Change

So, I've decided I'm ready for some change. Yesterday My mom and I had some girl time and went to barnes and noble, and when you first walked inside they had the, "bargain books" section. Well a particular book caught my eye called, "what happy women know", so for $4.98 I decided that maybe, considered my present misery, it had some advice maybe I could use. And I was right. The book is about positive psychology. Basically it goes like this: Instead of focusing on all of the bad things going on around you, take a moment to look at the positive things, and focus on that. Pretty simple philosophy, sorta one of those, "well DUH why didnt I think of that!". It also talks about lots of other things. Like perfectionism (which I am horribly guilty of) and why, instead of focusing on all of the things I have done right, do I focus on the few things I have done wrong. Why do we remember more of our mistakes than our successes. It also talks about appearances. According to this book 1 in 200,000 women are the body shape of Tyra Banks, so why is she the standard of what women should look  like, when  less than 6 in a million people actually look like her? It pointed out that as women, we often times look at those just a little bit more tendencies we have and judge ourselves as "have nots" instead of "haves". I know I do this to myself all the time. Growing up as a kid I never had new clothes or new shoes, and pretty much was always 5 years behind any style trend (because 5 years was usually about how long it took for me to get things as hand me downs). I'm not bitter about my youth, in fact I think growing up on the short side of things makes me appreciate what I have all the more. But still it definitely created a mind set in my head now that I am older of always wanting to be in-style and look "trendy", despite the fact that my frugal-ness  cringes at the thought of paying for it. 
So... as I continue to read more in this book I've decided to take up a number of its suggestions. 1. I'm going to take a "beauty walk" or a "beauty run" as often as possible (the book recommends 6 times a day, but I dont have that much free time) where the sole purpose is to look at something beautiful, and then describe what makes it beautiful. -- Today's object- the green tree's outside my apartment. They're older green oaks and  sweet gums and their leaves are a brilliant bright green accented by the subtle brown trunks underneath their canopy and they sway very gracefully in the breeze. 2. I plan on practicing the principal of Kaizen- or basically little by little. Instead of setting end all goals for myself. Im going to set smaller more easily attainable goals. Instead of saying I want to be a better runner. I'm going to say today I will run .1 more miles than I did yesterday.  So thats my plan. And I am defineitly going to finish reading this book. Maybe this was Gods way of pointing me in the right direction!