Perfect Happiness?

So you want to create a better life that you love but what is realistic in terms of happiness?

Primo Michele Levi was an Italian Jewish writer, who spent a year as a prisoner in the Auschwitz concentration camp. He experienced some of the toughest times imaginable. In his book "If this is a Man" he shared his view of happiness:-

"Sooner or later in life, everyone discovers that perfect happiness is unrealisable, but there are few who stop to consider the antithesis; that perfect unhappiness is equally unattainable".

Makes you think doesn't it? Humans can demonstrate incredible strength and resilience, and find some happiness in the most appalling situations.

Perfect happiness is not then a realistic target but imagine if your life was ideal and every day full of "sunshine and joy". It sounds wonderful but would you appreciate it? Sometimes it's only when you go through bad times or have bad days, that you then value the good ones so you need some balance in your life.

And what should we be satisfied with? What should we be content with? As part of his "Motivation Theory", Abraham Maslow described man as a wanting animal who is rarely satisfied for any length of time. He said that once one desire is satisfied, another one will pop up to take its place so that throughout our lives, we will always want something else.

We therefore need to be aware that what we want and what makes us happy will depend on where we are in life and which needs are currently being met.

To help you improve your chances of finding happiness, think about who you spend your time with - and how they make you feel. What would they say if they knew you wanted to change your life? Would they be supportive or dismissive of your desire to change your life?

If you are part of a group who are very down and anti-everything, it's easy to get pulled along on their wave of negative energy. You listen to what they say and you are influenced by their messages. Conversely, if you mix with people who are optimistic and positive, you are far more likely to be positive yourself. The group will see the good in any situation and will maintain a positive stance despite issues that they may face. They are also more likely to support you in any changes you wish to make - rather than to hold you back or to belittle your attempts at self improvement.

Now I'm not saying that you should "dump" your negative friends. Just become more aware of the impact they have on you and learn to manage the impact they have.Take time to consider the people you spend time with and how you feel when you leave them. If its negative, do think about how you can change that and when you want to see those people. If it's positive, then just let it rub off and enjoy it!

Take some time to think about what makes you happy and see if you can come up with three simple changes you could make to increase your contentment. And do it now - because you only get one life!

You Can!

It is entirely possible to always adopt a positive frame of mind. This can be aided through changing our mindset, paying attention to the language that we use and standing guard over our belief systems.

A positive mental attitude is a powerful prerequisite for motivating ourselves to live the lives that we so richly deserve. It is a must. A positive attitude is a prerequisite for achievement. Without it, little is possible.

Positive expectancy leads to a life that can be lived with complete fulfillment. We will be much more inclined to live a life of joy, focusing on doing what we want to and doing whatever it takes to achieve that, rather than living a life of fear and worry focusing on all of the 'disasters' that may befall us. The truth is, these 'disasters' may befall us and they may not. As we know, we get what we focus on. This may seem like a cliché and yet the reality of it cannot be denied. The key really is not so much about whether 'disaster' may befall us, rather, it is what we do with the 'disaster', how we respond to it, and that is really what makes the difference.

Being positively focused does not mean that you will not feel down sometimes. It does mean though, that these times become fewer and last for shorter amounts of time. It also means that in that place of not feeling entirely positive it is possible to be in that place for that short time knowing that you will come through it.

I know when I am feeling positive and being positive, it feels like all things are possible. I have many of my best thoughts, my best ideas from this place of positive energy, positive focus. I step into a place of no limits, where all of my limiting beliefs just wash away. An attitude of gratitude is also very significant here. Being grateful for the many lessons and many blessings that life brings us enables us to get stronger, even though in the moment of the lessons (that can otherwise be called challenges) it might not feel as though they are strength-building experiences. I believe that we are never given more than we can bear and in the moments of what might feel like life-threatening, soul-destroying experiences I do take time out to remember that, no matter what, I can handle it because of my fundamental belief that we are never given more than we can handle.

