Transforming Challenges to Passion and Purpose

March 31, 2008

by Alice Vlietstra

We hear much about happiness, but what about the melancholy sides of life? The tendency is to avoid it. Rather than avoiding it, understanding it and transforming may lead to deep gratification, passion, and purpose.
We all have times in our life when we have faced pain, disconnection, and separation. It can be from death, rejection, and many kinds of hurt. Initially, we may want to find ways to avoid confronting the difficult emotions.
It is not the emotion itself, but facing it and transforming it that creates the challenge. The greatest challenge is the tendency to judge. Doing so puts ourselves in a mental box, as though we want to hide and function as though we are complete and separate entities. The walls of our boxes are built from the hidden talk about our personal experiences and ourselves. Most frequently, this self-talk is not about the present, but early childhood patterns of belief.
Passion
When we understand that this pain has an early origin, we can have compassion for each other. We all have had childhood. We can discover the old childhood patterns, and release them. When put in perspective, this gives us a deep sense of connection and well being.
A deeper spiritual energy also emerges. Facing pain helps us to connect with our spiritual resources, make a difference, and be of service to others. This experience, combined with an appreciation of our unique strengths, seeds passion.
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Witnessing Our Miracles - The Gift of Transformation

March 30, 2008

by Camille Strate

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been dreaming of a day when I could write and get paid to do it. No ‘real job’. No worries about paying the bills. Just me and my computer and hours on end to write. Oh, what I could do then! What a grand and delicious way to spend my days! Oh, if only…
Then, out of ‘the blue’ it happened. Not in the way I’d have hoped, but nonetheless….I have the time to write and the means to do so. I have all day, every day to sit at my computer if I wish and write that long overdue novel (or whatever). The day I found out I was going to be getting this unexpected income, I was overjoyed. I was finally ‘free’ to do what I wanted and not have to put up with commutes and surly bosses. I could get up in the morning, make my coffee and sit on the porch to gather my thoughts. I could take a walk and soak in the beauty of my surroundings, thereby providing further inspiration to write some fantastic book. One problem…
The reason for the ‘unexpected income’ was my physical state.. Not good. Some sort of malady, thus far a mystery, had appeared and my physical mobility was completely impaired because of it. Forget the walks. Forget the hikes in the canyons. Forget any kind of physical activity. Just getting out of bed in the mornings was a feat. Pain screamed through my body at every breath.. Showering and getting dressed were major tasks. Even just getting up or sitting down at my desk was something I had to keenly focus on. Sheesh! NOT what I’d planned!
So, after months of agonizing pain and both physical and psychological, I made up my mind to just stop thinking about it. Okay. So there’s all this pain every time I move….does this mean I must stop BEING? Does this mean that this time I’m being ‘given’ is to be wasted on self-pity? Does this mean the book will go unwritten? I think not! But there was more to it than just the physcial challenge. There was the lack of ideas. What to write about? Where are all the ideas I’d had when I didn’t have time to write? Why am I sitting at my computer with nothing to say? What in the world is going on here? It was driving me crazy. And the more I tried, the more I had nothing to ’say’. Quite the quandary. Then one day, I had this idea….what if I pretended that I was on ‘holiday’? What if I just let the day unfold, without any plan or schedule or ‘to do’ list? What might that be like?
Once that thought entered my little brain, everything about my ‘life’ changed. I’d made the decision to accept my current ’state’ and not fight it. I’d finally given up the idea of ‘what used to be’ and started living in my ‘now’. I made a conscious decision to take each moment as it came and allow what would be to be. In short, I stopped fighting. This was a huge shift for me. And the changes that followed were even more profound than I could have imagined. All sorts of ‘tools’ began to appear. Books that affirmed my decision. People who had been in similar situations. Total strangers who had gifts to offer from their own experiences. All manner of little miracles (if there is such a thing as a ‘little’ miracle!) began to show up. It was as if the Universe was saying, ‘Bravo! You got it! Just let go. It’s all perfect just the way it is.’
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Mastering Your Mind Power - Your Number 1 Challenge, Part 2

