Where are you going today?

How are you going to get there?

Do you know that where you are going is completely up to you?

Speaking of where you are, how did you get there?

Did you have a plan, a road-map, or are you where you are today by happenstance? Did you just wake up with no real idea of how you got here?

Whether you know it or not: your freedom of choice has brought you to be where you are.

You have the freedom of choice and because you have chosen each and every circumstance of your life: your success and failure is completely within your grasp, your happiness and unhappiness, your present and future.

Everything that exists in your life exists because of you, because of your behavior, words and actions.

Here are a few examples of that:

1. Kate, a young woman from Russia. Six years ago Kate emigrated to this country. Completely unable to speak the English language, she now has a better command of the language than people who grew up here. This spring, she is starting college to get her degree in Accounting.
2. Aloha, a young woman in Florida, who is working as a waitress at a Waffle House. Aloha dropped out of high school because she had gotten pregnant. Now, with 2 small children, she hopes to someday get her GED and grow a better life for herself and her children.
3. Susan, a middle aged woman who did finish high school, but soon afterward had two children. Working smart and planning her trip, she retired from a career that culminated in an upper-level management position with a major national corporation.

Over 400 years before Christ, Socrates came up with what are known as basic laws of human life. One of them is called the Law of Cause and Effect. What that means is that for every effect in your life, there is a cause.

Let me explain: if you want a certain effect (end result), then you have to take certain steps (causes) to get that effect.

In our examples above, you see that each of the three women showed responsibility for their lives in different ways: Kate has a plan to make a new life for herself here in the States. Aloha has no real defined idea of where her life is, or is going, and Susan knew what it took to get where she wanted to go and followed that plan. She also has a plan for even greater success and achievement for the rest of her life.

Responsibility is the basic necessity to having the life you want and deserve.

When you accept that you are completely responsible for yourself and also that no one is coming to your rescue is the beginning of your road to success.
After you accept that, there is very little that you cannot do or have. “If it’s to be, it’s up to me!”

Success, achievement, motivation all come from your responsibility to yourself. Happiness and self-actualization are the end result from your responsible choices and planning.

Responsibility: It’s the absolute minimum requirement for everything you could ever really want in life.

What is your plan?

Goals, a bucket list, a place where you want to be in your life? You deserve a wonderful life, what are you doing to grow the life you deserve?

Think about it and tell me what you are doing to grow your life into the one you want and deserve?

Translate this with Babel Fish

Looking off across a landscape that is at first glance both stunningly beautiful and incredibly daunting is a bit like looking at our days sometimes.

In that first glance, we see either the absolute beauty before us or the challenges that lie ahead.

Now…

If you put those challenges in perspective, the beauty is still there, but the challenge isn’t quite as great.

Go take a new look at the challenges before you. Look at them, not as the whole wide panorama, but as that first tree you have to simply walk around to start conquering your challenge.

How many people do you avoid because they are always unhappy? They are the ones who are always complaining about everything?

How drained do you feel after just a few minutes with them?

What about if you are given the choice of them or someone who makes you laugh and think about just how good it is to be alive?

When you smile and laugh with people do you notice how much they want to be around you?

Go out tomorrow with a big smile on your face. no matter how stressed you are, keep that smile there and you won’t believe how many people will smile back. Those smiles will brighten your day, lighten your spirits and reduce the stress you are feeling.

Even if at first you are only acting like you are happy, before long you will be because people will return those smiles you are giving them.

Inspiration can come from any number of things.

Inspiration doesn’t need to be more than a momentary occasion. In fact, sometimes, inspiration is just that!

The sight of a beautiful sunrise or sunset, a field of butterflies fluttering over nearly mown grass, the look in a new born daughter’s eyes… all these and more can be enough to inspire you to great and truly wonderful heights.

Some people are inspired by these, other people are inspired by the sight of a monolithic building, a beautiful painting… the list of things that inspire are endless. I personally find a fountain of inspiration in one of my wife’s smiles.

