Don’t be all admin of living and chasing the next thing and too little of the full enjoyment of what’s in front of you.
Nothing comes easy, or does it?
Taking nothing seriously - the most important thing you can do.
The one single biggest thing you can do to have a better life?
Take nothing seriously.
It's such an old Ishaya principle, it's almost a motto.
But it is such an uncommon skill amongst humanity it's worth repeating, frequently.
Taking nothing seriously is crucial to the full enjoyment of life. Obviously. As the joke goes, none of us are getting out of here alive, so why not fully enjoy it?
But it’s also not just being a goof.
When you have a sense of lightness it automatically means you have things in perspective. Perspective means you have clarity, it means you aren’t getting sucked into the thing.
You can then be fluid, adjust easily, be wide open to different ideas. You can make the most of what actually is happening rather than trying to stick with some plan of what “should be” happening.
When you take things seriously it’s the spark that invites a fight.
Instead of laughing and letting it slide, the resistance builds and the fight blows up - unless you back down.
But when you don’t play the game, you are removed from the game. Job done. There is no struggle, ever.
So don’t even invite a fight, just take nothing seriously. Stop playing the game.
Keep what is most important to you as a priority. And that isn’t being right, it’s being happy.
I imagine. Unless being right is more important to you than your mental, emotional and physical health and wellbeing, in which case go ahead and try and be right.
Take nothing seriously. Be aware - learn to laugh at everything, most crucially yourself. If you are able to do that you'll have a source of entertainment forever.
The wisdom of choosing to be happy.
"Oh, I don't really think about that, because it's wasted energy, isn't it? What's done is done, we can't change that, but we can change the way we cope with it."
- Diane Piper, mother of Katie whose face was burnt in an acid attack, when asked how she felt about the attackers
Everyone has challenges. Everyone has troubles in their life.
But what amazes and inspires me is seeing people who have lived or are living through horrific things and yet who shine, full of gratitude and love for their life, as it is.
You might call them “glass half full” people.
Then there are those with comparatively event free lives who grumble and complain through every little inconvenience: “Glass half empty” people.
Why is that?
You constantly choose your response to life.
This choice defines how you live, regardless of the circumstances you find yourself in. This choice is total: You decide whether you live in peace or in suffering. No one and nothing can cause you to suffer; you decide to suffer.
I know it doesn’t feel like this. No one wants to suffer, everyone is looking for a way to avoid it. The trouble is we don’t know how.
Furthermore, suffering has become normal, it’s almost expected as “part of life”.
Being constantly happy is viewed with suspicion by some. If you decide not to suffer it’s almost like you’re not being “real”, whatever that is.
Once, a friend of mine who realised it was her choice to be totally at peace with the world was taken aside by a acquaintance in the street and asked if she was on drugs.
Bizarre isn't it? Happy lady, walking down the street = must be on drugs.
But definitely those, like Buddha and Jesus, who have transcended suffering are elevated to a mythical status, beyond humanity.
Actually, it’s your human birthright not to suffer.
Your birthright is to have absolute sovereignty over your responses to life. Complete freedom from suffering is simple.
It all begins with you deciding to take responsibility for how you feel, how you react to life.
Don’t take this decision lightly - it means you can never blame anyone else for anything. It’s all on you.
Then, decide that nothing will make you happy - you won’t delay your happiness for a future moment, you’ll find happiness right now, however your circumstances.
No longer will you wait for your partner or a new TV to make you happy. Now you’re going to choose to have happiness that is uncaused.
That is it. Take responsibility for your own happiness, and then choose it.
You will come to a point where you'll realise that to choose anything else is madness. And therein lies true wisdom.
Your life is your attitude.
"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." -Viktor Frankl
Sometimes I get accused of being unrealistic, harping on about the need for living life with the glass half full. People say that having a constant positive mental attitude is a nice idea, but sometimes life isn’t like that, that positivity is sometimes ignoring reality.
But what is real? What is reality?
Here’s what I see: You shape reality by *how* you see *what* you experience. It is all about your perception. Nothing is real, beyond your thinking about it.
Do you realise this?
