Dealing With Anger, Resistance And Pessimism | Eckhart Tolle

Eckhart Tolle discusses the decisive shift from identifying with a feeling and simply observing it in your energy field.
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6 Ways To Focus Your Attention And Be Happier | Sarah McLean

Become Fully Engaged And Improve The Quality Of Your Life

The questions that follow are designed to illuminate your ability to manage your attention as you notice what you pay attention to, how you pay attention, and the quality of your attention. 

I include this questionnaire in my book, The Power Of Attention.

Read through each question and either use them as journal prompts or simply reflect upon them as you go about your day. This inquiry will reveal to you the way you use the currency of your attention.

Ask Yourself These Questions

1. Do I give enough attention to the people, activities, and things that are important to me?

2. How does someone or something respond when I give him/her/it my undivided attention? How do they respond when I am distracted in his/her/its presence? (You might be too distracted to notice!)

3. Do I pay attention to and listen to my inner knowing?

4. How do I feel physically - and where in my body do I feel it - when I judge, feel spiteful, or have ill will toward a particular person or situation?

5. How do I feel - and where in my body do I feel it - when I offer loving and supportive attention to a family member, a friend, or a stranger?

6. How do I feel - and where in my body do I feel it - when someone ignores me, disregards my requests, or is generally not present when they're with me?

7. How do I feel - and where in my body do I feel it - when I am truly being paid attention to?

8. Do I often multitask or am I able to sustain an uninterrupted continuum of attention?

9. What external stimulus most distracts me? (My phone? My relationship? The people or objects in my environment?)

10. What internal stimulus distracts me? (My obsessions? My daydreams? My grudges? My limiting beliefs? Body sensations?)

11. How long can I engage and be present with someone without looking at an electronic device?

12. Do I feel a sense of rushing even when there are no deadlines and nowhere to go?
With this inquiry, you'll be more conscious of how you want to spend this valuable currency of attention.

You might get frustrated as you see that you live in a world full of distractions and potential addictions. And, yes, the contemporary culture seems to encourage the half-hearted way some of us attend to the world around us.

By noticing what distracts and detours you, you can begin to create some boundaries around them to reclaim your focus.

Here are some tips to reclaim your attention:

1. Set Your Priorities

Make a commitment to give your attention to what matters to you, whether it's your body, your relationships, your creativity, your work, your family, your pets, your plants, your spiritual life, or your environment. The ability to fully engage in a relationship with others and attend to yourself is expressed in your ability to listen, to love, to connect, and to respond in compassionate and meaningful ways.

2. Practice Fully Engaging In A Conversation

Mindfully listen and stay connected as the person in front of you speaks. Don't interrupt, or assume. Simply be present. When you respond, speak mindfully and with your full attention.

3. Get To Know Your Body

Listen with the same loving attention you offer to others. Ask yourself, "How do I feel when I focus on this?" the "this" in this case can be anything: a goal, a memory, a co-worker, your family, your pet,a  project, social media, a problem at work, nature, a television show, a news article, or any activity you are engaged in. Choose to focus more on that which nourishes you.

4. Go Analog

Stop sleeping with your phone. Instead, use a clock or watch. Don't start the day in emergency mode. Create a relaxing morning routine, one where you can be present and calm. This will establish a restful response as you embark on your day.

5. Unplug

Whether a few hours a day, or one day a week, unplug from your devices and social media. Create boundaries around what distracts you. Make time to be completely available to your three dimensional reality. Uninterrupted time is when creativity and inspiration can arise and your real-life relationships can flourish.

6. Get A Dose Of Nature

Research shows that a 20-minute walk can improve attentional issues. The natural world is a conduit for connecting to reality. It brings you to your senses and can charm your attention. This gives your brain a break from endless to-do lists and habitual thinking patterns that keep you distracted.

You can reclaim and increase the power of your attention and pay full attention, on purpose, to whom and what you choose.

Harnessing your ability to pay attention will restore the relational space between you and who and what you focus on.

Your attention is powerful, and you can be in charge of it when you set your mind to it.

