Many people I know are facing very uncertain, and dare I say scary, futures. Many are concerned for their children. In a world that seems to be growing colder and angrier by the day. It can be tempting to walk around downtrodden, angry or with a defeatist attitude. This would not only be understandable, it would be excusable.
What we must realize is that we are always creating an example for our children and the young people coming behind us. Being able to remain loving in a world that can be anything but loving is true courage and true strength. We may feel our opportunity to live in a peaceful and loving world has been taken away from us. In some regard that may be true. What is also true is that we have been given an opportunity todemonstrate how to conquer that darkness. We do so not with mere words, but with action. We do so not by matching or surpassing their anger, but maintaining our love in the face of it.
Take advantage of the opportunity fellow warriors. Stand up and be strong. Be aggressive in your love. Be courageous in your compassion. That is the sign of a true warrior.
A simple choice to smile when you wake up may not seem like much. Done repetitively, it can become a lifestyle! What do you do first thing when you wake up? Go to the bathroom? Pour a cup of coffee? Many of us reach for our phones. That is about the worst thing you can do! Exposing yourself to outside influences before you have had an opportunity to determine and set your own mood is simply dangerous.
When you smile, and i would add feeling one thing you’re grateful for, YOU set the tone for your day. A simple affirmationsuch as, “No matter what happens today, I will make the best of it and keep smiling.” May sound silly at first. Done for a month and it becomes who you are.
Don’t you deserve to determine your attitude towards your own life? I believe you do. The question is, do you?
The last few posts we have been talking about gratitude, appreciation and such. These are not mere idle words. They are powerful ways of thinking. Roughly ten years ago, I began to change the way that I thought and viewed the world. It has created some radical shifts in my life. I gained the love of my life. I wrote and published 3 books. I started a podcast and YouTube channel. I began speaking. This was all due to a change in the way I thought. When you develop an attitude of gratitude and live in the present life becomes nothing short of magical. Even if your life is tough right now, there are so many things we have to be grateful for. Clean water, the ability to read these words, the fact we are alive when there are so many advances in science and medicine.
When you develop this attitude, that of gratitude, you will recognize that merely being alive is such a great gift! One way to really begin to appreciate all that you have in your life is to live in the present. Way too many of us are filled with regret for the past, or anxious about the future. One already happened, one hasn’t happened yet. Regret the past? The only way to do anything about it is to take action in the present to make up for it. Worried about the future? The best thing you can do is to take actions now to prepare for the future. Don’t want to risk taking things in your life for granted? Stop looking at your phone and take a look around you.
We can get so busy working to afford a life, that we fail to realize that life itself is the gift. It is in mastering our thoughts and choosing what to focus on that is the secret to an amazing life. We can choose to focus on what is right with the world, or what is wrong with it. They are both available at all times. Focusing on what is good in the world does not mean you are ignorant to the fact that there are things that need improvement. Just that you are not dwelling on them. This is a lesson I practice daily. I work long days most of the time. I have a wonderful lady at home that I will soon marry. There are times that my heart almost breaks because I miss spending time with her. If I were to focus on that, my day would be filled with sadness and heartache. Instead, I choose to focus on how fortunate I am to have someone I am so excited to come home to. That is a gift that not many have. I can be grateful that I have a job that I can work to help support us. Again, something not many have.
Even writing this blog and my next book. People ask how after working 56 hours at my day job, 5 hours on Sunday as a DJ, and going to the gym 3 days a week, do I manage to still have ambition to write? Still have ambition? How many people get to share thoughts for reducing stress, increasing joy and becoming the best version of ourselves to people in over 200 countries? It is a feeling of joyous obligation. Meaning I know people are relying on me to bring motivating and empowering positive thoughts to them daily. That is such a great blessing and opportunity. Does that make it easy? No. It makes it worth it.
