Whether it’s money troubles, a difficult boss, a house that constantly needs fixing, or something else, we all encounter situations that cause us stress and can trigger stress-related symptoms, like headaches and heartburn. While you can’t always do a lot to change what’s happening, how you think about stressful events can make them better or worse.

For example, if I’m running late for a meeting, I’ll say to myself, “May this be one of the biggest problems I have in life!” That gives me perspective quickly and helps keep my stress level from going up. Here are some other ways of thinking that can help you resist stress.

1. Ask yourself if your response is out of balance.
Look at a stressful event on a 10-point scale, with nine or 10 being a serious physical disease or a life-threatening situation. Next, rate your emotional reaction from one to 10. If the source of stress merits a two and your emotional reaction is a five or six, you’re having a R6 response to a R2 problem. Once you know that, ask yourself if this will really matter in three years, three months or three weeks. Chances are, the answer is no.

2. Stop yourself from imagining the worst-case scenario.
This tendency is called “catastrophizing” or “what-if-ing.” It’s basically taking something that probably won’t happen and escalating it into something that definitely will happen. When this occurs, step back and ask yourself what the probability is of your worst fears coming true. It’s probably much lower than you fear.

3. Look for shades of gray.
When under stress, many people engage in black-and-white thinking — thinking a situation is all good or all bad. It’s important to avoid using words like “never” and “always” to describe the situation. These absolute words often create more anger and upset than there needs to be.

4. Don’t take things personally.
If your boss snaps at you for no apparent reason, don’t automatically assume it’s because of something you did. Consider the possibility that it could stem from something that’s going on with your boss. Try to accept situations on their own terms; so much of our stress comes from not accepting the world the way it is.

5. Look for the hidden lesson.
When something upsetting happens, consider whether or not you can change it. If you can’t, ask yourself what you can learn from it, how you can learn to live with it or what you can do differently in the future to prevent, avoid or handle it. These are much more effective coping strategies than beating yourself up or putting yourself down for what happened. In the meantime, focus on feeling gratitude for the great things that are happening in your life, because those can help you cope with the challenges life throws your way.

Stop right now and think about it. Can you remember? When was it? Did you enjoy that experience? Did you learn from it?

How do you feel when you do things for the first time? Do you enjoy it? Do you find it exciting? Is that something you’d like to do more of?

Would you like to have more “firsts” in your life? Would you be willing to pledge to do more “firsts” in life? How many “firsts” would you like to experience each year? Each month? Each week? Each day?

How would you feel if you were trying new things on a regular basis?

Think about how you can add more “first time” experiences to your life. Which of the following areas of your life provide you with opportunities for trying new things? Can you think of other areas you can add some “firsts” to?

Work/professional
Social
Spirituality/religion
Exercise/body
Intellectual/mental
Environmental
Financial

Still stuck?

Let’s see…is there something you could do differently at work? Find a new way of doing things? Add a new activity to your job description? Or even look for an entirely new job?

Is there a new place you could travel to? Visit a new country or city on vacation? Eat out at a new kind of restaurant, or cook a different type of food you’ve never cooked before?

Have you ever done yoga? If so, how about a different kind of yoga, like bikram or ashtanga? How about hypnosis? Would you be interested in downloading a self hypnosis mp3 and listening to it at home? Have you tried meditation? If so, how about trying a new mantra or listening to a new meditation CD? And how about a religious service? Are you interested in trying out a new spiritual group, religion, or church?

Could you try a new exercise class at your gym, or maybe go on YouTube to find a new type of exercise video if you work out at home? Or go running in a new park that you’ve never been to before?

When was the last time you learned something new? What are you interested in learning? How about a new language? Have you thought about downloading a language class or audio book on your iPod and listening to it at the gym or on your car stereo on the way to work? What else can you learn, and how?

What about environmental activities? Is there something you can recycle or reuse that you’ve never recycled before? How about vacationing at an eco hotel or going camping or backpacking, rather than staying at the same types of accommodations you usually book when you travel?

And how about financially? What can you do to make money in ways you haven’t so far? How about turning a hobby into a freelance job? How can you change your investment strategies and try something different?

Do any of these options sound viable to you? Do they sound like fun? What other ideas do you have? Please share below, I’d love to hear from you.

So…when was the last time you did something for the first time?

