What is The Worst Mistake?

Stepcase Lifehack

via 30s Tip: What is The Worst Mistake?.

Connecting the dots…

Calvin and Hobbes Comic Strip, November 27, 2012 on GoComics.com.

 

Hardships Often Prepare Ordinary People

Live Life Quotes, Love Life Quotes, Live Life Happy

via Hardships Often Prepare Ordinary People.

Jill Bolte Taylor’s stroke of insight

Yet another amazing TEDTalk worthy of your attention…

The Magic of Gratitude and Acceptance

Another Melody Beattie I should have posted on Thanksgiving but it rings true every day:

“Gratitude and acceptance are two magic tricks available to us in recovery. No matter who we are, where we are, or what we have, gratitude and acceptance work.

We may eventually become so happy that we realize our present circumstances are good. Or we master our present circumstances and then move forward into the next set of circumstances.

If we become stuck, miserable, feeling trapped and hopeless, try gratitude and acceptance. If we have tried unsuccessfully to alter our present circumstances and have begun to feel like we’re beating our head against a brick wall, try gratitude and acceptance.

If we feel like all is dark and the night will never end, try gratitude and acceptance.

If we feel scared and uncertain, try gratitude and acceptance.

If we’ve tried everything else and nothing seems to work, try gratitude and acceptance.

If we’ve been fighting something, try gratitude and acceptance.

When all else fails, go back to the basics.

Gratitude and acceptance work.

Today, God, help me let go of my resistance. Help me know the pain of a circumstance will stop hurting so much if I accept it. I will practice the basics of gratitude and acceptance in my life, and for all my present circumstances.” via Just For Today Meditations » Daily Recovery Readings – November 22, 2012.

I’m tore down…

Great song for where I’m at right now. Crank it!!!

Please know that often what feels like the end of the world is simply a challenging pathway to a far better place.

notsalmon

via Please know that often what feels like the end of the world is simply a challenging pathway to a far better place..

Watch “Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush; Don’t Give Up”

I think this is one of the greatest music videos [simple, impactful] of one of the greatest love songs ever [from two of my favorite artists, as well]. That’s a lot of greatest!

Posted from WordPress for Android

Words

Live Life Quotes, Love Life Quotes, Live Life Happy

via Words.

I hope that you find the answers you’re seeking

notsalmon

via I hope that you find the answers you’re seeking..

Traitor Crowded Dragster

Bizarro Blog!

Get more here: Traitor Crowded Dragster.

If You Don’t Control Your Attitude

Live Life Quotes, Love Life Quotes, Live Life Happy

via If You Don’t Control Your Attitude.

Within Every Problem

Live Life Quotes, Love Life Quotes, Live Life Happy

via Within Every Problem.

Star Power – Sunrise

Pops Digital

via Star Power – Sunrise.

Letting Go of Sh*tty Relationships

Joshua Fields Millburn writes:

Some relationships are incredibly pernicious. We often develop relationships out of convenience, without considering the traits necessary to build a successful bond with another person—important traits like unwavering support and shared trust and loving encouragement.

When a relationship is birthed out of convenience or proximity or chemistry alone, it is bound to fail. We need more than a person’s physical presence to maintain a meaningful connection, but we routinely keep people around because … well, simply because they’re already around

We’ve all held on to someone who didn’t deserve to be there before. And most of us still have someone in our lives who continually drains us: Someone who doesn’t add value. Someone who isn’t supportive. Someone who takes and takes and takes without giving back to the relationship. Someone who contributes very little and prevents us from growing. Someone who constantly plays the victim.

But victims become victimizers. And these people are dangerous. They keep us from feeling fulfilled. They keep us from living meaningful lives. Over time, these negative relationships become part of our identity—they define us, they become who we are.

Fortunately, this needn’t be the case. Several actions can be taken to rid ourselves of negative relationships.

Go to the source: Letting Go of Shitty Relationships | The Minimalists

The folks at PRWeb have a great infographic I want to share with you:

There are many types of content that businesses can use for content marketing. Which types are best for promoting your small business could vary depending on the products or services offered and the consumers targeted.

PRWeb has created this matrix to show how different types of content can appeal to different consumers and offers facts or suggestions about each. The top shows the the different types of content, while the bottom explains how those pieces of content can be used.

via [Infographic] The Content Marketing Matrix for Small Businesses.

Express your power gently

Cover of "The Tao of Pooh"

Melody Beattie writes:

Express your power naturally and as gently as you can.