Here is your life, and here are your mental processes about your life. They are the same thing. Your life isn’t different from the filters that you maintain – the judgements, the beliefs, the attitudes.
You, and you alone, define your own life. That’s what you get to choose, and no one can take that away from you. It is your internal attitude that shapes and makes everything. This choice is total – the experience of hell or heaven depends on you.
Your life isn’t about the circumstances, your life is always about your response to these circumstances.
You decide how you will respond to everything. Engage this choice, it is one of the most precious things you possess. Choose to see the good, to appreciate. Choose to be thankful. Choose to love.
Choose and choose again until it becomes a habit. And then choose once more. You will come to a place where nothing can make you suffer, unless you consciously allow it.
Heaven or hell? It all starts with your attitude.
The hidden danger of indifference
“The opposite of love isn't hate; it's indifference” - Steven Pressfield
Indifference is a very subtle beast, yet once fallen into leads a long way down a grey and winding path indeed.
Like a sleepwalker wandering deeper and deeper into the forest, life becomes lost not through deliberate choice but through not paying attention.
Its a truism that you don’t know how good you have it until its gone.
What you have to do today becomes more important than what is here, already. The lack takes our attention instead - what is missing.
This focus, continued for long enough, means life becomes one constant question: “Why?”
“Why is this happening to me?”, “why doesn’t life go the way I want it to?”, “why isn’t this working?”, “why does she have all the good luck?”.
Indifference directly leads to living life with the perspective of a victim, one long grey, whiney, blame and stress filled existence.
The solution lies not in the past or in some future time, but here, is this exact moment.
Pay attention, for what you focus on grows. Be not indifferent, or take things for granted. Base your life in the appreciation and gratitude for what you do have, right now.
Through continued nurturing and choice, the automatic - the natural - response and reaction to life becomes not one of “why?” but one of “wow”.
Richness and blessings lie solely in perspective. And now you know.
You may not be able to control the circumstances of your life, but you can control how you react to it. It’s not about the what, its all about the how.
Don’t allow life to unconsciously slip away.
A guide to living the best life possible, part 2
How do you live your life? Here's part two of Arjuna's guide to a rich and fulfilled life:
Find ways to be of service
Give more, in all ways. This life isn’t about getting. Your peace and happiness stems from the ability to openly give.
Stop complaining
Don’t complain, whine, whinge, bitch or moan. Don’t blame anyone either. It is the fastest path to misery ever.
Appreciate and be grateful
Go out of your way to speak about your appreciation and gratitude for everything. Through this your experience of life will be that the glass is not only half-full, but continuously over-flowing.
Seek for contentment, always
Your path in this life will be different from every body else’s. Rest assured, all will turn out fine. Don’t compare, live your life as it comes to you. Set lofty goals, but live now content in what you have.
Your purpose is intertwined with your passions
Do as much of what you love as possible. It is closely related to your purpose for being here.
Be full-on
Don’t be half arsed. Don’t wait for life to be given to you. Take 100% responsibility and make this how you want it. Someone once said: “When you were born you cried and the world rejoiced. Live a life so that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice.” Sounds like good advice to me.
Your natural state is freedom
You are a limitless being. Your awareness is unbounded by time or space. You are more than just your body or your beliefs. You are perfect, exactly as you are. Rest in the heart of your infinite being, be well, live, be free.
Eat your greens
Sleep well, exercise and drink lots of water too…
Excellent. Don't take these seriously now. Enjoy!
A guide to living the best life possible
Life doesn’t come with an instruction book. You have to work out for yourself what works. For what its worth, and for your entertainment and edification, here’s how I think life’s guide book should go:
The past is completely gone and the future is beyond your control
Base your life in the here and now. Become alive to this. You cannot live in any other moment. Stop regretting the past and trying to predict the future. Its futile. Be right here. The only moment that matters is now. It matters not a jot what just happened or where your attention was. Where are you now?
It’s not so much what you do, it’s how you do it
Your impact on the world is less about what you say and do and more about where you are when you say or do. Your presence speaks louder than words. Being in the same place as your body, absorbed in this moment, means you can meet the need of this moment. Everything will be so much more than if you are in your head.
Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy?
