What Are You Searching For?

I have not yet met anyone in my world travels who didn't want a little more inner peace. And, I have never encountered anyone who would trade a little money to rid themselves of their stress and worries.

So, is this what each of us is secretly or overtly searching for? Well, to be truthful I'm not sure. People who say they want less stress continue to pursue wealth, fame, power, position and more stuff. People who say they want to be happy often seem to sabotage this goal with poor choices, bad judgment and emotional immaturity. And people who say they want more inner peace still harbor old emotional baggage, replay old slights and hurts and let other people control their behaviors, attitudes, emotions and even their thoughts.

If we are truly searching for any or all the items listed above one would have to wonder whether we are just giving lip service to these goals, desires and dreams or if we really want them but just don't seem to know where to find them, how to achieve them or how to keep them.

I too have been guilty. I am just like you in that I would like a little more happiness and a little less stress yet when it comes to doing what is necessary I often fall short.

Sure, I have read all the books, hundreds and hundreds of them, attended the seminars, had personal coaches, spent hours and even weeks setting and planning my personal goals and dreams and spent more hours than I can remember praying and meditating and yet, here I sit from time to time, still questioning whether all this reading, study and searching is worthwhile.

During my years of study, research and searching I have come to a few conclusions.

1) Many of the people who supposedly have it figured out, don't. 

2) Many of the people who preach and teach this stuff to others and get paid handsomely to do so, don't have a clue. 

3) Some of the people who you would least expect to have the answers often do. 

4) Even many of the religious fanatics, diehards or steadfast believers in God still struggle with the same issues, questions and challenges as those who have never set foot in a church or Synagogue or read the Bible.

Why is this? Are we doomed as a species to just search and never find or discover the true meaning of our life or as the title says, why we are we here?

Humans have been asking for centuries; why am I here, where am I going and what am I supposed to do with my life while I am here?

One could get easily discouraged and feeling a little sorry for themselves spending years contemplating simple questions like these.

Have you ever asked yourself any of these searching questions whether in times of doubt or discouragement or happiness and contentment? Success or failure? 

Do you have any answers yet, or are you like most of us, that you just keep on trudging ahead through life one day at a time just earning, spending, working and playing?

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Think Your Way to a Better Life

Our thoughts are extremely powerful and either get us where we want to go or hinder us and hold us back from what we want to achieve so how do we think our way to a better life?

1. Realize the Importance of the Way you Think

I think the first step has to be realizing how influential your thoughts are in getting what you want out of life. If you realize their importance then you will make more effort in controlling your thoughts and focussing on the positive; if you don't realize their importance then you may just let your mind wander wherever is more natural for you and that may not be where you want to go. We need to take control of our thoughts before we can make them act for our good.

2. Take Note of Negative Thought Patterns and Take Steps to Overcome Them

Once you understand the important of your thoughts it is time to start taking note of your negative thought patterns that do not help you achieve what you want in life. Are you a procrastinator? Do you think that you will put off until tomorrow what should have been done yesterday? Do you commit self-sabotage? Do you think yourself into not succeeding at anything because you don't believe you will? Does negativity drain you of any energy you could put into more positive action? All of these thought patterns can be overcome and your mind can be trained to think right.

3. The Power of Affirmations and Visualization

Not only do you need to overcome negative thought patterns but you also need to train yourself to think positively and the best tools for this are visualization and affirmation. Visualization focusses you on what you want to achieve. It is a deliberate thinking about where you want to be. Affirmations fill your mind with positive thoughts and confessions and help you think positively and go after what you want in life. Picture yourself where you want to be instead of focussing on what you don't want in your life.

Why is Positive Thinking so Important Anyway?

In the first point I said you need to realize the importance of positive thinking, but why is it important? The fact is that when we focus on the negative we are drained of all energy and will become depressed and find it difficult to achieve the things we want to achieve. When we focus on what we want to become we find ways of making it happen. We have more energy to carry out the plans we develop for achieving our goals and gradually our life becomes totally different as we take these small actions and change the way we think.

Start taking control of your thoughts today - think positively, develop plans and visualize where you want to be instead of focusing on where you are. 

Before anything can happen it needs to begin as a thought; so think right.

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4 Steps to Help You Be Heard When You Lack Self Esteem

You whisper a suggestion, and the person besides you parrots what you've said to great applause. You want to scream out and say "that was my idea" but your throat is dry, you feel clammy and sweaty and just want the moment to end. Your heart is beating so fast you are sure it is noticeable. At least the focus is off you for now but then suddenly it's your turn to offer something, to say anything and you can't. You are frozen in fear. Business moves on and you want to say something, to say anything so your superiors know that you have something to contribute. The stress response has three options for you, fight or flight, which we are familiar with and then the third, freeze. You cannot move. It's as though you have become disconnected from your body.

