Tag: Wisdom

I <3 Gemma Stone…

Looking for another video post of hers I stumbled upon this to share with you…

“Jean-Paul Sartre says, “Hell is other people”.
I don’t think it’s quite that bad but the reality is much of the stuff that causes us to suffer, comes from our reactions to others.
What to do?
Let’s suppose you tried the strategies from the last vlog. Maybe you’ve also tried talking things out, setting healthy boundaries, and being ‘the better person’, and you’re still struggling.
This sucks. I know.
Do not close off your heart.”

Source: 3 more strategies for dealing with family drama | Gemma Stone.

I encourage you to visit her blog and subscribe or follow her on Twitter…

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Go easy

“Go easy. You may have to push forward, but you don’t have to push so hard. Go in gentleness, go in peace. Do not be in so much of a hurry. At no day, no hour, no time are you required to do more than you can do in peace. Frantic behaviors and urgency are not the foundation for our new way of life. Do not be in too much of a hurry to begin. Begin, but do not force the beginning if it is not time. Beginnings will arrive soon enough. Enjoy and relish middles, the heart of the matter. Do not be in too much of a hurry to finish. You may be almost done, but enjoy the final moments. Give yourself fully to those moments so that you may give and get all there is. Let the pace flow naturally. Move forward. Start. Keep moving forward. Do it gently, though. Do it in peace. Cherish each moment. Today, God, help me focus on a peaceful pace rather than a harried one. I will keep moving forward gently, not frantically. Help me let go of my need to be anxious, upset, and harried. Help me replace it with a need to be at peace and in harmony.”

Beattie, Melody (2009-12-15). The Language of Letting Go (Hazelden Meditation Series) (p. 90). Hazelden. Kindle Edition.

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Got excuses?

Watch this for one minute…

Takes only 1 minute to find inspiration for your work-out… – Lead.Learn.Live.

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The top 10 relationship myths and why they’re myths

Susan Krauss Whitbourne, Ph.D.

Susan Whitbourne shares this. I chose to share this one…

4. It’s better to live together before getting married. We can dismiss this myth fairly readily. According to the “cohabitation effect,” couples who live together before getting engaged are more likely to have their marriages end in divorce. The key here is that they live together before they actually get engaged. Once engaged, couples living together prior to marriage do not experience negative effects on their marriage’s duration. The reason for the cohabitation effect makes sense. Couples who decide to marry after living together may do so out of simple inertia. When they moved in together, the people who experience the cohabitation effect didn’t have a particularly strong romantic attraction. Once living together, they may have found it convenient to enter into marriage. Having drifted into that state, they find it just as easy to drift out. They are also more likely to be unhappy during the time that they’re together (Rhoades, Stanley, & Markman, 2009). It’s important to realize that the cohabitation effect doesn’t occur among every couple who find love once they start living together. It’s just that the odds favor people who make a commitment first, and then marry prior to deciding to share their living quarters.

Source: The Top 10 Relationship Myths and Why They’re Myths | Psychology Today

There are 9 more waiting for you at the source if you’re interested…

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Don’t drink the negative Kool-Aid

doomandgloomTerri Cole posted this recently…

The onslaught of bad news in the media continues to fester. The climate of fear has reached epic proportions. We are inundated with bad news about our crumbling economy, the rising unemployment rate, executive greed, lack of affordable healthcare, etc. So the question is how can YOU stay positive and productive in a relentlessly negative climate and NOT drink the Armageddon Kool-Aid?

Well, as you may have guessed, I have a few ideas. Continue reading “Don’t drink the negative Kool-Aid” →

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5 ways to eliminate distractions and do your best work

boldI like Amber Rae’s 5th way…

If you have to, do not be afraid to be unavailable, unreachable, and hard-to-get-ahold-of. Because in a month, you’ll be back and with hellfire momentum, and they’ll forget the weeks where you were MIA because you were focused.

This very moment, you can change your life. There has never been a better moment, and never will be, to take a stand, do what matters, and alter the course of your life.

It’s Go-time. Rock!

Source: 5 Ways to Eliminate Distractions and Do Your Best Work [BLOG] « Positively Positive

Go to the source if you’d like the other 4 – it’s worth the trip!

