Tag: self-improvement

WHO WOULD BUY A COPY? 🥸

Recently, I came across a story about the Mona Lisa, the famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci. A copy of the famous painting, made by one of da Vinci’s students, was discovered. It not only was better preserved, it revealed many of the details that had been lost in the original. If I gave you the option to own either one of these paintings, which one would you choose? The original, done by old Leo himself, or the copy done by his student? If you know anything about art, or the value of art, I am sure you will choose the original. Why? The copy is better preserved. It has more detail. Why is the original more valuable? Simple, it is an original.

You, my friends, are not much different than that famous painting. Sure, you might not be a 16th century woman, but you are far more valuable as an original. Keep this in mind as you make your way through a world bent on telling you who you should be. The only thing we should be working on becoming is the best version of ourselves.

This does not mean we ignore constructive criticism, or keep an open mind in regards to our character. What I mean is not to change yourself to conform to someone else’s definition of you. I remember hearing that Oprah was told she was far too empathetic to be in journalism. She cried whenever she reported on a fire because a family had lost their home. Had she listened and hardened her heart, she may have been able to become an anchor woman on the news. Instead, she leaned into who she was and became one of the most successful women in history. The world is filled with countless stories like this.

As we make our way through the week, and through life in general, let us be confident in who we are and work to be the best version of that. In doing so, you help give others permission to do the same. Never hide the gift of who you are from the world. It will help you attract the life and people that should be in your story.

WATCH WHAT YOU SAY! 👄

I have to share this story that just happened to me. Before heading out the door to write today, I told the love of my life, “I have no idea what I am going to write about.” As I was booting up my computer and settling in with my cup of coffee, I could not help but hear the two people next to me talking. It was a man and a woman in their mid to late sixties. The woman was complaining how stupid her son was. “He is married to that no good girl who blocked me.” she continued. The man countered with tails of his own children and how they annoy him even though they live out of state. Here is the crazy thing, they both went on to complain that their children never call them or want to get together with them.

The problem may seem obvious to most of us. However, these two people are certainly not alone in doing this. Daily, I am reminded of this at work and even when I DJ on the weekends. People only speak of their partner in negative terms. “You will never believe what stupid thing my husband did last night.” or “My wife is nagging me again.” Not surprising, the next day they come in with a tale of how they got into a big disagreement with their spouse the night prior.

Here is some powerful relationship advice. When it comes to the good in your relationship, share it everywhere you can. When it comes to negative items and disagreements, keep them in house. There are so many reasons you should do this. One, your words influence your attitude. This, in turn, influences your actions. Second, whoever you are talking to has their own bias and prejudice that they will bring to the situation. Seldom, if ever, will they encourage you to take and objective look at the situation. They may reinforce your negative opinions in an attempt to comfort you. This will only serve to magnify any negative emotions you are already feeling. The same holds true about positive words you say. Which is why you should share them. Lastly, it damages the image of the person you are talking about. After the disagreement has passed, the person you shared it with will have a less glowing opinion of your friend/spouse or whoever you were discussing.

If you don’t believe me, prove this to yourself. For the next week, speak all the good you can about all of the people you can and watch how your relationships improve. Not to mention, the more positive you speak, the more enjoyable you are to be around.

IT DOES MAKE A DIFFERENCE 🌻

One interesting thing about humans is that we tend to overestimate the impact of others while at the same time underestimating the impact we make. I have heard people say things such as, “I am just a parent.” Oh really now? Have parents ever made a difference in the world? I think we can all agree they have. They make a difference every day!

Just this morning, Margie and I went out for breakfast. It is something we like to do on the weekend because during the week I am always at work. Our server, an occupation that never gets enough credit, was super friendly. The food was great too, but her service really made the meal pleasant. We have certainly had experiences on the opposite end of the spectrum. This not only took away the pleasure of our dining experience, but, in my opinion, even takes away from the enjoyment of the food. It had our day off to a joyous start. She made a difference.

I was a bartender for 23 years. Whenever I trained a new bartender, or even when I was a trainer for the United States Postal Service, I always reminded the people I was training what an impact they made. I would tell them, “You might only interact with these people for 60 seconds. Make it the best 60 seconds of their day.” Whether you are ordering a drink, or buying a book of stamps, people remember good service. They are likely to give their business to someone who provides that good service. Not to mention, that is how we should treat each other. Can you imagine if you received friendly and amazing service everywhere you went? How would you feel at the end of the day? How about if you received grumpy and poor service everywhere? How would that make you feel? It does make an impact.

This not only applies to interaction with others. Think of what an impact picking up one piece of trash makes. You may be tempted to think it doesn’t make much of a difference. Now, imagine if every person on this planet picked up one piece of trash a day. That is 8 billion pieces of trash we would clean up by each of us only picking up one piece. That would make an impact. How about the opposite? If all of us thought, “I am only dropping one wrapper on the ground. What difference could that make?” If everyone on earth took the same course of action, that would be 8 billion additional pieces of trash laying around. Each action we take makes a huge difference. YOU make a huge difference. Know it. Act like it.

