Stop being average. Shine bright.

It’s Tuesday. It’s morning. It’s a beautiful day.

Every day, I wake up and say the exact same thing every morning: TODAY IS A NEW DAY.

TODAY IS A NEW BEGINNING.

I say this every day even if yesterday was the best day of my life. If yesterday was the best day of my life, I want today to be EVEN BETTER.

I say “today is a new beginning” every single day because I need the reminder to break out of my old habits and routines. I LOVE a disruption into my thought system, to let go of the past and allow everything to be totally brand new.

Yesterday when I was called a loser and annoying, I instantly wanted to make these people like me. That’s my old habit. My past tendency is to shine less bright. My past tendency is to “become human” and “to become average” and that way we all have problems, and we are all the same, and we can all relate to each other in our limitation, and there is comfort in misery and numbers.

But do I want to be comfortable?

Do I want to be liked?

Do I care?

Or do I want to fulfill my promise to God to be the light of the world?

Jesus in A Course in Miracles says he needs “happy learners.”

Most people do not like someone who is happy all the time. I have been called “a show off” and “Little Miss Know It All” and have been told to “get off my high horse”.

As a child I was an A student. I loved to learn. I loved to read. I would sit up front and listen and take notes while the rest of the kids were fooling off in the back. I was mocked for always knowing the answer, for always having my hand in the air, for being too smart, for shining bright.

Even the teachers would get frustrated and start to say: Okay, Lisa, that’s enough. Let someone else answer this question.

I was teased when I got a perfect test score back, and everyone else sitting around me with C papers.

They would all be talking, complaining, moaning, whining … and me with the perfect test paper would just sit there quietly. There is not even anyone to celebrate with. It’s a lonely place.

So I made a decision to become average.

I wanted to be liked.

So I started to let my grades slide, and lo and behold I started to be one of the people sitting in the group of moaners and complainers, upset about our C papers. Suddenly I was popular, with tons of friends.

It’s easy to be average once you make a decision to do so.

I wasn’t deliberately marking wrong answers on tests, I literally became a C student. When you stop studying, tests become really hard. You really don’t know the answer. You really do start to panic and sweat. You really don’t understand the material. You really do sit there at your desk and feel a pit of darkness come over you.

As an A student, life was a breeze. I would study. I would learn. Things were effortless and easy. I loved test time. Tests actually made me happy. They challenged me. There was no sinking feeling. There was no dread. I would just pick up my pencil and answer all the questions. Simplest thing in the world.

Then I would get an A+ paper back, and I would be on Cloud 9, totally pleased, totally thrilled … except again … I was usually up there by myself. Cloud 9 can be a really lonely place. I’d want to celebrate, but everyone else was wallowing in their failures and averageness.

Once I started to become average, life become really REALLY difficult. Being average is way more work than being smart. It is! Being average is like sludging through mud.

But there’s a plus side: everyone likes you because you are just like them, and they are sludging through the mud with you.

You are all in the same sinking boat.

It’s really funny when you think of it that way. Do you want to be in a sinking boat with other people who like you OR do you want to get out of the boat, be the light of the world, and be part of a solution to help those in the sinking boat?

Do you want to sludge in the mud alongside your miserable friends OR do you want to get out of the mud and be part of a solution to help others get out of the mud along with you?

People say: I don’t need your help. Who do you think you are? Little Miss High Mighty.
Well, then fine. Sludge on. Have fun down there. You don’t seem to be making much progress in that muddy sludge pit, but oh well. Do what you want.

But there are others who will see you standing on the grass, happy, in the open sunlight with no conflict … and they will look up from the mud and up from their problems and wonder: How did she get up there? And how can I get up there??

This blog is for you who is asking that question.

For the rest, there are a million other blogs you can go to where you will find comfort in people’s problems and complaining.

Call me a loser, but I’m not in the mud anymore.

And THE WAY is open for you.

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