You are sick and tired of seeing those less qualified promoted above you, people you've even trained! Why doesn't anyone just notice you and sing your praises? You do all the work and do it well but it goes unnoticed. You've fallen into the rut of being dependable, you never say no to extra work but when favors are being dished out, no one notices your existence.

Was it always like this you ask yourself? You used to have ambition and drive but you're stuck. Your bosses are becoming younger and younger and see you more as a relic from a time gone by, no longer interested in the detail that you pride yourself on.

You find yourself feeling unwell, you may have IBS or other stomach related anxiety. Every day is nerve wrenching as you try to find a way to be noticed for the right reasons. You are competent when left to work alone but as soon as someone in authority is around, you freeze, just like what used to happen at school.

Why?

Because your mind associates authority and your "superiors" as somehow having power over you and you become the "little girl". This is who is reacting in any situation where the focus is upon you. You want attention but you don't and your mind becomes conflicted. You feel unworthy of attention as that inner critic seeks to silence you. How many times have you told yourself, no one is interested in what I have to say, what would I know, they'll laugh at me.

Communication has very little to do with the words that are spoken. It is tone and your body language. This is why bullying claims are very hard to prove, the words of he said/she said are anemic on paper.

Whispering won't get you noticed, you have to learn to speak up in such a way that others listen. They hear you. But you have to believe in yourself before others and believe in you.

Who is someone that is always heard? Do they whisper and cower or do they take up the space they occupy without any hesitancy or apology for being around?

You can use them as a model, a way to understand the relationship between confidence and body language. Improve one, you improve the other. Let's start with these 4 steps. Stand in front of your mirror to notice like a before and after image. Look at how you are standing and your expression, not fun for you, I bet. Now step away and do the following:

4 steps to learn how to speak up:

1. Lower your voice. That's right, lower your pitch. Little girls are high-pitched and so are women and men who lack confidence. Practice it in a store buying a coffee, practice at home.
2. Play your favorite tune in your mind. This must be a song from when you felt alive and confident, an anthem from your teenage years. Singing activates both parts of the brain, the left (logic) for the words and right for the melody. It immediately relaxes the body to prevent your shoulders rolling forward to try to disappear. Singing will encourage you to open your chest.
3. Learn to say "no". Whether or not, you have the time and energy, just start saying no. Don't add an excuse. Just say no. Practice this in the mirror, in a lower timbre and loosen the body with your favorite song, and say, no. Picture the person who prevails upon you the most, the person you carry and say no. Have a giggle to yourself at the sense of power this gives you. You are not a little girl/boy but an adult.
4. Whose confidence do you admire? It can be someone you know, or an actor or a character from a story or movie. See them in your mind's eye, what is it you admire? Drift into their bodies, like trying on clothes, and see what it feels like.

Now go back to your mirror, what are the differences you can see, I bet your face is more relaxed and your body more at ease!

These are little steps that you can adapt and use immediately. It is important to clear the past and choose a therapy modal that suits you. Hypnotherapy and NLP are ideal modalities to raise self esteem as they go to the core of your inner self, your subconscious mind and to heal your inner child self who never learned to speak up because she/he thought what they had to say was not worthy of being heard.

You don't need to be defined by your past. Let these 4 steps act as a catalyst to help you be heard.


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ABCs of Stress Management

The ABCs of Stress Management Is Awareness, Balance and Control.

Stress is created when external or internal demands made on an individual are in excess of his coping strategies and capabilities. Let us illustrate how physical stress is formed. If you are asked to pick up a glass of water and place it on the table it is not stressful. If you are asked to pick up the glass of water and fill it to the brim without dropping any water outside, it is mildly stressful. If you are asked to hold that full glass of water for two hours without dropping any water, you will get totally stressed out.

Awareness

How stressed are you? Do you feel that you have absolutely no worries and stress in the world? Then you are lucky indeed to be part of the minority of the population today. For most of us stress plays an important part of our daily lives. It disrupts our energy levels, affects our performance and can be a huge drain on our resources. Becoming aware that one is experiencing stress is also difficult as people have got used to being under fire from all sides. It is not a natural state and will affect the health of a person in the longterm.

Balance

Once you are aware of the fact that you get stressed in certain situations, what do you do next? It is now time to manage stress levels better. Keep yourself primed for action without the accompanying tension. This can be accomplished by ensuring that you balance out the stress you are feeling in a certain situation in an optimum manner. You can avoid or modify certain stressors right away on your own. Other stressors may need some contribution from outside influences. The idea is to get hold of the problematic stressors and neutralize them.