March 28, 2008

by Harold L Lowe

If only I had known about the self image as I consciously began my journey to self improvement! I think of all the dust that could have possibly fallen on the ground to help some plant grow instead of collecting on the many self help and inspirational books, magazine articles, and tapes on my book shelves. I could have enjoyed some really great wines and a cruise or two with the money I used to attend various self improvement workshops and seminars, only to have the information fade into oblivion. I could have saved myself days, weeks, months, even years of frustration. I would somehow be introduced to a book like Think And Grow Rich, I would purchase a copy, read it, and began applying what I had learned as outlined. My motivation was high (as least I thought I was). Six months would pass, and I would see no visible changes in my life. Doubts would gradually appear. The inner voice (of the self image) would chime in with things like: I knew this stuff would not work. If it worked for those other people, they must have had something that I don’t have. Soon discouragement would ease its way into my thoughts. I would gradually stop applying lessons and return to my old conditioned life. A year or a few years later, I would bump into another book, maybe The Magic of Thinking Big, and I would literally repeat the above process and again and again. I can say without a doubt that those of you who were born into families who are in the 95% group face a 100% certainty that your self image will deploy its full arsenal of doubts, fears, and phobias to challenge your efforts toward controlling it. Remember, the self image has been in control of nearly every thing you have done most of your life. Now I do not mean that negative stuff is in total control of your mind all of the time. I do not believe that there is such a thing as a totally positive mind, nor a totally negative one.
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Discovering Intrinsic Motivation

March 27, 2008

by Michael J

If you are like me, you probably have had at least one day where you were moving slow and felt sluggish. You want to pursue your business pursuits, but you feel a resistant emotion towards the idea. So, you drag yourself to your desk and start to work. The realization for your own skills and abilities becomes obvious to you again as you start to draw on you own source of inspiration. Your own inspiration starts to evolve to intrinsic motivation and this carries you to a successful conclusion.
Understanding Intrinsic Motivation
It would be nice to be able to draw on intrinsic motivation emotion on a daily basis. However, the fact remains that this is often not possible. This isn’t of greatest concern to a lot of people. The truth of the matter is that there is no reason to be concerned over the lack of intrinsic motivation. A decrease in personal intrinsic motivation is something to look out for. It’s not that big of a deal because activating it is relatively simple if you know the steps.
Developing Intrinsic Motivational Drive
We all suffer at times from a lack of intrinsic motivational drive. That being the case all one needs to do is simply take the steps necessary to activate one’s own intrinsic motivation. Just like any undertaking of worth there will be some effort required. The amount of effort required to get back on track is a small amount compared to it’s alternative. Changing ones habitual ways of observing or acting is usually all that is needed.
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Being Passionate About Choices in Life - A Decided Heart

March 26, 2008

by Richard Rizza

Life without passion is what many of us have. At issue is how to be more passionate about your choices in life. The choices we make reflect the path we are on in life. The wrong choices will put you on the wrong path in life. A decided heart is a reflection of a person that is self-aware.
Each choice we make is a building block to the house we live in, the mate we wed, the way we raise our children, how we make our money and if we are happy or not. If you have made passionate choices in life then you will live your passion. If you live a life just accepting what ever comes your way you have decided not to live up to your full potential. Each of us has the potential to be happy and live passionate lives.
Living with passion means you are greeting each day with delight not dread. When you are and have been passionate about the choices you have made in your life the chances of realizing your full potential is great!
Having a decided heart means you have made a commitment to yourself to live up to your fullest potential. Living up to your potential involves examining your dream. Dare to dream. Your dreams are a manifestation of your deepest desires. Desires are highly self-motivating because they are passion driven and passion generates energy.
A decided heart is determine and persistent. Some of us are trapped in a dead in job, have money problems and are otherwise not happy. It is not possible to be happy when you feel trapped. The logical solution to acquiring a position you love instead of a job you hate, is preparation, planning and execution.
First prepare by searching your for your deepest desire and your lifelong dream. Dreams come true every day why not for you? Careful and thoughtful preparation followed by determination is rewarded by fruition. See your dreams come true by developing a plan to make your dreams reality.
If you passion is to own your own business but you have taken a job just to make ends meet, you are trading in your dreams for a bad choice possibly because you are afraid your dreams won’t come true. Maximize the chances for success and minimize your potential losses by developing a realistic plan.
If you have identified the things that you are passionate about in your life, then it time you searched for a way to make your passions work for you instead of lying and wasting. Un realized passion is a negative drain because it is failing to thrive. Passion need to thrive and it’s contagious. Start making small steps. Get a web site, buy a domain name and start an Internet business until you can afford to start-up a brick and mortar business if that is what you want.
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Self Motivation - You Have To Have It To Succeed

