Being motivated to be a better version of you today than you were yesterday can be hard. It is especially hard when you don't know yourself or don't love yourself. When you love yourself, you can generate the energy it takes to change. When you don't love yourself, it is hard to even get started. Get motivated to be a better you today by loving yourself. Here are some suggestions to get you started.
Me Time
Before you can overcome any problems that are associated from low self-esteem, you need to determine if you have low self-esteem. You might be shocked to realize that low self-esteem is not a rare problem, it is rather quite common, and people have to deal with it every day. In order to tell if you have low self-esteem you will need to know what symptoms to look for.
The first symptom that you need to look at for is the inability to make decisions. People with low self-esteem usually have a hard time making any kind of decision, whether it is for himself or herself or for somebody else. The reason for this is that they are afraid of making the wrong decisions. It can also be because they are afraid of not being able to make people happy because they are not good enough to make the decision.
If you are unhappy with how you life is going or how you feel about yourself one of the best things that you can do is take the time necessary to improve yourself. Self-improvement will go a long way towards making you feel good about yourself, but they can also make you happier with your life. Being happy with yourself and your life is one-step closer towards living a happy and healthy life.
If you are interested in improving your life here are some tips that you can follow to begin improving it.
It's every kids dream to move out of the house. Their parents can't boss them around anymore, they can make their own rules, and life will be good. However, sometime between childhood and adulthood, the dream of moving out can lose its glamor. Moving out is a big step to becoming your own person. It signifies that you are an adult and can fend for yourself. A lot of young adults can lose their motivation to get out of the house because of fear, doubt, and their unwillingness to shoulder responsibility. If you are one of those, you may ask how you get motivated to go out on your own. To get motivated to move out on your own and fend for yourself, the following tips can get you started.
Do you ever find yourself in pajamas still when dinner time rolls around? Do you ask yourself what the point is of getting ready for the day if you aren't going anywhere? A lot of stay-at-home moms find themselves in this situation. They lack the motivation to get ready for the day when the only one who will see them is their child. When you aren't going anywhere or seeing anyone, how do you get motivated to get ready for the day? Here are some helpful tips to get you up and going, even when no one is looking.
There is a fine line to being out-going and assertive and being over-bearing and aggressive. Understanding the essential differences is the first step to becoming a better you and being more assertive. Assertive behavior can save you from wasting time, but if it develops into aggressiveness, it can limit your potential. Most people are under assertive. They float through life letting others walk over them or walk by them. They may want to make new friends, learn new things, or be adventurous, but they are afraid. Get motivated to be more out-going and assertive by following a few simple rules that can change your view of yourself and give you the self-confidence to do instead of just dream.
People who are in control of their emotions are better able to control their behavior. Being emotionally healthy makes one better prepared to take on the inevitable changes of life. For most people, making mental changes is not necessarily the first thing that is done. Many people take emotional health for granted. There are many things you can do to boost your mood, build resilience, and get more enjoyment out of life through making metal changes that will help you to be a better you.
Everyone has something that they would like to change or improve about themselves. Sometimes finding methods for self improvement is difficult. It is much easier to find flaws and suggest improvements for others. Therefore, the first step in improving yourself is to take some time for introspection to determine which characteristics you are happy with and which characteristics you would like to change. Remember the point to making efforts in improving yourself is not to have a pity party and feel badly about your faults, but to positively look for ways to be better.
Few people have made the conscious effort to be fine with just how smart they are and therefore rid themselves of the desire to be any smarter. In fact, we would label someone with this mentality as dumb. So if we all want to be smarter, what is keeping us from doing it? The logical explanation is that we do not know how. Aside from going back to school, a huge time, and financial commitment, what can be done to get smarter? Fortunately, there are plenty of things that you can do on any budget and with any schedule that can beef up your brainpower.
The process of how to be better is going to be different for everyone. For those who are religious, a course on how to be better may include suggestions like attending church services, paying more often or committing more time to serving God. For someone who is struggling with health issues, a lesson on how to be better at managing your weight, exercising, and avoiding junk food may be most appropriate. But there are some principles of being better that apply to all of us, no matter what our personal flaws are. We can become better human beings, by taking the time to focus on others instead of ourselves. What is ironic is that in most cases being better person comes easiest when our focus is not on improving ourselves, but in being there for someone else.
If you've just suffered through a break-up you may be posed with the question: Can we still be friends? The answer is no; at least, not right away. If you've been together for a while, you've probably become confidants and loyal friends, so you don't want to throw that away, but you'll only be paving your road with pain if you jump from intimacy to just friends right away. Seeing someone frequently that you are no longer involved with in the same way (intimately) can be very painful for one, or both of you. There are steps you have to take before you can really become just friends with your ex, but if you do it right, you could be rewarded with a brilliant friendship from a difficult break-up.
Can you be friends with someone overnight? Yes, but most of the time, building friendships is a long process, especially friendships that will last. It takes patience to find and keep friends that will have meaning in your life. People come and go, but there are some simple things you can do to keep the best of them by your side and keeping you company along the road of life.
Pain is a part of everyone's life. But while everyone does have to feel some pain in their life, many people might be creating some of their own pain. It is this type of pain that a person can work to move away from. This movement away from pain can be hard and discouraging at times, but it can be done and is definitely worth it. This article discusses how a person can move away from pain.
Your soul is what defines your personality, the way you act, and how you feel, among other things.
Enriching and improving your soul can make your life more fulfilling. If you want to work on improving your soul, consider the following tips:
Everyone wants to be healthy, in mind, body, and spirit. If you feel like your body could use some improvement, you're not alone.
Whether you want to lose some weight or just be healthier and stronger overall, the following are some tips for helping you to improve your body:
Believing in yourself is not always easy, especially as we get older and have experienced things in life that lead us to believe we are not capable of doing certain things, whether it be discouragement from friends and family or anything else.
Everyone has goals in dreams in life, but they will be impossible to obtain unless you believe in yourself. The following are some tips to help you believe in yourself and reach your full potential.
Oftentimes, we find traits within ourselves that we would like to change. For some people, this is selfishness.
Selfishness, which includes focusing on yourself, your wants, and your desires and withholding things from other people, is harmful to all relationships, whether it's a friend, spouse, child, or coworker. Rather than thinking about the other person and their needs, you are focused solely on you, what you want, how the situation is affecting you, and so forth.
Being charitable is a wonderful trait to have. Charitable people give freely of their time and resources and are not selfish. As a result, they tend to have a very positive effect on the lives of many people, whether they know who they have helped or not.
Being more charitable doesn't mean just donating to charities. There are a number of ways you can be more charitable. You don't even have to have a lot of money-or any-to be charitable. Donating your time, talents, and resources are all ways you can be charitable without spending money.
Becoming a better person means recognizing faults and character flaws in ourselves and then working to correct them.
Everyone has things they need to work on. For some people, this is being judgmental. While most people judge others to a certain extent, some have more of a problem controlling it than others. Being judgmental can be anything from thinking someone is stupid for their personal religious beliefs to telling your friend she's a bad parent for letting her kids drink soda.
Think about the people you truly love and admire. If you were asked to describe some of their traits, chances are, you will say, "They're nice."
People value kindness in others. However, it's becoming more and more of a lost art. It seems like so many people now are quick with a frown, a rude remark, or other unkind acts. If you would like to be kinder, consider some of the following tips.
When you are ready to self improve you will find that there are tons of resources, and information available to you that will help you along the way. There are probably things that can help you staring you straight in the face, and you just do not notice them because you are not ready. However, each of us has the power to self improve. Often we do not recognize the need for self improvement because we get worse and worse gradually. So, it may take a major life crisis, or a significantly painful experience to get us to the point where we can improve our lives.
Thinking positive thoughts is one of the best ways to get motivated and stay motivated. We live in a society where few people are motivated. We see several people living mediocre lives never really progressing and moving up, and those people all wonder why they are not the lucky ones who struck it rich, or found great happiness and success in their careers. The fact is that positive thinking, and motivation go hand in hand, and with the right amount of both, you can stop living a mediocre life, and start living a great life.
"The more you think positive the more motivated you will be" »
Too many people go through life thinking that things happen to them. The truth is, we make things happen to us. While it is true that setbacks and road bumps are a very real part of life, the truth is also that we control our life. We determine if we will find success, or meet failure. We determine if we will be happy, or miserable. We determine if we will find joy and peace, or fear and anxiety. Our thoughts, actions, and approach to life are in our control, and it is through those things that we control our life. So, if you want to take life into your own hands, you can. Stop letting things happen to you, and start determining what you will get out of life.
No matter how old a person is or where they are in life, it is never too late for them to start making changes in their life. Making changes takes time and there are some steps that a person should take to start to make changes in their life. This article discusses starting now to make changes in your life.
