Upgrade Reality is a personal development eBook by Dirk de Bruin.  You probably know him as Diggy.  He authors the very popular blog Upgrade Reality and has released a new eBook by the same name.  He really went all out on this eBook and compiled all the best lessons he has learned in life.

Diggy has a rather non-traditional rise to success.  He finished high school a year early at 16, co-owned a supermarket with his dad at 17, learned forex trading at 20, and now he’s sharing his passion for personal development with thousands of people around the globe through his blog Upgrade Reality.

In Upgrade Reality, Diggy covers a wide range of topics, but all with a central theme of upgrading your own reality; that is, making your life the best it can be.  One of the great things about this eBook is that it is well rounded, focusing on a number of different areas of life.  Diggy draws from his own experience and really put a lot of thought into all the area in life that he has sought to improve.

Overview of topics

Diggy really filled Upgrade Reality with a full range of content covering all facets of personal development.  He covers Achievement & Success, Productivity, Confidence & Self-Esteem, Business, Body & Mind, and People & Relationships.

Table of Contents

Acheivement & Success

• Creativity
• Failure
• Quitting
• Goal-Setting
• Inspiration
• Motivation
• Take Action
• Success
• Vision Boards
• Leadership
• Travel

Productivity

• Productivity
• Relaxation

Confidence & Self-Esteem

• Anxiety
• Abundance
• Confidence
• Self-Esteem/Positivity
• Passion
• Purpose

Business

• Blogging
• Business
• Money

Body & Mind

• Emotional Control
• Gratitude
• Happiness
• Health /Exercise /Diet
• Now (The Present)
• Yes

People & Relationships

• Dating
• Friendship
• Love
• Networking
• Parting Words
• Resource Section
• My Favorite Story
• Upgrade
• Your Reality
• Your Perception of reality is reality!

Price/Value

$27.  This is a good value for so much content.  Most eBooks at this price point don’t even have half the content that Diggy has packed into Upgrade Reality.

What’s Included

The 122 page eBook

Pluses

• A wealth of personal development information
• A completeness of topics that touch on many facets of life and personal growth
• Great organization of topics and well written
• Leading by example, Diggy includes many personal examples
• Excellent design and layout

Minuses

Only one minus, and it’s just a pet peeve of mine.  He uses URL shorteners in the links, so I can see where the link is actually pointing.

Rating

5 stars.  Upgrade Reality is fantastic.  The thing I like most is its completeness.  Diggy really made a strong effort to cover a full range of topics to make for a well rounded look at personal development.  Upgrade Reality is a 122 page eBook that is really more like 244 pages since the layout essentially has two pages per printed page.  That is 244 pages completely full of super content.  I would love to see something like this taught in school.  Upgrade Reality would be a perfect fit in a high school class, where instead of theoretical concepts, you could get some stuff to really apply in life.  Content to make your life better, to motivate, and to inspire confidence.  It’s the kind of content that would really make a difference in life.

To be clear, when I say it would be great for high school students, it’s because I think that’s the best starting point to be armed with the kind of information Diggy includes in Upgrade Reality.  It’s definitely not the only starting point though.  I’m 35 years old and I still found a wealth of information that I can apply in my own life.  Upgrade Reality is a fantastic eBook, and its content would be equally at home in a real published book.  In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Upgrade Reality make the transition from eBook to published book.  It’s really that good.

Check it out for yourself.  Click the Order Now button to head over to Upgrade Reality to read what Diggy has to say, what others are saying, and to purchase a copy for yourself.

I’ve been seeing a lot of 7 Link Challenges around various personal development blogs. I also just added my own. The idea originated from a post on Problogger, and everyone is really jumping into this one.  It really took off on Personal Development blogs when Dragos Roua challenged some of his fellow bloggers to participate.  The result is a wealth of fantastic posts.

I am finding so much great info from these posts that I wanted a way to share them with everyone. I’m creating an index here for Personal Development bloggers that are participating in the 7 Link Challenge.  Follow these links and get ready to spend some time reading a wealth of absolutely fantastic content.

If you are a Personal Development blogger and you have a 7 Link Challenge that you’d like to share, simply add it using the form below.

Note: for “Link Title” please make that the title of your blog, and URL should be the URL of your 7 Link Challenge post.  I added a couple that I know of to get the ball rolling.

