What do you see today – difficulties or opportunities?

” A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” `~ Winston Churchill

There are days when life looks bleak. There are days when it looks scary or overwhelming. There are days when life looks grand and full of joy. But God is right there in the trenches with us and on the mountaintop too. There are days that I have to work at remembering that. Is that the case with you, too?

I will share two things my mom has said to me innumerable times over the years:

“two men looked out from their prison bars. One saw mud, the other stars”. AND

“Psychiatrists were doing a study about mindset/outlook. They put one boy (a negative thinker) in one room. They put the other boy (a positive thinker) in another room. In each case, the room was about hip deep in (I’m sorry to say) horse manure. They watched the boys through one way glass. The negative thinker just sat there amid the mess, glaring gloomily. The positive thinker squatted down and was digging eagerly through the manure. Finally, the psychiatrists walked into the negative thinker’s room. He said to them “I always have the worst luck”. Then they went into the positive thinker’s room. They said to him “what in the world are you doing?” “Why with all this manure, I just know there’s a pony in here somewhere”.

So, it is all a matter of perspective, at least to a certain extent. Some days we are being given a chance to really build our spiritual muscles, aren’t we? So today, I don’t wish you or myself a trouble-free or challenge-free day. I pray you have the oomph to keep looking. Yes, I wish you ponies <3. Maybe even some rainbows and butterflies 😉