The secret to powerful relationships | Abraham Hicks

Discover why relationships have been how they have been, and what to do about it.

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Building a Powerful Gut Instinct | Steve Pavlina

Human logic is incredibly limited. Even our best logic is layered upon emotional biases and instinctual behaviors. Logic doesn’t care if we learn and grow. Logic doesn’t care if we’re happy or miserable. Logic doesn’t care if we live or die.

Fortunately, logic is only one tool for making decisions. Our bodies have many more layers of intelligence.

One of those layers is your gut instinct. Many people experience this as a sensation in the abdominal region.

When I used to eat animal products, it was nearly impossible for me to tune into my gut instinct. That channel was almost completely muted. I’d only notice it in extreme situations, like when I got arrested. I think my inability to hear that channel was one reason I did so much shoplifting in my late teens. How could I hear it while so much of my energy was being used to digest a bacon double cheeseburger, french fries, and a milkshake?

When I went vegetarian, my gut instincts finally became audible, and they grew louder and clearer when I went vegan, but it still took many years for me to start trusting them. I wasn’t used to receiving information on this channel, so I didn’t consider it important. But as the volume increased, I couldn’t entirely ignore it, so I began exploring these signals through the lens of spirituality. I’d listen through meditation. I’d journal about these signals. I’d discuss my impressions with like-minded people. I interpreted this as a spiritual awakening of some kind. But in my day-to-day practical life, I largely disregarded this information.

Over time I slowly realized that my gut instinct was providing useful information, but I only saw this in hindsight. I didn’t act in alignment with these impressions when they first came up, but I eventually dealt with the consequences of doing the opposite. For instance, I paid the price of doing business with people who gave me a queasy feeling in my stomach.

Most of the time when I felt this gut instinct, it was a negative feeling. That made it hard for me to listen to it because I saw myself as a positive thinker. My personal bias was to find a way to make a deal happen or to make a relationship work. I wanted to achieve things. 

Saying yes to new experiences was a key part of my path of growth. I had a strong tendency to discount my gut feelings when they were negative. I figured that it was the voice of fear and cowardice and that I should simply power through it.

The way I see this gut instinct now is that it’s a summary reading of the combined energies of a situation.

These sensations are usually very general. They don’t come packaged with details or explanations. A gut instinct is like a thermometer. It can tell you if something is hot or cold, but it can’t tell you why.

Finding the Positive Path

For many years my gut instinct seemed like an annoying naysayer. But occasionally it would give me a positive sensation, such as when I was reading personal development books or going to a conference. The negative signals were often louder and more prominent, so when I experienced the positive ones, it mostly felt like a form of escapism.

Eventually I began to explore paths that gave me stronger positive signals, such as when I started writing articles in 1999. Reading a good book was something nice to do for myself, but writing articles clearly impacted other people’s lives as well. I noticed that when I considered ideas that involved some form of contribution, my gut gave me stronger positive signals than usual. I began doing a lot of volunteering during this time as well.

As I began receiving more positive signals to balance out the negative ones, I felt encouraged to trust these gut instincts a little more and to take more action in alignment with them. I was far from perfectly trusting, but life seemed a little more fair once I began sensing opportunities to pursue instead of only traps to avoid. I felt like this instinct was finally meeting me halfway instead of just being a naysayer. It’s easier to listen to a voice that says yes sometimes and no sometimes instead of only no, no, no.

I began taking more risks to act on this voice, and over a period of years, I explored more of its subtleties. The tricky part was distinguishing this voice from other channels like my memories, beliefs, and conditioned emotional responses. Sometimes I’d feel some fear or trepidation about a new experience, like volunteering to speak at a conference, but my gut instinct was telling me to go for it. Making such discernments required patient practice. The more I listened to these signals and practiced deciphering them, the more I could hear their individual voices and make better decisions. It’s like learning to distinguish the voices of different people talking in a crowded room. Your brain will figure it out with some practice.

Turning Up the Volume

I noticed that sometimes my gut instinct was very clear while other times it was murky. I found that the level of clarity was linked to my health habits. When I exercised a lot, the signal was especially clear. If I slacked off from exercise, it was harder to get a clear signal.
When I began exploring raw foods, these gut feelings became ridiculously loud and clear. Sometimes I found the signals overwhelming. 

This is one reason that I’ve been going back and forth between raw foods and cooked foods for so many years. I began dabbling in raw foods as far back as 1997, and I did my first 30-day 100% raw trial around 2003. In 2008 I ate 100% raw for six months straight. In the years since then, I’ve gone raw for 30 or more days many more times, especially when I wanted some extra clarity, but eating raw continuously hasn’t become my default baseline yet.

For the past two months, I’ve been eating mostly raw again, including 100% raw for several weeks in a row. Presently I’m eating about 90% raw. I still find it difficult to handle the intensity of my gut instincts when they’re at such a high volume. Eating cooked food has the effect of turning down the volume. Right now this is working well for me.

Another aspect of eating lots of raw food is dealing with the extra physical energy. I feel a little stir crazy if I eat raw and don’t move a lot. My gut instinct also tells me I need to spend more time outside in the sunlight. This morning I decided to take a day off from exercise and still ended up going for a 9-mile walk before breakfast. When I eat mostly cooked food, the urge to move isn’t nearly as compelling.

