The Real Life Time Warp

DaliTimeHave you ever noticed how the passing of time seems to accelerate as you get older? I mean, all my life I have been hearing “old folks” telling me, “oh my god, time goes by so fast… the last time I saw you you were only this tall” as they stand there holding their hand up at waist height. I remember thinking to myself, “what the hell are they talking about, the last two hours at this (insert family/formal event here) seem like an ETERNITY… and who the hell is this old lady anyways?” You have the same memories, of that I’m certain; even if you didn’t have the foul mouth/mind I had as a young lad.

Well, the time has come in my own life where I just caught myself playing the role of the old man telling one of my best friend’s kids how much he grew since the last time I saw him… while he looked at me with the “who the fuck are you again” look. Come on, who doesn’t remember uncle T? Being in my 30s, it’s a hard pill to swallow that I’m no spring chicken anymore. First they stop asking for your ID at the liquor store, then kids start giving you funny looks when you think you’re being cool, then you’re getting your good luck charms ready for bingo night at the VFW.TimeWarp

The relativity of time and our perception of how fast time passes is something that only comes to mind as you get older. My wife and I and one of our good friends had a conversation the other night that really put everything into perspective. We have all thought about it before, but I had never put words to it so elegantly as I did that night. Ironically my friend’s neighbor who was outside walking his cat (yes he was really outside walking his 18 year old, hobbling cat…) happened to be half-eavesdropping on our conversation and chimed in with exactly what I am about to tell you almost word for word. It is the best verbalization of why time seems to speed up as we get older that I have been able to come up with so far.

When a person is lets say 3 years old, one year’s passing equals 1/3 of their whole lifespan. Since a child only really becomes conscious of their individuality and existence as a person and starts thinking thoughts with words instead of only riding their emotions somewhere in between baby and toddlerhood, their conscious memory is even less than that. On the contrary when a person reaches age 30, each passing year is only 1/30 of their lifespan.  That same year the 3 year old goes through is consciously experienced as passing ten times faster for the 30 year old.

Timelines

Think about it. Each passing year as you age makes up a smaller and smaller fraction of your total conscious timeline and memory. When you get to be 60 years old, time will be passing twice as fast to you compared to the experience of a 30 year old.  When/if you get to be 90, you feel like time just whizzes by so fast and so much change happens so quickly that you have a hard time keeping your mind anchored into the present moment. The 3, 30, 60, and 90 year old human beings all experience the passage of the same calendar year in dramatically different ways.  Asking a 90 year old to sit in a room and quietly wait for 10 minutes would be like asking a three year old to to wait for 300 minutes or 5 whole hours! From their respective perspectives. Isn’t that insane?

MayanCircleThe ancient elders were absolutely right when they said that time is a river flowing downhill. It get’s faster and faster as you get older and if you fight the current, you get worn out real quick. As time goes by in this world more and more change happens in each age compared to the preceding one. This is actually what the Mayans were timing with their elaborate calendar system, but that’s a discussion for another time. You can read statistics all over the place that tell you that every two years ten times more data is created than in the previous two. Mind boggling! Consciousness and data grow exponentially and not in a linear fashion. More opportunity and more information is made available to us every single day than has ever been thought of before on this planet.

Back to the analogy of time being a river, some people seem to be stuck in eddy currents where time stands still. This became apparent to me a while back after going away to college for four years and returning to my home town where nothing seemed to change. It became even more shockingly apparent when I moved cross country for two years with my wife and two little girls and then moved back to the Chicago area two weeks ago where my wife and I grew up. I stopped at a friend’s parents house where absolutely NOTHING had changed since high school. Same furniture, arranged the same way… same smells, same vibe in the house, family members sitting in their same spots where they were 15 years ago. The only thing that changed was the date on the calendar.RiverRapid

This slapped me in the face with the importance of conscious growth. You have to grow and change and learn new things ON PURPOSE. Otherwise the river of time will push you off to the side into one of these eddy currents where you get stuck in old habits where nothing changes and there you sit as a spectator. With the amount of change that has happened in my family’s life and in my own personal awareness, I feel like I have aged at least ten years in the last two calendar years but that’s a good thing. I’m in the best shape of my life and I am getting smarter every day ON PURPOSE; not because I’m lucky. I love roller coasters and I love white water rafting. I couldn’t imagine sitting on the sidelines watching the world blow past me. I hope you feel the same way.

Keep evolving a little every day in any possible way…

Time is not measured by the passing of years, but by what one one does, what one feels, and what one achieves.

-Jawaharlal Nehur

You Are A Construction Zone

For things to change, YOU have to change.

-Jim Rohn

Rohn Get ItEach and every life form on this planet is a work in progress. There is no grand culmination to the evolution of conscious life. Every kind of critter from a bacterium up to a human being comes into the world with a certain hand to play. They play out their cards the best they can, learn as much as they can, teach what they can to posterity, and then it’s lights out until you come back around again (if you’re into that sort of thing). Success in the animal kingdom depends on the same thing as it does for us. It’s all very economical if you look at it. Life is simply trying to expend energy by making the best choices over perceived options to maximize safety, comfort, and growth.

I could listen to Jim Rohn lecture all day long. He is one of the best and brightest speakers still alive on the planet today. There are few people that understand the mentality of success so well and are able to articulate the message so that anybody with 1/3 of a brain can take some value away from his message. I like him so much because he was one of the first people to get me to see what my problem was. IT WAS ME! I had been pointing my finger so much that my hand was cramping up, but I needed the same slap in the face Jim Rohn did when his mentor told him “If you want your life to get better, you have to get better.”

Rohn ExcuseIt’s so ironic that every kingdom of life on the planet is fine tuned to it’s local environment the same way each instrument is tuned and timed to the same conductor in an orchestra. Everyone is playing like a beautiful symphony besides US, who are supposed to be the crowned achievers. There is quite a bit of truth to the whole story of man being tossed out of the garden if you read between the lines. When you stray too far from what is natural and harmonious your body, mind, and spirit all start to decay.

Don’t wish it were easier, wish you were better.

-Jim Rohn

So what do you do? Start going to work on yourself as hard as you work on your job. If you don’t design your own life’s plan and make your own choices chances are you’ll fall into somebody else’s plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much! Everyone stars in the movie of their own life. In the eyes of everyone else YOU are somewhere between a “best supporting actor” or an “extra.” You really shouldn’t be the star of anybody else’s movie. Parents struggle with this and often lose themselves and live vicariously through their children. You also shouldn’t give up the leading role in your own movie to anybody else. Don’t cast yourself into shitty roles on purpose either.

