Let's Talk

Posts Categorized: Featured

Are You Reaching Your Goals?

To succeed with personal or professional goals, we must first define specifically what we want. Assessing and evaluating takes thoughtful consideration. Clarifying what is important is the first step in preparing to work for it.

Today on my blog and podcast, you’ll find a series of exercises to help you recognize behaviors and choices that worked and those that didn’t and why they didn’t.

We’ll look at the most common obstacle to achieving goals, and you’ll learn how free-writing unlocks the brain and allows creativity to flow.

Why Your Focus Matters

A New Focus | FocusWithMarlene.com

At the top of my website, you will find this statement: “Your focus defines who you are and who you can become.”

FOCUS…
On God — let Him lead
On what you can do — not what you can’t
On choices and possibilities
On solutions — not problems
On principles and values — live them

Whatever challenge you face, you can have a life full of meaning, purpose, and joy.

What we focus on matters more than we think. Read on to discover whether you may be focusing on the wrong things, and how to change that.

Focus on What You Can Do, Instead of What You Can’t

We have all struggled with the enormity of problems we face and have gotten discouraged when we felt there were no solutions.

It’s at such times that we need to remind ourselves, “Yes, I can.” I can try as many times as needed. I can alter plans or update them when necessary. I can reach out for support and help.”

As we focus on ways to enhance and improve our lives, we can reduce stress and anxiety. Instead of increasing fears, we can lower constant worry and tension as we learn and apply new skills.

The Final Gift of Christmas

Christmas – a shining star – a break from the tedious schedules we find ourselves in.

For a moment in time, we escaped the drudgery, pressures, anxiety, and uncertainties.

For a moment in time, we humbly knelt before the Christ Child whose birthday we celebrate.

For a moment in time, we laid down our heavy burdens of doubt and fear and unanswered questions.

And now Christmas is over. The torn wrappings are stuffed in bags ready for the garbage pickup Bows are packed away to use again next year.

As I pick up the gifts I was given – love, joy, and peace – I find another one waiting for me; that final gift of Christmas: Hope.

5 Christmas Gifts I Am Thankful For

I love Christmas – the lights, the music, the gifts, and the anticipation of time spent with people I love.

As I reflect on the many gifts I have given and received at Christmas, I am reminded that perhaps the most important gifts we can give one another are not the carefully chosen and budgeted gifts from the store, but time to listen, loyalty, love, understanding, grace, and forgiveness.

Today on my blog and podcast, I’ll share five special gifts I’ve received this year.

What about you? I urge you to list the gifts you have received during the year and to give thanks for them.

Dickens and the Christmas House of Love

Everybody is familiar with the popular author, Charles Dickens, who wrote A Christmas Carol.

His first story, “A Dinner at Poplar Walk,” was published in a magazine in 1833. He authored 15 novels, five novellas, and many stories and essays. But most people know him because of his most famous novella, A Christmas Carol.

When I first started writing, I belonged to a group of writers who had been writing much longer than I had. At that time I began writing fiction and one of the pieces I wrote was “Dickens and the Christmas House of Love.”

Today on my blog and podcast, I’m sharing my new spin on Dickens and A Christmas Carol.

Give the Gift of Reaching Out to a Hurting Person

Thanksgiving is over and the beautiful fall colors have been replaced with red and green and twinkling lights. We have entered the season of Christ’s birth. The namesake of this holiday is so often forgotten, pushed aside, or replaced by a jolly old man in a red suit, congested malls, and holiday specials you can’t afford to miss.

While I love my tree lights and all the ornaments and decorations, without the gift of love given to us by that tiny baby born so long ago, Christmas would be shallow and superficial.

Christmas is a time when we can make a special effort to reach out to those who are hurting or are alone. A few minutes of our time, an empathetic listening ear, and understanding can be huge to those who are suffering from a loss or loneliness.

Mountains of Blessings

Thanksgiving and Christmas are times when we stop and appreciate the good things that have happened during the year. If we make an ongoing habit of looking for blessings throughout the year, we will be doubly blessed.

It is in the simple things of someone reaching out to us to see how we are doing, or saying thank you when we least expect it, or just simply listening, that harshness and tragedies can be reduced.

Sometimes in our haste to move past these times, we miss the blessings God is giving us – new growth and a new appreciation for what I have, no matter how small.

How to Integrate Attitude, Pride, Humility, and Respect Into Your Life

We need more than just the desire to live productive and meaningful lives – we also need humility and respect – for ourselves and others.

Whether in our business or personal lives, we need to believe in ourselves and take pride in who we are. But, without humility, we lose respect for others and eventually, for ourselves.

We don’t want to measure our self-worth by what others say about us. Nor do we want to exhibit arrogant self-importance. How do we find a balance?

Today on my blog and podcast, we’ll look at the traits of attitude, pride, humility, and respect, and discuss how we can integrate them into our lives.

What it Takes to Achieve

If you can imagine a better life, you can create it.

If you believe you can, you will find the strength and resources to make it happen.

To achieve, you must first believe you can.

Just like you, I have struggled with the enormity of problems and have been discouraged, thinking I would never find adequate solutions. Today on my blog and podcast, I’ll share a personal story about a crisis my family and I faced, and the actions I took that helped me move forward with confidence.