Trusting the Signals

I often like working and playing in sprints, with each sprint lasting a few weeks. This month I had planned to do two different sprints. First, I wanted to create the web pages for the new workshops we’ve booked and to open registrations for them. Second, I wanted to visit Costa Rica.

Logically it made sense to do the workshop pages first, then go to Costa Rica. That way people would have more time to learn about the workshops and to figure out which one(s) they want to attend. Going on the trip would be a nice reward for completing that project. So that was my initial decision.

But when I started trying to implement the decision, my gut said it was the wrong decision. I’d been eating 100% raw for several weeks in a row at this point, so that voice was loud and clear. I should go to Costa Rica first, then handle the workshop pages after I got back.

I decided to listen to the signal, but it didn’t feel like I was making a decision — more like the decision was made for me. I booked a flight and landed in San José the following day.

Overall it was a really nice trip. Rachelle and I explored several museums, a coffee and banana plantation, the top of a volcano, two rainforests, several waterfalls, and the capital of San José. We saw huge colonies of leafcutter ants as well as a bullet ant that was almost an inch long. We saw poisonous frogs. We saw orchids galore. We saw toucans up close and held them perched on our arms. We spoke a lot of Spanglish with the locals.

A few days before I was to fly back to the USA, I started having an intense allergic reaction. I began sneezing a lot, my nose ran like crazy, and my eyes kept watering. I felt like I had a cat sitting on my head, and I barely got any sleep that night. I couldn’t breathe through my nose at all. The next day was no better. Even after I showered and we went to another location an hour’s drive away, the symptoms continued all day long. It didn’t seem like a food allergy because I didn’t have any digestive issues. It felt like I was suddenly allergic to the air. I was puzzled since it was obvious that I was having a strong allergic reaction, but to what? How could it be following me around like this from one location to another?

I’m allergic to cats, but normally I’d have to pet one or come into direct contact with cat hair to have any notable issues, and I didn’t spend any time around cats on this trip. This reaction was much worse than any cat allergy I’d ever experienced.

While we explored a rainforest and I continued sneezing and blowing my nose dozens of times, a guide told us that one of the nearby volcanos had recently undergone a small eruption, spewing ash into the air which fell all around San José and beyond. He said that some people are allergic to volcanic ash, and he described the symptoms that I was experiencing. I’d never been in the vicinity of a volcanic eruption before, but apparently I’m one of those allergic people.

My symptoms continued for the rest of the trip, but once I got on the flight to Miami, I started feeling better almost immediately. I’d never felt so grateful to breathe the air inside a plane before. By the time I arrived back in Vegas, the symptoms were 80% gone. Within a few more days, I was back to normal.

Another oddity on this trip was the weather. When I checked the weather app on my phone before and after I arrived in San José, the forecast was 10 solid days of thunderstorms — not a single dry day in sight. I’d never seen a weather forecast like that, not even in Seattle. San José gets so much rain that there are trenches between the streets and sidewalks for the water to flow. You have to step over these trenches when crossing the street. Some are so wide and deep that they have small bridges built over them. Why would I want to go on a trip to a place where the expectation was constant rain?

Logically I expected this to be a very wet trip, but in actuality it didn’t rain much at all while I was there. Most days were partly cloudy and partly sunny. When it did rain, it was usually at night while I was inside. A couple other times when it rained, it was while walking in a rainforest, and the canopy served as an effective umbrella. Overall the weather was beautiful while I was there.

Despite all the sneezing in the final days of the trip, I had a wonderful time in Costa Rica. It turned out to be a really good time to go. But I didn’t realize how good the decision was till I returned home. A few days after I got back, there was a much larger volcanic eruption, covering the city of San José in tons of ash. Hundreds of people were hospitalized because of it.

If I had gone against my gut instinct, I’d be in San José right now. With the minor eruption that happened while I was there, I had one of the strongest allergic reactions I’ve ever experienced, and I couldn’t even see any ash in the air or on the ground. Given the situation there now, with visible ash in the air, on the ground, and inside buildings, I might have been one of those people headed for the hospital.

I suppose that now I also have the benefit of knowing that I’m allergic to volcanic ash, which may be a good thing to know when I travel to volcanically active places in the future. 🙂
While many people turn to raw foods to heal from serious illnesses, another attractor is the heightened sensitivity to various forms of energy — the energy of living beings, the energy of places, and perhaps the energy of the planet itself.

Letting the Locking Relay Float

Because these energies are always in flux, I find it nearly impossible to make gut-based decisions far in advance. The signals are very present-moment. When I make a gut-based decision, there’s a certain immediacy to it. I have to run with it right away.

It’s not unusual for me to feel a surge of clarity about taking a trip and to be in another city within 24-48 hours. Sometimes I’ve made a decision to take a trip in the morning, and I’m arriving at my destination that same evening. Sometimes my gut screams YES, but I know the YES is time sensitive. I have to act immediately or not at all. Even delaying one day can kill the timing.