Control

Here the idea is not to control the stress. Instead it is to control your own reaction to them. By directing one's own actions and thoughts it is possible to stay in a positive frame of mind. This defeats the stress and allows you a measure of self responsibility and control. A good night's rest is often one of the best ways to control stress. It is easier to deal with issues when you are well fed, well rested and healthy. So make sure that you actively look after your physical body and stress will begin to disappear.

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Monsters and Molehills

'Molehills in life are bumps in the road; they become monsters when we accept them as powerful truth, allowing them to become monsters chasing us through life. Molehills like the teacher who could not find anything redeeming in the student and carelessly flung demeaning insults, leaving behind a child who believed every word they said and became what they believed. The molehill became a monster that chased the child relentlessly through life, one failure after another.

Molehills are the path of destruction left after something uninvited digs its way through our sub conscious mind leaving a tunnel of doubt and a path of fear that somewhere in that dark tunnel lies the truth about who we will become. What we believe may be the most important block in our foundation. Even the greatest of blessings cannot be delivered if we cannot believe; we must believe to receive. Harboring the fear that we do not deserve or cannot achieve something that is important to us will ensure that we cannot.

Damage that begins in childhood plants deeper roots in our subconscious; it has a long time to grow and dig in. A child is born believing in goodness, it simply knows no other way. Trust has brought the child to this new beginning with a fragile defense system in place. In the absence of steady and positive reinforcement of encouraging truth and what can be, it is far easier for a child to believe what they see and hear, to begin to grow from those ideas. Sadly this is frequently the beginning of a long and difficult road filled with doubt, self-recriminations and fear of rejection that keeps the best in life at bay. The good things were never unattainable; they just became a mirage that could not be touched.

Sometimes there is no one to provide the kind of direction and reinforcement we need to escape from the monsters. How can we defeat something we believe is more powerful than us? Only by standing still and objectively looking at the monster, without any emotion. Emotion colors what we see and creates a binding force that ties us to the monster. Pain creates trauma; trauma is one of the strongest emotional bonds. It is necessary to tear the wound back open and stop pretending that we don't really care about things that matter a lot.

This leaves us vulnerable; vulnerable to the same pain, the same wrong ideas and yes, vulnerable to receiving the best that we can believe in. It is this that makes it worth the effort of tearing it open and re-examining without emotion what really happened. When we can do this, we can believe in ourselves and the best that life can provide for us, leaving the monster powerless. Like a shape-shifter it fades back into the molehill it always was, just a bump in the road. This is all that is necessary to be free to receive the best we can believe in.

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How Do We Know If We Can Trust Someone?

Many of us trust too easily only to discover that we were betrayed. Others of us don't trust at all. Trusting too quickly, or not trusting at all, usually says more about us than about the other person. Trust is not something that we want to automatically do when we meet someone. We also don't want to automatically mistrust someone either. Some of us experience an involuntary response to trust, or not to trust, and neither one of these extremes serve us well.

Trust is something that takes time. It's a process.

Trust is a process

When I say, trust is a process, it means that it takes time to get to know someone. If we enter a relationship at a slow and steady pace, we will discover more about who the other person's true self. We can then determine whether they can be trusted with our feelings, and our shared personal information, because our trust is the greatest gift we can give someone.

Finding the Balance

Some of us were betrayed early in life, and we don't trust easily because of that. Others so desperately want to be in a relationship, or a friendship, that we rush to trust someone to make that happen. We don't give ourselves the opportunity, and time, to get to know that person to determine if they are trustworthy, or not.

In adulthood, often not being able to trust a friend, or a potential romantic partner, may be because we have been betrayed in our childhood, adolescence, or at some time as an adult. The person desiring our trust may very well be trustworthy, however we may not be able to recognize this due to our history.

Our Past Relationships Reflected in The Present

One of the first big tasks of our lives is establishing trust versus mistrust. As a child, we develop a sense that our needs will be met, versus a sense that they won't. Our view of the world is often determined by how secure we feel that we can rely on others for our expectations to be met. If we have had good, consistent relationships in the past, we may assume as much from our current and future relationships, and trust too easily based upon this experience.

If our parents, or our experiences in past relationships, were inconsistent in meeting our needs, we may fear current and future relationships will respond the same way. We make ourselves vulnerable when we trust. Withholding our trust may be used as self-preservation to protect us from being hurt again. How can I trust myself from past mistakes?