WHATEVER YOU DO… BE A PRO 🏆

Today we are going to talk about the huge difference between two different words, reactive and proactive. Let us look at reactive first. When we put ‘re’ in front of a word, it means to do something again. If you think of what it means to reclaim something, it means you had it once, then you did not have it, now you have it again. In terms of our lives, when we react it is the same thing. There was an action and then it caused our action, or our reaction. That means our actions or behaviors, are predicated on the actions or behaviors of others. How would you like to live your life when how you feel, or how you act, is determined by others? I can’t imagine that you would feel in control of your life. In fact, you wouldn’t be. You would be at the mercy of outside circumstances.

What does it mean to be proactive? It means that we take action in advance of the upcoming situation. If you know you have an early morning, you may be proactive in your actions by putting your clothes out the night before, or getting the coffee maker ready. When you show up the next day you will be well-rested, well-dressed and on time. In short, you will look like, and act like, a pro. This not only works for getting up early. One of the best ways to be proactive is to work on controlling your thoughts, emotions and focus. Eventually, you will be faced with challenges to all of the above. If you are proactive when it comes to your self-control, you will be less likely to be reactive when the situation arises. This means if someone were to treat you unkindly, you would not have to react by feeling anger towards them or sadness based on their treatment of you. If you are able to control your thoughts, emotions and actions regardless of outside circumstances, that will make you a pro.

Invest in being proactive when it comes to improving yourself today. The result of such preparation will be more control over your life and less stress about it. Ask yourself, do you want to be at the mercy of the world around you and controlled by others, or do you want to be a pro?

TIME TO RECLAIM YOUR LIFE!💪

Whether you are 18 or 80, the time has come to reclaim your life! What we are talking about here is taking control of the inner game. The time for surrendering to your emotions or the expectations of others is over. The time has come to give up having worry over things we cannot control. What the world needs is you living the life you were born too. That is a life where your soul is on fire and you are burning bright with the light that is your truth.

Just like the mythical phoenix, it is your turn to rise from ashes of your former life to soar higher and accomplish more! Our planet is in desperate need of people living their passion and purpose. No longer can we have a population of mindless zombies chasing the brass ring. The media has us believing that happiness can only be found in material objects. Big Pharma is telling us that it is a Prozac deficiency. Even politicians, and certain religions, have us hating those who are different than us. Family and friends may try to pressure us to take paths in life that do not align with our values and spirit.

Reclaiming your life may sound like a large and complicated affair, but it is not. My upcoming fourth book will tackle this subject in great detail. Right now I would like to share a few crucial steps that you can take to begin the process of reclaiming your life. First, write down a description of what you want in your life and the direction you would like it to go. Just having this ‘north star’ in which to navigate your life by, will put you ahead of the majority of people in the world today. It will allow you to see right away if the actions you are taking, or about to take, will bring you closer to the life you want, or take you further away. It will also serve as a great reminder of the reason to get out of bed every morning.

Next, come up with a routine that will have you taking daily steps to create the life you do not need a vacation from. This can sound like a near impossibility, but it is a lot closer than you think. Creating a routine, and taking small but measurable steps consistently will allow you to continually get closer to that life you only dreamed of. More importantly, it will allow you to enjoy the process. Doing so will assist you in maintaining the self-discipline to stay true to the process you have set in place. Knowing every day that dream life is getting closer will have feed the flames of passion and that fire in your heart.

Whether you take these two steps, or something entirely different, I implore you to take action to reclaim your life from a world that is trying to steal in from you. It is you who deserve to wake up every morning on fire with excitement for the day ahead. This fall my fourth book will give you a customizable plan to do just that. Until then, feel free to share any tools and strategies that you use, or will use to reclaim your life, and like the Phoenix, rise from ashes of mediocrity to live an amazing life.

DO I HAVE TO? 😒

One of the greatest curiosities that I face is people who either purchase one of my books, attend a seminar or speaking engagement and then ask if they really ‘have to’ do the things that I recommend. I find this to be very confusing. Presumably, you purchase a book like Living the Dream or A Happy Life for Busy People, to learn how to transform your life. When the proven tools and strategies are placed before you on the pages, you ask if you have to do them. What is the answer to that question?

The answer is a resounding ‘No’. You do not have to do a single thing to improve yourself and/or your life. Then again, you also do not have to have an improved life. According to our good friend Isaac Newton, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Meaning, if you do put forth the effort to improve an aspect of your life, be that diet, skill set or fitness, then your life will have no choice but to improve.

There is a lot to unpack about this fabulous first law of motion as it relates to self-improvement. First, an object at rest will tend to stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force. Same is true with your life! Unless you act to change it, or more to the point, what you do not like about it, nothing will change. You must apply force to move your stagnant life. Second part is that an object in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. If feel like your life is in a downward spiral, you must again apply some opposing force to change that or it will continue to do so. Either way, action is required!

Bonus thought on the bottom of this. Objects with greater mass take more force to change their motion. That is to say, if you have been making poor decisions and neglecting your life for decades, it will take intense and consistent action to change that. Your life didn’t fall apart in a day, and it will probably take longer than that to turn it around. This isn’t theory. As you can see, it is an actual law of the universe. Do you have to take any action at all? Again, you do not. However, if you want to see change, according to law, you must take action!

