Get Out Of Your Own Way

Do you ever think about how unfair life is? Do you often allow your emotions to get the best of you? Do you ever allow fear and anxiety to fill you, bind you up, paralyze you, and keep you from achieving all that you know down deep is yours?

If any of this describes you, I have some simple yet profound advice.

What is it? Get Out Of Your Own Way.

Exactly what do I mean by that? Precisely this....

You have already been provided all that you could ever want and need to fulfill you in this lifetime. Everything and anything that you could possible imagine, your hopes, dreams, desires, are all attainable and within your grasp, waiting for you to accept, grasp, and allow to come to you. You already possess the ability to manifest far more than sufficient quantity in the areas of money, health, and relationships. You have been provided with all the gifts you need to live and experience a life of harmony, joy, inner peace, and unlimited prosperity in whichever area that YOU CHOOSE to experience it in.

If that’s TRULY the case why do you continually fall short of realizing these abilities? Why is it that you appear to experience struggle and strife from day to day, week to week, and year to year. Why does it seem so difficult sometimes just to make ends meet?

Simply because you have not yet discovered the simple steps that it takes to learn how to get out of your own way. You have not yet discovered the truth of your TRUE unlimited potential which was supplied to you and which you have had the ability to use since the beginning of time. You have forgotten and lost sight of the REAL TRUTH concerning who and what you REALLY are and allowed the perceived hardships and limitations of day to day living to dominate your thought process, blocking the manifestation of that which you most desire to experience. You have allowed what "Appears To Be" to blind you to what "Truly Is" and instead of accepting that, you feed and nurture that which you claim that you don’t want to experience.

Re-examine the first three questions that were asked at the beginning of this article. Did you answer yes to any of them? If so, you are creating, more specifically "attracting" situations that you would rather NOT experience.

You fail to realize that the perceived hardships of today are due to seeds that you have personally sown at some point in the past. And when they show up in whatever form they do you always seek out some temporary external solution believing that it, whatever it is, will somehow fill the void, only to find that at some point in the future the same void returns and presents itself to you once again, sending you again anxiously scurrying about looking for the solutions in the external world where you have failed to find them so many times before, only to find yourself once again unfulfilled, anxious, fearful, all the time knowing that somewhere deep within that there must be a better way. If only you could find it.

You continually attempt to fix effects with effects not fully understanding the need to seek out, discover and develop the knowledge of the TRUE Source from where these effects come.

So where is this Source? Where does this place of peace and serenity exist if at all? How does one find inner peace and comfort in times of trial? When the money’s short and the bills are long, the children are sick, the relationships that you most treasure appearing to be in turmoil, how is it that one can experience peace and serenity? Where are these answers to be found that will correct what "appears" to be real?

They lie within.

Within Each And Every Person That Has The Desire And Willingness To Seek Them Out And Discover Them.

All that is required is to learn to get out of your own way and learn to quietly go within and awaken that which holds and draws to you the answers that you are seeking. To quiet the constant anxious, fearful, and worrisome internal babble that has you convinced that pending doom and disaster is lurking just around the next corner waiting to jump out and lead you down the next path of hardship, rather than placing your focus on the fulfillment of the desires, dreams and visions that you hold as dear.

So precisely how do you get out of your own way? What exactly does it mean to go within?

Here is the step by step breakdown….

• Discover the real truth concerning who and what you TRULY are.
• Take the initiative to discover and eliminate the self limiting false beliefs you have absorbed and have "allowed" to block your path.
• Replace those which you discover aren’t leading you toward the fulfillment of your deepest desires with those that will.
• Understand that when hardship "appears" to be looming that it is only that, an "Appearance" which can easily be changed.
• Understand that the thoughts, beliefs and emotions that you allow are merely seeds that you have the choice and free will to feed and nurture or ignore.
• Come to the understanding that those seeds which are planted, nurtured, and fed will grow, not only in nature but in your life and that any other outcome is impossible and would go against the Laws of Creation
• Learn to develop and express sincere gratitude for that which you experience regardless of how it may appear, fully accepting the fact that ALL THINGS work together for good. That these perceived challenges that you are experiencing today are a direct manifestation of the thoughts feelings and emotions that you have experienced at some point in the past, and merely stepping stones that will enable you to reach your desired destination.
• Begin to understand that happiness is a choice, YOUR choice, and that by choosing that, the weeds that you have allowed to grow as a result of your previous mindset will soon whither away and be replaced with the sweet fruits that result as an effect of implementing your newfound knowledge.

