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The Unquenchable Desire For A “Do-Over”

The Unquenchable Desire For A "Do-Over" Sometimes, when you’re young, you call for a “do-over”… an opportunity to go back and attempt the same thing over again. It tends to happen the most in sports, such as basketball (especially when you’re playing H-O-R-S-E)… you take a shot, and something causes you to mess it up. That may be outside interference, or just you stumbling, but the result is the same… you miss, and you want another chance.

The desire for a “do-over”, though, is not limited to sports, nor to the young. The desire comes up now and then for most people as they go through life… they are not happy with where they are, so they long for the chance to “just do it over”. They may even go so far as to claim that it isn’t fair.

Unlike the example of kids playing basketball, however, there is no such option in life. With life, you must instead assess where you are now, and then decide where you want to go. Once you decide where you want to go, then, and only then, can you figure out what your next step should be on your way there.

You don’t have to decide where you want to go with your whole life, what your purpose is, or where you will find true fulfillment. You just have to figure out somewhere that is reachable that you want to be. You can decide to go with your desire to paint (or even be a painter) and acquire some brushes, paint, and a canvas or you might decide you want to be Mr. Universe, and start off with a goal of shedding 10 pounds of fat.

The trick is to focus not on the past, and what you didn’t do or where you didn’t end up, but instead on the future (especially the near future) and where you want to go from here. Focusing too much on the past often leads to depression (“Look at all these mistakes I made!”), and focusing too far into the future can leave you feeling overwhelmed (“I’ll never get there!”).

There are no “do-overs” in life… but you can get somewhere better, somewhere that you would like to be, if you’ll just reach out and take a step toward some place reachable that’s closer to where you would like to be.

Author

December 22nd

Goals

4 Keys To Making Your Dreams Come True

Everyone has their own dreams… mine is to be supported by my writing. Yours may be something completely different… it may be to travel the world, be a professional chef, or something else. You probably even have more than one dream… I wouldn't mind traveling the world, too.

There are a lot of individual steps to making your dream come true, of course, but those will vary depending upon what your specific dream happens to be. There are four key components, however, that are part of making any dream come true.

These four things will help you to make your dream real, and will help you with most other aspects of your life at the same time. They may come naturally to you, or you may have to work at adopting them, but once they become part of the way you approach the world, you will notice that things just start happening more easily.

So, on to the actual list…

How To Make Your Dreams Come True

Sharing

The first key is to share your dreams with others. This helps to make it more real and more conscious for you, making you more likely to notice opportunities related to it. It also helps to remind you that it is there, and that it is something you are working toward… so that you don't let your dreams die.

Besides helping you to be more conscious of it, sharing your dreams with someone can also make them feel included in that dream, making them far more likely to want to help you achieve it. It makes them feel that by helping you, they are helping something that they are part of succeed, like they have partial ownership. How much more likely would that make you to help someone that you know?

And just think, even if someone likes you for other reasons and would be more than willing to help you, they can only do so by accident if they don't know what it is that you want. When you do open up and share your dreams with them, they can actively do things to give you a helping hand.
Networking

Building on the first key, the second key is networking (and not the kind dealing with computers). Networking refers to keeping in contact with people that you meet, people with whom you connect. When you stay in contact, and check in on them from time to time, you keep that connection alive and you keep yourself in their thoughts, if something were to come up that they relate to you.

For instance, with my particular dream, if I were to stay in contact with someone, and they happened to make friends with someone high up at a magazine or newspaper, they might suggest to that person that they read my articles, or even directly that they should consider having me write columns for their publication. If I hadn't stayed in contact, then that person likely wouldn't have thought of me, and so that opportunity would never have come along.

Here's my confession: This is my weak point. I moved around a lot as a child, and I developed the habit of letting people go easily. This is a place where putting some time and energy into changing myself would probably really pay off.
Persistence

The third key to making your dreams come true is persistence… most likely it will take a fair amount of time to make your really big dreams come true. You will need to have the persistence to see you through until that time, persistence in sharing your dreams, networking, openness… and persistence in just continuing through life's ongoing costs and opportunities until you make it through.