It's Not You, It's Me

Sometimes it is challenging to differentiate to determine if we are not feeling trustworthy of someone else. Is it about them? Or is it about our own history? So many times, I have heard during psychotherapy sessions that, "My friend is talking about other people and I'm uncomfortable. I don't know if I ought to trust them or not."

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Get Self Confidence in 5 Steps

It is important to be confident. Being confident, means to be secure in who you are and being certain in the decisions you make. Being confident in your abilities means that you are positive about yourself and it is this self confidence that make other people have trust on you. More sure you are about your skills, will make other people have more confidence on you. Self confidence goes a long way. From seeing everything in positive light, self confidence helps in career as well as life opportunities.

Every person is not born with the skill of self confidence but it is ability that can be groomed with a little dedication. Here are 5 pointers for boosting your confidence in yourself:

Concentrate on Positivity

Revaluate your life and take a break from the people who take you and your self confidence to a low. Try focusing on the solutions rather than the problems. Even if there is nothing going right, keep in mind that one day it will. Stay positive and concentrate on the silver lining in the dark clouds. It's your life and to enjoy it you have to stay positive and let go of negativity and negative people around you. Remember that after every rainy day, sun comes out.

Change in Body Language

It is said that people takes more cues from non-verbal language that is body language rather than verbal language. It is very necessary to have a good and agreeable body posture that shows your confidence. The straightforward task of pulling shoulders back provides a sense of confidence to you and lets other person see that you have confidence in your own abilities. Smiling and maintaining eye contact makes the other person comfortable around you.

Never Accept Failure

Don't accept failure and never give up. The act of accepting the failure shows that you can be easily defeated by your defeats and have no confidence in yourself. Follow the old saying of "Try and Try again and Never Quit". More you get challenged by a particular problem work hard and make sure that you try and complete the task. If you are continuously knocking yourself down with your negative thoughts, you are becoming what you are sermonizing within your head. Next time you think negatively, substitute it straight away for a positive assertion.

Always Be Prepared

Whether you go out for a job interview or you are working on a new project, learn to be always prepared. Discover everything, there is to know about your line of work, work, projects and more. Whatever maybe on your "to conquer" list, it is important that you always be prepared for all the setbacks and triumphs. If you are geared up, and have the skill to back it up, your self confidence will rise.

Create Accomplishment List

Life is full of trials and there are times when it's hard to keep our self confidence up. In those times, sit down and make a list of all the points in your life that you are thankful for and list of all the things you are proud of accomplishing. Once your lists are complete, keep them by your desk and always be reminded of what a marvelous life you have and what an incredible person you really are.

With these five steps, you can boost your self confidence and turn a new page of your life. Remember have trust in your abilities and your self confidence will show.

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3 Reasons to Carve Out Time Each Day for Yourself and Increase Your Productivity

"I have no time to myself" this is a common refrain by everyone.

Now ask yourself this question, whose fault is it?

First, you have to accept that personal time is a necessity, not a luxury or you will never leave yourself any. This is a growing problem that will even affect your productivity and your health. Let me explain.

One of the most effective ways to manage this is to actually make an appointment with yourself. Block time on your calendar for taking yourself out to lunch, a 30-minute soaking bath, an hour at the library, or at your favorite coffee café. Then treat this like any other high priority appointment and keep it with a vengeance and determination. This is for your mental, emotional and physical wellbeing.

Schedule other appointments like this one through out the month, do not a standard Saturday afternoon one hour once a week slot, this routine will become too common place and will disregard the importance of it. You must think of this as a priority and something to look forward to and plan.

We all need some kind of break each day, to getaway from work, chores, and people, even family. Use your great brain and calmly think of creative ways to make time for you. Perhaps at first your family will need a bit of explaining to understand that you are doing something for them as well as for you and you are not selfish. While you are explaining you are also defusing any guilt that might surface, nurturers are notorious for self-imposed guilt.

Depriving yourself of "me time" will only leave your feeling ornery, resentful and stressed out.

Your stressful emotions will spill over onto your family, friends and other relationships. They will feel that something is wrong and they will absorb your stress.

Knowing that your emotions influence others, you have choices to make. You can be grouchy, resentful, negative, stressed and difficult to be around or you can be pleasant, loving caring calm, happy and a productive fostering healthy relationships.

Besides, how else can we properly evaluate what we are doing, see the big picture, and appreciate those we love, unless we stand back from them once in awhile.

This standing back allows you to put your daily life in to perceptive and you gain patience and calmness. Once you have your daily agenda controlled, you can start on the weekly strategies. This will be an ongoing process but a happier, healthier life is worth it.

