The Art Of A Bad Mood

Psychologists call it “emotional contagion.” But you can think of it as Scroogeology or Grinchonomics.

Better yet, think of it as the woeful friend, the crabby boss, the depressed party guest whose moods are so melancholy that, despite your good cheer, they suck the joy from the season.

The effect is far from imaginary. In the last five years, a growing body of psychological research — much of it focused on the emotionally negative or positive boss — is bearing out the power one individual’s mood can have on others.

“It is one of the most robust phenomena I have ever seen,” said University of New Hampshire researcher Richard Saavedra. “And it’s all unconscious.”

Fortunately, he said, just as Bob Cratchit and Cindy Lou Who refused to let Scrooge or the Grinch dampen their spirits, modern and age-old strategies can combat the draw of your own Debbie Downer.

As University of Michigan psychologist Christopher Peterson said, “That’s why we have eggnog.”

Recent evidence is consistent.

In the March issue of The Journal of Applied Psychology, Saavedra and colleague Thomas Sy at California State University at Long Beach examined the effects of a leader’s mood on a group.

They took 189 volunteer undergraduates, divided them into 63 groups of three and told them they were going to take part in a team-building exercise: putting up a tent.

Before the exercise, a “leader” chosen from each team was shown one of two video clips — “Saturday Night Live” skits or a vignette on torture — designed to induce a positive or negative mood. All team members’ moods were measured before and after the task.

Result: The leaders’ moods ruled, and negative moods ruled most. If a leader was up, some team members’ moods also rose. But if he or she was down, everyone was down.

In May, Purdue University psychologists presented similar results in Chicago at the annual meeting of the Midwestern Psychological Association.

Janice Kelly and Jennifer Spoor took 43 pairs of undergraduates and asked them to complete a task. One was designated the leader, the other the subordinate. The leaders, again, were shown movie clips, this time of the “choice” scene in “Sophie’s Choice” or a scene from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”

Bad moods ruled again, with negative proving much more contagious than positive.

Other studies show that the effect goes beyond leader-subordinate relationships. Separate studies of college roommates, dating couples and spouses all show that when one gets depressed, the other also becomes more depressed. Studies in Britain of groups of nurses and accountants showed that, within the same work group, individuals tended to share the same up and down moods.

“The idea is, you go to a holiday party and you’re happy until you enter into an encounter with someone who’s down or depressed,” said Sy of Cal State. “The next thing you know, your positive mood no longer exists. It has been hijacked by this other person’s bad mood. You go off wondering, ‘What happened?’ ”

Explanations abound. One is evolutionary, harking back to our animal selves.

People possess a vast range of troubles. But despite even grave concerns, humans in cultures worldwide generally report themselves as feeling fairly upbeat and positive, said Hope College psychologist David G. Myers, a scholar on happiness and author of The Pursuit of Happiness: Who Is Happy and Why?

Positive moods, therefore, are the norm, making negative moods stand out like an emaciated Santa. They’re cause for alarm. Something’s wrong. In the animal world, those that don’t instinctively notice and react to such warning signs do so at their own risk.

“The original form is the contagion of fear and alarm,” said Frans de Waal, a psychologist and primate expert at Atlanta’s Emory University. “You’re in a flock of birds. One bird suddenly takes off. You have no time to wait and see what’s going on. You take off, too. Otherwise, you’re lunch.”

In other words, getting caught up in another’s negativity is hard-wired, unconscious and powerful.

“I have often noticed how primate groups in their entirety enter a similar mood,” de Waal said. “All of a sudden, all of them are playful, hopping around. Or all of them are grumpy. Or all of them are sleepy and settle down. In such cases, the mood contagion serves the function of synchronizing activities. The individual who doesn’t stay in tune with what everyone is doing will lose out, like the traveler who didn’t go the restroom when the bus stopped.”

Now toss in empathy.

Although each of us may think of ourselves as individuals with our own emotions, we’re not, said University of Virginia psychologist Jonathan Haidt, author of The Happiness Hypothesis, published this month.

“We are fundamentally hive creatures, like bees and ants that have evolved as ultrasocial creatures,” he said. “We are exceptionally influenced by what is going on around us.”

When we encounter a Grinch or Scrooge or wearisome gloom monger, a) it captures our attention, and b) if we don’t feel attacked, we’re apt to empathize. People don’t say, “Hey, you’re down; I’m up! So who cares about you?!” Myers said.

“We take on the other person’s pain to some extent,” he said.

We sit. We commune. Research has long shown that we respond in like ways. They frown; you frown. They smile; you smile. They furrow their brows in conspiratorial disgust; you listen and furrow yours.

Natural and unconscious, the phenomenon is called “facial mimicry.” Coughs, yawns and laughter are contagious for the same reason.

“Acting as another acts helps us feel what another feels,” Myers said.

And feel it in very real ways.

Research shows that being exposed to someone cheery makes you cheery, but not as much as being exposed to a spiritless grump makes you depressed. As British researchers showed in work published last year, the phrase “I feel your pain” is more than a saying.

At London’s University College, psychologist Tonia Singer and colleagues used brain scans to explore empathy in 19 romantic couples. The experiment was simple. Both individuals were hooked to brain scans. One was given a slight electric shock while the other watched. Scans showed identical brain reactions. One partner was shocked, but the other partner’s pain center lighted up as if he or she had also been jolted.

So it goes with the holiday killjoy.

“Everyone wants to be civil, but unfortunately he draws your attention. You can’t help it, because that somberness stands in contrast to your generally pleasant life,” Saavedra said. “But before you know it, you’re drawn in and the only thought is, ‘I wish I could get out of here!’ ”

Strategies exist.

“In general, the key is awareness,” said Sy of Cal State. “The most insidious aspect of a negative mood is that, often, it infects you unconsciously. If you realize, ‘This person is depressed. I’m catching his mood. That is why I’m depressed,’ you can manipulate it. You can control it.”

The controls vary by person and situation. All of them come under the heading mood lifters.

Whereas, for some people, that might mean jogging or music or surrounding themselves with positive friends, for others it might mean an hour at the gym slugging a punching bag or kvetching with colleagues or a raucous night out.

Shopping. Movies. Family. Eggnog.

“There are lots of tricks we use. We do it every day, pump ourselves up,” Sy said “Why do we eat chocolate when we know it’s going to make us fat? Because it makes us feel better.”

Then there is this hopeful note.

Spirit-sapping Negative Nellies are powerful, yes. But research out of Stanford University and elsewhere also suggests that the moods of people who feel their emotions intensely — whatever they may be — are also highly contagious.

In other words, in the presence of merry spirits like Ol’ Fezziwig, the Scrooges of this world don’t stand a chance.

