Weekly Motivation #5
Tag: inspiration
Weekly Motivation #4
This week’s motivation comes from my previous post. Being told you’re too old, too thin, too fat, too whatever is not a reason to stop being who you are nor it is a reason to stop doing what makes you happy. Do you for you without worrying about the opinions of others. At the end of the day, you’re the only one responsible for your happiness.
Weekly Motivation #2
I will preface this week’s motivation by saying that I am flat out exhausted. It was one of those nights. Presley was grumpy and wanted nothing to do with sleep. She is such perfection. I am not complaining a bit that she needed me most of the night. The long nights are worth it. Having been awake since early yesterday morning makes for one very exhausted momma. On top of her being a typical newborn, my older children had need of me throughout the night as well, though their reasons differ a great deal from hers.
With that, I bring you “Weekly Motivation #2”. As sleep deprived as I am, motivation is absolutely necessary if I am going to keep functioning. Coffee is amazing, but it does not always work miracles.
Weekly Motivation #1
Everyone has bad days. Most of us could use a little inspiration to get us through the day sometimes. Occasionally, that morning cup of coffee just isn’t enough to get you going. These are my favorite inspirational quotes for the month of January:
15 of Martin Luther King Jr.’s Most Inspiring Quotes
A U.S. federal holiday since 1986, we honor Martin Luther King Jr. and his accomplishments in the fight for human rights and equality for African Americans every year.
Martin Luther King Jr. was a social activist and Baptist minister who played a major role in the American civil rights movement. From the mid-1950s until his assassination in 1968. During that time, he was was a key activist behind the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the 1963 March on Washington, helping bring to life landmark pieces of legislation suck as the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. In 1964, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Today, in honor of all of his accomplishments and in an effort to ensure that his legacy endures, I thought I’d share some of my most favorite inspiration quotes.
Martin Luther King Jr. in 1964
PHOTOGRAPH BY REG LANCASTER/DAILY EXPRESS/HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES
- “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
- “I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.”
- “We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”
- “Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”
- “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
BETTMANN VIA GETTY IMAGES
6. “Only in the darkness can you see the stars.”
7. “Let no man pull you low enough to hate him.”
8. “The quality, not the longevity, of one’s life is what’s important.”
9. “Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”
10. “Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see that whole staircase, just take the first step.”
VIA GETTY IMAGES
11. “An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”
12. “He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. he who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.”
13. “The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.”
14. “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.”
15. “We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”
Motivationals #1
A Little Inspiration
As a mom, you’ve probably watched movies like Home Again or Cheaper By The Dozen or really any rom-com where the protagonist is a career-driven, highly-focused beauty queen. You know the woman I’m talking about. She has kids, she works all the time, she preps the meals and helps with homework. She’s a referee, a coach, a cheerleader, a nurse, a chef, the reader of stories at bedtime, a chauffeur, and she’s probably exhausted, but you wouldn’t know it from looking at her.
Her makeup, hair, and clothes are always impeccable regardless of how tired she is or how early she got up or what she’s been doing that day. I’ve watched SO MANY of those movies and for years I always thought that those outward appearances were not even the slightest bit realistic. How do you juggle children and a job and managing a household and STILL manage to look that perfect? It’s impossible. For most of those years, actually, I was perfectly content just looking like your average Hobbit most days. Who had time for anything else?
At some point, though, I started to realize something. It is possible if you make it possible. I remember going to job interviews throughout my 20s, hoping to land a great job making great money and hoping that success would just happen. For all of those interviews, I usually brushed my hair, threw on whatever I had in my closet, and hoped for the best. My wardrobe consisted of things that your average teenager would wear. That’s right. I was 20-something years old going to job interviews dressed like I was still in high school. I can see why I didn’t get those jobs.
Not only was my body language and way of speaking completely awkward, but I didn’t dress the part, so no one took me seriously. I was 29-years-old when I finally began to really understand that if I didn’t take myself seriously, there was no way I could expect anyone else to do so. That was a huge turning point for me! I needed to start taking myself seriously. It’s kind of like really understanding what it means to “act your age”. I know plenty of women around my age who have always seemed more put-together, more mature than me. Being young at heart is never a bad thing but, in a lot of situations, you have to put the most mature version of yourself forward. That’s where all of this started.
First things first, I needed to act the part. I’ve gotten better at staying focused, being less chatty, and not participating in the rumor mill. It’s not a 100% improvement, but I’m getting there. Next, I needed to start looking the part. Outside of my work wardrobe consisting of a plain t-shirt or button-up blouse and jeans, I switched up my band shirts and Vans for skirts, dresses, cardigans, tons of jackets, lots of heels, a myriad of accessories, pants made of something other than denim, and even blazers. I decided that, if I wasn’t headed to my job, then I wanted to feel like a model when I stepped out of my home.
I’ve started taking care of my hair and skin, which I had let go for way too long. I even got into a routine with my skincare and started shaving my legs regularly. I get up an hour ahead of my boyfriend on days where we both work and make sure that my makeup is done to perfection. Even on days when I’m sick, I don’t want to leave the house looking like I’m sick. I found inspiration in those women whom I envied, the women that I thought it was impossible to become, and started really showing myself the love that I hadn’t in so very long.
That’s when I stopped being a mombie and started working on being someone I’m proud of. I still have a LONG way to go, but it’s better late than never. The crazy thing is that I’ve even inspired my 11-year-old daughter to start putting together outfits that look like something out of a catalog instead of something my 6-year-old would put together if she were unsupervised.
We all have to find inspiration somewhere. For me, it was the glamorous, put-together moms in Hollywood and in the town I live in that inspired me.