Self improvement is something everyone should try to accomplish on a daily basis. We all have room for improvement, whether it is being smarter, kinder, richer, funnier, calmer, or any number of other attributes. The following are some great tips to make self improvement easier, and natural:
Yelling is something that many people do without even thinking about it. But the reality is that it can be very damaging to relationships and can be the start of worse problems. It may be a sign of violent tendencies or just an inability to cope with difficult situations. There are many reasons why a person would feel like they need to yell about something, but there are also lots of reasons why you shouldn't yell to get the message across.
Introduction
Do you know someone who inspires you? Someone who always has the right thing to say at the right time? Do you wish that you could be an inspirational friend for someone else? I think that we all want to be able to provide those we care about with the hope, love, and motivation that they need. But the ability to inspire others is not something that most people work to attain; it comes naturally to a select few. Fortunately, there are ways that you can improve your chances of inspiring others and at the same time, you can do wonders to improving your own life in the process.
How to inspire others
There is nothing better than being able to provide the right words of solace to someone who needs it. But those words and emotions have to come from somewhere. Though it is unlikely that you will become an inspiring person overnight, there are some simple ways that you can inspire those around you to be their best as you try to be yours.
Everyone has room for improvement. No matter how much money you are making, you could make more. No matter how kind you are, you could be kinder. No one is exempt from being able to improve or be a bit better. Take a look at your life right now. No matter where you are, or how happy you are with it, there is always room for that extra degree. The following is a look at some things you can do without too much time or effort to be just a little bit better:
Everyone has strengths. But it can be difficult for a person to pinpoint their own strengths and find out what they are good at. Even though it is hard, it is not impossible. There are actually many different ways that a person can find what they are good at, and this article discusses several of them.
Introduction
Making the most of every day can be a very difficult thing when you aren't happy with yourself and they way things are going in your life. But it doesn't have to be that way because you can still find joy in life no matter what is happening. It is a challenge to do this, but following some simple steps can help you do much better in your quest to be happy and joyful.
Steps
It's no secret; life isn't always what we want it to be. However, we don't have to settle for less than we deserve. There are plenty of ways to live life to its fullest and to make sure you get the most out of your own life. Here are some tips on how to experience life at a higher level than just mediocre.
When people hear or talk about talents, many times the phrase, use it or lose it, will come up. This is true. When it comes to talents, if a person does not use the talent they have, it is very likely that they will lose the ability they have. That is why it is important to cultivate talents. But how does a person cultivate their talents? This article discusses just how to do it.
Introduction
Few of us are completely satisfied with the person that we have become. Most people, when truly honest with themselves, acknowledge that there is always room for improvement. While perfection is near impossible to achieve, we can do things that will help us to get closer to our best self.
Introduction
Being a kinder person is something that most of us could work on. Some people have already earned the label of being a grouch, while others have only those one or two stressors where they find it hard to show kindness. Whatever your situation is, there are always options available for improving your level of kindness.
It's difficult to balance everything that life throws at us. Finding a healthy balance between our work life and our home life is hard to do. With a little help however it can be done without losing your mind. Here's how to achieve balance in life while still have a full time job.
There is a lot of good in the world out there for the taking. There are high paying jobs, lovely people, flowers, delicious foods, fun vacations, and more. However, most people only sample a fraction of the wonderful opportunities out there. So, what can you do to grab what life has to offer?
Self-limiting beliefs are those things you believe about yourself that place limitations on your abilities. These can be conscious thoughts like, "I am so busy I will never have time to date." Or they may be unconscious thoughts like, "I am so fat no one will ever marry me." Some of these self limiting beliefs are founded, for example, you might actually be fat, and it might interfere with your ability to get dates. Or they might be unfounded, such as thinking that you are not lucky enough to get a good job. The problem with self-limiting beliefs is that they simply are not true. That you are fat may well be true. That no one will marry you as a result definitely isn't. That you might not get a job is true. However, luck isn't the criterion for getting a job. You get jobs based on merit. So, the first step to eliminating self-limiting beliefs is to realize that they are not logical.
The following is a way become a better person by learning how to forgive. Forgiveness is difficult and can mean swallowing a lot of humble pie, but if you can do it, you will feel better, look better, and be better.
Feeling good about who you are so that you can become better really is easy. Changing the way you feel about yourself, self-esteem, is going to be the first step to becoming a better you. Your outlook on who you are and how you see yourself can affect everything you do.
Learning to be patient, no matter how angry you are can be very challenging. Anger is a natural emotion but also an extremely powerful emotion that is hard for some people to express in a healthy manner. However, anger is rarely productive but it is an emotion that is normal and should be expressed. Practicing patience is a way to deal effectively with anger. Many times if a situation has caused feelings of anger, being patient can help deal with those feelings and allow you to deal with the situation in a calm, healthy way. Anger that is not expressed in a healthy, effective way can have negative effects on a person's health and well being.
It can be extremely difficult to find the motivation to believe in yourself especially if you feel no one does. But if you do not believe in yourself, how can you expect anyone else to? Only you can make your dreams come true and accomplish many great things in your life. Motivate yourself toward a life that if right for you and achieve the things that you want to achieve, not what someone else wants you to.
How to assess your self-help needs? The thing about self- help is you need to know where you want to help yourself. Assessing the needs you have in order to know what your needs are for helping yourself will take a little inward looking at your feelings.
Self-help books sell by the millions. The reason for this is that as humans, there is no manual that we are given at birth. We all learn things in different ways. Some of us want to learn by choice and mistake. While there are others of us that want to learn by other peoples mistakes. This is a funny way of looking at it, but seriously, this is what self-help is all about. We need to learn about something that specifically affects our lives.
This can be a specific aspect of your life, your body, your profession etc. However, it can also be an aspect of your husband or wife's life, your child's life, or a professional aspect of your life.
It can be difficult to expand our interests because we get so comfortable doing what we know how to do. We have fall backs for lack of learning new things, such as the television to watch, or the internet to surf. So, instead of learning and expanding as a society we remain stagnant.
It can be difficult to find motivation within yourself to break away from your everyday routine. We get used to doing what we do, and don't have an easy time finding the intrinsic motivation we need. The following are some tips for how to expand your interests and get motivated to learn new things.
"Motivation:How to expand your interests and get motivated to learn new things" »
If you want to expand your horizons you have to make it a priority to get out of your comfort zone daily, weekly, and monthly. This can start with little things, and move toward bigger, less comfortable things. Let's take a look at some examples and how they can help you to expand your horizons:
Daily: Decide something that you encounter regularly that makes you uncomfortable. For example, perhaps you take your child to school every day, and each morning you see the mother's of the other children, but you are too uncomfortable to talk to them. So, your daily trip outside of your comfort zone is that you will waive, or make a friendly hand gesture to the other ladies. This may not be easy for you, but it will mean that you have done something to at least try and expand your horizons.
Your success in life is tightly tied to your ability and will to live up to your potential. So why is it that all of us struggle to live up to our potential? How can we change our lives and live up to our potential? Keep reading and learn how.
1. Identify your strengths. In order to live up to your potential, you need to be able to identify your strengths- your talents or things that make you a unique and worthwhile person. You have the power to change your habits. You can acquire new skills and fully develop and use the skills you have. Once you've identified the strengths you do have, gaining new ones becomes that much easier.
Your success in life is tightly tied to your ability and will to live up to your potential. So why is it that all of us struggle to live up to our potential? How can we change our lives and live up to our potential? Keep reading and learn how.
1. Identify your strengths. In order to live up to your potential, you need to be able to identify your strengths- your talents or things that make you a unique and worthwhile person. You have the power to change your habits. You can acquire new skills and fully develop and use the skills you have. Once you've identified the strengths you do have, gaining new ones becomes that much easier.
How to become a better you? The hard part about becoming a better you is that you need to know what that means to you. The only person who knows what a better you is, you.
Therefore, in order to become a better you, it will first be important to know what a better you are to you. The steps to doing that will be as follows:
It seems as though our society has become more and more lazy over the last few decades. With the invention of so many new electronics such as TV, video games, and computers, as well as many others, we tend to be more cloistered in our homes and less motivated to get out of our comfort zones and try new hobbies, meet new people, and learn new things, and basically expand our interests.
It can be difficult to find motivation within yourself to break away from your everyday routine. Most people get caught up in doing the same things day in and day out - wake up, go to work or school, come home, eat dinner, watch TV, and then go to bed. It takes quite a bit of self-discipline to break free of this routine.
"How to expand your interests and get motivated to learn new things" »
For many years society has had a great interest on focusing on the external body image. Yet, it is becoming more well known that it is just as critical to concentrate on the importance of our inner self image and motivation exercises that will help you to achieve your goals and dreams.
We must develop "positive self image" to be able to attain the confidence that we require to reach our highest potential.
Self-image is the image you have of yourself, that is, self-image is the way you see yourself as relating to your friends, your work, your talents, your family, and so forth. Self-image is important; if you have a positive self-image you'll generally do positive things, and if you have a negative self-image you'll generally do negative things, or do nothing at all. Now, this rule doesn't always hold, because there are plenty of people with a low self-image who do positive things. But the fact is that there's a good chance that they're not being as effective as they could be otherwise; and the fact is there's a good chance they're not as happy as they could be otherwise.