To be successful takes a great deal of effort and willpower. To fail is the easiest thing to do: do nothing!
Here are a few tips to get you to do it:

1. Organise emails:
Process information as quickly as possible and turn it into actions. Start by organising your emails into various file folders. If the message needs to be actioned, move it to a ‘To-do’ file. If it is for reference, print it out immediately, file it and delete the email. If it is a meeting, move it to your calendar. Take the To-do emails and plan to action them in your diary. Let your diary tell you when to action the email.

2. Plan when to read emails:
Plan in your diary when to check on emails. The human mind is an inquisitive mind. As soon as an email arrives, we are tempted to read it. Not only does this distract us from what we are working on, it also wastes unnecessary time responding to something that may not be important. When someone emails you, they are not necessarily expecting an immediate response, rather a proficient response. If they require an urgent response they won’t have any difficulty in reaching you by any other means.

3. The Important task rule:
Plan in your diary what the Important tasks are and deal with them first. An Important task is not always urgent. If you focus on Urgent tasks only, your life becomes stressed and your function takes on the role of ‘putting out fires’ and losing focus on what is really happening around you.

4. One task at a time:
It is one thing to be able to multi-task, but can you focus effectively on all these tasks at the same time? Productivity may decrease and quality affected. The saying is true, “You can only sit on one seat at a time”.

5. Set deadlines:
When you have one particular task that you must accomplish, don’t leave it hanging. Give yourself a firm deadline that you must adhere to. When you waste time at the beginning, you will increase your stress levels as the deadline approaches.

6. Do it now:
When it comes to the little things, take on the “do it now” attitude. All those little things can add up to major stress if you continue to procrastinate. This just means that if you receive a bill in the post, go online and pay it. If you find something out of place around the house, put it away. Stop allowing yourself to save additional tasks for later.

7. Break up tasks:
All of us at times procrastinate due to the task being too large and in our minds insurmountable. For example, packing up boxes when we move home. There may be numerous boxes to pack and just the thought of it is daunting. Tell yourself that you’re going to pack one or two boxes per day and before you know it, the whole house is packed up and ready to be transported.

8. Make it easy to get started:
The problem is not finishing tasks, so often we have a problem starting them. Never dive into a task with all that enthusiasm without first knowing where and how you are going to start. Visualize how the completed task will look, then start by breaking it down into manageable chunks. Plan which chunk you will complete first and by when, and then only move onto the next chunk.

9. Get someone to hold you accountable:
It is easy to feel alone when snowed under by many tasks, but when it comes to overcoming procrastination there are probably many people that would want to offer you their assistance. When you have a particular task that you need to accomplish, ask this person to check up on you at certain intervals. This will assist to help you to hold yourself accountable and become a master at overcoming procrastination.

10. Give yourself a reward:
Give yourself a small reward after you complete a specific task or milestone. If you know a coffee break is waiting for you when you are finished doing something tedious, you will be inspired to get it done.

When it comes to accomplishing our goals we’re encouraged to reach for the stars and set big hairy audacious goals.
Although it’s great to be ambitious when we set goals like this,
we get so overwhelmed by how we’re going to actually manage to accomplish such things that we don’t bother to take action in the first place.
As a result our goals simply remain unrealized dreams.

With a few changes in the way we do things and the adoption of some simple mindsets we can make progress towards our goals much faster.

To get started you must have a destination

Bite Off Less Than You Can Chew

Most people never take action or stop half way to the goal line because they bite off more than they can chew. Eventually the goal they have in mind goes from being the pursuit of a dream to a daily chore. As a result they lose the motivation to work on a goal and before they know it the goal is yet another thing they didn’t follow through on.

By starting with bite sized pieces, our view of how much progress we’ve made shifts dramatically. Let’s say you want to write a book. Rather than concerning yourself with finishing the whole book, focus on finishing the first chapter or even the first page. It’s far less daunting and you will actually feel a sense of accomplishment as opposed to feeling like you’re goal is so far off.

Take Action Daily

The only way to get any sort of result is to take action towards a goal. By taking action every single day you create momentum. As momentum increases, the results taken from your action will become much more substantial, and eventually you’ll be at a point where you actually can’t stop because you’ve reached the point of no return.

