I originally started this site because I wanted to create more joy in my own life, and wanted to share the tips I discovered in my journey with anyone else who may be on the same path. One of the greatest gifts this website has given back to me is the continuing discovery of new and exciting ways to improve the quality of my life. I am constantly looking to strengthen anything I think needs work on me. Luckily I have no shortage of flaws to work on. We all do. They may all be different, but they are all a blessing in disguise. Challenges and imperfections give us a chance to learn and to grow. Plus, the pressure on somebody who is perfect would be more than I could bear. One of the interesting things about me is that on occasion I stress over gift giving. I always want to give the perfect gift. Of course I would recommend my book A Happy Life for Busy People which captures the very best of this blog. That may be just a shameless self-promotion. Actually my wonderful friend Cheryl gave me the best gift idea ever. If somebody asked you what gift you would want if you could have anything, what would it be? Chances are the answers here will be varied. Diamonds? A new sports car? A promotion at your job? Roses from an admirer? Why do we want any of these things? Diamonds could make us feel extremely valuable. A new sports car? Well that could certainly makes us feel powerful or really cool. Promotion at work could give us a sense of importance. Roses from an admirer would most certainly make us feel loved. I know what you are thinking, “Neil these are not one gift, they are many gifts. On top of that, all of these gifts are different” Very true indeed. What if I were to tell you there was a gift that could make you feel all of these things? It would make you feel more valued than a diamond, more cool than a sports car, more important than a promotion and more loved than several dozen roses! Would you not want to go out and buy that gift for the most important person on your gift giving list? Would you not want to give this gift for the most important of all occasions? Well I have good news and bad news for you. First the bad news, you cannot buy this gift. It is not available for any dollar amount and cannot be created by anyone other than you. No, in fact this gifts only price is a few moments of your time, some honest reflection and a pen and paper. That is the good news, this powerful priceless gift is available to anyone! Ok, so you have read this far and stuck with me, what is this gift already? Well, here it is. An honest and heartfelt letter of appreciation and gratitude. You may be tempted to dismiss this as trivial…don’t! Think of how you would feel receiving a letter from someone in your life not only expressing their appreciation for you, but going in-depth as to why they appreciate you and all the things you have done for them. How easy to you think it would be to write and give one of those letters to someone? Here is a little secret for all of my shy friends. The letter still works (although not nearly as well) even if you do not give it to them. Sitting down and writing out all the ways you appreciate someone and all they have done for you will change the way you view and thus treat that person. I also imagine that the energy will be picked up in some subtle way by that person. Of course the feelings would be far more intense and have a far greater effect if they could actually read the letter. Give it a try. Write one, maybe even hang on to it a while. Just see how life changes. Maybe shoot for writing one a week. Pick a different person each week. Tomorrow we will discuss another once a week action you can employ that will have a great effect on your life this coming year…
Tag: Law of Attraction
MIRACLE IN THE MEN’S ROOM
We have all heard the idea that we become what we think about. The power of thought has been promoted by some of the greatest beings to have lived including Jesus, Buddha, and leaders of almost every other spiritual belief system. It has recently been made popular in such recent books as “The Secret” and the “Law of Attraction” series by Jerry and Ester Hicks. One of the most powerful ways to capitalize on this power to change our lives is through the feeling of expectation. Think of how you feel when you have a negative expectations. Remember as a child waiting for that bad report card from school? yeah, me neither I was a perfect student as well. How about that review from the boss? Any situation we are dreading can be made far worse by us thinking about it or worse worrying about it. Our stomachs turn in knots…we become nauseous. Sometimes we develop a headache. We can literally make ourselves sick. Quite often the moment is never as bad as we feared. Even if it is, we have not made it any better by worrying ourselves sick about it. Think about the flip side of this. When we are excited about something. A date with a person whose company we really enjoy, a vacation we have been planning. The sad part is I know of a lot of people who use the negative power of expectation with these good things as well. I know a friend who had been planning a trip to the islands for some time. I saw her about a week before and she looked genuinely upset. I asked her what was wrong. She told me it was getting so close to her vacation she was getting nervous. She told me she was hoping that nothing would go wrong with the flight or the reservations. She was also going to pick up some medicine because she was worried she would get sick on the food. To avoid the overwhelming urge to ask her what the hell was wrong with her and to quite frankly get some ‘fresh air’ I excused myself to go visit the men’s room. Ok, probably not the best place to get fresh air, but I really needed to stop listening to a recital of all the things that can go wrong on vacation. What happened next was one of those moments that the divine power gave me a little extra help. While ‘taking care of my business’ I happened to notice what one fabulous soul decided to jot down on the wall of the men’s room. There is black magic marker was written the phrase “Do yourself a favor, expect a miracle” as I made my way back to the table my friend was at no doubt thinking of sharks attacking her while snorkeling I pondered the power of the this simple statement. If we truly are expecting miracles in our lives that fills us with a sense of hope, a feeling of joyous expectation. Even when we run into what seems to be a negative challenge if we can maintain that feeling of positive expectation we can more easily make it through the tough times. As for my friend? Sadly to say her vacation was amazing, she did not get food poisoning and all her worry, fear and dread served no purpose other than to ruin the days leading up to her vacation. So do yourself a favor and listen to the soon to be famous artist from the men’s room at my local watering hole- expect a miracle in your own life.