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Dealing With Anger, Resistance And Pessimism | Eckhart Tolle

Eckhart Tolle discusses the decisive shift from identifying with a feeling and simply observing it in your energy field. 

The real change comes from becoming aware of whatever is happening inside you... The anger is no longer you: the anger is anger, and you are the awareness.  You know it, you see it, you feel it, and there it is."

https://www.eckharttollenow.com

It's so great to get practical help on how to deal with anger.  Let me know know what you think below.

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Focus on process, not outcome | Tom Murcko

It seems like the best way to reach a desired result would be to focus on that result, try to move toward it, and judge each attempt by how closely you approximate it. But actually that approach is far from optimal. If you focus your attention and effort less on the results you’re hoping for and more on the processes and techniques you use, you will learn faster, become more successful, and be happier with the outcome.

By default we tend to be forward-looking, goal-pursuing, results-focused. Why? Because we’re wired for a discontentment with the present and a striving for a better future. Because results are easier to measure and evaluate than processes. Because we know others judge us based on results and we tend to care too much what others think.

But focusing on process rather than outcome is a much better strategy. Why?

• It eliminates the noise of external factors. Success can follow a flawed effort and failure can follow a flawless effort. In those cases, judging performance by outcome will reinforce the wrong techniques. You’ll achieve mastery of a new skill more quickly if you can learn to detect those cases and reinforce the correct processes whether or not they happened to lead to the desired outcome in that instance.
• It encourages experimentation. When you’re wholly focused on a specific desired result, you’re less willing to try long shots, less inclined to experiment, less open to serendipity, and less likely to stumble on an even better outcome than the one you were aiming for
• It lets you enjoy the process more. Life is lived in the present, not the future, and happiness is a process, not a place. Focusing on process will let you engage more deeply with the present and experience it more fully, which will help you learn faster and experience life more completely.
• It puts you in control. You have only partial control over whether you reach a specific external goal. But you have complete control over the process you use. Whether you give your best effort is entirely within your power. An internal locus of control leads to empowerment, higher self-esteem, and success, all of which contribute meaningfully to life satisfaction.
• It lets you enjoy and benefit more from whatever outcome does occur. In the long run things rarely turn out the way we expect them to. If your happiness is predicated on your success, and if your success is predicated on a specific outcome, you are setting yourself up for a high likelihood of frustration and disappointment. If you instead let go of the need for any particular outcome, you increase your chances for success and contentment. It’s fine to desire a certain outcome; just don’t make your happiness contigent on it. Instead, derive happiness from knowing that you gave every attempt your best effort.
• It will give you confidence. Not confidence that you’ll succeed in the current attempt, but confidence that you’re on the right path to mastery. You’ll worry less about the future because you’ll know that you’ll be happy regardless of the outcome of any given situation or event. You’ll be more free to get out of your comfort zone, to be spontaneous and take risks. And being unattached to a specific outcome means you won’t be needy, or get upset when things don’t go as you had hoped. The more you focus on process over outcome, the more confident you’ll become, and there’s nothing more attractive than confidence.

So how can you focus on process over outcome?

•  Don’t pursue the rewards directly, trust that they will come. Focus on the process with diligence and effortful study, and let the outcome take care of itself.
• Stop worrying about what others will think of your performance.
• View each attempt as merely practice for the next attempt.
• Choose for yourself how to rate your performance. Rate yourself based on the effort, not the outcome. Don’t try to win today, try to become a winner. Be happier when your best effort results in defeat than when a weak effort results in victory. Determine what your best effort would look like, and then make it happen.
• Bring awareness to your performance, either during or immediately after it, so you can learn to identify when bad results follow good processes, and vice-versa. With practice you will build the confidence needed to avoid second-guessing yourself when the results are bad but your technique is good.

Source: http://www.howtolive.com/focus-on-process-not-outcome/#.WEdiV_mLS00

Inspiring or what?  Love it!  Let me know what you think below!

How to Be Yourself | Eckhart Tolle

In this short video Eckhart Tolle talks about how to be yourself, how to stop the thoughts in your mind so that you can experience the presence of no thought.

I hope you find it inspiring. Please let me know below!

Source: https://youtu.be/q9azWMfkxH8