First impressions are absolutely everything.  When you meet somebody for the first time, you automatically make personality assumptions based on 1) what the person is wearing and 2) how the person is conducting themselves. After these first assumptions are made, a person then uses them as a filter for future interactions. If the first impression somebody got of you was a cold, calculating SOB, then you might not have much luck dating that particular person in the future.

1. Present yourself as a pretty, trendy person.

We like people who are pretty. We also like people who dress in a pretty way. So be a pretty person!

People assume pretty people are more confident, smarter, and friendly than less-than-average looking people. The opposite is also true - people assume uglier people are more timid, less intelligent, and not as sociable as their better looking counterparts. (This is as true for males as it is females.)

Take the time to go shopping to buy clothes that fit you fabulously. If you’re a woman (or a guy who likes to practice androgyny), learn how to wear makeup “correctly” so you’re always looking your best. Get a great haircut that flatters your face; shape your eyebrows (but not to the point where you’ll look perpetually surprised!) There are hundreds of books on styling - pick up a few, read up, and apply those tips!

2. Come off as modest about your accomplishments.

This should be common sense, right? Be modest about your accomplishments. When you acknowledge your achievements but ever-so-slightly downplay your road to success, everybody will like you more.

Be careful not to be too modest - overly modest people tend to be categorized as having low self-confidence levels and timid. Don’t completely overlook modesty either; if you don’t show a little modesty, you appear as boastful and rude to others. The obvious key is to strike a balance between the two.

We like people who appear modest because we don’t feel threatened by their accomplishments. People who overtly brag about every achievement they’ve made in life makes us feel insecure and annoyed; we tend to think, “Who is he to say that he’s done X? What an arrogant jerk!” However, if somebody says “Yeah, I accomplished Y, but the road was difficult; it took many, many hours of work and dedication,” we’re more likely to believe they’re one of “us - one of the little guys. It’s easier for everybody to relate to the latter than the former.

3. Show how much you have in common with the other person.

No, Paula Abdul, you and MC Skat Kat do not come together because “opposites attract.” In fact, that’s furthest from what psychology tells us!

People adore similarity. The more you are alike to another person, the more that person will like you in return. From favorite colors to favorite drinks to favorite sports teams, if you acknowledge you have a “favorite” with somebody, they will unconsciously like you more.

Why does creating similarity work? Because people want to be around people who are like them. Sharing common interests with another person helps creates bonds and positive mental reinforcement. We all think we have the “right” opinions on everything, so when we encounter somebody with the same views as us, we unconsciously think they must be a good person because we are good people.

While we’re on the subject of similarity, let’s talk about sub-branch of it: flattery! Why does flattery work so well? Because most of the time people are creating similarity by agreeing with the other person - e.g., “You made a decision you like, I like that decision too!” Because people don’t dissect what they’re told unless prompted too, creating similarity via flattery works surprisingly well. It creates a quick, lasting rapport with the other person.

* * * * *

Not all of these three tips should be taken as 100% truth all of the time. There are certain points in life where causing a bit of controversy can help change the status quo. There are also times where you’re going to want to purposely not be modest when vying for an important position.

Of course, it’s possible to use these psychological tips to manipulate people - you can artificially  make yourself pretty, you can lie about accomplishments and modestly talk about your fake achievements, and you can also agree to like certain things that you absolutely abhor. It’s dangerous to do this, however, as you wind up creating a fragile self-image that one well-thrown rock could shatter in pieces.

What first impression tips have you found useful?

I know, I know. Easier said than done, right? Email management doesn’t have to be obnoxiously difficult or hard, however. In fact, once you get into the groove of becoming master over your inbox, outbox, sentbox, and any other box you might possess, managing your email to boost personal productivity actually becomes… fun!

I have a few tips and tricks I use to make my email life more enjoyable and productive. Hopefully you’ll be able to apply these simple suggestions to your own email usage.

1.  Don’t use email when there’s a more viable alternative.

Face to face contact is great, so use it! Don’t dash off an email when a snappy 5 minute conversation can do the job quicker and more effectively. Likewise, pick up your cell and make use of your minutes when it’ll save you valuable time.

Don�??t get me wrong, I love the joys of email! But when I choose to use email over better alternatives, procrastination kicks in high gear. The pattern is always similar: at first, I�??m only writing an email. But then I decide to check on other emails people sent me�?� I do that, and then I�??m updating Twitter�?� whoops! Not surprisingly, I�??m on an entirely different track than I started out. Often when this pattern strikes, I waste a good half an hour trying to get back to where I previously was.

