Hello,
and thank you for dropping by today! We hope
that your day has
been a very special one so far and that you're able
to make it one of your
best days ever. Make it a great one--it is up
to you!
All
truly wise thoughts have been
thought already thousands of
times;
but to make them truly ours, we must
think them over
again honestly,
till they take root in our
personal
experience. -Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe
Resolve
to be tender with the young, compassionate with the aged,
sympathetic with the striving, and tolerant with the weak and
the wrong. Sometime in life you will have been all of
these. -
Lloyd Shearer
Good
people are good because they've come to wisdom through
failure. We get very little wisdom from success, you
know. -
William
Saroyan
Many
persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true
happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification
but through fidelity to a worthy purpose. -Helen
Keller
I've
never had someone come up to me and say, "I'm always
negative and it's working out great for me. I can't wait to
get up in the morning!" And yet, positive thinking
still has its skeptics.
Some people tell me that positive thinking doesn't work or
that it's "unrealistic," especially in today's
turbulent world.
"Look around you," they say. "How can you be
so positive?" Well, let me ask you this:
can the world be lifted out of negativity by adding MORE
negativity?
The truth is, there are certain things that negative
thinking will do for you. It will make you sick.
It will make you very unpleasant to be around. And, it
will significantly limit what you can achieve.
Let's take a closer look at why negative thinking doesn't
serve us. For starters, we all operate under the Law
of Dominant Thought. Simply stated, we're always
moving in the direction of our dominant thoughts.
Most of us have heard about the "self-fulfilling
prophecy"--that we get what we expect in life.
Expect negative results and, sure enough, you'll produce
negative results.
As I'm sure you've found, negative thinking also causes you
to feel more stress and to have less energy.
Scientific studies have demonstrated that negativity weakens
your immune system. How many times have you gotten
sick during a stressful period in your life?
If you're still not convinced about the effects of being
negative, take out a sheet of paper and write down your list
of all the benefits you're getting from negative
thinking. I think your list is going to be very short,
if you come up with anything at all.
Let me make an important distinction here. It's quite
natural for a person to feel sad in response to a tragedy or
the death of a loved one. There's a period of loss and
grieving that differs for each individual, and we don't
expect a grief stricken person to be positive in the short
run.
However, even a person in that situation will not be served
by holding onto their negative thoughts indefinitely.
(By the way, if you've suffered some trauma or have had a
difficult time releasing negative thinking, by all means get
counseling. That's not a sign of weakness. It's
a
constructive step to help you move forward in your life.)
Doing
What Comes Naturally
From everything I've observed, babies are naturally
positive. They're usually smiling and seem to be
enjoying life. I haven't met any negative, frowning
babies. That's why I don't buy the argument that
negative thinking is just natural.
Those who think negatively do so out of habit. They
have conditioned themselves to think that way. In Western
societies in particular, we've developed the tendency to
focus on minor irritations, even though these annoyances are
only a tiny part of our overall lives. We tend to
focus on the 5% of our lives that are going
"wrong" instead of the 95% going well.
We'll sigh and tell everyone about the traffic jam or flat
tire on the way to work. Yet, we'll never comment
about the miracle of our existence--the billions of cells in
our body that somehow allow our brain to function, our heart
to pump blood or our eyes to see.
We don't appreciate that we have enough food to eat or that
we have a roof over our heads, while there are millions of
people who don't have these gifts. It's no wonder that
so many people think negatively.
The newspaper is filled with negative news. Television
and radio reports dwell on tragedies and crimes. How
often do you read or hear about people helping each other or
doing something positive? Hardly ever. If you do
nothing to counteract this bombardment of negativity, you're
going to think negatively.
At any time, however, you could take control of this
situation. You could stop watching and listening to
all of the negative news and read something positive
instead. You could limit your contact with
"toxic" people and make sure your life is filled
with positive inputs.
If you did that, your "natural" inclination would
switch and you'd begin to think positively.
Quick
Mental Exercises
I'll show you that you have much more control over your
thinking than you might believe. Try this
experiment. Right now, think about your favorite
movie. You might even get a picture in your mind of
your favorite scene in that movie.
Now, let's think about your favorite meal. What is
it? A fresh salad. . . a juicy steak. . . grilled
salmon? Whatever it is, just think about it. Now
that your mouth is watering, let's move on. Think
about being out in a snowstorm, with two feet of snow on the
ground. Can you see the snow and feel the cold on your
toes?
In each case, you were able to control what you thought
about. You could shift your thinking in an
instant. It has been said that positive thinking is
harmful because optimistic people ignore things that can go
wrong or are easily duped and taken advantage of.
