Reality Check

If I were to ask you to think of the one thing you would most like to change in your life right now, what would it be?

How much better off would you be with that change actually occurring? And why hasn't it? Changing for the better is a three step process:

First, you need to be aware of the need for change. Second, you must be ready and willing to change. And third, you need to take action.

There's nothing complicated about it, but most people don't even get to that first step. Most of us are stuck in that place where we know that something is preventing us from being happier, healthier, more loving, more successful people. Some of us may even know what that thing is. But we fail to recognize just how crucial it is for us to make that change happen. Some of us refuse to see it. Whatever it is, we go on like this day after day, not making the changes that will lift us out of boredom, out of mediocrity, out of financial anxiety, out of tepid relationships, and into what we truly desire!

Why? Because we think it's too hard. And you know what, that's just it. We think it's too hard. It's the thinking! We think it's too hard and that's why it is so. The law of attraction states that our thoughts either bring us closer to or take us away from the things we want. So what if we were to think it was easy, something that could very well be happening in front of our eyes? What if we were to think, live and breathe the life we wanted?

The reason why most of us cannot effectively think success into reality is because since we were kids, we've been steadily overtaxing our brains with encumbering thoughts. These are debilitating beliefs that we've absorbed from people, events and experiences in our lives that have been deeply impressed upon our memory banks. And it's from these banks that we continue to draw on in our daily lives, referring to them whenever an opportunity presents itself. We believe that failure in future is likely just because we've failed in the past. And you know what happens? We continue to fail.

But what if we transform these old thought patterns into new, healthy, positive, life and success-affirming ones? Won't the mind work in the same way to turn these positive thoughts into positive realities? It's really the same software, but we're keying in different data. How different would the final design be?

So key in a whole new set of data into your brain. Change those beliefs about yourself. Instead of seeing and feeling yourself not getting what you want in life, see and feel yourself already living it! You'll be closer to your goals in no time.

Alternatively, you may read on article on Managing Your Mind to know how you can condition your mind positively

The 4 Basic Steps Of Journey Of Life

Lao Tzu, a Chinese philosopher once said "The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."

Do you know that we learn and grow by taking one step at a time in our journey of life? We may fall down, but we recover and take another step. That is the only way to learn and continue growing. In such a fast-paced modern world, however, some of us forget that basic principle. We try to run or avoid, inevitably trip and take a very painful tumble.

Some of us put off this journey of self-discovery and empowerment; we model ourselves against other people, we learn to suppress our genuine selves in order to fit in, we are scared perhaps that if we opened ourselves up and looked in, we might not like what we see.

Well, like it or not, that's a risk we all have to face. With high risk comes high rewards or a big loss. Unfortunately, most of us prefer to live in denial. We go about thinking the best or the worst of ourselves, until one day we fall down into the dumps and we actually have to face ourselves. Who are you? What makes you special? What makes you YOU, a unique one?

There are four basic steps that we need to follow on the journey of life.

Step One - Be prepared to look at yourself and admit that every bruise, every fall is all your doing also known as personal responsibility.

Step Two - Surrender, let go of the idea that you should control every event, and have faith that everything you ask will be given to you also known as self manifestation.

Step Three - Sit down every day and journal. Start a journal and every day record the events of the day, paying attention to your reactions to events, experiences, and people and detailed the scenarios. Catalog your reactions for what they were, whether they be anger, jealousy, resentment, joy, love, or self-pity. Refer to the blog on Journaling Yourself for more details.

By identifying your reaction and classifying it as your reaction to an event, you will come to discover why you are acting as you are. Why you would react angrily in a situation that does not require anger; your own feelings and responsibilities.

Step Four – Ask yourself why. "Why do I have that particular feeling in that situation?", "What is my deeper hidden reaction about this type of situation?". Start journaling your "why's" in a separate book. In this book, jot all your experiences and incidents of your past and how you reacted to them.

You will soon begin to see that your current reactions can be traced back to past situations. Sooner or later we must admit that all our reactions are a result of our desires, expectations and ego. Once you can trace your weaknesses, you will find ways to handle them in a more constructive and positive way.

Minimising Hypertension

There are many causes of hypertension or high blood pressure but one of the most common is stress. That's why it's so important for us to learn how to effectively manage stress and to devote adequate time to relaxing. Some people just can't seem to do this; they feel they always have to be in control or they have to be productive all the time or there's always some issue they can't seem to let go of. These people are at high risk of developing high blood pressure.

Are you one of these people? Consider these questions:

Do you usually feel a sense of urgency to accomplish more and more things in less and less time?