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A seven-step prescription for self-love

Some people see the term ‘self love’ and immediately start to squirm, yet the Good Book says we must ‘love our neighbor as ourselves’ implying that self-love is fundamental in healthy relationship. Author Dr. Deborah Khoshaba shares her perspective here…

Self-love is a state of appreciation for oneself that grows from actions that support our physical, psychological and spiritual growth. Self-love is dynamic; it grows by actions that mature us. When we act in ways that expand self-love in us, we begin to accept much better our weaknesses as well as our strengths, have less need to explain away our short-comings, have compassion for ourselves as human beings struggling to find personal meaning, are more centered in our life purpose and values, and expect living fulfillment through our own efforts.

Here is my Seven-Step Prescription for Self-Love. Continue reading “A seven-step prescription for self-love” →

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Every behavior and every thought has a consequence

PhotoReading David Kanigan’s blog led me to this gem by Kristin Cuthriell…

“When you choose the behavior, you choose the consequences.  When you choose the thoughts, you choose the consequences.” –Dr. Phil McGraw

First, look at the consequences and decide.  Is this what I really want?

My dad once told me, “Remember what you know.” Through the years, I have found this to be great advice.  So many times we forget simple truths in life, things that we already know.  Often, I write about these simple truths to not only remind my readers, but to also remind myself of things that we already know and may have forgotten to practice in our lives.

Today I write about choices.

Every choice that we make is followed by a consequence.  Too often, we act impulsively, not taking the time to think through the possible repercussions of our actions.  We do not play the tape through, which means that we do not visualize the backlash of our thoughts and behaviors.  We simply act without thinking it through in its totality.

Whether our choices are impulsive or well thought out, the consequences will be the same. Take the time to play the tape through. The choices we make when emotions are high, we usually come to regret.  Take a moment to think it all the way through.

Source: Every Behavior and Every Thought Has a Consequence | Let Life in Practices

Go to the source if you’d like her list of ‘obvious things we forget’. Click the ‘follow’ button while you’re there!

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Healthy choices

Português: Poeta latino Ovídio.

Just in case you missed this…

The cause is hidden, but the result is known. Ovid

We know it’s coming before we do it. Our boy[girl]friend dumps us and we devour the ice cream.

We don’t get the promotion so we head for the bar. We have a fight with our spouse and treat ourselves to a new leather jacket – at his or her expense. We decide that because we’re feeling bad anyway, we might as well take full advantage of it. We figure the worse we feel, the more entitled we are to the indulgence.

This type of behavior starts a cycle. The worse we feel, the more we want to self-destruct. Let’s face it – our actions are usually premeditated.

We think about the ice cream, the drink, or the leather jacket until we can get to it. During the planning stage, we can shift gears. We think it through. We know we have a choice. We decide to do something healthy instead of destructive.

Today I will make only healthy choices for myself.

Source: March 28, 2012 – Today’s Gift from Hazelden « cmmacneil

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Solitude: the benefits it brings

Solitude

Are you lonely or alone? Consider this…

“In a study of fifth through ninth graders, Reed Larson found that over time, the older children choose to spend more time alone. What’s more, their emotional experience was improved after they had spent some time on their own. Those adolescents who spent an intermediate amount of time alone – not too much, not too little – seemed to be doing the best psychologically.

The psychologists who really do get it about the sweetness of solitude are the ones I mentioned in my last post – Christopher Long and James Averill. The title of their key theoretical article is “Solitude: An exploration of the benefits of being alone.” No apology. No befuddlement that humans might actually benefit from their time alone.

Here’s how they characterize solitude:

“The paradigm experience of solitude is a state characterized by disengagement from the immediate demands of other people – a state of reduced social inhibition and increased freedom to select one’s mental and physical activities.”

Many readers made similar observations in the comments they posted to Part 1. Although there can be benefits to spending time with others, there can also be rewards to “disengagement from the immediate demands of other people.””

Source: The Benefits It Brings | Psychology Today.

Go to the source if you’d like to read the rest of the article. Me? This reminds me of the old adage about snow. If it comes to me, it’s work. If I go to it, it’s play. Same with being by yourself. If I choose it, it’s solitude. If I feel I have no choice, I’m lonely. What do you think?

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Is happiness the secret of success?

An emoticon with a smile. For more emoticons i...