CARRY IT WITH YOU
What if you could learn the secret tool that Einstein used to develop a good portion of his theories? What if it was the same tool that helped a famous engineer design many of the products he patented? What if I told you this same secret was used by successful authors, business people, and other successful people of all areas? Would you want to know it? What if I told you this secret would cost you less than a $1? Well here is the great secret. It will help you access the mountain of untapped knowledge trapped in your subconscious mind. It is…a pen and a pocket-size notebook. Now before you find yourself feeling disappointed. Let me explain. Have you ever caught yourself having a flash of brilliance where you come up with a solution you have been working on for months? I’ll let you in on a little secret, it didn’t just happen at that moment. Your subconscious had been working in the background on it for days, weeks, months or who knows how long. Same goes for flashes of inspiration. How many times has this happened to you? How many times have you struggled to remember what it was ten minutes later? something to the effect of “I had the perfect gift for my aunt, but now I can’t remember what it was” Now not all your ideas will seem so great later on, but the majority just might. Not only will it relieve some frustration and help you be more productive, it also helps train your subconscious how to communicate with your conscious thus bringing about more knowledge for you to work with. So before you dismiss this as old-fashioned, or not useful just remember we wouldn’t have E=mc2 without it. If you still worry about looking funny with a pen and paper with you, they also make great new apps for tablets and smart phones that are just like notebooks. You will be amazed and excited at all the great ideas you capture!
AT YOUR SERVICE…
An interesting fact I seem to run into time and time again is the close relationship between the “Law of Attraction” and living a positive rewarding life. Not to surprising as attracting the life we desire would certainly lead us to be happy. For those of you not very well versed in what the law of attraction may be, here is the most basic, nuts and bolts of the matter. basically that what we focus on and how we feel, the thoughts we send out to the universe influences the situation we find ourselves in. This has been, in some form or another, been put forth by almost every great thinker and spiritual leader throughout time. The formula for using this law to our advantage is ‘ask, believe, receive’ this was made popular in the movie and book “The Secret“. Well, I do not have a problem asking and always enjoy receiving, but like many of you until I see something I have a problem believing it. Faith, well it has not always been my strong point. Earl Nightingale put it this way, “Your rewards will always be in direct proportion to your service” Well, even though I endeavour to serve people to the best of my ability be it at the post office, the bar or in life in general I still had problems accepting that all this ‘good karma’ would come back. Ok, maybe I understood it intellectually, but couldn’t really grasp it emotionally. That is until today. I was watching a film with the famed Author Napoleon Hill. The man who wrote the famous book “Think and Grow Rich” back in 1937. He put it in such a way that helped me better understand faith, service and how that all comes together. He used the metaphor of the farmer. In the spring the farmer must purchase seeds, till the land, plant the seed and take care of them. Up to this point, not only has the farmer not made any profit he is actually in the hole for his time and the price of the seeds. Then, he sits back, let sunshine, rain and mother nature take her course. Along with some work by the farmer to maintain the soil. Then after a few weeks the seeds sprout, and blossom and the farmer is returned the only the seed money but several times that. The key was first he had to put in the investment, plant the seed and do the service. Then he had to sit back and wait. Confident his returns would come. This is not the first, nor the last time I am sure to learn a lesson from a farmer.
HOW DO I BEGIN??
Confession time. I have a terrible flaw. When beginning any project I tend to think ten steps in advance. I worry about what will happen months, sometimes years down the road. On several occasions this overwhelms me to the point I fail to even begin. On my road to self discovery I am learning to address and understand that as time goes on. In fact, had I not this blog would not exist. Which, some of you tell me would not be a good thing and I thank you for that.