Changing your thinking begins with mastering your thoughts. Until you do that, you can’t do anything. Once you do that, you can do anything. Mastering our thoughts means mastering our inner dialogue. Controlling the conversation that is going on in our heads and not leaving it up to chance or outside circumstances. This takes some discipline and willpower. It is certainly a skill worth mastering. When you do get control of your thinking, you will empower yourself to accomplish anything you are going after.
If you want to know the secret to an amazing life, start by mastering your own thoughts and emotions. It is a skill that will pay off more than anything else. More importantly, it will allow you to develop any other skill. If you fail to master your inner dialogue, you will forever be at the mercy of others and outside circumstances.
The world can sure be a rough place. It can feel dark and overwhelming at times. It is then that we should think of this analogy. I ship in the ocean is surrounded by water, only a tiny fraction of which could sink it. Yet it can survive years, decades or longer without the slightest issue. Even an occasional leak can be fixed and the ship can continue to sail the oceans without succumbing to the water. We are not much different when it comes to the negativity of life. We are often surrounded by it. Some sink and some continue to sail through life unencumbered. What makes the difference?
The difference is, much like the ship, those people who sail through life have found a way to not let the negativity get inside of them. It comes down to having a good defense for the mental, physical and emotional challenges that we will come up against. The time to come up with this plan is now. As the saying goes, the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, the second best time is today. Do not wait until your drowning to learn how to swim. Yes, that was a lot of metaphors in a row, but I am hoping it helps get the point across. Life may be smooth sailing now, but a storm is always right around the corner. Yes, that was another analogy.
There are many ways to set up a defense. Some people meditate. Some, like my mother, walk in nature. My fiancé likes to shop and create. I go to the gym or write. You have to find a constructive way to keep the water, in other words the stress, out of your ship. Should a leak develop, and you start to feel the negative creeping in, patch that sucker and get back to sailing. Having a healthy stress reduction plan could be a therapist to talk to, a journal to write in, a friend to meet for coffee or a dog to go for a walk with. What is your defense against the ocean of negativity we are all sailing through?
It is Monday. We have probably all worked very hard and the last thing we want to do is read a long blog post. Today we will just feature this handy list that might be worth printing out. Energy gainers and energy drainers. As the week goes on we will need more of the first and less of the second. Take a look at the two lists. There are some you might have thought of and some you might not. I am going to give you some from each list I am going to work on. I would love to hear yours in the comments below.
From the energy gainer list, first up I am going to use gratitude. A few post ago we touched on a new way to infuse more gratitude into our lives. This is a good idea no matter who you are. The benefits of being grateful could fill a book and has on several occasions. The new way we talked about was creating a gratitude picture folder on your phone. I am going to work on adding to mine and make it a point to look at the pictures of things I am grateful for at least once a day. The second one I am going to use is meditation. I normally meditate before falling asleep, but I am going to take a few minutes each day for a ten minute meditation. This doesn’t have to be complicated. You can even just close your eyes and count your breath. There are also plenty of meditations on YouTube you can just push play and away you go.
In the energy draining department, I am going to work on eliminating more news. With current political events, news is everywhere and it is seldom good. Avoiding it and focusing on news of friends and family would be far less stressful. I am also going to work on cleaning up some clutter. We may not think of this as an energy drainer, but it can be a big one. Looking at the paperwork you have stacked up, or little things you have to go through can sap your energy in a hurry.
These are my energy gainers and drainers I am going to focus on. How about you? Which ones jumped out at you? I would love to hear your answers in the comments below.
Does the above example remind you of your self-improvement journey? If not everyday, maybe at least some days? With everything I have going in my busy life, it can be me at times. It is important to recognize when it comes to improving ourselves, slow and steady is often the best course. As I so often do, I am going to use fitness as an example. Say you are extremely out of shape and want to improve in a hurry. So you go to the gym and workout hard for hours on end. One of two things will happen, neither of which is good. Let us take a look.