In a condensed version simply focus on your inner happiness regardless of external appearances and express thanks for all that you encounter along the way.

Do you have any doubt as to what is being conveyed? Try this exercise.....

The next time troublesome thoughts and emotions ignite within you, focus on them. Really look deeply and focus on what the perceived problem is. Analyze it, ponder it, and allow it to fill your entire being for just a few minutes. Now stop for a second and become aware of how you feel. Really analyze how your body feels, how clear your thinking is. etc.

Then try this.....

When a situation arises that you usually act upon as you did in the example above, this time discern first of all if there is something that you can do about it. If there is take immediate action to correct it, but only do so with the solution in mind, focusing only on the positive end result that you desire as you take the steps to complete it. If there isn’t anything that you can do at the moment, break focus from the problem. Think about a pleasant time you’ve experienced at some point in your life. A time that really gave you joy or pleasure. Allow your thoughts to shift away from what you can’t currently do anything about right now anyway and purposefully shift your focus to that pleasant experience whatever it might be. Really allow yourself to experience this pleasant memory and experience it like it was happening all over again. Now stop for a minute and analyze how your body feels. How clear is your thinking?

Do you feel the difference?

Begin to understand the simple, powerful and miraculous process of manifestation. Discover and accept the truth concerning the Unconditional Love that is yours and provides precisely what you ask based on your beliefs. Develop the self awareness to dig deeply enough to discern what those beliefs that you hold really consist of at their core. Change those which you find aren’t serving you. Don’t allow your thoughts to focus on problems that you can’t do anything about at the moment which creates self induced stress, fear and weakens your body as well as your spirit. And above all express thanks for the growth that you experience along the way.

Take immediate and focused action on that which you can change with only the solution in mind. Break focus from that which you find you can’t currently do anything about and allow yourself to experience and ponder on only pleasant things. Persevere and practice this exercise and before you know it your perceived problems will melt away like snow in springtime.

Once you have accomplished and mastered this exercise and learn to consciously and consistently use it, you will have learned what it means to "get out of your own way."

The answers you seek are readily available. All your hopes, dreams and visions for the future can and will become a reality in your life IF you’ll allow them to. Anything that you are able to conceive and hold in your mind can be and is experienced in the physical world. That which you place your focus and emphasis on whether consciously or unconsciously IS attracted to you, manifests and becomes your reality.

You are the producer and director in this movie called life. You possess the power to rewrite each scene. Become consciously aware of the script that you are writing. Allow each scene to express abundance and limitless prosperity in each area of your life and you will begin to experience just that.

Now you know what it means to Get Out Of Your Own Way. Implement what you have discovered and that which you most desire to experience in your life will be attracted to you.

You have the ability to experience Joy, Fulfillment, Inner Peace, Harmony and Limitless Prosperity in each and every area of your life.

Allow It, Receive It And Experience it.

How? It's really quite simple....Get Out Of Your Own Way.

© Chuck Danes. All rights reserved worldwide

Chuck Danes has been assisting individuals for the past 25 years in the areas of self improvement and personal development. His passion is assisting others in becoming aware of and fulfilling their unlimited potential. He is currently assisting individuals worldwide with life changing tips, techniques and resources, through both his monthly Life Enhancing newsletter, Enlightened Journey and his website at Abundance-and-Happiness.com

Law of Attraction: The Formula

“And the universe is just a big Xerox machine. It simply produces multiple copies of your thoughts.” – Neale Donald Walsch.

Law of Attraction. According to the Law of Attraction, at every moment, you are in the process of attracting to yourself whatever you are giving your attention to. You are continuously drawing into your life the essence of what you predominantly think and feel. By consciously focusing your thoughts and feelings, you can attract what you want and STOP attracting what you don’t want.

As you Think, you Feel.

As you Feel, you Vibrate.

As you Vibrate, you Attract.

The Law of Attraction responds to your vibrational offering with a matching vibrational response. Your vibrational offering is composed of your thoughts and accompanying feelings – your "Thought-Feelings." Thought-Feelings are powerful magnets, attracting into your life their vibrational equivalent.

