Change Your Life | Rock the World

Here in the United States, we celebrate Independence Day every year on the 4th of July, which just passed, and a lot of people here got a 3-day holiday weekend out of it this year, which was super swell.

I decided ahead of time that I was going to make the most of my weekend, come hell or high water. So I did. My wife and I attended a few different get togethers and events with our friends and family over the course of 3 1/2 days or so. And frankly, we had the best time.

Now I want to point out that we didn’t do anything that would necessarily be considered spectacular, like skydiving or riding in the space shuttle. But we don’t always need to ride the space shuttle to have a good time.

Because we have excellent friends. The best, frankly. And we can have a ton of fun just doing something as simple as spending a few hours with them at a barbecue or a restaurant or a bar, and eating and drinking and chatting.  Read more...

Hi kids,

Some quick news. I wrote a new article that was just posted on pickthebrain.com called “What Are You So Afraid of?”.

It’s all about getting over your fear of failure and finally taking those all important first steps towards the changes you’ve been wanting to make.

So, yeah, it’s about what I always write about, except maybe not so poorly written this time. You be the judge. You can read it here:

http://www.pickthebrain.com/blog/what-are-you-so-afraid-of/

I hope you like it.

Extra special thanks to Erin Falconer at Pick The Brain for posting this for me.

If you’re human – and I’m pretty sure you are – then at some point in your life you’ve been faced with making a decision that you didn’t want to make.

It could have been something not-too-pressing like what you’re going to have for lunch. Or it could have been something major like what college to go to, or what career to pursue.

Either way, if it was one of those “I’m not sure what to do” moments, then you know what I’m talking about. And you know that this comes up a lot in everyday life.

It’s actually a major source of stress for a lot of people. But believe it or not, what causes the most stress isn’t necessarily making the wrong decision, it’s when we haven’t yet come to any decision.

A lot of people don’t realize that, because not deciding anything seems a lot easier, at least in the short term. Think about it. You can always procrastinate and avoid any kind of immediate responsibility, but how long is that really going to work? You can’t simply wait out your problems expecting them to eventually go away. If you ever want to make some real changes, then at some point you’re going to have to decide to say “yes” to one of your options, and that means that you’re on the hook for your decision and the results that come from it.  Read more...

Whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t, you’re right.

 
When I was a kid, my mother would tell me sometimes that I had a defeatist attitude. That’s the word she used, “defeatist”.

She would tell me that in response to my regular comments about how I was no good at something or that I couldn’t do something, before I had even tried. Yes, I was one of those kids.

So she’d say something like, “What’s with this defeatist attitude? You haven’t even tried.” That’s not an exact quote.

And so there were a lot of things that I never did because I already knew that I would be no good at them. And at the same time, I’d sabotage the things I did try because I went in knowing I would fail.

I’m not exactly sure how I ever developed that attitude, or how I eventually got rid of it, but I do know that it can be an overwhelming and devastating personality trait.

I’ve seen the same thing more recently from some of my fellow kung fu students. Every 3 or 4 months we have advancement tests. Pass the test, move up to the next level. Naturally, it takes time and effort to prepare for the test, and it isn’t particularly easy.

I know I’ve told you this before, but sometimes it bears repeating: you’re not perfect.

You make mistakes just like the rest of us, and you have certain parts of your personality that are, shall we say, unfavorable, just like the rest of us. That’s just human nature, my friend.

And that’s OK. It’s normal. It’s natural. It’s understandable. So you might as well own up to your imperfections, because without a firm knowledge of what they are, how can you ever take any steps to improve on them?

And therein lies the crux of this article. Kapow!

We all have faults. We all have things about ourselves that we want to improve, but some of us aren’t really willing to look them straight in the eye for fear of what we might see. Wow, that almost sounds poetic.

What happens too much of the time is that we see ourselves in direct competition with everyone else, and we don’t want to admit that the other person is just simply better than we are at whatever it is. Our egos get in the way, and prevent us from being honest with ourselves.  Read more...