March 25, 2008

by Stephen Meyer

Self motivation is a key factor in building any Internet based affiliate marketing opportunity. With many things in our lives to distract us and even more things we might like to do better than working we must be self motivated to effectively build our home based business. Unlike the corporate world where we have bosses leaning over us and corporate deadlines to meet the legitimate home based business owner must set his own goals and have the motivation to see them through. Below are 5 tips to help you become self motivated.
Five Self Motivating Tips
Tip Number One is to Involve The People You Know
This first tip is one of the hardest for many people because it involves your pride. You are putting yourself on the line and doing anything other than what you promised can mean failure to yourself and to your friends. This tip is to involve others in your project. Even those of us who live very Hermit like lives know people we can involve. They can be personal friends, people in our neighborhoods, family and those we have occasional casual conversations with. By telling these people what you are doing and by setting a date for completion you are placing expectations in the minds of your friends and family.
This will actually do two things for you. First it will give you motivation to complete your project on the specified date because you now have people who are expecting to see it at a certain time. Secondly it will push you to do your very best on your project. No one wants to show their friends something they just completed but was only done half as well as it could be. Your pride will not let you do that. By involving others you are motivating yourself to be the best you can be and to do the best work you possibly can. Peer pressure even when you create it yourself is a very strong motivational factor
The Second Tip Involves Setting A Due Date
Like any business you have to have a set schedule that includes your legitimate home based business opportunities must have set business hours, when you will work and when you will quit. You must also have set schedules and due dates for the completion of your projects and home based business building goals. When setting your time frames and due dates make a list of what this schedule will do for you and your business and of the consequences of not meeting the deadline.
For instance many people have a goal of accomplishing a project that will promote their business each week such as a promotional package or advertising campaign. Having an understanding that accomplishing this task at a set time will give your business a predetermined amount of exposure and build your business at an acceptable rate you can motivate yourself to completing the task on time.
The Third Step Is To Give Yourself A Treat.
Life has many examples of how treating yourself can give you motivation to complete your projects on time. Pavlov’s dogs are a prime example. By building an expectation of a desired result you can push yourself to finish your work. If the result is a treat and you have a desire to receive that treat each time you start a task you will have the motivation to complete the task each and every time you start on a project.
Make the treat something you strongly desire. It could be a favorite food or snack, a walk in the park or anything else you really like and want. It also needs to be something that you do not give yourself unless you have finished a task. That could mean fighting off the temptation to just get what you want when ever you want it. A little self discipline is required but the payoff is that you have conditioned yourself to be motivated in your work.
The Fourth Tip Is Creating A Positive Mindset
Because legitimate home based business opportunities professionals are often alone with their businesses it is easy for them to slip into negative thinking. This can drag your business down and kill your motivation for completing your projects. If and when it happens you must stop it in its tracks. Luckily it is easy to stop. Change the atmosphere in your work area by putting some fun music on your stereo. Get some pictures of your family, friends, and pets and put them on your desk where they are easy to see.
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How To Stop Procrastinating

March 24, 2008

by Kevin Sinclair

Everyone, including you, has a tendency to procrastinate. So what exactly is procrastination? Simply put, it is when you put off something that can be done now because of laziness or carelessness. Procrastination is putting off things for another day, when it is just as easy to do them today. Many people have a tendency to put off things and then end up doing them at the very last minute or not doing them at all.
Procrastination is extremely common in students who need to complete a research project, complete a term paper or even study for an upcoming test. This is generally when the term "cram" comes into play. In order to get a good grade on the test, the student must "cram" for the exam in a short period of time, versus studying and planning for the test all along.
So why Procrastinate?
Almost everyone, at one time or another in their life, deals with procrastination. For some people, they make it a way of life or a bad habit. For others, they may only allow procrastination to affect certain areas of their life, but not their daily events. For whatever reason, people often put off things they don’t want to deal with at the time.
Some reasons you procrastinate are:
One of the most common reasons people procrastinate is because they are afraid. Although no one likes to admit they are afraid of something, fear often hinders people from attempting to do things, therefore, they put them off. Whether you are afraid of succeeding or afraid of failing, it is all fear.
Another reason for procrastination is because you may not feel like it is important enough. If your task is not given a high enough priority in the beginning, then you will have a tendency to put it off. You may very well know that the task needs completed, but you simply put it off because you find other things that are more important.
You don’t have the means to complete the task. In some instances, you may not have everything on hand to complete the task; therefore, you put it off. This may be the result of your inability to do all of the research and collect the needed data or you just don’t feel like putting the time needed to finish the task.
Some other reasons people procrastinate are: you have not completely committed yourself to the project, you are extremely busy, you are lazy or you simply don’t want to do it.
How to change the behavior:
Now that you have a better understanding of why you tend to procrastinate or did you procrastinate and decide to read that section later? You cannot expect that you will quit procrastinating if you do not have an understanding why you do it in the first place. Therefore, it is important to take a good look at why you put things off. This is the first step in learning how you can change this behavior.
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How To Conquer Adult Goals With Child-Like Behavior

