From the song 'Confused' by Natalie Brown and J. Rwakaara:

I feel a challenge in my soul today,
Questioning things I believed in so firmly yesterday.
How can I have faith in myself and what I feel to be true,
When the next day I feel my heart and mind telling me something new.
I feel the twisting of my soul today,
Something is challenging my perceptions,
And what I'm going through is hard...

Right now, I am confused,
Right now, I don't exactly know what to choose,
This day feels so unlike the rest,
Right now, I am confused.

http://youtu.be/djcHsbizj3k

"Talk back to your internal critic. Train yourself to recognize and write down critical thoughts as they go through your mind. Learn why these thoughts are untrue and practice talking and writing back to them."
- Robert J. Mckain

"Our doubts are traitors,
and make us lose the good we oft might win,
by fearing to attempt."
- William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure 

"The most important of life's battles is the one we fight daily in the silent chambers of the soul."
- David O. Mckay

"The most dramatic conflicts are perhaps, those that take place not between men but between a man and himself -- where the arena of conflict is a solitary mind."
- Clark Moustakas

"The greatest conflicts are not between two people but between one person and himself."
- Garth Brooks

"The greatest foes, and whom we must chiefly combat, are within."
- Miguel De Cervantes

MainMessageForToday
At some point, everyone has to deal with internal conflict or mental struggle. This could be the struggle to make a decision or negative self talk.

When it is difficult to do what you should.......
#struggles

Song 'Right Kind of Wrong' by Leann Rimes:
http://youtu.be/N-0VfwkaOFU

"Why don't you want to do what you know you should do? The reason you don't is that you're in conflict with yourself."
- Tom Hopkins

"Sometimes you have to choose between a bunch of wrong choices and no right ones. You just have to choose which wrong choices feels the least wrong.”
― Colleen Hoover, Hopeless

"You can control yourself if you really want to. I'll tell you how I know you can control yourself. If you were in a full fledged emotional temper tantrum in your house and I knocked on your front door..... Come on! Let me tell you what, you would get control of yourself, and it would only take a few seconds."
― Joyce Meyer

"It's not hard to make decisions when you know what your values are."
― Roy Disney

"A Native American elder once described his own inner struggles in this manner: Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time. When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, The one I feed the most. On Other Peoples Expectations: The only man who behaved sensibly was my tailor; he took my measurement anew every time he saw me, while all the rest went on with their old measurements and expected them to fit me."
- George Bernard Shaw

"There’s no getting around it: we all struggle with sin (Romans 3:23). Even the great apostle Paul lamented over his ongoing struggle with sin in his life: “For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me” (Romans 7:18-20).
- GotQuestions.org, http://www.gotquestions.org/struggling-with-sin.html

"All good is hard. All evil is easy. Dying, losing, cheating, and mediocrity is easy. Stay away from easy."
- Scott Alexander

"We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That's who we really are."
- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

"It is the eternal struggle between these two principles -- right and wrong. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time and will ever continue to struggle. It is the same spirit that says, 'You work and toil and earn bread, and I'll eat it.'"
- Abraham Lincoln

MainMessageForToday
One struggle is the struggle between right and wrong, good and evil. Discipline helps.

From the song 'Anyway' by Martina McBride:

You can spend your whole life building something from nothing,
One storm can come and blow it all away,
Build it anyway.

You can chase a dream that seems so out of reach,
And you know it might not ever come your way,
Dream it anyway.

God is great, but sometimes life ain't good.
When I pray it doesn't always turn out like I think it should
But I do it anyway, I do it anyway.

http://youtu.be/6uLtyzRgmyI

"EVOLVE THROUGH RESOLVE:

Ride the time and struggle to survive in the battles you cannot circumvent
Wisdom and strength of character are born out of every negative event
Strangle defeat with inherent traits unused and awaiting applications
Each victory will create a tool to be used by future generations"
- Kamil Ali, Profound Vers-A-Tales

"The harder the struggle, the more glorious the triumph. Self-realization demands very great struggle."
- Swami Sivananda

"Don't give up. I know you've made a thousand attempts to reach your goal, but look at it this way: after banging your head against the wall repeatedly, you ought to be numb enough break through this time."
- Richelle E. Goodrich

"Life is indeed a storm and while there are times you can sit and watch from the safety of a window pane there are moments you need to grit your teeth and take on the wind and the rain."
- Ken Scott

Featured - Lisa Kudrow's Story:

"...Over the next eight years, my resolve and commitment was steadily challenged: challenged by casting directors telling me to my face that I was horrible, agents letting me know, '[It's hard. We don't know what to do with you. They want gorgeous on TV, you know? There's really not a place for you.' Finally, I get a coveted spot in the main company of the Groundlings, and the director there didn’t like my work. 'The producers came to the show and they liked your sketches for their TV show. Can you believe it? All the great people they saw and they chose YOU. I just don't get it.' Lorne Michaels came to a show to look for new cast members for Saturday Night Live and out of Me, Kathy Griffin, Julia Sweeney they picked Julia Sweeny. I was devastated. That director told me, 'Of course they picked Julia, who else would they have picked?' Naturally, these things knocked me off balance and caused me to wonder if this was the right path for me. Am I going about this the right way? Do I belong here? Maybe I never will be a working actor and I've wasted all this time...then I'd DECIDE, no, they're just wrong (and a little insensitive) but mostly, they are just wrong."
- Lisa Kudrow's Commencement Speech 2010
http://lifelessonsforall.com/strugglestories2.html

"Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which [the Lord] has promised to those who love Him."
- Holy Bible (New American Standard Version), James 1:12

"Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed on an equal or greater benefit."
- Napoleon Hill

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress."
- Frederick Douglass

MainMessageForToday
It takes resolve, strength to get through a struggle. At the end, the person who entered the struggle is usually a better individual.

From the song 'I Look To You' by Whitney Houston:

As I lay me down,
Heaven hear me now,
I'm lost without a cause
After giving it my all.

Winter storms have come
And darkened my sun,
After all that I've been through
Who on earth can I turn to?

I look to you.
After all my strength is gone,
In you I can be strong.
I look to you.
And when melodies are gone,
In you I hear a song.
I look to you.

http://youtu.be/5Pze_mdbOK8

"We all have our ups and our downs and sometimes, it seems like our burdens are too much to bear, have faith and believe that God knows your strength and he knows your load and he won't give you more than you can carry."
- Rashida Rowe

"Life is filled with ups and downs, the one who perseveres can turn his life around."
- Sherman Holmes

"Life is full of lots of ups and downs… sometimes it’s like a wave in the ocean, knocking you down and leaving you breathless… Other times it like a ripple in a pond, barely noticeable but going on and on… Keep in mind when things don’t move they become stagnate and die so even in the confusion, enjoy the movement... It means you are alive!"
- Karen Kostyla

"Life is cyclical. It has ups and downs. Remember what goes down must come up. You control how long you stay in the down mode."
- Mary-Francis Winters

"Life is full of ups and downs. The trick is to enjoy the ups and have courage during the downs."
- Carson Kolhoff

"I've had 60 years of ups and downs, and all of the downs that I've had, I'm happy that I've had them because it's taught me to appreciate all the ups."
- Patti LaBelle

"Life is like a roller coaster. It has its ups and downs. But it's your choice to scream or just enjoy the ride."
- Unknown

MainMessageForToday
Life is full of ups and downs. There are struggles during the downs that will not last forever.

"It's not an easy road,
Many see the glamour and the glitter
And think it's a bed of rose.
Who feels it knows,
Lord help me sustain these blows."
- From the song 'Not An Easy Road' by Buju Banton
http://youtu.be/I02Kd_FIklg

Life stranded on an island was a struggle in this movie:
Cast Away
https://youtu.be/4olwbrY2kwE

"Nothing is given to man on earth - struggle is built into the nature of life, and conflict is possible - the hero is the man who lets no obstacle prevent him from pursuing the values he has chosen."
- Andrew Bernstein

"Times of great calamity and confusion have been productive for the greatest minds. The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace. The brightest thunder-bolt is elicited from the darkest storm."
- Charles Caleb Colton

"A crisis creates the opportunity to dip deep into the reservoirs of our very being, to rise to levels of confidence, strength, and resolve that otherwise we didn't think we possessed."
- Jon M. Huntsman Sr., Winners Never Cheat: Even in Difficult Times

"A crisis creates the opportunity to dip deep into the reservoirs of our very being, to rise to levels of confidence, strength, and resolve that otherwise we didn't think we possessed."
- Jon M. Huntsman Sr., Winners Never Cheat: Even in Difficult Times

"Events may be horrible or inescapable. Men have always a choice - if not whether, then how, they may endure."
- Lois McMaster Bujold, The Curse of Chalion

"Bad things do happen; how I respond to them defines my character and the quality of my life. I can choose to sit in perpetual sadness, immobilized by the gravity of my loss, or I can choose to rise from the pain and treasure the most precious gift I have – life itself."
- Walter Anderson

"Someone once told me that life wasn't fair...and they were right. But I don't think that life was ever meant to be fair or perfect. It's not the tragedy, it's how we deal with it. It's whether we come out stronger because of it. It's not about blocking out the pain or hiding from it, it's about letting the pain shape you into someone better than you were before."
- Nicole Garber, Coming Apart: The Disillusioning Art of Shell Formation, Volume 1

MainMessageForToday
Life is a struggle; find the strength to overcome.

Theme for the week 12/13 - 12/19: Struggle.