This 7 link challenge has been making it’s way around various blogs, and it looks fun, so I’m going to jump into the fray.  The idea is that I share 7 links on various key highlights of my blog.  Read on and you’ll get the idea.

My Very First Day

Eden Journal – A New Blog About our Path in Life.  My first post was to introduce me and what I planned to write about.  I’m still roughly following the original plan.  Over time I have come to see the direction I hope to follow, and in the coming days I’m going to announce a new clarity of vision.

How I Learned the Lesson of Hakuna Matta ”No Worries.” I also want to highlight my second post which is my first real “blog” post.  This has proven to be a popular post, and Google sends me a number of visitors on this one.

The Post I Enjoyed Writing the Most

The Open Mind Test Series. It’s hard to pick my favorite post to write.  I really like some of my story posts, but I think the Open Mind series was the most rewarding and most closely aligns with my personal philosophy and the philosophy of Eden Journal.

Post Which Had the Most Discussion

The Day I was Laid Off was the Best Day of My Life. This was one of my early posts, and it came shortly after I returned to work.  That was a good time for me to look back on the time I spent unemployed.  I really missed the time at home with my family when I returned to work.

The Post on Someone Else’s Blog that I Wish I had Written

How To Have Tourette’s Part 7: No Excuses. I really don’t have any post I wish I had written.  I figure that no matter what the post, it would be different if I wrote it, so no sense thinking about it.  I am adding this post though, because it’s the one that touched me the most.  It’s raw and honest and shows a side that most bloggers aren’t brave enough to share.

My Most Helpful Post

Sleep… How I Learned to Fall Asleep Fast, and You Can Too! This post details the steps I took to learn to fall asleep fast.  It’s been linked from a few different places and get’s a bit of traffic from Google.

The Post With a Title I’m Most Proud Of

There’s a Turd in my Nest. Really, how can you not read a post with a title like that.  This one was my first attempt at poetry, or at the very least a Dr. Seuss like rhyme.  The funny thing about this title, is how it came about.  I was listening to the radio, half daydreaming as I drove to work.  I think I pieced together a couple of conversations on the radio and pulled them into a daydream where I thought I heard them talking about a turd in a nest.  It sounded weird enough to make a good title, and then I created the post around that title.

A Post I Wish More People had Read

A Choice and a Purpose; Entering this Earthly Realm. This is a story I wrote about life before birth.  It’s a topic on which little is really known, so I gathered the info that I had at hand, and added that to what felt right to me to compose this post.

The other day I shared a link to Ali Quotes on Soulful Mind and Body.  Ali had a great idea to start sharing his own quotes.  After I shared that, Ali challenged me to come up with some of my own quotes.  I have accepted the challenge and am starting with this quote today.

“All of us will achieve enlightenment.  Some will reach it in this lifetime by seeking knowledge, approaching all with an open mind, and learning from life’s lessons.  Everyone else will have to wait until death when our soul once again has access to all knowledge and information.”

Reiki is a form of healing by touch and allowing energy to flow.  It’s a process of healing where you place your hands on or above the recipient of the Reiki healing.  As you progress through the Reiki healing session, your move your hands through a series of positions until you have covered a majority of the body.  The whole process is quite relaxing and feels really good.

When performing Reiki, I find it helpful to put on some nice Reiki Music.  When I first started I used an old Enya CD that I had.  It was about the only relaxing bit of music I owned.  Since then I have found a number of other great pieces of music, and many are designed specifically for Reiki.

I want to share a website with you, Reiki Music.  This website is specifically designed around Reiki Music.  It has a whole section of music that was created to accompany Reiki sessions and attunements.  There are some great selections here and I really like all the albums I sampled.

Many of these Reiki Music albums are infused with Reiki energy; that is they perform Reiki on the music itself.  This fills the music with good positive healing energy.  Some of the Reiki Music albums have set track lengths so that you can time each hand position.  When the song changes you know it’s time to move to the next hand movement.  I’ve seen one with three minute intervals, one with five minute intervals, and one with six minute intervals.  These are great for the Reiki beginner, as it gives you a little structure to work within.  Over time, you’ll learn to sense when it’s time to change positions, but in the beginning, the timed music works really well.