Jim Rohn PainSo what do successful people do that 97% of other people just DON’T DO? They merely sit down, decide to make a plan, and start taking steps in the direction of their end goal. THAT’S IT! There is no magic secret to changing your life. I know everybody at least makes it to the point where they say “ok, it’s definitely time… I know I need to change X.” Not everybody, but a good number of us make it to the point where we say, “in order to change X, I’m going to Y.” Here’s where we lose more folks on the path. These are the new year resolution people who make a change for two to five days then go right back to the status quo. Soooooooo few people actually stick with their plan UNTIL they get there.

How long should you keep trying? UNTIL!

Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment.

Jim Rohn.

With as much violence and racism and all other forms of bullshit and garbage spread like wildfire in today’s media, it’s more important than ever for us to be taking matters into our own hands. You can’t change what’s on that TV screen by yelling at your neighbors. You can’t change anybody’s real quality of life with Facebook likes. Anything you see on the screen, no matter if its a computer, phone, TV or a billboard is already a DONE DEAL. It’s out there… It’s done and stagnant. What you can change is yourself and the way you conduct yourself in your own home and your own life. The way you interact with other people at work or at the grocery store. You can change more with a smile and a friendly hello than you can with a 45 minute rant you post on youtube. Anything you resist grows stronger. Don’t you realize that’s how you build muscle?

I EMPLORE YOU to take a look at something you can improve in your life, no matter how small. Draw a line in the sand for yourself and celebrate a little victory. Then make another, albeit slightly larger goal, and get yourself another win. One more easy one and you’ll be on a roll. Get your subconscious mind primed to carry out bolder and bolder lifestyle changes. It really builds steam and lights a fire under your ass. Before you know it you’ll be in a whole new dimension of possibilities you were never aware of before. If you don’t know where to start, go to work on what you’re putting into and onto your body with my STEP BY STEP PLAN.

Jim Rohn MoreThe key to life is that childlike state. Remember to be CHILDLIKE and not CHILDISH. Keep yourself in the state of curiosity. Of wanting to learn a new musical instrument, or learn to scuba dive, or learn martial arts. Of learning a new skill no matter what it is to stay fresh and young at heart. Most importantly of all we need to teach our kids to be authentic to what they feel drawn to and interested in. Just imagine what your life would be like if you had been coached and guided to be the most creative and loving being. Teach our kids to do what they love and the money will follow their joy. When you do what you love, you never work a day in your life. Teach our kids the path to growing up at the BEING LEVEL and be the model for them to follow.

Remember evolving a little every day in every little way.

Don’t let your learning lead to knowledge.

Let your learning lead to ACTION!

-Jim Rohn

Is being TOO GOOD a sickness?

contempt

Do you think you are a good person? What does that even mean? How did you come to the conclusion that you are so good? After all, “good” is a very relative term. The whole dualistic mindset of GOOD vs BAD is very bipolar and is completely man made. The dualistic mindset is based on competition and division. If you are good, then something else has to be bad. It implies that you are “better” than whatever you are comparing yourself to. If you are “bad” than it is because of how much better you think other people are than you.

The moment you define something as good or bad, you’re just dividing the world.

-Sadhguru

Who suffers more, good people or the so called “bad people?” Really think about it. Too many “good people” always seem to be suffering more while they look on at the bad people living it up and enjoying themselves. How do you even become good? You head outside for a stroll where there are lots of other people and say, “he’s no good, she’s not ok, he’s not ok, he’s not ok, he’s not ok, she’s bad, she’s DEFINITELY not ok… compared to all of these people I am GOOD.” Once you have labeled a sufficient number of people as BAD, then you feel good. The more good you think you are, the harder it is for you to find somebody else that is OK in your mind. Meanwhile, some people sit around being such “goodie goodies” that nobody can stand even being around them!anxious

We think that we are good, because we are trying so hard to avoid all of these bad things. It doesn’t even matter what these things are. They’re different for each of us depending on our own personal views. We develop a sort of superficial happiness and satisfaction by successfully avoiding these “bad” things. These situations and vises that appear to be causing other people to be unhappy. But… have you ever noticed that when you are trying really hard to avoid something you just can’t stop thinking about it? Why is it that when you are trying to avoid a certain person that really pisses you off you just cant stop thinking about them all day and how much you can’t stand them. You are so afraid of the unpleasant situation that might ensue if you run into them, that you spend your whole day anxious and unhappy.

You are not free from it… You are just avoiding it…

Avoiding something is not freedom from it.

-Sadhguru

Too much of our mental process around these concepts of “goodness” and “happiness” is based on feeling good and/or happy because we don’t have something undesirable in our life that somebody else does have. Along the same lines we have this same happy/good feeling when we DO have something desirable that somebody else doesn’t have. All of these aspects of our self image that completely come from comparing ourselves to other people are completely unhealthy. Putting somebody down or excluding them to make yourself feel bigger and better in an outward way is frowned upon. judge gavelThis is referred to as bullying and bigotry. Why then do we think it is OK to do the same thing within the confines of your own thoughts? Just because nobody else can hear or see you doing it doesn’t make it acceptable. The door swings the other way too. Constantly putting yourself down by comparing yourself to other people is like cutting and other forms of self harm, only you’re doing it to your mind and emotions.

We all have to stop this constant judging and comparing. Get rid of the old dualistic way of thinking based on good vs bad and right vs wrong. These are all man made concepts that don’t have any existence outside of our mind. Why is it so hard to just be ourselves? Why can’t we just be genuine and do what feels natural without worrying about what anybody else is going to think or say? Why can’t we just let other people be themselves without judging them or pointing at them or whispering about them?

The easiest way to live in a more balanced and authentic mindset is to simply STOP judging other people. Try it for the rest of the day today. Really. I am challenging you. Whatever time it is that you are reading this, see if you can make it until you fall asleep without attributing any form of judgement an another person. It might be hard, especially since other people are constantly talking other people TO US (these other people really are a pain in the ass aren’t they… or is that a judgement too). You can listen, just don’t join in. When you feel the urge to get out your gavel, give yourself the reminder that every single person on this planet is doing the best they can with what they’ve got. If they knew better, they would do better and we need to be compassionate. A wise man once said we should treat other people the way we want to be treated. goodhabitThis GOLDEN RULE extends into the mental realm. Don’t think about others the way you wouldn’t want them to think about you.

Do this for the rest of the day. Then all day tomorrow. Then the next day, and the one after. You’ve got nothing to lose except a bad attitude towards other people! It will only make it easier to stop judging yourself! Do the future a solid and teach your kids the same habit!