The point of this confession? Is that I can understand when people tell me that in today’s world it just seems to difficult to achieve, much less maintain a positive outlook. What do they do about all the crabby people they encounter(more on that in another post) or how do they balance being informed without subjecting themselves to the negativity of their local paper or the evening news (also a subject to be addressed later this week) “It seems just to hard and hopeless I don’t even know where to begin” one lady recently told me. Well, thanks to some wise words from a dear old friend I was reminded of a great place that makes it fun and easy to start. One of my favorite books I have read in the last few years. Don’t worry for those of you who do not like to read it is also available on audio book. Even better, there is also a dvd! What is the title of this collection? “The Secret” I’m sure several of you have heard about it, and some of you may have not. personally if you can I recommend picking up all three as there is something to be gained from each different format. If you are not sure, or do not have the time or funds to dedicate to all three I strongly suggest starting with the movie. Imagine sitting down with a big bowl of popcorn, or your other favorite snack, putting in dvd, relaxing on your couch and in a mere two hours you can be on your way to beginning a more positive life. Now the movie is more about the law of attraction, but once you watch it you can see how close the topics of the law of attraction and living a positive life are connected. It also does a fine job of explaining why feeling good is so important and offers suggestions to help you to that end. I encourage you to watch it with at least one other person if you are able as it could become a fun and interesting conversation for years to follow. If you are unable to find a friend to watch it with you feel free to discuss it here with myself or other followers of this site as we are all here to help each other on the path.
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING HAPPY
Since I started this site I have had a few people tell me, “I like what your doing, but I have no time to be happy. I have to pay the pills and make dinner for my kids. I can’t worry about making myself happy. I have to concentrate on what is important”. That statement surpises me and yet it doesn’t. A lot of the influences we hear tell us that to worry about ourselves and our own happiness is selfish. We are taught to ‘put others before ourselves’. So why is being happy so important? Why should we spend so much time worrying about what makes us or others happy? Well we could look at the scientific facts that have been mentioned in the media so often. A positive attitude helps us live longer, boost our immune system, heal from injury quicker. Even if you have no interest in living a longer healthier life, although I am not sure who wouldn’t, happiness is still more important than most of us realize. It reduces our stress levels and allows us better to face the challenges that always pop up at the most unexpected times. How often we regret reacting to a mild irritation in a severe way just because our thoughts were already focused on some other trouble. It leaves hurt feelings and turns another situation from bad to worse. If we do our best to keep our thoughts focused on the joy that life offers us and adding more to our lives, then we shall see situations as they are. For those of you that are familiar with the Law of attraction, which states like attracts like. It should be apparent why being happy is so important. If you are happy you attract more happiness into your life, if you are unhappy you will be more likely to be faced with negative situations again and again.
So if we are busy focused on our own happiness, what should we bother worrying about others happiness? Well, recently that was shown to me in a dramatic and tragic way. A wonderful co-worker of mine took his own life a few days ago. When such an event happens we are always left with the same questions “how could I not know?”, and “What could I have done?”. Truth is, most of the time there is nothing we could have done, and no way we would’ve known. In this case by all accounts this gentleman was filled with good humor and had a real zest for life. Which stresses the importance even more. We never know what is going on in someones world. So consider that when dealing with the cheery lady at the coffee shop, or the grumpy cashier at the grocery store. We are never sure when someone may need that genuine compliment, or sign of gratitude from us. How important can happiness be? It can be a matter of life and death, for both ourselves and those we care about.
INSPIRATION AND ABUNDANCE DELIVERED RIGHT TO YOUR MAILBOX!
I know it takes a little effort to be on the lookout for positivity on a daily basis (it can be a really great habit once you get used to it) so why not have it delivered right to you? As a postal worker I see that almost every cause, hobby and interest has a magazine to go with it. So imagine my excitement when walking through the bookstore I discovered a new publication dedicated to living a more rewarding life! I could not wait to sit down and share it with my readers interested in loving their lives more. The magazine is simply titled “Law of Attraction” and it is filled with ways to feel younger, happier and healthier. As well as tips to increase the amount of Love, prosperity and gratitude in your life. So check out both their website and Facebook page listed here. I am always happy to share any new discovery of things that can increase the quality of our lives and ask you to feel free to do the same!
http://www.LawOfAttractionMag.com
http://www.facebook.com/LawOfAttractionMagazine
Please feel free to let me know what you thought.
SECRET 2 AN AMAZING LIFE 