One of my favorite Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes is “Lower Decks.” It includes the following scene, which begins when Ensign Sito takes too long to obey an order to fire the phasers.

RIKER: What happened back there, Ensign?
SITO: I’m sorry, sir. When we changed course I had to re-lock phasers before I could fire.
RIKER: Next time, try letting the locking relay float until the actual order to fire is given. They may not teach that trick at the Academy, but it works.
SITO: Thank you, sir.

When people ask me about my plans and intentions, especially with a desire to lock me into certain commitments, I often recall this scene. It reminds me not to succumb to the pressure to prematurely commit myself when my gut instincts are still in flux.

I understand people’s desire for predictability and certainty, especially when they want to coordinate their schedules with me. But I know from experience that it’s usually best for me to let the locking relay float until the order to fire is given. In other words, I prefer to let my plans and options float until I get a strong gut instinct to go a certain direction. Then I lock the decision into place and fire with immediate action.

I hope that what I’ve shared here gives you some insights to further develop your own gut instinct — and to trust it when your signals are loud and clear.

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A Guide to Clearing Your Energy Space with Energetic NLP | Art Giser

Discover how to clear your energy is this simple and powerful process outlined by Art Giser.
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What to Do When You’re Falling Behind | Steve Pavlina

When I was a kid, it took me longer than I would have liked to learn how to ride a bike. I kept using a bike with training wheels and I didn’t practice much, so of course I didn’t learn how to balance.

One day I observed that my sister (younger by 2.5 years) was getting close to figuring out how to ride a bike. She wasn’t quite there yet, but she was clearly much closer to balancing than I was. I couldn’t let her beat me to it!

So I grabbed my bike, pushed it out to the street, and decided that I was going to learn how to ride it then and there. I hopped on — sans training wheels — and swerved all over the place like an out-of-control maniac. I tried to stay near the grass when I could muster some degree of control, so when I fell, I’d hopefully crash onto the lawn instead of the street or sidewalk.

After many short-lived attempts, I finally learned how to balance. Then I was off and riding. I rode my bike a lot that summer and have had the skill ever since.

Up until that point, I’d been making a big deal out of the whole process. It seemed scary and daunting. I was afraid of falling. But once I confronted the fear and mustered the courage to risk getting hurt, I quickly emerged on the other side with a whole new skill. From the moment of decision to the time I emerged with the basic skill was probably less than an hour.

What finally motivated me to face the fear and take action? It was the feeling that I was falling behind. My peers were leaving me in the dust. They could ride and I couldn’t. If my younger sister got there first, I’d no doubt be unfavorably compared to her, and I really didn’t want to deal with that.

That build-up of pressure worked to my advantage. I was capable of facing the fear and developing the skill, but I’d been delaying. I was letting fear get the better of me. That pressure gave me a much needed kick in my complacency.

Many years later, I found myself in a similar situation. When I started college, I didn’t take school seriously and goofed off a lot. I basically triple-majored in shoplifting, alcohol, and poker… and was eventually expelled. By the time I had a second go at it, my old high school friends were all starting their senior year, while I was starting over as a freshman. I was three years behind my peers, and I really felt the weight of that.

Once again, the feeling of falling behind became a powerful motivating force for me. Instead of taking four years to graduate, I made a huge commitment to master time management and tried to earn my degree a lot faster. I took about 3x the normal course load, and I earned not one but two Bachelor of Science degrees (in mathematics and computer science) — in only three semesters. Additionally, I received a special award for the top computer science student (as selected by the faculty) when I graduated.

I had no idea I was capable of that, just as I had no idea I could learn to ride a bike so quickly. The feeling of falling behind served as a powerful motivator. Instead of trying to squelch those disappointing feelings, like I’d been doing up to that point, I allowed myself to feel the weight of that pressure. I used those seemingly negative feelings to motivate action and overcome resistance.

The Positive Side of Social Pressure

There are many ways to deal with social pressure, especially when you feel you aren’t measuring up to some external standard. You can question or reject the standard, which is often the best option for standards you disagree with. Or you can agree with the standard and use the pressure to elevate your performance.

I’ve seen other people leverage this same kind of pressure to their good advantage. People who’ve been languishing in their careers unleash dormant ambition. Shy or socially awkward people push themselves to master social skills. People who’ve been mired in scarcity unlock financial abundance.

Very often, these people succeed, sometimes remarkably so. They turn the feeling of falling behind into a powerful source of motivation. They redefine their old relationship to their peer group. Instead of being the late bloomer, the laggard, or the underachiever, they become the fast learner, the leader, the performer.

Accelerating Your Growth

Using social pressure to beat yourself down is pointless. Using it to motivate fresh progress is powerful.

When you perceive that you’re falling behind, how can you leverage this feeling to speed up your growth?

First, let yourself feel the heaviness of the pressure. Stop trying to repress it, minimize it, or distract yourself from it. Feel the pain. Feel the disappointment. If this makes you feel like a complete loser, let those feelings flow freely for a while. Own those feelings. They’re temporary.

Once you’ve had a chance to let those feelings circulate and you no longer feel like you’re repressing those emotions, then pause and forgive yourself. So you fell behind. It happens. It’s okay. Acknowledge your humanness. Say, “I forgive myself fully and completely.”

