“A man who does not think for himself does not think at all” - Oscar Wilde

Do you ever just stop to think?

I have a confession to make.  I have a bad habit. It’s called thinking. Well okay, it’s not really a bad habit, but I sure do a lot of it these days. I used to just take everything as I “knew” it to be.  Now, I’m constantly thinking - thinking about how to improve my life, improve my thinking.  Everything I do originates with my thoughts so improvement must start there.

Last week after writing my last post on the realities we create for ourselves and after attending the last lesson of another SFT seminar simply to hone my skills, I went into deep thought and decided to conduct an experiment.  I began to think about how we all view the world from our own set of rose colored glasses.  This can be good, bad or neutral.  Every time we see something or someone, every time an event happens Read More »

“Greatness is not found in possessions, power, position, or prestige. It is discovered in goodness, humility, service, and character.”  - William Arthur Ward

It’s no secret.  We live in a me, me, me world.  We want everything our own way and we want it now.  “It’s my way or the highway,” some say.  Some people see absolutely nothing wrong with this philosophy.  In fact, there are probably some people reading this right now that fall into that group.  You may be saying, “I have to have that philosophy or I’ll get run over in this rat race of a world.”  If that is your philosophy let me ask one question - ok, maybe three - “Do you enjoy being around other people with this attitude?  Have you ever had or seen a good boss that possessed this attitude?  Have you ever been around a person in authority with this philosophy that was effective?”  Chances are you have not.

So, why would you want to be humble in this “me” world?

In SFT, I learned early on in my lessons that humility was necessary in order to process and remove emotional pain.  I was told and I have learned by experience that if humility is not in place then it is impossible to remove the pain of an event or situation.  It’s totally useless to every try.  We also call humility the “me factor” in SFT.  I was trained to ask myself, “How’s my ’me factor on a scale of 1-10?’” before even attempting to process pain.  If humility is not there the pain will remain.  I knew first hand that this was going to be one of the most difficult lessons for me to master.  I was right and selfishness is very easy for me to slip back into if I’m not watching.  As a matter of fact, recently I have noticed myself letting the old selfish bug creep in.  It’s no wonder I’ve been struggling in some other areas as well.  But, pain processing is not the only benefit of humility.

As I was thinking about this post and planning out what to say it all the sudden hit me.  There are so many ironies associated with humility.  What I want to discover today is:

The Misconceptions vs. the Reality of Humility:

Myth 1:  Humility means letting people run all over you.  It means you are no good.

Reality:  Humility requires confidence - confidence in self and in God - to the extent that you don’t need to have everything your way.

Myth 2:  Humility means you are weak.

Reality:  Humility is strength under control.

Myth 3:  Humility is for stupid people.

Reality:  Humility requires wisdom - wisdom to see what the outcome will be if you always demand to have things your way.  (pss.-  No one will want to be around you plus you will be miserable.)

Myth 4:  Having humility means everyone will look down on you. 

Reality:  People will respect you if you consider their needs and wants and let them have their way sometimes.  (Four of the men that I have respected the most in my life were the most humble men I have ever known.)

Myth 5:  Having humility means that you don’t deserve anything and will never have anything.

Reality:  At the root of humility is gratitude.  Gratitude recognizes all the blessing you have even though you don’t deserve them.  True gratitude will lead to more blessings than you could ever imagine.

Myth 6:  You’ll always be a low man on the totem pole if you’re humble.  You have to lift yourself up or nobody else will.

Reality:  The results of humility are that you will be lifted up. 

“Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord and He will exalt you.”                    - James 4:10

Myth 7:  You can’t be humble if you are a leader.

Reality:  You will never be a leader if you are not humble (even though you may be in a leadership position).

Myth 8:  I will never get what I want if I’m humble.  Reality:

“The only way to get what you want is to help other people get what they want.”    - Zig Ziglar

Myth 9:  If you are humble you can’t have your way about everything.

Reality:  This one is actually true.  The only downside is that if you demand that the world revolve around you then you will be miserable and disappointed at best.

“What makes humility so desirable is the marvelous thing it does to us; it creates in us a capacity for the closest possible intimacy with God.”  - Monica Baldwin

 If humility is such a good thing then, “How do I get it?” 

* One thing that has helped me the most along this continual journey is to focus on my blessings.  At one point I wrote down all the blessings I could think of and I reviewed the list daily.  This really got me to see how truly blessed I am even though I don’t deserve the blessings (that is not a “poor pitiful me” mentality).

* Checking your motives is another good way to work on humility.  Is it all about you?  How pure are your motives - honestly?