The Formula. When you understand the Law of Attraction Formula, you understand the process of manifestation. When you apply the Law of Attraction Formula, you become the conscious creator of your own life. Here’s the formula:

Think + Feel = Attract

The Universe takes your Thought-Feelings at face value. When you focus Energy with your Thought-Feelings, the Universe doesn’t know whether you’re focusing on something you want to happen or something you’re afraid might happen. It’s important, therefore, to focus all your Energy on what you do want and avoid putting any Energy into worrying about something you don’t want.

To increase your power of attraction, get yourself to the feeling place of your desire – think and feel with great emotion how it will feel to experience the object of your desire. To become a more powerful magnet for your desires, make powerful declarative statements – I am wealthy. I am gorgeous. Everybody loves me. Everything I desire comes easily and joyfully to me. But most of all, declare with all your heart – I am absolutely and eternally wonderful and worthy of everything I desire. To make sure you’re a magnet for what you want rather than what you don’t want, the key is to always choose empowering Feel-Good Thoughts.

Attract with Feel-Good Thoughts. When you feel good, stay with it and expand on it. When you’re feeling prosperous / healthy / joyful, amplify these feelings. As you think and feel from a place of abundance, joy and confidence, you create more of the things you want. When you feel bad, shift to a thought that feels better. As you think and feel from a place of doubt, fear and insecurity, you create more of the things you do not want. When you find yourself feeling poor / unwell / sad, move away from these feelings by choosing thoughts that feel better.

You create your life moment by moment as you notice how your thoughts make you feel and then consistently choose thoughts that feel better. As you choose Feel-Good Thoughts, you take back your power to create your own life. As you apply the formula Think + Feel = Attract, you truly can be and do and have whatever you desire.

Kate Corbin is a Law of Attraction Life Coach and the creator of Gold Star Coaching. Both her coaching practice and her e-book, Dining at the Cosmic Café: How to Be and Do and Have Whatever You Desire, http://www.goldstarcoaching.com/ebook.html are designed to empower you to truly live the life of your dreams. To contact Coach Kate, check out her e-book, and subscribe to Magical Musings, visit http://www.goldstarcoaching.com/

Manifestation and the Importance of Living in the Present

Do you sometimes observe your mind? In the ancient Vedic scripture Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna says to Arjuna “One must deliver himself with the help of his mind, and not degrade himself. The mind is the friend of the conditioned soul, and his enemy as well. For him who has conquered the mind, the mind is the best of friends; but for one who has failed to do so, his mind will remain the greatest enemy.”

When you start observing your mind first thing you might notice is that you don’t control it. How many times you have read something, sometimes even trying to really concentrate on the subject, but then you caught yourself thinking about something completely different at the same time?

You can observe your mind, because you are not your mind, as you are not your body (This article is not about “You are not your body” subject. I wrote more about it in “Introduction to Manifestation”)

To manifest what you want you need to control your mind. You need to concentrate, meditate and visualize often. You need to focus on the things you want to manifest. If you allow your mind to jump freely from one subject to another, like a monkey from tree to tree, it will take you long time to achieve your goals.

One aspect of this is importance of living in the NOW. You can notice that we often think about the past, and when we think about the past we tend to think about “old good times”. There are not “old good times”. We simply forget about bad times and think about good times mostly, because it allows us to escape from the present reality and live in happy illusion.

The point is that the past, happy or sad is dead. We can’t change it. It also doesn’t have any value for our manifesting purposes. Of course we can hopefully learn from our past mistakes, but that’s it, otherwise dwelling on the past is just a waste of time.

If we don’t think about the past we usually think about the future. Often we are afraid of the future, sometimes we look at the future with hope. But the future is made in the present. We need to start living in the present and concentrate on the present. We need to be happy now. If we are happy now, we build our happy future. Because of that it is very important to gradually control the mind and to live in the now; try to be happy now.

We can easily change our mind’s states. We can listen to some good music which we like, we can think about someone we love or we can look at something beautiful. Whatever helps you to feel happy, and the most important we can visualize the things we want in the future as already achieved.

A good way to get in the good mood is to do some simple yogic breathing exercises, which very quickly help to achieve peace and control of the mind.

Another good way is to practice gratitude for the things you have and the things you would like to have. You cannot feel unhappy when you feel grateful.

There are many different methods, but to start manifesting the things you want easily and quickly it’s good to find a good mentor or course, and follow the instructions. Reading about manifestation, the law of attraction and self improvement is always good, but the best is to take action and apply what you have learned.