This is just another way we can keep evolving a little every day in every way.

Purity comes from INCLUSION, goodness comes from exclusion.

-Sadhguru

When Nobody’s Around & Nobody’s Looking

I wrote a post a few weeks back touching on the topic of normalcy and how there is really no such thing as a “normal” person. Every normal person you’ve ever met is just a weirdo like you itching to get out of his  or her protective shell. I see everybody’s personality like one of those Russian dolls; one shell inside another, and another, until you get to the core where the piece of chocolate is. russian dollsJust about every “normal” person you know is probably just an acquaintance. Once you get inside their hula hoop and break through their defenses, the jig is up and BINGO there’s that insecure, weirdo you knew was there all along.

You see we all put up these shells around us to protect our ego from feeling vulnerable. When you first meet somebody, what you are meeting is that version of their personality that they are projecting out to the public. You are seeing only what they want you to see, especially when you’re dealing with an adult, while most children can be taken at face value. I do this, you do this, everybody does this to a certain extent that correlates with how high their self confidence is and how high they rank on the “I DON’T GIVE A F***” scale. Because the truth is some of us are truly mentally and emotionally sturdy to their core and some have faced so much criticism and ridicule that they no longer give two shits what anybody thinks. This version of you is the one molded by talking to parents, teachers, policemen, strangers, and any other sort of authority figure who had the potential to react in an unpredictable way “IF” you said or did something outside of the social norm.

Just inside the outer shell is usually the personality you project to your peers. This shell is a little bit closer to the real you, but still has quite a bit of barrier set up to keep out potential embarrassment. When you’re growing up this version of you gets projected to your classmates, the other kids on the baseball team, kids in the neighborhood and at the mall, etc. When you get older it becomes your coworkers, your kids’ friends parents, people you see regularly at the gym or grocery store… you get the picture. These are people that you want to LIKE you. You see them at parties and you might even have a couple beers with them after work, but you still have quite a bit of the real you shrouded in the cloak of normalcy.securitycams These are people that you are always scanning and analyzing for clues and subtle signals; hints on whether or not they might be considered good candidates for access into the next level.

The next level requires one to be granted special security clearance. This is where you feel open enough to talk about how you really feel about things. Where you share emotions, cry on shoulders, rant and rave when pissed off, share goals and aspirations. These are people you trust with your dirty laundry and skeletons in your closet. People that also trust you with theirs out of loyalty and genuine caring. They know about your bad habits, favorite tastes in music and food, religious and political views, and any other secrets that may have left the safety of your own skull. Sometimes siblings, parents, and other family members don’t even carry the credentials for access to this version of you.

Family is a touchy subject because no two are the same. A lot of the time family members will know the real you, and you will know theirs, but neither of you would ever admit that the other is right. This builds lots of tension if not addressed in a compassionate way. Sadly some people don’t even allow their own spouses access to this. It might take YEARS of being in a relationship with someone before you start to see the “real them” come out. robin smileThis is where you can even get to know somebody better than they even know themselves and they can know you better than you even know yourself. It can be an incredibly beautiful thing when you know what each other is thinking and know what they’re going to say before they say it. Closeness and connection are immensely rewarding to the spirit but we still do an excellent job at hiding our flaws out of the fear of rejection and abandonment but you can’t hide everything and definitely not forever. Sometimes the truth of what was being held back comes out in heated arguments and it’s too hard for the relationship (no matter what kind) to bear. When trust in this inner circle is betrayed lives get tossed into total upheaval. Long term couples break up, best friends go separate ways, whole branches of family stop speaking.

I have seen much of this in my day and it truly sucks. This is the kind of emotional and spiritual pain that would be gladly traded for physical pain with no hesitation. The mind actually WILL manifest this kind of trauma as psychosomatic illness when left unchecked. This is one of the main causes of the human condition we call clinical depression. Most depression isn’t some mysterious disease that afflicts random people by chance. Anyone who thinks that is either naive or an asshole. Depression comes from being betrayed, humiliated, abandoned, neglected, or abused either physically, mentally, emotionally, or sexually by someone you were supposed to be able to trust. It also comes from the shame, regret, sadness, and guilt of hurting someone you loved in any of the ways I just mentioned. This type of condition isn’t something that drugs can fix. This is something that ends in suicide; whether it ends with some shocking act that everyone thinks happened out of the blue, a slow motion train wreck of a battle with alcohol, drugs, and hopelessness or anywhere in between. This is no joke. I know it has touched my life in many ways and you’d be a liar if you said it hasn’t touched yours. This is why the innermost sphere at the core of your being is the most important of all.

russian doll coreThe innermost shell of your being is the story you tell yourself in your own head. It is the thoughts you think to yourself, about yourself when you are sitting awake at night. A history of perceived negative reinforcement from the outside world will program your subconscious mind to beat you up. You can be your strongest ally or your absolute worst nightmare. You can sit in a room full of people that love you, that accept you and it won’t matter because you can completely lay waste to your self from every angle. We’ve all been in the state of mind where you get to thinking “damn I’m such a loser, nobody really likes me, they’re all just pretending to like me, how could anybody love me after what I did, I’m so fat, I’m such a failure, I’m too skinny, I’m so fucking ugly, I’m too short, I’m too tall, I’m such a whore” and on and on.

robin aloneIt’s a scary mental state to be in and it causes a vicious cycle. Shitty thought patterns cause low awareness and shitty choices that result in shitty life experiences which… you guessed it… cause more shitty thoughts. Rinse and repeat. This is a process that has to be derailed and reprogrammed manually. It has to happen on purpose and doesn’t have to follow hitting the proverbial “rock bottom.” Rock bottom happens to be a funeral for too many amazing people on this planet so don’t let that be you or your loved one.

The road you want to be on is the road of personal development and growing up to be the real you. It starts by energizing your physical body and tearing down all of the shells you have erected to protect your ego from feeling uncomfortable. If you want your life to change YOU MUST GET OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE. One has to get off his or her ass and get outside for a walk and start eating a clean diet. This alone has a huge impact on mental clarity and confidence. Then get rid of all of these fragmented personas and start projecting the best version of YOU that you know how to. No more juggling between social groups, just be your damn self no matter what. Give yourself that 10 on the “NOT GIVING A FUCK” scale. Confront past traumas HEAD ON with strength and the will to move beyond the hurt no matter what role you played in the situation. Remember forgiveness is for YOU, not for the other person (even if they are or deserve to be in prison).