When I started learning what it meant to take care of myself and to own my power, I talked loudly, spoke up, and yelled in order to set boundaries, limits, and to express myself. That was the way to get my point across. That’s how I’d showed people I meant what I said.

I had to say it loudly.

About five years after I started this process of learning what it meant to own my power, I met a bear called Winnie the Pooh. The book that introduced me was The Tao of Pooh. Lights started coming on. The seeds of new lessons began to sprout.

To own my power, I could quietly say what I meant. The clearer I was about what I had to say and who I was, the less I had to shout. Owning my power wasn’t something I had to plan out, premeditate, and obsess about.

The more I took care of myself and connected to myself, and the clearer I became, the more natural and easier it became to own my power. My power–including setting limits, saying no, refusing to be manipulated, and saying I’d changed my mind– often became a natural, graceful, timely expression of me.

There are still times in our lives when we have to be firm, sometimes forceful, and repeat what we’ve said, sometimes loudly. The quieter and more relaxed we can be when we say what we mean is usually in direct proportion to how much we believe in ourselves.

Let your power, boundaries, and expressions of who you are arise naturally.

Learn and respect the value of responding as gently, but as firmly, as you can.

God, help your power flow through me. Teach me to take care of myself gently, in a way that reflects harmony with myself and as much as possible, the people in my life.” via Just For Today Meditations – Maintaining A Life.

The best of ‘what I see’ for 11/25/2012

  1. The human relationship system is guided fundamentally by needs for relational value, navigated on the dimensions of power, love, and freedom. Neurotic relationship patterns emerge when people adopt rigid styles or express extreme interpersonal reactions in response to fears that their relational value needs won’t be met. Susan’s needs for relational value drove her to respond in a maladaptive way. Individuals who hide in their apartments out of social anxiety, individuals who hunt for any signs of betrayal, and individuals who vacillate between being needy and fearing control all engage in neurotic relational patterns in that they each are attempting to manage their needs for relational value, but are doing so in a way that ultimately produces intense conflict or pushes others away leaving such needs fundamentally unmet. Our defenses are the way we manage tension between conflicting goals and filter stuff out of our full consciousness. The defensive system tries to bring harmony to the various other systems of adaptation, but sometimes does so at significant costs. Two very common defenses are repression and rationalization. Repression is when material is blocked out of self-conscious recognition (see here for an example). Rationalization is when we make up reasons that hide our true needs or feelings. Research on cognitive dissonance offers some compelling examples, and I highly recommend the book, Mistakes were Made but Not by Me, for an excellent analysis of ego defensive processes via rationalization and how such processes lead to maladaptive patterns.
  2. Neurotic emotional patterns come in two basic flavors, over-regulated (meaning suppressed and not expressed) and under-regulated (meaning hyper-sensitized and over-expressed). Feeling states per se are almost never bad. However, feeling states can become hyperactive (or chronically accessible) such that they can be triggered at the slightest stimuli and can then dominate the individual’s mind set. Individuals with depressive or anxious disorders are generally under-regulated in those feeling states and need help containing them. Often, however, the problem isn’t that an individual is feeling too much, but that he or she is walled off from some or all of their emotions. Some common examples are the “always nice” person who “never” feels angry, the competitor who attacks others instead of feeling shame, the unemotional distancing person who can’t feel anything at all. These individuals usually have a form of “affect phobia,” which is maladaptive because it blocks them from key aspects of their human experience.
  3. Neurotic habits are automatic or ritualized patterns of overt behavior that people engage in to alleviate anxiety and provide a sense of familiar security. The problem is that, carried out over the long term, the habitual patterns are maladaptive. A classic example is the anxious drinker. Stressed all day, riddled with achievement and relational anxieties, alcohol becomes a short term, medicating balm. Unfortunately over time, it comes with significant costs (hangovers, weight gain, health problems, etc). Binging and purging, ritualistic ordering or cleaning, nail biting or trichotillomania (hair pulling) are all common examples of neurotic, maladaptive habits.
  4. “When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.” ~Miguel Ruiz
  5. “Worthiness, in very simple terms, means, I have found a way to let the Energy reach me, the Energy that is natural, reach me. Worthiness, or unworthiness, is something that is pronounced upon you by you. You are the only one that can deem yourself worthy or unworthy. You are the only one who can love yourself into a state of allowing, or hate yourself in a state of disallowing. There is not something wrong with you, nor is there something wrong with one who is not loving you. You are all just, in the moment, practicing the art of not allowing, or the art of resisting.” – Esther Hicks
  6. “Challenges come so we can grow and be prepared for things we are not equipped to handle now. When we face our challenges with faith, prepared to learn, willing to make changes, and if necessary, to let go, we are demanding our power be turned on.” – Iyanla Vanzant

45 Characteristics of Healthy Relationships + The Secret to Applying Them

Sometimes, when I start curating content, I don’t know when to stop. In those times, only copying and pasting will suffice! Kristen Barton Cuthriell writes:

Is your relationship healthy?