By ERIC ADLER
Kansas City Star

6 Ways To Avoid Negativity

One of our great challenges in life is to avoid negativity - a negative attitude to ourselves and others. It is easy to become suspicious, critical, depressed, fearful, but, despite the prevailing attitudes of the world there is no inevitability that we have to become a grumpy old man. It is quite possible to see the beautiful in the ordinary and bring to the fore the better side of human nature. If we avoid negativity we will see definitely see the positive in life and enjoy life much more.

Criticize Not

Criticizing others is a very pervasive bad habit we all have. Sometimes we can actually go out of our way to look for the failings and faults of others. It is as if we are blind to their good qualities but their mistakes stand out in our mind. Even worse we can often imagine faults that others might have. This is the height of stupidity, but the nature of the mind can easily turn to negativity and we have to be on guard.

It is a great exercise to try and think about the good aspects of people whom you frequently criticise. The important thing is that criticising others has an unmistakeable impact on ourselves. If we are permanently finding fault with the world it affects our self.

The world will not collapse if we halt our self styled criticism. If we look to encourage and praise the good aspects of others, we will bring these qualities to the fore in ourself.

Choosing Consciously

All the time we are faced with choices. Do I see the negative or the positive? Somebody at work might pass a thoughtless and disparaging comment. Our instinctive reaction may be to nurse a sense of grievance and think of many equally unpleasant things to say about the person in return. However, another way to look at this situation would be to think. They are unfortunately wrong, perhaps they are feeling insecure and so try to unfairly put others down. In the past there may have been times when I may have done something like that. I will make an effort to be kind to that person as this will be the best way to show they were mistaken and also to help them overcome their depressed state of mind.

The first response invites a tit for tat response which will encourage negativity. The second response is dignified and requires nobility of character. But, we lose nothing by avoiding negativity - we gain a tremendous amount. The point is we always have a choice about how we respond to situations; avoiding the negative and unpleasant just takes a conscious decision.

Self-Belief

It is vital to cultivate a sense of self-worth and self-respect. If we do not have faith in ourselves how can we have faith in anyone else? Self-belief should not be equated with arrogance or pride. We are seeking to cultivate a sense of self respect so we are at peace with ourselves. We are often our worst critic, sometimes we ignore genuine faults but worry excessively over minor issues that aren’t really faults. We need to learn from our mistakes and be honest with our weaknesses but it should not be at a cost of putting ourselves down. If we make a mistake learn to let go, don’t keep the negative memory at the forefront of your mind. If we can have a good feeling about ourselves it will be very easy to have a good feeling about others and the rest of the world.

Service

Idleness is the worst cultivator of negativity. If we sit mopping aimlessly around we will inevitable become bored and negative. Life will seem no fun. The easiest way to change our mindset is to become meaningfully busy. As we mentioned in this story about ‘helping an alcoholic’ it was only when the alcoholic helped other people that he was able to overcome his personal weaknesses. If we really want to serve others there will always be some way that we can find. If we are really busy we will not have time to criticise the world. If we don’t have work to do, we can also just take physical exercise. This is also an excellent way of shaking off the cobwebs of our mind.

Osmosis

The nature of the human mind is that it consciously or unconsciously absorbs the vibrations from around us. If we spend time with negative people, watching 24 hour news, then we will be more prone to negativity ourselves. We have to choose our work, leisure time carefully. Don’t spend too much time with the grumpy old men or gossipy old ladies. When we do spend time with negative people we need to be on our guard that we don’t share their world view.

Be young At Heart

I have already made two references to ‘grumpy old men’ this is not an ageist remark. You can be a grumpy old man when you are 20. You can be 80 years old but remain young at heart. Age is very much something of a mental attitude. We want to cultivate a childlike attitude which takes joy from small, simple, beautiful things. We want to avoid a great sophistication and mental disection of everything. If we over analyse life we are living in the mind and unable to live in the heart.

Source: Tejvan Pettinger

This Article Doesn’t Exist

What are you worried about right now?

Well, it’s an almost guarantee that you are worried about nothing, for the very reason that you don’t exist!

You have no worries because you have no mind or body or life to worry with — it’s all an illusion. No worries, but more significantly, no worrier.

If you think this sounds like utter nonsense, some of the most brilliant scientists, philosophers and theological thinkers of our century would disagree with you.

Science and math suggest that we humans don’t exist, (even though there is really no math or science — more illusions!)

The advent of quantum mechanics and modern physics increasingly imply that our existence as human beings is a kind of persistent illusion. We are under the false assumption that we’re people, we only imagine we have bodies and brains, and minds functioning inside those brains. Illusions, all of it.

Listen to what one of the greatest physicists of the century, Authur Eddington said of quantum theories:

“In the world of physics…the shadow of my elbow rests on the shadow table as the shadow ink flows over the shadow paper…the frank realization that physical science is concerned with a world of shadow is one of the most significant of recent advances.”

By “shadow” Eddington meant illusion. More than any other science, it is particle physics that is confronting the fundamentals of reality, and more and more, the evidence point to the fact there is no reality!

For the past 300-some years, the world has been under the impression that everything is made up of atoms, “the building blocks of the universe.” It was the great Isaac Newton who solidified our impression that atoms were like billiard balls. Pile enough of them on top of each other, set them in motion and you get rocks, trees, animals and people.

But in 1900 Albert Einstein’s hero, the brilliant Max Planck, revealed some incredibly disturbing discoveries he made while trying to solve problems concerning the radiation of energy.

To make a long story short, Planck was forced to conclude that matter at its most fundamental level is not continuous, not solid. There are no tiny billiard balls. When you break down an atom, you get an electron, a proton and maybe a neutron. But it turns out these are not the smallest units either. You can break things down further to bosons, quarks, W particles, tachyons and a lot of other shadowy “things” that just sort of wink in and out of existence.

Where do things go when they “wink out?” Nowhere! They cease to exist! Then they come back again.

So what? you might ask. Well, as you know, the human body is made up from the fundamental elements of nature. We are mostly water, but we also have iron in our blood, calcium in our bones, and such. But each of those substances are made up of individual atoms, which in turn are made up of ghostly bits of nothing that just sort of come and go, in and out of reality.

Scientists call this blinking process “quantum fluctuation.”

So when the elements of your body fluctuate, so does your body, and so do you! So does you brain and the chemicals in your brain! In fact, you may be in a state of nothingness more often than you are in a state of somethingness (even though there really is no somethingness!)

As the currently popular medical guru Depack Chopra points out, all of us our dead (nonexistent) for much of the time, yet we are all constantly afraid of dying, not realizing we are dead much of the time! (Oh by the way, there’s no such thing as time either. Einstein proved it was an illusion, but we won’t get into that right now).