Celebrate Small Victories

When you assess the progress towards a goal you have choices. You can either focus on how far you have to go or look at how far you’ve come. When you do the latter, it tends to motivate and inspire you. When you do the former it demoralizes and demotivates you. We’re so caught up in getting to where we want to go that we forget to enjoy the journey and celebrate the small victories along the way.

Learn from Setbacks

Setbacks and failure are a part of accomplishing anything worth doing in life. In almost every story of massive success that you’ll come across, there are MAJOR setbacks that took place. Setbacks are usually opportunity in disguise and we have to remember that sometimes we’ll take 2 steps back in order take 20 steps forward. If you look back over the course of your life you’ll notice the serendipitous nature of setbacks.

Keep Charging Forward

Many people tend to give up on a goal when they feel stuck or as though there is not light at the end of tunnel. One of the best ways to get past this is to adopt that attitude belief that when you feel the most frustrated and most ready to give up, you’re on the verge of a major breakthrough. It would be a shame to make so much progress towards a goal and abandon the pursuit in your final hours. Often, accomplishment occurs on the final hours of a goal.

Take a Break

We live in a world today where people seem intent on moving a million miles an hour. As a result people suffer from anxiety and diseases that didn’t exist before we got ourselves in such a hurry. It’s important to make a point daily to take a break from everything and do something without any purpose other than for the enjoyment of whatever you’re doing. Don’t walk for the sake of exercise. Just walk for the sake of walking.

Detach from the Outcome

Our need for instant gratification is so strong that when we don’t see a result form something we’re working on immediately we become tempted to abandon its pursuit. But consider the actions you take the seeds that you plant in order for your goal to come to fruition. If you pull those seeds out of the ground to check on the progress of their growth you’re essentially starting the process all over again. So, let nature take its course and stay detached from the outcome.

Treat your goals as part of the game of life and don’t take everything so seriously. If you do that you’ll find yourself not only enjoying the process but making much more progress.

Do you find it tough to work towards your goals – even when you know they’re worthwhile? Perhaps you’ve tried to push yourself forwards with willpower … but it hasn’t worked.

self motivated, ways to be self motivated

Instead of willpower, you need more self-motivation. That way, you won’t run out of energy – and you might even find yourself enjoying life more!

Here’s how to become more self-motivated:

#1: Spend Your Time on Tasks You Enjoy

If you have a choice about what you’ll spend your time on – perhaps what job you’ll take, or what you’ll major in at college – then choose something that you’ll enjoy. Going for a job that pays a little more, or a major that sounds a bit more prestigious, isn’t going to help you stay motivated.

Even if you’re working in a job that you dislike, you probably have some control over the tasks you take on.
Can you ask to be involved with a new, interesting project? Can you volunteer to help your manager with a particular piece of work?

#2: Take Pride in What You’re Doing

Some activities can seem pretty futile. Perhaps you’re a small cog in a big machine at work, and it’s tough to see how your contribution matters.
The truth is, it does make a difference – your company wouldn’t have hired you in the first place if it didn’t.

It’s easier to be self-motivated when you take pride in what you’re doing, and you do it to the best of your ability.
Whether you’re cleaning the house or dealing with customers, you can consciously decide to do your very best.

#3: Think About the Outcome

In an ideal world, every task would be its own reward. Of course, it doesn’t always work like that.
You’ve probably got a bunch of tasks on your list that aren’t especially interesting or enjoyable – but you want
to get them done anyway because they’ll take you towards your goals.

Try focusing on the outcome: that qualification at the end of your degree course, or the money you’ll have if you stick to your savings plan.

You might even want to find an image that helps represent this outcome (the job you want to have, or the car you’re planning to buy) and keep it close to hand.

#4: Be Careful With Your Use of Rewards

Some people motivate themselves with rewards: Once I’ve answered these emails, I’ll have a chocolate bar.
This can be helpful if you really need to push yourself through a particular task – but if you do it too often,
you’ll find yourself relying on the reward instead of your natural motivation.

Think instead about the rewards inherent in the task itself: Once I’ve answered these emails,
I’ll feel on top of things or Answering these emails helps me to keep our customers happy. Instead of seeing the task as yet
another item on your list, think of its real impact on you and others.

#5: Learn Something New

We’re all natural learners – it’s how we survive. “Learning” isn’t just for children and students: it’s something we do throughout our lives. If you’ve ever struggled to figure out a new piece of software and had an “aha” moment, you’ll know how good it can feel to learn something new.

