Happy New Year!

A wise manager of mine once had my coworkers and myself gather into a conference room in which sat an enormous table piled with magazines of every genre. We were instructed to look through the pages and cut out our future...whatever we dreamed it to be...and glue them to a poster board. We then took turns explaining the meaning behind our displays.

The reason for such an exercise, our manager explained, was because a study she had recently read showed that people who envisioned their future through writing or pictures, had their fantasies come true X percent of the time...I don't recall the actual number.

But I do I remember that my story board had children on it, a photo advertisement for the television show Gilmore Girls (I dreamed of living in a quaint, friendly town like their fictional Stars Hallow), an old house with charm, a happy man (hoping to be a good wife), a women in some great clothes (no explanation necessary there!) and other various dreams of mine.

I now have three healthy, happy children. I live in Cedarburg, Wisconsin...a small town straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting. Our home was built in 1887. I hope I'm a decent wife, but suppose you'd have to ask my husband. And I'm happy to report that more days than not I'm pleased with my apparel. Coincidence, I don't know.

But I do know that these results have made me a believer in the power of positive thinking...that it at least can't hurt. So if you're hoping and praying that 2009 brings about specific changes for your life, I recommend you spend some time writing down your future as you see it, or taking your scissors to a magazine as I did all those years ago. And you can have your children do the same as well...you're never too old or young to dream big!

It's a new year. A time for cleansing. A time for beginnings. A time for looking forward.

I pray your 2009 is overflowing with faith, friends, beauty, happiness, sunshine, love and wealth…and that you encounter just enough challenges to appreciate it all!

After all, you need a few clouds to make a beautiful sunset! Happy New Year!