Think & Create

By Paul Dalton

“I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.” – Jimmy Dean

When I was a kid I would imagine that I could make things happen just by thinking about them. For example, if my best friend was coming over to play I’d look out for him from my bedroom window and try to control the exact moment he would come cycling around the corner into my road (I was an odd child!). I would close my eyes, count to ten and then open them again, expecting to see him arriving right on cue. I was never very good at it though!

What interests me about that childhood memory is that it follows a very similar pattern to how many of us still operate as adults. Not that that we consciously go around believing that we are controlling the external world with our thoughts, but that we place firm expectations on how things are supposed to turn out and by when. When we are clear about what we want to have happen in the future we often rely on optimism as a way of assuring ourselves that everything will turn out just right.

I believe optimism is a vital quality to have, but there are different ways of doing it. Generally speaking there are two strategies for being optimistic, each of which leads to a very different kind of experience:

1 – HOPEFUL PREDICTIONS

This is the strategy that most people learn to adopt early on. It is partly based on the belief that Positive Thinking is the key factor that influences the outcome of a desire. It is also based on the belief that what seems reasonable to one person must also seem reasonable to another and therefore the intended result should be pretty much guaranteed. E.g. “It seems reasonable to me that I have worked in this company long enough to be included in the next round of promotions, so I don’t see that my boss will overlook me this time.”

‘Hopeful predictions’ involve us imagining desirable future scenarios and then placing our demands on how and when we expect them to manifest. This is all well and good if our predictions are based on sound probabilities, but when it is more of a finger in the air job we are often just setting ourselves up for a fall.

• I’m optimistic I’ll have been promoted within 6 months
• I’m optimistic I will win The X Factor
• The sun will come out tomorrow
• This time next year I’ll be a millionaire
• I’ll be well again by Summer

Of course, when our ‘hopeful predictions’ actually do come true (by luck or otherwise) we naturally congratulate ourselves for staying positive and not letting obstacles get in the way. However, when they don’t, we get frustrated and feel hard done by. That is why it is common to hear people say things like “I’ve tried to be optimistic, but it doesn’t work!”

The problem isn’t that Positive Thinking as a way of being optimistic isn’t effective. The problem is in thinking that the Universe should be working to our schedule! The law of cause and effect is the most reliable enabler of results, but when it comes to making optimism work for us rather than against us we must lose our obsession with timeframes!

2 – FAITH BASED OPTIMISM

Using faith as a basis for optimism is really about trusting the natural law of cause and effect. We all know that given the right conditions a flower will grow and bloom in its own good time. We don’t need to give it a deadline.

If the ‘effect’ is a beautiful flower opening up, the ’cause’ must have been someone planting a seed in fertile soil and making sure it had the right amount of sunlight and water to encourage growth. We can always be optimistic that a flower will result because it is the nature of flowers to flourish under such conditions. What we can’t always guarantee is the precise moment the petals will burst open from the bud, but that’s ok – we can be patient ;o)

This is how faith based optimism works best for us. Rather than making hopeful predictions that circumstance will just swing in our favor, we need to understand the conditions that are most likely to cause the effect we want. As we go about providing those conditions we can have genuine faith that we doing exactly what is needed for our seed to flourish. We cannot guarantee the exact moment it will bloom, but we can have faith that it will.

Faith based optimism can also mean not insisting on a specific goal having to be met, in order to free up some space and creativity to satisfy the fundamental desires that were driving that goal in the first place. For example, rather than pinning all her hopes on being promoted within 6 months, Sally may need to recognize that what is really important to her (besides money!) is simply being recognized and rewarded for adding real value to her employer by doing work that is challenging and meaningful. The key is then for her to ask “What kind of conditions do I need to create for myself in order to make that kind of outcome inevitable?” If she is then willing to drop the deadline, her optimism will continue to let them know she is following the right path.

Here is another example of how to turn a ‘hopeful prediction’ into ‘faith based optimism’:

Hopeful Prediction

“I am optimistic I’ll meet the girl / boy of my dreams and be married within 3 years. I’ll then have someone to give me the life I want.”

What is the REAL underlying importance of that?

“To have companionship with someone who compliments my personality and who is open to giving and receiving affection within a loving relationship. I am quite an adventurous person and it would be great to share my life with someone who also sees life as a bit of an adventure… oh, and kids would be nice too!!”