* Increase your self esteem.  There’s a number of ways to do this.  Work on yourself.  In other words, focus on growth.  Set specific goals for things you can work on.  Read the Bible and other helpful books to gain ideas. 

* Draw near to God.

* Do something constructive and worthwhile.  Be creative and get to work.

* Practice noticing the interests and needs of others and act accordingly.

In other news:

* If you want to learn more about SFT Awareness I encourage you to read my recent post at Jenny Mannion’s blog.

* The P4P Bookstore is finally open!  Come on in a relax.  Browse around to find some books for your personal growth. 

Have you ever said to someone (or wanted to, but didn’t)…  “Will you please just listen to me.”  How many times have you been trying to tell someone something and they were just not listening?  How many times have you felt like you might as well be talking to a brick wall.  Do you feel that sense of frustration rise up your spine as you think about it?  Have you been a poor listener?  Is listening a thing of the past? 

My friend, Ron Wilkins, was probably one of the greatest listeners of all times.  Ron and his apprentice, Gary Washer have taught me much about listening.  I give them credit for most of this material.  Ron said in his book, Removing Emotional Pain, that listening may be the most difficult [life] skill to learn. I agree with that.  Listening is twofold.  It involves listening to ourselves as well as listening to others.  Today’s focus will be on listening to others. What I have found is that by taking the time and making the effort to listen to others that often times the favor will be returned and people listen to me.

Listening is not easy, but it’s not impossible either. Understanding that listening is not an ability, but a skill that can be learned is refreshing.  (Yes, it can be learned!) 

Before we begin talking about how to listen, we need to first of all understand why we typically don’t listen. 

Understanding why listening is so difficult:

• Many mistakenly believe listening is an ability, not a skill that can be learned.
• It’s not easy to create the conditions necessary for for good listening.
• It takes a lot of effort, time and concentration to gather all the facts in a situation.
• It involves much more than simply hearing words or sounds.
• It’s challenging to see things from the other person’s point of view
• Listening involves getting rid of numero uno - ourselves. 

If listening is so difficult, then why bother with it?

• It prevents you from jumping to conclusions, possibly taking things personally or assuming you already know what the person is saying.  Failing to listen may cause you to take things the wrong way, stripping your inner peace right out from under you.  Listening allows you to see a person’s hurt from their point of view, not yours.
• It’s just plain rewarding to understand someone else.  You get a sense of fulfillment knowing that you are helping someone else to feel validated and understood.   Feeling understood is one of the strongest needs of human beings.
• Stronger, more intimate relationships
• A sense of peace from not having to talk and be number one and feeling like you have to have the last word
• You will become the most interesting person in the world as Dale Carnegie says in his book, How to Win Friends and Influence People
• People will love you forever if you take the time to listen to them. 

So if listening has so many benefits, let’s take a look at how we can become better listeners:

1.  The most important aspect of listening involves “putting ourselves in the other person’s shoes.”  I like to give myself a mental image of literally (but not really of course) transporting myself from my body into the body of the other person.  It helps me to “get inside of them.”  This is challenging, and takes lots of practice to master, but it can be done.  The purpose is to try with all of your being to fully understand the person.  Consider the experiences of this person.

2.  Humility.  This thing of getting into the other person’s shoes requires us to completely forget about ourselves and that is very difficult…..  But, it can be done.  Humility is not an option in learning to listen.  It says to the other person, “You are very important and I want to understand you.  Right now, it doesn’t matter what I think.  All that matters is you.”  Challenging?  Yes!  Rewarding?  Oh yeah!!

3. Give the person your full undivided attention and avoid distractions.  If it’s something really important create the favorable conditions necessary to listen to someone.  If someone is trying to talk to you about something and you are in the middle of something else and know you are not really able to listen at the time don’t fake it. These are magic words for this situation:  “John (or person’s name), What you are saying is important to me, but right now, I’m in the middle of something and don’t feel like I can be a good listener.  Is is okay if we talk about this when I am finished so that I can better understand you?” 

Listen with your body.  When someone is talking to you turn your whole body, not just your head (if at all possible), to face the person talking to you.  Don’t just look over your shoulder or worse yet, continue what you are doing, and say “uh-ha, uh ha.”  That doesn’t count.

Know your distractions.  Is the TV a distraction for you?  A certain show?  Turn it off.  Are you in a restaurant with that significant other and the TV is in your view.  Sit in the other direction or ask for another seat.  Is the daily mail more important than the people right in front of you.  You might try listening to their day first and reading the mail later.  See how much this can enhance your listening skills and your relationships.