Prioritise your peace and happiness. Humanity is crazy. There are so many people who would rather be right than happy. The end of all conflict lies in valuing happiness over everything else. You like happiness? Stop caring if you’re right or not. As my meditation teacher instructs, also take things a little less seriously every day.
You reap what you sow
You want a different fruit? You need to plant a different tree. Doing the same thing and expecting different results will never work. What you give, you get. What you focus on, grows.
Love people just as they are
Don’t insist that people change. You may be clear and honest in what you want, but after that step back and whole heartedly accept and allow every single person you meet.
Change what you can change, accept what you must accept
See the difference. Give yourself the wisdom to see what you can change or leave and what you must accept. Don’t push or force anything. Its a complete waste of time.
Call your mother
It's important.
Part two coming soon...
Freedom of choice.
Wouldn’t it be cool if you could choose how you felt? Wouldn’t it be great if instead of reacting and firing off that you could choose to be all zen, and just flow through? Or if you did react to something, if you got angry or mad or sad, then you could just choose to drop it when you wanted to?
Actually it is cool to live like that.
It makes life so much easier. Instead of carrying anything, you are able to just let it go and get on with what is in front of you.
It’s much more fun. Being overwhelmed by your emotions or being pulled this way and that by what life brings you, holding grudges and maintaining arguments - that isn’t much fun. But living with complete choice is very very fun.
Living a life of constant free choice is possible for you, if you want it. It is also simple. All it takes is practice, the right kind of practice. That is all.
The right practice is one simply of being as present as you are able. Be alive to now. Absorb yourself in now.
When you fall into the habit of going into the past or future, choose to gently bring yourself back.
The only reason you carry anything is because of a habit. The only reason you react to anything is a habit.
Why not create a new habit?
Aristotle said something wise about this:
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
It doesn’t require hard work. It does require commitment, but then so does anything. Getting to the shops requires a certain maintenance of focus long enough to reach the store and purchase what you want.
Same here with this experience of being free of being yanked by the chain of the mind.
Life is your choice. Exercise your freedom of choice. Do it until it becomes second nature.
Well, actually its your first nature, as in it is the way you were meant to live so there is nothing second about it, but you know what I mean.
As I sit here eating cheesecake, I realise all of this is an easy thing to say. I get that.
Cheesecake is good, and easy, though not often plentiful, at least in my house. Life is different sometimes. I know.
But here’s the thing - start now. Practice when life is easy, when the going is good. Then when you need it most, you won’t need to work at it. It’ll be as simple as I say it is. You'll become like human teflon, laughing all the way to experiencing heaven on earth.
If you want it, and do what is necessary, you’ll become it.
Let me know how you get on.
Let me know too if you are interested in learning the Bright Path Ishayas' Ascension. This one guy I taught last week described it as "sneaky", in that it comes and gets you. He's right. Choice comes and gets you. Can't make it any easy that that.
Where are you?
The greatest way to live the best of lives is to spend as much time in the same place as your body as you can. That may sound funny, but humans are the best time travellers. We are anywhere but here in this moment, we are always in the past or future. We live everywhere but in our bodies, we spend an awesome amount of time in our heads.
That is the reason why you enjoy what you enjoy so much, whether it is golf or knitting, climbing rocks or making music, exercising or just sitting, watching.
When you do these things you become very present. You get out of your head, your senses broaden, you become aware.
You become absorbed in the task, and in this moment. It captivates you, invigorates you, you become alive.
But this experience isn’t task or situation specific. I always thought that kayaking brought me so much joy because it was being in nature, it was exciting and it was physically challenging.
It is all these things, but critically I enjoyed it was because it was an escape, and being an escape I let go of my life. My life was somewhere else, but now was now. This was ‘me’ time!
It wasn’t because I was up a river, it was because I let go and focussed on the here and now.
It is the same with everything - It isn’t about what you do, it is always about how you do it.
I realise now that I am better at being present I can have the same buzz from washing the dishes. Being in the outdoors may give me an extra sparkle, but the sense of being alive and absorbed, completely and utterly present to this moment is available no matter what I do.
Letting go of what has been and what will be is the key.
Just now - be awake. Be here. Notice. Be involved in now.
