The number "3"

 

A few years ago, a friend shared a tip with me that she had learned at a seminar, and was finding it useful in her own life.  It was to start every day by writing down 3 tasks you wanted to accomplish that day.  They don't have to be big jobs; in reality it is the little 10-minute jobs that seem to pile up.  Why the 3 task/day works is that not only do you get 3 things accomplished each day, but once they are done, so are you. There is always so much to do in a busy household or in maintaining a home, it can become overwhelming, which may result in accomplishing nothing for the day. I wrote three things down for a long time, but right now I just make a plan with my first cup of coffee and store it in my head.  It is a fact that it takes consistently doing the same thing 20 times to develop a habit and I have developed the "3 tasks a day" habit. I understand it works for exercising or walking, but I can't speak to that. I just admire people that don't feel their day is right, until they have done their walk or gone to the gym.

We never seem to notice three things have happened until it arrives and then we announce, "well that's three". Deaths seem to be one of those examples. For me most recently I have said, "I know three people that have had a fire in their home in less than a year". We don't seem to pay attention to good things with the same energy, but we need to.   

Three is a good number for me. I have three children and three grandchildren. It anyone asks me to pick a number, I pick three. My youngest granddaughter was born on June 3rd and I believe the number 3 will serve her well in her life.

   

I know several people that list three things they are grateful for every day. Some do it in the morning, some at night, but they are devoted to doing it.  Clearly, they have rewired their brain.  We really need to remember to be grateful for what we have.  We all know those people that struggle to get into a room because they are dragging such a black cloud with them.  They feel the world has just dumped on them, and no one has problems like they do.  I really, really struggle to stay positive in those situations. We also know people that have all the reasons in the world to have a dark cloud but don't seem to. They usually end up making us feel better about ourselves.  I like spending time with those types of people.  They make me a better person. 

I liked this quote and felt it spoke to the way I have led my life.  I have always been the type of person to go after what I want.  Especially in the last couple of decades.  Some of those things were frightening such as buying a condo, applying for jobs, even buying a vehicle but I did it.  I am grateful that times have changed, and women are usually respected as equal.  If I feel the least bit uneasy about an interaction I just leave, I have always relied on my intuition to direct me. When I bought my last two vehicles, I asked for the youngest salesperson.  I felt that the older ones already had clientele and I wanted to be part of developing clientele for the new person. The last vehicle I bought; I picked what I thought was the youngest from the website.  Little did I know they had not updated their website in years, and he wasn't the youngest.  I later found out they had a woman salesperson. She did a favor for my salesperson and took me on my test drive. Because I know absolutely nothing about a vehicle, except for color, I assumed that was the same for the rest of the female population.  Car salespeople are traditionally men, to have a woman on staff certainly needs to be on the website. A woman that not only understands a vehicle but is excellent with numbers is someone I would have picked as my person to sell me a vehicle.    

 

Have you even sat for a long time and rehearsed "how" to ask for something.  You convince yourself that the answer will be "no", so why even ask.  Many scenarios play out in your head until you finally get the courage to ask.  The line "well the worst that can happen is they will say no" and you make your request. Why are we so frightened to ask? For me I don't want to give other people extra work because of what I need in my life.  Yet, I have no problem taking on other people's favors. I have three replies: yes, no or I need to think about that.  I have become way more confident in saying "sorry, I can't help you with that".  I learned a long time ago, if you say "no", you don't even have to explain why!  

 

If I had never stepped forward, I am not sure where I would have been.  In many aspects of my life, I have had some true successes, and I have also had some epic failures.  But life for me goes on.