Conditions for Faith Based Optimism:

“I know that when I take responsibility for nurturing my own wellbeing and happiness I am naturally more attractive to others. When I am happy in myself I tend to do the things that bring fun and adventure to my life, which causes me to express authentic joy in a way that reflects who I really am. If I am expressing my true happy self whilst doing fun and adventurous things, I’m likely to meet lots of other fun and adventurous people, of which one may well turn out to be… THE ONE.”

HOMEWORK

Pick an area of your life that you would love to be genuinely optimistic about.

Rather than being specific in what exactly needs to happen and when, take a step back and investigate the deeper, more general desire that wants to be satisfied.

Ask yourself, “If the kind of result I am looking for were a seed, what conditions would I need to provide to allow it to flourish?”

Then with patience, faith and love continue to do what you know to do give that seed every chance of life.

kennethg Life

By Daphne Rose Kingma

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘press on’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.” –Wolfgang von Goethe

Persistence is the spiritual grace that allows you to continue to act with optimism even when you feel trapped in the pit of hell. It is the steadfast, continual, simple — and at times excruciatingly difficult — practice of trudging forward until the difficult present you’re scared will go on forever is replaced by a future that has a new color scheme.

Persistence isn’t fluffy or humorous (although it can benefit from frequent infusions of humor) or stupidly optimistic. Persistence is intention embodied, repeatedly, in action. It’s seeing something through, even when it seems like you’re not getting anywhere, because inside you know a solution is coming toward you that is different from the present, and that when it arrives it will hold a cornucopia of new possibilities.

Somewhere in the distance, your future is holding out its arms to meet you, ready to bring you whatever you’ve had the courage to ask for. It is already holding in trust whatever you have the courage to keep steadfastly moving toward. It wants to join hands with you to create the next chapter of your life, but it won’t — it can’t — if you stay riveted to the same spot, whining and complaining, passive, fearful, and resentful. That’s because the future always comes toward us in exactly the spirit in which we approach it — hands and heart open, or souls withered in defeat.

When you decide to persist, it’s not because you’re an idiot, not because you don’t know from the inside or from looking around just how dire your current circumstances are. It’s because in the face of perhaps thousands of reasons to be discouraged, you choose to be bold, to carry on, to keep on duking it out, no matter how grizzly, tedious, intractable, or seemingly hopeless the present situation may seem. The power of persistence is required especially when we’re dealing with intense, emotionally devastating circumstances or bunches of hugely difficult things that have stacked up all at once. When you’re facing a diagnosis of Graves’ disease, a taxi accident, and the imminent death of your sister, and your boyfriend has just moved to Japan, you will definitely need to call on persistence.

Sometimes the persistence that can transform a whole life lasts just a few minutes — as in the case of the soldier who slings his buddy’s bleeding body up over his shoulder and lugs him across the desert until he can deliver him to the medivac copter. Sometimes it is a life’s work, an Erin Brockovich-like crusade of endlessly knocking on doors, talking to strangers, gathering evidence, and poring through mountains of papers until, finally, you uncover the facts that can change everything.

Persistence is guts. Stick-to-itiveness. Determination. The willingness to repeat and repeat and repeat until you’ve achieved the desired effect. Persistence says: Don’t give up!
In this sense, persistence is visionary. Expectant. A sacred journey resplendent with hope. When you persist you know, on a visceral level, that you are enacting your part in the invisible contract between you and the cosmos. Instead of feeling powerless, you feel alive. Instead of feeling hopeless, you have a sense that you’re on the path to somewhere. Instead of feeling like a victim, you feel like a person of action; in your deep self you know that this choice for action will one day be rewarded with a response.

Persistence is the journey of effectiveness that allows you to hope. It is the energy that wants to get things done, to assist you in moving from crisis to solution. Persistence can take you from debt to solvency, from heartbreak to true love, from sickness to health, from foreclosure to having a home. Emotionally, it can take you from fear to joy; spiritually, it can deliver you from despair to peace. So persist, be steadfast in your undertaking, for only the path consistently traveled can deliver you to the outcome you long for.