In other words, if you expect the sun to be shining all the
time, you're just naive and are sure to be
disappointed. But positive thinking doesn't mean that
you ignore reality or refuse to consider the obstacles that
might arise. On the contrary, the positive person
expects a positive outcome but
prepares for overcoming obstacles.
For example, if a positive person is planning an outdoor
wedding, he or she won't use the power of positive thinking
to make sure it doesn't rain on the big day. Rather, a
positive person is prepared with contingency plans, focusing
on things that she can directly control, such as having a
tent available in case it does rain.
By this point, I hope that you're receptive to the idea that
negative thinking won't help us. So, the question is:
how can we change our thinking to become more
positive? The answer, simply stated, is that you must
change what goes into your mind every day.
Start by eliminating as many of the negative inputs as
possible. While you can listen to the news for a few minutes
to catch the important headlines, there is no need to hear
reports of the same murders and bombings over and over each
day. At the same time, replace the negative inputs with
positive stimuli.
Read positive materials on a daily basis. Listen to positive
audio tapes or CDs, or to music that inspires or relaxes
you.
Here's another technique: monitor your everyday
language. When you find yourself beginning to complain
or talk negatively, switch immediately to something
positive. Say something like, "I really have so much to
be grateful for" and start listing some of those
things.
Condition yourself to focus on constructive solutions to
challenges, rather than harping on problems or fretting
about things outside of your control. Make a commitment for
the next 30 days. Think about what you want instead of what
you don't want.
Think about what you're grateful for rather than what you
believe is missing in your life. Saturate your mind with the
positive. After 30 days, you can then decide whether to keep
focusing on the positive or to revert to your negative
thinking pattern. I think I know which one you'll choose!
Jeff
Keller is the President of Attitude is Everything, Inc. For
more than 15 years, Jeff has delivered presentations on
attitude and motivation to businesses, groups and trade
associations throughout the United States and abroad. Jeff
is also the author of the highly acclaimed book, Attitude is
Everything.
A
nice song for this week (I might have done this one fairly
recently, but I can't remember. It's worth seeing
twice, in any case!):
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Being Together
How to Live in Harmony with Everything
Joan Duncan Oliver
Science and spirit agree: we exist in a web of
interrelationship. Humanity is but one strand in the
vast network of animals, plants, mountains, oceans, and
air comprising our earthly home. Our well-being
depends on courtesy to one another, our survival on global
care. Karma turns on respect.
Common courtesy seems to have vanished. Take
cellphones--nobody can talk on them without disturbing
everyone around them. Surely this lack of
consideration is bad karma.
It's hard to put a karmic price on technology, but if
we could, cellphone use would run high. Bad phone
manners aren't a crime, but they brutalize quality of
life. What to do about that is another matter.
We don't seem to realize how far our voices carry or how
oblivious we are when we take calls while driving or
walking down the street. One thing you can do is be
mindful of your own cellphone use. If we were all as
careful as we'd like others to be, a more responsive ethic
would emerge. In the meantime, use any creative
means you can think of to bring cellphone users to their
senses--humor, surprise. And don't underestimate the
power of group pressure. On a bus recently a phone
user was being so obtrusive that another passenger finally
yelled at him to pipe down. The entire bus broke out
in applause, and the man slunk off at the next stop.
We also need to lobby for more cellphone-free areas and
promote those that already exist, such as airplanes and
"quiet cars" on trains. As Christine Rosen
of the Ethics and Public Policy Center has suggested,
"We need to approach our personal technologies with a
greater awareness of how the pursuit of personal
convenience can contribute to collective ills."
Cellphone misuse is only one example of what seems to
be a widespread lack of awareness. In the city where
I live, parents use baby strollers like battering rams to
shove their way through crowds. And their
kids? They run amok in stores, in restaurants, on
public transportation. But if you say anything to
the parents, they accuse you of being anti-child.
Counterattack is a common ploy we all use to divert
attention from our own behavior. But before you take
parents to task, remember that most of them regard any
criticism of their children's behavior as a personal
insult, as well as an assault on them and their parenting
skills. Use diplomacy in such situations.
Children are easily distracted, so sometimes all it takes
to quiet them is to redirect their attention.
Parents are less likely to take offense if your
intervention is matter-of-fact and non-judgmental.
Easier said than done. Manners are a lost art
nowadays. Sometimes it's hard to have a civil
exchange. We demand respect from one another and get
mad if we don't get it. What's the answer?
