It all comes out in the end

Do you believe one person doing something can make a difference?
Do you believe that by doing something you can make a difference?
Do you believe *you* can accomplish?

Image of the earth droplet from Oceanflynn, CC 2.0

Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't.

Take today for instance -- I had a thrilling moment when I realized that choices I have been making in the foods I eat and what I drink are having an effect on my bodily functions.

After a moment of elation, I found my mental attitude switching.

Seems I could only handle a moment or two of feeling elated, and "Look!  I did it!".  Nearly immediately, I started berating myself for the fact at the moment I cannot seem to provide space for myself and my dreams to live; nor financial security.

Found myself questioning -- "what good does it do to have made this impact on my bodily functions when I can't make the same impact on the rest of my life?"

These instances happen to me, as I look back on it, often-- this denial of the fact that I can make a difference, I can accomplish.

For whatever reason, I tend to push back, or bury the moments of elation. Either the incident is *buried by guilt for having something good*, *too small to be acknowledged*, *a fluke*, *just a small thing that I can't repeat in my big life issues*, or (insert your own reason/excuse here). The fact is I often have taken a moment of 'I can' and instead focused on 'I can't'.

To counter that, at this moment in time, I choose to honor the questions to my self:

• What if I can make a difference?
• What if I can accomplish?
• What if I don't have to choose to denigrate small accomplishments because I don't think I've successfully accomplished bigger things?
• What if my accomplishment isn't of great importance to anyone else, but it is important to me?

Okay, here goes ...


My small accomplishment: over the course of the last 7 days, by paying attention to what I choose to eat, what I feel drawn to at the store, how my body feels, and choosing to be patient with myself: I have had an effect on both the amount of energy I feel and can face the day with; and, a difference in the material (and the ease with which) I excrete.

Yah, I can hear some of you laughing at me ... go find another blog to read. Or better yet, remember a quote from Marian Wright Edelman

"We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee."

For those of you laughing with me ... you can make a difference, you can accomplish. The size of the accomplishment matters not, it may be a first small accomplishment or the next step in a series of small accomplishments that brings about a larger effect. It's still an accomplishment and worthy of your awareness.