Take your allotted number of time outs, this time out ideas are a natural way of managing your stress and becoming comfortable with nurturing you. 

Nurturing the nurturer is a major method in naturally managing your stress.

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Do You Sabotage Your Own Efforts?

I'm sure that many of us have experienced a point in our lives where we've became aware of the need to start making some positive changes. We may feel ready to commit to formal New Year's Resolutions or simply say 'today's the time to focus on spring cleaning our habits, friends, relationships and ultimately our lives'.

Yet how often do those goals and important objectives quickly become sabotaged and hi-hacked? We may not fully appreciate why it's happening but unconscious resistance can interfere with our desire to break out of old habits and behaviour patterns.

It can be interesting to look at those occasions:

- Many of us will be able to recall a time when we were determined to address our eating or drinking habits and make healthier choices. Before too long we were making excuses to regularly visit the supermarket to buy one or two items that we suddenly needed urgently, had unexpectedly run out of or had accidentally forgotten.

These are great examples of how we sabotage our efforts by convincing ourselves that we're 'just' popping to the shops to buy those urgent supplies, the bread or milk. We tell ourselves that we'll only be a few minutes, insist that we'll limit ourselves to those specific aisles, but then find ourselves wandering along the other lanes 'just in case' we see something else we need. Often the temptation can become so strong that we end up buying chocolates, a bottle of wine or something that we really shouldn't. Deep down though we knew we'd succumb!

- Or it may be that we choose to implement a fitness regime with a friend or colleague who we unconsciously suspect is not fully committed. There may be a part of us that acknowledges we need to go regularly to the gym, run a marathon or commit to a health objective but in reality we're less than enthusiastic. Choosing to workout with someone who is less motivated than ourselves can bring a much easier going, less tenacious approach. Then if the plan fails after a week or so we can blame someone else, excuse ourselves far more easily, shrug our shoulders and feel vindicated.

- What about if a relationship's floundering? Maybe there's an estrangement which could go either way and we feel quite stressed and want to ensure that our position is fully understood. We know that texting, when we need to communicate information, is an efficient, concise, documented way of communicating, but struggle to hold ourselves back from being more hands on and pushing for a more interactive involvement. The problem is that entails talking to the other person.

We may tell ourselves that we hate texting; it's far quicker and more efficient to phone with our message. But if we're at a sensitive stage in the relationship we may know deep down that we're putting ourselves in a vulnerable place when we contact them via the phone. Typically we know that we'll end up asking questions, explaining ourselves in painstaking detail or going through the arguments and grievances yet again.

It can be more sensible to limit ourselves through the use of text. It's important to hold onto the knowledge that it's in our best interests to resist the temptation to phone and avoid inflaming the situation even further.

In any of these instances, be aware of what the underlying sub-text is if you frequently find yourself missing out on completing your objectives, especially ones that you feel would significantly benefit your life. And accept that it may be beneficial to enlist help if you find this repeating pattern too difficult to break on your own. Learn to pay attention to what happens when you become distracted and veer off course. Listen to what your thought patterns and feelings are saying. Intercept them and deal with the information.

It may be that you're not really committed to losing weight, getting fit or letting go of the relationship just yet. Discover where you're at; only then can you ascertain what would motivate and work for you. That way you're less likely to sabotage your efforts and goals.

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The Five Ingredients of Happiness

I've been reading The power of Self Discipline by Brian Tracy over the last few weeks, and I just had to share a small extract from the book, as It helped me so much.

The five ingredients of happiness.

A short fall in any of these areas can cause stress, unhappiness and a feeling of being our of control.

1. Health & Energy - The most important element of a good life.

2. Happy Relationships - 85% of your happiness will come from your relationships with other people

3. Meaningful work - to be truly happy you must be truly engaged with life. You must be doing things that keep you active & give you a sense of fulfilment. If you are making a living you must be doing work that you enjoy, do well and for which you are well paid. People are only truly happy when they feel like they are making a contribution of some kind, that they are putting in more than they are taking out. You need to feel that what you do really makes a difference to the lives & work of other people.

4. Financial independence - some of the greatest fears we experience are those of loss, failure and poverty. We fear being destitute without funds and dependant on others.. One of your chief responsibilities to yourself is to work towards financial independence and financial freedom throughout your life.

5. Self- actualisation -This is the feeling that you are becoming everything that you are capable of becoming. This occurs when you feel you are realising more and more of your true potential.

Abraham Maslow is best known for his hierarchy of needs. He determined that people have both deficiency needs & being needs. People strive either to compensate for their deficiencies or to realise their potential.

