Month: July 2013

TRIAL AND ERROR

“My life has been based on trial and error. I finally paid attention during the trial, now I’m learning from my errors”
-Kari Hutton

Life, it always has its ups and downs.  No matter how far along we are at creating the life of our dreams, there will always be challenges. Now this may seem depressing news, but it is quite the opposite.  Challenges provide us a chance to grow. The are the seeds to great opportunity. You could never have the feeling without overcoming a challenge.  The secret to making challenges work for you is what you do with them.  When you find yourself in a troubling situation is your first feeling “Why me?” or how life is not fair?  I’ll admit there are days I am as guilty as the next person of this.  When we are faced with a situation that is not what we desire we can make it work for us. Even if it is completely out of our control, we can still have a victory if we ask ourselves “What can I learn from this?” If you say nothing, just think if you could learn something from it, what would it be?  Maybe it is as simple as who will stand by you when the chips are down, or how you will react when faced with a tough time.

I have a friend who was recently sent to prison.  She is a young single mother and for some serious life mistakes she faces over a year away from her family.  Now she could simply focus on missing her son, or how her life is so far down the wrong path, but she is not.  In fact, she is working on transforming her life while behind bars.  She is beginning to explore things like the love of attraction and the power of positive thinking.  She is working on educating herself in different fields and writing a book to help others who may be headed down the path she went to so that they may not make the same mistakes.  Whenever I receive a letter from her it reminds me how much good can come out of a situation that seems so bad.

The moral is this.  Sometimes life will suck.  The two real secrets are as follows.  First, how to reduce the times that happens.  Second, how to make the most of it when it does. If you can do this your life will be a success.  So this week as we are faced with challenges let us stop and ask ourselves “how can I make this work for me?”.  Be a master of your life, not a victim.

WHEN WE HAVE NO CONTROL..

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves”

-Viktor Frankl

Often I am asked “How can I be expected to live a positive motivated life when I am surrounded by all these negative people at work?” or “How can I remain positive and motivated when my loved one just passed away?”  Again I am here to be the first to tell you this blog is not about being happy 100% of the time.  It is about being happier and being so more often.  There will be times in our lives that situations happen beyond our control.  That is when we are forced to grow.  When our emotional fortitude is strengthened. When we are forced to look for a deeper meaning than what lies on the surface.  You have heard the saying “We can’t control our circumstances we can just control how we react to them”  As the quote above indicates there are times when there will be nothing we can do to change our situations.  Sure you could always quit your job and go looking for another.  You better not be a single parent or like eating very much though.  Once a loved one has passed on there is nothing we can do to bring them back.  That quote actually came from the author of a book entitled “Man’s Search for Meaning”.  Viktor Frankl was a prisoner in a Nazi death camp with his family.  He was spared from the gas chambers, but had the terrible job of removing all of the dead bodies.  Some of which were his friends and relatives.  Now I realize this may not be all that inspiring, but my point is very few of us face a situation that tough.  This man did.  He knew that he could not single-handedly change that situation.  What he could do was change what it meant in his own mind.  He used his goal of being able to survive to be able to tell his story to both prevent something that terrible from happening again as well as to show others they have the power to impart meaning to any situation they face.  So next time life gives us a challenge, remember it is not only our chance to grow, but our chance to look for the beauty, to look for the empowering meaning.

Metal motivation

Yesterday we spoke of exposing ourselves to different sources of motivation and inspiration.  Well I have come across what I feel is an excellent site for people who may find this whole taking control of your mind and using the power of your thoughts a bit too ‘new age’.  It also works great for people like myself who on an occasion or several need a shove to be reminded to do the things we know we should be doing, but for a million different reasons are not.  Now I caution some of the language on this site is a bit strong, but it is a great bold look at how to improve your life and empower yourself. the site is www.metalmotivation.com The esteemed gentleman who you will see and hear from, CJ, has some amazing ideas and serves as another great option to plug into for some great motivation and life changing tools.  He also has some pretty great t-shirts there too. Check it out, if it works for you great! His concepts are some of the best I have heard in a long time. Have a passionate and thrilling day my friends!

 

What language do you speak?

The voice in my head asked me a very interesting question the other day.  Which is amazing because usually it is mentioning something about rum or pizza.  Terrible vices aside, the question was “How many different languages are there in the world?”.  To skip you from having to leave this site and head to Google, the answer, though debated is in the neighborhood of 6500.  Why on earth is this relevant, and what does it have to do with living an amazing life?  That is another great question and one that leads us to my next point.   In the past how many things have we tried learning that just never ‘clicked’?  I know I have quite a few.  English language for one, which is ironic considering my book is almost complete.  Maybe playing a certain musical instrument? Cooking a certain dish? Math? Science? History? Some of us just find a way to get through the subject and hope we never have a call to use it later in life.  Imagine if we had applied this same logic when we were learning to walk, or to talk?  There are some people I may speculate did give up, but that is a topic for another day.  Truth is we just kept at it, often approaching the subject from every different angle.  I began to ponder how this related to learning how to transform your life.  Now before you think I am going to tell you to read a book on motivation written in Zulu when you live in Peru let us slow down for a minute.  Think of how many books you have seen or heard of on how to improve your life?  How many different life coaches are out there? We both know there are a lot in both categories. Why? If there is a magical secret do we need both “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff”  as well as “Think and Grow Rich”?   If one person could teach us how to succeed in life to we need both the late Zig Ziglar as well as Tony Robbins?  The answer in short is ‘yes’.  To explain why, let me ask you another question.  Do they all agree?  To they all have the same plan and state it the same way?  You know the answer is no.  So who is right? They all are.  Then again, they all are wrong too.  Before you think I started listening to the rum voice in my head let me explain.  We all are unique creatures.  We all have had unique experiences.  That is why it is important to expose ourselves to as many different voices as we can.  I can think of no better field where this is so evident than self-improvement.  Haven’t you ever been having a conversation with a group of people and had to ask someone “What are they trying to say?” When your friend explains it, suddenly you discover that person was speaking a language you know and they are not crazy.  Ok, at least it should work that way most of the time.  The difference here is just the words being used. So remember to do yourself the service of exploring as many paths to motivation as you can and go with the one, or ones, that work for you.  I hope I will be one of them, but if not that is ok too. Just search and discover the voice that speaks to you!