The author is a teacher and an internet marketer. His hobbies are manifestation, self improvement and Forex currency trading. His manifestation website is http://www.manifestwealthmentor.com, where you can get free manifestation and self improvement e-books and reports.

The Extraordinary Few

Who am I that I could make a change? How can I make a difference?

Throughout history, it has not been those who have asked the questions that have made their mark on history, but those who took the next step. Those who have taken action.

Look around you. All intelligent human life can see what is going on around them. We all know what the questions are with regards to what needs to be done.

And for the most part, we all know the answers, as well. We know the answers because we are intelligent human life. The problem is, the answers usually aren’t easy choices. Easy choices or easy solutions would have already been done. But the answers we know require thought, preparation, effort, and sometimes, sacrifice.

That is why problems and challenges still exist. Too few of us “intelligent human beings” are willing to step forward, take a risk, accept the criticism, and make a difference.

Risk and criticism follow anyone who is willing to step forward and choose to make a difference. We make mistakes. None of us are perfect. But the individual who is willing to try, who is willing to fight the status quo, who is willing to reach and stretch and work for a better world is the one whom the masses will follow.

Look at all the truly great people of the earth. They didn’t just wake up one morning and say, “Today, I’m going to become a hero or heroine.” They just simply decided that if a particular change was going to happen, they were going to have to to be the one to do it!

And then they acted on their decision, and the rest, as they say, is history.

The secret is not in knowing something needs to be done, but in deciding to be the one to do it. It’s a very thin line of decision that separates the average from the extraordinary.

You are meant to be great. You are meant to be one of the extraordinary few!

Only you can make it happen.

Bob Curtis has a bachelor's degree in Psychology, and has been writing about the elements of relationships for a number of years. He is the manager of the Essential Sunshine Association, a new website for positive relationship development at http://www.essun.blogspot.com

8 Ways to Transform Your Life

Transforming our lives into “purpose” can be a most rewarding process. It can be one of the most challenging, as well. Living our lives with purpose means we must live in the moment, not in the past, nor in the future. It means to live consciously in the moment. That is the challenge! Too many of us live in the world of “what ifs” or in the world of “coulda, woulda, shouldas.” If you live in the world of regrets, you will fail to see the possibilities, hope and transforming energy in your life.

The following “8 Ways to Transforming Your Life” are suggestions you can use to find purpose in each and every day of your life. The suggestions are not some magical formula, nor anything extraordinary; they are simply purposeful actions that each of us can do on a daily basis to help us find purpose, meaning, and create transforming moments within our lives.

1. Journaling. Ah, the old practice of journaling! A simple tool, but most effective. Getting our thoughts out of our head onto paper is a most helpful tool. It has the potential to give you clarity around your thinking. It allows you to put your thinking into perspective and create a space for redirecting negative thoughts.

2. Thinking Your Self Happy. Most of us have heard the saying, “Fake it until you make it!” “Thinking your self happy” is another twist of that phrase. Happiness starts with our thinking. Thinking is the catalyst for our feelings; our feelings are the catalyst for our actions. Happiness starts from within; it does not have to be dependent upon the externals of our lives. Create happiness by thinking “Happy!” Smile more, laugh more, and think good thoughts.

3. Live for Today. Think about this for a moment. Can we really have our thoughts dwelling on the past or focused on the future, if we are to live for today? To live our life with purpose, we can only live in the moment. The past is lessons taught and the future never arrives; only the present moment arrives. Our choices today will influence the next “moment” when it arrives. We can’t tackle the tomorrows; we can only deal with today. Choose to live today with purpose.

4. Make a Plan. What a simple, yet most effective process. The “To Do List!” I call it the determination list, things I’m determined to do today. There is something edifying about creating and accomplishing a “Determination Plan of the Day.” By doing so, we begin to make better choices about living out the day; we recognize and better appreciate our responsibilities, we don’t just float through the day, but live it consciously; and we can eliminate indecisive living. We take charge of our lives, rather than letting life take charge of us.

5. Honor Your Mind. One of the key tools in helping prevent or reduce the effects of some forms of dementia, such as Alzheimer’s disease, is keeping the mind active. Be determined to learn something new today; read something that you’ve been wanting to read for some time; create something new. Exercising the mind is like exercising the body; we need to put some exertion into it to make it count.