I recommend dwelling on the forgiveness step until you really feel that you’ve forgiven yourself. Try journaling about your decision to forgive yourself. Write or type, “I forgive myself fully and completely,” over and over again. Keep your attention on forgiveness and self-compassion until you feel some emotional release, especially some tears. If you truly forgive yourself, you’re likely to feel some relief and lightness afterwards.

Forgive yourself, but don’t let yourself off the hook completely. It’s okay that you slacked off in the past. It’s not okay to keep slacking off. Resolve to be done with that dissatisfying past behavior. No more falling behind.

Realize that you can get caught up. You can go faster. You can redeem yourself.
Accept that it won’t be easy. It doesn’t need to be easy. The challenge will be good for you. It will help you grow. It will wake you up. It will help you raise your standards.

Now turn your attention to creating a positive vision of fresh action going forward. Redefine your short-term vision of success as a vision based on action, not on immediate results. One reason we fall behind is that we make a big deal out of failure. However, many results (such as learning to ride a bike) practically require you to fail — sometimes a lot — before you can succeed. So don’t put so much pressure on yourself to achieve a specific result just yet. Instead, feel the pressure to take simple actions. Turn this pressure into movement.

When I committed to learning to ride a bike, instead of focusing so much on the end goal, I pushed that desire to the back of my mind. I focused on facing the fearful action I was dreading. For me it was trying to ride and falling and getting hurt. So I made the commitment to go ahead and try my best, to fall as much as I might have to fall, to endure the scrapes and bruises, and to quickly get back on the bike and try again. I accepted that there might be some pain and blood, and if so, I’d hurt and bleed and keep going. By accepting the possible outcome I feared, I reduced my resistance to action. I decided I’d rather be a bruised and bloodied boy who could ride a bike instead of a pristine boy who couldn’t.

What’s the equivalent bloodied version of yourself that you’re avoiding and thereby causing yourself to fall further and further behind? Is it a vision of yourself having to work or study for long hours? Is it a vision of yourself being repeatedly rejected? Is it a vision of yourself making mistakes and losing money? You can endure all of those things. And you can keep right on going after they occur. They’re all petty fears to begin with. You’re strong enough to handle them.

In college my commitment was to sign up for as many classes as I could schedule on my calendar. I decided I’d do my best to attend those classes, do the assignments, take the exams, and learn the material efficiently.

Doing Your Best

Define success as doing your best. Face the fear. Make the valiant effort. Don’t worry so much about the end result.

One reason you may feel like you’re falling behind is that you haven’t been doing your best. It isn’t the perception that other people seem to be passing you that’s such a bother. What really gets under your skin is believing that you could have prevented it. The consequences of not doing your best can be very unsettling when they finally catch up to you.

Ask yourself the question, “What would my best look like?”

This is a powerful question to ask, but so often we don’t ask it because our answers will shed light on those situations where we clearly aren’t doing our best. And that’s where the feeling of falling behind starts creeping in.

Let it creep in. Immerse yourself in those feelings. Feel the unpleasant heaviness and disappointment of falling behind.

Then define your best in the form of simple and direct action. What is the best effort you can make? What can you do? What’s the action to take?

You can try and fail. You can try and get rejected. You can try and learn.

If you keep making your best effort again and again, you’ll power through old fears and sniveling worries faster than you thought possible. And soon the results you desire will become visible… and then fully realized.

Where do you feel like you’re falling behind? In which areas of your life are you underperforming? Let yourself feel the weight of those disappointments. Forgive yourself. 
Identify what your best effort could look like. Then go take action. Make the attempt. Fall. Get bruised. Get up and try again. Persist until you create your desired results.

It’s just like riding a bike.

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How to Create a Compelling Life Script | Bob Proctor

It’s 2017…

And it’s been quite a while since I’ve seen so much collective uncertainty and turmoil in the world.

However, you shouldn’t let all the chaos affect you.

Instead of seeing the world the way the masses do, view it—and your life—through an entirely different lens.

One of the best ways I know to do that is to create a customized life script that uplifts, empowers and delights you.

And listen…

You don’t have to be unhappy, anxious, or unhealthy to do this.

Even if you’re very pleased with your current life circumstances, I encourage you to design a life script.

My friend, Peggy McColl, started creating life scripts about 20 years ago, when she found herself at the lowest point in her life. Even though she is now living the life of her dreams, she still constructs scripts to keep taking her life to new heights.

What genre will you choose?

Don’t let the dramas of the outside world, your past failures, or even your successes define or limit you. Failure is not fatal. And success is not final.

You’ve got a power flowing through you that allows you to do things that will astound you. So, decide what, exactly, you want your future to look like.

How do you want your days to play out? Who do you want to be spending time with? Where will you live? How much money will you make? How healthy will you be?

The truth is, you are writing the script for the movie of your life in every moment. So, think about this…

What genre do you want your movie to be – a comedy? a drama? an adventure? inspirational?

Most people don’t realize they have the power to choose. So, they let other people choose the plot, the cast of characters and the movie setting.

In other words, they are extras in their own movie!

