward with a good thought.  
4. Read a book that uplifts you. I love the books that come from author Debbie Macomber. No matter how serious or somber issues are, there is always light at the end of the Macomber’s tunnel. If you have never read a Debbie Macomber novel, start with Twenty Wishes. This book part of the author’sBlossom Street series. A blurb from booklist on the Amazon site about Twenty Wishes. “…One of them brings up the idea of making a list of wishes: things they’ve secretly wanted to accomplish but never did. However hesitant they might be at first, as the women complete their lists, they begin to embrace the idea of making each wish a fact…”.

 Twenty Wishes (Blossom Street) is available from Amazon.  Visit Debbie Macomber

Successful relationships whether business or romantic are built on a foundation of honest, thoughtful communication. Whether you are contemplating a business partnership or marriage, giving some thought to these four questions may save you headache and grief.  

1. How does the person react in a crisis?
2. How does he or she handle money?
3. What does the other person expect from you? What might happen if those expectations aren’t met?
4. What are the other person’s goals? What are three things he/she would like to accomplish in the immediate future, and in the long term?
5. What makes him/her angry? How does the person deal with anger?

 Think before leaping, if his or her goals are not the same or at least similar to yours, do you really want to move forward?