If there are specific areas in your life where you feel very unmotivated, is that because you’re not confident? You might hate cooking, writing, exercising or some other task, because you know you struggle to do it well. Taking the time to learn about it could really boost your motivation.

#6: Stay Focused While You’re Working

You might be motivated to start a new task … but if your attention wanders after five minutes, you’re going to struggle to keep that motivation going. Every time you switch to something else (like Facebook or your phone), you’re breaking your concentration.

Stay focused on one thing at a time – even if that means turning off your internet connection or blocking websites that distract you.
If you keep stopping and starting, it’ll seem like your task is dragging on forever – it’s much more motivating to make steady progress.

The reason that we experience suffering comes ultimately from our mind. According to Buddhism, our main mental problems or root delusions are: attachment, anger and ignorance. Because of these delusions, we engage in actions that cause problems to ourselves and others. With every negative action (karma) we do, we create a potential for negative experiences. (See also the page on karma.)

How can attachment bring us suffering?
We just have to think of chocolate and there is the temptation of eating more than is good for us. Or as example, my favourite story: the way people used to catch monkeys in South India:

One takes a coconut and makes a hole in it, just large enough that a monkey can squeeze its hand in. Next, tie the coconut down, and put a sweet inside. What happens next is pure attachment. The monkey smells the sweet, puts his hand into the coconut, grabs the sweet and … the hole is too small to let a fist out of the coconut. The last thing a monkey would consider is to let go of the sweet, so it is literally tied down by its own attachment. Often they only let go when they fall asleep or become unconscious because of exhaustion.

Ultimately, the Buddha explains that our attachment to life keeps us in cyclic existence or samsara, which does not bring us continuous happiness.

How can anger bring us suffering?
As will be explained in the page on karma, all of our actions have consequences. Doing harm to others will return to us as being harmed. Anger is one of the main reasons we create harm to others, so logically it is often the cause of suffering to ourselves.

How can ignorance bring us suffering?
This is explained in two ways:

- The conventional explanation is that because we are not omniscient, we regularly get ourselves into trouble. We do not realise all the consequences of our actions, we do not understand other beings and we do not understand why the world is exactly the way it is. So we often end up in situations where we do not take the best actions. Just reflect for a moment how often we think: “If only I had known this earlier…”

- The more complicated explanation refers to the most profound aspect of Buddhist philosophy: ultimate truth or emptiness. This is a vast subject, and also after reading the page on wisdom it is still unlikely that it will be completely clear; it takes years of study and meditation to realise the insight into the wisdom of emptiness. To put it very simple: reality is not what it seems to us. As reality is different from our opinions about it, we get ourselves into trouble. As long as we fail to realise the ultimate truth, we will be stuck in cyclic existence. While being in cyclic existence, we will always experience some aspect of suffering (which is at least having the potential for future suffering).

Gareth Cliff takes a stand for South Africans, STRONGLY expressing the views of so many I am sure!

Finally two STRONG celebrities speaking out about ANC government, their ways, or lack thereof….

Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Gareth Cliff.

Read the Gareth Cliff article here:

dear-government-by-gareth-cliff

Additional websites discussing views and and feedback

• http://www.timeslive.co.za/entertainment/article716599.ece/Cliff-has-a-go-at-ugly-Blade-Zumas-bastards
• http://www.timeslive.co.za/entertainment/article718996.ece/Critical-DJ-to-meet-Zuma
• http://africartoons.com/cartoon/2220

This is a prepared text of the Commencement address delivered by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, on June 12, 2005.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960’s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

Something which I have been saying and teaching for many years is that your mental strength and fitness is one of your greatest assets. So why is it that so many people continue to line themselves up for practically what is to be considered Mental Suicide.

Have you ever noticed that it can be a beautiful day and you can be in the most beautiful surroundings, but if there is a T.V. around and there is a news story which is full of suffering, hatred, violence or scandal, then the attention of most people will be on it and not on the beauty of their surroundings even if the story has no direct impact on their lives?

People have been conditioned to allow this sort of mental programming to affect their lives and the lives of their families without even being aware of the damage which this does to their mental state.

Why is it that we will go to any measure to secure our homes and belongings by putting up high fences, razor wire, security beams and burglar proofing, but when it comes to our most valuable asset (our minds) the majority of time we allow any unsavory or damaging influences in without actually putting the most basic security checks in place?