Let's consider some tips for improving your self-image.
One of life's most difficult challenges is to stop worrying about the idiotic things Fred and Joe are doing and worry instead about our own tiny imperfections. We're not talking about "Fred and Joe are experimenting with dynamite in my bathroom, which ironically is where I keep my invaluable shot glass collection, but really I don't want to be a hypocrite because after all I eat too much sugar." No, we're talking about those things which seem huge because of their emotional impact but which narrow into manageable proportions once we take a deep breath, step back, and look at our own behavior.
1. In some ways, the question answers itself. Most of us are aware of one fault or another, whether it be laziness, irritability on the road, chronic abuse of pain meds, cheating in class, cruelty to animals, cruelty to people who are cruel to animals, an unreasoning hatred of Democrats or Republicans (depending on what you are; I guess Democrats AND Republicans would work, too), and so on.
"How to focus on what you need to improve, not on what others need to improve" »
Most people want to improve and become better people, but don't really have an idea of how to do this or where to start. One of the best things to do before you decide what needs to happen in order to improve yourself is for you to decide what it is that you think makes a good person. Really slow down, and make a list of what you think constitutes a good person, and then go for it. Do what you need to do to become the human being you want to be. The image of the best person, is individual to you. Make sure that you know what that means to you, personally. If you need a place to start, here are some ideas of things that generally make people into better individuals.
One way you can help yourself to become a better person is by doing service for other people. This is one of the best ways to improve yourself. By helping others, you will be creating change in the world and making life a little easier for other people. You will also be motivating others to do good as well. Serving others increases personal satisfaction incredibly by helping your self esteem to grow. The more service you do, the more you will want to do. If you begin this chain of doing good for other people, it will be hard to break.
Being spiritually centered and calm can greatly improve your happiness. Whether involved with an organized religion or not, spirituality is very important. It's a common misconception that spirituality is about improving your knowledge of your religion. Improving yourself in this way is wonderful for your spirit, but the true meaning of gaining spirituality is simply having a healthy and peaceful soul. Here are some things you can do, both within organized religion and out, to help have a healthy and happy soul:
In the fast-paced world that we live in, most of us are often incredibly busy. We are usually constantly at work or school or cleaning or doing activities or something else, and it's tough to slow down. Often times when we do finally get the opportunity to slow down, it's really hard to even get the motivation that we need in order to have any sort of desire or want to make an effort. Here are some ways to help get that motivation to make the push and give the effort that your goals require to become accomplishments.
1. First of all, remember who you are making these changes for and what your reasons are. No matter what it is that you are doing, or what it is that you're having a hard time becoming motivated for, it is most likely that you have really strong and powerful reasons behind the desire to do this. Make sure you know where this desire is stemming from. If you can really set down what your internal motivation is, that will help you incredibly to want to make this effort to accomplish the things that are important to you. This can be especially helpful if your desire stems from a need to please your family. Wanting to be a good spouse or parent sparks a fire under most people. Try to tie your desires to improve to your family, and think about how what you are changing will positively affect and help them.
Almost everyone wants to become a better person. The difficult part isn't wanting to be better, it's getting motivated to expand your list of personal qualities and positive attributes. Being motivated sounds a lot easier than it actually is. You can have all the desire in the world to change and become a better person, but when it actually comes down to taking the steps to do so, it is often a different story. So how do you gain this motivation? Here are a few tips:
1. Make sure that you have good role models and examples. Surround yourself with successful people as much as you can. If you spend time with people who have a lot of success with what they do, you will see how greatly the personal qualities and positive attributes that they have affect their happiness. It can be very inspirational to see this. When you spend time with people who have the attributes you want to have, pay particular attention to their happiness. Seeing this will help you to desire to improve yourself, and you will get the motivation that you've been seeking. By having these type of people around you, you will realize that improving yourself is possible, and you will be better motivated to go out and get what you're looking for.
"Getting motivated to expand your list of personal qualities and positive attributes" »
With motivation it is possible to accomplish just about anything. The most common thing stopping the average person from achieving their goals is a lack of motivation. A lack of motivation can have serious effects on many aspects of your life. Being able to find motivation within affects your professional life, your relationships with others and even the way that you value yourself. If you can manage to stay ahead of the game through motivation you will have discovered that you are a better person overall because of it.
Stay ahead of others on the corporate ladder...
The most common interview question - The motivation question lies behind a huge part of the interview process. According to a recent poll, employers were asked "What are the first questions that you ask when looking for an individual's qualifications?" The most common responses of questions asked at every interview were: "Can you do the job?" and "Why do you want the job?" Employers know that you need the money that a job will give them, what they are looking for is something more. They are looking to see if you have the motivation to accomplish the particular job that you are applying for.
The hidden attribute - When employers look to hire or promote individuals they often define motivation through the use of many other comparable terms. Employers say that they promote individuals who have the right "chemistry" or "attitude." It is an individual's motivation that is often seen as their personality. Motivation can be apparent in a firm handshake just as much as the lack of motivation can be perceived as poor communication and weak leadership skills.
When you want to establish a habit, whether in yourself, or in others (like your children), there are some specific things you would need to do in order to do so.
Practice. If you want it to become habit you have to do it over and over until it becomes so, this is practicing. If you want kindness to be a habit, you have to practice being kind, even when someone cuts you off while driving. It is the practice of bad habits that makes them into habits. So, it works for good and bad, if you start consciously doing something, and you practice it, and do it often enough, it becomes habit, and you will do it without thinking about it. However, this is not overnight, or simple.
Working from home is a dream for most of us. Dedication, commitment and hard work could lead us to a very successful "working at home' business. What are some of the steps for staying motivated to work from home?
Working from home can be a wonderful opportunity for anyone, but also a headache. There are so many ads "working at home businesses" on the internet, newspapers, on the side of the roads offering easy jobs with great pay that a lot of us desperate moms or dads fall for. Because of hope, we see ourselves spending money responding to those ads and be terribly disappointed when none of those "working at home" ads fulfill what they offer.
For most students, the most difficult part of the learning experience, is learning how to become self-motivated. The ability to be a motivated student is very difficult, and often times, when it comes down to making a decision between completing an assignment on time and doing something else more entertaining, such as going to a movie or out with friends, the decision is not what it should be. There are many things you can do to help become a more motivated student, and setting a plan to accomplish your goals is crucial.
1. One of the most important things when attempting to motivate yourself in your schooling is to remember the cost of paying for school. It is a very good thing to remind yourself once in a while how much you spent on any given class's tuition. When deciding whether you should give your full effort to a class or not, the reminder that $400 or so worth of tuition money was spent to pay for the class will remind you of the importance of the class. You wouldn't have paid that money in the first place if the outcome of doing well wasn't important to you. So remember your long term goals, because having an end in sight always helps.
There are many different things that you can improve in your life. One might be motivation. Motivation is a hard thing not to have these days. Sometimes it takes motivation to get through a day. With out the right motivation things might get over looked or might not even get done. Helping motivate people by positive reinforcement is better than trying to do it by negative reinforcement. Here are some reasons why increasing motivation through positive reinforcements is a good thing and the rewards that can come from it.
The first reason why increasing motivation through positive reinforcement is a good thing is because it makes people think that you are actually noticing what a good job they are doing and will help them want to do more. For example if an employee is working on a project for work give them positive reinforcement. This will help them feel good about themselves and it will increase their motivation to want to succeed if they think that what they are doing is worthwhile. If there is no positive reinforcement and they think they are just doing a project to occupy time they won't be motivated and will not give it all they can.
"Increasing motivation through positive reinforcement and rewards" »
There are many different ways that one can increase motivation. One way that you can increase motivation is through positive reinforcement. Another way to increase motivation is through celebrating the successes. Here are some ways to increase motivation by celebrating successes.
The first way to increase motivation by celebrating successes is with your children. Children increase motivation when they are rewarded. One way to reward your kids is by celebrating their successes for example if your child does good on a test that they have been working hard to study for take the time to notice and maybe even take them out for ice cream or something. Celebrating their successes will help increase their motivation to do as good as they can because they know it will not go unnoticed.
Most people have trouble focusing on the task at hand, in order to solve this problem there are several things you can try to motivate yourself to focus on what needs to be done. Your state of mind and daily life play a role in what you are able to focus on at any time. When you go to work just push everything that does not pertain to work out of your mind and think only of getting your work done. Here are a few things you can try to keep yourself focused on the work you are supposed to do.
1. Relax: If you are feeling a bit overwhelmed you will not be able to focus, so take a minute and breathe. Take several deep breaths until you feel calm.
a. Stop and think: Take a minute to sit back and think clearly about what you are doing and what you want to do and go from there. You will be more motivated to work if you have a clear head.
b. Meditate: Sit in a quiet place with no distractions and close your eyes and ears, take a deep breath in and let it back out again, clear your mind. You will find that you are able to focus on your work because you are only thinking about work.