Keep in mind, though, that there is a difference between persistence and stubbornness… don't just keep doing something that doesn't work without a reason to believe something will change. Persistence is continuing in spite of obstacles, not just continuing blindly.
Openness

The final key is openness… being open to seeing opportunities that might take you in the general direction of your dreams, without being on the direct path. This might be something like me going to a conference for authors and publishers, where I might meet someone who could eventually help me to get a deal to write a book, or a syndicated column.

It might also be being open to making a friend somewhere that you might not ordinarily look for one… perhaps when you meet, in passing, a friend of a friend, or someone from your significant other's family. It might be that you are open to everyone, and are friendly to someone at a key moment in their life, and that person might eventually be the person who brings your dream to you.

It might also be that you help someone achieve their own dream, without looking for anything in particular in return… just being open to whatever might come your way.

Whatever life may throw your way, when you close up, you cut off opportunities for your dreams to come true. It is natural to mentally curl up and try to protect the injured part of you, but that reaction is more often harmful than helpful over the long run.

If you can learn these things, or if they come naturally to you, you'll likely find success in whatever it is that you do. They don't guarantee instant success, the instant fulfillment of all your dreams… they provide the tools to build the framework upon which success hangs, the ladder to your dreams.

It is relatively rare for someone to have all four of these attributes naturally… mostly you have at least one of the areas listed above where you are weak. Fortunately, however, you can learn them, and make them part of who you are. If you work at it hard enough and long enough, you can make them nearly as instinctive as someone who DOES have them naturally.

My weakness, as I said above, is networking… it simply doesn't come naturally for me. I'm working on it, and intend to keep working on it, but it's something I have to consciously work on right now… hopefully I'm persistent enough to make it more natural.

What about you? What's your weakness?

Author

January 21st

Feed Your Mind, Goals

The Perils Of Being Too Goal Focused

If you read many books or websites about self improvement in general, and success in particular, you will notice one theme, one concept, that appears more often than nearly any other: setting goals. I even recommend it myself, from time to time.

Setting goals can help you to focus your energy and effort, making it far more likely that you will get something accomplished. That, in general, is a good thing… I even set goals for myself (like hitting 1,000 subscribers by May 31, 2008 *hint hint*).

The peril lies in becoming so focused on the goal that you start becoming blind to where you are now, so focused on the destination that lose sight of the opportunities along the way. This is a trap many people fall into, and one that it's sometimes difficult to recognize even after you fall.

Let me give an example that you have probably seen (or even done) yourself: the person who is always focused on how to make money. Their goal is to have (or make) some amount of money, and they view every situation through this lens… and become so focused on it that they miss opportunities to make new friends, one of whom might even be their ticket to the money which holds their attention.

It's not too difficult to think about other examples, from the person who is so obsessed with someone that they miss a chance with someone who would have made them happy for the rest of their lives, to the person who is so focused on getting promoted that they forget to look around and see other opportunities, whether at another company or in another field.

That's why I, personally, recommend choosing a path more than a goal. That's not to say that you shouldn't have a goal in mind… again, I have a goal of 1,000 subscribers. Your focus, however, should be on choosing your path… your attention should be on where you are now, and what the next step might be.

Focusing on the path, and choosing your next step, keeps you more aware of your current surroundings, and oppotunities that might arise that either move you toward your original goal faster, or even change your goals… there is no need to stick to your original goal if it's no longer somewhere you want to be.

Focusing on the path also tends to reduce the amount of stress in your life as you notice the things around you, the things you already have, and the things within your reach, while thinking less about the things that you don't have. In the picture above, the person focused on the goal would just be worrying about how much further they had to go, where the person focused on the path might stop to take the time to notice the beauty around them… and perhaps meet others who also stop to appreciate it.

Goals are wonderful things to have… as long as they are not set in concrete, and you don't lose sight of the beauty and wonder of the path you are taking to get to them.

One step at a time down the path, and you won't get overwhelmed. One step at a time and you give opportunity a chance to catch your attention.

One step at a time, and you are far more likely to be somewhere that you want to be.

Author

January 4th

Feed Your Mind, Goals

Six Months Later

Different things are significant to different people, but this month marks something of significance to me: I have now been blogging for six months.

A lot has changed in that half of a year, for me… I've gone from 34 visitors my first month to over 50,000 in both October and November. I have had my articles viewed over a quarter of a million times.