It is this unchecked access to our minds which allows the myriad of negative influences which we are exposed to on a daily basis which leads to the slow and drawn out death of positive mindsets in our modern day society.

It is nothing more than Mental Suicide in essence though because this process is not the fault of anyone else but ourselves as we are responsible to stand watch as the gatekeeper to our own minds.

So it can be very easy to turn around and begin to blame:

• The Media
• Advertising Companies
• The Corporate World
• The Schooling System or Institutions of Higher Learning
• The Government

And the list can go on and on but in effect we can only blame one source for the negativity which goes into our brain and that is the gatekeeper, ourselves.

It is each and every person’s personal choice as to what they choose to allow having an effect on their mind as it is your responsibility to do the necessary security checks regarding:

• Does this information affect me directly?
• Is it of any benefit to me to watch, listen to or read this?
• Can this help me reach my goals?
• Is it positively stimulating or enriching?
• Will it bring me closer to the Life of Abundance I desire?

These are the basic security checks which we all need to do on a permanent basis in order to stop the poisoning of our minds with negativity.

Failure to do so is the equivalent of mental suicide and there is no one else to blame but ourselves.

A successful Entrepreneur wants to be a leader and not a follower as this is the only way that they can create, protect and enjoy their own success!

Unfortunately the moment that one becomes a leader and makes a success all sorts of negative influences are automatically thrown their way.

Influences such as:

• Jealousy from others
• Ignorant and negative criticism
• Doubt, speculation and negative input from family and friends

And once again the list of negative influences can go on and on and many of them will even present themselves right in the beginning when an aspiring Entrepreneur is only getting started.

It is your ability to be able to act as the effective gatekeeper to your own mind at this stage which could easily make the difference between you succeeding or failing in your endeavors not only in business, but in every aspect of your life.

You need to strive to keep your mindsets free of these negative influences and to focus on creating value in everything you do should you truly want to become a leader in the world of Entrepreneurs.

Ways to grow a better mindset:

1. Conserve and Protect Confidence

Make sure that you always conserve and protect your own confidence, avoid people who are continually trying to negatively affect you or break down your own self confidence.

2. Don’t take unconstructive criticism personally

As an Entrepreneur you will definitely become the target of a lot of unconstructive criticism, learn to ignore it and how to determine what criticism is there to help you and which is negative and of no benefit to you.

3. Protect your own mind

Become the best gatekeeper of your own mind so as to keep all of the negativity out which will lead to the suicide of positive mindsets. This is your most valuable asset so guard it well.

4. Avoid Unnecessary Media Exposure

Carefully monitor and choose what you allow the media and other sources to pump into your mind, always check to see whether it affects you directly and if it can possibly have a positive effect on you, if not, simply ignore or avoid it.

5. Educate yourself as to the Strategies and Principles of a Wealth Creator

By doing this you will learn how easy it is to be misled by outside influences as a result of conditioning and incorrect mindsets, learn how easy it truly is to become a success and enjoy the life of a Wealth Creator which is filled with abundance and success.

These are but a few steps which you can take in order grow and become the best you can be.

All strength to you and remember, your mind is the most important tool any Entrepreneur can have when it is well protected, exercised and correctly focused.

More Articles:

http://www.warriormindcoach.com/blog/2010/09/01/great-mental-strength-tips-from-jon-gordon/

http://www.phoenixcoyotescare.com/columns/player-development/ten-ways-to-improve-your-player%E2%80%99s-mental-strength/

1- Find the C below.. Please do not use any cursor help.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOCOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

2- If you already found the C, now find the 6 below.

99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
69999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999

3 – Now find the N below. It’s a little more difficult.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMNMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

This is NOT a joke. If you were able to pass these 3 tests, you can cancel your annual visit to your neurologist. Your brain is great and you’re far from having a close relationship with Alzheimer.

Congratulations!

_______________________________________________________________________________
part 2
eonvrye that can raed this rsaie your hnad.

To my ’selected’ strange-minded friends:
If you can read the following paragraph, forward it on to your friends and the person that sent it to you with ‘yes’ in the subject line.

Only great minds can read this
This is weird, but interesting!

I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno’t mtaetr in what oerdr the ltteres in a word are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is that the frsit and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it whotuit a pboerlm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! If you can raed this forwrad it