There are also some Reiki Music albums that are termed as Popular Artists.  Most of these have rich vocals, which I love.  I have always felt great healing power in the human voice.  Some of my favorites are by the Mediaeval Beabes, a group of female singers.  To me it’s like taking that healing power of the voice and multiplying by each member of the group.  The result is powerful healing music.

Some of the Reiki Music there is good for meditation or yoga.  I don’t practice yoga, but I do sit in meditation on occasion, and I find it much easier to clear my head with some soft music playing in the background.  It’s like a gentle reminder for my mind to stay on task rather than to jump all about.

Head over to Reiki Music and check it out, I’m sure you’ll find some great new music to accompany your Reiki, self-healing, meditation, or yoga.

Hey everyone.  I just wanted to put up a quick post to share something cool that Ali over at Soulful Body & Mind just started.  He had an idea to start writing his own quotes.  I think it’s a cool idea so I wanted to share it. 

Writing your own quotes is a great way to highlight some of your personal philosophies.  Here is his Ali’s first quote.

I want to expand on some of the topics in my last post about The Invisible Gorilla.  If you haven’t read it yet, you should pause here to read The Invisible Gorilla post, and then come back to this post.  I say this because it will help you understand where I’m coming from and also because there are some spoilers in this posts that would make the other post less understandable.

In the Invisible Gorilla post I shared a few videos that demonstrated the how the focus of the human mind can be so keen as to completely miss an obviously out of place element.  Before experiencing this for myself, I would not have believed it.  How could anyone watch a video and completely miss a gorilla strolling through the scene.  The gorilla was in the scene for a full nine seconds and even paused in the middle to thump his chest.

I pride myself on being observant.  I like to notice things that other people miss.  I like to see the hidden treasures in our world.  Noticing everything and paying attention to the treasures along the way is integral to enjoying my path through life.  A big part of this blog is about our path in life.  And now to see so clearly that it is so easy to miss things, it makes me feel a little disappointed.  Disappointed in my ability to notice things and disappointed that it seems to be part of human nature.

I find it important to pay attention to these things that are irritating or disappointing.  They are usually changes to expand our minds, and this is one of those cases.  Our focus is what allows us to work more efficiently.  It allows us to tune out distractions.  It’s part of what allows us to function as a highly evolved animal.

In my interaction with others, especially in the workplace, I find there are two types of people.  There are big picture people and there are detail oriented people.  I wonder what the split is among these types when they take the gorilla test.  I’m a big picture person; I always look to see how the details affect the situation as a whole.  Other people I work with are detail people; they excel at digging into the details to make things work.  Both are necessary parts of any company.  My feeling is that, on average, big picture people will notice the gorilla more often than detail people.

On the other hand, I may be way off about that, it may be too broad a generalization.  I wonder if this ability to notice things is built into our DNA.  That is, if it’s part of us from birth, or instead if it’s something that can be learned.  I suspect to a certain degree it can be learned.  At least that what I gather from all the spy movies I’ve seen.  You know, the ones where the CIA agent goes through training and learns to notice everything around them, the ones where the Secret Service guy spots the suspicious character, and the ones where the hero notices danger and is able to make a crucial escape.

I want to note that there are two related terms in this field of attention and perception.

One is Change Blindness.  This is where we fail to notice a change, and relies on us having a comparison in memory.  For example, one person is standing behind a counter.  He ducks down to retrieve something, and someone else takes his place.  Not recognizing the different person from the one in your memory is Change Blindness.

The other is Inattentional Blindness. This is where a change in the environment or field of vision is not noticed, and does not require any comparison from memory.  The Invisible Gorilla video is a good example of this, where people are focused on counting balls and miss a gorilla walking through the scene.

The question in my mind is:  Can we be trained to overcome change and inattentional blindness? I know that we can train ourselves to be more observant, and we can train ourselves to notice more things in our environment.  It’s difficult to find any evidence in the Google searching I did.  (If you find any evidence please let me know in the comment section below.)  My feeling is that we can overcome it to a certain extent.  After all, 50% of the people studied in experiments on change and inattentional blindness are able to notice the change.  So what makes those 50% different?