You may live the busiest of lives but you can only do one thing at a time - do that one thing. Be totally absorbed in it. Don’t half-arse do it whilst thinking about what you have to do next.
You will find you become much more efficient, and perhaps more importantly, enjoy yourself much more.
Be alive!
Your life is your choice.
I am halfway through spending three months in a retreat centre in Spain, teaching yoga and The Bright Path Ishayas’ Ascension meditation. Life is pretty darn good, as you might expect. The weather is sensational and we are surrounded by mountains and forests in which I get to run and explore on my days off.
Best of all, I get to live with all kinds of amazing people. There are some seriously cool human beings here.
One is a young fella from Norway called Thomas. Thomas is blind from birth but has the greatest attitude to life. He doesn’t let anything stop him from doing what he wants.
Try walking around your house with your eyes closed. Try doing yoga - or simply stand on one foot - with your eyes closed. Try just eating with your eyes closed.
Now imagine what it would be like to get yourself downtown and find the shop you want. Or get yourself to an airport and fly to another country where you don’t speak the language.
And everything he does, he does it all laughing, all day long.
The effect on everyone else is huge.
First of all, no one can complain about their small problems any more. Thomas and his attitude puts everything in perspective. They drop their “stuff” and just get on with life, enjoying it, squeezing this moment for what it has.
Second of all, everyone wants to help him out. He’s such a joy to be around, everyone wants to be around him.
You see, life follows a series of fairly simple rules. One of these is that what you put your attention on, grows.
If you focus on what you don’t have, on what is missing, on things that you regret then you end up complaining and in misery.
If, on the other hand, if you focus on the good, on what is great about your life, about what you do have - no matter how small - you will have an amazing time.
Since you have choice, how do you want to live?
Thomas walks into plenty of walls, but he never stops exploring, and he never stops smiling.
You, and you alone, define your life.
When you take responsibility for defining your life, you shake the world. When you refuse to be a victim to circumstance and just play your cards as you have them, you not only live a great life, you inspire everyone.
All your heroes have done nothing but the same: “I’m not waiting for someone to give me life, I'm going to take it.”
Choose to be a hero.
The way to happiness, part 2.
Happiness. Why are so many people searching for happiness? Why doesn’t it come naturally to humans? Well, it does, actually. It is your true nature to be happy. It is very easy to be continually happy when you know how. Honestly, I speak the truth as one who has experienced unhappiness, stress, times of depression, anxiety, fear, all of those things that we don’t like. If I can find constant happiness, you can.
Life does not need to be ups and downs. That is not part of being human, it doesn’t have to be part of the deal. Suffering is not necessary, I promise.
If you like that idea, then you are in the right place. Just assuming it as a simple possibility is the first step to experiencing complete happiness and contentment, in every aspect of your life.
Last blog (see here if you missed it) I talked about how people expect that people, things, possessions, careers etc., etc., will make them happy. It’s not true. Make happiness an inside job, make it about not getting but being. Happiness is an attitude. First be happy, make it a foundation, then live your life.
The second reason why you aren’t continuously happy is this:
- You don’t make it a priority.
What is the most important thing to you? If you could give your loved ones one thing, anything at all, what would you give them?
Everyone I ask this question tell me some version of happiness. When it comes down to it, happiness is the most important thing to everyone. Everyone just wants to be happy.
But they don’t prioritise it.
It is well down the list of things to do.
Their lists are full of things to get and to achieve and to do, and then, right at the bottom, last on the list, when they have time to get to it, is to be happy.
Only because we believe after I do x, y or z, then I can be happy. Work first, finish things to do, and then be happy.
Nope, doesn’t work, you never get there.
If you are interested in being happy you have to be like an Olympic athlete of happiness.
Focus.
Make happiness the core of everything you do. Make it first and the middle and last. Train to be happy. Make everything about internal happiness.
Then, and only then, it comes and gets you. You realise that you are happy for no reason at all. Nothing can give you happiness, you just choose it. Nothing can take it away either. You prefer things go a certain way, but either way you are happy.