2. Take a break: Get up and go for a walk for about 5 minutes then come back to your desk or work area and get back to work, you will be able to focus on your task if you take a break ever so often. Take a longer bathroom break, go outside and get some fresh air.
There are so many different things that you can do that just benefits you and only you. You can buy yourself a new outfit or get a new hair style. But one of the most important things that people will notice more than anything else you can buy is your confidence. If you do not have good confidence and do not know why it is so important to always try to increase your self confidence here are some reasons how increased confidence benefits you.
The first reason how increased confidence benefits you is because it will help you to feel better about yourself. Most people that have low confidence are because they feel like they do not fit in or feel intimidated by the people around them. Having increased confidence will make you feel good about yourself and to feel like you fit in and have a purpose in life. Feeling comfortable around people will help you to make more friends and want to get more involved in different activities whether it be with the community or in different daily activities.
Are you a nag? Do you worry too much? Are you always poking your nose into other people's business? Do you focus too much on the negative? Are you judgmental? Are you quick to jump on the bandwagon? Most everyone has a personality flaw they wish they could get rid of. However, most everyone also makes excuses for why they have it, and why they can't change it. "It's just my personality" is a common cop out. Personality flaws are not embedded, we develop a personality, and we can change it, we just have to have the right motivation. So, how do you motivate yourself to improve personality flaws?
1. Recognize the flaw: Obviously the first step to changing, or improving a personality flaw is to recognize it as a flaw. All too often we can readily see flaws in others, but neglect to see our own flaws. So, in order to motivate yourself to improve your personality flaws, you have to truly know it is a flaw. It might be helpful to look at others with this same flaw, and see how it affects your relationship with them, how others are affected, and what results this characteristic has caused for them. Like stated earlier, it is easier to recognize problems in others, and thus it is also easier to see the consequences of these flaws. So, for example, if you have a neighbor who gossips a lot, and you want to change that habit, or personality flaw in yourself, look at how their gossiping makes you feel about them. Look at how others feel about them. Do you want others to feel that way about you?
When you are trying to stay motivated and focused, distractions are never a good thing. So, how can you fix a distracting environment so that you are able to stay motivated? Well, the fixes are simple, but only if you are dedicated to creating a distraction free environment. The answer is simple, you remove the distractions:
Figure out what your distractions are. If you are not sure what your distractions are, you can't remove them. So, your first step in creating a distraction free environment so that you can stay motivated is to determine what your distractions are. You figure out your distractions by noting them on paper whenever a distraction occurs. So, keep a pad of paper and a sharp pencil or a pen. Each time you are distracted, write it down. Those are the distracting elements that need to be fixed.
"How to fix a distracting environment so you can stay motivated" »
Being motivated can be difficult, to make it easier, you may want to try and find someone to stay motivated with. When you have a motivated partner, you are much more likely to get and stay motivated yourself. Let's just take a look at an example.
Let's say you made a goal at New Year's to work out every day. You did really well for a week or two, but then you had a late night, there was a big snow storm, and you got a cold. Suddenly your motivation to keep your goal and work out each day goes out the window. However, let's say at New Year's when you make this goal, you enlist a friend to work out with you. Each morning the two of you meet at the gym, a park, etc. You work out together, then part ways. Having this work out buddy means that despite a late night, bad weather, or being a little sick, you are going to make an effort to get up each morning and be at the gym, park, etc. Why? Well, the following are the reasons why, the how's of how a motivated partner can help you stay motivated:
Discipline, hope, self improvement, motivation, behavior, attitude, desire
The mind is one powerful key to self improvement. Your behavior, attitude and habits develop strongly through what you see, touch, experience in your own personal life or shared by someone else. Self improvement, where to begin?
Everyone wants to achieve more. Just look at how successful self-help books like Seven Habits of Highly Effective People are. Sometimes it can be hard to be motivated long enough to read through an entire book like that though. So, here are a few quick ideas on ways to motivate yourself to achieve more.
1. Set achievable goals
It is a lot easier to accomplish more when there are specific goals to be met. Make small goals to reach a bigger goal so as not to bite off more than can be chewed. For example, if a person wants to lose 30 pounds they should start with losing 1-3 pounds week. Trying to lose 30 can seem intimidating and can be frustrating. Setting unrealistic goals encourages people to give up. Instead, set a very reachable goal for a shorter period of time. Keep the same goal until it can be consistently met. If the person on a diet can't lose 1-3 pounds in a week they certainly shouldn't aim for 3-5 pounds in a week. They should keep the same goal until they meet it. And if they have a hard time doing that, they should drop down to a daily goal. A daily goal for someone trying to lose weight could be something simple like going for a 15 minute walk. So the first tip for ways to motivate yourself to achieve more is to set and keep achievable goals.
Confidence is one of the greatest keys to success in this life. Confidence is central to being successful and satisfied in your professional life, in your schooling, and in your interpersonal relationships, both romantic, familial, and friendly. But many of us have difficulty developing this confidence. Before you get down on yourself even more for not being confident enough, look at these 7 tips for adopting a more confident behavior so that you can start to see your life go more the way that you would like.
7 tips for adopting a more confident behavior
We have conversations constantly, all day, every day. Conversations are the way that deals are made, things get done, and relationships are formed and strengthened. But many of us aren't particularly confident in our conversational skills. Here are 6 ways that you can converse more confidently. Practicing these 6 conversation tips will help you improve your conversations, which means that you can improve your success at work and at school, and improve your relationships with other people.
6 ways to converse more confidently
We have conversations constantly, all day, every day. Conversations are the way that deals are made, things get done, and relationships are formed and strengthened. But many of us aren't particularly confident in our conversational skills. Here are 6 ways that you can converse more confidently. Practicing these 6 conversation tips will help you improve your conversations, which means that you can improve your success at work and at school, and improve your relationships with other people.
6 ways to converse more confidently
Looking and sounding confident is important because it inspires trust in other people, and also makes you feel better about yourself. Here are 5 ways that you can sound more confident.
5 ways to sound more confident
1. Speak clearly.
2. Enunciate your words-stop mumbling!
3. Avoid using slang.
4. Clarify your comments.
5. Practice, practice, practice!
Confident body language and confident appearance are two of the most important tools that you have in interpersonal communication and as you strive to achieve your various goals in life. Here are 4 ways that you can look more confident. Looking more confident will help you influence others, will help you strengthen your relationships, and will make you more effective at work, at school, and at home.
4 ways that you can look more confident:
There are 4 great reasons why you should develop confident body language.
Developing more confident body languages is one of the first and most important steps in developing a more effective and successful approach to your personal life and your professional life.
So much of society is based on first impressions. This fact is completely unavoidable. And much of first, second, third, and tenth impressions are based on your body language. For people to be able to trust you in business decisions, or in personal decisions, they need to be assured of your own confidence and their own confidence in you.
How many times have you thought, "I will finally get to that!" or "It's a new year and I am going to." Many times we seemed to be swallowed in life by our intentions. We plan on doing something but seemed to be sidelined by the everyday concerns and needs of our lives. Perhaps some sort of life changes has led us to setting goals and forming a plan but that now leaves us with the next question-How do I achieve the goals I have set? If the process of goal setting has been followed in setting realistic, attainable goals and the goals have been written down in detail then the following steps can help anyone looking to put a goal-setting plan into motion-
1. Follow your goals with positive action. By using the power of positive thinking followed by positive action
The years pass by quickly and we seem to be caught in the rush of have to's as we scurry through our lives. Being so caught up in the everyday routine may lead us to forget what we truly want to accomplish in life. Then suddenly an event small or large may occur that makes us sit up and take notice. Often these events cause us to reflect on our life plan and we may determine we are not going or being where we want to be. In these moments, life seems to take on a new perspective. We see with clarity the wrong turns we've taken along the way. Fortunately there are two directions to look: backward and forward. It is at these times we may turn to our life plan and begin setting concrete goals that will chart us in a different direction. We know that by setting goals and working hard we can get to a place we want to be. Yet while we had gained some clarity we may still be overwhelmed by the choices ahead of us. This is where the ability to set goals and master them becomes key. The following techniques have been shown to be the most effective in setting goals:
1. Most importantly-Write down your goals! This allows the goal to become something real and concrete. To often goals are only passing ideas because we fail to bring them some depth and possibility. Also by writing down your goals you have a permanent record of what you want to achieve. Post your goals where you can see them and be reminded of them.