I have recognised that I do have a huge ability to achieve great heights in whatever I choose to do. Residing in this place of certainty enables me to know this beyond any doubt, and it is the power of positive focus that helps me know this. It elevates me to another plane. Being positively focused takes me out of complaining and into taking matters into my own hands to make things the way I want them to be. The questions that I ask myself are entirely different when I am in a positively focused place to when I am a place of negativity. The focus really is on, what can I do here and now to take me to the next level? What do I need to do to enable me to positively focus on coming up with a solution? How can I creatively address this challenge/situation/problem? What do I need to do to get the outcome I want? What do I need to do right now? What can I ask others to do?

The more I locate myself in the landscape of YES I want to do this, then the question of how becomes my focus, rather than... I want to do this, it feels impossible so I won't even attempt it. Do I falter sometimes? Yes, I do, of course I do. Do I get up and dust myself off and get on with it? Absolutely.

It is stunning how many people wire their brain to focus on the impossibility of it all, as they perceive it. When we do this, what comes through are all the reasons that make what you think you can't. We need to stand guard over our internal dialogue, the dialogue that sabotages the will of our best endeavors.

Some of the internal dialogue that is very prevalent and recognised by many, centres chiefly on not being enough, as in....

o I'm not intelligent enough

o I haven't got enough money

o I haven't got the support

o I don't want to do it on my own

o I won't succeed

This list could go on forever. In creating these limiting beliefs in our own minds, all that is being done here is that we are creating a false scenario of fear. We need to find ways to effectively manage this fear.

Follow Your Heart!

Failing to identify your purpose is like being on a ship without anyone steering it to the chosen destination. It will end up anywhere.The key to finding your purpose in life is to follow your heart and do what you really LOVE to do! That's it!! When you wake up to this truth, you will find everything changes because you're doing what you were put here for in the first place.

How?

By looking within. Some of you will already know what your passion is, but will find it difficult to step out the box. But its time to listen to that inner voice. At this point it will be time to put your negative thoughts about yourself aside and start entertaining a positive outlook on knowing that finding your purpose means it can be achieved.

Don't live someone else's dream. When you have figured out what your purpose is you must NOT let anyone 'steal' it by their opinions, too often people are more concerned with what others might think Instead of doing what they want. I used to be so conscious about what others would be thinking of me, the actions I took and the things I would say. So as a result I would not be living as the real me!

Finding your purpose will lead you to have a vision. Your vision is the route you take in steps to complete you purpose. Your vision will lead to the end goal. In order to reach your goal you must set short-term goals in order to keep you on track

"Where There is no Vision The People Perish." ~ Bible

You may feel like you cannot earn money doing what you love to do. There's no need to just give everything up that would be silly (unless you can afford to do this) but there is always downsizing. Work a part-time job so you are earning enough to live off while you have the time to pursue you life's purpose.

Be ambitious and don't give up! Finding your purpose can change your life overnight if you would just be committed in taking the first step - making a decision to follow your dreams!

"What a different story people would have to tell if they would adopt a definite purpose and stand by that purpose until it had time to become an all-consuming purpose." -Napoleon Hill 

Do What You Have To Do!

What is it that makes you come alive? What is it that makes you feel like you are truly living the sort of unique and inspired life you feel that you were born to live?

 So few of us ever really live a life of purpose and passion. The reasons for that are not as simple as most new age self help books want you to believe.

Your defining life purpose is revealed through adventure, trial and error and the spiritual evolution that comes naturally through living life. Do things you know you love and that make you feel alive, awake and inspired to share with others.

I believe that the secret to living... is GIVING. Sharing what it is that you truly love to do.By discovering your gifts in a way that best serves others, and that makes the world a better and brighter and more enlightened place, your true light reveals itself as well.

As a matter of fact, statistically... people who are in service oriented industries, and those who help others through teaching, or nursing, or mentoring or advising in a capacity that helps folks overcome obstacles are some of the MOST likely people to believe they are enjoying the sort of life they were destined to live (and conversely, people in positions that are primarily financially driven or economically oriented, are the LEAST likely to feel they are living on purpose... and have some of the highest levels of regret later in life as well).