More importantly, I've gotten to know myself better, and I have grown (in the mental and spiritual sense) more rapidly since I started writing than at any other time. I am doing something now that I am actually passionate about, rather than just doing what I need to in order to survive.

I have also found what it is that I want to do for a living: write. If I could do that off of A Miracle A Day, that would be fantastic, though I make very, very little money at all from it right now (I do run Google ads at the bottom of each article). If it comes from some other source (I have started, though never finished, a book, a work of fiction), I would still be happy… after all, I run this site from a passion, not for the money.

That being said, regardless of income, I have goals for the website, and I'll share them with you now… hopefully this will help me keep them in mind, and perhaps someone will read them and lend a helping hand, whether through advice, or simply spreading the word.

Goals For The Next Six Months:

500 subscribers by the end of 2007
1000+ subscribers by the one year anniversary of the blog (in May)
10,000 visitors in one day (I've passed 7,000… 10,000 is the next big mark, but can only be achieved by spreading the word)
1,000,000 views

Of course, if you want to help me hit the first of those goals, you can subscribe now in a reader or by email (if you haven't already), or you can recommend A Miracle A Day to a friend, and encourage them to subscribe.

Over the six months I've been writing, I have written 171 articles (this one is #172). I like most of them, obviously (there are a couple I'm not so happy with, like this one), but some of them are ones that I particularly like. Now seems like a good time to share my favorites, so here are a few of them:

My Personal Favorite Articles (from oldest to newest):

So… there you go, that's where six months of blogging has gotten me, and where I'd like to go in the next six months. And all of my goals depend on help from you, my readers… so if you like my site, subscribe (by email) if you aren't already or spread the word and recommend it to someone you know (or a lot of people, I don't mind ).

Author

November 30th

Blogging, Goals

Achieving Your Goals – Negative Motivation VS Positive Motivation

When it comes to motivation, it can be broken down into two categories: negative motivation and positive motivation. Negative motivation is "push" motivation… you are trying to push something you don't like away from you. Positive motivation is "pull" motivation… you are trying to bring something that you DO want closer to you.

Each has an area where, generally speaking, it is more effective. Negative motivation is good for getting you started, for getting that initial movement that is often the hardest part to achieve. It does not, on the other hand, last all that well. Positive motivation is just the ticket for that… positive motivation can be a lifelong thing, but in general is not as great for getting the first sparks together to "light your fire".

Negative Motivation

Negative motivation is very good for getting you moving. It provides a sharp stimulus that is congruent with out instincts… that thing is unpleasant, get away from it. Our instincts don't make a distinction, in this case, between physical unpleasantness and mental unpleasantness… either way, our instinct is just to get away.

This can work very well… if your doctor tells you that you have cancer, and that unless you do what they say you are going to die, that provides some really strong motivation to change your ways and do what they say. The motivation is sharp, strong, and focused… do what you need to (what the doctor tells you) in order to avoid something unpleasant (dying of cancer). Since motivation is linked to action by way of a cost/benefit ratio, you can see that the cost (doing what the doctor tells you) is very low in comparison to the benefit (not dying).

Negative motivation has a very definite weakness, however. It can be quite strong, enough to get you moving when other things wouldn't, but what happens when you take the negative stimulus away? The motivation dries up almost instantly.

In other words, once you feel like you are safe from whatever the unpleasantness was, there is no more motivation from that source, though you may keep up whatever changes you have made out of habit.

Positive Motivation

Positive motivation is generally not quite as good at getting you moving. The natural instinct to avoid unpleasantness is not triggered, thus leaving you without the added boost that brings. Even if there is something you really, REALLY want, unless the path from here to there is pretty obvious, there may be some doubt, some fear, about your ability to achieve that thing, making it harder to get started.

On the other hand, positive motivation doesn't necessarily have a defined end, either. If you lose weight because your doctor tells you that you have to or suffer some really unpleasant problems, then once you lose enough weight, that motivation goes away. If you lose weight because you want to feel more fit and healthy, however, that motivation doesn't really go away. You're still going to want to feel fit and healthy, even after you've achieved your original goals.