DEATH IS NOT THE ENEMY ⚰️

What a profound quote. “Death is not the enemy, a wasted life is.” Thinking of this, we should feel a real sense of urgency in our life. Most of us live as if we will never die. We all will. This thought should not fill you with fear or sadness, but rather create a strong desire to create a life worth remembering while you have a chance. I use the metaphor of an hourglass. Our life is like the sand that is going from the top to the bottom. It is continually decreasing. Here is the crazy thing, we never know how much sand is left in the top. We just know that it is less than it was a second ago.

Whether you are ending world hunger, inspiring all the people you can or raising the best children you are able, do something bigger than yourself. Have a goal to leave the world a better place than you found it. Do this in as many ways as you can and you will definitely lived a life worth living.

START BUILDING THE NEW 👷‍♂️

Great advice from one of history’s greatest thinkers. It aligns with one of the principles I teach. That is you should focus on adding the positive rather than eliminating the negative. There are several reasons you should do this. The main one is that is changes your focus from a feeling of sacrifice, to one of accomplishment. Take healthy eating for example. If your entire focus is “How can I stop eating all the bad for me food I love?” That sure feels, and sounds if we are being honest, like you are sacrificing or ‘giving something up’. That makes it feel difficult. If you ask yourself, “How can I add healthy and delicious meals to my meal plan?” That sounds as if you are adding something to your life.

Weight loss is another example. Thinking “I have to lose all this weight.” Certainly does not sound fun or like something we would look forward to doing. However, “How can I live a more active and healthy lifestyle that I enjoy?” sounds a lot better. Instead of thinking of grueling hours in the gym and fad diets, it will have us thinking of bike rides or walks with the family and discovering new healthy dishes. This may sound like splitting hairs on the subject, but it results in an entirely different reality.

Which lifestyle do you think you would be more likely to maintain, one of sacrifice or one of building? One that makes you feel like you are losing or lack something, or one that feels like you are gaining something or building towards a new and exciting future?

LETTING GO HAPPILY 🎈

The Winnie-the-Pooh posts have been quite popular on this site lately, so here we have another. It is Monday, and a lot of us are feeling the weight of the world on our shoulders. We need to let that go. Many responsibilities weigh heavy on our minds. It is not that you should not acknowledge that they are there, or even work on a plan to make sure they are taken care of. No, by ‘letting them go’ we, and that loveable bear, mean something different entirely. We should change our focus.

What this translates to, is where we choose to live. Not geographically. I am still waiting for the invitation for a book-signing in Fiji or the Maldives. Where we choose to live emotionally. Yes, I said choose. In life, there will always be worries, challenges and fears. They will creep into our minds whether we wish them to or not. What we do when they crop up is what makes the difference in the quality of our lives. If we are currently facing a health challenge, it will certainly be in the front of our minds. We must realize two very important things. First, there is only so much we can control about every situation. If we have done what we can do, we should focus on the positive outcome we are hoping for and feel grateful for it coming, even before it arrives. Second, and more importantly, we have to remember that stress and worry will only serve to make any situation worse. Not only mentally, but physically as well. Worry for long enough and you will weaken your immune system and give yourself ulcers. Plus, it will raise your blood pressure and a host of other nasty maladies. Not to mention it drains your energy and your spirit.

This week, let us do our best to let these things go. Instead, let us do our best to fill our minds and hearts with the most positive and encouraging thoughts we can come up with. Better yet, let us share these thoughts with everyone we meet. In fact, if you have a positive or encouraging thought, feel free to share it below.

SUFFER LESS😬

This really is one of the secrets to living an amazing life. Not to spend too much energy on things we cannot control. Instead of worrying about whether someone likes you or not, spend more time on making yourself the best you can be. That way, if anyone doesn’t like you, it is more about them than about you. Most of have heard the saying, “I might not be everyone’s cup of tea.” Here is one to consider. You could be the best cup of tea ever, and there will still be people who don’t like tea. I am a coffee person myself. That is to say, you could be amazing and some people still may not like you. Maybe they have prejudices or preconceived notions that have nothing to do with you.

Another example is focusing on what you can control in an uncontrollable situation. I dislike cold and winter. As I write this, I am looking outside at snow blowing and temperatures below freezing. Try as hard as I might, I cannot control the weather. What I can control is making sure I have warm clothes and a cup of hot coffee, as mentioned above. I also plan trips to warm destinations and try to convince the love of my life that spending the winters in the tropics is a far better idea. It is what I can control in a situation that I cannot control. Focusing on those things instead of trying to change the weather is a lot less stressful and a lot more productive.

Save yourself some stress and focus on what you can change. When you seem to be facing a challenge that is beyond your control, ask yourself, “What can I control in this situation that is beyond my control?” You may not be able to control your job downsizing, but you can control polishing your skills and networking to place yourself in a better position. You cannot control the economy at large, but you can control your own personal economy. Stress less. Worry less. Control what you can.