I believe that the best way to discover your true mission in life is to start by believing that there is a genuine reason you are here. Believe in something bigger than yourself, and that there is some sort of karma that continues on after this life is over.

People who have near death experiences, for example... and "see the light" almost universally come back believing that their lives are meaningful and that they were sent back to fulfill some unique mission that they had not yet discovered, or equally as often, had not pursued (even though they knew what it was).

What do YOU believe? What is your life's true purpose? Have you discovered it? The truth is, once you awaken to the idea that your life is bigger, broader and more meaningful than you imagined, only then, do we truly live a life we love.

How To Find Your Life's Purpose.

"Why am I here?" is probably one of the most asked questions whenever someone gives a thought to his or her own existence. This may be an ancient question but only a few really know the answer. What we do know is that each person has a different purpose and that purpose always points to something that will make your life and the life of others become more fulfilling. So if you're on the path to finding that purpose, here are some of the ways to get you started.

Find out the things that you love doing. It all starts with love. What do you love doing? What is the good that you do every day that makes your blood boil with joy? Find that out and keep it in mind forever. For example, I love knowledge, I love improving myself, and I love helping other people. These are the good things that I know I will never stop acquiring and doing that can make lives better. It gave me a higher sense of satisfaction so that became a purpose.

Look for the people who complete you. These are persons that you have or will have in your life that make you whole. It can be your spouse, your children, a family member, or a very dear friend. If their absence makes you incomplete or if your absence makes them incomplete, then you have found a purpose.

Embrace your talents. If you have a talent and you love doing it then by God, embrace it and keep doing it. If you have a talent for painting then paint your own masterpiece. Writing? Keep your imagination running wild and write something wonderful. You love to sing? Then sing your heart out. Embrace your talents and keep on creating something that comes from your heart. That is a purpose.

Find out what is lacking. This isn't about focusing on the negative part of your life but rather it is about opening your eyes to things that you can help improve. Look around you and see for yourself. Do you like the way you are living now? If not, then make it your purpose to improve it. Do you feel unhealthy? Then make it your purpose to be truly healthy. Always strive to make things better. Make that your purpose.

Work on your legacy. If you die today, do you have anything to leave behind that will help people remember you for generations to come? No? Then I suggest that you start working on your legacy while you still can. Famous and legendary people like Albert Einstein or Steve Jobs are remembered because they left something behind that benefit the lives of others. These are their legacies. What is your legacy? Make that your purpose in life.

Our purpose in life is like a fuel that keeps us going. It is what drives us to make our existence more meaningful. Purpose is what makes us a human-being. So go out there and live your life and find your purpose.

Attitude For Success. 

Having positive thoughts is one of the main keys to success. Thoughts attract circumstances and people towards us. Through the Law of Attraction our dominating thoughts create the life that we live in. We become our own creator through our thoughts. Whether we realize it or not we're responsible for what has happened in our life, what is happening and what we are about to experience in our lives.

"Change your thoughts and you change your world". ~Norman Vincent Peale

Our dominating thoughts are the medium which we attract what we desire. Unfortunately most of us have let this go autopilot. We've failed to take possession of our own mind. The undesirable circumstances that we experienced are not the conspiracy of some power that wants to punish us. Rather it's the outcome of our own continuous thoughts and believes. Negative thoughts attract negative circumstances and positive thoughts attract desirable circumstances.Thoughts of fear, hatred, jealousy, worry, doubts, anger etc. creates circumstances that reinforces these emotions.Thoughts of love, gratitude, self- confidence, faith, happiness brings about similar circumstances.

I've known people who have gone through difficult times. Even after these trying times are over they kept reminding themselves of the hardships, broken relationships and erosion of respect from society. They just refuse to come out from their rut. By constantly occupying their thoughts with negativity they dig their own hole even deeper.Dwelling in self-pity and wallowing in worry and complaining of past and current negative situation have never helped nor will help anyone. That's the law and that's the way it is and that's the way it will be!