Some people think if you are happy, you are blind to reality. But when we research it, happiness actually raises every single business and educational outcome for the brain. How did we miss this? Why do we have these societal misconceptions about happiness? Because we assumed you were average.

When we study people, scientists are often interested in what the average is. If we study what is merely average, we will remain merely average.

Many people think happiness is genetic. That’s only half the story, because the average person does not fight their genes. When we stop studying the average and begin researching positive outliers — people who are above average for a positive dimension like optimism or intelligence — a wildly different picture emerges. Our daily decisions and habits have a huge impact upon both our levels of happiness and success.

via Is happiness the secret of success? – CNN.com.

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Control

Cover of "The Language of Letting Go (Haz...

Melody Beattie shares…

Many of us have been trying to keep the whole world in orbit with sheer and forceful application of mental energy.

What happens if we let go, if we stop trying to keep the world orbiting and just let it whirl? It’ll keep right on whirling. It’ll stay right on track with no help from us. And we’ll be free and relaxed enough to enjoy our place on it.

Control is an illusion, especially the kind of control we’ve been trying to exert. In fact, controlling gives other people, events, and diseases, such as alcoholism, control over us. Whatever we try to control does have control over us and our life.

I have given this control to many things and people in my life. I have never gotten the results I wanted from controll­ing or trying to control people. What I received for my ef­forts is an unmanageable life, whether that unmanageability was inside me or in external events.

In recovery, we make a trade-off. We trade a life that we have tried to control, and we receive in return something better — a life that is manageable.

Today, I will exchange a controlled life for one that is manageable.

Source: March 26: Control | Language of Letting Go

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This Moment is a Chance to Be Free

Paraglider over Stanage Edge As free as a bird.

Every once in awhile, even Shirley Maclaine is right…

Dwelling on the negative simply contributes to its power.” ~Shirley Maclaine

Have you ever felt like you were drowning in negativity?

Maybe you were feeling down on yourself, but instead of pulling yourself up, you made yourself feel bad for struggling with yourself in this way.

Or maybe you made a mistake, but instead of forgiving yourself, you beat yourself up over it, rehashing everything you should have done.

It’s all too easy to get stuck in a cycle of negativity. Even if we practice yoga, meditate, or start our mornings with positive affirmations, we can fall down, and find ourselves wondering why it feels so hard to get back up.

As I mentioned last week, I spent most of my life in this type of cycle, and despite the tremendous progress I’ve made over the years, I still fall into this trap sometimes.

When this happens, I might be tempted to think myself in circles—to essentially let my feelings paralyze me while I dwell on the same fears and frustrations over and over again. And then I might wonder why I feel so stuck.

The truth is we feel paralyzed when we paralyze ourselves, and we can set ourselves free if we stop obsessing about why we can’t.

Source: Tiny Wisdom: This Moment is a Chance to Be Free | Tiny Buddha: Wisdom Quotes, Letting Go, Letting Happiness In

Go to the source if you’d like to read the rest of Lori Deschene’s post…

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How To Escape? Understand, Really Understand The Rules of Life. Rule 6…

Richard Branson at the Virgin America OC Launch.

I found blogger Nicholas Bate through my friend David Kanigan. Are you following his ongoing series? Here’s his rule #6…

We have been seduced. Even though folk tales, our parents and pop song lyrics have warned us, we love to be seduced. But money, fast cars, sex, drugs and rock and roll do not make us happy-or certainly not beyond the instant application. But research does consistently show that the following will:
Growth and challenge. We human beings love a challenge. Because it gets us to grow. And we are meant to grow. We are not meant to stagnate: we get dulled, jaded, and unhappy. Of course what that challenge is for you,only you can find out. It might be teaching disadvantaged children, it might be becoming a gardener, or building a multi-national organisation.
Nurturing our Nature. But what ‘growth’ is doing, of course, is allowing us to nurture our nature. To take the genetic gifts we have and use them, to enjoy them. Again, no one can tell you what those are. No-don’t try and be Richard Branson-simply be the best version of you that you can be; that’s what nurturing your nature really means. And as you challenge yourself you’ll find out more about what your true nature is.
Do it with passion (or pack it in). And once you are nurturing your nature you will want to do it with passion. You’ll love it. You won’t be able to help it. And if you don’t: it’s telling you something. Pack it in as soon as you conceivably can.
Balance your compass. You know what a geographical compass is. If it is not set correctly, you’re in a mess. You’ll get lost. The same applies to your personal compass. Set it correctly and the path is yours. You’ll get there and you will enjoy the journey. Ensure you know what you want for your (1) career; what are you going to do? How are you going to earn money? (2) mind/body: are you looking after them? How? (3) finances: what state are they in? What needs action? (4) relationships: which ones need some attention? (5) fun: are you having fun-if not, what’s the point? (6) contribution: that’s the one which make us all tick, really. Where’s your contribution?

