It’s Springtime: 4 Timeless Thoughts on the Most Optimistic of Seasons

Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bellymotherbaby/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

“An optimist is the human personification of spring.”
Susan J. Bissonette

Spring is finally here in Sweden. Well, kinda. It’s more of feeling of spring I suppose in the way that Doug Larson so awesomely points out in the quote above.

But still. After a long and very cold winter it’s great to have some warmth, a few birds singing and see more smiling and enthusiastic faces as you walk the streets.

So I thought I’d share a few of my favorite sayings about spring that can help us to make this year the best one yet.

1. Make decisions at the right time.

“Never cut a tree down in the wintertime. Never make a negative decision in the low time. Never make your most important decisions when you are in your worst moods. Wait. Be patient. The storm will pass. The spring will come.”
Robert H. Schuller

I think this is a very good tip and something I wish I had thought about a few times in the past. When you are in the low time or a bad mood you can’t really see reality in an accurate way. Making important or negative decisions when you are in that headspace isn’t a good idea.

Nowadays I have a learned to just be still and wait out those angry clouds. Even if it feels like there is an urgent decision to be made (which isn’t always the case even though your clouded mind may fool you into believing that).

Then, when the mind is clearer it becomes a lot easier to make a good decision.

2. Be consistent to get some real results.

“One swallow does not make a spring, nor does one fine day.”
Aristole

To live a happier life and make a real change you can’t just take action or do things on a day when you feel inspired. Sure, the spring may give you a boost of energy and inspiration right now. But what will you do with that? Just surf on those good feelings for a day or a week? Or let it be a start to consistently taken action each day, even if that inspiration and initial enthusiasm may dissipate (which it pretty much always does)?

To take action more consistently here are a three good tips:

• Use a morning routine. I have mentioned this many times, both in my ebook and in various articles. The reason for that is that this is perhaps the most powerful tip I have found so far in this area. You simply set up a routine in the morning that you do as soon as you wake up. This works so well because what you do early in the day often sets the context for your day. As humans we have a strong tendency to want to be consistent with what we have done before. That’s one big reason why a bad start often leads to a bad day and a good start often leads to a good day. Read all about my and other people’s morning routines in this article.
• Don’t hurt yourself. This is a very important reason for me at least. When you disappoint yourself and don’t think and do as you really deep down want to you hurt yourself by lowering your self esteem. Whatever you do during your day sends signals back to yourself about what kind of person you are. Do the right thing like being effective, kind or go to the gym and you feel good. Get lazy, negative or just plain mean and you tend to feel worse after a while. You don’t get away, there is no escaping yourself. And there is always a price to pay. This is a powerful motivator to become a better person.
• Use reminders in your environment. What you do is simply to write down what you really want to make into a habit or a natural part of your life on something like a post-it or on your screensaver or in your cell phone. At the moment I use a small whiteboard on my wall that has stuff like “I make $5000/month” and “Keep things extremely simple” written down on it. I have found this to be very useful to keep myself on track, to keep my focus on the essential stuff and not get so distracted by everything around me.

3. Keep going.

“No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn.”
Hal Borland

Persistence might not exactly be the sexiest sounding quality. It might not sell a lot of products to people looking for the magic pill. But it is an immensely helpful quality to cultivate and put to use.

If you fail, what do you do? You dust yourself off, learn what you can from what happened and try again. If the success you are looking for won’t come that quickly – a pretty likely scenario – then you have to persist.

Persistence is one of the most useful qualities one can have. Not only because you will still be out there in a less competitive playing field as lot of other people have given up and gone home. But also because developing persistence will enable you to get what you want. It may just take a little longer than had hoped for. But if you keep going, if you refine your approach based on what you learn from experience and other sources then better times will come.

4. Winter makes the spring so much better.

“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.”
Anne Bradstreet

The winter of life is often in retrospect a gift. It makes you stronger. More empathic and understanding. It helps you out in some way and guides you. You can always look back at it when you feel down and be happy that you aren’t in that place anymore.

Your winter and adversities expands the spectrum of human experience, understanding and emotions for you. Your capacity for genuine gratitude increases because of it.

The sad times make the happy times even sweeter.