He concluded that you only begin to evolve & develop to the highest levels possible for you when deficiency needs are first satisfied.

Deficiency needs:
* Safety & survival - food, water, accommodation, clothing
* Security - Financial , emotional and physical
* Belonging - Social situations with others , home and work.

Being Needs:
* Self esteem/ego - feel & like yourself determines your happiness more than any other factor. This comes from being liked, accepted, doing a good job and moving towards your goals.

Exercise

1 Identify the areas of your life in which you feel the happiest and the most in control - How can you expand on them?

2 Identify the area of your life that you feel controlled by other people or factors - what can you do to resolve these situations?

3 Intentify those areas in your life where there's a gap between your current level of accomplishment & what you would really like to achieve - What can you do to bridge these gaps?

4 Identify the most pressing needs that you have today that are not begin fulfilled - How can you begin to satisfy this deficiency need.

5. Identify those activities that give you the greatest feeling of personal happiness - what can you do to increase these moments of happiness?

6 Identify those areas in life that you are the most discontented - which steps could you take immediately that would resolve those feelings of discontent.

7. Define happiness for yourself what does it mean? What would have to happen for your to feel truly happy? what can you do immediately to help create this situation?

I hope it helped you as much as it helped me. I now have a completely new set of action points which Ill be sharing over the coming weeks.


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Overcome Worry And Be Less Anxious

Everyone worries. But at times our lives bog down with too much worry, which impacts appetite, lifestyle, relationships, sleep, and job performance.

Worry really offers little benefit to life, so if we look at causes and prescriptions for worry our it becomes manageable.

People often worry because they enjoy it. They have a need to live with daily drama. Constant worry meters out doses of drama on an "as needed basis" and this seems normal. By dramatically acting out life issues big or small, these people stay on center stage with sympathy as their needed applause.

Uncertainty is another catalyst. The uncertainty of jobs, bills, debts, children, life changes, etc punches our worry button. People often don't react well to changes brought on by normal life uncertainties.

But, change is a partner in life and may allow good to things happen. Take note, Charles Darwin's research indicated that it's not the strongest nor most intelligent that survive, but those who are most responsive to change.

Lack of knowledge or skills creates anxiety. Being in a position where we feel "in over our heads" is worrisome. Being out of the comfort zone is tough for everyone. But, the fact is you either climb your own way up to speed in knowledge and skills, or you change your surroundings.

Another contributor to worry is the lack of control. We all need some control. Even a toddler does things to exert control in an adult's life.

We really may have more control than we realize and just don't recognize it. But, there will always be things beyond our control and we must learn to function as things are.

Our upbringing and past life experiences will also foster anxiety. Parents have been known to create worry filled homes with an odd child called anxiety. Research indicates that we're molded by our social environments and tend to mimic them.

Worry may come from past trauma or negative experiences. Accidents, illness, or personal witness to bad events causes anxiety. These may be justifiable causes but stick with us just the same.

Even with so many prompts for worry, it's not as difficult to curb as you might think. But, you need the desire to change your life, and you do need to work at it.

Turning to ideas for managing worry, Winston Churchill reflecting back on his own troubles found that many never really happened. Shakespeare gives another clue when he wrote, "to thine own self, be true".

Honest self-reflection is a good step toward managing anxiety and counseling opens a door to personal discovery. The more clarity we gain the more quickly we move toward positive ground.

We have natural tendencies toward vagueness and generalization. Along with counseling, sharing with a trusted family member or close friend, or even a personal worry diary can help clarify issues.

Guarding against falling into the "what if trap" is a necessary for worry management. Conjuring "what if" scenarios is of little value since most of the plots we create rarely happen. So instead of imagining things that may never happen, eliminate the "what if's".

Find ways to embrace the uncertainty of life. At times, life is a great venture. At times, it requires problem-solving. At times, it totally stumps us. But, each moment in life inevitably happens with little predictability. Worry doesn't change this.

Start an exercise program. Walk, bike, swim, jog, stretch, etc. Exercise goes a long way toward eliminating stress and anxiety. A moderate daily routine of exercise will boost your mental health.

Finally, worry does little good, fixes nothing, and causes anxiety. Self-understanding is central to living a worry free life. So, embrace life, be honest with yourself and worry less.

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7 Techniques for Dealing With Stress That People Often Ignore

Ever struggled in dealing with stress?

Being successful and constantly improving yourself while striving to be the best is hard work and very often it comes with a fair bit of stress.

While having a constant state of urgency and alertness might be quite beneficial while perusing your ambitious goals, it can really wear you down unless you combat the effects of stress on your body.