6. Renew Your Spirit. Our spirit is always in need of attention. It finds pleasure in finding purpose in our daily interactions with others. Be determined to do something for someone else today without expecting recognition for your good deed. Givers gain! Love always comes back to us if we give it away freely. Center yourself in prayer, meditation, or through a simple, quiet reflective walk. Reflect on the moment and relish it. Connect with your higher power.

7. Invigorate Your Body. Nourish your body today with exercise, good food, and healthy choices. Walking is the best form of exercise and the most accessible for most of us. Begin with short walks, making your walks over the weeks into longer more meaningful treks. Drink lots of water, your body will love you for it. Decide to kick a bad habit that is abusing your body by creating an alternative habit that is healthy.

8. Create a Quiet Space. Consciously create quiet time for yourself within your day. Connect with your higher power and get a better perspective on the things that challenge you. Reflect on the people you are blessed to have in your life and give thanks for the abundance God gives you each day. Renew your positive energy by meditating on your blessings of the day and strengthen your resolve to live a purposeful, conscious life.

“Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in life has purpose.” – Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, M.D.

Horizons Unlimited Life Coaching Services
http://www.horizonsunlimitedlifecoach.com

How To Create A Happiness Habit

When you wake-up in the morning do you say: “Oh God...it’s morning” or do you day “Thank God it’s morning and I look forward to today.” Why are some people so happy and optimistic and other so unhappy and pessimistic?

Are you frequently in a bad mood or just plan unhappy? There are easy ways to beat the blues or even a bad day. Good moods or a peppy personality is not a disposition you are born with or without. You are not doomed to stay unhappy the rest of your life. Your level of happiness is a learned skill. It’s easy to learn. Anyone can learn to bust a bad mood or look at the world through more happy or optimistic eyes. Do you want to improve your mood or become more happy and optimistic? If so, read on.

In our studies of happy and optimistic people for our book, “SPONTANEOUS OPTIMISM: Proven Strategies for Health, Prosperity & Happiness”, and as a result of our coaching to help people boost their happiness, we discovered key methods they use to stay ultra-motivated. This motivation fuels their ability to accomplish their goals and, ultimately, attain their vision. I will show you these methods so you can put them into action to become more healthy, prosperous, and happy. We call this Positive Mind ConditioningTM. Importantly, these are totally learnable techniques and skills. You do not have to be born this way. Also, you do not have to worry that it is too late in your life to grasp it. All you need to do is practice these skills each day so you can benefit. You will learn five essentials of making yourself ultra-motivated.

In this article you will learn the five essentials of Positive Mind ConditioningTM. In the next article (stayed tuned), I will teach you techniques to use for more conditioning your mind to feel happy and optimistic and also the key to optimism and happiness in your life.

5 Essentials To Feel Ultra-Motivated

You can supercharge your motivation when you use the five essentials underlying all motivation, ambition, and drive. These elements form the foundation for you continuously feeling motivated.

To benefit, simply keep these essentials in mind all day every day. Eventually, they will turn into beneficial habits. They enable you to maximize your power to achieve whatever you set out to do. Importantly, using these essentials also help you work smarter, not harder. With them, you harness your mental energy to complete tasks quicker and in a more creative, positive manner.

Essential #1: You Can Only Have 1 Thought at a Time

This is the key to feeling optimistic, enjoying your life, and fulfilling your vision for a delightful life. You only can keep one thought in your head at a time. This is one of the most powerful yet under publicized insights in psychology.

Question: So, what should your one thought be?
Answer: Dwell on what you want to accomplish.

Do not dwell on what you do not want.

This is one of the easiest ways to keep negative thoughts out of your mind. You crowd them out. After all, if you keep thinking positive, optimistic and uplifting thoughts, you cannot simultaneously focus on negative, depressing or upsetting thoughts.

In fact, intriguing psychological research even shows that people who focus on positive experiences can put up with more discomfort than people who do not dwell on positive, pleasant thoughts. Eventually, by putting this essential into action, you weed out any sprouting negative thoughts.

To see how magnificently this essential works, do two experiments with yourself. First, the next time a negative thought crosses your path, immediately think of your goals or a delightful experience.

Second, do random checks on your thoughts. A few times during your next five days, occasionally pause. Check to see if you are thinking pessimistic or optimistic thoughts. If you are thinking negative thoughts, you now know what to do!

Essential #2: Expect the Best

What are you thinking about? Do you have a goal or an exciting vision for living you life? Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "A man is what he thinks about all day long."