Few of us would set off on a cross-country trip with only an agenda in mind and the hope that we might find the landmarks we are going to see. We would first figure out what we wanted to see, where the places were and decide the best way to get there. We would perhaps consult a travel agent and certainly we would look at a map. Unless we had all the time in the world we would then figure out how long it would take to reach our desired destinations. And finally we would go over exactly what we wanted to see and do when we reached our desired stops. Yet with all this planning for a trip we rarely put the same amount of planning into our lives. Using some simple goal-setting principles can provide anyone with a detailed map of priorities and desires and then help that person translate them into action. We dream of where we want to go we just need a map to get there. Following are 7 questions to ask yourself when setting any goal-
1. Is your goal something you really want or something that just sounds good? If you are working on something that is someone else's priority or doing it for someone else's approval you will probably not be as successful. Make sure that your goals are consistent with your values.
Are you un-motivated? Do you need the keys to effective self motivation? Motivation is something that we all want. Motivation can help us become more successful in our personal lives, in our work, at school, in our relationships, as well as many other aspects of our lives. Motivation is what helps us lose those extra five pounds, start up a business, or work on organizing the home office. If you're normal, you make a lot of goals and have a lot of really good intentions, but about two days later, they're already nothing more than a guilty memory as you slide right back into your old habits. It seems like motivation is one of the hardest things out there to actually get and keep. Well, today is your lucky day because it is possible to become effectively self motivated. Here are some tips and keys on how you too can become motivated and get those things done that you've always wanted to do, but were never quite motivated enough.
Experts break motivation into two different types of motivation: intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. Let's give an example of extrinsic motivation first. Extrinsic motivations are things outside of you that motivate you to do something-you go to work because you want the paycheck at the end of the month, for example. You exercise because you want your body to look a certain way. A good way to get extrinsically motivated is to set up awards or prizes for yourself. This acts as an effective way to motivate yourself to do something, if that works for you. For example, you can promise yourself that if you lose five pounds, you can go splurge on that pair of designer jeans that you really want. Or if you reach a certain goal at work, you can take a day off and go to a day spa or go golfing or something along those lines. The only way that these awards will work as extrinsic motivators, however, is if you don't cheat and go ahead and do them anyway, and if you continually work towards them instead of deciding that they don't quite matter that much.
Because people have many different temperaments, many different meditative techniques have been developed. If you have never meditated, you might wish to try several of the following techniques to discover which one is the best for you. If you respond to music, you can try an instrumental meditation tape. If you are a visual learner, you might start with Tratak. In any case, get into the habit of meditating by setting aside quiet time each day.
Meditation is a time to let go of your daily tensions and anxieties, a time to let your mind and body relax and just be. It is also a time to gain insights into your inner resources.
Witnessing
Witnessing is the purest form of meditation. It is simply sitting in meditation and watching the thoughts that come and go without judging or commenting. It is interesting to see what our moment-to-moment thoughts consist of from a completely neutral position.
Vipassana
Vipassana is a Buddhist meditation that focuses on the rise and fall of the breath. Vipassana means "breath." While the mind is engaged in focusing on your breathing it cannot focus on its usual distractions. In this meditation, your breathing should be gentle and regular. Just allow it to be the place where your mind is focused and enjoy the feeling of witnessing breathing rather than concentrating on it.
What brings luck your way? Luck isn't something you necessarily find, it's something you create. Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "Good luck is another name for tenacity of purpose." When you follow your passions, opportunities present themselves - and when you take those opportunities and come out ahead, you feel lucky! Keep your eyes open, keep your mind open and be willing to dive in when you find yourself in one of those "right time - right place" modes.
Often an optimistic attitude will open up a stream of good luck! A sense of the positive helps us to keep going when the going gets rough. And when we get through those rough spots, it feels easier, we feel luckier. Look at life as an adventure, and find joy in going after what you want.
And, just for the fun and "feng shui" of it, you might want to carry a lucky charm. A lucky charm can be anything that you believe will bring you that extra something you need to get you where you want to go. It can be a token (like a coin, a shell, or a rock) or it can be a piece of clothing, a color or a number, or a particular song you sing. Basically, a "charm" creates a kind of magical spell, which brings you confidence and comfort. It's something familiar, that we can rely on when we feel that our nerves, or circumstances, can get the better of us.
In a way, having a lucky charm is a little bit like leaving the details up to the universe. We admit that we only have so much control, and that there is an element of fate, or luck, involved. When we have our lucky charm with us, we feel like that luck is on our side - and we can give up some of the feeling that it is all up to us alone.
How many times have you made excuses for putting off something you really needed or wanted to do? Probably too many times to count. It is all too easy to get in the habit of putting the desires of your heart on hold. You may have been taught to put the needs of others first or that it is selfish to think of your own desires.
Mind you, there is times when it is appropriate and right to put the needs of others first, i.e., children, and others who have a right to depend on you.
Yet, even with that you must not always put yourself last and deny yourself the happiness that comes from doing something for yourself. The truth is, when we do something that brings us fulfillment, it has a positive impact on every area of our lives.Another truth is that if we don't do certain things we greatly desire for ourselves, that feeling of failure and disappointment often negatively impacts our lives. It doesn't have to be that way.
Now is the time to begin a new journey of personal and, perhaps even financial fulfillment. You have within you the ability to change your circumstances. The change begins when you make up your mind to stop putting off those things your really want, and ought to doing for yourself.
Friends, it is always a power of your dreams and a motive to move ahead, which is required to move ahead and to be successful in life. Does it sound, impractical; let me share with you, something practical and real.
Some real time facts:
1.Out of the first four stores F. W. Woolworth opened, three failed. When he died, he was worth more than $20 million.
2.Einstein was 4 years old before he could speak.
3.Isaac Newton did poorly in grade school and was considered "unpromising".
4.Beethoven's music teacher once said of him, "As a composer, he is hopeless".
5.Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team.
6.Walt Disney was fired from a newspaper because he "lacked imagination, and had no good ideas".
7.Thomas Edison's teacher told him he was too stupid to learn anything. Later, he tried 1,600 different materials before settling on carbon as the filament for the electric light bulb.
Over the years in America and the west generally, the nature and means of education have dramatically changed. But it is an error to think that before the contemporary era of schooling on a mass scale that no one was deeply or broadly educated. Many in colonial America were exceptionally well-educated, yet largely self-taught or taught by a tutor or mentor. Such was the case with scientist, lawyer, theologian, statesman, patriot and father of seven, Roger Sherman.
In his astonishingly productive life as one of the leading citizens of colonial America, Sherman studied privately with Rev. Samuel Danbar, worked as a shoemaker and then as a land surveyor and an author of an almanac filled with astronomical calculations. He read for the bar (as was the custom of his day) and became a lawyer, though he did not earn a college degree. He also read deeply in theology and received an honorary degree from Yale, where he became treasurer. He was even a professor of religion for many years.
Sherman was widely respected and known in Connecticut, as a list of the legislative, judicial and executive positions to which he was elected demonstrates: both houses of the Connecticut legislature, justice of the peace, judge of the Superior Court of Connecticut, member of the Continental Congress, delegate to the Constitutional Convention, Mayor of New Haven, member of the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate.
Think about what you're doing each day and ask yourself - "Is what I'm doing now getting me to where I want to get to?" If the answer is "No" then do something different. Get out of your comfort zone and change your habits.
An instructor was watching me use a piece of equipment in the gym the other day. "Let me show you a different way to do it" says he. As you'll guess, the "different" way was a lot harder, somewhat more painful, however a lot more likely to produce results.
The human body will always find an easy way to do things and so does our brain; however as we all know - "no pain - no gain." So if you want something different to happen - do something different.
The psychologist Abraham Maslow said - "If you deliberately plan to be less than you are capable of being; then I warn you that you will be unhappy for the rest of your life. You will be evading your own capabilities, your own possibilities."
It's never too late to make that change.
Ray Kroc, the founder of McDonalds, was over fifty when he started making money. Kroc was a paper cup salesman who obtained the marketing rights to a multi-mixer invented by Earl Prince. He criss-crossed the US for seventeen years selling these mixers until he met up with the McDonald brothers. Dick and Mac McDonald ordered eight of his mixers and had them churning away all day. Kroc was entranced by the effectiveness of the McDonald's operation and started thinking about building McDonald's restaurants all over the US. He thought he could then sell more multi-mixers. The McDonald brothers weren't too keen to the idea so they franchised the restaurants to Kroc. He ultimately bought out the McDonald brothers and as they say - the rest is history.
Lately, I’ve become super sensitive to the amount of excuses people make for not living up to their fullest potential.
I have a friend who is starting out on a new venture. He constantly complains that his new venture is not going the way he wants it to go. But, whenever I give him a suggestion to get around whatever he believes to be an obstacle, he ALWAYS has an excuse as to why my suggestion won’t work.
He is selling a product that he designed. He has the product available in a few stores, in which he personally knows the owners. He’s also trying to sell it on the Internet. But it isn’t selling like he thought it would because he knows nothing about computers or the Internet.
So, I suggested that he branch out and contact all stores in the state and surrounding states, to see if they would be interested in carrying his product.