And sometimes, that inspiration will cause complete different reactions from you.

Sometimes, you may look past that field of butterflies to the barn beyond and the interplay of lines there. One day you may see something and not be very impressed and the nest day… it is enough to make you go change the world!

That’s the thing about inspiration: it comes in so very many shapes, forms, and ways!

Writers, painters, sculptors, inventors of all kinds… all have looked at their various worlds and gotten inspiration from each of those worlds in different ways.

Look around you, look at your world through new eyes and see what inspires you there.

Take that inspiration and enjoy it, build on it, and live a wonderful life!

What motivates you?

Is it the satisfaction of a job well done?

Does your motivation come from your love of your life?

Or does it come from attaining a goal that you set for yourself?

Ask any successful person what it is that motivates him or her and you will undoubtedly hear something about their goals.

Setting goals is extremely important to motivation and success.

What goals do you have and how are you going to reach them?

Ever thought about what you like most about your life?

Tell you what, take a minute and think of what the one thing in your life that you like the most.

Spending time with your family? Learning new things? Trying to make the world a better place to live, even if it is only in your own back yard? Just being alive and able to enjoy the dawn of a new day? Taking time to sit back and enjoy a few minutes of solitude and reflect on your day?

You see, the answers can be as wide-ranging and individual as we each are.

Over our lives, the answers we give will change. It might be that you are, like a lot of people right now in the midst of a transition in your life? What you felt to be most important a year ago, even six months ago… what you liked most about your life may have changed?

Studies have shown that there are different stages we go through in our lives. In each of these we have different priorities, goals, and aspirations.

This is not a bad thing; a time of transition can force us to re-evaluate our lives and dig deeper to find what REALLY means the most to us.
And in this re-evaluation process, something else is going on: you are growing in your life!

This growth may not be as life encompassing as a regenesis of your life, it doesn’t need to be, but when we find out what it is that truly is our number one priority, that which will make us move mountains and that we REALLY love… then we start to begin to really live and love our lives!

I stopped in at a favorite tobacconist of mine, not a big place but always a place to catch a few minutes or hours if I choose of good conversation.
Today, I was once again delighted by the fact that not only did they have my favorite pipe tobacco but a number of the cigars I love.
Now, I am not going into all this to tell you of my affection for cigars, pipes, and the camaraderie smoking these can engender but more of the treatment I receive when I walk in the door.
Within seconds the store owner will walk past and with a gentle pat on the back and in a heart-felt tone ask, “So? How is today going for you?”
He isn’t asking to ask, but he REALLY cares.
And you know something?
That care may extend outward but just by caring, his world is richer for it.
How much trouble is it to ask and CARE about how someone answers if you ask them, “How is today going for you?”
Lemme tell you: it feels good to see the light on someone’s face when they realize someone really does care.
Try it, for them… for yourself. It will make a difference.

This is basically the second of two-parts on being overwhelmed by all the stuff in your life. So, if you haven’t read “Overwhelmed, under whelmed, Or Just Whelmed…?” I’m going to ask that you read it then come back and read this.

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We can’t avoid all stress, in fact some stress in our lives is a good thing, but when it begins to impact our lives negatively we need to deal with it and learn to reduce it.
We can learn to counteract these negative effects and evoke what is known as the relaxation response. This is a state of deep rest that is the exact opposite of the stress response.
You’ve heard of the ‘fight or flight’ situation where a situation causes your body to be flooded by chemicals that make you choose whether you fight or flee.

Well, this is called the stress response and is usually triggered when you are in a truly emergency situation. The same ‘crash’ that occurs after one of those situations is the same as what your body is having to deal with when it constantly senses that it is in the same circumstances.
This is why being under a lot of stress makes you feel always run-down: you ACTUALLY ARE because your body isn’t being allowed to recover from each episode.