Put simply, we have to realize that, friend or enemy,
we're all connected and that civility is our only shot at
not destroying one another. The upside to the
current manners crisis is that a new field is
emerging--etiquette counseling--and etiquette courses are
even cropping up in colleges. Clients for this new
brand of coaching include everyone from upwardly mobile
executives to children whose parents lack the patience--or
know-how--to pass along basic social skills.
Every culture has rules for proper behavior. What's
de rigueur might vary from one place to another, but
prominent on every list is courtesy. Mystic and
author Andrew Harvey notes that the Sufi code of conduct, adab,
rests on what one scholar described as a "profound
courtesy of the heart that arises from a deep relationship
with the divine and expresses itself in refined behavior
of all kinds with other beings." A person with adab
shows "tenderness toward all creation," Harvey
adds.
That sounds like a recipe for good karma. But
doesn't "tenderness for all creation" have a
limit? Would it mean, for instance, that I couldn't
bring sand home from the beach for my son's aquarium
because doing so would diminish the environment?
If everyone who went to the beach brought home a
bucket of sand, the beaches of the world might indeed be
diminished. But the oceans are continually grinding
up shells and stones to create new sand. Earth
replenished herself as long as we don't interfere too
much. The problem, of course, is that we've already
interfered way too much, defiling the natural world and
exhausting its resources, collectively accumulating very
bad karma as a result.
What's the solution? We can't stop consuming
altogether.
It comes back to respect, to a basic regard for one
another and for everything--animal, vegetable, and
mineral--on the planet. When we truly grasp our
interdependence, we find it hard to ignore the fate of a
seagull or a stone or a Dinka tribesman.
Living
Life Fully, the e-zine
exists to try to provide for visitors of the world wide web a
place
of growth, peace, inspiration, and encouragement. Our
articles
are presented as thoughts of the authors--by no means do
we
mean to present them as ways that anyone has to live
life. Take
from them what you will, and disagree with
whatever you disagree
with--just know that they'll be here for you
each week.
Our
minds can shape the
way a thing will be
because we act according
to our expectations.
Federico
Fellini
At
Your Own Pace
I recently took a fairly long trip in a rented truck, one
that was full of our furniture. Because it was so
full, it was pretty obvious that its gas mileage was going
to be even worse than it would be for such a truck. In
order to save on gas, my wife and I decided that we wouldn't
go any fast than 55 miles per hours in the truck, even when
the speed limit was 75. Don't worry--we pulled over
often to let people pass us when there was only one lane.
But there was something quite nice about going our own pace,
even when the people around us were going much faster.
We knew why we were going the speed we were, and we knew
that it would serve no real purpose to go faster--it would
only cost us more money without accomplishing anything that
we needed.
Going at our own pace isn't something that's valued much in
today's culture--everything and everyone seem to be geared
for speed, going faster and faster, while supposedly
accomplishing more and more. I suspect, though, that
of the truly fulfilling tasks that we could be taking on
each day, most of us are addressing very few of them with
this speed that we're allowing to take over our lives.
We go faster only because we think that others expect it of
us, and we're getting stressed and worn out accomplishing
things that don't have much lasting intrinsic value at all.
Going at our own pace allows us to do many things
well. First of all, if we take on a project at a pace
that's comfortable to us, we're going to do a much better
job on it. I've hurried through jobs before and ended
up having to go back and re-do much of them because I've
missed a step or did something poorly that made later steps
impossible. Time saved? None--in fact, I often
found that hurrying through a task made me end up taking
longer at it, and not even doing as good of a job.
Going at our own pace allows us to enjoy the journey.
If it's a trip, we get to see the views and really soak them
in, rather than flying by them and getting a quick glance at
them. If it's a task, we get to experience each step
fully for exactly what it is--a step in a process--and that
allows us to learn more about the processes involved in
life. Many people, especially those who study
meditation, have found that taking our time with individual
steps is a form of meditation that allows us to truly
experience the moment, whatever we may be doing.
If I'm cooking a stew, for example, I really enjoy cutting
up the vegetables, even though there's a part of me that
doesn't want to take the time necessary for the task.
I find that once I start cutting up the potatoes and celery
and onions, it's very relaxing to do so, especially when I
focus fully on the task and empty my mind of other things
going on in my life. I may want to get them done in a
hurry, but it's better for me to take my time. It's
better for the finished product, too, for the vegetables
cook more uniformly if they're cut to similar sizes.
When I'm running, I witness more than ever just how
important it is for us to go at our own pace. If I
enter a 5k fun run and I try to go out with the leader at
his or her pace, then there's a good chance that I'm not
going to be able to finish the run at all. If I go too
fast, I'll burn myself out and lose my ability to
continue. If I go at a pace that works for me, though,
I'm going to finish the race in good shape, not too depleted
but not at all fresh. If I go too slowly, then the
race generally isn't much of a workout for me at all, and
since running is a form of exercise for me, going to slowly
isn't an option.