Similarly, when people ask for your email or you’re inclined to pass it out like Halloween candy to people who you think might need it, don’t give it out at all. Instead, offer these people another method of contacting you. That way they can keep in touch without clogging your inbox with annoying clutter.

Besides, people like direct communication a lot more than they lead on. Talking directly to another person is much more rewarding - on both ends - than a lifeless, text-filled email. It’s infinitely more appreciated by so many people.

2. Use multiple email accounts for different life compartments.

Separate email accounts for different life compartments = you stay amazingly organized.

I do this useful trick with my blog. I have one email account for people who want to contact me, another account that I use to leave blog comments with (so I can easily keep track of responses to my comments), and yet another account that I use when registering for various websites. While this may be overkill to some bloggers, it allows me to keep the different facets of my blog separate from one another. When I’m required to find a specific email or piece of information that’s located somewhere in one of my inboxes, I can go straight to the appropriate box instead of shuffling through hundreds of emails in one stuffed inbox.

You can apply this to your own personal life as well. Some different email account designations could be family / friends / personal acquaintances, coworkers, and online accounts. (You can get as specific as you want, even creating certain accounts for certain purposes.) Remember, the goal here is structured organization. You don’t want one or two of your email addresses to become catchalls for all the email you receive. Get as detailed as you possibly can in order to maximize your email organization.

3.  Replace email checking with a more positive, rewarding behavior.

Are you constantly checking up on the latest email from your loudmouth, noisy coworker regarding the juicy office gossip about the manager and his affair with you-know-who?! Maybe you need something better to do with your time!

“Aww,” I hear you whine, “what else could I be doing with my time?” You could improve you daily time management - for example, you could schedule the rest of your day or sketch out your weekly plans. You could brainstorm ways to achieve your yearly goals in a more quicker, productive way. In the 15 minutes you might be using to check email, you could be doing light stretches or exercises to get your blood pumping - this can help reduce feelings of tiredness and fatigue.

The bottom line is simple: when you’re actively engaged in an activity that you 1) consciously choose and 2) know can pay off in the future, it’s hard to stop doing said activity for something as trivial as checking your email.

There are so many different internet-based time wasters out there now: Facebook, Twitter, forum usage, MySpace, gossip websites, and so on. I’m sure all of these services love your patronage! Don’t use them for the sake of using them. Be the master of the technological resources in your life.

Somewhere out there, a major technological time waster is waiting to snap onto the coattails of your personal productivity. Don’t idly fall into the email procrastination trap! Use your email wisely, and reap the benifits of improved productivity.

When my clock is summoning the time for all the world to see - and when I can clearly see what the time is - I notice a few occurrences happening in my work:

• I work with a quicker pace. If I see it’s exactly 2:00pm and I need to be out of the door by 2:30pm, I know I need to completely finish and get a move on my current project. Productivity increases.
• I stick to what needs to be done, not what I feel like doing. Consistently being reminded that I only have 24 hours in a day makes me seriously cherry pick the types of projects and goals I want to accomplish. Since I always only go after the projects and goals that I’m going to have serious excitement completing, my motivation is always up… and in turn, my productivity increases.
• I make wiser present-moment decisions. With a constant reminder of how few minutes there are in a day, I can’t afford to make decisions that whittle away at my precious hours. The snap, spur-of-the-moment choices I’m forced to make are, more often than not, the right decisions needed at the time.

When I see the big, red numbers glaring at me from slightly above my head, I know what time it is. I can’t delude myself into thinking I have more time than necessary when I’m constantly reminded of the current, correct time.

And I know this “boost your productivity with a clock!” tip sounds totally silly. I know most of you probably think I’m nuts for suggesting something like this. But it works so well! The clock may be ugly and not an item that’s going to get accolades for beauty. However, the objective I gave it - to keep me in line and to encourage me to become more productive - is always the same, and the obnoxious digital clock always delivers perfect results.

If anything, my clock is a reminder of the effects my work environment has on me. When I organize my computer and desk to be productive, efficient, and utterly fabulous, I always achieve my daily goals. But if I mold by environment to be akin to a relaxation spa, my productivity spirals down the drain. I know myself well enough that if I change my context to be results-oriented (or not), that’s how the chips will fall.

What little tricks do you have to maintain your productivity on a daily basis? More importantly, does your work environment promote productivity or encourage procrastination?