Practice. You need to prioritise and practice. Close your eyes every day and meditate. Keep it simple and joyful. If you want it simple, and joyful then learn the Bright Path Ishayas’ Ascension. Fastest path to happiness ever. I promise.
Be happy!
The way to happiness, part 1.
Just watched a film called "Hector and the search for happiness". It was alright, not amazing but not awful. But... it involves a psychiatrist who realises he’s not happy and he can’t help his patients be happy so he takes a journey to see if he can find happiness.
Many adventures later and he comes back to his girlfriend and his home, where - surprise, surprise - happiness was all along. I’m sure there’s a moral in there somewhere.
There are so many films and books about happiness at the moment. But shouldn’t happiness be normal? Not only a human right, but a human reality?
Obviously happiness is being missed by so many. Why don’t a big chunk of the population consistently experience happiness? More importantly, the question is: Why don’t you experience happiness all of the time?
Here’s the first reason why (look for the second reason in the next blog):
- You don’t know where to find it.
Stop looking for something or someone to make you happy.
Happiness is an inside job, always and forever. Things don’t make you happy, you decide to be happy and go from there. Happiness is never given to you, happiness is an attitude that you choose, no matter your circumstances.
Remember Golden Rule of Existence #41: ”It is never the situation, only, always and forever it is your reaction to the situation” .
You aren’t so much in control of the circumstances (although you’ll try hard to be - stop controlling, by the way), you are totally 100% in control of your reaction.
If you are looking for happiness in a person, in possessions, in travel, in anything, you will miss out, always. These things are to be enjoyed, but happiness does not lie in them.
We have it backwards. “When I have x, y, or z, I will be happy”. Nope. Be happy first.
Consider happiness as being your base, your foundation. If you have a solid happy foundation, everything you add to it will only be more and more enjoyable and life affirming. If you have no foundation, nothing you throw on top will satisfy. Make sense?
It will require practice. To make happiness your foundation in the quickest amount of time the best practice I know is to meditate. Better still learn the Bright Path Ishayas’ Ascension. If you have already learnt, make sure you close your eyes every day. It’s important.
Okay?
Look within. Be happy, enjoy everything.
Part two soon.
Be the change...
“Be the change you wish to see in the world” - Gandhi It is a fascinating and inviolable certainty of this world:
What you give tends to be what you get.
If you are smart, and you are smart otherwise you wouldn’t be reading this, you may come to the following conclusion:
If you get what you give it would be a good idea to give what you want to receive.
It works at the most basic level: If you want more hugs, give more hugs. If you want happier people around you, be more happy. If you want more love, give more love.
But it even works at a more subtle and abstract level.
If you want more understanding, give more understanding.
If you want more honesty, be more honest.
More clarity? Be clearer.
More patience and tolerance and mutual respect? Be all of that.
It’s the coolest thing once you see it. Loving, open, happy people have a whole world that is loving and open and happy. They attract very similar people. Scared and anxious people tend to create events and people that make them scared and anxious, giving them more reason to be scared and anxious.
Now: If you find yourself pointing the finger at people and insisting that they are more x, y or z, for whatever reason, it's an excellent sign you need to look at yourself.
Be the change you wish to see in the world. That single act, bringing the focus of change to within yourself changes more than you can possibly imagine. It all starts with you.
Ever tried to actually change someone? In fact, do you realise you try and change all your loved ones? Stop, its futile. People dig their heels in deep when they feel someone is trying to change them. But they do respond to a) openness and b) change in others. It all points back to you.
But don’t take my word for it, do it. Even if you disagree, try it. Prove me (and Gandhi) wrong by putting your money where your mouth is.
Save the world starting with yourself. You are the one person you can change. Might as well get going.
Give yourself an "A"
What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail? How would you be if you knew the future was going to turn out perfectly?
Keep the door of possibility wide open. Go beyond the voice that says you might fail, that something might go wrong, that you are not good enough.
The inner critic can only see limitation, it cannot see potential and possibility. Infinity is far too much for the mind to grasp, and that is why is focusses on the small: on Lack, what you don't have and what might go wrong.
Believe in this and the world gets squashed and grey, and you along with it.
What if you flipped this Lack thought? Do you ever focus on what might go right? That you are more than good enough?