We can both go against the nature's flow and perish or we can go along the nature's flow and flourish.
We can either follow the path of failure or we can follow the path of success. Following the path of success need deliberate, conscious effort- constant effort in fine tuning our thoughts but taking the path of dissatisfaction and frustration requires no such efforts.We can either walk the road of frustration, disappointment and misery or we can walk the road of happiness, satisfaction and wealth.

How exactly do we do that?

Through positive thinking; through constantly dominating our thoughts with optimism; through getting aware of our thoughts and feelings and transforming any negative thoughts or feeling to positive ones.Whenever you feel down, whenever you have negative emotions, stop and ask yourself why you are feeling this way.There are only two things you can do. Either you can allow yourself to feel the negative emotions or take a little effort to neutralize them with positive ones.

Get away from any environment that gives you the negative feelings.Think about things or people that make you feel good. Do the things that help you to get rid of the undesirable feelings-like listening to your favorite music, playing with your pet or reading a book.For some, they prefer to think about their future success. They imagine and dream about the life style that they want and feel them as if they're already achieved.They feel so happy and satisfied that they take control of their own mind and think what they want to think rather than allowing the environment to affect them negatively.

With great optimism and positive mental attitude come the powers to direct the mind to whatever goals you have. As optimism take over, aid comes from unexpected direction. With positive thoughts come positive circumstances!

Prepare Your Steps!

Personal development is a process, and because it's a process planning it should be organized and well thought of in order for it to be successful. This article will be showing you a guide on fully planning and completing your venture for self-improvement.

Self Evaluate!
First step is self-evaluation. Take note of all your strengths and weaknesses. In this process make sure to be unbiased and totally honest. Keep in mind that this will be the foundation of the whole process. Therefore make sure the results are accurate and true. You can also asks opinions from people who are close to you, because there are some parts about ourselves that we don't usually notice but is very noticeable from another person's view-point.



Determine!
The first step is done; now, the second step in the whole process would be determining which strengths and weaknesses you plan to develop. Prioritize which you need to do first or which you can do together.


Strategize!
In this step you will need to formulate a plan or strategy in improving yourself. Since you already know what specifics thing would you like to improve about yourself, you will need to plan specific interventions on those things, and also in this stage you need to clearly state the goals you want to achieve and how you can evaluate these goals after the end of the whole process.


Application!
Here's comes the hardest part, since you've already fully plan the things you need to do. This is the stage to put your plans into actions. Remember, this is the hardest part and if you don't properly do the plans you need to put into action, chances will be very high that you won't be successful. Also a point to remember here is not to give, there might be times in which you will fail to fully follow your plan, but don't let this get you. Give yourself some chances to commit mistakes, just make sure to do your best to not let it happen again.


Appraise!
This stage is the evaluation stage, as I've mentioned in the planning stage to put how to specifically evaluate the goals you want to achieve. This is the stage that you will be doing it. Verify if the goals you want to achieve were met. If by any chance they weren't, don't let this upset you. You just need to retrace the steps that you've taken. Check which part didn't allow you to achieve your goals. If you've already found it, reformulate a better plan and go through with the process again and again until you succeed in personal development.


Following these steps will help you in achieving your goal to achieve your quest in personal development, but remember that the path of self-development in itself is personal. Therefore, if you develop your own method to develop yourself without these steps, then you can also do that. Each person has his own style. This guide is more of a generic guide that you can use.

Let's Improve.

In order to develop self-esteem and build self-confidence, you must appreciate the fact that you are not superhuman! Realize that you cannot always make everything better, but that you can change certain things.

"The Serenity Prayer" puts it like this...God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference.

Here Is What You Can Do;

Take responsibility for your actions. Developing a successful attitude, rather than showing low self-esteem, means to accept responsibly for your own failures as well as your own victories. Therefore you will know that it is down to you to do well in life or not.

Discover your inner personality. It is a step in the right direction to discover the root cause of why you often feel the way you do. Truly knowing yourself and your inner problems is the first step in achieving your goals in your life.