Well, starting today, become the conscious writer, director and star of your movie. 

Remember, this is your life. If you want a life with more passion, awe-inspiring relationships, a grand business, write it into the script.

You are an individual expression of Universal Consciousness with your own unique purpose and gifts. And you have the power to create your life in accordance with your preferences.

However, to get the most from this process, you’ve got to write a script that allows you to dream big AND still believe that it’s possible for you. Because if you don’t believe it, you won’t expect it and that will keep your desire from moving toward you.

So, allow me to explain how to do both of those things…

How to write a script that tunes you in 

and turns you on!

Here are five tips for writing a compelling life script that helps you create the movie of your dreams:

• Handwrite your story in the present tense, as if you are living it NOW.
• Make it a very positive and uplifting vision of your future. Talk about the things you want MOST in each area of your life—physical body, business or career, finances, relationships, intellect, spiritual connections.
• Engage all your senses and include as much detail as possible about where you are, what you look like, who you’re with, what you do, your financial situation…everything.
• See and feel yourself living in accordance with this script that is custom made for you by you. The more you feel it, the more real it becomes, and the more powerfully you are attracting it.
• Review your script each day. Writing your life script is not something you do once and forget about it. You should read it every day, and refine it as necessary to keep you worked up.

When you write a life script in this manner, it accomplishes five things. It…

1. Compels you to change or get very clear on your thoughts about your future.
2. Moves you beyond limiting beliefs.
3. Keeps you focused on—and, therefore, attracting—what you want rather than what you don’t want.
4. Intensifies your feelings and expectations about your true desires.
5. Harnesses the power of the Universe and attracts people, places and resources just as you want them to be.

How to increase your belief

Once you create a script that allows you to dream big, you may need to work on your belief that it’s possible.

To do that, read your script out loud (with feeling) and record it. Then, listen to it several times every day. I recommend listening to it when you wake up and again before you go to sleep at night. You can also listen in your car and while you’re getting dressed, working out or cooking.

With this spaced repetition of new ideas and beliefs, you will be able to change your thoughts and belief systems (your paradigm). When that happens, your actions will change too.

One of the reasons life scripts work is because they put your mind in a state of expectancy. The stream of plenty always flows towards the open and expectant mind. Expectation is the attractive force that moves your dream towards you.

Before long, opportunities and people who can help will begin to “show up” until you become the person you want to be. Then, your whole life will become what you imagine it can be.

If you’re serious about taking your life to the next level—and beyond—don’t just read about this process. Do it now. You’ll be so happy that you did.

To your success,

Bob Proctor

Source 

Cultivating Burning Desire | Steve Pavlina

When asked during an interview how he managed to reach the top as a professional bodybuilder and Hollywood actor, Arnold Schwarzenegger replied with a single word, “Drive!” All great success ultimately begins with an idea, but what makes ideas become reality is the fuel of human desire. An idea by itself can give you a temporary feeling of inspiration, but burning desire is what gets you through all the perspiration necessary to overcome the inevitable obstacles along the way.

Take a moment to think about the goals you’ve set for yourself. (You have set goals, haven’t you? If not, go read the article on setting clear goals.) How committed are you to achieving these goals? Under what conditions would you give up? What if you could significantly increase your desire to achieve these goals? What if you wanted them so badly that you knew with absolute certainty that you would absolutely, positively never ever give up? When you are truly 100% committed to reaching your goals, you move from hoping to knowing. If you want something badly enough, then quitting is simply not an option. You either find a way or make one. You pay the price, whatever it takes.

Those with an intense, burning desire to achieve their goals are often referred to as being “driven.” But is this special quality reserved only for a privileged few? Certainly not. With the right approach, anyone can cultivate a deep, burning desire within themselves and move to a state of total commitment, knowing with certainty that success is as inevitable as the sunrise.

So how do you cultivate burning desire? You begin with an outside-in approach, altering your environment in ways that will strengthen your resolve while eliminating doubt. If you take the time to do it right, you’ll establish a positive feedback cycle, such that your desire will continue to increase on a daily basis.

Here are eight steps you can take to cultivate burning desire to achieve any goal you set for yourself:

1. Burn the Ships

I’m not going to pull any punches with this one. If your goals are really important enough to you, then you can start by burning the proverbial ships, such that you have no choice but to press on. For instance, if you want to launch your own business, you can begin by making the commitment to quitting your job. Write a letter of resignation, put it in a stamped envelope addressed to your boss, and give it to a trusted friend with firm instructions to mail the letter if you haven’t quit your job by a certain date.

One Las Vegas casino manager made the decision to quit smoking. He didn’t feel he had the personal willpower to do it alone, so he took out a billboard on the Las Vegas Strip with his photo on it along with the words, “If you catch me smoking, I’ll pay you $100,000!” Was he able to quit smoking? You bet! (Ok, bad pun.) This is called willpower leveraging. You use a small bit of willpower to establish a consequence that will virtually compel you to keep your commitment. As Andrew Carnegie once said, “Put all your eggs in one basket, and then watch that basket!”