Whatever your battle, it’s never easy. The monsters never just slink back into the woods with their tails between their legs. They will fight you for every breath. There is a battle in this universe for every inch of light, and only those who persist will rise to behold the astonishing light of the sunrise.

kennethg success, Tips perseverence, persistance, success

“Consult not your fears but your hopes and your dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what it is still possible for you to do.”
Pope John XXIII

kennethg Quote Pope John XXIII

“Be ready when opportunity comes… Luck is the time when preparation and opportunity meet.”
Roy D. Chapin Jr.

kennethg Quote Roy D. Chapin Jr.

“Success is the result of good judgment, good judgment is a result of experience, experience is often the result of bad judgment.”
Anthony Robbins

kennethg Quote Anthony Robbins

by Ron White

The stage was a Texas Rangers baseball game. I stared at the batter and muttered “potential” as he held the bat over his shoulder waiting for the pitch. No sooner had the word escaped my mouth when my friend leaned over and said, “What did you say?” I replied, “I said potential.” Her confused question was, “OK…? Potential in regard to what?”

I then explained. “Well, in science they have something called potential energy, and it basically says that the higher an object is, the more potential energy it has. For example, a rock on top of a building has a potential energy in it—if it were to fall. I was just thinking about the potential energy in the player’s bat and how that relates to me.”

She looked at me intensely, somehow sensing that I was telling the truth that these were my thoughts. She proclaimed, “I never cease to be astounded at the weird things you think about.”

Perhaps it is an odd thought to cross my mind at a baseball game, but it happened. Potential energy basically says that the higher an object is, the greater the potential energy. A ball on a six-story building has more potential energy than one on a three-story building. As a matter of fact, the doubling of the height doubles the potential energy.

At the baseball game, when I started thinking about potential energy, I was considering it in regards to me—and you, for that matter. You see, it has been said that from those to whom much has been given much is expected. Based on the fact that you have access to a computer, understand how to read and have a thirst for learning, you have been given much. Or, in scientific terms, you have tremendous potential energy. You are like that rock on a tall building. However, if you sit there, the potential energy is never utilized or accessed.

One of the greatest tragedies of life is when an individual has tremendous potential energy and squanders it. That is one of my greatest fears. I am constantly faced with the prospect of not using my potential energy. To me, that is one of my largest motivating factors. Every day as I age, I look in the mirror and question if I did everything I could to use my potential energy. Did I do everything I could to figuratively jump off that building and expend the energy?

Pent up inside of you right now is tremendous potential energy that could be utilized to cure cancer, send humans to Mars, write a novel or become president of the United States. The great tragedy is not expending your potential energy and falling short. The great tragedy of life is to be that boulder—to have tremendous potential energy—and squander it through inaction.

There you have it. I was thinking about potential at the baseball game. I was thinking about it because I know that humans with nothing more than primitive tools constructed the pyramids, Stonehenge and the Great Wall of China. These are testaments to human potential. They are testaments to certain individuals thousands of years ago expending their potential energy for the ages to witness and marvel at. The challenge today for you may not be a monument for society or culture; however, it is a call for you to understand potential energy and implore you to seize yours.

kennethg Life, self improvement Life, potential, talent

Now that I’m ‘older’ (but refuse to grow up), here’s what I’ve discovered:

I. I started out with nothing, and I still have most of it.

2. My wild oats have turned into prunes and All Bran.

3. I finally got my head together; now my body is falling apart.

4. Funny, I don’t remember being absent minded…

4. Funny, I don’t remember being absent minded…

5. All reports are in; life actually is unfair.

6. If all is not lost, where is it?

7. It is easier to get older than it is to get wiser.

8. Some days you’re the dog; some days you’re the hydrant.

9. I wish the buck stopped here; I sure could use a few.

10. Kids in the back seat cause accidents.

11. Accidents in the back seat cause kids.

12. It’s hard to make a comeback when you haven’t been anywhere.

13. The only time the world beats a path to your door is when you’re in the bathroom.

14. If God wanted me to touch my toes, he would have put them on my knees.

15. When I’m finally holding all the cards, why does everyone decide to play chess?

16. It’s not hard to meet expenses… they’re everywhere.

17. The only difference between a rut and a grave is the depth.

18. These days, I spend a lot of time thinking about the hereafter. I go somewhere to get something and then wonder what I’m here after.

kennethg Humour Humour, jokes

by John C. Maxwell

(Here’s a short excerpt from an article by best-selling author and leadership expert John C. Maxwell. Enjoy!)