Even at its most solid state, the atom turns out to be not very solid at all. Atoms are 99.999999 empty space. If the nucleus of an atom were the size of a ping-pong ball, and if you were to place it in the center of a large football stadium, the electrons that orbit around the nucleus would be at the outer walls of the stadium.

What is between the nucleus and the electron? Nothing! And what are the nucleus and electron made from? Smaller and smaller bits of energy which are not solid, but actually whirling fragments of light.

Even a block of solid lead is nothing and light, acting as “something.” So is your car. So are the chemicals in your brain. So are you.

Once during a long, boring drive from Grand Forks to southern Missouri with one of my graduate school professors, we became embroiled in a lengthy debate about the deep issues of the universe. I argued that all was illusion, and he argued for solid reality. When I mentioned the unreal nature of fundamental particles, he said:

“That makes no difference! All this means is that these flucuating bits of energy are what we are made out of — but we are still us, still the same, still real solid people. Are your saying is that we are more fundamental than atoms.”

He also said: “If I whacked you with a baseball bat, I bet your pain wouldn’t feel like an illusion!”

At the time, I was stumped to answer because that was before I understood the nature — or more accurately — the mechanics of illusion. I didn’t realize that even our argument was an illusion!

The fact is, my professor and I could have argued for years on end and neither of us would have convinced the other because BOTH of our aurguments were false! Why? Because neither of our arguments exist!

The fact is, language is one of the primary ways in which we become deceived into believing in solid reality. Once a creature reaches the stage where it can manipulate symbolic language, you can bet that creature is deeply buried under many layers of illusion.

I also should have quoted the Uncertainty Principle and the Incompleteness Theorm to my professor.

You see, the idea that language is all illusion is not a simple belief, but a fact which has been proved mathematically. Back in the 1920s, a German math genius by the name of Kurt Godel produced a rigorous mathematical demonstration which showed that all logic was ultimately self contradictory.

Godel’s proof is known as Godel’s Theorm, but also as the Incompleteness Theorm. It states this:

“It is impossible to to establish the logical consistency of any complex deductive system except by assuming principles of reasoning whose own internal consistency is an open question as that of the system itself.”

Whew! That’s just a fancy way of saying that, no matter what your viewpoint — it’s wrong! You will never be able to convince someone of what you believe because all rhetoric is, by nature, fundamentally inconsistent.

That’s why arguing politics and religion is so frustrating — no one is ever right, literally! All arguments are rigged from the start!
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But there’s even more bad news for reality. It’s called the Heisenbreg Uncertainty principle, suggested and later proved by one of the fathers of quantum mechanics, the great Werner Heisenberg. His principle states:

“The position and the velocity of an object cannot both be measured exactly, at the same time, not even in theory. The very concepts of exact position and exact velocity together, in fact, have no meaning in nature.”

What this means is that physical objects cannot be pinned down to absolutely exist in any one place at any given time. Like Godel’s Theorm, this principle comes with a rigorous mathemetical proof.

So not only are all verbal arugments fundamentally inconsistent, and therefore false, but physical matter ultimately cannot be measured.

As one physicist put it:

“Our conception of substance is only vivid so long as we do not face it. It begins to fade when we analyze it … the solid substance of things is another illusion … we have chased the solid substance from the continuous liquid to the atom, from the atom to the electron, and there we have lost it.”

It’s amazing how complimentary Godel’s Theorm and the Uncertainty Principle are — they both devastate the idea of a solid physcial world filled with ultimate “truths.” There are no objects, no people and no truth. We’ve only been tricked into thinking so, as weird as this sounds.

Who have we been tricked by? Ourselves! And we don’t exist! Odd!

You might ask: How does knowing that you don’t exist help you with your daily troubles? Well, in fact, it helps a lot. Indeed, this knowledge can lead you to an extreme state of happiness, even bliss. How?

By getting to work at realizing that you are buried under many layers of very tricky, persistent illusions, which because of their mathematical inconsistency, are driving you nuts! It seems like you can never find ultimate truth, true peace and the purest of love becaue you are trying to get these things under the false assumption that they exist in some real way. They don’t. And neither does pain, suffering and worry.

The greater degree to which you become aware that you and your world is all sticky illusion, the greater your feeling of being happy, loving and truthful will become. Why this is so becomes plain when we give a more conventional example of how illusions cause pain.

We all know someone who has mistaken money for what money represents, or mistaken money for happiness. Money itself is just paper, a symbol which rerpresents material goods. Some people fall under the illusion that money is an end it itself, so they mindlessly persue more and more of the green stuff until they have a heart attack and die.

All would agree it’s good to be free of the illusion of money and materialism.

Well, as it turns out, the more illusions we get rid of, the better off we are. Getting rid of illusions like money, drugs and sex addictions is easy compared to getting rid of major illusions like death, time, language, and physical existence, but it’s far from impossible.

I should warn you also, that the more you try to achieve happiness, the worse off you’re likely to get because happiness is an illusory concept which does not exist. You’ll get very frustrated, although frustration does not exist either. Sorry.

So it’s better to work on getting rid of illusions themselves and let the rest take care of itself.

The brilliant psychologist-philospher-author Ken Wilber describes seven layers of illusion in his groundbreaking book, The Spectrum of Consciousness. In this book, Wilber takes you step by step through the kind of illusions human are trapped within, from Nothing to the deepest layer of illusion, which he calls “dualisms.”

The more you understand the nature of illusions, the various kinds of illusions, (especially language, time, the separation of objects in space) the more likely you are to find your way out.

This is what Zen and other forms of meditation are about — to get you to stop thinking so that the ultimate silence of the greater reality of Nothing can be realized.

But as any Zen master would warn you, the minute you start thinking that Zen meditation is going to help you, or that the Zen philosophy is going to help you, or any philosophy or any religion — in that assumption you get lost again!

What’s truly weird about illusion is that you have to use illusions to get rid of them, and it’s hard describe how this gets done. Remember Godel’s Theorm: all arugments based in language are fundamentally inconsistent, and therefore, just more traps.

Even what you are reading here right now is a trap, though this article strives to point out the fact that you are trapped by illusions! But I think it’s at least better to know you’re in jail, than being in jail and thinking this prison we call “life” is our true home.

Some might say: “Okay, but it’s better to exist as an illusion that suffers than to be nothing at all!”

So let me throw you this bone: The big Nothing scientists and philosophers speak of is not so much the complete lack of anything, as it is a singularity of pure Virtual Potential. It does not exist, but has the potential to exist if it wants to. It’s Nothing, but a kind of dynamic Nothing. Whatever. Words and labels are tricky.