I don’t care what you think it is that makes you weird. If it’s something that is actually harmful to you or others, FUCKING STOP IT ALREADY! If it’s just something that is weird and unique, but generally harmless, OWN IT! We only get one shot at this life, and you need all the time you have left to evolve as much as you can toward being the best you you can be. chain breakerWhy would you want to spend your time doing anything other than being yourself, and helping others become their own greatest version? You don’t have to quit your job or run away to do this. It starts right now. The world we live in is pretty damn accepting of just about anything, as long as you can get over your own fear and self doubt about it. You can be a gay, transgender, biker, vegan, who teaches Pilates and have all the true friends you can handle.

From baby steps to giant leaps…

Evolving a little every day, in every possible way.

Shifting gears from WHEN to UNTIL

Hopi ElderYears back I remember watching a documentary about the Hopi elders. The main idea that they were trying to get across to their own people and the world at large was the resounding message, “We are the ones that we’ve been waiting for.” They knew that great change was coming over the world there was nothing we could do to stop it.  They also knew that nobody was coming to save us. They were absolutely right on both the global cultural scale but also down to the daily personal level. It is truly up to each and every one of us to determine the trajectory of our own lives.

We are the ones that we’ve been waiting for.

-Hopi Elders

We have to face it. The majority of us are facing the harsh reality that we were raised by a generation with certain views that quite hold water anymore. Whether it be sexuality and gender, religion, political reform, or music, things have changed a lot and are still changing. The days of keeping the same position in a company for 25 years are also over. Now you have to be willing to work yourself out of a job to stay competitive. I’d say for about the past 100 years or so each new wave of humans has come up against challenges that their parents did not quite possess the mental wherewithal to coach them through effectively. Humans have seen wave after wave of technology and an explosion of information like has never been seen on the planet before.  Just think about it. Electricity, the automobile and industrial revolution, airplanes and travel, spaceflight, the internet, smart phones, and the list goes on. If you pulled out an iPhone with the Google Earth app and zoomed in on your house from space 500 years ago they would either burn you at the stake or worship you as a god depending on your locale.

info overloadIn a world where knowledge is power it is extremely important to be at your own helm. While it is easy for a person to be dis-empowered by a lack of information, now it is just as easy to stand in front of so much information and so many choices that they are frozen stiff like a deer in headlights. Indecisiveness and procrastination are the new plagues of our generation. Everyone says they hate being bossed around by leaders, but the truth is nobody does anything until push comes to shove. Nobody can make up their damn mind. Then if they do happen to make their mind up, they still don’t get off their ass and DO anything about making a change in their life. THIS MEANS YOU! And ME. This is a WE problem. We all need to get off our asses and start putting effort into making the changes we know we need to make to increase our quality of life as a species.

I say it over and over. We need to be making these changes at the level of our lifestyle. Permanent changes. They have to be practiced on purpose until the critical mass of momentum is reached. This is how the subconscious mind adds the new behavioral pattern into it’s auto-pilot programming.

It’s not difficult, it just has to be DONE. Life is about the DOING, not about waiting for things to be done for you. Nobody is coming to save you, and nobody CAN save you. I don’t care whether you’re waiting for Jesus to come back and or if you’re waiting on some advanced alien race to come show us silly humans how we aught to be running the show. These religious and other mystical figures aren’t supposed to be worshiped and knelt down to, they’re supposed to be emulated. They are a template for you to follow if you want to grow up as a being. If you’re just sitting back, pointing your finger, and waiting for a savior of any kind you have already lost the game. Nobody can be saved by anyone else. It’s like cheating on your math homework in junior high. You might sneak by a few times but when the test comes and you aren’t prepared, you fail the test.

It has to start some place. It has to start some how. What better place than here. What better time than now. ALL HELL CAN’T STOP US NOW.

-Zack de la Rocha

We can’t be waiting for the right time. “WHEN” and “IF” are two of the most toxic and pathetic words to think about making life changes with. Most times you use the word, you’re making an excuse and implying it’s somebody else’s fault.  You are putting yourself in a spot of weakness. Telling yourself the story in your head that you are a victim; not in control of your own life. Don’t be fooled by anyone who says they can save you without you putting any effort in. I like the Alan Watts quote, “Let me help you out of the water before you drown… said the monkey putting the fish safely up a tree.” If you were in a car you would be stuck in PARK. Maybe neutral if you’re lucky, but definitely not in drive. How many of these have you said or overheard this week?

I’ll be happy when…

I’ll be able to accept my self for my own unique weirdness when…

I’ll start eating better when…

I’ll start exercising more often when…

I’ll start working on my marriage when…

I’ll be a better parent when…

I’ll stop smoking/drinking/(insert vice here) when…

I’ll start learning that new skill when…

I’ll ___ when ___.

ExcuseGet real with yourself. Stop making excuses for why you aren’t the way you need to be in order to feel self confident. Telling yourself these stories in your head is the perfect recipe for depression. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that things like depression, alcoholism, drug addiction, and most chronic illness like obesity and diabetes are afflictions that you are just so unlucky to have fallen victim to. These are symptoms of a poor physical and mental habits that become ingrained into your damn soul. The consequence for inaction is suicide whether it be instant or in slow-motion. You have to put persistent effort into changing otherwise YOU ARE NEVER GOING TO GET ANY RESULTS and you are NEVER GOING TO FEEL GOOD ABOUT YOURSELF when you are alone with your thoughts.

Circumstances? What are circumstances? Hell, I MAKE CIRCUMSTANCES! ATTACK! ATTACK!!!

-Napoleon Bonaparte

The better appropriate word to use when you are talking about making self change is “UNTIL.” The word UNTIL implies that you are going to persist for long enough to reach that critical mass where the subconscious mind takes over. It sounds so simple. How did I not think of this before. Why is this kind of philosophy not taught to children in schools from a young age? Sometimes the answers are so simple that we overlook them and we keep looking aimlessly while life slips away. Like my grandmother always said while my grandfather looked for something right in front of his face, “God damn it John, if it was a snake it would bite you!”

Start replacing the WHEN statements with UNTIL statements:

I’m going to run 5 miles every single day UNTIL I lose 50 pounds.

I’m going to do 500 sit-ups a day UNTIL I have a six pack.

I’m going to make 50 sales calls a day UNTIL I double my commissions.

I’m going to practice my instrument UNTIL I can play at a concert.

