Tag: Gratitude

TRY THIS TOMORROW ⏰️

Here is something that can make a dramatic difference in your life. Waking up in a good mood. Have you ever given that much thought? Has it ever occurred to you that you have a choice as to what kind of mood you do wake up in? I wake up at 4am six days a week. Margie is always amazed that even on very little sleep I tend to wake up in a good mood. It wasn’t always this way and yes, there is a secret to it. Before I share what that secret is, ask yourself what waking up in a good mood could do for you? Waking up in a determined state instead of reacting to what the world throws at you. Deciding your own emotional state instead of leaving it up to the fate of others or outside circumstances.

This will allow you to do a great many things you would not be able to if you did not control your own emotional state. You will decrease your stress levels and the hormones related to it. This can minimize your risk for heart attacks and high blood pressure. That is pretty important. You will also be less reactive. When we are already stressed, even the smallest things can set us off. When we face a challenge beginning in a good emotional state, we are better equipped to make intelligent decisions. We will also be less likely to be left with consequences we will regret. Less stressed and generally more full of joy means our immune systems will be stronger. That means less colds and flu. To the very obvious, life is a lot more enjoyable.

By now you should be sold on the benefits of waking up in a good mood, but how do you do it? It is easier than you think and not complicated at all. It starts the night before. What you think of the last five minutes before sleep is what your subconscious mind will focus on while you are sleeping. If you go to sleep dreading the alarm the next morning, or fretting over all the problems you had that day, that focus will only cause those situations to grow. Give yourself a break and focus on what you have to be grateful for. It could be the fact you have a place to sleep. It could be the person next to you or the cat or dog at the end of the bed. Instead of dreading going to work, be thankful you are employed. Many are not. This is why reading something inspiring before bed helps. If you keep a gratitude journal, reviewing it before bed makes it that much more powerful.

When you do wake up, even if you have very little time to yourself, you can still set yourself up for success. Did I mention that I wake up at 4am? I often have very little time to get ready and get to work on time. The main reason is that I have a hard time leaving a warm bed with a hot lady inside of it. Instead of being upset I have to do that, I am grateful I have that. Then, near my bed and all of the places I am sure to go in the morning, such as the coffee maker, I have reminders of things that I am grateful for or that bring me joy. Pictures of loved ones or fun vacations. A well-placed inspirational quote can help your focus. Even reading your favorite motivational and inspirational blog, Secret2anamazinglife.com, can start your day out right. A little bit of light physical movement to get the heart pumping helps. If you have a mantra or an inspiring saying you enjoy? Try repeating it to yourself as you get ready. Place inspiring quotes or images on the bathroom mirror to look at while you brush your teeth.

These are but some of the ways that you can assure you wake up ready to take on the world and be a blessing to those around you. I would love to hear any tips you can offer on how to start your day off filled with joy and inner peace.

HIDDEN MEDICINE 💊

I have been writing this post for a week now. That is to say I had the title and idea for a week, but I wanted to wait until I had the time to really sit down and share this with you. What do we mean by hidden medicine? The idea came to me while listening to a song with that very title by the band Red Thunder. If you get a chance, look it up on YouTube. What is the ‘hidden medicine’ and where to we find it? We find it inside ourselves. What is the hidden medicine we all have inside of us? It is many different things. We will touch on a few of them today. If I have left off your favorite one, please feel free to let me know in the comments below.

Inside each one of us, there is a vast storehouse of potential that goes unused. That is because it is never explained or taught to us. Schools are more about teaching us what to remember than how to use what is inside of us. Our parents and teachers were most likely never told about this great power either. By the end of this post, you will know what your hidden medicine is and how to use it. Some of this medicine helps heal you physically, some mentally, some emotionally and some spiritually. A lot of it will help in all areas. Let us get started with our hidden medicine and begin healing ourselves.

