My Job is Stressing Me Out. Is that true? | Byron Katie

An honest inquiry into the source of stress in your life will yield some surprising results. If you're mindful, present, and inquiring, you won't be able to fool yourself, says Byron Katie.

Katie's latest book is "A Thousand Names for Joy: Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are".

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Be, Do and Have More | Zig Ziglar

Zig Ziglar's early days sharing how you have to be before you can do and have more of what you want. 

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Finding your Meaning of Life - Inspiring Video

Life has no meaning. Each of us has meaning and we bring it to life. It is a waste of time to be asking the question when you are the answer. We do not enter the future we create it.

Inspiring words from Ashton Kutcher, Jim Carrey, Steve Jobs, Will Smith, Stephen Spielberg, Oprah Winfrey, Neil deGrasse Tyson on creating your meaning of life. Meaning is not something to be found in life, meaning is something we create. May these powerful words inspire your day today

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Stop Is One of the Most Underutilized Four Letter Words in the English Language | Kathleen Dwyer Blair

Have you ever found yourself on the receiving end of someone's tirade while sitting in your living room, the board room, or at a family gathering? Have you found yourself screaming in your mind, "stop", yet the word is stuck in your throat and you cannot even imagine saying it out loud?

Well, guess what? This is just what I'm encouraging you to do. It really is okay, and actually emotionally healthy to say, "stop" if we are feeling that someone is speaking to us in a way that feels uncomfortable or is unacceptable.

Don't Only Yield to The Needs of Others

As an emotionally healthy adult, it is our responsibility to teach people how we want to be treated. We cannot assume that the other person knows how we are feeling, or if something is upsetting us. In part, this means if someone says or does something that is not okay with us, then we need and deserve to say, "stop."

This can be done in a non-aggressive and healthy manner.

• Don't shout, speak in a calm, yet firm voice.
• Be mindful of your tone of voice and body language.
• Use "I" instead of "You" statements.
• Your response may sound something like this, "Please stop. I need you to stop."

Developing Acceptable Signals & Healthy Boundaries

I encourage the individuals and couples that we work with in our psychotherapy practice to establish guidelines around how they want to be treated by the people in their life. The time to have this discussion is when both individuals are in "neutral". When there is no emerging issue, or current conflict for either person. This is a healthy way of discussing how each person wants to be treated. When both people agree to this, healthier interactions tend to take place.

The focus of the discussion is utilizing a very specific and individualized method of setting emotional boundaries. What works for one person, may not be satisfactory for the other. Therefore, it's important to determine what each person is comfortable with in their communication with each other.

"Boundaries serve as a reminder that there are two distinct people in the relationship with their own perspectives, needs, feelings, and interests." ~ Toni Coleman, LCSW, CMC and relationship expert

Many may prefer that the other not put their hand up, or use assertive body language, to interrupt while communicating. Hence why it's important to come up with the words, and acceptable signals, beforehand. This way both people are comfortable with what's established so that's part of the agreement. This discussion, and new communication method, is planned and processed in advance, so this becomes the new normal.

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Marketing From Your Conscience | Steve Pavlina

Years ago I learned a simple yet powerful marketing secret: You must become so convinced of the benefits of your product or service that you feel you’d be unjustly depriving people by not doing everything in your power to get the word out.

I was infected by this attitude from Jay Abraham. Jay has an absolutely brilliant way of thinking about marketing. For example, if you’re an accountant, and you’re skilled at saving people money on their taxes, Jay might ask how much you save your average client. Say it’s $500 per year. And then Jay would ask how much you charge. Say it’s $200. Then Jay might take you through a conversation like this:

Jay: So it’s costing people a net $300 per year not to do business with you.
You: Yes, that’s fair to say.
Jay: How long does your typical client stay with you?
You: About three years.
Jay: So that’s a total of $900 then. People are effectively being charged $900 not to work with you, $900 they would have otherwise been able to keep.
You: Alright.
Jay: So if you meet someone and don’t tell them about your service, you’ve just cost them $900.
You: Hmmm…
Jay: You have a duty then to share this knowledge; to do otherwise would be irresponsible.
You: That’s a strange way to think about it.
Jay: What’s strange about it? If you have the ability to save people $900, then you’re costing everyone $900 they could have saved whenever you don’t tell someone about your service. Don’t you have a moral obligation to save people this $900 if you can do it? Wouldn’t it be unethical not to do it?
You: How is it unethical?
Jay: You’re cheating people out of $900 you could have saved them. All you had to do was speak up – or at least try. What might that $900 mean to certain people? You’d be costing people a great deal of additional enjoyment, education, retirement income, vacations, etc. I consider that kind of negligent behavior unethical. Don’t you?
You: I just never thought about it that way before.
Jay: Start thinking about it that way then.

In other words, if the product or service you provide is truly of benefit to others, then marketing becomes a duty. Not spreading the word is irresponsible and unethical.

Of course, the opposite is also true. If you have a product or service with no real benefit, then to actively market it would be irresponsible as well. If deep down you have doubts as to whether what you’re providing is of real value, you’ll probably sabotage yourself in your marketing efforts. I see this all the time among small business owners — they often don’t believe enough in their products to aggressively market them. So they hold back and fill their days with non-marketing activities instead. Doing too much marketing makes them feel uncomfortable.

I’m not advocating trying to fool yourself into believing in your product/service when you don’t. I’m suggesting you consult your conscience to see what you already believe. If you run your own business and don’t market it very well (a common situation), is it possible you don’t really believe in the benefits you provide? Or if you feel you’re ready for a better job but don’t go out and apply for one, could it be that you secretly feel the potential employer would be better off hiring someone else?

How well do you market yourself in other areas? Do you hold back from pursuing new friendships or relationships because you don’t believe enough in the benefits that others would experience from your companionship? What would happen if you truly believed in the benefits you can provide?

When you find your conscience is holding you back from effective marketing, don’t try to squash that inner voice. Listen to it. Hear what it has to say. Are your products just wasting people’s time? Are your services pointless? Would an employer be better off hiring someone other than you? Would a friend be better off without you in their life?

Your conscience can point you in the direction of greater internal congruence, allowing you to market yourself very naturally and eagerly. Sometimes this involves recognizing the genuine benefit that’s already there, such as with the accountant example at the beginning of this article. But other times it requires changing the offering to create a new benefit that really matters to you.

When I started StevePavlina.com, I had to remember this powerful lesson: marketing must align with conscience. I can tell I’m congruent in this area when I’m eager to do marketing work instead of wanting to put it off. If I feel a desire to procrastinate on marketing, I know something is wrong. So I run through one of those imaginary Jay Abraham conversations in my mind to see where I stand. What is the real benefit I’m providing? How can I quantify it? What will I be costing people if I don’t market to them? Why do I have an ethical duty to market this information?

Be careful not to confuse this with vanity, which is self-directed. This type of motivation is directed outward. It’s not about telling yourself how great you are. It’s recognizing what you can do for others that really, truly benefits them. If I think about myself being a great writer or speaker, that isn’t going to help my marketing. In fact, it will likely hurt me by injecting too much ego into the message. But if I think about what real benefit I can offer someone, that is very motivating. My understanding of this benefit must be rooted in the facts, not on a fictionalized exaggeration. Recognize and acknowledge the real, down-to-earth benefits and what they can actually do for people. And if the benefits are too weak to give you the feeling that marketing is an ethical duty, then stop your practice of junk marketing, and listen to what your conscience has been trying to tell you all along.

What kind of product or service do you feel you really should be marketing and selling? What skills do you need to develop that would make you an intelligent choice for your preferred employer to hire? What do you need to change in yourself to make it genuinely beneficial for others to befriend you?

By creating and acknowledging the real benefit that you actually believe in, you accomplish two things. First, your feeling of certainty will move you to action. You’ll become driven to market yourself, your product, or your service because that’s the right thing to do. Secondly, you’ll actually be providing something of value that genuinely helps others. And together these two results will create a positive feedback loop where the more aggressively you market and sell, the more people you help, and the more certain you become that you’re doing the right thing.