I’m going to cut sugar and meat UNTIL my pancreas comes back online.

lighthouseYou get the picture. Start telling yourself these power statements when you wake up in the morning. Work like Arnold Schwarzenegger says with reps and sets of the desired behavior until you get the results you want. YOU WILL GET RESULTS WITH THE PROPER EFFORT. It is a damn law of the universe. You can overcome any obstacle in your life no matter how deep your depression or how bad of an alcoholic you are. $50K rehab programs and years of counseling are only as good as they are at making YOU help yourself. Retrain your body, mind, and spirit for balance and upward mobility. Don’t put bandaids on bullet wounds. Keep a daily journal that you fill with things you are thankful for, people you love and want to make proud of you, plans for how you are going to achieve goals. You can do it. From baby steps to big leaps.

Be the lighthouse showing others how to get out of the storm and safely to shore. That’s the meaning of life for me.

Evolving a little every day in every possible way.

Using the Power of Habit – Are You Doing It Wrong?

ThinkingMan_RodinI read a lot of books. Most people don’t read these days which is a damn shame. OK, I’ll admit I went through a dry spell for a good block of time where I didn’t read anything that wasn’t force fed to me in Junior High and High School, but luckily for me I got back on the horse in college. I love to read books about psychology and thinking. I am a deep diver when I get into a topic of interest and this is both a blessing and a curse. I get fixated on whatever is in my cross-hairs. Always have, and this has pushed me into some pretty negative thought patterns in my day. I have inadvertently set a handful of bad habits this way which had to be undone later on. Most (close to all) of the unhappiness in my life, both past and present, has come from me not maintaining control of the voice in my head and allowing it to set bad habits in my way of thinking.

I talk about that “voice in your head” quite a bit because that voice in your head is what governs the way you perceive your personal reality. Your “reality” that you experience is 100% subjective. thinking-gorillaNo two people share the same exact reality. Quantum physics even tells us that there isn’t even such a thing as a solid matter “Reality” with a capital R. There are only billions of “realities” (lower case r) rendered to each of us as we observe what is going on in our environment. Five honest people could witness the same car crash and give five completely different accounts to the police of how it played out. Each of them would believe their own account enough to pass a polygraph. So who’s right? We have to let the judge and jury decide. But wait, even their views are completely subjective.

You don’t attract what you WANT. Wants are intellectual in nature. Wants are in your conscious mind. You attract what you are in harmony with, what you ARE. And you ARE the sum total of your thoughts that become fixed in your subconscious mind.

-Bob Proctor

The fact is we usually have little to no control over anything that happens around us in our life.  We can exert a certain amount of control over our physical surroundings and we can manipulate people around us to a certain degree with some effort (if your into that sort of thing), but there is only one thing you can control. That is the way you respond. Lets face it, SHIT HAPPENS and you get to deal with it. Your habits of thinking directly govern how you respond. How you respond to things and the story you tell yourself in your own head is what determines your quality of life.

Humans like all other animals are creatures of habit. But what exactly is a habit? Simply put, a habit is a usual way of behaving. Something that an organism does often in a regular and repeated way. Getting more into it, Merriam-Webster’s medical definition says a habit is “an acquired mode of behavior that has become nearly or completely involuntaryhabit aristotle by frequent repetition or physiological exposure.” Our subconscious mind functions totally on habit.

When we DO or THINK anything repeatedly our subconscious mind literally takes in the program just like a computer and then acts it out automatically without any further conscious effort. This goes for anything that you repeat enough times whether it is beneficial or detrimental to your quality of life. This is why it is so important to become aware of our inner thought processes and conduct routine audits. It’s tough, but it’s so important if you want to make any sort of change to your lifestyle. Any change that you attempt to make in your way of living whether it be physical, mental, or spiritual HAS to be a change made at the subconscious level. You must make it a lifestyle change that you repeat for long enough to adequately “program” it into the subconscious mind.  You must make it an automatic way of being otherwise you will go right back to the undesired state.

The chains of habit are often too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.

-Warren Buffett

I like the way Earl Nightengale talks about the subconscious mind as a garden. The garden will grow any seed you plant in the fertile soil whether the plant be a medicinal herb or a deadly poison. The garden will return whatever you plant, but it doesn’t care what you plant. A garden will also go to weed and be eaten by intruders rather quickly if you don’t properly protect and tend it. This is why it is of utmost importance to make sure you are only planting what you WANT to see grow up tall and bear fruit. Only set habits that will be beneficial to our quality of life and lead to our physical, mental, and spiritual advancement. All three of these go hand in hand and they all work with the same universal habit force.

I was listening to a lecture last week that almost brought me to tears because of how beautifully the person talked about how we can grow up and set a habit of being more spiritual in our daily life. It wasn’t anything that I expected but it was so true. I don’t even know the man’s name that was speaking but it doesn’t matter. Even a bum on the street could have said it and it would be every bit as true. spirit evolveWhen something eloquently put rings true and resonates with your soul the source doesn’t really matter. All that matters is the value you gain from it.

What he said was that a person who is very spiritual is a person that you can’t even tell is spiritual. One that simply walks around balanced and knows who they are. Someone that doesn’t have to yell it from the tree tops. One that can simply walk from place to place and be peaceful; not in fear. Comfortable all the time because they know who they are. Balanced, all the time. Compassionate, all the time. Slow to anger, slow to be irritated, willing to listen. That is the evolution of spirituality in a human being. These are the kinds of habits that we should really be setting. Habits that help us grow up at the “being” level.

Have an amazing rest of the week and remember… keep evolving a little every day in every way.

Who Are You Behind Closed Doors?

The only normal people are the one’s you don’t know very well.

-Alfred Adler

The man who spoke these words was founding the school of individual psychology back at the end of the 1800’s, but they have never been more relevant than today.  His peers and colleagues were intellectual giants like Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. Over 100 years later and we are still mulling over the “weird” ideas these gentlemen introduced into the mind of our collective culture. We are still coming to terms with the ideas that spilled out of that era.  The ideas of these men and others such as Tesla and Edison and Einstein were the culmination of the seeds planted by the Enlightenment area in Europe during the preceding hundred years. The intellect of the general public has taken this long to catch up.

enlightenment
What was the main idea of the Enlightenment, you ask?

Wikipedia will tell you that it’s purpose was to reform society using reason. The goal was to challenge all ideas, especially those grounded in tradition and faith, and to advance knowledge through the scientific method. It promoted skepticism on all fronts.  The Enlightenment was a revolution in human thought. It’s rather easy for us to see how many benefits came to our culture from this period, but to the rest of the general population at the time it was absolutely crazy. Completely weird! But they showed us that there is a HUGE advantage to being weird and thinking differently than the herd.

