Oh yea! Here comes another, “be thankful for living” article. Hold on this is cool.  What if we could hold on to the flavor of our attitude during the holiday season throughout the year?  What would it mean?  No doubt we would have greater wealth, health and happiness.  Why?  Well because when we are thankful we appreciate the value of something. Conversely to be discontented with something means we see the bad and the useless in that thing, and discount its value.

But as the Bard of Avon wrote, “Nothing is good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” These 10 little words are much more than a clever little bit of iambic pentameter. They hold the keys to the kingdom, because the mind attracts that which it thinks about most.  Oh great here he goes again, the whole positive mental attitude thing.  Yep.  Its because as artist marketing themselves it is critical.  Actually i would submit that it is critical in living a fulfilled life.  Thoughts are things. An idea held in the mind consistently can’t help but manifest itself in the life of the thinker.

You have probably heard the Christmas story of two boys.  I am not sure where this story comes from some I cant give it proper attribution, but here it is.  One boy was always positive and the other usually negative.  Grandpa decided one year to really encourage the negative boy by blessing him with significant gifts.  His hope was the negative grandson would value his gifts and begin to cultivate an attitude of gratitude.  So on Christmas day the boys clamored around the tree and opened gifts.  The negative boy had piles of the most elaborate and expensive gifts, everything a boy could want.  He moaned about the color, the size, the model, not being able to get them opened without a degree in engineering and everything else.  Nothing was right. The positive boy waited until his brother opened all of his gifts and then he opened the one gift he had. It was wrapped in a brown paper bag.  With eyes of delight he ceremoniously unveiled his gift. A big bag of dried horse doodoo.  Tears came to his eyes and with a bright smile he began prancing around, whooping and hollering.  Perplexed Grandfather asked him what he was so exited about.  In gleeful response the boy said, “Grandpa with all of this horse doo there has got to be a pony somewhere!” “I finally got my pony!”  WOW.  First time I listened to that story I teared up…just a little. (big weenie)  Anyway don’t cha love that?

Success at anything in life isn’t really much more complicated than that positive mindset. It’s just mental discipline: training your mind to be appreciative of the things you have and using them as stepping-stones to getting more of what you want. Everything happens for a reason, good, bad, or indifferent. Regardless, it’s your job to find value in the situation and use it to your advantage.  Your greatest gift is the power of your mind to think independently.   That wonderfully creative mind conceives your art, has developed the skill set to create that art and finds the discipline to market your art.  Isn’t it time to throw off social conditioning that has fooled us into accepting other peoples fear anxieties, limitations and negative attitudes as your own?  I think so.  One thing for sure about being an artist is that there is an area of self discipline that is in our make-up.  Sometimes I think it sleeps or maybe is lurking just beneath the surface but it is there.  Lets tap that and begin to live with an daily attitude of gratitude.  It will surely improve our  art.  See ya next time.  LIVE. LOVE. LAUGH