You can have the most amazing, revolutionary, creative idea and no matter how good it is, there is a guarantee almost as if by some unwritten law of the universe, that someone (and likely someone you know well) is going to poo on it.

Criticism is a sad aspect of human nature but some people are most comfortable putting others down & trying to keep them there. It can be absolutely crushing to the one on the receiving end, as well as their dreams. A lot of people never get far enough to see their ambitions take off because they succumb to the stress & pressure of what others might think of them. And for what? For striving to be better, to have more, to become something other than mediocre?

The most successful people in history have a very small set of things in common. One of those things is that they didn’t let the nay-sayers stop them from going forward and following their vision. They went forward. They made history.

Grab Opportunity…Or Create It

I’ve had some great successes in my life & have experienced more than many my age. Still, I’ve passed up more opportunities in my lifetime than I’ve ever followed through on – and the biggest reason is fear. A lot of times, it’s been fear of what someone else who’s close to me would think if I were to follow such a “dream”.

You may not make history by following a particular dream of yours but you should always follow through on it. Take what opportunities come to you. Make opportunities when they are scarce – instead of creating excuses.

Frozen from Fear of Criticism?

A while back, I realized that I had allowed myself to be a victim of fear. There were times when I froze instead of blazing ahead. That sounds pretty silly but it was true! It hurts when you have a vision, desire, idea or ambition but don’t have the faith & belief – or at least emotional support – of those who matter most to you. They might be jealous, envious or just plain calloused.

I’m not going to analyze the various reasons ‘why’ some people like to criticize & belittle those with vision, dreams & goals. It doesn’t matter. What is important is that you don’t fear such a reaction or let that stand in your way for one moment.

Just Do It!

You probably have a “bucket list” of things you hope for or want to do or accomplish in your life. Don’t wait until you’re terminally ill or only have a few short, golden years left to do them. Chances are, if you’re waiting for exactly the right time & situation, it will never magically appear. Whatever it is you have on your list, get serious about it. Plan it out. Turn the vision into a goal with a time frame. Then do it.

Don’t let anyone steal your dream.

Photo credit: Kathryn McCallum, some rights reserved.

It’s almost Christmas and Hanukkah is underway. As the snow falls in Colorado, I’d like to share some warm holiday wishes & a few thoughts on the time of year.

Please take a moment to share your thoughts on the season in the comments, below.

If you have trouble seeing the video here, you can view it on YouTube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3Yl65oZ4I4

Getting involved in time-wasters is a common way to distract from things that really matter. Before you know it, you can lose hours of precious time which could have been better spent crossing something off of your “to do” list. Television, web browsing, email and now, social media, tend to be huge time wasters. I recently read an article that stated some employers feel they are losing about 25% productivity of their employees due to time spent (or wasted) on email, browsing & social media.

Procrastination has a compounding power to rob us of motivation and positive mental energy. The longer we procrastinate, the harder it is to get back on track. We tend to minimize the importance of paperwork, phone calls, etc., the longer it has been since we first needed to get them taken care of. We can be pretty creative when it comes to making up excuses for not doing something now. It’s all a matter of habit – and what procrastination teaches the mind, is – simply put – to be lazy. The more we procrastinate, the less motivated we become. It’s a vicious cycle.

A sense of self-control & accomplishment comes from getting things done but when we put those things off, the opposite happens. We feel a loss of control & empowerment which can actually lead to lethargy & depression. The longer we put something off, the harder it is to get it done. I’ve struggled with this for a long time, in fact, I have a few books on the subject. What I discovered is that if I procrastinate reading the books, they don’t help either. Imagine that! Martin Luther once said, “How soon ‘not now’ becomes ‘never’“, and oh, how true that is.

Here are a few ideas to help get back on track and out of the procrastinator’s rut.