A couple of years ago I started a little training of my own in order to be more observant.  I didn’t like the fact that I would often miss things that others would notice, and I wanted to change that.  I also really liked the heroes in the spy movies that noticed every little detail in a room.  I don’t remember the name of the movie, but it was one where some young people were studying to enter the CIA, and part of their training was to become more observant.  I was really interested in that component of the movie.  And much like the kung fu movies, where after the movie I kung fu everyone in the house including the cat, I got pumped up and wanted to emulate some things I had seen.  In the movie, much of the practice involved memorizing a pile of items on a table, covering the pile with a blanket, and then recalling everything they saw.

Well, that kind of activity may be beneficial, but it seemed kind of boring to me.  Instead I developed some of my own techniques for becoming more observant.  The main technique was simply to practice being more observant.  Here are a few of the activities I practiced.

One New Thing Per Day

On the way to work I would make an effort to notice one thing I had never seen before.  I drive to work every day, so you’d think I’d seen it all, but day after day I was able to find things I hadn’t noticed before.

The Unnoticed Item

At random times throughout the day I would make an effort to notice something that I felt most people wouldn’t notice.  It might be a stapler that’s always there on the desk, or the way a cord loops down under the desk, or a spot on the floor that never got cleaned.  I tried to pay attention to the little things that often get overlooked.

A Walk in the Park

I liked to take walks in the park, but I realized I often failed to pay attention to all the details.  So I began taking time to notice more things during my walks in the park.  From a small ant carrying a tidbit of food to the way a tree spreads its branches.  There is so much to see in nature, we very often fail to notice most of it.

Sit and See

Sometime I like to just sit outside my home and enjoy the outdoors.  While I was in my quest to become more observant, I practiced by looking at everything around me as I sat outside.  I looked in all directions; down at the ground, up in the sky, to my left in the grass, to my right in the flower beds.  I noted the differences in each piece of mulch.  I noticed how the flowers leaned towards the sun.  I look with the intent to see all the details that I usually don’t bother paying attention to.

This was all good practice and I think it did help me to become a little more observant.  I think mostly the repetitive nature of my observance practices helped plant a small seed in my mind.  It’s one that clicks every once in a while and says, “pay attention.”  That pay attention seed helps me to be more observant.

Even so, I don’t think any of us can be observant all the time.  We have times where focus is required, and that focus must tune out distractions.  There is some compromise needed between focus and observance to all that is around us.  Through the videos I’ve seen recently on change blindness and inattention blindness I have come to realize that this tuning out is a necessary part of us.  I’m also going to go a little easier on those around me when they don’t happen to notice all the details.  I’m seeing that it’s one of my flaws to be a little short with people when they don’t see the same things I see.  I’m going to work on that.

If you like this kind of thing, you should check out the book The Invisible Gorilla.

I hope you are finding this topic as interesting as I am.  If so, be sure to sign up to receive my posts for free.

I recently came across a video that is absolutely fantastic.  It’s called the Invisible Gorilla.  It’s a test of attention and illustrates something called Change Blindness.  If you think you are an observant person, these videos may change your mind.  I’m going to share a few videos, so if you are reading this in an email or RSS reader, you’ll want to click through to the site to view the amazing videos.

Here is the first called The Selective Attention Test.

Watch the video and then we’ll see how you did?  According to Daniel Simons only about 50% of the people pass this test.  I find this amazing.  The first time I saw this video, I already had read about it, so I knew what to expect.  Happily he posted another video also.

In this video called The Monkey Business Illusion, he expects you to be on the lookout for changes.  Watch this one and see how you do.

How did you do?  Be sure to tell me in the comments.  I was able to see the gorilla and one of the other changes, but I missed one change.

I consider myself to be rather observant, and I must say it really irritates me to have missed anything.  I have even practiced becoming more observant by mentally reminding myself to pay attention and see things I might not normally see.  I practice this from time to time.  Sometimes I’ll do it while driving to work, or maybe while walking in the park, or even when sitting outside my house.  So when I miss things and I’m really trying to see them, that is most irksome.

Even though it’s irksome, it’s actually pretty normal.  Like I said earlier, about 50% of the people miss the change.  I find this absolutely fascinating.  Why is it that we miss things so easily?  The concept behind this is called Change Blindness.  It’s actually the same concept behind sleight of hand, but seeing it in videos like these bring that concept to a whole new level.

Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons are the creators behind these videos.  The have recently published a book called The Invisible Gorilla.  In the book they use a variety of stories and counterintuitive scientific findings to reveal an important truth: Our minds don’t work the way we think they do.  Judging by the videos, I’m going to have to agree with that statement.