Are you easily frustrated by people or systems which don't seem to be operating at their maximum efficiency?

Do you often bring work home?

Do you feel you have to be in control all the time? Do you feel you have to be right all the time? Do you always feel the pressure to win?

Do you feel the pressure to get things done, no matter how tired you are or how late it is?

Do you think doing nothing is a sin?

If you answered "Yes" to most or even all those questions, then you're in very real danger of developing hypertension. You probably can't relax and enjoy what you've accomplished because you're too busy thinking about what more you can do, what you're going to do next, how you can maximize your gains, and so on.

Not that there's anything wrong with seeking perfection and striving to do your best, but what this kind of over-achiever often fails to notice is where he's reached the tipping point; when he is actually doing real harm to his health.

As with most other afflictions, the first and most crucial thing for you to do is to acknowledge that you have a problem. It can be near impossible to do, since you have such high standards for yourself. But a train can only maintain maximum speed for so long before the engine begins to overheat.

Minimising hypertension is not simply taking a vacation every now and then. It has to be a sustained and regular programme of relaxation and reminding yourself that it's ok to let some things go.

Three Principles of Fulfilling Relationships

There are three principles that we should understand well before committing to any romantic relationship. If you're already in a relationship, studying these principles intimately and practicing them will help ensure a lasting, satisfying relationship.

Unrealistic expectations are usually what drive a couple apart, so the first principle to understand is that your partner does not owe you your happiness. This may sound strange because why else would we want to enter relationships if not to find happiness?

Sure, we should derive joy from our relationships but our partner should not bear the duty of giving us joy. Joy should be the spontaneous consequence of two people sharing feelings of love for each other, not the result of one party constantly striving to fulfill the other's needs. When we expect our partner to make us happy, we set up opportunities for failure, and each time our partner fails to meet our demands, we lose respect and affection for him or her. Besides, love doesn't mean consistently giving in to our demands. And love doesn't mean always making us happy. What gives our joy may not always be in our best interests. And love can sometimes mean hardship and pain.

The second principle for fulfilling relationships is to love your partner for who they are. Don't love a fantasy version of them you hope will emerge in the future. Many people enter a relationship thinking that in time, their partners will change, but this often doesn't happen. Your partner entered the relationship believing that this is what you fell in love with. He or she doesn't see any reason to change.

Loving your partner for who they are also means accepting their flaws, or what you deem to be flaws. Each person has attractive qualities as well as some habits or characteristics we may not find so beguiling. But we should love our partners in spite of the qualities we don't appreciate as much as the others. There is no perfect lover, like there is no perfect gadget. You're always going to have to trade off certain features for other ones you find more suited to you. And when you run into conflict over those undesirable features, your love for the whole product should be more than enough to make you overlook the flaws and still embrace your partner. So ask yourself "If my partner upsets me, will I be able to look past the words and actions and still love the person?"

The third and final principle is to love and respect yourself as much as you love and respect your partner. This is because if you feel inadequate compared to your partner, you might become obsessed with fulfilling his or her needs and neglect your own. Over time, your partner will learn to take you for granted and you will no doubt begin to feel like you got the short end of the stick.

Maintaining fulfilling relationships is no easy job, but understanding and practising these three principles should help you a great deal.

The Strength To Walk Away

How do you deal with potentially explosive situations? Where tempers are beginning to flare, tensions are steadily escalating, and sufficient buttons have been pushed?

What happens with many people is that they remain in the situation, either hoping to talk things over calmly or to make their point emphatically clear. But this can only work if the other party is willing to collaborate. But sometimes, the other party can be willfully difficult. They can be persons who get off on pushing your hot buttons.

What happens then? A likely scenario is that like a fish to the bait, you continue to engage in the conversation, the other party continues to gall you, and *snap!*, the last straw breaks your back. At this point, when self-control is lost, you may utter threats, make scathing remarks, or throw pot-shots that you immediately regret.

In a social setting, you may end up looking rash and petty. In a business or corporate setting, you may appear to be antagonistic and hot-tempered. In a personal context, you may end up really hurting a loved one. In the long term, angry outbursts will sour any relationship.

If you find yourself quite unintentionally getting yourself into potentially-explosive situations, how can you avoid actually exploding?

Well, you can walk away.

A seemingly simple thing to do, but something that can be extremely difficult to do in practice, especially when you feel you've been grossly misunderstood. You'd want to stake it out and explain yourself until the other person gets it, right?

That's what keeps you there. That's what makes you reiterate your arguments again and again until they begin to sound meaningless. In these instances, you're at the losing end; it's simply more sensible to walk away.

