Living Better Part 1: Two People I Admire

Living your best is an on-going process, but I'm focusing on my day-to-day attitude at the moment and becoming more positive. Two people I admire for their positivity are my former co-worker Charlie and my sister Heather.

Charlie (with his home-made bike satchel)

Charlie and I were walking to the bike repair shop when we stopped at a corner. We were about to cross the street when a truck sped up, turned in front of us, and honked angrily.
"Geez," I said, but Charlie just smiled.
"Oh well. I just let those things go." I thought about that for a moment.
"It's really impressive that you think like that," I responded.
"Well...what else can you do? You can get angry or feel badly about it, but it's not going to solve anything - he's already gone. I figure he's more in a hurry than I am, and he's probably having a bad day already...so I just let him honk his horn and not let him get to me."

Heather

Similarly, I was talking to Heather on the phone once and noticed the way she quickly let go of negativity. At the time, she was having the worst room mate problems. When people mistreat you and make it difficult to come home, it's enough for me to be in a poor mood all day every day. Yet once we switched subjects, she was up-beat and happy. I got the feeling that being positive was a more regular state for her...the one she came back to even among life's difficulties. It makes sense how she tends to draw people to her.

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In my opinion, these two people are amazing because of the way they look at life. I want to be like them - a person who brightens a room when I can, because life truly is good. Yet I've noticed it takes courage on my part to do that - to break normal social conduct and randomly say hi to someone, even if they look at you funny afterward. It takes courage to do it again. In the end, though, I think it will pay off: I can't make people feel good if my glass is always empty...so I'm going to fill it up :).