Acknowledge the real benefit you provide. Don’t fall into the ego trap by exaggerating your impact, but don’t minimize or deny the positive benefits either. Find the truth of the situation. Is your conscience congruently committed to the belief that you’re marketing something of real value, or have you been lying to yourself? And if it’s the latter, how can you correct it?

When your marketing message is congruent with your conscience, your motivation for promotion won’t be restrained by hesitation. When you believe that marketing is simply the right thing to do, you’ll do it eagerly, not for your own gratification but because you know you’re genuinely helping people.

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Controlling Your Own Schedule | Steve Pavlina

Sometimes people use their job as their blanket excuse for not being in control of their schedule. “Oh… I can’t because I have a job,” is the main reason people give for not being able to do 30-day trials, experience extended travel, and do immersive deep dives.

However, during periods without a job, these same people often switch to a different excuse. Oh… I can’t because I’m unemployed right now.

Self-employed people do this too. Oh… I can’t because I have to work.

Work will come and go. Your finances may fluctuate over time. But no matter what, time is passing. You have the same number of days this month that anyone else has. You’re free to decide how you’ll use these days. If you want to spend this time on work, you can do that. If you want to spend the time on other growth and lifestyle activities, you can do that too.

You Have More Control Than You Think

Many people have a hard time accepting the responsibility of being in control, so they yield this control to someone else. Unless you’re being forcibly enslaved, giving someone else control of your schedule is only a temporary assignment. The truth is that you’re still in control all along because you can make a different decision whenever you desire.

If you give control of your schedule to a boss, a company, a client, a spouse, or anyone else, that’s a temporary choice. These people don’t actually have control over your time without your consent. You can always change your mind and start saying “No, thanks” to their requests.

Not having control over your schedule can be stressful. But the lack of control is an illusion. You chose to put yourself in that situation, and you didn’t have to. You could have made different decisions, and you still can. If you don’t like the stress, you can take back control and make different decisions.

I’m not suggesting that you can control other people’s reactions, and fortunately you don’t need to. I’m just suggesting you can start using your time differently and thereby get different results.

Shortly after I started my first business developing computer games, I made the mistake of giving control over my schedule to other people, mostly publishers I worked with. That created a lot of stress. Several years later when I realized I didn’t have to do that, I stopped and reclaimed control over my schedule. The stress went way down, and I enjoyed my life and my work so much more.

Even when I was deep in debt, I realized I didn’t have to waste my time answering creditors’ phone calls or reading their computer generated letters. During a time when it seemed entirely unreasonable to control my own schedule, I took back control and let everyone else lay the consequences upon me. I worked on the projects that appealed to me. I exercised a lot. I put more energy into my overall enjoyment of life. I let the most demanding people spin their wheels while I focused on my own goals.

Is this completely selfish? I don’t think so, especially since contribution was a big part of my goals. By taking back control, I learned to make better decisions than others had been making on my behalf.

The people I know who enjoy the greatest lifestyle freedom (and usually the greatest all-around happiness) wield a lot of control over their schedules. They decide what they want to do and when they’ll do it. They don’t always get it right, but they figure out what works for them through trial and error. They like seeing each year as a canvas upon which they consciously paint the unfolding story of their lives.

We all have this freedom. We just have to step up and claim it, which means we have to start consciously rejecting unreasonable claims to our time.

Even if someone else seems to control some of your schedule, this is happening with your consent. You didn’t have to consent to this, and you still don’t. No one else actually controls how you spend your time. People can offer you tasks to do, and you can accept or decline those at will. Either way there are consequences.

You control your schedule. You can pretend that you don’t, but yielding control to someone else is only a mind-game you play with yourself.

The Real Consequences

What are the consequences of not following orders? You may get chastised. You may get fired or rejected. What keeps you in line is the fear and resistance regarding those consequences. The real consequences are usually no big deal though.