Positive motivation gets stronger as you go along. Seeing progress toward your goal, whatever it may be, reinforces your positive motivation at the same time that it weakens your negative motivation… after all, you're getting closer to your thing you want (positive, or "pull" motivation) and farther from the thing you want to avoid (negative, or "push" motivation). Positive motivation can also help you conserve momentum when moving to a new goal after completing your current one.

Summary

The trick of motivating yourself is to know how to combine the two, and which to use when. Negative motivation is good for getting started, which is why many people who speak about reaching your goals will tell you to share your goals and time frames with someone else. This induces the negative motivation of not wanting to look bad in front of that person. That can range from a medium to a very strong negative motivation. At the same time, however, it makes you start framing the way you look at your goal in terms of that negative light. This can lead to you looking for ways to avoid both working on the goal and the person with whom you shared that goal.

That's where positive motivation comes into play. Once negative motivation gets you moving, you can start to see your progress toward your goal, which helps to strengthen your positivel motivation into a force that can support further progress. As you make more progress, and the end point (your goal) becomes clearer, positive motivation becomes even stronger, getting to the point where it can really drive you to the next goal once the current one is achieved… as long as you don't slow down too much. Once you slow down, you may need the kick from negative motivation once again.

So… that's a really simple look at the differences between negative motivation and positive motivation. Do you find that you use one more than the other? Will you change how you attempt to reach new goals after thinking about the difference? Let me know in the comments.

Author

October 10th

Energy, Feed Your Mind, Goals, Motivation, Perseverance, Planning, Polarity

I Need Your Help

I Need Help

I need your help with something. I set a goal, quite some time back, of reaching 100 subscribers. As you can see if you look near the top left corner of this page, I've reached that goal. I was talking about this fact with my wife last night, and she asked me what my next goal would be. I had already thought about this, of course, so it didn't take me long to answer: 500 subscribers.

Now here comes the part where I need your help: She told me that she wanted that as an anniversary present. My anniversary is November 20th, or less than two months away. My subscriber count HAS nearly quintupled over the last six weeks, going from around 22 to, as of last time I looked, 104. If I continued that trend, I WOULD be able to give my wife the present she asked for.

On the other hand, increasing my subscribers by 82 over 6 weeks is a very different thing than increasing it by 396, even if the percentages are similar. The only way I can think of to reach that count is if I get linked by bigger bloggers. So, this is where I need help: If you are one of the bigger bloggers I link to in this article, and you check your links, if you find something of interest on my site (and I'll provide a choice or two I think might interest you), please help me and link to it.

If you are one of my normal readers, and have a blog of your own, I would appreciate any link from you, as well… any link can bring readers, who can then become subscribers if they so choose. Or, if you happen to be reading this and know someone who might be interested in linking to my content to help me give my wife her present, let them know. I know I'm unlikely to send enough traffic to any of these links to get the attention of a blog of any size, so I'm hoping they watch who links to them, and if not, that we can contact them by other means and get them to participate.

Okay, so all of that out of the way, here are some of the bloggers that I read, that have higher (mostly a LOT higher) traffic and subscriber count, and whom might be interested in content on this site:

ProBlogger - I read ProBlogger's content every day on how to improve your blog. I have a feeling he might be interested in How To Get 17158 Page Views for ProBlogger, or possibly The Eyes Of A Photographer for Digital Photography School.
Steve Pavlina – Steve Pavlina is the one who got me started with blogging, and I still read his stuff every time he puts it out. He might be interested in Believe It Or Not, Your Beliefs Affect The Physical World or Which One Runs Your Life – Love Or Fear?.
Henrik at The Positivity Blog – Henrik is a good blogger… I really like his articles and his writing style. He might be interested in The Truth Behind Falling – And Being – In Love, The Difference Between Intelligence And Education, or 8 Ways To Put Procrastination Off Until Tomorrow.
John Place – I've been reading John's stuff since I first got started blogging. He started at about the same time as me, just a month earlier, but has already gotten over 1,600 subscribers. He might be interested in How To Reclaim Your Life From Marketers, The Difference Between Intelligence And Education, or A Potentially Fatal Mistake.
LifeHack.org and LifeHacker.com – Two of the biggest blogs when it comes to the self-improvement niche… they also have a lot of tech content. They might be interested in How To Reclaim Your Life From Marketers or 8 Ways To Put Procrastination Off Until Tomorrow.
Peter at I Will Change Your Life – A blog smaller than the ones above, but growing rapidly… he recently reached the goal I'm working toward, 500 subscribers. He might be interested in The Truth Behind Falling – And Being – In Love or A Potentially Fatal Mistake.