7 Techniques for Dealing With Stress

It’s really important that you take care of both your body and mind and not allow the strain of working hard to chip away at your health.

These are 7 techniques for anyone dealing with stress:

1. Stop Doing Things You Hate

This may seem obvious; but jobs are the biggest cause of stress for people.

Is this because they’re tough and pressuring?

Maybe, somewhat. However, the big difference linking jobs to stress, is that the people who regularly get stressed out by their career don’t really enjoy their job.

You can quote me on that.

The logical first step to dealing with stress, and completely ridding yourself from it, is to look at the source. What’s giving you all your stress? Is it a side effect from an activity you love? Or is it coming from your boring career choices?


2. Exercise In-between Work

We all know that exercise is important, and yes, some people do still neglect it.

Although, have you ever tried exercising in-between workloads? Say, in your lunch hour?

If you’re self-employed, it’s probably a lot easier for you to exercise during the day. If you’re employed working 9-5, then maybe you could squeeze a quick workout during your lunch hour.

The idea behind this is that you’re resetting yourself for the afternoon ahead, and not allowing any stress to build up. Give it a try, and see how different it is to simply exercising before or after work instead.


3. Meditating on Your Thoughts

One of the keys to staying healthy, especially when you are under a lot of stress, is keeping your mind healthy. One of the most beneficial practices to help maintain mental health, stability and happiness is meditation.

Despite the fact that some goal-oriented people might not have a positive outlook on it, meditation can be extremely beneficial and can reduce the effects of stress on your mind and body to a great extent.

Clearing your mind with it on regular basis helps people become calmer, more relaxed and less prone to stress.


4. Switching Up Your Pattern

Gary Vaynerchuk says that switching up the regular pattern is often the way to break out of plateaus; in business and in life. Plateaus often cause stress, because you start to get fed up of flat-lining, and not making any progress.

Switch up your pattern. Do something different. Go somewhere new. Introduce a new feature into your business. Change your fitness routine. It could be anything.

As long as it breaks your normal pattern of living.


5. Take Care of Your Stomach

While constant high stress levels affect our whole body quite adversely, there are some organs that suffer more than others. One of the first body parts that might start suffering when we are under a lot of stress is our stomach.

When we are under a lot of pressure or when we are in an unpleasant situation, our body’s natural reaction for some reason is to start contracting our stomach into a ball.

This makes it especially vulnerable so people with a lot of ambition that are working hard towards their goals in today’s busy and tiring world, should take special care of their stomachs.

Many herbs and plants can have a soothing and stimulating effect on our stomachs and one of the most effective ways to take advantage of this is through essential oils.

The best place to look for suitable ones to help battle the effects of stress on your stomach is essential oil for vomiting or for an upset stomach.

There are multiple essential oils you could use like lemon, lavender or peppermint and there are a number of different blends you can prepare.


6. Get Both A High Quantity & Quality of Sleep

While striving for maximum productivity, many of us push ourselves too hard and forget about the importance of sleep.

Our body needs to get a constant amount of sleep and if we don’t get the sufficient amount on regular basis, your health, productivity and creativity will quickly start deteriorating.

Sleep is a natural mechanism that allows our body to restore its energy reserves and is also a natural way for us to deal with stress. When you don’t get enough sleep, stress starts to accumulate and maintain a healthy mind and body quickly starts to become increasingly difficult.

But if we get enough sleep every night, our tolerance for stress becomes much higher and our alertness during the day manages to remain heightened. In other words, you will be able to achieve more if you don’t skimp on the sleep.

7. Take A Natural Stress Supplement

On top of everything else, multi-vitamins and various natural ingredients can make a huge difference to your overall health and well-being. In fact, it’s surprising just how much difference taking a supplement can make to the way you feel.

If you’d like to add a stress/health supplement to your arsenal, and I highly recommend you do, then check out some of these awesome supplements:

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Why Small Wins Create Huge Success

If you are the kind of ambitious, bold-thinking, courageous high level achiever, you probably are a serious action taker who understands the essence and importance of daily personal growth and development.

A daily habit of self-improvement is one of the golden keys to consistent success. This kind of self-investment will lead you to become more successful, attractive, productive, courageous, happier, healthier and more fulfilling life.

As Jim Rohn taught me, if you want to have more, you have to become more. For things to change, you have to change. For things to improve, you have to improve.

The level of success we experience in our outer world is simply the mirror reflection of our self-identity and personal development of our inner world.

So when you raise your personal development set points (self-identity, mindsets, attitudes, philosophy, skills and abilities), everything in your life will be raised automatically.