The consequences that many people fear are the same consequences that other people accept and enjoy as their daily reality. I get chastised now and then. And I’ve lived without a job for 24 years so far. These aren’t scary consequences to be avoided. This is just normal, everyday life.

Look at the flip side. Have you thought about the consequences of obedience and passivity? What are the consequences of following too many orders? You may not be able to travel much. You may not have time to explore a rich and rewarding social life with quality friends. You may not be able to consciously work on your personal growth. You may not have time to set and achieve your own goals. You may miss out on life itself.

There are consequences on both sides. The question I like to ask is this: Which path will yield the most growth in the long run?

The main reason I don’t give someone else control over my schedule is that I trust that I’ll make smarter, more growth-oriented decisions than they will. I don’t have to make brilliant decisions every day, and I wouldn’t find that realistic anyway. I just have to outperform a would-be boss, which isn’t difficult.

The Growth Challenge of Freedom

Having lots of control over your schedule is a major growth challenge unto itself. What will you do with all that time? There are so many possibilities to consider! How can you even choose from such an endless sea of possibilities?

People often let someone else make these choices for them because they don’t understand the real challenge. The challenge is simply to make a better use of your time than someone else would choose for you.

You can hire someone to control your time for you, but they’ll generally take a significant cut of the value of your labor for the privilege (typically 60-70%). Hiring a manager (i.e. a boss) is expensive, so if you go this route, be sure to hire a quality manager who will listen to your feedback and help you grow and improve over time. Having a mentor boss for a while can be a valuable part of your journey.

When you’re in control of your own schedule, your personal weaknesses are fully exposed. If you aren’t very focused or disciplined, you’ll soon find yourself drifting and flailing. Then you have a growth challenge. How can you make reasonably intelligent decisions and focus and discipline your mind to get things done? Can you do this on your own?

These are tough challenges to be sure. That’s why the self-determination route appeals to me so much. These challenges really push me to grow. I find myself dropped into a sea of possibilities, and I must learn to swim.

This challenge is there for all of us. Just because we pretend it isn’t there doesn’t make it recede. You can give someone else control over your schedule, but the personal challenge remains intact. The invitation to greater growth is always present. You can embrace this challenge by consciously wielding control over your own schedule, acknowledging that you can never truly assign this responsibility to someone else. Or you can go dark and pretend you aren’t in control.

Oh… I can’t because I have a job, isn’t a valid excuse for not tackling other growth challenges. You can tackle whatever challenges appeal to you, so don’t pretend to be helpless and out of control. Just say, “I choose not to tackle these growth challenges because I’m currently exploring and enjoying other growth challenges right now.” Even when you’re choosing to follow orders for a while, stay conscious by acknowledging that you’re always in control over your decisions and your schedule.

Great food for thought?  Let me know what you think below.  


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How to Make Personal Growth More Fun (and Easier) | Henrik Edberg

“People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing.”

Dale Carnegie

When you read this blog, other blogs and books on personal development it’s easy to get drawn into an atmosphere of this being really serious business.

And for someone who needs help it can be. If you are really out of shape or have a huge debt or haven’t had date in ages or just don’t know what to do with your life then it’s no fun.

However, as usual, I want emphasize what works here. And through my own experience these last few years I have discovered that taking this as deadly serious business makes things harder than they need to be.

So today I’d like to suggest a bunch of ways to make personal growth and achieving what you want more fun.

Think of it more as light and breezy fun rather than going to war.

No, you are not going to war. Thinking that you are can help you to ramp up enthusiasm and aggressiveness in the beginning. It seems to help you.

So you make any personal development goal – or just anything you want out of life – in to this epic struggle. Perhaps just in your mind or also by reading more and more about a topic.

The more you think and read about a topic the more complicated it seems in your mind and is also becomes “heavier”. What may have been pretty straightforward in real life becomes this huge struggle, where you are Rocky Balboa taking slow painstaking steps uphill against horrific odds. Yep, it’s a real inspiring thing as you struggle as the heroic underdog.