This request is by no means limited to the people listed above… as I said above, if you know someone else who might be interested in my content, and willing to help me out, please feel free to contact them and give them the address of this website in general or this article in particular… in fact, here is a link that you can copy and paste for this article, in case you would like to pass it along: I Need Your Help at A Miracle A Day.

So… sorry to call in the good will of my readers, but I really do need help in order to give my wife the anniversary present she asked for, which, of course, I walked blindly into. Oh, and to any bloggers who read this, whether mentioned above or not, if you were to pass along this request, that would be much appreciated.

Author

September 27th

Blogging, Goals, Growth, Motivation, Off Topic

8 Ways To Put Procrastination Off Until Tomorrow

Notepad - List

Ah yes, the joys of procrastination… putting off all the hard or unpleasant work that you need to get done until later. Then, when it all piles up until it's over your head, you feel overwhelmed, wondering how you managed to end up so deep in a mess and how to escape.

Some people seem to have a natural tendency toward procrastination, always putting off until tomorrow what could be done today. Others don't seem to have that issue. They don't seem to have any problem just getting right to work on something, even when it's very unpleasant to even think about. Those of us who fall into the first category can, however, take steps to deal with our "problem".

So, since you have a tendency to procrastinate (otherwise, why are you reading this article?), why not put it to work against itself? Here's some ways you can put off procrastinating until tomorrow.

Write A Daily Task List (DTL)

This one is relatively obvious, and you've probably heard it until you're sick of it… but any list of ways to help put off procrastination would be incomplete without it. All this requires is that each night you make a short list of things that need done (or worked on) the next day. Once you have your list, there are many other things that you can do with it.
Prioritize Your DTL By Importance

The first thing you can do is prioritize the list you created in #1 by importance. That way you can be sure that you will at least get the most important things accomplished, and you are likely to find that you get more than the first few things done, because you feel like you've gotten the important stuff out of the way and gotten something accomplished for the day. You may even find yourself on a roll, getting things done left and right.
Prioritize Your DTL By Difficulty

Your next choice is to prioritize your list by difficulty, putting the most difficult tasks first. This makes it so that you have the hardest work out of the way early, so that when you are more tired later in the day, you have only the easier tasks left, thus decreasing the chances that you will put a task off until tomorrow because it's too hard to finish in the time that you have left. Also, this particular method of prioritizing is even more likely to make you feel like you're "on a roll" than #2.
Prioritize Your DTL By Unpleasantness

This may be very heavily related to #3, as difficulty is a major factor in how unpleasant a task is… but it's not the ONLY factor. This means of prioritization has the advantage that as you complete your tasks, the remaining tasks are more and more things that you actually want to do, not things that you have to do. Also, like #3, you're less likely to have that really unpleasant task at the end of the day that you put off until the next day because you don't want to start it late.
Reward Yourself When You Complete Tasks Early

People have known for thousands of years that you train people, including yourself, through rewards and punishment. You reward behavior which you want to increase, and punish behavior you want to decrease. Since most procrastination has punishments built right in (like putting off paying your bills… not good for your credit, people come and shut off power, etc.), you are free to concentrate on the rewards side of the equation. The three easiest ways to do that are trewarding yourself for completing unusually difficult tasks, rewarding yourself for completing a longer-term task early (ie something that you expect to take a week and you finish in three days), and rewarding yourself for completing your DTL. Don't make the rewards too easy, or out of proportion, though, or they won't help you to train yourself… you have to feel like you earned whatever it is.
Post Your DTL Where You Will See It Regularly

This is especially good if you cross tasks off as you go, since it allows you to see your progress. It can be motivational to see a list of ten tasks with seven of them already crossed off, especially if it's still relatively early. Even if you don't have anything crossed off yet, having the list in a place where you see it can remind you of what you decided to do for the day if you get distracted.