His excuse is that he doesn’t know how he can find all of the stores that specialize in what he sells.
I suggest that he gets a yellow page or business-to-business book and simply call the storeowners.
Our friend, singer and songwriter Chuck Pyle, likes to say, "The mind is like a bad neighborhood-you should never go there by yourself." If you're mind hasn't been trained to help you, via methods like meditation, shamanism or NLP, it might really be a bad neighborhood. Our minds constantly absorb thoughts, behaviors, and responses from our environment. These various thought patterns and responses may or may not be in alignment with our goals. So, unless we actively train our minds to be responsive to our needs, we may be in for a wild chariot ride (and 6 out of control horses)!
From a shamanic point of view, we say that each person is a spirit with a mind and body. In other words, we are spirit and mind and body are tools that we, spirit, can use. However, just because we have mind as a tool doesn't mean that mind, in its current form, is a good tool for us. The untrained mind is a lot like an untrained animal-be prepared for the unexpected!
Have you ever sworn to yourself (say on New Year's Day?) that you're never going to fall for the wrong kind of mate again? Or you're going to lose 10 pounds this year? Or you're going to . the list is endless. Then what happens? We forget what we've promised ourselves, or we find other priorities that are more important. That forgetfulness is a sign that mind isn't trained to help us with our aims. Mind is doing its own thing.
If you suffer from a nagging feeling of "there must be more to life than this", you're not alone.
"There must be more to life than this" can be an extremely de-motivating force. Guess where this feeling usually comes from? Your Job. Why? Most people hate their jobs.
The first point that needs to be addressed is that it's okay to hate your job. It's normal! The amount of people who like their jobs are few and far between. Most that enjoy the daily grind are either very lucky or have been in their current job less than six months.
In life, many of us simply plunge ahead, only to realize later that some of the things we did, we wish we hadn't, and some of the things we didn't do, we wish we had. How do you keep yourself on the right track, the right path? And how can you live happily ever after? Here's how. Here's one simple easy-to-do thing that can help keep you on the right track and help you live happily ever after ...
Before you do something ask yourself, "will I be happier afterward?"
How does that work? How do you apply it to your life? Here are some examples ...
Before a person binged on something they shouldn't eat too much of, if they had asked themselves "will I be happier afterward?", maybe they would have binged less, or not binged at all.
Before a person bought an expensive, non-returnable item on impulse, if they had asked themselves "will I be happier afterward?", maybe they wouldn't have bought such a dumb thing and wasted their money.
Before a person jumped into bed with someone or moved in with someone or married someone or divorced someone, if they had asked themselves "will I be happier afterward?", maybe they wouldn't have done it (or maybe they would have!)
Clutter is a big problem for many people. At a lecture that I gave, I asked for a show of hands regarding how many people had problems with clutter and disorganization. I was surprised to find that at least half the people raised their hands.
One of my clients told me that she was trying to help her sister get back on her feet after her sister had been laid up with an illness and lost her job. Her sister’s house had always been a mess, and had become so filled with clutter that there was no place to walk or sit. My client, Rebecca, offered to buy her sister a car if she would clean up her house. Rebecca even offered to help her sister clean up the house. Rebecca was shocked when her sister refused the offer, even though she desperately needed the car. He sister was unwilling to get rid of the clutter.
Why? Why was the “stuff” so important to her?
Underneath all addictions lies fear - of emptiness, helplessness, loneliness and aloneness. Addictions are a way to feel safe from feeling these difficult and painful feelings, and an addiction to clutter is no exception. It’s all about having a sense of control over feeling safe. Clutter, like all addictions, provides a momentary feeling of comfort. However, as with any addiction, the clutterer needs more and more clutter to maintain the illusion of safety and comfort.
When my mother died and my son was cleaning out her house, he discovered huge amounts of clutter. While my mother’s house always looked neat and clean, the cupboards and drawers were filled with clutter. My son told me he found 6 broken hair dryers in one cabinet. Why would my mother want to keep six broken hair dryers?
If money is considered to be the root of all evil, then what would we classify as our addictions?
The psychology of the human mind is ultra complex when compared to any other species on earth, so why does it love to tangle itself up in a destructive mode? Once more, why would it seemingly feel right to be in this place in life?
Let’s drill down and put addictions in a separate folder. Psychological addictions are much more prevalent then physical ones; however, people can have both. When someone is psychologically addicted, they are obsessed with doing, having, and the idea of a specific concept swirls within.
If one is physically addicted, the actual body craves, but the mind can easily be trained that it also must “have it” in order to function properly.
Two main reasons behind the psychology of addictions are fairly simplistic human emotions that we all have. Self worth and security are the primary root reasons for our propensity to become addicted.
Example: An invitation lands inside your mailbox and many people that you know and don’t know are going to be there. Feeling unsecure about your abilities, you summon up the courage to consume three or four drinks to take off the edge and loosen yourself before the event takes place.
The Communication Process
Communication is defined as a process whereby information is exchanged between individuals through a common system of symbols, signs, or behaviours. Human communication is the process of making sense out of the world and sharing that sense with others. The process involves three components: verbal, non-verbal, and symbolic.
Verbal communications are the primary communication skills taught in the formal education system and include such things as reading, writing, computer skills, e-mail, talking on the phone, writing memos, and speaking to others. Non-verbal communications are those messages expressed by other than verbal means. Non-verbal communications are also known as ‘body language’ and include facial expressions, posture, hand gestures, tone of voice, smell, and other communications perceived by our senses. We cannot not communicate and even when we don’t speak, our non-verbal communications convey a message. Symbolic communications are demonstrated by the cars we drive, the houses we live in, and the clothes we wear (e.g. uniforms – police, military). The most important aspects of symbolic communication are the words we use.
Words, in fact, have no meaning; rather we attach meaning to them through our own interpretation. Therefore our life experience, belief system, or perceptual framework determines ‘how we hear the words.’ Rudyard Kipling wrote, “Words are of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.” In other words, we hear what we expect to hear based on our interpretation of what the words mean.
According to social scientists, verbal communication skills account for 7% of the communication process. The other 93% consist of nonverbal and symbolic communication and are called 'listening skills.' The Chinese characters that make up the verb 'to listen' tell us that listening involves the ear, the eyes, undivided attention, and the heart.
Perhaps the best known and least used advice is that the best cure for your blues is to focus on others. In this world of increasing self-interests in expense of helping fellow men, we are seeing a dramatic increase in depression, loneliness, and decreasing self-worth. Charity, as described in the bible, is the pure love of Christ. Through this pure love, you can not only help your own self-worth but others as well.
One can hardly write all of the benefits of donating to charities and others. First, donating to charities helps others in need. There are times in our lives which we have no control over what happens. These occur during natural disasters, wars, and diseases. During these calamities, which happen at no fault of their own, these people are helpless, depending on support from others. Only through donations can they be helped. By helping other countries or those in our own country, all of society is benefited, as the standard of living is increased on a wide scale.
The second great area of benefits from donations occurs on a personal level. By focusing on the needs of others, our own needs and pains are forgotten or alleviated. Selfishness is greatly decreased through donations. Upon seeing the benefits of others of your donation, your self-worth is also increased. You and the benefitor's level of happiness is increased. No material item that could be purchased with the donation could be a substitute for the joy that can be felt by helping others in need.
Deep down, where it counts, many people do not believe that they deserve success. They do not think that they are worthy of success. And they may be right.
They long for success. They imagine success. They struggle for success. They aim for success. But, they are addicted to failure.
Yes, addicted. They refuse to give up their habitual ways of thinking, despite the overwhelming evidence that their thinking is not producing success. They refuse to give up their habitual beliefs, despite the obvious evidence that those beliefs are not conducive to success.
Every successful person I have ever met reports that it is their thinking that first stood in the way of their success and then, when they changed how and what they thought, paved the way for their success. It is the same experience I had.
Every successful person I have met believes that they deserve success. Not because they are smarter. Not because they are better educated. Not because they are in any way special or unique. They believe that they deserve success simply because they believe that they deserve success. And, they are right.
Those who are spiritually minded have a couple of preconceptions (beliefs and thoughts) about success that do not serve them and may be preventing them from achieving their ideal of success.
Choice isn't always a matter of being able to choose what happens to us. Life happens, and often without any say from us. However, our circumstances do not determine who we become. Only we have the choice to determine that. Everyone is who he or she wants to be, regardless of what one might think. We all have choices and each choice leads to the creation of who we are.
There is a great quote that states, "Everybody's a self-made man; but only the successful ones are ever willing to admit it.". It does seem that we are more than willing to take credit for the success we have become in life, but less willing to own the areas where we are not so successful. The credit for those areas that are not so perfect seem to be reserved for our childhood, parents, a bad boss, spouse and on and on. However, in the end only, we can determine how the people and events in our lives will affect us. We can let them drag us down or we can use them as building blocks for a strong personal foundation.