Bringing your system back into balance through the relaxation response with things like walking, deep breathing, relaxing your muscles, reframing the situation in your mind will slow your heart rate, lower your blood pressure, and allow you to deal with the stressors that originally caused the problem.

Increased energy, less susceptibility to illness, being able to focus and solve problems easier, higher productivity and motivation… oh, add in relieving aches and pains, all of these are the results of working on, and mastering the relaxation response.

The feeling of being overwhelmed can come from the buildup of a lot of little things in your life all coming together at the same time or it can happen all at once with one or two major events occurring at the same time.

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No matter how it happens, the feeling of being engulfed by life’s responsibilities and burdens can become very taxing and stressful.

As I’ve said before: it’s time to take a break (even if it is only for a few minutes), step away from it all and take a deep breath.

Go for a Walk

Taking a walk when you are stressed will not only get you out of the stressful situation and give you some perspective so you can go back in a new frame of mind, but it will give you a little exercise.

And… exercise can be a great stress reliever in itself, since it helps you blow off steam and releases endorphins.

Sit back and take a deep Breath

Ok, you’re at work and can’t leave or you are in a situation where going for a walk isn’t possible… all is not lost!

Why breathing exercises? Because they provide more benefits than just relaxing you.
Anxiety and stress can be reduced symptoms caused by breathing exercises.
Anxiety and stress increase your heart and breathing rates and increase your body’s demand for oxygen. Learning to control your breathing rate can be very helpful.
Breathing exercises can also improve how well you do during physical activities, as well.

Breathing exercises help keep your chest muscles active. They also allow you to get more oxygen with each breath and to breathe with less effort.

Breathing exercises can go a long way to making you feel better.
These can you feel better right away. By getting more oxygen into your body you will begin releasing physical tension and clearing your mind a bit.

These are two ways that breathing exercises can benefit you, and you can do them anytime or anywhere, even if you can’t easily get up for a walk.

There are a lot of people in sedentary jobs where they spend their days in a have to drive and getting out for a walk isn’t feasible and learning breathing exercises are a good alternative for relieving stress.

There are a vast number of breathing exercises that you can use. The breathing exercises I do are fairly simple and consist of stretching as much as I can (whether I am sitting or standing), then:
In a relaxed position with my knees apart:
Slowly inhale through my nose, counting to three in my head.
Making sure to breath as deeply down into my abdomen and expanding my diaphragm as much as possible, I hold this air for about a five count.
I then let this air out through my mouth, counting to three in my head as it leaves my lungs. Repeat several times. That’s it!

I do this as often as possible, and one nice side effect is that since I travel to cities that are over a mile above sea-level, this allows me not to get light-headed when I am there. Just a nice side benefit.

At the end of this post you will find links to just a few of the vast array of sites where you can find out more about breathing exercises.

How about taking a Mental Break

A quick few minutes of peace and quiet as you visualize a calm place in your mind can be a nice way to restore some peace of mind. A memory, a few moments of looking at pictures, even a few stolen moments of looking up a dream destination on the Internet will allow you to slip away. It’s easy to do, and can relax you both mentally and physically and allow you to better deal with and in turn lessen the effects of stress in your life.

Look at the situation differently

Sometimes the way we look at a stressful situation can intensify the stress that we feel. If we can train ourselves to put it into a different perspective–one that causes us less stress: how would that change its effect on us?

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As I have said before stress, even negative stress can be used for good: It can be a motivator to propel us to move out of the situation we are in, but if it is not recognized and controlled it can defeat us instead of being the impetus we need to grow.

Walk, breath, take a little time for yourself, re-evaluate your situation, and take another step on your path to growing the life you deserve!

http://cas.umkc.edu/casww/brethexr.htm
http://www.amsa.org/healingthehealer/breathing.cfm
http://www.med.umich.edu/1libr/aha/aha_breathex_sha.htm
http://www.energiseforlife.com/tony_robbins_breathing_exercise.php

Ever felt like you are slowing sinking under all the various things going on in your life?