4.  Do NOT think about what you are going to say in response.  Humility definitely plays a role here.  Because you are humble and forget about yourself for the moment you don’t need to say anything.  This can be especially challenging, but may actually take a huge burden off of us. 

5. Validation.   Once the other person has spoken, then it is appropriate to reword what the other person has said in our own words to make sure we understand.  We’re repeating back to them what we understood them to say.  This is not accusatory, simply rephrasing.  Remember humility….  An example would be, “So what I hear you saying is……”  or “So you are saying…..”

6.  Ask questions if you don’t understand or have enough information.  You might say, I’m not sure I understand you, could you please say that again” or “Will you please explain that a little more.”  This lets the other person know you are trying to understand them.

7.  Listen to their voice inflections and body language.  Is their voice raised?  Are their arms flailing around?  They may be very upset or just plain mad about something.  Voice and body language leaves many clues.  Become a master at recognizing these things.

What are some ways that you have learned to be a better listener?

Has not listening gotten you into trouble?  How?

Can you name some more benefits to listening? 

photo by clearly ambiguous

Last week, I was forced to deal with the sudden death of one of my uncles.  It seems that it is maybe an event that shouldn’t have happened - at least not at this time.  Whatever happened, he is now gone and we are forced to grieve his loss and think of his memory. 

Death has been something I have had to deal with a lot over the past six weeks.  First, it was my friend Ron.  Now it is my Uncle Robert.  One thing is certain, we all face death.  It is inevitable.  Sure, science has advanced and people live longer now, but we still can not live forever on this earth. 

Being forced to face death so much has caused me to ponder about life more and reflect over my life.  What can death teach us about life?  Can peace abound in the midst of death?  Sure it can and I believe it should.

So what can we learn from death?

1.  Tomorrow is never guaranteed.  The next hour is never guaranteed.  Life is short.  So what is guaranteed?  Only this very moment.  So the question arises, “What are we doing with this moment?”

I’m not sure of the author, but this is a great quote brought to my attention by my friend David B. Bohls of Slow Down Fast:

Now is mine.
I can do what I want with it.
I own it, for better or worse.
What I do now, in this present moment, is what makes up my life.
My whole life is only a succession of nows.
I will take this moment and do something with it.
What I do with each now will make me or break me.

2.  The biggest thing I have been reflecting on is, “If I were to die right now, how would my epitaph, my eulogy read?  Each of us are writing our eulogy now - at this very moment.  So what is it saying?  Take some time now to reflect on that thought.  I will be doing that over the next few days.  Stephen Covey talks about the importance of doing this in his must read book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

A Thought to keep in mind….

Each moment is a stepping stone or building block to the summation of our life. 

If your stepping stones or building blocks could speak what would they say?  Are they applauding you for a job well done and making your life beautiful and full of peace or are they all crumbling to the ground screaming for help to be re-stacked into a sturdy structure and masterpiece?

A while back, I came across this short, but incredible movie that illustrates this point so well.  It’s worth a look.

3.  How can someone have peace as they face death?  Inner peace is about facing death confidently - knowing you are living the life you are meant to live every day of your life.  It is about living life for God not yourself.

Life is not about staying alive.  It is about being prepared to die at any moment.

WB School is a great resource I have found.

4.  Facing the death of loved ones has taught me not only the importance of reflecting on my life at this time, but to also take the time on a regular basis to do so?  Am I living the life I want to live is a good question?  If not, why not?  If not, then what can I do about it?  What can I do different?

5.  “It’s all in YOUR mind.”  This last one is directly from my uncle Robert.  One of the men presiding at his funeral told the story of how he was making excuses to my uncle.  Speaking about something he was doing, but didn’t feel like he was doing well, the man said to my uncle, “I just don’t feel like I’m making a difference.  I just don’t feel like I’ll ever be any better than I am now.”  My uncle said to him, “Just remember that’s all in YOUR mind, not anybody elses’.”      Thought:   What are you telling yourself?

Homework:

Write out your eulogy.  This is not to be a morbid experience, but rather an exciting one as you lay out how you want to live your life and what you want to be remembered for.  Keep breaking this down into smaller and smaller achievable daily steps and take action to achieve it.  Refer to Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People if needed.

At the end of every day, ask yourself, “If I could change one thing about today and the way I lived it, what would it be?”  What one thing would give me a stronger sense of inner peace?”  Write it down.  Resolve to put that into practice the next day. 