But the reason you have the illusion of being, along with its joy and suffering — you want it. At the same time, you can have the bliss of realizing Infinite Potential without the suffering of the illusion of objective existence. In fact, this is your condition right now. You just don’t know it. It’s weird.

A lot of people who read this article are going to say: “Jeez! What a load of utter nonsense!”

And guess what? They’re right!

Article Source: Ken Korczak http://ironghost.wordpress.com

The Other Side Of Life - Video

We’ve all had those days were we think we’re the center of the universe. Sometimes we become so self absorbed in our everyday lives and make the mistake of thinking the world is out to inconvenience us.

Check out this video for an alternative look. Maybe it’ll make you think the next time your impatiently standing or feel the world is out to get you.

Napoleon Hill Discusses Andrew Carnegie

An oldie but a goodie. Napoleon Hill talks about the wisdom the billionaire Andrew Carnegie shared with him some hundred years ago.

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How to Be Positive During Tough Times

Great article from US News and World Report. Here’s why it’s so important to stop complaining.

It’s too easy to complain right now. You’re paying through the nose for gas, you’ve put off retirement for another five years, your company just sacked 10 percent of your coworkers, and your workload has doubled. Even worse, your CEO made more money than the Chicago Cubs last year. It’s ridiculous! It’s outrageous! And you can’t get a day off to save your life.

Well, you’re probably the reason Jon Gordon, an author, speaker, and consultant, wrote The No Complaining Rule: Positive Ways to Deal with Negativity at Work, because negativity is contagious. It spreads through organizations, hurting performance and productivity. Gordon recently sat down with U.S. News to talk about finding a better outlook on hard times. Excerpts:

Are you suggesting all complaining should be wiped out?

It’s the mindless complaining and the subtle negativity that really destroys organizations and teams.

Complaining is contagious, as we know. You get off the phone and you’re surrounded by people, maybe in a cubicle, and you start complaining to that person next to you, and that person starts complaining to the person next to them. One person can really affect an organization with their negative attitude.

What really separates complaining from other conversation?

There are two kinds of complaints. There’s a chronic, mindless complaining which is just venting and complaining, where you just feel helpless, you feel powerless. No. 2 is because it’s becoming a habit. You’re just so used to doing it.

On the other hand, a justified complaint says: Here’s what I don’t like, here’s what I don’t want, here’s what’s wrong. But here’s what I think we should do about it. It’s all about intent. If you care about the organization and you want something better for everyone, then it’s a positive complaint. If it’s all about your own ego, then you’re not interested in serving the team.

How can almost-retirees stay positive, when they have to stay at work or go back to work because they aren’t financially able to retire?

It’s “get to” versus “have to.” You get to go to work. You get to have a job, versus “have to.” So many people your age are sick. Many people have not even made it to your age. My mom passed away at 59 a year and a half ago. She was young. She was a real estate agent, and she got cancer. When I speak to people in real estate, I’ll say, ‘I know you’re facing a tough market right now, but you get to have this job, you get to live this life. My mom wishes she was in your shoes.’ And that really resonates with them.

You get to drive in traffic. Many people don’t even get to drive a car.

No. 2: They can go to work every day and say, ‘What bigger purpose can I fuel up with today?’ The research is clear—people are the most energized when using their strengths for a bigger purpose, beyond themselves. Older people have a lot of gifts to give in the workplace—a lot of wisdom and a lot of advice. Mentor, teach, share, and serve.

How do you face challenges?

When you’re facing that obstacle, look for the lesson; look for the opportunity in the challenge. Look for the solution in the complaint. Look for the action that needs to take place. The next president of the United States will be someone who has a clear vision for the future and offers solutions, not complaints.

Stay positive. This is not Pollyanna. But you have to have a positive vision for the road ahead. Looking forward—no matter what age you are—and being optimistic is the key.

Gratitude seems to play a big part.

It’s everything. I think it really is everything. All the research on gratitude is so powerful: You see that you can’t be stressed and thankful at the same time. It’s the way our brains and bodies are wired. So you focus on gratitude and you won’t be stressed. It’s the best stress reducer.

Is gratitude in short supply?

No doubt. OK, you’re paying $4 a gallon for gas, and I’m as upset as anybody. But you can say: ‘We’re not paying $8 a gallon. And we live in a free country. We live with so many amenities. We live with so many free things that we can enjoy.’… Instead of focusing on that complaint, you can now be grateful for what you have. And which emotion’s going to uplift you? Gratitude. Which one’s going to enhance your longevity? Gratitude. Which one will strengthen your immune system? Gratitude.

It seems an unusual topic for the workplace.

It’s harder in the workplace, and it’s not as natural. A great example is Doug Conant, the CEO of Campbell Soup. He’s written 16,000 thank-you notes to his employees over the last seven years. The No. 1 reason that people leave their jobs is because they don’t feel appreciated. It’s not only being thankful for your job, but being thankful for the others that you work with.

How successful are some corporate programs aimed at increasing positivity?

It has to permeate the organization. It has to be part of your DNA, of who you are. It works if it’s sincere. It works if it’s real, and if people know you really care about them. I can walk into a restaurant and tell if it’s a fake smile or it’s real. You can walk into a company and tell whether it’s real or not.

You say that negativity fills voids. What voids should companies look out for?

If employees don’t feel seen or heard, or they don’t hear and see, they don’t know what’s going on and they don’t feel communicated with, we will assume the worst. And the great example of that is cancer. Cancer sits alone in the body. It starts acting alone. It’s the same way with a company. If you think you are alone, you’ll act alone. But if you feel like you’re part of the body, part of the whole, then you’ll support the whole.

Copyrighted, U.S.News & World Report, L.P. All rights reserved.

Louise Hay - You Can Heal Your Life: The Movie

This entertaining and inspirational movie based on the best-selling book of the same name is hosted by author and teacher Louise L. Hay. This film gives penetrating insights into Louise’s fascinating personal story; and shows how her views on self-esteem, abundance, and the metaphysical causes behind physical ailments were developed. It also reveals how she applied these concepts to her own emotional, spiritual, and professional life.

A number of luminaries in the fields of self-help, philosophy, health, spirituality, and New Thought join Louise, giving their take on success, happiness, and the myriad ways in which people can heal their own lives. And there are also gripping firsthand accounts from others who have been positively affected by Louise’s work.

[youtube qYCamVx4fSQ]

Some Thoughts On The Mind…

Throughout history, in every great teaching, culture and religion, a central principle is the power of our thoughts to build the life we desire. The essential power of our thoughts is no secret…except to those who have yet to learn it.

“Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.”
– Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

“For as a man thinketh in his heart so is he.”
– Proverbs 23:7

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought; it is founded on our thoughts; it is made up of our thoughts. A man’s life is the direct result of his thoughts… We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts we make the world.”
– Gautama Siddhartha (Buddha)

“To know, yet to think that one does not know, is best; not to know, yet to think that one knows, will lead to difficulty.”
– Lao-Tzu

” A thought is an idea in transit.”
– Pythagoras

“He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger… Men of superior mind busy themselves first getting at the root of things; when they succeed, the right course is open to them.”
– Confucius

“Let go the things in which you are in doubt for the things in which there is no doubt.”
– Mohammed

“Mind is the creator of everything.
You should therefore guide it to create only good.
If you cling to a certain thought with dynamic will power,
It finally assumes a tangible outward form.
When you are able to employ your will for constructive purposes,
You become the controller of your destiny.”
– Paramahansa Yogananda

“They can because they think they can.”
– Virgil

“Our life is what our thoughts make it.”
– Marcus Aurelius Antonius

“It is not the events but our viewpoint toward events that is the determining factor. We ought to be more concerned about removing wrong thoughts from the mind than removing tumors and abscesses from the body.”
– Epictetus

“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
– Shakespeare

“I think, therefore I am.”
– Descartes

“The universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a great machine.”
– Sir James Jeans

“Mind is the Master-power that molds and makes, and man is Mind, and ever more he takes the tool of Thought, and shaping what he wills, brings forth a thousand joys, or a thousand ills. He thinks in secret and it comes to pass; Environment is but his looking-glass.”
– James Allen

“What the mind of man can conceive and believe, the mind of man can achieve.”
– Napoleon Hill

“If I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning.”
– Mahatma Gandhi

“Somehow I can’t believe that there are any heights that can’t be scaled by a man who knows the secrets of making dreams come true. This special secret — curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy, and the greatest of all is confidence. When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable.”
– Walt Disney

“Happiness is not a matter of events; it depends upon the tides of the mind.”
– Alice Meynell

“Human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind.”
– William James

“Our life is what our thoughts make it. A man will find that as he alters his thoughts toward things and other people, things and other people will alter towards him.”
– James Allen

“When you rule your mind you rule your world. When you choose your thoughts you choose results.”
– Imelda Shanklin

“Think positively and masterfully, with confidence and faith, and life become more secure, more fraught with action, richer in experience and achievement.”
– Edward Rickenbacker

“You have to expect things of yourself before you can do them.”
– Michael Jordan

“We are what we think; as we desire so do we become! By our thoughts, desires, and habits, we either ascend to the full divine dignity of our nature, or we descend to suffer and learn.”
– J. Todd Ferrier

“The significant problems we face today cannot be solved on the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.”
– Albert Einstein

“The soul attracts that which it secretly harbors; that which it loves, and also that which it fears; it reaches the height of its cherished aspirations; it falls to the level of its unchastened desires. Every thought-seed sown or allowed to fall into the mind, and to take root there, produces its own, blossoming sooner or later into act, and bearing its own furtive of opportunity and circumstance. Good thoughts bear good fruit; bad thought, bad fruit.”
– James Allen

“What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.”
– Yogi Berra

“The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds.”
– Gerald G. Jampolsky

“Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.”
– William James

“To think health when surrounded by the appearances of disease or to think riches when in the midst of the appearances of poverty requires power, but whoever acquires this power becomes a mastermind. That person can conquer fate and can have what he or she wants.”
– Wallace D.Wattles

“What the mind does not attend to, the mind dismisses. What the mind attends to, the mind considers. What the mind constantly considers, the mind believes. What the mind believes, the mind eventually does.”
– William J. McCrane

“Man, alone has the power to transform his thoughts into physical reality; man, alone can dream and make his dreams come true.”
– Napoleon Hill

“Just as each plant has its foundation in the hidden soil of the earth, so too are your thoughts based in the inner part of yourself… By learning what goes into creating within the inner part of your mind and what the process of growth is for your thoughts, you can learn how to make your thoughts stronger and healthier, and enrich your existence.”
– Brad Jensen

“Your thoughts are the architects of your destiny.”
– David O. McKay

“Reality is not so much what happens to us; rather, it is how we think about those events that create the reality we experience. In a very real sense, this means that we each create the reality in which we live.”
– Dr. Albert Ellis

“Thought takes man out of servitude, into freedom.”
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“We lift ourselves by our thought, we climb upon our vision of ourselves. If you want to enlarge your life, you must first enlarge your thought of it and of yourself. Hold the ideal of yourself as you long to be, always, everywhere — your ideal of what you long to attain — the ideal of health, efficiency, success.”
– Orison Swett Marden

“We tend to get what we expect.”
– Norman Vincent Peale

“All things are created twice. There’s a mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation of all things. You have to make sure that the blueprint, the first creation, is really what you want, that you’ve thought everything through. Then you put it into bricks and mortar. Each day you go to the construction shed and pull out the blueprint to get marching orders for the day. You begin with the end in mind.”
– Stephen Covey

“You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you.”
– James Allen

“The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.”
– Plutarch

“The more intensely we feel about an idea or a goal, the more assuredly the idea, buried deep in our subconscious, will direct us along the path to its fulfillment.”
– Earl Nightingale

“Our imagination is the only limitation to what we can have in the future.”
– Charles Kettering

“Our subconscious minds have no sense of humor, play no jokes and cannot tell the difference between reality and an imagined thought or image. What we continually think about eventually will manifest in our lives. The first order of business of anyone who wants to enjoy success in all areas of his/her life is to take charge of the internal dialogue they have and only think, say and behave in a manner consistent with the results they truly desire.”
– Sidney Madwed

“A man’s felicity consists not in the outward and visible blessing of fortune, but in the inward and unseen perfections and riches of the mind.”
– Anacharsis

“For success, attitude is equally as important as ability.”
– Harry F. Banks

“Any fact facing us is not as important as our attitude toward it, for that determines our success or failure. The way you think about a fact may defeat you before you ever do anything about it. You are overcome by the fact because you think you are.”
– Norman Vincent Peale

“Every achiever I have ever met says, “My life turned around when I began to believe in me.”
– Robert Schuller

“Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence
– Albert Einstein

“It is not who you think you are…or even who you think you are not that really determines success…it’s who you think you are becoming…”
– Doug Firebaugh

“A belief is not merely an idea the mind possesses; it is an idea that possesses the mind.”
– Robert Bolton

“Once you begin to believe there is help ‘out there,’ you will know it to be true.”
– Saint Bartholomew

“What this power is, I cannot say. All I know is that it exists…and it becomes available only when you are in that state of mind in which you know exactly what you want…and are fully determined not to quit until you get it.”
– Alexander Graham Bell