It is too true that the definition of a “normal” person is a person we don’t know very well.

lucyEverybody is a different person behind closed doors. You would be shocked to see what some of your closest friends are doing behind closed doors right now as you read this. I’ll bet your grandmother would be completely shocked to see that thing you did just the other day. Don’t lie! Pretty much every person you have ever seen in your entire life is a complete weirdo. The whole idea that there exists these “normal” people that we need to stifle out our uniqueness to impress is complete bullshit. Owning your weirdness is wonderful and freeing.

What you think of as your greatest flaw might actually be your greatest gift in helping you become your greatest version.

-Ralph Smart

I grew up knowing I was different.  My mind was on things like the cosmos and ancient Egypt from the time I was old enough to read. I was into all sorts of things that none of my friends and family were too interested in. At a certain age after starting school I thought I was too “weird” to be fully accepted by the herd. I stopped being comfortable with my weirdness and didn’t talk about anything “weird” for almost 20 years. 20 whole years! I was more concerned with socializing and sports and everything else that fills time. I am proud to have finally arrived at a place where I am only going to keep getting weirder as time goes on and I get more confident in myself. The more confident you become in owning andhandovermouth expressing your authentic uniqueness the more of your inner weirdo exposed to others with no fear.

If you’re reading my articles, chances are you’re a weirdo too. The greatest way to be weird around normal people is to stop justifying what you are doing if you feel it is right. It still won’t make sense to anybody that doesn’t want to understand and you should save your energy for something you really want to be doing. We can’t go around trying to convince everyone that we are right. We need only to BE the way that we know we should BE. Live the lifestyle that you know you should. Act in an authentic way and do what you feel in your heart to be right all of the time.

It’s always easier to fight for one’s principles than live up to them.

-Alfred Adler

A sad truth to face as adults about ourselves and other adults is that you can’t SAVE anybody. When you force somebody into something they’re not (at their core) ready to do, you’re not helping them. They’re not changing at the “being level” because they are not putting their own honest effort in. It’s like helping them cheat on their homework in school.  Which only leads to cheating on the test, failing the course, and more risky behavior down the road. They’re not learning their lesson they’re meant to be learning and as soon as you slack horsewaterin your involvement they go right back to the condition you found them in. If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. The only way to truly lead and inspire real change is to lead by example. BE that change you want to see in the world and stop leading horses to water.

Come out of the closet about whatever makes you weird. Don’t be afraid to share your ideas, but don’t force them or feel you have to defend them. We are afraid to reveal to the world who we really are. We keep ourselves in perpetual bondage because we are afraid of being whispered about. Let’s face it. You are going to be ridiculed and called out by people who are close to you as well as people you’ve never and will never meet. Don’t let that bother you. My wife and I literally had to “come out” to our families about eating a healthier diet and getting rid of other toxic things from our lifestyle. It was a lot harder than you think to say, “No offense, but I don’t eat that anymore.” You also wouldn’t believe the looks I get when I tell somebody I moderate my kids’ sugar intake.

The herd is programmed to police itself. The herd doesn’t like when you start doing anything that makes them feel uncomfortable. This is especially true if it involves you starting/stopping something that makes them feel like they aren’t making the bestherd choices in their own life. We get very insecure around people who we feel are “better off” than we are. We break ourselves down in our own mind and tell ourselves that we are “less than” and not “equal to.” We literally and subconsciously hand our power over to anybody our mind has identified as “superior” to us. This isn’t fair because of how aggressively our subconscious concepts of who we should be idolizing are molded by the media. This is followed by accusing said person of “thinking they are better than us” when the only problem exists within the story we’re telling ourselves in our own heads.

The truth is that we are all magical beings that are capable of manifesting anything we can imagine into our lives as long as we put in the required effort. We need to keep looking in the mirror when we complain about things that are happening in our life. Like one of Tony Robbins’ mentor
Jim Rohn always says, “If you want your life to get better, you’ve got to get better” and “If you’re not willing to risk the unusual, you will have to lightbrainsettle for the ordinary.” Don’t be afraid to be yourself. Don’t be afraid to start making changes in the way you think and set some new goals. There is literally nothing stopping you from doing anything you want if you are confident enough withstand the criticism until you get there.

Evolving Every Day in Every Little Way

The largest danger in life is that you might be too careful.

-Alfred Adler

 

Oh Grow Up!

We have all heard it… We have all SAID it… “Why don’t you GROW UP!” Perhaps you were even having one of those monumentally insightful (eyes rollingconversations about somebody close to you in the 3rd person and uttered the phrase “If he/she would just grow up, they could stop struggling with ___ (insert character flaw here).  thedudeI don’t even have to have ever met you and I am certain that you are guilty. I certainly am. Although we may technically be right, at least from our point of view, how much thought have you actually put behind it? Have you ever really contemplated what it truly means to grow up?

Growing Up at the “Being” Level

When we in our culture use the phrase “growing up” what do we actually mean? We aren’t really talking about getting older per se. Although there is a tangible amount of wisdom and experience that comes with age, the amount of birthday candles on your cake isn’t exactly correlated to how “grown up” you are. There is a strong current that more or less sweeps us along through our younger years and then past adolescence before spilling us into the Gulf of Adulthood. It takes some folks longer to get down the river than others, but most make it at least floattripto the gulf. After you’re a bonafide adult its on you. Because we all know of both 70 year old whiners and toddlers with the wisdom of an old soul.

I spent some time last summer with a group of these so-called responsible adults for a workshop in the mountains southwest of Washington D.C. One of our main topics of discussion every night was this theme of growing up, but growing up at the being level. We had the privilege of working intimately with NASA Physicist and Expert in consciousness research Tom Campbell who put a proper perspective on it for me.

What do I mean by the “being” level?

When I talk about myself at the “being” level, I am talking about the way that I “am” at the core. Not about the way that I act, but the way that I really am.  Me at my being level is the sum of my talents, my values, my habits, my fears, my beliefs, my assumptions and my overall disposition. It’s how I conduct myself in my interpersonal relationships. My level of maturity at the being level that I bring into any given situation has to do with my INTENT. The conscious INTENT is the key to having those “aha” moments that lead to real personal growth. Each personal epiphany is like a little trophy letting you know you “grew up” a little bit. It has everything to do with the story you are telling yourself in your own head while you are “acting” out your daily behaviors.

Age doesn’t define maturity, some people will never grow up.

crossingLets say I help an old lady cross a busy street. There are several possible intents that I could have while I was acting out the seemingly good deed. From a higher point of view, whether or not it was actually a good deed has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I helped anybody cross any street. It has to do with my “intent” and what I was thinking to myself at the time of the occurrence.