Source: How To Escape? Understand, Really Understand The Rules of Life. Rule 6 – Nicholas Bate

I like “do it with passion or pack it in”. How about you? Go to the source if you’d like to download his free ebook…

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Nine requisites for contented living

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe at age 69

Health enough to make work a pleasure.
Wealth enough to support your needs.
Strength to battle with difficulties and overcome them.
Grace enough to confess your sins and forsake them.
Patience enough to toil until some good is accomplished.
Charity enough to see some good in your neighbor.
Love enough to move you to be useful and helpful to others.
Faith enough to make real the things of God.
Hope enough to remove all the anxious fears concerning the future.
–Johann von Goethe

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Here’s How To Love Yourself and Feel Great!

I stumbled upon this gem from Bryan Reeves this morning…

Have you heard the expression, “The world is your mirror”?

I originally learned that means whatever I saw in the world/people around me only reflected something within me. More interestingly, whatever I rejected in others, in the world “outside” me, only pointed at the same quality within me.

At first, that idea pissed me off.

I despised my father’s obvious arrogance; there was no way I was arrogant like him. I despised my then-girlfriend’s shallow judgmental thoughts; I didn’t judge people like she did. In fact, I was awesome, possibly even headed for sainthood. After all, the only way I could see the judgmental and arrogant nature of others was because I was so wise and insightful, so unusually compassionate and loving (it made sense at the time).

So, saintly being that I was, I would use “the mirror” as a spiritual weapon to vanquish the unseeing. For example, at the slightest provocation by that former girlfriend, like when she made a judgment about my character, I would just smash the “mirror” over her head (metaphorically speaking). It generally went something like this:

“Say what? You think IIIIIIII am selfish, disrespectful and immature?? …. Weeeeell, what does that say about you??? … After all, I’m just your mirror!!” [SMASH!!!]

It was basically the spiritual version of “I’m rubber, you’re glue, whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you!” Obviously, I sensed wisdom in the idea but just couldn’t figure out how to make it work for anyone.

One day, a friend reacted angrily to news of a child being murdered. In discussing the “mirror” idea, he refused to accept that his angry reaction to the story meant that he also was violent and could do such a thing to a child.

I understood his objection. It seemed a solid refutation of the idea. So I went home and meditated on it.

Then it popped.

via Here’s How To Love Yourself and Feel Great!.

Go to the source if if you want to know ‘what popped’!

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Fifty ways to boost your productivity

Category:Educational research

Nicholas Bate shares his 50 ways to boost productivity…

  1. Don’t hold stuff in your head.
  2. Keep your head clear and use your head for thinking: decisive, critical, imaginative.
  3. Use paper/screen for ‘holding’ your list of what needs attention.
  4. Our greatest asset is where we place our attention.  Bear in mind we live in an exciting world where our attention is constantly ‘pulled’ to another place.
  5. To be productive is to maintain attention on what is important in the face of continuous distraction.
  6. And what needs attention is not just urgent, but what is important and thus often apparently not urgent e.g. health.
  7. Thus: ask what is important?
  8. Firstly by referencing the compass points of your life….
  9. Thus: your business/career
  10. Thus: your health
  11. Thus: your relationships
  12. Thus: your finances
  13. Capture these on you attention list.
  14. Secondly by stretching your planning horizon…
  15. Every day, ask what’s important tomorrow?
  16. Every week, ask what’s important next week?
  17. Every month, ask what’s important next month?
  18. Every quarter, ask what’s important next quarter?
  19. Every year, ask what’s important next year?
  20. Capture these to on your attention list.
  21. And finally anything which is burning and urgent; add these to your list.
  22. But the more you do 8 and 14 above…
  23. The fewer will be generated by  21.
  24. Every end-of-the-working-day review your list and decide what does need attention: create your daily list.
  25. Don’t try and do everything…

via Fifty Ways To Boost Your Productivity – Nicholas Bate.