“People become really quite remarkable when they start thinking that they can do things. When they believe in themselves they have the first secret of success.”
– Norman Vincent Peale

“You can conquer almost any fear if you will only make up your mind to do so. For remember, fear doesn’t exist anywhere except in the mind.”
– Dale Carnegie

“Poverty is a way of living and thinking, and not just a lack of money or things. Prosperity is not just having things. It is the consciousness that attracts the things. Prosperity is a way of living and thinking, and not just having money or things.”
– Eric Butterworth

“The person who sends out positive thoughts activates the world around him positively and draws back to himself positive results.”
– Norman Vincent Peale

“The Law of Attraction attracts to you everything you need, according to the nature of your thought life. Your environment and financial condition are the perfect reflection of your habitual thinking. Thought rules the world.”
– Joseph Murphy

“People are just about as happy as they make up their minds to be.”
– Abraham Lincoln

“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.”
– Marcus Aurelius

“Mind is the master weaver, both of the inner garment of character and the outer garment of circumstance.”
– James Allen

“Truly, thoughts are things, and powerful things at that, when they are mixed with definiteness of purpose, persistence and a burning desire for their translation into riches, or other material objects.”
– Napoleon Hill

“Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
– Romans 12:2

Going With The Flow (Video)

Let go of your resistance and understand how good it can feel by letting go. The following video by Esther Hicks is a wonderful discussion on how going with the flow can improve many areas of your life. Fear, depression or loss of control is just another way of hanging on and not letting go. When your stream is moving fast and your not flowing with it, your life becomes increasingly miserable. Not going with the flow is at the heart of every negative emotion you’ve ever had. Stop paddling upstream against the current.

The Changing Nature Of Energy

Did you know that if your life was not changing, you would not exist?

Our Universe and everything in it is continually changing, because our Universe is made of energy. Energy can only exist if it is in motion and changing. If energy stopped being in motion, our entire Universe and all Life would vanish. Our lives are also energy, and therefore they too must always be in motion and continue to change. You cannot stop the motion and change in your life, and nor would you want to. The changing nature of energy gives us Life. It causes Life to grow and causes us to grow.

And yet when there is a big change of energy which affects our lives, we often label it as bad, and cause ourselves sorrow, pain, and suffering by resisting the change. But you always have a choice. In the Universe there is never just one way. You are never trapped with no way out, no matter what has occurred. There are two paths available to you in every circumstance and moment in your life. The two paths are the positive and the negative, and YOU are the one who chooses which path you will take.

You have the power to transform negative change into positive, but you cannot do it by resisting the change. Resisting the change is focusing on the negative and it is choosing the negative path, which brings with it even more negativity, more pain, and misery.

To transform the negative into positive, you must choose the positive path and command that this changing energy transforms into millions of blessings that pour down on you and everyone involved. Command the changing energy to bring unlimited good and positivity. Know and believe in your heart that as you command it, it must be done.

And then the day will come in the not too distant future, when you will look back and see all the blessings that you brought into this world through you and change.

by: Rhonda Byrne

Why Do We Lie?

We all lie, all the time. It causes problems, to say the least. So why do we do it?

It boils down to the shifting sands of the self and trying to look good both to ourselves and others, experts say.

“It’s tied in with self-esteem,” says University of Massachusetts psychologist Robert Feldman. “We find that as soon as people feel that their self-esteem is threatened, they immediately begin to lie at higher levels.”

Not all lies are harmful. In fact, sometimes lying is the best approach for protecting privacy and ourselves and others from malice, some researchers say. Some deception, such as boasting and lies in the name of tact and politeness, can be classified as less than serious. But bald-faced lies (whether they involve leaving out the truth or putting in something false), are harmful, as they corrode trust and intimacy—the glue of society.

Kidding yourself

Many animals engage in deception, or deliberately misleading another, but only humans are wired to deceive both themselves and others, researchers say. People are so engaged in managing how others perceive them that they are often unable to separate truth from fiction in their own minds, Feldman’s research shows.

For instance, In one experiment, Feldman put two strangers in a room together. They were videotaped while they conversed. Later, independently, each was asked to view the tape and identify anything they had said that was not entirely accurate.

Rather than defining what counts as a lie and to avoid the moral tone of the word “lie,” Feldman’s experimenters simply asked subjects after the fact to identify anything they had said in the video that was “not entirely accurate.”

Initially, “Each subject said, ‘Oh, I was entirely accurate,’” Feldman told LiveScience. Upon watching themselves on video, subjects were genuinely surprised to discover they had said something inaccurate. The lies ranged from pretending to like someone they actually disliked to falsely claiming to be the star of a rock band.

The study, published in the Journal of Basic and Applied Psychology, found that 60 percent of people had lied at least once during the 10-minute conversation, saying an average of 2.92 inaccurate things.

“People almost lie reflexively,” Feldman says. “They don’t think about it as part of their normal social discourse.” But it is, the research showed.

“We’re trying not so much to impress other people but to maintain a view of ourselves that is consistent with the way they would like us to be,” Feldman said. We want to be agreeable, to make the social situation smoother or easier, and to avoid insulting others through disagreement or discord.

Men lie no more than women, but they tend to lie to make themselves look better, while women are more likely to lie to make the other person feel better.

Extroverts tend to lie more than introverts, Feldman found in similar research involving a job-interview situation.

Workplace lies

Other research has delved into prevarication in the workplace.

Self-esteem and threats to our sense of self are also drivers when it comes to lying to co-workers, rather than strangers, says Jennifer Argo of the University of Alberta.

A recent study she co-authored showed that people are even more willing to lie to coworkers than they are to strangers.

“We want to both look good when we are in the company of others (especially people we care about), and we want to protect our self-worth,” Argo told LiveScience.

The experiment involved reading a scenario to a subject, telling them they had paid more than a coworker for the same new car. When the coworker, in the scenario, mentioned what they had paid, $200 or $2,000 more in different versions of the experiment, the subject was asked to report how they would respond.

Argo found that her subjects were more willing to lie when the price difference was small and when they were talking to a coworker rather than to a stranger.

Consumers lie to protect their public and private selves, she wrote in the Journal of Consumer Research with her colleagues from the University of Calgary and University of British Columbia.

Argo said she was surprised that people are so willing to lie to someone they know even over a small price discrepancy.

“I guess closely tied to this is that people appear to be short-term focused when they decide to deceive someone—save my self-image and self-worth now, but later on if the deceived individual finds out it can have long-term consequences,” she said.