If I walked up and thought to myself “How stupid of her to be out here alone and vulnerable, now I of all people get stuck helping her.” Maybe I could have been thinking, “Hey, there goes an old lady who needs to cross the street… and there are a few other people around… and if they see me help this old lady they’ll really think I’m a swell guy.”  I could even be thinking, “There goes an old lady who needs help, and I know that Jesus wants me to help people, so I aught to be a good boy and help her otherwise God will be mad.”  All three of those show a low level of personal maturity at the “being” level.

Every human being is an artist. The dream of your life is to make beautiful art.

-Miguel Angel Ruiz

The INTENT of a person who has a certain maturity of the “being” would have to do with a genuine caring and love. It has to do with stepping in whenever help is needed because deep in yourtouching soul you want to make her feel safe and it makes your heart warm to add value to other people’s lives. Not just your friends and family, but everybody you come into contact with is worthy of experiencing the best version of you. Life should be an art form where we leave every person we interact with in a better emotional state than they were in beforehand.

Having positive and constructive interactions with other people literally super charges our attitude and raises our vibrational/emotional state to a place where we find more and more opportunities for personal advancement. This coupled with a childlike open minded curiosity to keep learning new things is all the fuel you need to keep growing at the being level. This is the true meaning of spiritual growth. When spiritual growth is the only thing we get to take with us from this Earthly realm, the ability to learn and unlearn becomes a crucial skill. The speed and quality of our growth depends on how much we pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and put real, honest effort into rooting out our fears, getting rid of bad habits, and shedding light on false beliefs and assumptions.

caterpillarThink about it, who are you anyways? Who are you really? You have a body, and a brain, and a mind, and your thoughts… but YOU are not any of those things.  You are not your body any more than you are your Toyota. You are the consciousness that possesses and observes all of these things. We and our children accumulate these experiences through lifetimes here and there and everywhere gleaning the meaning and lessons taken to heart from each of these experiences over eons. Lets face it, wise men and women have been trying to WAKE US UP on this planet alone for thousands of years. Now it’s our responsibility to encourage each other to keep growing up with a genuine compassion, because we are all powerful beings waiting to be activated.

Know ye not that ye are gods?

Remember the plan.  Evolving a little bit every day, in every possible way.

TJ

What Should Be The Role Of A Good Parent In Today’s World?

sadhmountainI love listening to different perspectives on topics that pertain to struggles I am having in my own life. I recently listened to a recording of an Indian yogi and mystic by the name of Sadhguru, founder of the Isha Foundation, taking questions after a lecture he had given.  One question really struck a chord with me.

So… what should be the role of a good parent in today’s world?

His response was one of the most insightful pieces of oratory that I had ever heard on the topic of parenting.  Having two young children of my own, I’m always questioning whether the way I go about the monumental responsibility at hand.

A parent is a very funny thing.  Parents are trying to do something, that nobody has ever really known how to do very well.  Nobody in history has ever definitively handholdknown what the best way to parent their children was.  Even if you have 12 children you are still learning.  You may raise your first 11 properly and the 12th one can really put you through the ringer.

So if you are trying to give it your best shot, what is the best thing you can do? Sadhguru went on to say…

Spend sufficient time with yourself.  Look at yourself carefully.

How you are.  How you sit, how you stand, how you speak, what you do, what you don’t do…

I think you must look at yourself very carefully because the children are picking up everything. RAPIDLY… and they’ll exaggerate EVERYTHING that you’re doing.

This really hit home because I see every parentshadowslittle habit that my girls pick up coming from my lovely wife… and she sure as hell picks up every little annoying habit that I contribute to the pot.  It’s quite funny how it’s so much harder to see one of your own habits manifest in your child’s mannerisms than it is to spot those from others.

That being said, one foremost thing we have to work on is to at least make ourselves in such a way that we actually LIKE who we are and behave. Somebody else may not approve, but it doesn’t matter.  At least you have made yourself in such a way that you have a degree of self confidence. Maybe you can not raise your children to somebody else’s standards, and who even knows the kinds of standards that are set for you.  But at least you must become the way that you like the way you are.

securityhandsThat is a must, but that will only create the necessary ambiance.  It still doesn’t make you necessarily a good parent, but it creates the necessary ambiance. Creating the necessary ambiance is absolutely a large part of parenting.  A large part.  If you create the right kind of atmosphere of a certain sense of joy and love and care and discipline for yourself AND your home atmosphere, generally they grow up peacefully.

Of course you want to provide opportunities for them.  Unfortunately each of us can only provide an opportunity to the extent that we ourselves have access. You’ll always do your best according to your limitations, but the important thing is what kind of humanoutlate beings or brats you raise.  For that, what kind of being YOU are is an extremely important part of raising children.  So if your wife became pregnant, it’s time for YOU to start your transformation. Now because another life is coming in and YOU YOURSELF might not conducting yourself in such a way that is suitable to be emulated. Becoming conscious of what we are doing and what is rubbing off on even our babies is extremely important.

What should we be teaching and what we should do?

Sadhguru had the following piece to say that I really liked…

I think one important thing you should teach your children is to always question everything but not with suspicion…  With a genuine wanting to know.

If we could just bring the concept into our children’s minds, that they can freely question anything INCLUDING US and the way you are; in a healthy way (not in a sick way questioning things because you think there is something wrong with everybody) the children will be constantly exorcising SadhTalktheir intelligence.  That will not insure whether he or she is gong to become, a doctor, an engineer, so on and so forth, but one thing is clear. The curious higher intelligence is active when you do not stifle the innate curiosity. Of course you want to put him or her through the necessary physical activity to give a healthy body, but it is just as important to foster an active intelligence.

This next quote caught me off guard at first, but then made complete sense after I thought about it…

Try bringing him up without any sense of identity.

If you do not entangle his intelligence by being identified to this or that, then he is willing and open to everything.

If you bring him up this way, the best possible that he can make out of this life, he will do.  He may not become like somebody else, but he will grow to his maximum potential.

Of course along the way it depends on who he meets, what happens, what situations he gets into, whether he comes into a spiritual space, or he goes into a war zone…  Those things we can not identitycontrol. Right? However we do have control over some circumstances.  You CAN create an atmosphere of love, thoughtfulness, and openness. When you do not (knowingly or unwittingly) train your child to be exclusively identified with any particular social institution, naturally there is no sense of prejudice and no grounds for being offended. When you bring up a child free of prejudice, in a loving very open atmosphere, GENERALLY they do well. Buuuuuuuut, there is no guarantee because there are other influences in the society. There is no insurance or guarantee. That is a risk that you are taking. Always.