One only has to read the stories of successful people to know that adversity seems to be a common denominator of those who made it. Few successful people had success handed to them on a platter. Most worked, struggled and experienced their share of failures. What is different about these people is that they didn't let these adversities get in their way. They actually used adversity to build on. They turned their stumbling blocks into a paved highway to a better life.
Treasure Map Your Success for 2005
Treasure-mapping is the process of visualizing on paper exactly what you want. The clearer you can see your desired future as a reality, the sooner it can manifest. The actual process is simple: look for color pictures in magazines or catalogs and use rubber cement to glue them to a half sheet of poster board. Each new year, my husband and I 'treasure map' what we want in our lives for the year. Whenever we anticipate a major change, such as moving to a new city, buying a house, or changing jobs, we treasure map the change.
YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND SPEAKS
It is not necessary to know what you are looking for when you begin the search. This process allows your hearts desire in your subconscious mind to speak to you. As you look through the pictures, notice which ones resonate strongly inside you. Just tear them out and continue looking.
KNOWING WHAT YOU WANT IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN HOW YOU WILL GET IT
The magical part about treasure-mapping is that you don't have to know where the desired object or opportunity will come from. Gifts, contest prizes, unexpected surprises are not unusual. When you are very clear about what you want, you attract the energy and open yourself to opportunities you wouldn't have been receptive to before.
"Know Yourself" That's what the big guy said way back when? Was it Aristotle, Plato or Socrates? Anyhow, that's the essence of what this article is about.
You are a "self-help" seeker and user. You want resources to advance yourself in your life, to feel better, stronger and more successful. You're not satisfied with how things are. And you're not complacent about it. You're motivated. Therefore, you've come to the right place.
We're going to take you through this guide to instruct you on a few matters that relate directly to your goal of having the best self-help resources at your disposal. No more trial and error. This is it. We're going to get focussed.
OK, be sure you've read our article on "Assessing Your Self-Help Needs," (also available here at Ezine Articles) especially the part that distinguishes between "categories of distress" and "categories of achievement." These are arbitrary definitions. We use them to help our readers differentiate between "goals to be achieved" vs "problems to be solved. This ensures that we are all on the same page.
Let's identify a few symptom problems under categories of distress. We start with the big ones and work our way down.
I look out my window at daybreak as the sunrise creates tiny sparkles on sheets of frozen snow. Two mornings later, the snow and sparkles are gone. Even the warmer weather will not last long.
Within a few months, many people will realize that the sparkling changes they've worked for, and perhaps achieved, were short lived.
Maintaining personal change requires inner conditioning to clean out old beliefs and assumptions. It requires strong reasons, focus, self-discipline, and commitment. It also requires enough faith to be flexible for continued growth.
People begin with the best of intentions to change. However, it is easier to settle back into familiar habits. The changes do not feel comfortable enough to last. Often, desired results are not clear enough in mind to warrant long months or years of persistence.
Motives and Reasons for Change
Positive personal change requires strong reasons and compelling ways to do the work. Sometimes the person is inspired by the need to live differently. He or she says, "I've chosen this long enough," or "I'm not tolerating this any longer." Instantly, they change,and their lives soon begin to mirror that internal change.
Do you find yourself sitting at work longing to be somewhere else and doing something you have always wanted to do?
We’ve all had moments like that and my moment came in 1995.
I can vividly remember the day it happened. I was driving a fork lift for a company that was subcontracted by the printer company, Lexmark.
I had enough of the dreaming. Walked over to my boss and like a possessed soul that had lost control of my own actions I handed her my security badge then walked out the door.
That was 10 years ago and I have never regretted taking that risk and following my dreams.
I didn’t know what I would do exactly or how I was going to do it, but I knew in my heart I was going to do it.
Several days past and I signed on to the Internet and started surfing around though I wasn’t looking for anything specific.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin
Are you sick and tired of being treated like a doormat and having people walk all over you? If you answered yes, read on...
It's time you learn to assert yourself by respecting and honoring your personal and professional boundaries. It is important that you do so because if you can't look out for yourself, nobody else will.
We have all at one time or another experienced boundary violations from friends, relatives, or co-workers be it intentional or unintentional. Such encounters can become very uncomfortable and difficult to deal with, especially when dealing with people you know intimately. How can you stop the cycle of abuse and take control of your life?
It starts with self-honoring and self-respect. Know yourself. Know your strengths and weaknesses, know what you stand for and what you don't stand for, know your boundaries. As the Greeks once said, "Know thyself and you will know the Gods and the universe."
“If you could eliminate one day from your past so that you never had to live through it, what day would you erase?”
“If you could ask a single question of a dead relative, what would it be and of whom would you ask it?”
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These questions come from a little book I’ve been reading as a way to begin the New Year. If. . . Questions for the Game of Life by Evelyn McFarlane and James Saywell (Villard, 1995) My partner and I have been playing it, throwing out questions and sharing responses.
Some questions are easy and fun: “If you had the chance to make any one purchase that you passed up in your lifetime, what would it be?” (Ah, no contest! The set of antique china we found on the Oregon coast some 8 years ago but were too timid to buy.”
Others are a challenge: “If you could choose the very last thing you will see before death, what would it be?” (That took some reflection, but, although I’m not a gardener, what I think I’d most want to see is perfect, full-blown rose.)
Still others plunge us into an intimacy we may or may not have considered: “What is the one thing from your past about which you feel the most guilty?” (OK, so I’m chicken – I pass!)
It’s a fun game, and a good relationship-builder. And yet I wonder: what happens if I go a step farther, take the initiative of shaping the questions I need to hear.
“You cannot control what happens to you, but you can control your attitude toward what happens to you, and in that, you will be mastering change rather than allowing it to master you.”-Brian Tracy
In order to make choices that may change your destiny, you must first know yourself and what you are creating moment by moment. What you do in the present moment brings you closer to being in command of your destiny. When you focus on past experience and the knowledge you’ve gained from school, work, society, economic, and spiritual training, you can begin to know yourself.
Human nature is created so that you can choose your destiny, and then control it. The key is to be one of the few who know where you are going and exactly how to get there. To do this, you must realize that life is changeable. With each change along the way you develop experience. You enrich your learning.
Since your life is always in a constant state of creating and developing, you create your own story by choosing the direction you want it to take. With any one decision, you can change your destiny. You have the power to do this: it is called making choices. Without it you’d just be following the masses and letting others control your destination.
The repetition of certain thoughts also plays a huge part in determining your destiny. This is why it’s most important to be aware of what and how you think. Some thoughts that may bear repeating include:
Just when I have something figured out, along comes another how-to-article telling me how to be or do something better or even change my entire life. No matter where I turn, I am constantly reminded that I am not good enough in more ways than one. I am not smart enough, not rich enough, not slim enough, not efficient enough, not pretty enough, not powerful enough, not “with it” enough and probably “out of it” altogether.
That’s me and it gets worse. In line with our education economy, yesterday’s perfect diet is banned today and my car of the year was just recalled. My time-management is out of date and my writing achievements fade against the big authors. Yes, I am my own worst critic. Growing up with perfectionist parents didn’t help either. It wasn’t until their seventies, that my father could tolerate fingerprints on his freshly washed car and that my mother learned to enjoy a meal without matching table décor.
Perfectionism is driving us up the wall or around the bend and neither direction is desirable. No wonder half of the population is on Prozac and the other half copes on some other crutch. We live under constant pressure to be perfect and expect nothing less from others. Intensely glued to information that helps us conform to some perfect ideal, we learn less about ourselves. Detached from the core of who we are, we show up with fabricated selves to gain approval.
Writer and philosopher Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said, "Kindness is the golden chain by which society is bound together." But I was not thinking about the golden chain of kindness one day when a dilapidated automobile, possibly held together with glue and wire, parked in front of my house. During those years, we lived in a small town just across the street from the church I served, and travelers in need constantly found their way to our home.
I was growing weary of helping the numerous people who stopped by almost daily. I was frequently awakened in the middle of an otherwise good night's sleep, to get out in the cold and help someone passing through. Once our property was vandalized; once I drove through a blizzard in order to get two people to safety; many times I felt taken for granted by penniless motorists or hitchhikers who did not thank me for help they received and complained that I didn't do more. I hadn't felt a part of a "golden chain of kindness" for a while and, though I still offered assistance where I could, sometimes I inwardly wished they would just go away.
But on this day, a young man with a week-old beard climbed from the broken-down automobile. He had no money and no food. He asked if I could give him some work and I offered him gasoline and a meal. I told him that if he wanted to work, we'd be pleased if he'd cut the grass, but work wasn't necessary.
In an article discussing the need for innovative products and profitable service offerings, Vinutha V., points out that, "improvements are only the expected results, not the source of competitive advantage. Improved product development through innovation arises from the knowledge and experience of employees." [Source: The Financial Express - appearing in ZDNetIndia News]
Soft skills, "holistic development", "employee empowerment" and other terms are merely euphemisms for leadership energy - they are the process, purpose and principle which supply people with knowledge and propel them to take competent action.