• Higher self-esteem. People who are constantly learning and growing have a good self-image.
• Willingness to change and risk. One of the obvious evidences of growing people is that they are constantly changing and risking. Show me a person who doesn’t change, who doesn’t risk, and I’ll show you a person who’s not growing.
• Passion increases. When we begin to grow personally, our passion for life and learning begins to increase proportionately.
• Lifting the lid for others. What a leader does determines what everybody else is going to do. The people don’t pass the leader. An organization’s growth doesn’t outpace the leader’s progress. As you lift the lid for yourself, you lift the lid for others.

kennethg Life fulfill, john maxwell, maxwell, potential, pursue

By Harvey Mackay

It’s just business as usual, day in and day out. The fast lane gets faster. Competition for business and jobs gets meaner. The world gets smaller every day. You’ve dealt with a hundred co-workers, customers, vendors, and the irritating kid who works at the lunch counter. It’s time to go home and unwind.

The traffic jam gives you an opportunity to replay some of the day’s encounters. Regrettably, you wish you would have handled a few things quite differently. How can you make tomorrow better?

My mother always told me, “You don’t have to like everybody, but you do need to learn to get along.”

Over the years, I’ve developed a list, a “Ten Commandments for the Office,” which makes my commute home a little less guilt-ridden. Better yet, it’s improved my commute to the office. If I follow my own advice, I won’t have to spend my time apologizing for what I should have done in the first place. Try it out.

1) Be respectful. This includes respect for other people’s property, ideas and time. Frankly, this commandment should about cover everything. If you are respectful of others, you can usually work out most issues – even if it’s agreeing to disagree. An added bonus is that when you treat others with respect, they are more inclined to return the favor.

2) Follow through. If you promise to do something, do it. No ifs, buts or maybes. No excuses, no whining. You are only as good as your word. There will always be a place in this world for the person who says, “I’ll take care of it.” And then does it.

3) Think before you speak. Don’t say whatever is on your mind, unless you want your mindless thoughts to come back to haunt you. Those ghosts can rise up years later, just when that promotion looks so promising. And while we’re on the topic, remember that how you say something is as important as what you say.

4) Help out. So what if it’s not in your job description. If you have an opportunity to be useful, jump at it. Even if the rewards are not in the form of a paycheck, your co-workers will remember who helped them when they needed it. Taking on a little extra work – or a lot – shows that you are a team player, an employee worth watching.

5) Learn something new every day. It could be a new skill. Maybe the latest developments in your industry. Or just the name of a person you see daily at the copy machine. You have millions of brain cells just waiting to work for you!

6) Pay attention. If you go directly to your cubicle and barricade yourself all day, you’re missing important developments in your workplace. Not the gossipy events, of course, but the really good stuff – new procedures, new ideas and so on. This commandment also covers those occasions when the value of your input depends on your familiarity with the situation at hand. In short, always keep your antennae up!

7) Ignore pettiness. Rise above it, or you will be dragged down with it. There will always be someone who will make a mountain out of a molehill. It better not be you.

Be patient. Not to be confused with tolerating incompetence, this commandment covers a multitude of situations.; Someone misunderstood you. A job is taking longer than you planned. You are missing every traffic light. What will you gain by losing your cool? I’m not a patient guy by nature, so I’ve really had to work at this one. If I can do it, you can too!

9) A good attitude is up to you. It takes a lot for the world to come to an end, so don’t act like it’s happening every day. Be encouraging, be cheerful. Refuse to be brought down by minor – or major – setbacks. Bad attitudes are contagious. The good news is that positive attitudes are catching, too.

10) Do your best. Like commandment #1, this should also cover just about everything. No one can ask you to do more.

It’s important to decide early on how you will conduct yourself. Then, when a crisis erupts or challenge arises, you won’t have to think twice about the right thing to do. I’ve always said that perfect practice makes perfect. These rules are no exception. And just for the record, these commandments work outside the office too.

Mackay’s Moral: Some rules are made not to be broken.

kennethg Life Harvey Mackay

“I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure – which is, try to please everybody.”
Herbert Swope

kennethg Quote Herbert Swope