Since Mother’s Day is around the corner, my original thought for this post was to find a great poem about mothers and to post it here and to talk a little bit about the poem. Well, the problem came when I couldn’t find a poem that I liked, so another thought came to my mind. I thought that I would instead write about characteristics of mothers that promote peace in her children. This partly came about because I am not yet a mother and I am constantly asking myself, “If I have children what are the things that I want to instill in them?” And more specifically lately, I have been thinking about how I will work to bring about inner peace or peace of mind in their lives.

So what are some characteristics, some qualities that a mother can possess or exhibit to bring about peace in her children?

1.  Listening and understanding.  I’m not just talking about surface listening.  I want to be the kind of mother that truly seeks to understand what my children are saying beneath their actual words.  What is their body language saying?  What are their feelings?  What are the thoughts behind those feelings?  What are their deepest strongest desires and wishes in life?  What are their interests?

2.  Since peace is the absence of conflict, I want to be a mother who encourages my children to reach their full potential.  If I listen to their interests and what they want to do and encouarge them to go for it with all their being, then what I will be doing is removing any inner conflict they have that could possibly tell them that they can’t really do what they want to do.  In other words I want to eliminate any self limiting beliefs that could possibly arise within them.  I don’t even want it to ever enter their minds that they can’t do something.

3.  When a conflict arises, I want to be a mother that focuses on the solution, not the problem - whether that be a conflict between me and the children or between the children themselves.   Focusing on any problem only brings about more problems and more conflict; therefore the absense peace.

4.  Also, as a mother who promotes peace,  I think it is necessary to raise my children with a purpose.  I see the need to lay out the values and principles that I want to instill in my children and focus on them every day.  I think the biggest mistake that parents make (and it’s one I would have made if I had raised children before this time in my life) is to not raise them with a purpose.  By focusing on these values and principles I see that the most important thing for me to do to eliminate conflict in this area and to promote peace is to:

5.  Walk the talk, as many people call it.  In other words, I need to exemplify these values and principles since children always do what you do, not what you say.  Many people say what they think is important and talk about others who do not do what is important, but few actually do it themselves.  Clearly laying out these values and priorities will eliminate any doubts or conflicts in the child of what is important to me and they will likely follow suit.

6.  One of these values that I believe is crucial for me to promote and teach peace to my children is humility and selflessness.  I believe with humility that about all conflict in the world will be nonexistent.  That is what I have seen in my life.  When I am being selfish and self centered then I have lots of conflict in my life.  When, on the other hand, I forget about myself and focus on the needs of others then I get my needs met also and everyone is happy and full of peace and happiness.  There is no doubt that with a mother’s selfless giving and humility that her children will not only have peace, but that she will find it also.  That is not at all to say they she should ignore her needs, for that is a sure recipe for inner conflict.

7.  One more ingredient I see necessary for me to raise my children to have inner peace is to teach them to see things in perspective or to see the big picture.  In other words, I want to teach them to look at long term consequences or results of their actions or thoughts.  Will what they are doing now effect things for the good or the bad?  Will the current situation matter tomorrow, next week, next decade?  Will it matter 20 or 30 years from now.  I believe teaching them to think this way will help them to not focus on instant gratification, but to think through things.  It will help them not to get too wrapped up in their problems, thus eliminating conflict.

Well, I certainly haven’t covered everything here that I want to teach my children, but this is a good start and I know these are absolutely necessary for me to instill in them…. 

For those of you who are not yet parents:  What are some things you want to do to promote inner peace in your children?

For those of you who are parents:  What are some things you do to promote peace in your children?

 Raising Positive Kids in a Negative World

To read the precious articles in this series please go to:

Are You a Puppet on Strings? - Taking Back Control of Your Life
Steps to Happiness – Part 2Steps to Happiness - Part 3 - Does this Stuff Really Work?
Steps to Happiness – Part 4 - Who is Master?
Steps to Happiness – Part 5 - Choose What Kind of Chicken You’ll be before an Egg Hatches
Steps to Happiness - Part 6 - Happy People Don’t Seek Happiness

A thankful heart is the parent of all virtues.

- Cicero

This last article on Steps to Happiness has come to be my favorite although I didn’t know it would at the time. This gratititude thing has presented itself to me over and over again and I soon came to see that as Cicero said it truly is the “parent of all virutes.” The more this idea presents itself and the more I think about it the more I come to see that it is the foundation of all the other steps. Maybe it should have been first. But, then again maybe the other steps are necessary in order to be grateful…..I guess you could look at it both ways. Either way, I’m just being constantly reminded that I need improvement in this area of my life (and for that I’m grateful!).