Just as a note, the phrasing in that last sentence is important… always look at your list as what you decided to do, not what you "should" do. What you "should" do takes the element, the feeling, of choice out of it, which can leave you feeling resentful even if you made the list yourself. It's a list of tasks that you decided to do, not something forced on you by others.
Be Accountable To Someone Else For Your DTL

Just about everyone hates to feel stupid in front of someone else. If you let someone else read your DTL, and share your progress on that list with them at the end of the day, it provides a little more pressure to actually get things done, so that you don't feel like you have to stand there in front of them and tell them that you screwed around all day and didn't get anything on your DTL done. Don't let doing this make you feel like you have to put more things on your DTL just to impress them, though… the list is still for you, and you don't want to exhaust yourself trying to impress someone.

If you're in a relationship, your significant other is probably a good choice for this.
Do Things Instantly When Possible

This is really simple, and the thing that has helped me the most with my natural tendency to procrastination. This is completing tasks as soon as you can when you become aware that they need done. For example, you can pay your bills as soon as you get them in the mail. Or you can fix that chair with the wobbly leg NOW instead of waiting until the weekend (by which time you've probably become accustomed to procrastinating that task, which makes it easier and easier to continue doing so, while other tasks pile up behind it).

Your mental list of what needs done (not the same as your DTL) can become overwhelming when things pile up, making you want to hide behind one distraction after another. Completing tasks as soon as possible after you become aware of them keeps your mental list all cleared out, making you far less likely to feel overwhelmed, helping you to put off procrastinating.

Procrastination tendencies are incurable. They will be with you for the rest of your life (at least from what I have observed in other, and felt personally). Using the methods above, however, you can put procrastination off until tomorrow, and get things done today.

Author

September 18th

Goals, Motivation, Perseverance, Planning, Priorities, Timetables, Tips Tuesday

The Most Essential Ingredient Of Success

Peaceful Scene

There are an incredible number of books, articles, videos, and any other kind of media you can imagine selling you "the secret of success". Most of these methods are questionable… after all, if it were easy, then everyone would be successful, and that's clearly not the case. There is one thing, however, that IS critical to success… success in ANY field.

That one thing is awareness. There are many kinds of awareness, but there is one kind that has greater impact on your path to success in anything you attempt. That kind is awareness of self… awareness of how you make choices, how you change your subconscious tendencies, and how that determines how you see the world.

We all face an uncountable number of choices each day. With each choice that comes, you have two levels at which it can be made: subconscious or conscious. The default is subconscious, as you can plainly see if you think about it. You don't consciously choose when (or whether) to breathe, at least not normally. You don't, generally speaking, choose which letters to read in which order. Your subconscious handles all of these types of decisions…. EXCEPT when you become consciously aware of it.

When you read the paragraph above, you may have suddenly become aware of your breathing, and made a choice to hold your breath, or breathe more deeply. If you did decide to do one of those things, then your conscious mind made the decision to take over that choice temporarily from your subconscious. It will shortly pass the choices back to the subconscious as your awareness of your breathing fades.

When you become aware of a choice your conscious mind has the chance to pick the option that best aligns with your conscious goals, rather than your subconscious goals. That means that you have a much better chance of achieving success in the area where you are aware. Your conscious mind has the ability to prioritize goals much better than your subconscious… for instance, your subconscious will seldom, if ever, decide that something is more important than taking care of hunger. Your conscious mind, on the other hand, can see that going to an interview during your lunch break, and thus missing lunch, will satisfy higher priorities, like getting a better job.

Your subconscious mind makes choices based on the history of how your conscious mind has chosen in situations similar to current circumstances. Any time it doesn't have enough related decisions, it passes the choice on to your conscious mind by bringing it to your awareness. It also brings things to your awareness that your conscious mind has taught it are important.

You teach your subconscious about what is important to you by giving it your conscious attention. Whenever you think about something, you are giving it importance "points" in your subconscious. That is, if you think about something in passing one time, it will barely register as important, and your subconscious will only bring things to your awareness concerning it if they are huge, and if it's shortly after the thought. If you are constantly thinking about something, however, your subconscious will interpret that as you telling it that that something is very important, and it will pop even minor things relating to it into your awareness.