THE KILLERS ARE AFTER YOU!

Now before I accidentally hit a nerve with anyone who has an intense case of paranoia, let me explain.  I do not mean actual physical killers…exactly.  No, I am referring to a special group of people we all have in our lives.  Bob Marley referred to them as ’emotional vampires’  Teddy Roosevelt called them ‘spectators’.  They may be vindictive and easy to spot.  They may also be well-meaning and come in the disguise of someone who cares.  I call them ‘dream killers’.  We are exposed to them sometimes right out of the womb.  Sometimes they are our parents.  Now that is not to say you should not listen to your parents, especially when you are young.  Be aware, however, that even they come with prejudices and emotional baggage of their own.  It is easy when we hear some mean-spirited person come to us and tell us how they hope we do not succeed.   In fact, these quite often can be our greatest motivators.  You hear it time and time again with sports heroes.  Everyone told them they were too slow, or too small and they keep that chip on their shoulder to drive them.  Quite often this results in someone accomplishing goals even they never dreamed they could accomplish.

Then there are the others.  Well-meaning friends, family members, co-workers or just people we meet who try to steer us from our dreams.  Let me give you a personal example.  Several customers at the post office I work at are eagerly looking forward to my book being released.  When a certain person was asking me how it was progressing the fellow behind him informed me “You should not quit your day job”.  He informed me about how risky writing a book can be and how much ‘safer’ a job could be.  This man, no doubt trying to be helpful, was transferring his fears to me.  Later that afternoon a customer had heard from someone in the small town I work in about my literary endeavors and asked me “You really don’t expect to make a living at that? Most authors never make it you know”.  All these people were trying to keep me from experiencing failure and heart-break.  If we listen to them and ‘do as we should’ slowly our dreams die.  We follow the safe path all the others do.  Did you know that 95% of Americans over the age of 65 are either dead or dead broke? They are completely reliant on someone else, be it social security or a part-time job or relative just to survive.  Now money is only one measuring stick for one’s success, but the same holds true for people who tell you “those self-improvement books never really work” or “you shouldn’t try anything to risky”  Remember they have their own fears and life lessons.  Take what they say with a grain of salt.  They do not know what you are made of, or what faith lies inside of you.  Be aware of those who kill your dreams and your spirit.  Believe in yourself!

FREEDOM

Today is July 4th.  If you live here in the United States it is a day we celebrate our freedom as a country.  That is not what this post is about though.  No I am talking about a universal freedom.  A freedom that we all have.  One that is in the possession of everyone whether you live in Brazil, Greenland, Egypt or California.  This freedom, however, is seldom pursued or even used by most of us.  What is this freedom I speak of?  It is our freedom of mind, freedom of thought and freedom of feeling.  There are many people who let circumstances control their minds.  “Well I would be happy if only this political party wasn’t in”.  They let things they read, words other people say, political ideology, beliefs of the masses dictate what happens inside their own heads.  Sure it stings when someone says or does something mean or vindictive to us.  Remember, we cannot control circumstances.  As the saying goes “What people say and do to us is their business.  How we react to it is ours”  Like liberty and freedoms on a national level, personal liberty is an aspiration to be fought for at all costs.  We have been told how to think, how and what to feel since we were young.  It is our duty to decide what we believe and what thoughts we will allow to rule our daily thinking.  It is time to begin the struggle for mental and spiritual independence from negative and limiting thoughts and beliefs.  For no country can be free, no people can be free if first their minds are not free.

THEY JUST DO NOT UNDERSTAND

“When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life.  When I went to school they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up.  I wrote down ‘happy’.  They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life” – John Lennon

This quote is a perfect example of how we can lose focus on what is truly important as we grow older.  First we want independence, then we want a job, perhaps then a better job.  We want a smart good-looking spouse, a nice car, a great house in a wonderful neighborhood.  Even those who have more altruistic goals.  They want to save the whales, save the planet, save souls, save money by using coupons and shopping wisely.  All of these ‘goals’ have the same end to them.  Why would you want the house, the beautiful spouse, and the fancy car?  Why would you want to help starving people a million miles away that you may never meet?  While all of these goals are worthwhile, some more than others, we do them all for one real reason.  It goes by many disguises, security, pride, contentment.  What all those feelings amount to, they make us happy.  The famous Beatles singer had it right.  Those of us who are more worried about the current ‘assignment’ don’t really understand life.  Learn to be happy while going after that beautiful spouse.  Feel joy in the process of helping endangered species.  If we can master the feelings without the material support than we shall truly lead a life of joy.  So learn to find the happiness in the journey my friends and you will have more to celebrate when you reach the destination.