Deal with your problems. Will help you if you are struggling against low self-esteem and aid you to act with the confidence you need in your day-to-day life. You may need to seek professional help to effectively deal with a major problem. You can then move on and develop other good qualities in yourself. You can develop self-esteem and build self-confidence simply by finding out why you act the way you do.

Change the thoughts in your subconscious mind. By conditioning your mind, you will change your subconscious thoughts without having to think about it, you will then automatically behave and act the way you want to. Studies prove that that is exactly what happens!

The Benefits Of Positivity!

The strength of positive thinking is a tool that makes one's life brighter and more positive. Positive thoughts encourage good health, good relationships and happiness. A good life cannot be achieved by having positive approach for a few minutes, instead; you need to have positive thoughts throughout your life. You should submit your life to thinking and promise yourself to remain positive throughout your life. Your action not only brings a great change in your life but affects the people around you. Positive thoughts are not only achieved by repeating certain positive lines to yourself for some minutes... you need to make it your regular practice. This will bring a positive effect into your life. 

It will be noticed that after some time the uncertainties and doubts will fade away and rays of will spread all over your life. Before doing anything always imagine the desired result of what you are going to do. Always visualize in your mind what you want to happen, you would be taken aback by the results. Try to add the words like will, able, can etc to your vocabulary to spread and to let positivity penetrate your whole mind and soul.

You will see positive results spreading out over the whole environment. You can impress people with your positive approach. Your thoughts can also boost your relationship with your friends, family and co-workers. This will make you amazed at your quick gain of reputation as an optimistic person. 

While talking, try to use the words that promote positivity, success and happiness. In this way your positivity not only affects you positively but it also leaves positive marks on the life of the people in your surroundings.

Try to keep yourself around positive people and avoid being in the company of people who you always find whining, complaining and spreading negativity. Try to help those people in thinking positively and eradicating negative thoughts from their mind. Always try to confine your thoughts and mind to positivity and try not to think negatively in any way. Whenever you find anyone complaining, try to find the solution to their problems and tell them to start thinking positively.
Try to help people in thinking positively and eradicating negative thoughts from their mind!

Aspire To Be The Best. 

You should always aspire to becoming the best. Your passion should always lead you to aspire to greatness. The fact is that we may never be the absolute best at a single thing, but we can aspire to be an inspiration to others in our fields. Always attempt to boost your worth in the field you work in, then enjoy what it does for your self-esteem.

When you are engaging in the personal development process, experiencing failure often deals a damaging blow to your self-concept. Actually, failure is really a learning experience. It shows you what your strengths and your weaknesses are. In that sense, every failure should be a point of pride for you, as you have uncovered another piece of your personal puzzle.

If you notice that you are consistently failing to meet your goals and live up to expectations, you should attempt to diagnose the probable causes. Find out some ideas online and look to others who have similar expectations. You also might find that your goals are indeed not realistic, or that some other critical resource is needed before your goal can be realized.

Knowing where to steer your life is an important thing to consider when thinking about personal development. Long-term goals are huge and can have a huge impact on your perspective.

Maintaining benevolent wishes for others can lead to an increase in the good things you bring into your own life. In this instance, wish only the best for people. Focusing on positive things will help you stay happy and motivated.

Each day should be an opportunity to top the previous day's accomplishments. You should never stop trying to find ways to do things better, and better yourself. Push yourself to do something better today than you did the day before.

Leaders are humble, though powerful and strict too. A strict attitude is required but advice should be given in a caring way. A good leader has morals and is honest; these are crucial characteristics for any successful person to hold.

Making yourself number one, and not overextending yourself, is very important. You are responsible for making yourself happy. While it is important to remember this, you shouldn't step on other people. If you are true to yourself and stick to your morals, you will end up happier on your path to personal development.

Learning to react selflessly is a sign of progress in the path of personal development. There are times when you may have to sacrifice something and simply care for someone else. You will soon become the person you envision for yourself, when you have mastered the ability to personally sacrifice without harming your own well-being.