Feldman says people should become more aware of the extent to which we tend to lie and that honesty yields more genuine relationships and trust. “The default ought to be to be honest and accurate … We’re better off if honesty is the norm. It’s like the old saying: honesty is the best policy.”

Source: LiveScience

If You’ve Never Failed, You’ve Never Lived

“We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.” — Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962.

That’s just one of the failed moments of some of history’s most famous people which include Ulysses S. Grant, Thomas Edison, and Walt Disney among others. If you’ve never failed, you’ve never lived.

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Is There A Time In Your Life When You Finally Get It?…

…. when in the midst of all your fears and insanity you stop dead in your tracks and somewhere the voice inside your head cries out: ENOUGH! Enough fighting and crying or struggling to hold on. And, like a child quieting down after a blind tantrum, your sobs begin to subside, you shudder once or twice, you blink back your tears and through a mantle of wet lashes you begin to look at the world through new eyes. This is your awakening.

You realize that its time to stop hoping and waiting for something to change or for happiness, safety and security to come galloping over the next horizon. You come to terms with the fact that he is not Prince Charming and you are not Cinderella and that in the real world there aren’t always fairy-tale endings (or beginnings for that matter) and that any guarantee of “happily ever after” must begin with you, and in the process a sense of serenity is born of acceptance.

You awaken to the fact that you are not perfect and that not everyone will always love, appreciate, or approve of who or what you are… and that’s OK. (They are entitled to their own views and opinions.) And you learn the importance of loving and championing yourself, and in the process a sense of new found confidence is born of self-approval. You stop bitching and blaming other people for the things they did to you (or didn’t do for you,) and you learn that the only thing you can really count on is the unexpected. You learn that people don’t always say what they mean or mean what they say, that not everyone will always be there for you, and that it’s not always about you. So, you learn to stand on your own and to take care of yourself, and in the process a sense of safety and security is born of self-reliance. You stop judging and pointing fingers and you begin to accept people as they are and to overlook their shortcomings and human frailties, and in the process a sense of peace & contentment is born of forgiveness.

You realize that much of the way you view yourself and the world around you is as a result of all the messages and opinions that have been ingrained into your psyche. You begin to sift through all the crap you’ve been fed about how you should behave, how you should look, how much you should weigh, what you should wear, where you should shop, what you should drive, how and where you should live, what you should do for a living, who you should sleep with, who you should marry, what you should expect of a marriage, the importance of having and raising children, or what you owe your parents.

You learn to open up to new worlds and different points of view. And you begin reassessing and redefining who you are, what you really stand for. You learn the difference between wanting and needing and you begin to discard the doctrines and values you’ve outgrown, or should never have bought into to begin with, and in the process you learn to go with your instincts. You learn that it is truly in giving that we receive. And that there is power and glory in creating and contributing. You stop maneuvering through life merely as a “consumer” looking for your next fix.

Your learn that principles such as honesty and integrity are not the outdated ideals of a bygone era but the mortar that holds together the foundation upon which you must build a life. You learn that you don’t know everything, that it’s not your job to save the world and that you can’t teach a pig to sing. You learn to distinguish between guilt and responsibility and you learn the importance of setting boundaries and of learning to say NO. You learn that the only cross to bear is the one you choose to carry and that martyrs get burned at the stake.

Then you learn about love: Romantic love and familiar love. You learn how to love, how much to give in love, when to stop giving and when to walk away. You learn not to project your needs or your feelings onto a relationship. You learn that you will not be more beautiful, more intelligent, more loveable or important because of the man or woman on your arm or the child that bears your name. You learn to look at relationships as they really are and not as you would have them be. You stop trying to control people, situations and outcomes. You learn that just as people grow and change so it is with love.

And you learn that you don’t have the right to demand love on your terms. And, you learn that alone does not mean lonely. And you look in the mirror and come to terms with the fact that you will never be a size 5 or a perfect 10 and you stop trying to compete with the image inside your head and agonizing over how you “stack up.” You also stop working so hard at putting your feelings aside, smoothing things over and ignoring your needs. You learn that feelings of entitlement are perfectly OK and you learn that it is your right to want things and to ask for the things that you want and that sometimes it is necessary to make demands.

You come to the realization that you deserve to be treated with love, kindness, sensitivity and respect and you decide you won’t settle for less. And you allow only the hands of a lover who cherishes you to glorify you with his or her touch… and in the process you internalize the meaning of self-respect. And you learn that your body really is your temple. And you begin to care for it and treat it with respect. You begin eating a balanced diet, drinking more water and taking more time to exercise. You learn that fatigue diminishes the spirit and can create doubt and fear. So you take more time to rest. And, just as food fuels the body, laughter fuels our soul. So you take more time to laugh and to play.

You learn that for the most part, in life, you get what you believe you deserve..and that much of life truly is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You learn that anything worth achieving is worth working for and that wishing for something to happen is different than working toward making it happen. More importantly, you learn that in order to achieve success you need direction, discipline and perseverance. You also learn that no one can do it all alone and that it’s OK to risk asking for help.

You learn that the only thing you must truly fear is the great robber baron of all time: FEAR itself. You learn to step right into and through your fears, because you know that whatever happens you can handle it and to give in to fear is to give away the right to live life on your terms. And you learn to fight for your life and not to squander it living under a cloud of impending doom. You learn that life isn’t always fair, you don’t always get what you think you deserve and that sometimes “bad” things happen to unsuspecting, good people. On these occasions you learn not to personalize things. You learn that God isn’t punishing you or failing to answer your prayers. It’s just life happening. And you learn to deal with evil in its most primal state: the ego.

You learn that negative feelings such as anger, envy and resentment must be understood and redirected or they will suffocate the life out of you and poison the universe that surrounds you. You learn to admit when you are wrong and to building bridges instead of walls. You learn to be thankful and to take comfort in many of the simple things we take for granted, things that millions of people upon the earth can only dream about: a full refrigerator, clean running water, a soft warm bed, a long hot shower.

Slowly, you begin to take responsibility for yourself by yourself and you make yourself a promise never to betray yourself and never, ever to settle for less than your heart’s desire. And you hang a wind chime outside your window so you can listen to the wind. And you make a point to keep smiling, to keep trusting and to stay open to every wonderful possibility.

Finally, with courage in your heart, you take a deep breath and you begin to design the life you want to live as best as you can.

Author Unknown

The Wrath of Condemnation

Have you ever seen something left where it shouldn’t be and thought, “Who is the idiot who left this here?!” And then remembered it was you?

I have. And you’d think that would cure us forever of our natural tendency to wrathfully assume bad intentions or carelessness or stupidity when others do wrong. But it didn’t cure us, did it?