• Start by limiting the time you allow yourself to spend on certain time-draining activities each day. Don’t let yourself go over that limit unless you’ve completed everything you need to get done for the day. If you need to, write down the limits you set for yourself so you can refer back to it later.
• Make sure that you’re keeping a running schedule & task list. Whether it’s on your computer, smartphone, planner or on a paper pad – keep it handy & keep things organized on it.
• If you’re completely bogged down with a huge task list, rebuild it from the ground up. Start completely over by taking a new inventory of everything that needs to be done, reprioritize it all and set new due dates.
• Give yourself the credit you deserve! Whenever you get something done that was actually on your list, make sure to cross it off & take a mental note. This helps by empowering you mentally. You’re now back in control!

You’ll have more time than you thought by staying more organized & sticking to the limits you set for yourself. Believe it or not, you will have more emotional energy to deal with things as you accomplish more. Your mind will feed from the accomplishments you make & be charged up for more. Practice a positive habit of “doing” to increase the sense of worth & power of control you have over your life. You’ll feel more motivated and find you have more energy emotionally and physically, as well.

I’ll leave you with one of my favorites by Mark Victor Hansen, which does away with the excuses & procrastination attitude: “Don’t wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect. There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. So what. Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger and stronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and more successful.”

Everyone has different methods for getting things done. I’d love to hear from you what you find most effective, so share in the comments, below.

Stores make their employees leave home & family in the middle of the night to come man the battlements, so to speak, in preparation for the enormous crowds of shoppers. Polices are on hand to maintain control at “door buster” sales, yet each year, we see news stories of people who’ve been trampled & killed by fellow deal seekers!

Black Friday is the iconoclasm of Thanksgiving.

Are we really supposed to humbly reflect on & express our deep gratitude one day and then switch to the opposite extreme the next day in order to save a few dollars? Sure, I know there are great deals out there on Black Friday and people can be “thankful” for saving money. But it seems that Black Friday is has almost become the anti-Thanksgiving with all the commercialism and the general mindset or attitude that surrounds frenzied shopping.

Thankfulness is a mindset essential to abundance and a key part of positive thinking. Giving thanks in our heart & minds, as well as expressing it to those around us, should happen every day – not just one day each year.

Going beyond expressing thanks to others as a matter of courtesy or kindness, we should constantly have in our minds what we are thankful for. So, as a friendly reminder; make an extra effort to keep that feeling and mindset of giving & gratitude as you’re out doing holiday shopping & planning for festivities.

Stress & commercialism this time of year can take away from the real meaning of what we’re commemorating during these magical, special holidays. Embrace the bounty that life has to offer you …which can only come after having gratitude. Being the day with thanks every day. Express it to those around you. And good luck if you’re out shopping this weekend.

If you’re anything like me and most other people, you’ve probably had the feeling of running out of motivation. That’s pretty normal.

Imagine getting up in the morning, not eating and going about your day. You come home after a long day and you’re really hungry. Yet, you don’t bother to eat that evening. The next day comes and goes without you taking the time to eat again. How long far do you imagine you could go like that – without eating? Your body gets weak, it breaks down & gets sick unless you feed it regularly.

Our mental & emotional self needs to be fed regularly, just like the physical body. If not, it gets weak and breaks down, too. We’ve all been there & seen the warning signs. We become negative, hopeless & slothful without feeding our motivation (and attitudes).

We humans must actually practice motivating ourselves and make a daily habit of it. It’s no different than nourishing your body through a healthy diet.

A Few Motivating, Inspirational Ideas

Pay attention to what you listen to. Everything you see & hear is feeding your mind. So, ask yourself, “is it positive or crap?”

Put something positive on your music player in your car. Listen at home, as you commute, etc. Music is fun and I really enjoy it. But what you can pick up from a good audio book or podcast can go a long way to recharging your emotional batteries.

Something I do daily is listen to an audio book or podcast as I’m shaving & brushing my teeth in the morning. I listen to a couple of YouTube videos by one of my favorite inspirational authors or an audio program by someone like Jim Rohn on my iPhone as I’m commuting. If I’m waiting for an appointment, I read something inspirational. I also keep a few great books by my bedside so I can easily read something positive right before turning out the light to go to sleep.

Those things all help to nourish my mental & emotional being and strengthen my motivation. My resolve stays stronger. I really notice when I don’t do these things for a day. It’s easy to feel the difference – almost like skipping an important meal. I’ve made a habit of doing things like these by practicing them over & over.

