Start Your Morning with Uplifting Thoughts

Bring Inspiration and Motivation to Each New Day

Wake up to these inspiring thoughts each morning and have a better week!

By Ralph Marston

It's amazing what a bit of encouragement and positive reinforcement can do. A small bit of shared wisdom can go a long way to make you feel better and make life feel brighter.

Need some positive input in your life right now? Here are seven simple and inspiring doses of daily motivation that will help you start your morning with an uplifting boost.

Read the first motivational thought.

Since 1995, Ralph Marston's words of wisdom and joy have brought encouragement to millions through his Daily Motivator website. He has published more than 4,000 brief, positive and empowering messages on The Daily Motivator website. To visit The Daily Motivator, go to www.GreatDay.com. Experience the peaceful, inspiring photo & music presentation "The Wonder of It All" by Ralph Marston at www.wonderofitall.com

Choose to Live For, Rather than Against

Choose to live for, rather than against. Focus on what you love and not on any kind of hate.

Practice genuine, cleansing forgiveness, and let the burden of resentment fall softly away. Remind yourself that worry accomplishes nothing worthwhile, and give your awareness to more productive pursuits.

Put your energy into building what is creative, valuable and empowering. And you won't have to constantly fight against what is destructive and draining.

Concern yourself more with accepting responsibility than with assigning blame. Let the possibilities inspire you more than the obstacles discourage you.

You have so very much to live for. Look at each twist and turn in the road with a grateful heart, and you'll find real treasure in every direction.

Live your days on the positive side of life, in tune with your most treasured values. And in each moment you'll have much to live for.

Be the Answer

You can't depend on some expert or guru to provide you with the answer you seek. Instead of looking for the answer outside yourself, choose to be the answer by the way you think and act.

You are the world's most knowledgeable expert on your own life. Put some of that expertise to good use.

Certainly others can give you advice, suggestions, inspiration and expanded perspective. Yet it is up to you to choose what is best for your own unique situation.

The most valuable course of action is not to be found by plugging yourself into someone else's formula. The success you will achieve is the success you work to define on your own terms.

Speak with your own voice, think with your own mind, and act according to your own vision. The expert advice that will be most beneficial is the control you exercise over the choices you make.

Live in such a way as to be the solution to the problems you face and the answer to the questions you ponder. And be the fulfilled, successful person you are destined to be.

You are More Than You Know

You are not your car. You are not your job. You are not your bank account. These things are useful, and they help you to make your way through the world, but they do not define you.

You are not your problems. You are not your failures. You are not your disappointments. These things challenge you and can ultimately help you to grow, but they do not have to limit you.

You are the child who danced in the sunshine, the young person who dreamed of changing the world. You are the admirer of all the beauty around you, a spirit who cannot be tied down. You are the best that you can imagine, a bundle of possibilities yearning to be fulfilled.

The shallow, superficial things will define or limit you only to the extent that you let them. Pay attention to them, but don't give your life to them. You are so much more.

Dwell in the Living

The beauty of life is in the living of it. And the living of life is now.

It is fine to make grand, wonderful plans and to then bring those plans to life through your efforts. Yet do not ignore the quiet, stunningly beautiful treasures in each ordinary moment.

Happiness is not in some distant place of perfection and pleasure. Happiness is waiting for you to give it life in this moment.

If all of your dreams were to suddenly come true, you would have no use for them. For the real essence of their joy is in the journey you take to reach those dreams.

It is in working your way through each day, one moment after another, that you connect with the value of life. Every flavor of experience adds to the richness in one way or another.

Do not put a lot of effort into judging whether today is good or bad, happy or sad. Just go ahead and live it with a thankful heart, and you will surely experience this day's own special value.

Really Live

Imagine a sparkling, blue sea, filled with life and color and beauty. Now think for a moment about how you can most fully experience it.

If you try to take it for yourself and keep what you have taken for yourself and no one else, all you end up with is a bucket of salty water. Yet when you let go of your need to possess, and dive in, immersing yourself in the sea and giving yourself to it, then you fully experience its magnificence.

Similarly, when you try to take from life and hoard a small bucket of it for yourself, whatever you get is not really worth having. It is when you dive in and give of yourself that you experience the real meaning and beauty of being alive.

Life is simply too grand and too magnificent for you ever to be able to take anything away from it. You can never take away and keep for yourself anything more than a mere token. When you really give is when you really live.

Allow Yourself

Allow yourself to fully live this day. Go ahead, you deserve it and it is by far the best choice you can make. The burdens do not have to burden you. The worries do not have to worry you. The beauty and abundance all around you are yours to behold, to value and to enjoy. Allow yourself to live the joy and purpose that your life is meant to be.

There is no reason to hold yourself back or to deny yourself the very best that life has to offer. There is every reason to move positively and enthusiastically forward with all the energy that is in you.

Let yourself laugh and cry and love and wonder. Let yourself live and taste and learn and see. You are not some empty machine that is programmed only to act and react in certain, pre-defined ways. You are free and aware, flexible, adaptable, creative and able to reach ever higher.

Allow yourself to live this day with everything you have. You'll find that it is more than enough.

If You So Choose

If you so choose, the challenges can make you stronger. If you so choose, the disappointments can make you more determined.

If you so choose, every mistake can lead to greater understanding and effectiveness. If you so choose, every frustration can help you to be more patient and more persistent.

If you so choose, even the unexpected setbacks can bring new and positive possibilities. If you so choose, you can find value and fulfillment in every circumstance.

If you so choose, each day can be filled with even more joy than the one before. If you so choose, even the most seemingly random events can work in your favor.

If you so choose, you can remain steadily focused no matter what distractions may attempt to throw you off course. If you so choose, you can look back on this day with no regrets.

Life is filled with an endless variety of circumstances, opportunities and possibilities. If you so choose, you can make the most of it all in this and every moment.