“I’m just having a bad day.” If I could only have an extra nickel for each person who said that to me during their office visit, there’d be a lot more to put in the collection basket each Sunday morning as it’s handed to me at church.

The traffic is backed up, sorry I’m late I spilled my coffee and had to go home to change, I got a flat tire, I couldn’t find my keys. I’ve heard it, you’ve heard it, we’ve all heard it.

Fortunately, that doesn’t happen to everyone every day. But when it happens most mornings that throw off the first appointment on the schedule or the first scheduled appointment after lunch, the people who do show up on time get really cranky.

The first week of the Master Key Experience was a real eye-opener for me. I rarely need to read anything more than once, O.K., truthfully sometimes twice. But the same chapter three times a day, and for thirty days over and over and over again? If I do the math correctly that chapter I’ll have read 90 times before I move on to the next chapter and lesson. Really? And now I know why.

It’s day four, I’ve now read the same chapter 12 times and now I’m beginning to “get it” and I’m not cranky at all. The one passage that stands out to me most is this,

“I will drink as instructed and spill not a drop. And the seed of success I will swallow.”

Og Mandino, The Greatest Salesman In the World, page 57.

The subconscious mind works in mysterious ways and the one thing I know, it does not sleep and takes not a single break.

Sure I’ve already been a little behind, but I’ve quickly caught up. Getting behind is a lot like being late for an appointment and writing it off as a “bad day” and giving up until tomorrow.

Tomorrow will be better, we hope, while subconsciously waving a little white flag of surrender on today. The problem with bad days is that they tend to pile up. A bad day becomes a bad week and a bad week becomes a bad month and before you know it, it’s 2024.

So instead of giving up on today and waiting for tomorrow, I’ve put myself on a strict news holiday. No newspapers, political podcasts, debates, or commentaries. Just the work I need to do, quality time spent with my family with meaningful conversations, daily exercise, and the Master Key Experience.

What a difference!

I’m not one to be held hostage by circumstances and while I’m waking up earlier than I have in the past three years, I’m finding myself more productive having accomplished more this week simply by scheduling my time better, and I believe reading the same chapter 12-times already this week has something to do with it.

I’ve always been self-employed so nobody has ever had to tell me when to show up, deadlines to meet, or what needs to get done. Make no mistake, there’s a TON of work ahead, I know it and in this week’s notes I now know, “There is a difference between WISHING for a thing and being READY to receive it.”

Make it a good day.