Relationships take work.  Hard work.  But the rewards to having a fulfilling relationship are MANY.  Are you doing the things necessary to keep your relationship strong?  Could it be stronger?  Look for ways to improve your relationship today and everyday.

Characteristics of Healthy Relationships

  1. You can be your true self with the other.
  2. Communication is spontaneous and open.
  3. There is a balance of closeness and separateness.
  4. You are able to take responsibility for your own behaviors without blaming your partner for your actions. (Get rid of “He/she made me do it.”)
  5. You discuss and negotiate rather than fight.
  6. You feel comfortable sharing your fears and insecurities.
  7. Rules and boundaries are clear, yet flexibility exists.
  8. You don’t lie, but you also refrain from using hurtful language in the name of being brutally honest.  (Don’t say something just to be mean.)
  9. You enjoy doing things for yourself, as well as for the other.
  10. Personal growth is encouraged.
  11. You make it through rough times without splitting up or threatening divorce.
  12. You treat each other the way you would like to be treated.
  13. You have a strong sense of interdependence rather than dependency or co-dependency. (Equality within the relationship)
  14. There is play and humor in the relationship.  You have fun together.
  15. You enjoy being together, but are able to spend time alone.
  16. You do not attempt to control each other.
  17. Each is trustful of the other.
  18. Privacy is respected.
  19. You both refrain from passive-aggressive behavior. (Silent treatment, hanging up phone, being late when the other is waiting)
  20. You forgive each other for mistakes.
  21. You actively listen to the other. (Really hear what the other is saying)
  22. You both are able to apologize. (Even when you do not think you are at fault, you can be sorry that your partner is feeling hurt.)
  23. You avoid mind reading and making assumptions.  When upset you both seek clarity.
  24. You are able to validate each other- even when you disagree. (You recognize that the opinions and feelings of the other are important.)
  25. There is a balance in giving and receiving.
  26. Conflict is faced and resolved.  Avoid allowing resentment to take hold.
  27. Negotiations are fair and compromise is present.  Create win-win resolutions.
  28. Mistakes are accepted and lessons are learned.
  29. You NEVER bring up the intimate disclosures of the other when angry or arguing.  Intimate disclosures are off-limits.
  30. Humility is present.  You are able to give up always being “right.”  Don’t let your ego get in the way.
  31. You are willing to make sacrifices for the other.
  32. You speak each other’s love language even when it differs from your own.
  33. You share mutual activities and interests.
  34. You NEVER call each other names or physically assault one another.
  35. You have strong friendship.
  36. You encourage and support each other. (“I have got your back.”)
  37. In conflict, you respect your partner’s need for a time out.  (Time to calm down and think rationally before resolving an issue.)
  38. You do not expect your partner to complete you.  You are secure in your own worth and want to share your life with them.
  39. Physical contact is mutually enjoyed.
  40. Appreciate each other’s strengths and overlook each other’s idiosyncrasies.
  41. Both are open to constructive feedback.
  42. Other meaningful relationships and interests are present.
  43. You have similar values, but do not demand that the other have the same values as you. (Mutual respect exists)
  44. You are willing to take risks and be vulnerable.
  45. You avoid intentionally hurting the other because you have been hurt.  No tit for tat.  No keeping score of grievances.

The Secret to Applying Them

Focus on what you can change about yourself rather than concentrating on what your partner needs to change.  Instead of approaching your partner with a “This is what you need to work on” approach- approach them with a “this is what we need to work on approach.” Then work on yourself regardless of the actions of your partner.  You may be surprised to see what teaching by example can do for you and your relationship.

The more of these things you are doing- the healthier the relationship.  Use this list to guide your growth rather than to judge your relationship.  Just as no person is perfect, no relationship is perfect.  Rather than demanding that you or your partner be perfect, look for areas of needed growth.   See what you can do to improve the relationship with the one that you love.

Source: 45 Characteristics of Healthy Relationships + The Secret to Applying Them – Let Life in Practices

Beautiful Has Nothing To Do With Looks

Live Life Quotes, Love Life Quotes, Live Life Happy

via Beautiful Has Nothing To Do With Looks.

You Have To Find Something

Live Life Quotes, Love Life Quotes, Live Life Happy

via You Have To Find Something.

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