The first, and most obvious, is you will burn out. This can manifest itself in many ways. You could injure those muscles that still have a lot of rust on them. This could cause long-term or even permanent damage. Speaking of damage, you could go from a weight bench to a table in the emergency room if your heart is not up to the task. Second, you could burn out mentally. Deciding it is too hard or even impossible to workout. It wasn’t working out that was the problem, it was your approach. That is why slow and steady is the best.
If our person in the example above focused on just one thing instead, they would have been a lot better off. Maybe commit to doing a certain number of squats everyday or even a simple walk after dinner. In any area of improvement, I feel it is best to leave wanting to do a little more. That way you will approach the next time with enthusiasm and eagerness. Sure, you could push your body and heart to run a couple of miles, but you would be exhausted and not look forward to doing it again. Instead, start with a nice neighborhood stroll after dinner. Gradually go a little further each time.
This works the same with any kind of self-improvement. If you add too much all at once it can seem overwhelming and you may be tempted to quit. Instead, try meditating for a month before adding journaling. Start with stopping drinking soda before a total diet over hall. The secret to success is to start small and think big.
This is a great secret to overcoming life’s challenges. When you cease to have problems and start to have lessons, not only does your stress reduce, but your intelligence increases. This simple change in inner dialogue has a huge impact in your life. Changing the question you ask yourself may not seem like that radicle of a shift, but it is. The reason this is so, is because your brain will always come up with an answer. Look again at the two questions and consider what kind of answers could come from either.
Asking yourself the question, “Why does is this happening to me?” can lead to some disastrous results. You could start to assign blame and attach to things that it has no business being attached to. Like some kind of karma spin the bottle. You may start to compare it with the lives of others. “How come this never happens to Bob or Betty?” you might ask. The truth is that we never know what challenges Bob and Betty are facing. They have their challenges and we have ours. The bottom line is that the situation is happening to you. Those are the facts. To move ahead in life it is far greater to work with the facts than to wonder why they exist.
Asking yourself, “What is this trying to teach me?” or “What can I learn from this?” turns a challenge into an opportunity to come up stronger, smarter and maybe even a little happier in the end. Say you lose a job. That is a painful situation. It is also a good reminder that we should have multiple sources of income and always stay brushed up on our resume and skills. What if your car calls it quits? Perhaps it is reminding you to be better with preventative maintenance or to have savings set aside for such an occurrence.
The questions we ask ourselves will go a long way into determining the actions we take. Make sure the questions you ask yourself will lead to empowering actions that will improve your life. Start with changing the one above. Be patient with yourself. It takes time and practice to change thought patterns, but the returns will be well worth the effort.
After all of the political nonsense has settled, we are left with one truth. The world is changed by our example, not our opinion. Before elections, politicians will say anything to get elected. They will tell you how they will end crime, end world hunger, cure cancer and a million other promises that could never really be fulfilled. What is more important to me is to look at someone’s character. Do their words match their actions?
Lately, I have really been focused on discovering ways in which I can improve myself. The first major steps to improving myself was to be honest in areas in which I could improve. After all, if you don’t know where you are starting from, it is really hard to get anywhere. In reflection, I not only cringed at how I used to be, but had some pride with how far I have come. One of the major changes was being an example of how I think people should be. It may be difficult to figure out what is the right action to take in any situation. The easy way to solve this is to make sure your actions are an example of your beliefs.
This quote is a fine example of what we are talking about. Living your faith is far better than preaching it. Being an example of kindness and compassion is truly the way to live. Whatever you wish the world to become, the best way to move it towards that is to be it! At least you are one person closer and are showing the others just the way to accomplish it. People listen to your example far more than they listen to your words.
If you want to change the world, think of what example you would like be and be one.
One of the traits I have developed through the years is an ability to survive the passing of loved ones better than most. This is not to say that I have been cold and uncaring. Quite the opposite. The sadness and sense of loss is just as great in my heart as the next person. What I have learned to do is give the loss, and in doing so the life of that person, a sense of meaning. A few posts ago I, titled You might be asking the wrong question, I spoke a little more about this process. If you are really struggling, or would like additional thoughts on grief and loss, you might want to read that after you are done with this one.