In the classic book The Art of War, Sun Tzu notes that soldiers fight the most ferociously when they believe they’re fighting to the death. A good general knows that when attacking an opposing force, it’s important to create the illusion of a potential escape route for the enemy, so they won’t fight as hard. What escape routes are you keeping open that are causing you not to fight as hard?

If you don’t burn those ships, you are sending the message to your subconscious mind that it’s ok to quit. And when the going gets tough, as it inevitably does for any worthwhile goal, you will quit. If you really want to achieve your goals, then you’ve got to burn those ships to the ground, and scatter the ashes. If you’re thinking that the average person won’t do this, you’re right — that’s why they’re average.

2. Fill Your Environment with Desire Boosters

Let’s say one of your important goals is to lose weight. Get some poster board, and make your own posters that say, “I weigh X pounds,” where X is your goal weight, and put them up around your house. Change your screensaver to a text message that says the same thing (or to some equally motivational imagery). Get some magazines, cut out pictures of people who have bodies similar to what you’d like to have, and put them up around your house. Cut out pictures of healthy food that looks good to you, and post those around your kitchen. If you work in an office, then alter your office in the same manner. Don’t worry about what your coworkers will think, and just do it! They may poke a little fun at you at first, but they’ll also begin to see how committed you are.

3. Surround Yourself with Positive People

Make friends with people who will encourage you on the path to your goals, and find ways to spend more time with them. Share your goals only with people who will support you, not those who will respond with cynicism or indifference. If you want to lose weight, for instance, get yourself into a gym, and start befriending those who are already in great shape. You’ll find that their attitudes become infectious, and you’ll start believing that you can do it too. Meeting people who’ve lost one hundred pounds or more can be extremely motivating. If you want to start a new business, join the local chamber of commerce or a trade association. Do whatever it takes to make new friends who will help you keep your commitment.

Although this can be difficult for some people, you also need to fire the negative people from your life. I once read that you can see your future just by looking at the six people with whom you spend the most time. If you don’t like what you see, then change those people. 
There’s no honor in remaining loyal to people who expect you to fail. One of the reasons people fail to start their own businesses, for instance, is that they spend most of their time associating with other employees. The way out of this trap is to start spending a lot more time associating with business owners, such as by joining a trade association. Mindsets are contagious. So spend your time with people whose mindsets are worth catching.

4. Feed Your Mind with Empowering Information on a Daily Basis

Inspirational books and audio programs are one of the best fuel sources for cultivating desire. If you want to quit smoking, read a dozen books written by ex-smokers on how to quit the habit. If you want to start a business, then start devouring business books. Go to seminars on occasion. I advise that you feed your mind with some form of motivational material (books, articles, audio programs) for at least fifteen minutes a day. This will continually recharge your batteries and keep your desire impenetrably strong.

When you absorb material created by an extremely passionate person, you’ll often find yourself feeling more passionate as well. A great book I read was Pour Your Heart Into It by Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks. As I read the book, I was absolutely amazed at how someone could be so fanatically enthusiastic about coffee. Other enthusiasm-building authors/speakers I highly recommend are Harvey Mackay and Zig Ziglar.

5. Replace Sources of Negative Energy with Positive Energy

Take an inventory of all the sensory inputs into your life that affect your attitude — what you read, what you watch on TV, the cleanliness of your home, etc. Note which inputs influence you negatively, and strive to replace them with positive inputs. I’ll give you some good places to start. First, avoid watching TV news — it’s overwhelmingly negative. Do you really need to hear about the woman who was mauled to death by her neighbor’s dog? Fill that time with positive inputs instead, like motivational and educational audio programs. If you like to watch movies, then watch movies that are full of positive energy, such as light-hearted comedies and stories of triumph over adversity. Avoid dark, tragic movies that leave you feeling empty afterwards. Dump the horror books, and replace them with humor books. Spend more time laughing and less time worrying. If you have a messy desk, clean it up! If you have young kids or grandkids, spend some time playing with them. Some of this may sound a bit corny, but it will really help increase your overall motivation. If you have a hard time motivating yourself, chances are that your life is overflowing with too many sources of negativity. It’s far better to happily achieve than it is to feel you must achieve in order to be happy.

6. Dress for Success

Whenever you pass by a mirror, which is probably several times a day, you get an instant dose of image reinforcement. So what image are you currently reinforcing? Would you dress any differently if your goals were already achieved? Would you sport a different hairstyle? Would you shower a bit more often?

Although for years I enjoyed the ripped jeans and T-shirt look, I noted that when I visualized myself in the future, having achieved certain goals, I was dressed a lot more nicely. With some experimentation I found a style of clothing that looks professional and is also comfortable. So I gradually donated my old clothes to charity and replaced my wardrobe with clothes that fit the new identity I was growing into. (Consequently, there’s a Salvation Army store with quite a stock of gaming industry T-shirts.) I learned this idea from an ex-Navy Seal, who stressed to me the importance of taking pride in your appearance, and I can say with certainty that it makes a noticeable difference. So make sure the clothes you wear each day are consistent with your new self-image.