Our first hidden medicine is gratitude. If you have even followed this site for a short time, you know how much we promote gratitude. This is not by accident or because it is trendy. No, gratitude has a great deal of power. As you can see in the picture above, it can heal a lot of things in your life. If you were to do only one thing to improve your life, I would suggest developing an attitude of gratitude. Suffering from fear or anxiety? Gratitude can help you heal that. If you are feeling full of lack, if the outlook of your life looks grim or you feel that the world is out to get you, gratitude can help heal that. You will start to see magic in everyday life. You will realize what truly matters and how lucky you are no matter how contrary those statements may sound at the moment.

The next hidden medicine is helping others or altruism. There is nothing that will make you forget your problems, or help you feel a warm fuzzy feeling in your heart quicker than helping someone else. If you feel that your problems feel overwhelming, reach out to help someone else. Not only will you feel good for doing something good and making the world a brighter place for that individual, but your own problems might seem a little easier to tackle after that. Helping others can make us realize how important and valuable we are. It can help us to realize what a difference one person can make and remind us that person is us!

To avoid making this too long and losing any of you, we are going to lump some of the last hidden medicines together. We will put them under the umbrella of ‘self-care’. Is self-care really a hidden medicine? You bet it is! This can mean so many different things for each of us. Some of us like being in the garden and working with plants. Some like going for walks in nature. It could be meditation, coffee with a friend, a good workout or a glass a wine and a good book.

Here is the medicinal quality of all of these items. They will affect our emotional state. They will infuse our spirit with hope, joy and lots of other positive emotions. They will force us to live in and learn to love the moment. This will help reduce stress and all of the not so pleasant side-effects that comes with. Being happier, healthier and less stress can also help heal our relationships with others. Why is that important? The worst emotion to feel at a funeral is not loss, it is regret. Knowing you should have said or done something differently. Knowing you could have acted better. What would be worse is if the funeral was your own and you wasted a good portion of your life sick, stressed and overwhelmed. Use your hidden medicines today before it is too late. Again, if you would like to add more please share in the comments below.

THE GIFTS YOU GIVE YOURSELF

Who does not like to receive gifts? I know I do. Just the other day, Margie got me this amazing book. It made me quite happy. Even thinking of it as I write this has put a smile on my face. Not everyone is lucky enough to have an amazing lady in their life like I have. You cannot always depend on people giving you gifts every day. That is unless they are the Amazon driver.

There are two amazing gifts that you can give to yourself daily that will not only make you happy, but unlike Amazon, they will actually add to your life! We are going to tackle these gifts one at a time. A little word of caution. Do not underestimate the power of these gifts. You may look at them and think, “Oh that’s cute.” Perhaps you might even think they sound a little cliche. I can promise you that if you make giving yourself these two gifts a habit, you will add so much peace and joy to your life it will seem like magic. As an added bonus, you will also reduce many of the negative stressors in your life as well. Like…well…stress. You will worry less. You will experience less anger. Are you ready to go shopping? I have great news! You do not have to go to a store. You do not have to go to a website. You do not even have to spend any money for these gifts. Perhaps that is why so many fail to see their value. You will be one of the few that do!

I can see some of you rolling your eyes at this one. “Another post about gratitude?” Yep! More than anything else in my life, gratitude has been so transformative. If you make it a focus and daily practice, the power it has to positively impact your life can seem like magic. Let us throw a little science in the mix. You think, on average, 60,000 thoughts a day. Some a little more. Some, it would appear, a lot less. 80% of those thoughts are negative. 90% are the same thoughts you had the day before. It is crazy how the human brain works. Here is how to change all of that. Begin by thinking with purpose and thinking with gratitude. I threw a lot of numbers at you but here is the important one. You can only think 1 thought at a time. Therefore, when you are thinking about what you are grateful for, you cannot be thinking about what you are worried about. When you are grateful, you cannot be angry at that very second. You can see where this is going. Less anger, less worry and more gratitude. Just think how that may affect your life.