Follow the ‘via’ link above if you’d like the remaining 25 ways. Before you go, however, I’d like to call your attention to a post and a couple of screencasts I’ve done on a tool called Evernote that I use in conjunction with a ‘philosophy’ called Getting Things Done [GTD] to help implement Nicholas’ first 6 ways…

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Fake it ’til you make it?

Photo of Barbara Grizzuti Harrison ca. 1980 fr...

Fantasies are more than substitutes for unpleasant reality; they are also dress rehearsals, plans. All acts performed in the world begin in the imagination. — Barbara Grizzuti Harrison

Our minds mold who we become. Our thoughts not only contribute to our achievements, they determine the posture of our lives. How very powerful they are. Fortunately, we have the power to think the thoughts we choose, which means our lives will unfold much as we expect.

The seeds we plant in our minds indicate the directions we’ll explore in our development. And we won’t explore areas we’ve never given attention to in our reflective moments. We must dare to dream extravagant, improbable dreams if we intend to find a new direction, and the steps necessary to it.

We will not achieve, we will not master that which goes unplanned in our dream world. We imagine first, and then we conceive the execution of a plan. Our minds prepare us for success. They can also prepare us for failure if we let our thoughts become negative.

I can succeed with my fondest hopes. But I must believe in my potential for success. I will ponder the positive today.

via March 24, 2012 – Today’s Gift from Hazelden « cmmacneil.

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On overlooking...

“The art of becoming wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.” -William James Anderson Layman’s Blog: On overlooking…

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Don’t Follow Your Passion, Follow Your Effort

Effort

The great philosopher Mark Cuban shares this…

I hear it all the time from people. “I’m passionate about it.” “I’m not going to quit, It’s my passion.” Or I hear it as advice to students and others “Follow your passion.”

What a bunch of BS. “Follow your passion” is easily the worst advice you could ever give or get.

Why? Because everyone is passionate about something. Usually more than one thing. We are born with it. There are always going to be things we love to do. That we dream about doing. That we really really want to do with our lives. Those passions aren’t worth a nickel.

Think about all the things you have been passionate about in your life. Think about all those passions that you considered making a career out of or building a company around. How many were/are there? Why did you bounce from one to another? Why were you not able to make a career or business out of any of those passions? Or if you have been able to have some success, what was the key to the success? Was it the passion or the effort you put in to your job or company?

If you really want to know where your destiny lies—look at where you apply your time.

Source: Don’t Follow Your Passion, Follow Your Effort [BLOG] « Positively Positive

Me? I think Cuban’s binary perspective that is BS. I am fond of saying it’s not either/or — it’s both/and. In this case, it’s not passion or effort — it is both harnessed and combined effectively. Go to the source if you’d like to read the rest of his perspective, but it seems to me he comes around when he says “When you are good at something, passionate, and work even harder to excel and be the best at it, good things happen.” imho, passion is the fuel that makes the effort possible; without one you don’t have the other…

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Here’s How To End Suffering Once And For All

Love On The Rocks...lol

Mastin Kipp of The Daily Love shares this…

I am not saying that painful things in your past didn’t happen, but what I am saying is that they no longer have to be painful. And it’s not as easy as changing your mind once or twice. It takes work, and reps, like in the gym. But if you try and try enough over time, new life and new meaning can emerge.

One of the best ways I know how to do this is to take ourselves out of our own story and step into the thoughts, feelings and beliefs of the person who hurt us. Not so we can make right what they did, but so we can begin to understand the painful event from their point of view.

As I have guided clients through this process, the outcomes have been amazing. Forgiveness on a whole new level of themselves and others. And of VERY traumatic events.

The point of forgiveness is not to make right what happened, but to bring a new sense of empathy and compassion to all involved – this includes you.

The best way to get back at people who have hurt us is to forgive them, because that is how we break the bond over the painful event. And from there, when we step into their shoes of how they must have been thinking and feeling, we begin to understand that their actions were not truly against us, but a request for Love or Significance in a very messed up way; that was the best way that they knew how to at that time.

Source: Here’s How To End Suffering Once And For All!

Go to the source if you’d like the rest of his perspective on the issue…

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