Words of Encouragement to Read During Hard Times

 I wrote this for me, but maybe these words will encourage you too.

You really are smart and capable, even when you don’t feel that this is true. And people are capable of changing. If you don’t like the way something is going, it’s okay to try something different. 

This may sound counter-intuitive, but you don’t have to like something to get it done or to like the end result. Being unhappy or tired or bored in the middle is often part of the process. Suck it up and deal with it.

Finally, be kind to yourself in hard times. Everyone makes mistakes, everyone has bad moods and bad days, everyone experiences failures on the way to success. It’s okay not to know how to do something and it’s okay to mess up while you’re figuring it out.

The wonderful thing is that we get through hard times. Hard times don’t last forever. 

In the end, everything will be okay. Really.

Swedish Death-Cleaning End-of-Year Update

This was on my closet door for 16 months!!!

Reading 50 books didn't go so well. I only managed to finish 18 books during 2021. Some of them were library books or ebooks, and I think I only gave away one or two of the books that I owned.

On the other hand, I finally discarded or donated 1,000 things. After listening to a TED Talk in July of 2020, I was inspired to get rid of 1,000 things because, as Liz Wright said, it would change my life.

Click here to watch Liz Wright's TED Talk.

I am happy to report that it actually did change my life significantly for the better.

I didn't put a lot of energy into Marie-Kondo-style tidying and decluttering, but one of the surprising benefits of having this goal was that I bought way less stuff because, you know, it would be more work to discard or donate it later on. Every purchase became more deliberate and I ended up with fewer projects to complete and fewer books to read someday.

A second surprising benefit was less stress, because the pile of things I needed to do or deal with wasn't constantly growing/growing exponentially.

Liz Wright was correct: Get rid of 1,000 things, and you will change your life for the better!