Of course, there are times when it's inappropriate to allow
your desire to go your own pace to affect others. I'm
constantly baffled by the people who travel in the left lane
of freeways even though they're driving five miles below the
posted speed limit. They belong in the right lane, but
by staying in the left lane--even when they're not passing
anyone--they're creating dangerous situations that can have
deadly results. And if you have a deadline for a
project at work, settling into a slow and comfortable pace
may make you feel better momentarily, but it could have
drastic results when you miss the deadline for that project
or presentation.
All in all, though, I find that when I find a comfortable
but challenging pace, and when I stick to that pace, I
experience a lot less stress and anxiety. Life's
simply too short to spend tons of time being stressed out,
so it's important if we're going to live our lives fully
that we make decisions that will allow us to do so, and not
decisions that will keep us enduring stress. I know
the paces that work for me because I've allowed myself to
experiment and try new paces, and I know that if more people
would explore other paces in their lives, they could find
those paces that make them more effective while going
through less stress.
The
world has a way of giving
what is demanded of it. If you are
frightened
and look for failure
and poverty, you will get them,
no matter
how hard
you
may try
to succeed. Lack of faith in
yourself, in what
life will do
for you,
cuts
you off from the
good things of the
world. Expect victory and you make victory.
In
over a dozen years as a stress consultant, one of the most
pervasive and destructive mental tendencies I've seen is
that of focusing on what we want instead of what we have.
It doesn't seem to make any difference how much we have; we
just keep expanding our list of desires, which guarantees we
will remain dissatisfied. The mind-set that says
"I'll be happy when this desire is fulfilled" is
the same mind-set that will repeat itself once that desire
is met.
A
friend of ours closed escrow on his new home on a
Sunday. The very next time we saw him he was talking
about his next house that was going to be even bigger!
He isn't alone. Most of us do the very same
thing. We want this or that. If we don't get
what we want we keep thinking about all that we don't
have--and we remain dissatisfied. If we do get what we
want, we simply re-create the same thinking in our new
circumstances. So, despite getting what we want, we
still remain unhappy. Happiness can't be found when we
are yearning for new desires.
Luckily,
there is a way to be happy. It involves changing the
emphasis of our thinking from what we want to what we
have. Rather than wishing your spouse were different,
try thinking about her wonderful qualities. Instead of
complaining about your salary, be grateful that you have a
job. Rather than wishing you were able to take a
vacation to Hawaii, think of how much fun you have had close
to home. The list of possibilities is endless!
Each
time you notice yourself falling into the "I wish life
were different" trap, back off and start over.
Take a breath and remember all that you have to be grateful
for. When you focus not on what you want, but on what
you have, you end up getting more of what you want
anyway. If you focus on the good qualities of your
spouse, she'll be more loving. If you are grateful for
your job rather than complaining about it, you'll do a
better job, be more productive, and probably end up getting
a raise anyway. If you focus on ways to enjoy yourself
around home rather than than waiting to enjoy yourself in
Hawaii, you'll end up having more fun. If you ever do
get to Hawaii, you'll be in the habit of enjoying
yourself. And, if by some chance you don't, you'll
have a great life anyway.
Make
a note to yourself to start thinking more about what you
have than what you want. If you do, your life will
start appearing much better than before. For perhaps
the first time in your life, you'll know what it means to
feel satisfied.
The happiness
of your
life depends upon the quality
of your thoughts. . .
take care that
you entertain
no notions unsuitable to virtue
and reasonable nature.
Yes, life
can be mysterious and confusing--but there's much of life that's
actually rather dependable and reliable. Some principles apply
to life in so many different contexts that they can truly be called
universal--and learning what they are and how to approach them and use
them can teach us some of the most important lessons that we've ever
learned.
My doctorate is in Teaching and Learning. I use it a lot when I
teach at school, but I also do my best to apply what I've learned to
the life I'm living, and to observe how others live their lives.
What makes them happy or unhappy, stressed or peaceful, selfish or
generous, compassionate or arrogant? In this book, I've done my
best to pass on to you what I've learned from people in my life,
writers whose works I've read, and stories that I've heard.
Perhaps these principles can be a positive part of your life, too! Universal Principles of Living Life Fully. Awareness of
these principles can explain a lot and take much of the frustration
out of the lives we lead.
Explore all of our
quotations pages--these links will take you to the first page of each
topic, and those pages will contain links to any additional pages on
the same topic (there are five pages on adversity, for example).
™