7. Use Mental Programming

This is a Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) technique that will help you associate strong positive emotions to whatever goal you’re working to achieve. Find some music that really energizes and inspires you. Put on your headphones and listen to it for fifteen to twenty minutes, and as you do this, form a clear mental picture of yourself having already achieved the results you want. Make your imagery big, bright, vivid, colorful, three-dimensional, panoramic, and animated. Picture the scene as if looking through your own eyes (this is very important). This will help you form a neuro-association between the positive emotions elicited by the music and the goal you want to achieve, thus strengthening your desire. This is a great way to begin each day, and you can even do it while lying in bed when you first awaken if you set things up the night before. You should cycle the music periodically, since the emotional charge you get will tend to diminish if you listen to the same songs each time.

Keep in mind that this form of mental programming is already being used on you by advertisers. Watch a fast-food TV commercial, and you’ll note that the food is big, bright, and animated — spinning burgers, lettuce flying through a splash of water, ripe tomatoes being sliced — and don’t forget the catchy tune. So instead of letting others program your desires for you, take charge and mentally reprogram yourself.

8. Take Immediate Action

Once you set a goal for yourself, act immediately. As you begin working on a fresh new goal, don’t worry so much about making detailed long-term plans. Too often people get stuck in the state of analysis paralysis and never reach the action stage. You can develop your plan later, but get moving first. Just identify the very first physical action you need to take, and then do it. For instance, if you’ve decided to lose weight, go straight to your refrigerator, and throw out all the junk food. Don’t think about it. Don’t ponder the consequences. Just do it immediately.

One of the secrets to success is recognizing that motivation follows action. The momentum of continuous action fuels motivation, while procrastination kills motivation. So act boldly, as if it’s impossible to fail. If you keep adding fuel to your desire, you will reach the point of knowing that you’ll never quit, and ultimate success will be nothing more than a matter of time.

If you apply these eight strategies, you’ll add so much fuel to your desire that the fire will never burn out. You’ll move towards your goals like a guided missile to its target, and you’ll enjoy the process because you’ll be so focused on the positive rewards instead of the difficulty of the tasks. If you get enough positive energy flowing into you, you’ll soon have positive results flowing out of you. And you’ll quickly become the kind of person that others refer to as “driven.”

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Do These 7 Things to Get (and Stay) Motivated | Brian Tracy

The best motivation is self-motivation. Here’s how to get in an inspired state of mind.

How do you stay motivated and inspired? How can you keep your passion, your excitement, fired up? By reviewing these self-motivators on a regular basis:

1. Get serious.

Make a decision to go all the way to the top. Up to now, you've thought about it. Up to now, it's passed your mind. But now make up your mind to go all the way to the top, and your life will take off. It's the most extraordinary thing.

Your life is like a shadow going up the dark side of a hill—until the moment you decide that "I'm going to be the best at what I do.” And suddenly you rise into the sunshine, and your life is forever after different—wonderful.

Get serious. Don't fool around anymore.

2. Know your limiting step.

What's your limiting step? What's the one skill area that's holding you back? What's the quality? What's the action? Ask other people. Find out what you need to become good at.

Find out what's keeping you stuck. What is the critical limiting step that's determining your success today?

3. Get around the right people.

Who are the right people? Winners. Get around positive people. Get around people with goals and plans, people who are going somewhere with their lives and have high aspirations. 

Get around eagles. As Zig Ziglar says, "You can't scratch with the turkeys if you want to fly with the eagles."

And get away from negative people. Get away from toxic people that complain and whine and moan all the time. Who needs them? Life is too short.

4. Take care of yourself.

Take excellent care of your health. That means good diet, good exercise. Everybody knows they should eat better foods, work out regularly and get lots of rest. If you're going to work hard five days a week, go to bed early five days a week.

5. See yourself as the best.

Visualize yourself as the very best in whatever you do—continually. Remember, all improvement in your life begins with an improvement in your mental pictures.

6. Talk nicely to yourself.

Control your inner dialogue and practice positive self-talk. How? Say, "I'm the best." Say it. Say, “I like myself,” “I can do it,” “I love my work.” If you say those things to yourself and you don't believe them, isn’t that lying to yourself? No, that's not lying to yourself—it’s telling the truth in advance. Because it doesn't matter where you're coming from—all that matters is where you're going.

Talk to yourself the way you want to be, not the way you just happen to be at this moment. Remember, you may have gotten where you are today largely by accident. But where you're going in the future is purely by design.

7. Get going.

Move fast. A sense of urgency is the one thing you can develop that will separate you from everyone else. Develop a bias for action. When you get a good idea, do it now.

And the faster you move, the better you get. And the better you get, the more you like yourself. And the more you like yourself, the higher your self-esteem is. And the higher your self-esteem is, the greater your self-discipline is. And the more you persist, then you ultimately become unstoppable.

Want to be successful? Check out 7 activities you should be doing in your spare time.

Excerpted from Success Mastery Academy by Brian Tracy 

I hope you found this useful.  Please let me know what you think below.

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4 Small, Simple Ways To Get Back Your Sparkle | Tia Sparkles

Everyone is trying to accomplish something big, not realising that life is made up of little things. – Frank A Clark.

Little things are happening around us every day.

Every moment, in fact, we are encountering little things. Yesterday, when I was walking into a shop, a woman smiled at me. I smiled back and thought to myself, “That was such a small thing but it made me happy to be acknowledged by a stranger.”