Make A System That Works For YOU…Then Practice!

The best thing about doing this is – it really doesn’t take any extra time! Get just a little creative and most of your motivational practice can be done while you’re doing something else or have “down” time. If you have a smartphone, use it smartly. Make it your tool. If you don’t have something like that, get a cheap MP3 player or carry a pocket-sized book of motivating stories with you. You can find a lot of ways to work this into your daily routine without upsetting or neglecting anything you already have to do.

The only extra time you’ll really need to take, is getting your own system together. Once you have that in place, practice, practice, practice.

Do you have your own motivational practice? What’s your system …or what ideas have you tried for inspiration & motivation in your life? How did it work for you? Take a moment & leave a comment with your thoughts, below. 

Author and success guru, Jack Canfield, has a wonderful analogy of faith. He describes the way we can drive a car at night, even at highway speeds, seeing only by the headlights of the car which shine for a couple hundred feet ahead of us. We can drive from Los Angeles to New York – a distance of almost 2,800 miles – only seeing a couple of hundred feet head of us at a time.

Since I went through flight school several years ago, I’ve often imagined the journey through life being somewhat like an airplane flight. Before each flight, I had to have a flight plan, specifying where I’m starting from, my final destination and the “planned” route – knowing that the route may likely change as I’m enroute due to various circumstances.

So often, we’ll get caught up in the details and minutia of planning how everything is needs to happen to make our own successes happen – to reach a certain “destination”. That’s a waste of time. It’s like trying to find a way to see the entire highway to New York City while still standing firmly in Los Angeles. Or a pilot trying to think of and calculate every possible variable before leaving… he’d never take off!

My point here is, we can’t let not knowing every possible  scenario or having all of the answers keep us from moving forward.

Where Are You Headed?

In order to actually get somewhere, you have to have a clear destination in mind – a goal. It’s best to have some fairly clear directions, or at least know which route you’re going to set out on. Most people are most comfortable setting out on a trip with as much information as possible, ahead of time. That makes good sense.

Planning & forethought are important! But moderation in planning is key. You aren’t always going to have every detail known before leaving on your trip. You don’t have to possess all of the answers or see each and every step at the moment you set out toward your goal, as long as you clearly know the destination we’re heading toward – just like the trip from Los Angeles to New York.

The Flight Plan in a Nutshell

Like any of us when we set out on a trip, the pilot gets enough information to complete his flight plan prior to departure but that doesn’t mean he has all the answers. He’s trained in contingencies and how to adapt in order to reach his destination. He has a reasonable belief that he will make that destination because he knows where he’s starting from, where he’s heading and some of the variables in between.

The most important part in planning is knowing where you’re going. That’s having a clearly defined goal to travel toward.

Just like a flight plan, write your goals down. Keep them handy an review it often. Some short-term plans need to be reviewed several times a day – making sure we get done what needs done through that day. Other, more long term flight plans should be reviewed daily or at the very least, once a week.

When you run into unseen variables along the way, adjustments in your plan need to be made. If your destination changes, you will need to change your routing. If you have to make any changes, write them down on your own “flight plan”.

By knowing which way you’re headed, making frequent reviews of your progress and small adjustments as needed, there is no journey too long or destination too far.

Life is just that way. No goal is too high for you to reach if have a plan – and then DO IT. Actually set out on your journey and GO!

A video post discussing Rule 1: You Have to Really Want It.

From: 5 Essential Rules for Personal Change.

What excites you to the point that you are actually driven to make it happen? When it comes to making personal changes, you must find the reasons for the change that actually motivate you to the point of passion!

What are you own thoughts & experiences on this? Let’s talk! Share what you have in the comments below.

One of the greatest obstacles to real understanding is having to face some of our own fears. You have to leave your pride behind because you can’t be afraid of the other person’s point being different from your own. Sometimes we’re afraid of what the other person thinks or feels about us. This has been a challenge to me through most of my life.