"Is not the holy energy of true love ever sagacious, far-sighted and prophetic? Truth is not isolated: it is not a part, but the whole. It is love, and beauty, and joy. The wise man does not believe and opine, but he knows and is the very truth which he utters. His thought is action: his knowledge is love" [Emerson's Essays, by A Disciple, in the US Democratic Review Volume-16, Issue-84]
Leading is an act of energetic purpose - it's the directing, focusing, shaping or configuring of energy towards a desired objective.
This article is dedicated to a woman that I've never met and probably never will. Tall with dark, dark hair, she was perfectly manicured in a tailored suit with high-heeled pumps. We shared a subway car in Manhattan two years ago. She was standing, holding onto the subway car strap and meticulously applying three coats of mascara as the train bumped and shifted. With my jaw dropped in reverence of her talent, I imagined this to be her morning routine because she was REALLY good at it. (I can barely put on clear lip gloss in a moving vehicle.)
We all have morning routines and daily repetition makes us experts at them. What’s your morning routine? Does it help to balance and center you for the day – or leave you feeling scattered?
I invite you to try a powerful five minute morning ritual to set your day off with awareness and consciousness, moving daily towards the balance and fulfillment you desire. The ritual is very simple, consisting only of three simple questions. The secret is to be honest, give yourself the 5 minutes… and to ask the questions.
I was hired to do some training for a sales team from one of the largest companies in America. There were 16 people on this team. This year their sales (for the 16 of them) will be 250 million - that's right, a quarter of a billion - dollars! Needless to say, it was an excellent and fascinating time. I decided to learn a little bit myself so I watched them closely to see what kind of people they were and to see what common denominators they shared. Below is what I found. I think you will find the elements applicable to your own life.
The first thing I noticed about this successful sales team was that they had a sense of humor! They simply weren't a terribly serious bunch of people. Instead, they saw that life was to be enjoyed and that means they were able to laugh a little bit. Sure, there were varying levels in this but they all had a sense of humor. They were able to laugh at circumstances, and they were able to laugh at themselves. It was quite refreshing and a core element of their success, I'm sure.
The second thing I found out about this group was that they did not achieve their success through pedigree, but through hard work. They didn't come from families that gave them a free pass into the upper echelon of the corporate world and they didn't get a head start from upper crust universities. What got them to where they are now? Hard work! That's right, another example that if you put your mind to it, work hard and get in the right situation, you can achieve great things! These folks work long hours and are disciplined in the work they do. And it is paying off.
You are a Creative Worker:
God carries on creative work through human beings. Human beings serve as instrument of transformation of thoughts and ideas from the spiritual state to the physical state. Our mind which is an aspect of the brain mechanism is a creative device which enables us to relate to spiritual as well as physical existence.
Our role in the creative process involves receiving thoughts and ideas which emanate from God into our mind. By means of our mental and physical powers we are able to transform these thoughts and ideas into physical reality. So the human being receives from the spiritual and transforms into the physical. Our function in the creative process can be likened to the function of a television set. The pictures we see on the screen do not originate from the television set. The television set receives signals that are transmitted from a television station and then transforms these signals into observable pictures on the television screen. In the case of the creative process, thinking enables us to tune in to and receive thoughts, ideas and concepts from God. These thoughts, ideas and concepts we are then able to transform into physical (objective) reality by means of our mental and physical powers. To illustrate this process let us consider how a building comes into existence. By thinking, an architect receives ideas and concepts of the design of a building in his mind. By means of his mental and physical abilities he transfers his mental pictures of the design of this building to drawing on paper. A builder, by interpreting this drawing, is able to construct the building thereby bringing it into existence. And so what has come from God as thoughts has eventually become a physical reality.
Within is the person we really are. Within lies our very existence. And only from within can we make it happen. This is where our very all subsists. Within you is the ability, what it takes' to make it all happen for you, just the way you want it. WITHIN! WITHIN!! WITHIN!!! Oh what a place! This is the only place that will ever always and fully be yours. The only domain where you are king indeed. Not even the future or the past holds a stake high enough to be compared to that within you. The renowned jurist, Oliver Wendell Homes couldn't have said it better when he remarked, What lies ahead of us and what lies behind us are nothing compared to what LIES WITHIN US. The past haven gone and the future waiting beyond, you are left with but one great option - That which is within you. Your very bird in hand. I want you to realize that your best bet is in all that you are potentially endowed with within, though it may not appear, as it ought to be at present.
You cannot afford to plan on the past cause it's gone. It is in the tomb. Neither can you build on the future because it is pending in the womb. But you can work on what you've got within you at present. You can if you choose to. Because your endowments within is all you've got. This, you will always have. So, take to Theodore Roosevelt's advise, Do what you can, with what you have (within), where you are.
"Work smarter, not harder" is a cliché that has darted in and out of the workplace for years. But it's still as true as ever. And it's often overlooked advice that truly works. "Working smarter" means think strategically about how to improve your productivity. For starters, think about how you spend a typical day. Then eliminate the time robbers. How? Like this...
1. Discourage excessive visitors. Move the candy dish. Put it far away from your desk. Why? Because food is a friend when you're trying to attract or meet your peers but it's also a foe that cuts into your time. If 12 people stop by your desk for sweets and initiate a five minute chat each, you've lost an hour of your day.
2. Train your family. Set limits on personal calls. I once worked beside an executive assistant who received at least ten calls daily from her teenage daughter. Use the three or five rule for family members who like instant input: Wait until you have at least three (or five) items to discuss with me before calling my workplace, unless your request is an emergency or timely. ('Mom, the sale ends today' falls under neither of these categories).
"What's Keeping You At The Office (9 Tips To Get Home Quicker)" »
In Corrogue I am finding it’s a wonderful life.
Let me share with you how this happens. Apply the seven principles listed below and each day you too will come to enjoy more and more. Learn the real “Art of Living.” Then you can really begin to enjoy this extraordinary gift we call “life.” I use the term “Love Is Flowing Eternally,” to remind me of the essence of our life’s experience. This helps to remind me that we are all loved unconditionally.
Lets begin with these seven steps to fulfilment.
I have given each step a one-word title beginning with the letter P. This is to aid your memory. All these steps are important. Think of yourself going on a journey. This is a journey were you get to spiral upward. This spiralling upward takes you into greater and greater experiences of gladness and joy.
Journal Expressions
If you haven’t already done so, please start keeping a journal today. It is one of the most effective ways to hear your own voice. You should not share the information in your journal with anyone. These are your private and innermost sacred thoughts. You should not hold back in any way when expressing yourself within your journal. Let it flow freely, using any language that most accurately conveys your true thoughts. It is incredibly healing and calming to get your thoughts down in written form. Later, you can return to your entries to see how you’ve grown or are handling similar situations differently. The key is in knowing that no one else will ever see your entries.
Paper Journal
Keeping a paper journal offers you the advantage of being able to make entries at any time you feel. You can also express yourself through drawings or sketching as well. I’ve even pasted pictures inside. You’ll notice that you write larger and with a heavier strokes when angry or anxious. While feelings of appreciation and peace will show up differently in your handwriting. All of this is a wealth of great information when looking back on your earlier entries of several months or years ago.
Believe it or not, values are in the core of all of us. These underrated rankings tell more about us than we could ever imagine. Yet, many of us overlook this extremely important portion of our lives.
Why do we?
Because so many of us get caught up in the race of life and flying ahead of others becomes more important. If becoming a better person everyday is important to you, (and it should be) you need to make this crucial evaluation before ever progressing forward.
Lets say hypothetically you have a lot of personal issues unresolved, for whatever reason. In addition, you realized that due to your being so self absorbed, you are the highest value in your respective life and always have been.
Whew! A lot to have realized.
Your partner, child, job, friends, religion, car and pets are all inferior to your number one position. This has a lot to do with your feeling a lack of personal security that can be made to feel secure by centering yourself in the spotlight at all times.
We typically think of New Year’s as the time to make annual resolutions and start fresh. Unfortunately, we all know that most resolutions are quickly forgotten. The good new is that "now" is always the best time to take charge of your future and create the life you want. Real success is about choosing your priorities, and then following a plan that emphasizes the things that are most important to you. With that in mind, here are 10 suggestions for creating a wonderful, productive and rewarding year for yourself (and your practice)!
1. Take time to decide what you really want this year. What would make it a great year, a fantastic year for you? Dream and scheme, and then dream bigger! And write it down, just for the fun of it.
2. Mark one day each month, just for you. Use ink, not pencil, and schedule an appointment with yourself for one full day each month. Have fun and renew yourself, just for the joy of it. Every single month. No exceptions.
3. Take more vacation that you had planned. Look at the calendar and write in a couple extra weeks off! Relax. Do things you enjoy. Go camping, rent a cabin at the beach, visit old friends, or climb a mountain. Just do it!
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