The only thing that matters is if you do your best or not, that is all there is to life.

Thanks for taking the time to read through my latest pondering.  I am happy to pass along insights that I come across in my daily journey. Special thanks to you all that have the patience to read all the way through an article that isn’t just designed to grab your eye and sell you something. You readers really don’t get enough pats on the back! Until next time my friends…

Evolving a little every day, in any possible way.

R Eye Icon

4 Easy Reads Guaranteed to Change Your Life

Old booksWhen I was a young boy I was a huge reader.  I learned to read a bit early and I remember wanting to read everything I could get my hands on.  Dr. Seuss, dictionaries, encyclopedias, you name it. This carried on until junior high and the advent of puberty.  This is when most of us in our culture learn to stifle our imagination and uniqueness and trade it for acceptance into the herd.

People do it every day.  They talk to themselves.  They see themselves as they’d like to be.  They don’t have the courage you have, to just run with it.

-Tyler Durden

This situation seems to me like a bit of a double edged sword.  There is definitely safety in the heard.  If you stray too far from the herd you risk being “labeled” something undesirable.  My lord, nobody wants that. You have to learn to do the “social dance” in order to function effectively in the world. It is important for us to learncubicles the many, many lessons about how to get along in this human situation that can only be learned in social settings.  Even our blood family just another kind of social institution.

The problem is that a large percentage of us trade a little bit too much of our individuality and curiosity and start conforming to a model of life that doesn’t really promote health or personal happiness.  The movie Fight Club really hits a nerve the protaganist says, “We buy things we don’t need, with money we don’t have, to impress people we don’t like.”  We get so afraid to go against the grain that we might live the rest of our days without ever returning to that childlike state.

Child-LIKE but not child-ISH.  Being child-ISH would just pertain to farts and toys and other tomfoolery.  The word child-LIKE alludes to the way a curiouskidchild is imaginative, open-minded, and free of assumptions and prejudgments.  A child has an honest-to-god genuine curiosity about the world and wants to solve any mystery they become aware of.

Lets Face it, life does not get easier as you get older.  It doesn’t get easier when you have to support yourself away from the nest.  It doesn’t get easier when you get married or when you are responsible for raising children.  These can be amazingly positive events, but they do complicate things.  There are also life events that are hard to find the bright side of. Some things happen to us or to the people around us that carry the power to completely derail your trajectory in life and leave you unhinged.

When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.

-Viktor Frankl

Life doesn’t get easier when you get blindsided by a divorce or lose your job out of the blue. Life most certainly doesn’t get easier after you lose a young child to cancer or if one of your parents commits suicide when you need them the most.   Lets face it, shit happens, and we have to deal with it.  How you deal with it and the story you tell yourself in your head every day determines the quality of your life.  That voice in our auschwzhead is actually the only thing you can have any TRUE control over.

I love the example set by Viktor Frankl, the Jewish psychiatrist who was sent to a Nazi concentration camp. His message was that regardless of the physical, intellectual, or psychological abuse he was subjected to in the camp, no one could cause him to think something he didn’t want to think. The same is true for us whether we want to believe it or not.  When the shit hits the fan it is the hardest, but also of the utmost importance to maintain control of “that voice.”  We need to be thinking in a way that is going to lead us down the path of learning and growth.

I went through a series of life changing events in a relatively short period of time and the way I looked at myself and reality had to be shaken up like an etch-a-sketch.  It was right at this time that rather than slipping into depression and complacency I picked up a book that changed everything for me.  Then I picked up another and another.  I rekindled my love for reading and my curiosity and enthusiasm for learning new things.  I now only seek out books that have the power to completely change a person’s life.

These 4 Books completely changed the way I think… and they’ll do it for you.

Seriously, just pick one of these and read it.  It doesn’t matter which one you pick.  They’re all amazing in no particular order, but after you pick one, you’ll be looking to quickly pick a second one.  I wish I would have read books of this caliber ten years ago and that’s why I want to share them.  These books have the power to change the way you think about yourself and the world WITHOUT having to go through a traumatic life event.

Consider each one of these a way to undo some bad programming and upgrade your operating system:

The Biology of Belief by Dr. Bruce Lipton

BioBelief

Through the research of Dr. Lipton and other leading-edge scientists, stunning new discoveries have been made about the interaction between your mind and body and the processes by which cells receive information. It shows that genes and DNA do not control our biology, that instead DNA is controlled by signals from outside the cell, including the energetic messages emanating from our thoughts.

The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz

4Agree

Don Miguel Ruiz reveals the source of self-limiting beliefs that rob us of joy and create needless suffering. Based on ancient Toltec wisdom, The Four Agreements offer a powerful code of conduct that can rapidly transform your life to a new experience of freedom, true happiness, and love.  Be Impeccable With Your Words, Don’t Take Anything Personally, Don’t Make Assumptions, and Always Do Your Best!

The Art of Living by Bob Proctor

artLiving

This book just came out in Dec 2015 and I am already blown away by how profound it has been. The topics span what our creative faculties are and how to use them, why we need to unlearn most of the false beliefs we’ve been indoctrinated with our whole lives, and how our intellects have the ability not only to put us ahead in life, but also to be our biggest detriment. Erase negative thought patterns and retrain the brain for success.

Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill

thnkgrow

Napoleon Hill and his philosophy of success and effectiveness in the world is the first book that condensed the wisdom of the great thinkers and billionaires of the early 1900s.  His mentors were men like Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford.  This book is highly recommended by every single successful person whom I have studied.  Simply put, we become what we think about.  So we need to be disciplined and direct.

We are so amazingly lucky to live in a day where we can literally come online and have any book imaginable shipped to our house in many times less than 48 hours.  We need to sit for a minute and reflect on the fact that we live in a time where information and wealth is more abundant than it has ever been before.  I am grateful from the bottom of my soul for the fact that I am alive at this very moment.  Every trial and tribulation that I have been through on this journey pales in comparisonstudy to what amazing things are possible to achieve.

I am so thankful that I can now pass the knowledge I learned from these books, and many more like them on to my children and grandchildren.  If none of these books even slightly peak your interest, please look around and find something that tickles your fancy.  Let today be the day you start reading again. I heard someone say the other day that in the age of information, ignorance is a choice.  That is a damn fact that you simply can’t deny.

For Knowledge itself is power.

-Francis Bacon