Me as a Lego Minifigure

Have you ever wondered what you'd look like as a Lego Minifigure? Yeah, me either. But then one day while at the Lego Store my daughter built me. Long brown hair in a pony tail, coffee cup in one hand and a phone in the other. Nailed it! 

Previously I discussed seeing myself reflected in my children. But me as a minifigure, that was seeing a glimpse of her perspective. Interesting and humorous. Looking back now I wish I would have bought it. I could sit me on my kitchen window and be reminded that my very observant and loving daughter knows me - maybe better than I know myself sometimes.  And also be reminded of that smirky smile on her angel face when she finished building me and brought me to my attention. I love that girl - I'm going to have a make a trip back to the Lego store and have myself rebuilt!

In the mean time - maybe I'll put that phone down a little more often but not the coffee! Thank God they didn't have a little Lego laptop or worse a king sized bed with a cushy pillow and cozy blankets. My minifigure would have destroyed that place trying to get to that!

Life, internal dialogs and other excuses...

It's been crazy around here! When life bombards with stress its easy to start making excuses. I've been thinking about writing and I've been wanting to write but I've been making excuses. I even thought I'd write about all the excuses why I haven't written - as if you are really interested in my excuses or the stress in my life. After pondering all this I decided that my excuses aren't helping me and surely wouldn't help you if I were to pour them out for your reading pleasure.

So why do we make excuses? Fear is probably one of the main reasons we make excuses, fear of failure, rejection, effort and success, fear of change. I think many of us dislike change even if we don't notice that about ourselves. When things stay the same it feels normal. There's nothing to fear because we know what to expect, we know what is expected of us and we know that the amount of effort needed doesn't change much either. When things feel normal we think we know ourselves but deep down we know there is something missing.

For me I'm sure that I'm afraid of success. Sounds strange but I have noticed a pattern of failing to try and quitting just before reaching the goal. Is that crazy or what? But I know now that my excuses and my fear are part of the reason I started this blog. Fear and excuses have caused me to miss out and to feel the desire for knowing myself better.

We all have an internal dialog. Part of the excuse habit stems from the constant conversation we have with ourselves. If we remind ourselves of our fears and justify our excuses then we'll never get where we want to be with ourselves.

No one ever excused his way to success.  ~Dave Del Dotto

So where to go from here? I'm starting by rereading The Power of Words
I obviously need to remind myself of the importance of making an effort to have a polite and kind inner dialog. When I catch myself justifying my excuses instead of taking the action that I truly am capable of I'm going to change my thoughts and change my words. I'm going to work hard at not accepting guilt I haven't earned including guilt that I needlessly put on myself. I'm going to make goals and keep records of progress. It is important to notice progress (even baby steps) and to take pride in that - even reward myself.

I also think I'll do some research on some of the people I admire. Starting with Benjamin Franklin. Every time I search online or pick up a book about self confidence, drive, taking responsibility and all the things I'd like to improve on, there I find a quote or mention of Ben Franklin and his words seem to always inspire. So I'll start there and I'll start now.

When and where will you start?


He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else. – Benjamin Franklin