Generally as you begin your day or a project, your frame-of-mind proves extremely important. It is this simple:

If you start a day or task with a

* positive belief that you will succeed, you increase your

chances that you will figure out ways to assure a

successful outcome

* negative belief that you may fail, your belief makes it

much harder to build up your motivation to succeed

The moral that what you expect will materialize in reality.

Let us look at it a little differently. Everyone has noticed some pessimistic people seem like an accident waiting to happen. And, lo and behold, many pessimistic, complaining people ram into all sorts of potholes.

In contrast, you probably have observed some people for whom success seems to come somewhat easily. These people almost invariably tend to be optimistic people. They expect the best and keep their minds focused on what they want. Through some cosmic vibrations, they draw to themselves people and opportunities that prove helpful. It almost seems like they are magnets, attracting what they want into their lives. By constantly expecting the best, they get exactly what they expect. So, carefully choose what you expect, because you may get it.

Essential #3: Strong Ambition

Wishy-washy people do not go very far. They get swayed by whatever crosses their paths. In contrast, the people who move mountains, people who get things done, are people who feel a profound sense of mission. They dive into their projects with gusto. I believe that every highly successful person is a maniac on a mission.

The finest way to develop strong ambition is for you to think about your goals, ambitions and things you want many, many times each day. Again, think about what you want and specifically what you need to do to get it. This is like adding logs to a burning fire. Your intense dwelling on what you want builds incredibly strong ambition in you.

I know how powerful this method is from personal experience. As my husband and I built our businesses from scratch, we encountered many challenges and roadblocks that easily could have thrown cold water on our ambition. Using this essential method of Positive Mind ConditioningTM always gave us hope, purpose, and reason to keep plugging away. We still remember innumerable times when we kept our spirits up by smiling and saying aloud, "We're maniacs on a mission!"

Essential #4: Gumption to Change How You Think

The way you handle situations has served you to some degree. Now, you have a tremendous opportunity to feel more confident and optimistic than you ever may have dreamed possible. To do this, we recommend you adopt or adapt some essentials of Positive Mind ConditioningTM. This can unleash your energy and hone your focus on what you most want.

The difficulty in doing this is the seemingly "natural" tendency to slip back into your old ways of doing things. Some people call this a rut or the "comfort zone." Whatever you call it, you probably continually have certain habits that you would do better without. Now, you can seize your opportunity to do things a bit differently.

For example, starting now you can create a finer, more exciting future for yourself just by starting to

* dwell on positive thoughts of what you want -- and

avoid dwelling on negative thoughts of what you do not want

* expect the best

* act like a maniac on a mission

To do this, you need the gumption to change or improve some of your habitual ways of thinking.

When you hear new information on a subject, don't you sometimes change your opinion on the matter? This is similar. You can continue your habitual ways of using your brain. Or, you can inject these Positive Mind ConditioningTM methods into your daily activities. And you get to reap all the benefits of more productive ways of thinking and feeling. Remember: "Happiness is a choice, not an automatic response."

Essential #5: Persistence

Persistence is a key to feeling happy. Fascinating research done at Stanford University proves that persistent people achieve more than their less persistent colleagues

In a large study they found that children who had exhibited the ability to persist and delay gratification, stood out as much more competent human beings than the children who grabbed the marshmellows. The children with persistence were more

* assertive

* confident

* likely to pursue challenges

* able to handle frustrations

* likely not to give up when encountering obstacles

* willing to start and complete projects

This study shows that impulsive people are less likely to succeed in life than people who delay gratification. Or, to put it another way, people who persist achieve more than people who want their rewards before they finish a project.

You can use this information to help yourself. Successful people persist. They keep plugging away even though they may not see the immediate benefits or rewards of their hard-work. People with stick-to-itiveness are much more likely to get what they want -- eventually -- than people who want it now.

An interesting example of persistence in action occurs every year. About once a year, statistics are released about how many new businesses failed. In general, new businesses close down during their first two years of existence. Businesses that persist for two or more years in business are much less likely to fold.

Usually such figures are displayed to illustrate how many businesses fail. I found it more useful to put this in another light. Probably what is happening is that entrepreneurs who are impulsive and refuse to delay gratification cannot stand to keep plugging away for more than a year or two. At that point, since they have not made their fortune, they close shop.

