Warrior of the mind

Some of us are always looking for answers. We collect good advice like a librarian collects books. But we don’t put ideas to use as weapons against our lower selves. That’s harder than finding more new ideas to collect and put on the shelf of our mind.

Put ideas into use. Be a warrior, and fight the inner battle so your highest, virtuous self may prevail.

2017 Human Freedom Index

I track the “Human Freedom Index” put out by Ian Vasquez and Tanja Porcnik at the CATO Institute each year. They combine personal freedom and economic freedom to get an index.  This year’s freest countries – 

1) Hong Kong 2) Switzerland 3) New Zealand 4) Ireland 5) Denmark 6) Canada 7) United Kingdom 8) Australia 9) Finland 10) Netherlands 11) Luxembourg 12) Austria 13) Germany 14) Norway 15) Sweden 16) Malta 17) Belgium 18) Czech Republic (Where’s the US you must be asking!) 19) Portugal 20) Lithuania 21) Poland 22) Estonia 23) United States of America.  

The USA was down four spots this year.  We Americans like to think we are the freest country on earth because after all – didn’t we “invent” freedom?  I like to think we did as far as our founding documents go.  But we have turned our back too often on those documents, and allowed special interest in the government class to take too much power for themselves, at our expense.

We need to be careful.  This could get worse if we keep asking the government to help us in so many ways, by confiscating the means from us.

The Weather Inside

It’s not what’s happening outside of you that will determine your experience of life, your success and your destination – it’s what is happening inside of you that matters.  

You can’t control the weather outside, but you can control it inside.

Are you?

Control your attention –

We don’t live where our body is. We live where our attention is.

Control where your attention is. If you can’t, you don’t have control of your experience.

Where are you placing your attention these days?

Joy and pleasure are different

There is a significant difference between joy in your soul and hedonistic pleasure. One leaves you feeling fulfilled and the other can leave you feeling empty.

You know the difference. There’s nothing wrong with pleasure, but not at the expense of joy in your heart and soul.

What fills you up?

Treat people for what they can be

If we see people as small, untalented and insignificant, and we treat them that way, they become worse.  

But if we treat people for what they could be, for what they are capable of, we encourage the spark in them to be more and do more.

I bet your favorite people aren’t the ones who are always reminding you of your shortcomings, but the ones who believe in what you can do, whether you were doing it or not; the ones who encouraged you by their very attitude toward you.

How are you being to those that are underperforming their potential?

No Regrets

Regret comes from the idea that you could have done better in the past.  

If you could have you would have. Let it go.

No regrets.

Mastery is no fun most of the time

You know the ant and the grasshopper story.  The kids who hung out on the street, while others toiled away doing their homework, projects, or learning one skill really well.

Now we are adults, and those of us who have mastered something have it to lean on, to earn with, and to satisfy our deep need to be important and feel we are really good at something.  

That mastery didn’t come by having fun all the time, constantly engaged in activities that were stress relieving and entertaining.  It came by self-discipline and hard work.  Were we having fun?  Not the kind of fun everyone else was having.  We were not having fun most of the time as we labored and focused, so we may get a feeling of satisfaction that we had just taken a new step towards mastery.  The feeling was fleeting, but enough of its own reward. We moved on to ascending the next step right away – seeking the feeling again.

In the end, we will have reached a greater portion of our potential than we would otherwise; and maybe that’s the most fun of all.

Scar tissue is stronger than regular tissue.

We can interpret the bad things that happened (to us) as unfair, troubling, disturbing, and a liability, or we can see them for what they are; just events that made us who we are – smarter and stronger.

Realize their positive effects, and move on.

The power to choose our response

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is the power to choose our response. In our response lies our greatest growth and freedom.”            – Victor Frankl

It’s not so much what happens to us that shapes our lives and results, it’s how we choose to respond to what happens that matters more.

No matter what happens, we can decide to accept it, lash out, love it, hate it, carry it, dismiss it, make it mean this or that, learn from it, or forgive it. And it’s never too late to change our response to something that already happened that we have already responded to a different way.

How have you shaped your life with your responses?