Obviously, the first step is listening to the whatever person. However, another major hurdle to understanding is, really knowing what’s gone on before the moment you’re trying to understand that’s caused the other person to think, feel or act the way they do.

The reason this is so hard for most of us is that it requires stepping outside of our own “bubble” that we see the world from and actually developing a real knowledge of how & why another person feels they way they do.

Sure, understanding can lead us to changing our own point of view, too. For some people, this is an inner fear. Especially if there’s a chance they could be proven wrong somehow. But once we can really see things from another person’s perspective we can add that to what we’ve always seen from ours. If it helps us to learn & grow, that’s a good thing!

Real understanding rarely comes quickly. It takes time and at first, a lot of effort. Like anything else, it comes easier as you practice.

There are times when we totally fall down when it comes to having understanding. Usually when emotions like frustration or anger are high. Obviously, if you can cool off or wait for a calmer time, you will be able to address the situation with more of a clear understanding than when you’re feeling passionate about something.

Understanding is an essential part of all relationships – working relationships and friendships… but where it really matters and where it’s the most difficult, is in a loving relationship with a spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend and your children.

Real understanding may not be easy… but once you get it, it will be very well worth your effort & patience.

It’s common knowledge that change is usually uncomfortable & can be difficult. Having a few easy rules to guide us can hold us on course like the beacon from a lighthouse when the stormy waves of life come crashing down on us.

Whatever kind of change we’re trying to make in our life, in order for it to be lasting, there are some very inarguable simple rules that have to be met. These rules have been compiled from the principles taught by many notable experts such as Anthony Robbins, Dr. Stephen Covey, Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Dwayne Dyer and more.

1. YOU Have to really want it. [Video]
   Whatever your reasons for making change, they have to be your reasons. Meaning, you think about it…it is your focus. You own this.
2. YOU have to DO it!
   Take action. This has to happen daily – each and every day. Nike’s old slogan is simple and to the point, “Do It!”
3. The change cannot be reliant on anyone else.
   You can’t hope for or rely on someone else to create change in YOUR life or make your life better! Being responsible for change means that you must “own” the situation and acknowledge that results – or lack of results – are up to you. Sure, there are always things in life outside of our control. Being accountable and owning your situation will put you in charge of what you do have control over.
4. What YOU do must be different than what you’ve done before.
   If you’re doing the same things or acting the same way as before, you aren’t going to get different results. Albert Einstein taught “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Since change depends on action, how can you “act differently”?
5. YOU must not quit when things get hard.
   And things will get hard. Just keep going. Persist again with each new day. All worthwhile, lasting change takes time. This means you’ll have to be patient as well as persistent… every day. If you fall down or have a bad day, begin with a smile again tomorrow.

Check out this list & practice it for the next 30 days. These rules for change have already helped countless people around the world. See what kind of a difference it makes for you! Bob Parsons also has a set of 16 Rules for Success in Business & Life in General that you might find handy. Share your ideas & thoughts in the comments, below.

What the Army may not want you to think of is the fact that you don’t need anything or anyone else to be your best. You already have everything it takes!

Don’t get me wrong here. I completely support & stand behind our armed forces & the amazing people who serve. Period.

Making the effort is all that stands between who we are now and being our absolute best. Sure, it’s not always easy but you sure don’t need a drill sergeant to drive you to improve yourself, right? You simply need a plan…and to stick to it.

While that might seem to make light of the steps and effort that goes into realizing our full potential, it’s all that’s required to begin the process. For anything we do in life, there is a process, a “recipe” of steps, so to speak. The recipe for beginning along the path of being your very own, personal best is simple on paper. And it looks something like this:

1. Realize the need for change – or that there’s “room” for personal improvement.
2. Have a desire to make that change. This is extremely important & without this desire, it’s never going to actually happen.
3. Put together a plan: goals list, mission statement, covenants to yourself & others, etc. Include dates you’ll start and when you’ll reach other milestones.
4. Start your plan on the day you’ve designated. Review your plan daily so it stays fresh.
5. Nourish yourself. Fee yourself positive along the journey so as to keep your mental-self strong.
6. Never give up!