Often we dismiss the small stuff because we are caught up in the bigger picture. We’re working towards our goals that are afar off and forget to stop and “smell the roses” along the way.

Not every little thing is as positive as a happy face or a helping hand, though.

Little negative things happen, too. Things go wrong some days. We can focus on them so heavily that they take over our lives.

Instead of letting frustration get the better of us, being able to see small positives will pull us through each of those negative days. Wonderful things are all around us if we could but notice them.

It all depends on our outlook and attitude.

Does small stuff make you sparkle inside?

Consider the following situations:

SCENARIO ONE: YOU’VE HAD A BAD DAY.

So nothing went right for you today? You had to start one of your jobs three times before you got it right; your friend forgot it was the day to meet you for lunch – and so on.

These negative things can be blown out of all proportion causing you to label the day a failure.

** Get back your sparkle **

If you focus on positive aspects of the day, your face will turn from a scowl to a smile. It’s not easy to see the positives because several happenings, one after the other, can really cloud any sunshine.

Maybe the job you started three times was very impressive when you eventually finished it. Be grateful and smile. Maybe your mum/spouse had your favourite meal ready when you arrived home. That’s enough to warm anyone’s heart – and tummy.

Seeing the happiness that little things can bring will change your opinion of the day. It really wasn’t so bad after all, was it?

“As you start and end your day, say ‘thank you’ for every little thing in your life, and you will come to realise how blessed you truly are.” Unknown.

SCENARIO TWO : BIG THINGS ARE A PRIORITY NOW.

When you were a kid, your day was filled with little things that brought a smile to your face. You ran outside in the rain; you looked with wonder at the first strawberry growing on your plant; you sat on your swing and laughed as the breeze blew through your hair.

Now, though, there’s no time for the playful things of life. The big things have taken over. Rush to the bus so that you get to work on time; cancel morning tea with your friend because an important meeting has suddenly been scheduled – and so on and on.

** Get back your sparkle **

One way to cope with the busyness of life while you make sure you put some small stuff back into the mix, is to follow the five/two and two/five rules.

On week days, schedule five jobs for the day that must be done, but schedule two things for yourself that you love to do.

At the weekend the numbers reverse. Do five things for yourself – a family picnic, coffee with a friend – but schedule two jobs that must be done to keep your life afloat.

“I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things . . . I play with leaves, I skip down the street and run against the wind.” Leo Buscaglia.

SCENARIO THREE: PEOPLE ARE ANNOYING YOU.

Well, that’s part of life, eh? People annoy us, of course. Family, friends, ones we love, people in our work situation, all annoy us at times. Dealing with annoyances isn’t easy.

I find that instead of managing the day as things happen, I try to set the agenda or feeling for the day myself. That way I can better deal with whatever comes along.

** Get back your sparkle **

I’ll tell someone I love them, compliment someone on their work or how they look, drop a coin into the busker’s hat, and generally be on the lookout for opportunities to pass happiness on. This makes me happy inside, as well as the other person.

Of course, every day isn’t going to go along like this – in a positive way. There’ll still be difficulties to overcome and disappointments to handle. But we won’t come crashing down as far as we might have, had we not started the day off positively.

So try to factor the small stuff into every day. You set the agenda and see the difference that makes, to you and others.

“You are precisely as big as what you love and precisely as small as what you allow annoy you.” Robert Anton Wilson.

SCENARIO FOUR: SMALL STUFF THAT DOESN’T SPARKLE.

One weekend we looked after two children while their mum flew interstate for a job interview. The 10-year-old asked me a question, when we were getting ready for a picnic. “Why do you worry so much about little things?” I was taken aback. When I thought about it, I found, to my surprise, that I do this a lot.

Little things annoy me, like: Where are the scissors? (I always put them back in their appropriate place, but other family members don’t.) Why is the ‘phone ringing just when I’m ready to leave for an appointment?

** Get back your sparkle **

Instead of just accepting that these things happen, I was displaying annoyance. I could see that these little things were setting the tone for the day. I wasn’t in control at all, they were.

From that moment on I decided to monitor my behaviour to my own and others’ advantage. These are only little things but the minute I accepted that things happen and worked around the issues without getting cranky, the day was happier.

In this scenario, attitude is key. How easy it is to change our attitude! I could see beyond the trivial to the many good things about the day.

“Little things seem nothing, but they give peace, like those meadow flowers which individually seem odourless but all together perfume the air.” Georges Bernanos.

Which leads me to wonder – are there really any little things in life?

I’m reminded of the words of Bruce Barton: “Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things, I am tempted to think there are no little things.”

From now, I’ll look at small stuff in a different light.

It’s the small stuff that can reach inside ourselves and out to others, and change a day entirely. When we stop concentrating on annoyances, minor problems, or the busyness of life, we are open to seeing little miracles all around us.

Smile and let the sun shine through you to others with whom you come in contact each day. You don’t know when the little things you do and say will make a difference – somewhere.

The world might be a better place because of the small stuff that you were responsible for, that grew and grew into bigger stuff.

Please let me know what you think below.

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