It’s also a great way to make things so much harder for yourself. It’s you putting up imaginary obstacles in your own mind that aren’t even there in reality. The Rocky way of thinking about these things is very seductive. But life becomes so much lighter and easier when you just let that stuff go.

It’s a bit counter-intuitive and it took me quite some time to understand this. You think that an overly serious attitude may seem like the right attitude to help you achieve your goal.

But a more relaxed and fun attitude where you tell yourself that what you are doing isn’t really that complicated, epic – millions of people have probably done what you want to do in last 1000 years or so – or super serious is often more effective to get the result you desire.

Of course, sometimes things will suck but I think that if you can approach things this way you’ll get more enjoyment on your path to your goal and you won’t put up extra obstacles on that path.

You can bring awareness to what you are thinking while on the daily walk on that path by asking yourself questions like “Honestly, am I overcomplicating this?” or ”Am I taking this a bit too seriously?”.

Find out what you have fun doing.

If you don’t like jogging don’t do it. Not everyone has be a runner to get exercise. Be curious and explore different options, perhaps soccer or table tennis is a better option for you? 
Finding what works and feels good for you makes it a lot easier to stick to the plan and be consistent each week rather than feeling like you have drag yourself to the gym again.

Detach from the outcome.

This is one of my favorite tips for making it easier to take action and to do so consistently. It makes the doing more enjoyable and there is less inner resistance or projections into the future that can screw things up.

I first got this tip from the ancient Sanskrit Hindu scripture Bhagavad Gita. It says:
“To action alone hast thou a right and never at all to its fruits; let not the fruits of action be thy motive; neither let there be in thee any attachment to inaction”

This tells me to understand that I cannot control the results of my action. I can’t control how someone reacts to what I say or what I do. And that I should do what I do just because it is something I want to do rather than because of some outcome I’d like. But at the same time I should not let these two ideas lead me to become passive and get stuck in sitting on my hands and not taking action at all.

Basically, I do what I think is right and that is my responsibility. And then the rest (the possible results), well, that is not up for me to decide about or try to control. I let it go.

Now, I apply this when I do something. I can get motivated by future results before the doing the activity. But when I start doing any those activities I detach and change how I think. I just focus on showing up and doing. This may sound a bit weird or hard but after a while it gets easier and easier to do that shift in your mind and to not start projecting into the future while you are doing.

You can apply this to:

• Working out. By focusing on just showing up and doing the workout you won’t get discouraged when you haven’t lost x pounds after a week. You become more patient and more emotionally stable when you don’t think about losing that weight all the time. If you just show up and work out – and control what you eat – the pounds will come off.

• Blogging. If you don’t have to worry about what people may think about your next post then it becomes a lot easier to calmly write what you want instead of getting stuck in some kind of writer’s block.

• Social interactions. If you detach from an outcome such as someone liking you at a party or on a date then you’ll be less nervous. You won’t try to impress people. You will be more like how you are with your closest friends, relaxed and easy going. Just being yourself is an often cited and sometimes criticized piece of advice. By detaching from outcomes – while still of course using your common sense – it will be a lot easier to just be the best version of yourself.

Focus on the positive things from the past.

It’s easy to fall back into the common habit of focusing on your past failures. Doing so can make you feel like giving up. Or like this is a war. Or like getting out of your comfort zone is just one big hassle.

So I suggest changing your focus. Remember when things went well.

Awash your mind with positive memories.

Realise it can be fun to get out of your comfort zone despite what your mind and feelings might be telling you before you get started. Think back to the previous times when you have broken out of your rut. Focus on the positive memories, when you got out there, when you took a chance. And you’ll recall that it wasn’t so bad, it was actually fun and exciting and something new to you.

A lot of the time we automatically play back our negative experiences – or negative interpretations of events – in our minds before we are about to do something. And we forget about the positive memories and our previous, positive achievements. Avoid that trap. Let the fun and good memories flow through your mind instead and let things become easier.

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