In sharp contrast, entrepreneurs who delay gratification -- who acknowledge that business success may take many years -- persist. They keep focused on doing whatever they need to do to grow their businesses, although it may take them years to achieve key business goals.

When my husband and I started our consulting and training businesses, a very successful businessperson told us, "It takes about five years to become successful in your own business."

As we each tackled zillions of challenges and obstacles, we often comforted ourselves with our belief that this self-made millionaire knew what he was talking about. He was right. Actually, it took us a bit more than five years to achieve the level of success we envisioned. Importantly, what would we have achieved if we had thrown in the towel too early?

By disciplining yourself to keep working toward your goals until you reach them, you develop well-deserved self-esteem and confidence. These are hallmarks of every happy and optimistic person. Remember what Benjamin Franklin once said, "Diligence is the mother of good luck."

© Copyright 2006 Maryann Troiani, Psy.D.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Mary_Ann_Troiani

Change your mind and the rest will follow!

"Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”

- GEORGE BERNARD SHAW -

Change has a very negative connotation for most people. On a deep emotional level we are creatures of comfort and we automatically seek out that which feels good in the moment. We long for comfort and this usually comes from that which we know; that which is familiar to us. Once we can comfortably deal with and "know" all the "unknowns" we can "relax" – because your nervous system and your mind is designed to find and attach a meaning(s) to everything and therefore something new is always a confrontation between that which is and that which will be in your mind.

The unknown is always something that your mind and your nervous system has to "unravel" afresh and this very process feels uncomfortable on many levels. When something becomes comfortable you get used to it as you remove all the "unknowns" and your automatic behaviour can take over again. Our nervous system works primarily by conditioning and by repetition we notice and assume patterns that are consistent. This system is really there to serve us in helping us being more efficient and to be able to do more, more efficiently. Your mind is designed to always look for the best way. Through repetition we learn certain orders and sequences in which things happen and we learn to recognize and respond according to these sequences. Every emotion you experience, for instance, is nothing but the result of a sequence of events and reactions triggered by your unconscious awareness that generates and creates the actual feeling which is nothing but a sensation in your nervous system.

To change anything you must first of all become aware of these patterns. You must become aware of what goes on under the surface of your conscious awareness. This is not difficult and everybody can do this. You need not understand everything about the human nervous system to use it. Simply be aware of the fact that there is a part of you that responds and acts "automatically" based on your past experiences and associations. The challenge is to go from one pattern, one that does not serve you, to one which does. You quite literally would have to change your mind in that you have to change the way you perceive yourself and your life. Doing things differently will feel uncomfortable at first, but you can rest assured that the "uncomfortable" will become "comfortable" as you start to form new associations and new patterns of association.

The process of making the "uncomfortable" comfortable or making the "unknown" known is the way we grow as human beings. What you are comfortable with represents your comfort zone which includes all the experiences that you can comfortably deal with. If you don't expand this "zone" then you simply won't expand yourself as a person. The need to grow and become more as a person, is a deep emotional need that all humans have. Without growth you simply won't be happy. All growth, although it feels uncomfortable in the moment always feels immensely fulfilling in the long term and it is this feeling that we all really crave for; the feeling that we call "good". You can do something that feels comfortable and "good" in the moment by staying with what you know, but true fulfilment comes from pushing beyond your comfort zone and creating a sense of pride in yourself. Growth means change and change involves risk and risk is the process of stepping from the known to the unknown.

The truth is that all of life is constantly in a process of change. Nothing ever stays the same. It is the nature of all of life, including you. Even if you do nothing life will still change. For you to progress, you have to decide to consciously initiate and create the change. You have to consciously put yourself in the uncomfortable place where you can grow and as you do this you progress. Progress is by choice while change is automatic. To be in control of your life you have to consciously choose to change and to keep changing yourself to become the person you want to be.

All change starts with a change of mind. You have to start by changing your thoughts about want you want to change. In changing the way you think about something you immediately change your perception and consequently the way you feel about it. When you change the way you feel you change your behaviour and that is how you progress. Constantly trying to change behaviour will rarely create long term and lasting change. Change your mind and the rest will follow! If you don't change then you simply won't grow and if you don't grow you are not really living.

This article is published with the permission of the author, Deon Du Plessis. He is the founder of The Self Improvement Gym, and author (in)action, a groundbreaking new action guide on eliminating procrastination. For more of his in-depth insights into personal development and access to his free self improvement library visit http://www.The Self Improvement – Gym.com