Why not?
Why not embrace an attitude of vision and of possibility? Instead of listening to the "you should" or the "you need to", why not go with the "what if?" and the "how about?"…?
Drop the limitations. They are only imagined, they only have power because you believe them. Instead, give yourself an “A”, in advance - focus on the possibility of the greatness of what could happen.
Assume an attitude that lights up your life, and in doing so lights up the life of all those around you.
Assume an attitude that everything will turn out just fine. Be supremely present in this knowing. How do you live in this knowing?
And why not? Wouldn't this one shift make your life amazing?
Attitude informs everything.
check out Benjamin Zander here in this video for more.
Gratitude - simple, powerful, but rarely done.
My computer died the other day. Completely kaput. Funny how I can use something everyday and not really notice how much a part of my life it had become until it was no longer there.
You ever notice that?
How something can be essential in your life and yet you only truly appreciate it when its gone?
One of the most inspiring stories I have ever heard was regarding a woman who lost her legs in a bomb attack on the London Underground. Years later she was interviewed and what struck me was her attitude. I can’t find the interview so I can’t directly quote what she had to say, but essentially she said the day she lost her legs was the day her life started.
You see before that day she was in survival mode, just getting by - alive but not really Living. A cycle of wake, work, sleep, repeat. Her overwhelming response when she came to in the hospital was one of gratitude for being given a chance to live. Her focus was not on the legs that she had lost but the fact that she was still alive.
The bomb was her wake up call - it shifted her attention from merely surviving to truly living. It shifted her focus from what she didn’t have to what she did have. It showed her she didn't have any time to take anything for granted, that life itself is an incredible gift.
I see so many people who don’t realise how truly rich they are. They have so much, and yet they don't realise it simply because they take big chunks of their life for granted.
I had an ear infection the other day meaning I had no balance. Even the act of sitting up in bed and getting to the bathroom was a major achievement. As the infection left, how sweet was it to walk freely? Very.
I can’t tell you how powerful the simple act of being grateful is. Going out of your way to be thankful transforms your attitude to life. The simple fact that you are alive becomes a source of richness and wonder.
If you decide to be actively grateful, even for the small things, the following will happen:
You will become very present
Your life will come truly alive. It will become a continuing source of satisfaction.
Your relationships will grow and become deeper - simply because you are nurturing them.
You will complain less and less.
You will be less able to stay self absorbed, in worry or guilt or doubt.
You will realise how the world transforms according to your attitude.
You will realise that your happiness is your choice.
You will become someone who others want to be around. Your happiness will inspire others to be happy.
There’s probably a hundred more, but try it, live it for yourself.
You want more from life? Start by being grateful.
The end of bad days, right here
Did you know that bad days don't just happen? The only time you have a bad day is when things don't go the way you planned them. A bad day simply is that reality hasn't met your expectations of what "should" have occurred.
The degree to which it is a bad day, ranging from merely difficult to complete disaster, depends on how much you were fixed on sticking with your plan - ie. how much you resist what is.
Life isn't good or bad, it isn't out to get you sometimes, it just is what it is. Life is constant change. Can you be fluid enough and adapt?
How flexible and fluid you are with what is happening will determine how much freedom you will experience. If you can cultivate an attitude of "how fascinating!" to everything that happens to you, life will become an absolute adventure and never ever "bad".
The end of bad days is all in your attitude. You can step out the door with a plan, but surrender it to an attitude of adventure: "OK! what is going to happen today? Bring it on! I'm ready. And if I'm not ready, I'll just be surprised".
Do this and you'll never have a bad day ever again. I promise you.
Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans
“Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans.” - John Lennon It’s a funny old thing, life. It’s happening here and now and more often than not, most people aren’t aware of it. They miss out on life itself, thinking and planning about some other moment, some moment in which they believe life will happen.
Do you do that? Is your life going on right under your nose while you are elsewhere?
Unless you are present and alive to life, to this moment, you will miss out. And no one has an infinite amount of time to get to the task of really, truly living. It’s something you need to get onto very very soon.
If I may be so bold, I would ask:
What do you think it’s going to take for you to wake up to this?