You work in a demanding job but lately it’s more hectic than normal. You want more from life so you take on challenges that are supposed to enrich your life.

If you are married and have children, you worry about not being able to spend more time with them.

Throw in something like a relocation, wedding, vacation… oh, and not to forget the unexpected tragedies (big and small) of life: the refrigerator, water heater, a daughter’s car breaking down…

Even though some of this myriad of dozens of things may take months to build up, it seems that they all just come together at the same time.

Oh… I forgot to mention the time you want to devote to your relatives and friends.

Do you begin to feel like you need an extra plate to hold it all? You begin to think of sleep as a luxury that you faintly remember indulging in during a past life?

We all know that stress can be a motivating factor in our lives, however high levels of stress can also have the opposite effect. Fatigue, feeling overwhelmed, irritability and increased susceptibility to illness: all of these are common symptoms of having to much stress in our lives.

Do you always feel like you are rushing just to keep up? Does your “To Do’ list that seem to grow larger every day?

Poor time management is a major source of anxiety and stress and the feeling of being overwhelmed.

And yes, I know what you’re going through and after a while you just want to sit down, take a deep breath and pretend for a few moments that it will all go away.

Well, it won’t, but you can lessen the intensity of some of these stressors.

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So? You ready?

First: Where do you want to go in your life? What is it that you want to achieve?

You need to be as specific as you can here BUT! realize that this might change.
In truth, it probably will change. But right now, think about whatever personal, financial, career, and emotional goals that you have. Even if you have already done this: do it again. You will find that re-evaluation is going to be a reoccurring theme in growing the life you deserve.

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What you are going to do is list EVERYTHING in your life that asks for ANY attention from you.

This is similar to making a household financial statement. Only this is for your life.

Trust me, you will BE AMAZED at what you find with just this exercise alone! Notice that I did not say ‘simple’ exercise.

You will find your time and energy is being taken up by things that have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with advancing your life. In fact, you will find that there are some things that hold you back and work to defeat you.

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Get out a notebook, a pen, a cup of your favorite (non-alcoholic at this point) beverage, find a quiet place to think.

Take a deep breath and write down each of the things in your life you have to commit time and energy to.

Now… you are going to list everything, and I mean EVERYTHING you need to do, If it has a ‘to do by’ date: list that.

Okay, next you are going to need to go through and give everything a priority.
The items and activities with the highest priority ranking should be the ones which help you achieve your long-term goals and ambitions. There will be some short-term items that may initially have high rankings but these will be things that you MUST do on a daily basis.

Oh, if you have to redo this list a dozen or so times to get the rankings where you finally feel they should be, don’t worry, that’s part of what this exercise is all about: making sure you realize that you need to choose your life and place a value on the priorities you have set to make it grow.

You will also begin to see where you will choose to lose tasks and activities that do not help you toward your goal and grow your life.
As you see some of the areas where you have been wasting your time, you will either choose to do away with these things or you will relegate them to your ‘I’m not going to worry about those’ file.

The remaining tasks and activities will need to be addressed one thing at a time.
Go after the tough top priority items first. Most people have the tendency to tackle the little things first and get them out of the way, telling themselves all the while that they will be able to go after the big jobs with less stress on themselves.

My wife has this saying: everything takes longer than you think it will. And you know something: she’s right!

All those little jobs are going to eat up all your time and leave you worn out and frustrated that you didn’t get to the really big jobs. The tasks that were the really important ones.

Attack the high priority jobs first and when you have finished each of them, move on down the ladder. This will do a number of things for you: First you will have removed the stress of having that task hanging over your head. Two, you will find that you have a lot more time left. And three: you won’t nearly as tired at the end of the day.

Finish one at a time and move on. You won’t waste a lot of time switching between tasks and letting them draw you down. You won’t believe just how much time you will free up by doing this very simple thing.