When I mention the gift of forgiveness, people stop and say, “I thought you said this was about giving yourself gifts? Forgiveness is something you give to others?” This may seem so on the surface, but it really is the gift you give yourself. Forgiveness does mend relationships and that certainly helps. Before we get to far ahead of ourselves let us clear one thing up right away. Some people may think forgiveness is excusing the words or actions of another. It is not. What it is doing is preventing those very words and actions from hurting you over and over again. That is what happens when you keep hurt and anger inside yourself. Have you ever watched someone tell you a story about something they will not forgive? They often get upset just telling you about. Their blood pressure rises, their cortisol and adrenaline spike. Meanwhile, the person who did this to them is enjoying a latte and reading a book down the street without a care in the world.

There is a million reasons why people do hurtful and mean things. We can’t pretend to know everyone’s story. Truth is, it really doesn’t matter. Look at the quote from Buddha. We are only hurting ourselves. This is even trickier when the person that we are so upset with and cannot forgive looks back at us in the mirror. We hurt someone and never got the chance to apologize. We did something foolish. We self-sabotage. There are a million crazy reasons we get upset with ourselves. What do emotions like regret and guilt do? They can quite literally drive us to an early grave. It certainly does not change the past. It only steals joy from the present. That does not to much to help the future either. Just like when we are upset with someone else, hanging on to that pain only serves to hurt us over and over again. Do yourself a favor and let it go. Not for them. For your peace.

Can you see how focusing on these two gifts can radically transform your life? Imagine taking just a few moments of your day to pause in reflection on gratitude and forgiveness. How would that improve your life? I would love to hear your answers.

WHAT ON EARTH IS IT?🤔

Here is a great gift I received from the love of my life. A book filled with 500 things to be happy about. The cool thing about all of these…well…things, is that none of them require a large amount of capital. Most of them require none at all. Can you imagine that? In a world that makes a fortune off helping people find their bliss or joy, here is a book that lists 500 ways you can do it for free or pretty close to.

One of the things that makes this book so fun, other than the amazing lady who gave it to me, is that many of these things happen to us daily and we take them for granted. Why is that so fun? It means we are passing by happiness daily to look for it. Most of them we fail to notice or fully appreciate. Some we even turn into negatives. Does this sound confusing at all? It did a little to me in reading what I just wrote, so let me clear it up with a few examples.

Here is a picture of me working out. Seriously, it is of the late Greg Plitt, one of the people I draw inspiration from. Many of us are on a quest to get in better shape. Does this sound familiar? You make an gym date with your friend after work. 5pm rolls around and you are so tired you just want to collapse on the couch. How could you have been so dumb to say you would go to the gym? Suddenly you are mad at your friend, mad at yourself and dreading going to the gym. You make it there and complain about how tired you are through your entire workout. After you make it back home you cannot believe how sore you are. With a change in perception this could be an entirely different experience. You could look forward to working out after a long day knowing that it will help reduce stress, release the feel good hormones and provide you more energy on the back end. You could enjoy the knowledge you are getting stronger with each rep. When you get home you could let the sore muscles give you a feeling of pride that you put in a good workout. 

There is a literal fountain of possibilities to be happy. Most of them require the ability to be present. Some listed in a book are as follows. Finding a matching lid to a container. We all know how frustrating it can be when you can’t. Why not enjoy a little moment of happiness when you do. A bird landing close without seeing you. How cool is it to be able to catch a glimpse of an animal that is normally scared of humans? Peeling of the protective sticker on a new gadget. Knowing that it is ready to be used. It is like starting a new adventure. Take a moment to smile about it. How about the smell of early morning coffee? If we take a second to notice it at all, we may just say, “That smells good.” What if we really took even a few seconds to pause, inhale and really savor the smell.

Here is what I noticed almost all of the ‘things to be happy about’ involved. There were two things required to transform what may be ordinary happenings into moments of joy in our hearts. Those two things are being present and being grateful. Knowing this, we can transform anything into a moment of being happy. Like our workout example above, if we change our perception, we can change our emotional state. Imagine being grateful you can workout. Sure, you may not be where you want to be, or able to do what you want to do just yet, but you can workout. Many people can’t. Think of the ability to read this blog. How many people in the world are still not literate? How many do not have access to the internet?