Your subconscious is not terribly smart… it's more like a computer. It does what you tell it to do, but can't make intelligent decisions on its own. What that ends up meaning is that it takes not only the content of your thoughts when determining what's important to you, but also the "polarity". That is, if you think about something in a negative way, it will bring things that relate to that thing in a negative way to your attention. If you think about it in a positive way, it will bring things that relate to that thing in a positive way to your attention.

One example of this is finances. When you think about how little money you have, what things you don't have, and how you don't seem to be getting anywhere, that's what you're telling your subconscious is important. That means that it will make you aware of things that relate to (and reflect) how little money you have, what things you don't have, etc. If, on the other hand, what you think about when it comes to your finances is how you can invest time or money to bring added benefit, that is what your subconscious mind will bring into your awareness.

For instance, let's take a situation and look at it from each perspective. Let's say a coworker tells you about his new fishing boat. Someone who looks at what they don't have feels bad, or jealous/envious, that the other guy can afford to buy a boat when they can't. Someone who looks for opportunities, on the other hand, might see it as a chance to make a friend and go fishing with them, or from a more financial side, might offer to buy the fish the coworker catches for a set rate, knowing that he can sell them for more than that.

That's the same situation, the coworker with the new boat, and two completely different ways of seeing it. The same thing happens in other areas, too, like relationships. If you think more about what's wrong with your relationship (or what's wrong with the other person), your subconscious is going to bring more of that to your attention. If, on the other hand, you think about the positive aspects of the relationship, or positive attributes of the other person, your subconscious will make you aware of things related to that. It's pretty obvious what a difference that can make in a relationship.

The good news is that you can intentionally choose to think (or not think) about a specific thing, or in a specific way. That is, you can consciously choose to look at your relationship from a positive perspective, and start teaching your subconscious that THAT is what you want brought to your attention. You can turn your thoughts away from what you lack any time they head that direction, and that will make that of less importance, thus bringing less of your lack to your attention.

By doing this, you are choosing what to be aware of. That means that you make choices in that area consciously, thus also setting "the history of how your conscious mind has chosen in situations similar to current circumstances", and changing how your subconscious handles similar situations in the future when your conscious mind is too busy to deal with it.

You can set the patterns of success consciously, and then your subconscious will automatically reinforce those patterns. You can also set the patterns of failure, and your subconscious will automatically reinforce THOSE patterns. The difference between the two is awareness… when you become aware, you can set the pattern of your choice. That just leaves choosing what success means to you… and focusing your thoughts and awareness on that meaning.

Author

August 27th

Awareness, Energy, Goals, Patterns, Polarity, Relationships, Subconscious

Journey VS Destination

When you are headed somewhere, whether in a car or in life, you have two potential statuses. You can be on your journey or at your destination. Which one is a better target upon which to focus your attention?

When you set a goal, you are setting a destination. In order to reach that destination, you must begin a journey from your current location. This may be a long journey, with many intermediate places along the way, or a very short journey, the shortest being a single step.

On a very short journey, there is little difference between the journey and the goal. There is not much upon which to focus your attention along the way, so on very short journeys the focus is really the same… it has to be on the destination because there's so little journey.

On long (or even medium) journeys, however, there is a significant difference between focusing on the destination and focusing on the journey. If you focus on the destination, it's like a race… you'll probably get there faster, but miss out on things along the way. You may miss out on other opportunities and paths that are available to you, possibly including alternative paths to the same destination, which might be more enjoyable, or even faster than your original path. You may even find out along the way that you are no longer interested in reaching the original destination… you might find something better to head toward.

There are other benefits to focusing on the journey, as well. One of these is that you can be aware of where you are now, and enjoy the scenery. Another is that you feel less urgency, and therefore less stress. You have more opportunities in general… to meet new people, have new experiences, learn new things, and to gain enjoyment from each of these things.

So focusing on the journey brings these benefits in exchange for less certainty and potentially less speed in reaching your goals. It's your choice… if you want to focus your energy on quickly reaching specific goals, then you will probably do so more rapidly and will have a more certain path. If you want to focus on the journey, you will gain many more opportunities and be able to more easily reassess your path to see if the original destination is still where you wish to go. If you enjoy personal growth, and if you are reading my web site you probably do, then the choice should be obvious.