OH! Note here! Do not take on any more than you can handle! If you cannot fit it in: just say “NO” to it. That even means those little tasks that someone else may think are necessary in your life. This is YOUR life, not theirs: let them go find their own life.

And don’t forget to plan personal time for yourself. These leisure activities are a basic requirement to help you decompress and begin to enjoy life and grow in your life.

One final note: yes, I know that this exercise is going to require a certain commitment of your time and energy, there may be times that you will feel it to be REALLY daunting, but when you think about just how important your life is and the life you want and deserve is… you will look back on this and rejoice for what it will teach you and how you will have grown.

Motivation… what is it?

What does it mean to you?

What motivates you to do something?

Well, let’s start with what ‘motivation’ is.

I could bore you to tears with a long drawn out explanation of what Intrinsic and Extrinsic motivations are.

Instead, I’m only going to say that Intrinsic Motivation is that where you are rewarded by doing something. This is the one we will be most interested in.

But you need to know that Extrinsic Motivation comes from outside of you. Someone cheering you on from the sidelines is Extrinsic Motivation.

Whether our reason for doing something comes from within ourselves or from outside, that reason is our Motivation.

When we have a clear understanding of our motive, and where it is coming from; we can more easily achieve our goals and desires.

Now! How important is motivation in your life?

VERY!

The achievement of our goals and desires is driven by our motivation. Do you know what  the greatest motivator is? Competition! Yes, the need to accomplish, to win, to achieve, to outdo.

To SUCCEED!

But I’m not just talking about outdoing other people, but pushing yourself and challenging yourself to go to the next level… to be better tomorrow than we were today.

Pro-football players who have played and won the Super Bowl are among the most driven to play in another Super Bowl game. Business leaders are the same way. Have you ever heard of the head of a company make the statement that “Well, we had an incredible year last year, so we’re going to take it easy this year and let everyone catch up”.

I haven’t. They are continuously motivated by their past successes and the promise of still another success.

When the Motivation to succeed is not coming from inside yourself, we need to be motivated by someone else.

Team leaders, managers, supervisors… their job is to motivate their team-members and workers to achieve an agreed goal.

Their Extrinsic Motivation is the fuel that drives the achievement of their  subordinates in the accomplishment of their tasks and goals.

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Where do you get your motivation?

We all get motivated in one way or another by our families, our friends, co-workers, the cashier at the market… sometimes our motivations are to do something, sometimes we are motivated NOT to do anything. Yes, Motivation works both ways!

It can spur us toward a goal, but on the other end of the spectrum, it can push us away from something. Sometimes we can be motivated toward something we know we should not be.

It is part of growing that we recognize this and learn to avoid these negative influences and motivators.

Many people look to their Spirituality for guidance , support, and strength in avoiding these negative influences and motivators in their lives.

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What happens when you don’t feel all that motivated anymore?

Work has become drudgery? Coming home… you dread it. Not because you don’t have a loving family but because you are getting nothing out of it and giving nothing back in return. Nothing inspires you.

Do you look around to find as many of those ‘inspirational’ and ‘motivating’ quotes as possible to bombard yourself with. I didn’t think so.

Up until now, you have probably either suffered through these doldrums or looked for something to divert your attention until you regained that enthusiasm and got back in the groove. Ever ask yourself how much time you lost and that was wasted in those down-times? And the results that did come about because of your allowing yourself to be diverted.

Well, how about this for an idea: INSTEAD of wasting time (remember your life only goes for so long and you NEED to make the MOST of every minute), why don’t we try something different:

Figure out what it is that truly motivates you and work on THAT. Not allowing yourself to be sidetracked by life’s other minutia, and ask yourself, “What it is that specifically motivates me?’

Is there an underlying motivation to your inactivity toward your goal?

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These are just some of the questions you need to consider when you start to take your first step on your path to growing your life and making it the life your truly deserve.