As this idea kept presenting itself me I was refered to a book. After researching the book I can say that it will be my next purchase (soon) and one that I can recommend to my readers. It is called Thanks!: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier. I can’t say it’s a “new science,” but it certainly looks like something we can all learn from. (Don’t you love how in this world of blogging we can end a sentence with a preposition.:) I always wanted to do that. My English teachers would not be proud. :))

When we take on this new attititude (really, it’s like a whole world view) and TRULY INTERNALIZE it, it changes how we see EVERYTHING and how we think and act and treat everyone including ourselves.

Well, enough babbling……

Gratitude….

Does it ever seem like you just don’t have anything? Do you often find yourself complaining about the things you don’t have? Are you not getting what you want out of relationships? These are serious issues for many people and it seems like a solution is nowhere in sight. So what can be done about it?

Developing and maintaining an attitude of gratitude is a must in order to find solutions to these problems and to lead a life of happiness. Without this attitude one will lead a miserable life at best, but with it the blessings abound. So the question arises, “If it is so important then what is it and how do I achieve it?” That’s the question I asked for a long time. Discovering the secret was life transforming.

I remember the first time that I encountered someone who had a true spirit of gratitude. I totally could not understand it. I remember thinking “I wish I could be like that.” – not realizing that I really could be. She had always been one of my favorite people, but it wasn’t until this day that I figured out why. Her husband was basically in a vegetable state and at the point of death and she said to me, “He may not live, much longer. I’m just thankful for the time we’ve had together.” I thought, “Wow, that is an amazing attitude!”

What is an attitude of gratitude?

Before we go any further, we need to recognize that attitude is a mindset; it’s a way of life, a constant way of being – of looking at things. It is something that we internalize. We define gratitude as being thankful. So we could define attitude of gratitude as a constant spirit or state of thankfulness.

So how do I develop this attitude?

First, and probably the most obvious recommendation, look around at all the people who have it worse than you do. There is always someone out there that is in worse shape than you are. If you’re not convinced then watch the news (although I try not to do that because it is so negative.) You will always find someone who is in a more troubling situation than you. It will put you in your place very fast.

Second, recognize that EVERY blessing you have is a gift from God – everything from, a roof over your head, to food to eat, to (hot) water to take a bath, to the people in your life, to the air that you breath, to life itself, to time. Not only is it a gift from God, it is a gift from God that you do not even deserve. This is not a “poor pitiful me, I’m not good enough for anything” attitude. It is exactly the opposite - recognizing how truly blessed you are and realizing that we are all sinful people that God chooses to bless anyway. He just blesses those people much more who live their lives for Him (I am not talking monetarily, although it can be included).

Truly happy people recognize that everything they have is not only a gift that they don’t deserve, but that it is a gift to be used for God’s glory. (This attitude changes how you treat everyone.) God really blesses these people. They also recognize that any of it could be taken away at any time and that is okay because they never really even deserved it in the first place.

When you view everything as a gift something almost magical happens. These things begin to transform into something beautiful. If we treat the people in our lives as a gift, then our relationships start to change and take on a whole new beautiful form.

Third, focus on what you DO have, not on what you do not have. There’s a secret. It goes like this: What you focus on expands. If you think about and focus on what you do not have you will just keep having nothing because nothing expanded is still nothing. If you focus on what you do have, you will be amazed at the blessings that come into your life. (Focusing on positive things always creates more positive thoughts. Focusing on negative things always creates more negative thoughts.)

Fourth, give of your abundance – your newly discovered blessings- cheerfully (even if it seems like very little). You always get back in direct proportion to what you give. If you give a little, you get a little back. If you give a lot you get a lot back.

Remember how we deal with life is always a choice. From experience, I can tell you it is well worth finally choosing gratitude.

Exercises:

1. Make a list of all your blessings. Read the list at least twice a day.
   
2. When you start to think about all the things you don’t have, just replace it with 3 things that you do have (and your mind will show you even more blessings that you do have.)
   Ex. If you only have $2 to you name. Think “Wow, I have $2, instead of thinking I ONLY have $2. Then think of two other blessings to go along with it. Remember someone out there has lost everything they owned in some tragic event. Even if you have lost everything you own, be thankful for life itself and the opportunities ahead of you instead of focusing on the problem itself.

http://www.wbschool.org/ and
www.housetohouse.com/hth/freebies/

Exercises:

Use the above resources to learn about God and form a relationship with Him.

As you go throughout your day look for ways to bring joy to others. Act on it.