The earliest example of putting this to use was the passing of my grandmother. In my life, I was very close to both of my grandparents. When my grandmother passed, it was like the ending of an era. The large family gathering began to lose people one by one. Family gathered around the table for a big meal became less and less of an event. When I stopped to finally soaked in everything that was different about my grandmother being gone, I decided the best way to honor her memory was to be what she brought to the world. When my grandfather passed, that was an even bigger blow. It seemed surreal at the time. What it did do was make me appreciate everything my grandfather taught me both by word and example.
Between 2017 and 2018 I gave 5 eulogies. I am a public speaker, but let me tell you, those are some of the most difficult to give. It wasn’t until I turned the focus into serving those who were there also experiencing loss, that it became far easier. The same is true in dealing with my own grief. turning it into serving those in the world who would be missing the traits that those I lost had brought to the world made my grief easier to handle. Those we are filled with sadness due to their loss must have done many things that brought joy to our heart and others. If not, chances are we would not be that filled with grief over their loss. It is identifying those traits and stepping up to be that for others that will not only honor the lives of our loved one, but help us in our own grief.
I am not telling you that being a good listener because your late aunt was, or always blessing people with a little humor because your mother did is going to change the fact that you are filled with grief over missing them. I don’t think we should be focused on trying to remove the grief. Again, I suggest reading the post You might be asking the wrong question. By giving our grief, and therefore their life, some purpose, our heart may find it a little easier to go on. In fact, when we find ourselves doing something that our loved one would have done to make someone smile, it just might do the same for us.
There is a lot of apprehension in the hearts of many people. It seems there is a great deal of concern that people with little care or concern to treat others with dignity and respect have been put in positions of power. As someone who has made it their life mission to leave the world a little better place than I found it, I can totally understand this. We were taught as children to respect each other, including those we differ with. We were taught that it is right to disagree with someone in a respectful fashion. Even on the elementary school playground we were taught that it was not nice to call people names just because they were different or held different opinions than us. Hopefully, these are the same lessons that we taught our children.
It is therefore understandable to be concerned when those who are supposed to be examples do the very opposite of this. Will the world become less caring and callous? I would be lying if I would tell you that some less-informed souls may view this as permission to act that way in their own lives. What can we do about all of this? Surprisingly, quite a bit. It is easy to feel hopeless and despondent about the whole thing. The more constructive action would to be to intensify our acts of kindness and compassion. Recently, I wrote a letter to the Dalai Lama, who is a master at teaching compassion. If you want any lessons on how to stay compassionate in an often cruel world, I recommend listening to some of his talks. Many are available on YouTube.
Many people view this solution as ridiculous or think of themselves too small to make that big of a difference. Nothing could be further from the truth. Let me break this down for you. How many people on average to you interact with on a daily basis? If you work in retail, this could be close to 100. Even if you don’t, you probably run into at the very least 10. Let’s just say 20 as an average. If you do your best to treat everyone you contact with kindness and compassion, maybe even say a few empowering words to them, do you think that would make a difference? What difference would 20 people make in a world of 8 billion? Let us do the math. 20 people a day, on average, for every day of the year equals 7300 people. If we went for the person in retail who sees 100 people a day, that number goes up to 36,500! Can you see the power we hold? You could be a beacon of hope for so many people. An example of goodness in the world. A reason to believe.
If only 20 retail employees did what we are discussing, that would bring us close to a million people shown kindness and compassion. When you add words of empowerment, that could be a million lives you positively impact. What do you think those people would go on to do? You can see the power of the ripple effect here. It works in reverse too. If one person decides they are too insignificant to make a difference, that is between 7300 and 36,500 people who will be negatively affected. Do you see the power your one example can make? What if you are a teacher? A boss or a leader of some other fashion? The impact of everyone makes a huge difference. Do not let an election or a sometimes hard world make you believe otherwise.
SECRET 2 AN AMAZING LIFE 