What is it going to take for you to realise that your life is ending one moment at a time, and you are somewhere else, lost in your head?
When are you going to stop wasting a single moment adrift in the past or future or some other location, wishing, dreaming that you were anywhere but here?
When are you going to make the most of each and every moment?
Please do. Please wake up to your own life, take it and go. Live it fully. It requires so little, just your attention applied now. Such a small, simple sacrifice, and you get so much.
If you don’t, who will? If not now, when?
ps. if you don't know how - just ask. It really is a simple thing.
How happiness is like exercise
Did you know...? Thinking too much, anxiety, worry, anger, fear, stress, actually negativity in general… all of these things are just habits.
They are something we’ve learned to do in response to things that we don’t like. The more you react in a certain way, the stronger that “way” gets and so the easier it is to respond like that.
It becomes a habit, a reaction.
It’s a bit of a bottomless cycle, a slippery slope.
But the good news is that it is just a habit. You can create another habit.
The even better news is that you don’t need to work out or overly analyse why you get stressed, or anxious, or not respond to life in the way that you want.
A habit is simply a strong pathway in the brain.
Want a new habit? Make another pathway. Do something else that takes you in another direction.
A little known key to life is what you put your attention on, grows.
The more you do it, the more the new habit becomes stronger and more “slippery” for your attention, the old one less so. You become incapable of behaving like you used to, simply because all your attention is on the new way of being.
Happiness is way more attractive to the mind. If you give it a chance it will become your default.
Good news indeed. I believe it was Aristotle who said:
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act, but a habit.”
In this way, happiness is a lot like going to the gym - that’s why I say the source of happiness and all good things in life as occurring when you are mentally fit, and flexible, and fluid.
You don’t need to believe a push up or Zumba class will make you stronger and healthier, you just need to do it - with good form and regularly - and the results are obvious.
Regular practice is everything then.
A fitness regime is essential. If you want a better life, some sort of regular “choice” practice - as in choosing your attitude and choosing to be present - is necessary.
You need to give it enough time to create a new habit, for it to become stronger, and the predominant way of living and being in the world.
But the more you do it, the more your life changes and so the more you keep wanting to do it.
It becomes self-propelling and motivating.
But you need to start. And you need the commitment to follow through.
Grab a buddy and make a pact, set aside a time each day. Just close your eyes. Remind yourself to see everything as being half-full. Be as present in this moment as much as you can.
If you need any assistance in this, let me know. I know some good ways.
Take care, and have a wonderful weekend! In fact, make it a habit.
- Arjuna
Things to do to make sure your day is a happy one
Happiness is a choice. When you realise you aren’t so much in control of the situation as you are in control of your reaction to the situation, then happiness becomes a viable option. It becomes in your control.
So how can you set your day up to be a happy one?
I have drawn up a little list for you. Feel free to add your own:
1.) Prioritise said happiness Wake up every morning with the intention of making the foundation of your day the choice to be happy (or whatever the most important thing is to you: peace, contentment, love etc). Put it first on your list.
2.) Meditate regularly Meditation - properly done - is the practice of being non-judgementally aware. Through practice a state of calm, connectedness grows within you. You also get to clearly see what choices serve you, and are able to make new ones.
3.) Accept Learn to accept the things you can’t change or leave. Don’t settle for complaining or blaming. Just accept and then you can work with what you have. Complaining is not the road to happiness.
4.) Live with your glass half-full Not an invitation to live in the pub, but rather an invitation to choose to appreciate: to see the good and the positive. You can do this in any situation or with any person, you just need to decide to.
5.) Be Grateful Happiness isn’t provided by the people and the things in your life. Happiness comes from the gratitude that these people and things are there. Gratitude is the fastest path for more.
6.) Give Find a way to give to other people. Even if it is a smile or the intention to make someone’s life a little easier, do it. You cannot be self-absorbed when you are giving. And if you find yourself ‘stuck’, get going and give.
7.) Hang out with happy people Spend as much time as you can with people that make you happy. It is contagious!
8.) Live a life of purpose Every day, do those things that fulfil your purpose. If you aren’t sure what your purpose is, it is closely related to your passions.
Give them a try and see what happens…