Author: Howard Valentine

This was me in 2003.

 

This is me today.

How did I do it?  I just took one step at a time.

 

 

This morning I set my clock back one hour. I asked a couple friends today what they did with their extra hour and most of them said “slept in”. I didn’t  sleep in this morning, I turbo charged my extra hour and turned it in to an hour of power. I have been very productive all day and have got a ton of stuff done and knocked off about 10 things off  my to do list.

This afternoon I went out for  a run, it felt great to get outside even though it was a little chilly, not only did the time change today but the weather here in Southern Pennsylvania  has also changed, it was a balmy 35 degrees today.  You could feel the chill in the air today , most of the leaves are now off the trees and there were not very many people out walking and running compared to the last couple Sundays. . Maybe they were home watching football getting ready for a big Pittsburgh win tonight.

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Have a great rest of the day and enjoy your extra hour!

One day I will_____. I once heard this this phrase referred to as Someday I’ll, as in some far away destination that someone is planing to visit. The question I have is, why say “One day I will____ ” Why not live your dream today?

What made me think of all this was I talked with someone  that I had not seen in a couple years and he was telling me about all the things he wants to do when he retires. I kept thinking to myself, why don’t you do some of these things today?  Why are you waiting for some magical time in the future to do all the stuff you want to do?

The way I look at is, the only time you really have is now and it would be wise to do what you want to do now. We think that one day we will get to all of our projects, our goals, our hobbies and go on that dream vacation. The fact is the time to go for your dreams is today. None of us know what is going to happen tomorrow, so why not go for our dreams today.

We sometimes self sabotage our dreams by procrastinating  and thinking about what happened to us yesterday or what is going to happen to us tomorrow and not being fully engaged in of all of the great stuff that is going on around us right now.

Today is Saturday and I have been enjoying every minute. Many of the things I did today some people may consider boring everyday tasks, like going for a run, getting a coffee, stopping for a hair cut, making lunch and cleaning around the house. The truth is I am enjoying every minute because I realize that my life is  made up of just a bunch these little experiences. I don’t want to to live my life on “Someday I’ll”  My choice is to live in the here and now.

Here are five  helpful hints for living in the present

• Smile when you wake up in the morning and think of 5 things you have to be thankful.

• Do things that get you engaged in the present moment, turn off the gadgets for a while and zone in on whats going on around you.

• Let go of any thoughts that take you away from the present moment. Do one thing at a time.

• Compliment someone and say thanks.

• Be thankful for what you already have in your life and count your blessings

 

I think this quote is so awesome. ” Yesterday is history, tomorrows a mystery. Today is a gift. That is why its called the present”

Have a great day!

I have a note on my desk that says “2014 is the year of the Podcast”. Today is October 5th 2014, that means, I have just about 3 months to record and post my first podcast. I will get the first podcast posted to i tunes sooner than later. I have recently been taking  lots of action on stuff  more quickly and not waiting for all the lights to be green before I get started on a project. I am taking more of  a Go, Set, Ready approach to life. For example with this blog post, today I could have sat around thinking of some big title and wrote out a bunch of notes on what I want to talk about today. Nope…this is straight from the hip and unedited other than the spell check. The results that I have been experiencing are great I am getting a ton more things accomplished in a much shorter time frame.

As soon as I am finished writing this post I am going to jump on Fiver and find someone who is creative with audio to produce an intro to the podcast. Next week my goal is to recorded and  publish the first podcast to I tunes.

If you cant tell I am excited to get the podcast started and I am pushing myself to get it going. This blog will be so much more fun once it is in a podcast format and I can just  say whats on my mind. That is the fun of podcasting, its your own little radio station with you as the producer and host. I cant wait!

This whole website/podcast adventure for me is just like running, you never know what kind of run your going to have until you get out there and run. I have gone for runs that I thought were going to be my best and they did not turn out so great and other days when I was not feeling it, turned out to be some of my best runs ever. The key is, you just got to do something, anything that will get you moving in the direction of where you want to go and eventually you will get to your destination.

Earlier this morning it was 33 degrees which for  October 5, is just a tad chilly but I see that the sun has come out  and it has warmed up to a balmy 41 degrees it looks like it will warm up just enough this afternoon to set things up for a nice Sunday afternoon run.  Well, I am going to get moving here, have a great day and I will talk to you later!