The really eye-opening part of all this is that this Change Blindness has real world consequences.  Imagine making a turn at an intersection, and while looking for cars you miss seeing a pedestrian, bicycle, or motorcycle.  Imagine convicting someone of a crime you witnessed based on the fact that you knew it was them, and later through DNA testing you find out it wasn’t.  These are just a couple of examples.  The book, The Invisible Gorilla, is full of many more.

I want to share one more video with you.  It’s from a Ted Talk on Counter Intuition by Daniel Simons.

I am completely amazed at all this.  I’m going to have to pick up the book.  If you’d like to order the book, you can order it from Amazon here: The Invisible Gorilla

Be sure to check out the follow-up to this post on Being Observant.

Summer is a tough time for campfires. The hot weather and mosquitoes aren’t good companions for a campfire. Not only that, but summer is a busy time for most people as they happily follow their own summertime pleasures. Because of this, several of my regular campfire guests were unable to participate in this month’s campfire. Annabel, Patty, and Krissa are very busy in their own pursuits, and while I’ll miss their participation this month, it gives me an opportunity to invite a new face to join us around the campfire.

Please welcome Ali Myers from Soulful Body & Mind, who has rapidly become one of my favorite bloggers. I feel that Ali’s thoughts and ideas very much mirror my own, and I’m super excited to have him joining us at this month’s campfire. Happily, one of our regular participants, Patrenia from Personal Finance Notebook, has made time and is really excited to be returning for a super fun campfire.

For this month’s topic, I had a theme that kept popping into my head. I couldn’t really explain it, and it wasn’t readily apparent that it would make a good topic for a post. I like to follow my intuition though, so I decided to just go with it, and see what developed. And I also like to stretch some creative muscles once in a while with a unique topic. This month’s topic is Sunshine and Rainbows.

Thank you for joining us

I want to thank you, our readers, for joining us around our campfire. I hope you have enjoyed our discussion on Rainbows and Sunshine. Please take a few minutes to get further acquainted with our campfire guests by visiting their blogs and subscribing to their RSS feeds. You may see an unusual thing when you visit some of these blogs. You’ll notice that some of us may have posted this same Campfire to our individual blogs. We have decided to throw SEO (search engine optimization) rules to the wind and truly share this collaboration. We all participated in this great discussion and wanted to share the great conversation will all of our readers. We hope you’ll appreciate this new found nature of sharing in this wide world of blogging.

Want to keep the campfire going? Add your thoughts on Sunshine and Rainbows in the comments section. And be sure to check out the comments sections of our campfire friends to see more great contributions to The Campfire.

A family of squirrels live in a tree,
Along with some birds and bubbly bee.

A Mother squirrel looks over this crew.
Caring for her tree is all that she knew.

Each squirrel and bird has a nest of their own.
They live there as children until they are grown.

In the beginning they took great care of their nest.
In a tree full of life that’s really quite best.

But as time went on, they began to grow careless.
And in all honesty they really did care less.

They left half eaten acorns scattered about.
Some for so long they started to sprout.

They left trash in their nests, they didn’t recycle or reuse.
“Why should we” they thought, “There’s nothing to lose.”

They consume all they want full of great greed.
“We have an endless supply of all that we need.”

They thought this to be true but mother squirrel new better.
She tried to convince them in a speech and a letter.

She talked and she preached, she led by example.
But try as she might they continued to trample.

The good tree that provided life for each one
was slowly dying, but what could be done?

The mother squirrel was concerned about the health of her dear tree.
But none cared, not the birds or the squirrels or even the bee.

They continued to live their lavish lifestyles,
Consume and dispose of trash in big piles.

One day they came home and what did they see?
A turd in each nest, how could that be?

Who would do such a thing? It made them quite mad.
To poop in the nest of another was really quite bad.

Would they understand the lesson their mother was teaching,
You have to respect your surroundings, it’s what she’d been preaching.

They had but one tree to live and to play.
I think they learned their lesson that day.

You must respect the world you live in.
Or one day the Mother Earth may happen to shit in
the home you inhabit, the only you live in.

We have only one planet to live and to love.
Now is the time to rise up above
and to take care of all that you are not innocent of.

Love and Respect your planet, your neighbors, and yourself.

Photo by Per Ola Wiberg