Guard Your Success. Guard Your Mind

Have you ever noticed that right after watching or reading the news, which is many times very negative in nature, that you feel un-nerved, stressed, frustrated, upset, offcenter, etc? Wonder why?

As guardians of our personal success, we need to realize that there are things out there that will steal your motivation and your positive mindset. These success thieves come in the forms of all things negative.

While you don't want to be out of touch with reality, you also don't wan't to focus too much on the negative side of it. Feed your mind from more positive sources.

The news is more often than not a bad place to find a source of motivation and encouragement, as bad knews unfortunately attends to draw larger crowds.  I never could understand why people devoured bad news so much more rapidly than good news. Sometimes it seems like people think that having a positive mentality is cheesy, uncool, or the like. Go around with a smile on your face, and a few people are bound to look at you strangely. 

The truth is that negativity will most certainly slow or even halt your progression to success. In this respect, negativity can be considered the enemy. Try to develop the habit of looking on the bright side. Engage in optimism.

Here's a powerful tool that you can use to switch over to the positive mentality: habit. We are creatures of habit. And by our habitual natures we either rise to greatness, are brought to our knees in failure, or become bogged down in stagnation. Changing habits can be frustrating, however. One way to limit the frustration involved is to learn to observe your mind state. Try it now. Try to gauge how positive or negative your mind-state is right now, as if you were an unbiased third party. Now continue to observe what your routine has been like to today. Were you around positive people? Or negative? Digest positive news or negative? Is the glass half empty or half full? When you know the answer simply decide to gently steer your mind in the right direction. You are in charge, right?

You can't just decide to be positive and keep patronizing those negative and draining sources  around you. Invest less time in the negative people around you. If all  of your friends are negative and cynical, then you might try looking for a more positive bunch. Turn off the news and find a good positive book to read. There are many, many out there. I have found that it is usually good to read from a motivational book in the morning before I get going.

Sometimes during the day our minds can be so overrun with the negativity around us, that we will ourselves feel incredibly negative. We may even say that we are in a bad mood. You see, when your mind is exposed to negativity and you have left it unguarded, your mind will absorb it and move the negativity into your working memory. What happens next is that the negativity begins to affect all of your actions, thoughts, and decisions. The negativity goes straight to the subconscious processing centers of our brain and begins to affect us on every level including how we feel physically, spiritually, and emotionally. On the flip-side, positivity has the same effect. What we should do when we realize that our minds have become engulfed in negativity is to purge our minds of it. Just spend a few minutes somewhere quiet, or if there is nowhere just imagine a peaceful scene and visualize the worries and negativity slipping away freely. See your mind become calmer and calmer, relax your muscles, and breathe deeply and calmly. De-stress, remove the negativity (remember, you're in charge), then with some sense of urgency, find something positive for your mind to chew on. If you can't find anything, then decide to have a positive conversation, no matter how brief, with the next person you talk to. Think about what you will say. Will you complement them? Will you comment on how nice the day has been? Maybe you will talk about how energetic you felt this morning? Find something good, and dwell on it. 

Remember, you are the guardian of your success. Feed your mind with positivity and watch your spirit grow. 

Until next time, have a great day!!!

Good is not Enough. Greatness is the only way to Excellence

Here's a quick nugget of advice for you. Don't be good. Be great.

Greatness is the only road to excellence. If you choose to be only good, your success will be sub-par. Every day seek out and employ ways to strive for personal greatness. Most of us know the good way to do things. Now let's ask ourselves, "What's the great way to do things?"

This is a serious warning. Beware the temptation to settle for good enough. Why would you settle for less than you can have anyway? It's like saying that you'd rather have the treetops rather than the heavens. Aim as high as you can and give it all that you have. Don't waste your time with "good enough." You would be cheating yourself and everyone around you.

One way that you can aspire to be great is by going after your dreams. So many of us have had our dreams stolen from us over the years that we become complacent and feel forced to do only good enough. And many times, it is difficult to be asked to dream again. But we must dream. And we must go for our dreams. It is our dreams that fuel our desire to be great. You must have a dream.

What makes a dream a dream? We must find that something inside of us that motivates us and pushes us forward to greatness. We must find our passion. If we spend our days working towards things that we are not passionate about, then we are wasting our time. 

Sit down. Grab a pencil. Make a list. Write down all of things that are most important to you in life. Write down all of the things that really move you emotionally. Think of all of the people that are dearest to you in life. What can you do to help them the most? You have to find your dream, your passion. Brainstorm. When you finally think of that one thing that really, really moves you, it should be so dear to your heart that it causes you to get a lump in your throat and become misty-eyed. It is then that you will have found the seed of your passion. And this seed of passion is what dreams are made of.

Now you that you have your dream, expand it. Dream big! Don't dream small. Remember, being good stops being great dead in its tracks. Dream big! It would be a shame if you wound up being less than your true potential. We are seeking out our true potentials and we are going after them. Dream big. Choose to be Great. 

Have a GREAT day!