Studies show that when you make a mistake, you’ll emphasize the circumstances that made you do it. But when someone else does something wrong, you think it’s because they are a jerk. That’s regular language. More accurately, when you make a mistake, you will probably think it was because of the circumstances. But for others you probably won’t be so lenient. You’ll attribute more of the cause to the person’s character or personality. You’ll assume they did the wrong thing because they have a personal weakness or character flaw.

That’s the natural tendency. You aren’t a slave to that, of course. You can know about it and do something about it. You can give people the benefit of the doubt deliberately. You can try to think of all the times the person has acted in your best interests in the past and weigh the odds: Were they really out to get you or did they just make a mistake? You can remember times you made the same mistake and regretted it later and assume the other person will do the same. There are lots of ways you can compensate for your mind’s natural tendency to pass judgment on others.

Which one should you use? All of them, and try your best. Passing judgment doesn’t help you. It doesn’t help the other. It doesn’t help your relationship. It doesn’t help anyone in your life. In fact, it harms all of these. Your judgment sparks a mild (or even intense) anger. That’s not good for your health. It puts stress hormones into your system that strain your body. It doesn’t help the other. When has it ever helped you when someone thought you were a jerk? Sure, it helps sometimes when someone tells you about a mistake you’ve made. But it helps you most if they do it with forgiveness and understanding rather than judgmentalness and condemnation, right?

So passing judgment harms your relationship. The anger and bad feelings it causes, even if it’s mild, interferes with you two being open, trusting, loving, kind, having good feelings for each other, etc.

And passing judgment is actually bad for everyone in your life, because the state it puts you in doesn’t go away right away. So you carry it with you when you go home and talk to your spouse, your friend, your kid. It might be mild, but it’s there and doesn’t need to be. Just as you can housetrain a dog, you can “housetrain” your brain. Teach it to do the unnatural. Teach your brain to compensate for it’s automatic judgmentalness. You will be happy you did.

In an experiment by Dolf Zillmann at the University of Alabama people volunteered to ride an exercise bike. At some point, each volunteer is treated rudely by one of the other volunteers (but who is really part of the experimental team). Later, the volunteers got the opportunity to get back at the rude person (by criticizing him in a written evaluation), and they sought revenge.

There were two different groups going through almost identical experiences, but in the second group, this difference was added: After the person was rude to a volunteer and then left the room, someone else came up and explained to the volunteer that the “rude” person was stressing out because he or she had oral examinations coming up for a graduate degree. In this version of the experiment, the volunteers were still given the opportunity to take revenge for the rudeness but chose not to. Why? They were given an explanation.

You can create an explanation yourself for the behavior of others, or even better, you can find out. I used to work at a place where one of my customers was a really nice guy but kind of odd. One time one of my co-workers criticized the customer for being odd. She had clearly judged him without ever wondering WHY he might be that way. When I told her about his experience in Vietnam (he was shot through the head and suffered brain damage) her harsh judgment of him completely vanished and was replaced by guilt for ever having thought those things about him.

Remember that next time you pass judgment on someone you don’t know well. Not even for their sake. Remember it for YOUR sake. Your judgment influences the way you feel and the way you behave toward that person. Harsh judgment makes you feel critical and holier-than-thou, and that doesn’t feel nearly as good as compassion. If you make an assumption that the person has circumstances that would explain their behavior, you can feel compassion and that will change the way you treat the person. This is a very important way you can become more like the person you’ve always wanted to be. Resist the urge to judge and give people the benefit of the doubt.

Author: Adam Khan
author of the book, Self-Help Stuff That Works and http://youmeworks.com/

16 Motivating Rules To Live By

Bob Parsons… the guy who started godaddy.com wrote what I think is pretty solid advice… worth a read.

1. Get and stay out of your comfort zone.
I believe that not much happens of any significance when we’re in our comfort zone. I hear people say, “But I’m concerned about security.” My response to that is simple: “Security is for cadavers.”

2. Never give up.
Almost nothing works the first time it’s attempted. Just because what you’re doing does not seem to be working, doesn’t mean it won’t work. It just means that it might not work the way you’re doing it. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, and you wouldn’t have an opportunity.

3. When you’re ready to quit, you’re closer than you think.
There’s an old Chinese saying that I just love, and I believe it is so true. It goes like this: “The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed.”

4. With regard to whatever worries you, not only accept the worst thing that could happen, but make it a point to quantify what the worst thing could be.
Very seldom will the worst consequence be anywhere near as bad as a cloud of “undefined consequences.” My father would tell me early on, when I was struggling and losing my shirt trying to get Parsons Technology going, “Well, Robert, if it doesn’t work, they can’t eat you.”

5. Focus on what you want to have happen.
Remember that old saying, “As you think, so shall you be.”

6. Take things a day at a time.
No matter how difficult your situation is, you can get through it if you don’t look too far into the future, and focus on the present moment. You can get through anything one day at a time.

7. Always be moving forward.
Never stop investing. Never stop improving. Never stop doing something new. The moment you stop improving your organization, it starts to die. Make it your goal to be better each and every day, in some small way. Remember the Japanese concept of Kaizen. Small daily improvements eventually result in huge advantages.

8. Be quick to decide.
Remember what General George S. Patton said: “A good plan violently executed today is far and away better than a perfect plan tomorrow.”

9. Measure everything of significance.
I swear this is true. Anything that is measured and watched, improves.

10. Anything that is not managed will deteriorate.
If you want to uncover problems you don’t know about, take a few moments and look closely at the areas you haven’t examined for a while. I guarantee you problems will be there.

11. Pay attention to your competitors, but pay more attention to what you’re doing.
When you look at your competitors, remember that everything looks perfect at a distance. Even the planet Earth, if you get far enough into space, looks like a peaceful place.

12. Never let anybody push you around.
In our society, with our laws and even playing field, you have just as much right to what you’re doing as anyone else, provided that what you’re doing is legal.

13. Never expect life to be fair.
Life isn’t fair. You make your own breaks. You’ll be doing good if the only meaning fair has to you, is something that you pay when you get on a bus (i.e., fare).

14. Solve your own problems.
You’ll find that by coming up with your own solutions, you’ll develop a competitive edge. Masura Ibuka, the co-founder of SONY, said it best: “You never succeed in technology, business, or anything by following the others.” There’s also an old Asian saying that I remind myself of frequently. It goes like this: “A wise man keeps his own counsel.”

15. Don’t take yourself too seriously.
Lighten up. Often, at least half of what we accomplish is due to luck. None of us are in control as much as we like to think we are.

16. There’s always a reason to smile.
Find it. After all, you’re really lucky just to be alive. Life is short. More and more, I agree with my little brother. He always reminds me: “We’re not here for a long time, we’re here for a good time!”

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