Let us add to the list of 500. Share your little things that bring you great joy, or could bring you great joy with a little present moment awareness and gratitude.

WANT SUCCESS? KEEP IT SIMPLE 💯

This post was inspired during the amazing dinner that Margie and my mother put together to help celebrate 1000 blogs on this site. Our good friend, Ron Perez, looked around the table and told me something that in its simplicity, was yet profound. He said, “Neil, all you need is good friends and good food.” He was right. I could not have been happier than I was that night. No amount of fame or fortune could have done it. No amount of monetary reward. People often trip over some of the greatest treasure on their way to look for it.

Having a good group of friends and being able to share some good food, is something far too many of us in the world are not able to do. In fact, having a strong social circle and good friends is one of the most determining factors in longevity. This according to the Blue Zone book that examined the lives of the longest living people and what they had in common. Mr. Perez’s statement was quite the wise one and backed up by science.

Many folks spend a great deal of their time and energy investing in obtaining wealth and prestige. If you were to obtain such things and sacrifice your relationships to do so, you would still be poor. Something about friends – money cannot buy true ones. It is something that has to be fostered and grown with time. It takes trust, honesty, love, compassion and many other things that money or fame could not buy. On the opposite end of the spectrum, if you lack money but still have a great deal of true friends, you are wealthier than you can imagine. Not only are they able to help you, be that financial or connecting you to opportunities, but they will encourage and support you emotionally.

I am still reeling from the outpouring of love that I received at that surprise dinner the other night. That made me feel like the wealthiest person in the world! By our definition, I believe that I am. In your life, keep it simple. Invest in the things that truly matter. Take care of those who take care of you. Spend your time and money building friendships and helping others. The payout will be far better than any winning lottery ticket you could come across. To me, my friends and family are the greatest treasure.

THAT WAS QUICK!😲

Last post to celebrate 1000 posts on this site, we discussed what actions would make the greatest difference. Two of the most important were fostering an attitude of gratitude and sowing the seeds of what you wish to reap. I have done my best to practice this is the last 1000 days. I do my best to make sure each post does a little bit to uplift, inspire and educate all of those who read it. We discussed how actions of kindness and compassion are great seeds to sow that will come back to fill your world with kindness. Little did I know that I was foretelling my future!

Margie had told me she was going to take me out to celebrate 1000 posts and my dedication to writing them everyday. Little did I know, her and my mother worked together to gather some of my closest friends to help me celebrate. I could not have been happier. Last post I discussed the importance of making sure you surround yourself with great people that will encourage you and lift you up. I certainly have! What a great blessing all of these friends are!

I also had a separate section to say how grateful I was for Margie and how much she has added to my life. This is one example where I was overwhelmed with love and appreciation. Not only did she have me feeling these emotions, but her, along with our friends and family, have me excited to bring my fourth book to publication. Last post was advice to plant seeds of kindness and compassion. It was a reminder to surround yourself with amazing people. Today is evidence and proof that it does indeed come back to you. With abundance at that. I am so grateful for everyone that came out, or sent their thoughts and wishes last night!

I COULD NOT DO IT ALONE 😊

Today is the 999th day in a row we have posted content on this website. That means tomorrow is day 1000! It was an arbitrary goal set almost 3 years ago. When it was set, there were no thoughts of how long that actually was. Simple math could have shown it was a lot more of a journey than it seemed.

Some of the challenges faced in maintaining this content were vacation in the Bahamas. Yes, that doesn’t sound like much of an obstacle. Let me tell you, when you have to write before you can try the buffet or swim in turquoise water, it is a challenge. There of course were health challenges. Allergies, a cold, a Dislocated shoulder to name a few. There were also times I had no idea what to write about.

That is why it is so important to surround yourself with people who not only encourage and assist you with your goal, but hold you accountable to it. A debt is owed to so many. My friends Mary and Eduardo who are so kind as to share these posts on their social media. My mother who shares ideas of subjects she would like to hear discussed. This is very helpful. Everyone who engages through comments, likes and other manners. Even my friends in the great country of Greenland who give me other goals to reach.