However, some people approach this self-improvement process in a wrong way, which sabotaged their time, energy and efforts to succeed.

For instance, many of us are under the assumption that the best types of changes we can make are those 'big steps'.

You probably have heard about terms like 'turn over a new leaf' and 'start afresh' as if we could just hit a 'reset' button like a computer and everything will become clean and perfect right away.

In reality, the most effective, long-term, sustainable kind of self-improvement always involves taking small, tiny, seemingly insignificant steps day in and day out.

Breaking out of old destructive habits and introducing new habits into our routine are very difficult and the whole process requires a lot of effort.

Habits are formed when certain actions get repeated over time, and those neural connections in our brain will be strengthened every time they are instructed to fire the signal.

It's like creating a deep groove and then running water along the surface - it gravitates to the groove.

When you're trying to change a habit, you're exerting a lot of energy to go against this natural inclination of existing neural pathways whenever you perform the new action. Thus, you need a lot of focus, dedication and willpower if you truly want to change.

So if you're trying to change 27 things at once, or if you're going from no exercise to exercising 2 hours every day for 6 times a week, you're setting yourself up for failure.

Additionally, when you are overloaded with excessive information, your brain won't be able to process them and you will be shut down to take any kinds of action at all. So you remain as the same old self!

So the best way of creating lasting changing is almost always changing just 1 tiny thing at a time - be it getting rid of certain behaviors or adding a new empowering success habit.

This will make your entire body mechanism much easier to handle the transition when you shift from failure to success over time.

With enough consistency, persistence and patience, you will build up great positive success habits over time and you'll start to experience massive success you've always desired.

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12 Tips For Conquering Anxiety

Anxiety is part of the human condition. Search for somebody that never ever feels anxiety. Some individuals are more resistant to stress and anxiety than others, but everyone can reinforce their capability to manage anxious sensations. Establishing a high level of anxiety is a learned ability. Reducing stress and anxiety is an ability, too.

The crucial factor to managing anxiety is to begin reducing it as soon as possible after it hits you. The more it develops, the more challenging it is to manage.

Deal with anxiety rapidly and easily:

1. Break your day into small pieces. Just worry about the percentage of time in front of you. If you're sitting in a conference at 9:00 AM, there's no need to fret about how you're going to pay the electric bill or exactly what you're going to have for dinner. Take the day a minute at time and keep your interest on that minute.

2. Create a mantra and utilize it. Have a positive and uplifting phrase you repeat to yourself. You'll eventually begin to think it and you'll obstruct any negative self-talk.

" I'm happy with the ability to manage any circumstance."

" My life is filled with joy and positive energy."

3. Workout. The quickest way to relieve anxiety is to work out enough to sweat. A casual walk is better than nothing, but to get the greatest benefit, it's necessary to get your heart beating hard.

4. Utilize distractions. Distractions never ever fix the underlying problem, but can supply relief. See a movie, play cards, or do a crossword. Hang out with a friend. Give yourself a break and put your focus in other places.

5. Keep going. Anxiety occurs since some part of your brain is attempting to stop you from doing something about it. It has learned that it can control you by making you feel miserable. You can reduce the anxiety you feel by plowing ahead. Your brain will learn that making you feel anxious does not work.

6. Give yourself 20 minutes to fret and worry each day. Schedule your worry time. You'll find yourself less inclined to fret throughout the other 23-plus hours of the day.

7. Change your environment. Leave your existing environment and provide yourself a change of scenery. Go to the park or invest some time at the coffee shop. Spend an hour window shopping. Shake things up a bit.

8. Hang out with your pet. If you have a pet, you know how reassuring they can be. Rest on the floor and have a heart-to-heart with your pet. How could you not feel better?

9. Write in a journal. Get your anxiety out of your head and down on paper. There's something cathartic about writing when you're stressed out. Make a habit of writing about your life each day.

10. Discover the best aroma. The right scent can be relaxing. Travel to the candle store and find something that makes you feel excellent when you smell it. Or check out some of the aromatherapy oils at your local health store.

11. Find a hobby that requires concentration. It could be chess, playing the piano, or knitting. It doesn't matter what the pastime is as long as you enjoy it and it requires your complete attention. It can be a fantastic way to invest your down time.

12. Envision. Envision something positive. Fantasize about Maui or keep in mind a favorable experience from the past. Imagine your perfect day.

Dealing with stress and anxiety is necessary. Effective individuals are successful due to their ability to handle stress and anxiety effectively. When you feel fear begin to build, deal with it instantly. A high level of anxiety is very difficult to manage. 

Develop a list of methods that can be carried out rapidly when stress and anxiety first appear.

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