Do you have the power to walk away from potentially-explosive situations? Are you able to postpone defending yourself to another more appropriate time? Can you conserve your cool and avoid saying or doing something you'll regret later?

Because when you care too much about winning in such situations, you lose. You're the one who feels the pressure, you're the one who seems antagonistic and defensive. It will be hard initially, but practice walking away and you'll understand just how powerful it can be in defusing explosive situations and even persuade others to see things your way.

Knowing Your Self Worth (Part 3 of 3)

In this part, let's continue to look at some key characteristics or disposition of people with a high level of self-worthiness.

Some say you can't escape worry; it's a undeniable fact of life. If you think something bad is going to happen, why should you be having a great time?

And to a certain extent I agree... I mean, if you feel the tremors of an earthquake coming on, you really wouldn't want to sit on the porcelain throne with a good book, if you know what I mean. You'd be worried sick, probably even panicking. And this kind of worry might even save your life, because you'd be driven to seek some safety or rescue.

But though worry can be useful in certain contexts, in most day-to-day situations, it's more of a bane than a boon. Just think of the things you usually worry about and you'll realise that for many of them, there's simply nothing you can do. And those things you can realistically do something about, you're so petrified with worry that you can't think of any solution or even have the motivation to do anything about them.

Worry can be a driving force, but for most of us, most of the time, it's simply a handicap. Unless you feel you can realistically do something about something you're worrying about, and will do it, there is simply no sense in worrying. Most of our worries relate to trivial problems anyway, like "will people like me at the party?" or things we can do nothing about, like aging. That's why one of the main habits of self-worthy people is the lack of worrying. "Care-free", not "care-less" is the watchword.

A self-worthy person is also able to appreciate most things around him. He is constantly mindful of the fact that Life itself is a wonder; that it's wondrous and worth being thankful for that he can move, can touch, can taste, can laugh, can see clearly with spectacles, lenses or laser treatment, can read a book, kick a ball, dig his toes into the sand, stroke a cat, and transport himself around swiftly in metal boxes that create cool, comfortable atmospheres and emit pleasant sounds from their speakers.

And finally, the hallmark of a self-worthy person is his ability to love people and other living things. He is constantly giving and receiving love. Whether it's planning a good time for someone, sharing his favourite food, or daily picking up someone from work, his mind is filled with thoughts of how to make others happy. And he is able to receive the rewards of this with equal enthusiasm; we all know the joy of giving... sometimes, we should also allow others to experience this joy.

Knowing Your Self Worth (Part 2 of 3)

In the last part, I talked about how a healthy sense of self-worthiness is the fundamental building block of a happy, loving and successful life. In fact, it's the main reason for many of the emotional problems we face today like low confidence, self-loathing, lack of love, worry, fear, doubt and so on. We also talked about how one of the key characteristics of low self-worthiness is the need for other people's approval for your opinions and behaviour. Another one was how some people feel that they do not deserve happiness and therefore accept mistreatment and abuse from others.

Today, let's go through the main clues that hint at a person's high level of self-worthiness. These are characteristics that we would all do well to master.

First, a habit of thinking and acting spontaneously rather than from fears based on past experience. This means that you begin every task with a clean slate. Like an actor on stage, your previous scene has already transpired. Whether or not you stumbled on some words or gave it a lacklustre rendition, it's over. Period. You cannot go back and do the scene again. All you can do is give your next scene your best shot. Thinking about your performance in the last scene only preoccupies your mind with something you can't do a thing about and will likely adversely impact your next scene.

Another characteristic of self-worthiness is the freedom to enjoy each moment, unencumbered by regret or resentment from what's past or fear of what's to come. The past and future are an illusion, as they say. The only "real" moment is Now. If you can't savour the most of it, whatever it is, then you're wasting the moment. And it won't come back. So forget about how you quarrelled with your partner last night, how obnoxious you thought he or she was... today, remember that ultimately, you're in love with each other, you have this beautiful new day to enjoy together, so do it.

A self-worthy person also doesn't judge himself negatively. By "negatively", I mean in a way that is unconstructive and masochistic - that is, consistently saying to yourself "That was a dumb thing to say!" or "That was a stupid thing to do!", "You're so unattractive!" or "You never do anything right!" - you know, making shallow, sweeping statements about yourself without assessing the situation or making a commitment to do better next time. A self-worthy person knows that frequent self-beration gradually breaks down a healthy ego until the brain starts to believe these crippling remarks. The body soon begins to obey what the brain believes in and subconsciously instructs the body to do.

I'll explore more habits of a self-worthy person on the next part.