A very special amount of gratitude to this lovely lady, my fiancee Margie. She not only provides the occasional idea for me to write about, but puts up with all of my crazy thoughts as a writer. She also does her best to make sure I get enough rest, and keeps my belly full of delicious food.

Each one of these amazing people helped this site reach 1000 days in a row of content. Without them, it would have been far more difficult, if not impossible. No great feat is accomplished alone. After tomorrow, I look forward to setting my sights on the next horizon. I would be honored if all of you would join us as we continue to help each other become the best version of ourselves and discover the secrets to an amazing life.

2 SPECIAL DAYS IN ONE! ✌️

Today, in the Northern hemisphere, it is the first day of spring. I am normally excited for this day as I am really against all things winter. This year has been especially tough. My lovely lady and I were unable to get away as we are saving for our wedding. Making through an entire cold and gloomy winter without an escape to the tropics is quite difficult for this author. Make no mistake, it will not be warm and sunny because the calendar said it is spring. This I know. Somehow, it just is a little easier mentally knowing that it is not that far away. As I write this, I sit in a warm coffee shop staring out at a gloomy day filled with freezing rain. I know, sunshine and flowers are right around the corner.

The second thing I discovered is that it is national Neil Day. I cannot make this up. I did not realize there is such a thing. The fact that it falls on the first day of spring prompted me to take the day off of work. I am going to relax and spend the entire day with the lady I love. That gives me two fun things to celebrate. One of the great keys of life is always having something to celebrate. It not only puts you in a good mood, and allows you to be creative, but it helps you focus on being grateful as well.

To assist in that endeavor I made a small purchase. It was a desktop calendar that gives you a holiday on every day of the year! If you combine that with a day by day motivational calendar, you got a good start to any day! For just a few dollars, every day you will be greeted with a different holiday and a fun picture. You could always look them up online, but I feel it is a lot easier when it is hanging right on the wall. What is your favorite holiday? What new holidays could you discover and celebrate?

LET US CELEBRATE TOGETHER 🙌

Today is International Client Day. A celebration of all the people that make your business possible. If I am being honest, I think of the people that follow this site, or purchase my books, more as a family than clients. A like-minded community of individuals striving for a better life and to become the best version of themselves.

I am certainly grateful for every person who has ever read a word here. You are part of the family. Even more impactful are those who comment. Sharing your thoughts and opinions add quality and content to what we all share and learn here. Whether that is on this very site, in our Facebook group or anywhere else. In places such as Italy, Lebanon and England I have received great advice on books to read, people to listen to and thoughts to ponder.

All of our family, which some may call ‘clients’ I am eternally grateful! Thank you for sharing this journey with me!

THE GREATEST GIFT 🎁

It is indeed a great gift to let someone know how much you appreciate them being in your life. How often do we do this? You deserve the great feeling of making someone feel appreciated. If we are being honest, we all have quirks that can make us a challenge to be around on any given day. Myself included. Therefore, our true friends deserve the feeling of appreciation for all they do, and all they put up with.

The cool thing about making people feel appreciated is that it is a win/win situation. As we described above, you both get that feel good emotions, but there is even more. In today’s world of technology, the ways you can convey this message are endless. You can of course get together for dinner or a cup of coffee and convey it personally. That is the most heartfelt. If this feels a bit awkward at first, there are a million other options.

You can send someone a text. Maybe a message on social media? You could even post something on their social media page so everyone knows how much you appreciate them. One of the most unique ways is to send them a greeting card in the mail. For the price of that cup of coffee, you can purchase a card and stamp and send them some well wishes. The great thing about sending a message this way is that it is there in black and white. They can review it over and over again. Bringing joy to their hearts several times.

Is there someone in your life you really appreciate? How could you tell them? You could even choose multiple options. You could also send appreciation to several people. This practice will dramatically improve your life and theirs! Again, it is a win/win situation.