Get a boost toward your goals

You can reach your goals if you stand on top of the right books, seminars and classes from the right people.

What voices are the right ones for your goals?

Blaming is Abdication

The minute you blame, you abdicate.

So if you blame others for your situation, you are saying they are in control of that part of your life, and you are not.  And if that is true, then you have no power to change it.

Don’t blame.

Take responsibility, and take control.

Laughing – when there is nothing else you can do.

“Tragedy is when you cut your finger.  Comedy is when you fall into a sewer and die.” – Mel Brooks

Sometimes something so terrible happens that it’s impossible to feel bad enough relative to the other things you thought were bad.  What can you do? – Laugh.

“Dang.  Oh well.  Lol”

Mel Brooks also said – “Humor is another weapon against the universe.” 

Use it when you need to.

Cheating Death

If Einstein, Rockefeller, and Reagan couldn’t cheat death, what chance do you have?

You are alive now.  

Make the most of it.

Understanding Others

“To love is easy and therefore common – but to understand – how rare it is!” – L.M. Montgomery

“We do know that no one gets wise enough to understand the heart of another, though it is the task of our life to try.” – Louise Erdrich

“Those who understand only what can be explained, understand very little.” – Marie Von Ebner-Eschenbach

“Capable people do not understand incapacity, and clever people do not understand stupidity.” – Doris Lessing

“The heart of another is a dark forest, always, no matter how close it has been to one’s own.” – Willa Cather

Being authentic

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about who we pretend to be.” – Kurt Vonnegut

Fake it ’till you make it is good advice I think.  We must learn, act, and talk like the person we want to be to become that person.  

But “Fake it ’till you make it” can turn to “I’m fake and not true to myself and I have lost my way”. 

Who are you really?  Does it match with the person you pretend to be?  Is the person you pretend to be the person you still want to be?  Do you fear not being the person you pretend to be?

How to be valuable

Be useful.  Be a person that solves problems, not a person who creates them.

That comes first.

Then you will be valuable.

Ignorance

These days everyone has access to information, yet some remain ignorant.

“To be ignorant of one’s ignorance is the malady of the ignorant.” – A. Bronson Alcott

“Ignorance is not a simple lack of knowledge but an active aversion to knowledge, the refusal to know, issuing from cowardice, pride, or laziness of mind.” – Karl Popper

“Ignorance is an evil weed, which dictators may cultivate among their dupes, but which no democracy can afford among its citizens.” – William Beveridge

Purpose and Drive

Successful people have a purpose strong enough to make them do the (uncomfortable, “difficult”) things they have to do to accomplish the results they want.

Do you?

A new decision

This is happening in your life.

You did this and that happened.  

You tried it and you learned something.

You’re in charge.

What’s the next move?

No risk, no story to tell.

To accomplish anything worthwhile, to live a full, exciting life, and move towards what you are really capable of doing, you need to take some risks.

Sometimes it’s a physical risk.  But most times it’s in your head – risk of embarrassment, loss of time, loss of opportunity, or just “loss”.  But the risk of not trying and arriving at death safely with no losses under your belt will be far worse and irrevocable when you get there. 

Are you taking appropriate risks?

Everyone thinks this is cool…

Too often we chase things that other people think we should do, have, or be.  Many people become addicted with and self-identified with things that come from consensus.  Social media is a great tool to live this way.

But if you live like this, one day you will start to feel like your ladder was up against the wrong wall; that you’ve been living to make others think you were cool or successful, and ignoring what YOU think.

Happiness and fulfillment are great achievements. 

Not a hedonistic pleasure kind of happiness – but a knowing that you are being a good person, using a fair measure of your potential, acting with good character towards others, and being true to yourself while you do it.

What do you really think of you?

Being calm

“It’s difficult to be calm until you’ve lost a lot and won a lot.”

As a child we get upset about small things, and we feel a thrill winning small games.

As we grow we play different “games” and the stakes are higher.

I have lost a lot.  When a loss comes my way I can know that I have had far bigger losses than this, and I will be ok.  

When I win, while it’s fun, I know it will not really change my life, and it’s not what is most important.  When I win, I am free of it.

Because of all this, my emotions are more level than when I had experienced less.

Of course, there are many paradoxes in life, and there is certainly something to say against this. 

But what I have learned is that wins and losses are only in your mind.  And when they happen, you can more easily see it was a mental mountain, and release it.

A you one of the few?

Only a few Americans have clearly defined written goals.

Less than 1% can identify their primary objective in life.

Are you one of them?

Which wolf wins?

https://youtu.be/AkMQIM4DGHQ?si=rv-2MfUwyQYGBi-9

A Think Daily subscriber named Doc Holladay commented on a post a few days ago and put a link to this song he wrote a couple of years ago.  I thought the song could be a huge hit!

Check it out and you tell me.

OR – tell him in the Think Daily comments and the YouTube comments!

Living with your decisions – or not

Sometimes there is something that is troubling you each day that you have to deal with.  Often it is from a poor decision you made in the past.  

Sometimes to solve the problem you need to undo that decision to make your life better or solve that problem.

New information, new decisions.

What decision have you made, that now after seeing where it lead, you can see it was not a good decision for you?

You got yourself into this, and you can get yourself out.

Living Longer – part 2

Studies have revealed that people with positive views of old age do better than people with negative views.

People with the brightest beliefs live 7 1/2 years longer than people with the gloomiest beliefs!

I turn 60 next month and I am looking forward to the decade!  I’m gonna rock it!

What are your views about old age?

Living Longer

In industrialized countries about 1 in 6000 people make it to age 100.  

One in 5 million make it to be 110 years old.  The oldest human was 122 years, 164 days old.

Personally, my goal is to live to be 100.  But of course, some people are in such pain or state of incapacitation when they get old, that dying may not be such a tragedy to them, but a relief.  Why live longer if you are suffering?

The time to think about this is now.

Here are five habits that are thought to extend life – 

1) Regular exercise.

2) Good diet.

3) Healthy weight.

4) no smoking

5) don’t drink too much.

One expert says this – “Don’t eat too much, stick to plants.”

How long do you think you will live?

Which version of you wins?

In different situations, we can be kind, helpful, productive, happy, and centered, etc, OR rude, callous, bitter, violent and jealous, etc.

We all have the potential for each version in us, and we have all brought each side out at times – at our best and worst moments.

In this struggle, the great challenge is to be our best as we walk through our time here each day.

Your lower self, or your higher self – which version of you wins?

Withhold Judgement as Long as Possible

Sometimes you have to make a quick judgment.  But most times you don’t.

If you make snap judgments, you are wrong too often.

When you are wrong because you jumped the gun, it’s embarrassing and you lose your credibility.

Stay open.

Don’t jump to conclusions or the first answer.

Withhold your judgments as long as possible while observing and collecting more information.