You’ve probably done one of those exercises where you imagine your own funeral and what people would say about you, in an effort to determine what parts of your life you might want to change now. You may have also been asked, and even thought seriously, about what you would do if you knew you only had a few months or a few days to live. I’d like to suggest an even more extreme exercise right now.
I’m a relatively happy guy, but sometimes I can get pretty out of sorts. Usually that is related to something I’ve been meaning to do, or always wanted to do. Something, of course, that remains on my “to do” list, and never quite makes it to my did list.
I don’t know how many articles I read on the subject of happiness last week, but, if I had to venture a guess, I’d say it was 30 or 40. The way I’d sum up the articles is, “The good news about happiness is that it seems to be a skill we can acquire and develop.”
The bad news is that most of us are not as happy as we could be.
Most of live our whole lives, to some extent, in this half-waking, half-conscious way. More…We know what we’re doing, but we don’t think about it. We don’t stop to consider whether this is the right job for us, whether this friend is dragging us down, whether we need to spend more time on what we really love and enjoy.
A nationwide survey sheds some light as to what people think will help them achieve their business goals in 2008. What made the top of the list? Achieving a work-life balance!
This should come to no surprise to many of you reading this. It seems we are all working longer hours and spending more time trying to keep up with technology rather than using it to help us achieve productivity gains. We’ve become victims of our own success; often times forgetting about those people we share a house with — our family.
Do you have a real desire for your “fifteen minutes of fame?” Most people would answer this question yes, without thinking about it. Of course we want fame.
But do you really want fame, or do you want a legacy? They’re not exactly the same thing.
How many times have you heard someone saying, “I sure wish I would have…” or “If only I had taken the chance and…”. Our lives are full of decisions. And a decision we make every day is whether or not to do certain tasks. The question is which will you regret doing more – an action that you took, or an action that you didn’t take? For most us, we end up regretting the actions we didn’t take far more than we regret those that we did.
You know, we all have change in our lives. Most of us detest change, dread change, feel change is a real problem to deal with. I’m talking here about major changes.
But if you take a look at the major changes in your life over the last five years, up to about six months ago, you’ll probably see that since you’ve moved away from those changes, you can see that they were really beneficial.
Difficult at the time? Sure. No one’s going to argue with you about that. Change can be tough.
But it’s important to keep change in perspective.
Working with financial planners and lifestyle coaches, one step at a time, will help you put together a complete lifestyle package to guide you through not only your financial future, but also your lifestyle – setting up goals and milestones to help you support your personal beliefs, culture preferences and values that define who you are.
We all dream of having a better life – finding a meaning in our life and pursuing our passions and goals. For some of us a better life means advancing our careers, for others it may be a path of personal discovery that leads to a better life. For others it could mean returning to school to get a degree so they can get the job they always wanted and provide for their families. A better life is achievable by anyone who wants to take the time and effort to do what it takes to attain it. A lot of people sit around talking about having a better life, but how many people are willing to put forth the effort required to actually achieve it?
Here is the 24th issues of personal development & happiness carnival. I was asked to fill in as this week’s host. Here you go.
We should think of ourselves, care for ourselves, and take what we need, if it is ours to take.
I think that as a culture we tend to try too hard to avoid sadness at all costs, and I think that’s a very serious mistake. I have seen people bury parents and then bury all the feelings associated with the death, all the feelings of loss, all the grief. This is not a good thing. Sure, we can get right back to work. Sure, we don’t hurt.
Take a few moments to pause and relax this holiday season.
When I think of the old paradigm – my old, ill-conceived, self-taught definition of success (that success means money, wealth, status, and power) – I am reminded of an old parable that goes something like this:
Who is the Successful Man?
One day a wealthy father took his son on a trip to the country so that the son could see how the poor lived. They spent a day and a night at the farm of a very poor family. When they got back from their trip, the father asked his son, “How was the trip?”
If you’re addicted to adventure, challenge, and achievement, or even if you aren’t, you’ll love my article published at The American Chronicle.
The irony is that the more we try to cram into our already overpacked lives, the morescattered and fragmented our lives become. And when that happens, we lose sight of what’s most important to us. We are let down, disappointed, confused, unfulfilled.
The Cinnamon Bear is a radio program from the 1930’s that played six days a week from Thanksgiving until Christmas. It is about two characters,