March 22, 2008

by Ronnie Nijmeh

Remember when you were a child, and you received your first bicycle? Oh, how excited you were to climb on it and ride it as far as you could go, pedaling as hard as you possibly could, and showing all of your friends and schoolmates the shiny new love of your life! It didn’t matter that you didn’t know how to ride it immediately or that you did not own proper safety equipment. Your entire goal was to get on top of that bike and race the wind down the street. Sometimes, having just the burning desire is enough to motivate you to seek out the know-how and to practice riding until you are able do it all by yourself.
That burning desire, or passion, is an overwhelming emotion. It is that boundless enthusiasm we need to help us finish a task, begin a new project, conquer a fear, or to overcome a bad habit or addiction. It is the siren, or bugle, which leads us into battle.
If we can gather and preserve that childlike passion, we can accomplish anything. We can jump on that bike and start pedaling, and as we build the confidence and momentum, we can remove the training wheels and tackle the art of riding a bicycle. And by the turn of the next bend, we are riding that bike downhill towards the horizon with the wind behind us - without apprehension, concerns, or hindrances.
Although passion is a great motivator, it is often difficult to find and even harder to maintain. A good way of cultivating passion and retaining it in our sights is to seek out inspirational words and images. One powerful solution comes from free wallpapers with inspirational quotes. These vivid pictures with phenomenal, moving quotes can be the exact recharge we need for reviving passion and keeping it onboard. Furthermore, free inspirational desktop backgrounds can be a part of any workspace. Not only are these backgrounds pleasant to look at, but these free wallpapers with inspirational quotes are also excellent to share with family, friends, and team members.
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Motivation - Dictating The Terms For Yourself

March 21, 2008

by Shanat Kuphur

The importance of the word named "motivation" conveys lot more than it seems to have. Anything and everything that have to be done won’t be materialized unless and until it is supplemented by the crucial entity named "motivation". Motivation is not something that could be manufactured, instead it has to come from within, rather, has to be cultivated.
It won’t ever be an animated reality if I mention that it is because of this motivation that world progresses even a fraction of a second. So, in a micro sense, each human needs to be motivated for every deed of his to be done. If you understand that the greatest or the ever discussed topic in psychological arena is motivation related aspects, its importance is conveyed and taken for granted.
Though we state that motivation is more or less a mental concern, it should not be stated that the physical well being and fitness have hardly any role to play. Moreover it could be stated that, motivation related problems are cancerously growing among the youth. This is so severe a scenario that they have to have a serious look at the mental status, physical well being and attitude. People, who are addicted to habits like smoking, alcohol consumption etc, should treat motivation as a pivotal entity in recovering themselves from those habits.
People who find it difficult to change their habits or people who continuously fails in motivating themselves to move forward to achieve their desired goal would find hypnosis as an effective solution. Hypnosis could very well be stated as a process of changing the well settled habitual mental status of people which help them in uprooting the so called status, to lead a better living. In whatever one does, motivation holds the key. The situations could be as diverse as it can be like meeting the deadline when given a job, stopping a bad habit like smoking or consumption of alcohol, reducing the weight drastically etc..
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Find Your Passion - It Will Change Your Life

March 20, 2008

by Jarrod Clark

I often encourage entrepreneurs or I’ll generally write in reference to anyone about the importance of achieving your dreams. In fact, in my previous blog "Is Your Dream Alive?" I talk about examining your priorities and not letting your dreams go to waste. Part of achieving your goal is having a passion for what it takes to achieve your goal. You have to love what you do not only because it makes you money but because of the pure thrill that you get from doing it. There are many people who earn a massive income but don’t like what they do. In my blog "Is Your Dream Alive?" I ask the question: What are you passionate about? Think about it for a moment. What do you like to do? I do believe if you focus on what you’re passionate about before you focus on the money, the money will come.
I think about when I was younger, and many of you who know a little about me know that I am a drummer. I love making music because it is a great outlet for me. Music is good for the soul. Henceforth, knowing that, it gives me a sense of fulfillment to make music because I know that I have the ability to effect people’s lives and make them feel good. I played drums in the church when I was younger and for many years I didn’t get paid to play drums. Neither was I playing drums looking to get paid. I was playing drums because I loved to play drums, PERIOD! It wasn’t until I got older, that I started to get paid to play and it was offered to me, I didn’t ask to get paid to play.
I wanted to tell that story because the law of attraction basically says that the things that you focus your thoughts and time on are the things that will manifest themselves into your life. Many will often ask themselves "well if I just focus on making money then the money will come… right?" In response to that I will say "sure, yes the money will come." However, I must say that that is such a general statement. The fact is, yes everyone focuses on making money all the time. Most of the population gets up everyday and works a 9-5. Why? Because making money is a way of life, you have to make money to make a living. By changing your focus and asking yourself, what am I passionate about that makes me happy? It is what you like to do, that makes you money, that will give you a sense of freedom. Statistics say that only 2% of the population is financially free. Many artist/painters make good money but they didn’t wake up one morning and say, "…gee I think I will go and take a class and learn how to paint masterpieces because that will make me good money." No, most artists, who are successful, were sincerely passionate about drawing and painting long before they started making money doing it. It was something that gave them a sense of fulfillment because it’s an art of expression.
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