Personally, I don’t think this aspect of productivity as such a bad thing. It only emerges as a problem when there isn’t any specific, important task you’re becoming more productive at. However, I’m slightly different than the rest of the crowd. While I do enjoy applying some productivity tips in my life, I like to manage the bulk of my time instead of getting nitty-gritty and chopping off minutes from the projects I enjoy doing. This way I’m not trying to steal minutes from one project to the next because I feel as if I don’t have “enough time” to complete everything.

How do I manage my time like this? I use specific, planned out, one hour blocks of time to finish chunks of my long-term goals.

What could you accomplish if you took one hour of your time and really applied it to achieving one of your goals? Take a moment and wholeheartedly think about that.

And when you’re done straining your brain thinking about that… try the method out for yourself! Locate an hour where nothing important is happening, and make a written plan of how you’re consciously going to use that hour of limited time so that every single minute is dedicated towards the success of any major goal you have. You only get 60 minutes. How are you going to divvy them up? And there’s absolutely no cheating, you MUST use every one of those 60 minutes. No coffee breaks! No Starbucks runs!

Of course, those marvelous, little tips and tricks of the productivity world will creep into your thinking. But you also become slightly enlightened; a brand new shift in your thinking arises. Instead of trying to become better at the task that you’re currently performing, you’re forced to only pick tasks that you know are going to have a substantial payoff. You don’t have the time to whittle away doing mediocre work that spins yourself in circles.

What tasks must you do in that hour? What tasks can you totally cut out, 100%? What percentage of your time will be done doing X, Y, or Z? Is there anything you need to focus on intently, or will your time be evenly spread out among various tasks? Be as specific as possible. “I will use 5 minutes doing X.” is not unheard of! Make sure that every minute is accounted for and that every minute is being put towards something substantial and worthwhile.

One great application (and example!) of this method is practicing a musical instrument. The average time spent practicing any musical instrument - whether it be clarinet, piano, or violin - is about an hour a day. If you’re a serious student and want to become better, then you must make crucial decisions about how you’re going to practice. How much time are you going to spend on technical aspects, such as playing scales, trills, and exercises? How much time will be used to practice your actual material that you use to become a better musician? Will you be devoting any time towards the study of musical theory or history? Depending on your level of expertise, different students will give different answers. But only the best students will consciously decide what needs to be focused on and to what degree.

Working on specific goals for one hour a day is almost like cooking dinner, in a way. When you have the recipe in front of you and you follow the steps, you definitely know you’re going to get the desired result… or something close to it. You don’t skimp out on ingredients; you don’t try to cut corners with the expectation that by modifying the recipe, you’ll create a better dish. Likewise, productivity and time management are the same way. If you follow the plan - that was created in advance - you’re going to hit near the bulls-eye if you keep track of what you’re doing. Cutting corners or skipping steps might work in the short term, but you might bake something that’s not as tasty as you expect!

As an unintended bonus consequence, planning out an hour to the nines to knock a dent in one of your goals is also an incredibly motivating task in itself. It’s as if you’re given a stone, a hammer, and a chisel and told to make a masterpiece out of the hard rock you see. When it comes time to put your grand plan into action, it’s incredibly easy to stay on track as well, because you’ve already written every single instruction down. You can’t get blown off course unless something drastic happens or you quit. (But I already know that you aren’t a quitter, you ambitious go-getter!)

The more time you give yourself to work on a project, the more likely you are to not fall back on productivity time wasters. Part of the negative Catch 22 of the Productivity World is that it’s easy to get caught up becoming more productive at paper shuffling or pencil sharpening. While these things are… well, you know, semi-important, there are more important things in life than making sure all your #2’s are ready to use. Giving yourself exactly one hour, that’s planned out to be effective in reaching your goals and efficient in execution, will make such the difference in your life when you realize what fabulous results you get!

Common Sense as a Problem Solving Tool

When faced with an ominous roadblock of a problem that I’d like to blast through ASAP, I ask myself this question, based on common sense:

What is the simplest, most direct way to solve this problem?

Personally, I like solutions to my problems that are both simple and direct. Simplistic, direct solutions are almost never fun to implement, but I achieve my desired results very quickly.

You may be thinking to yourself, “That’s such a deep statement to get out of thinking by common sense”, but thinking with common sense almost always ends up giving you the simplest, most direct solution to any problem. Some examples include:

• “How can I lose 20 pounds?” Common sense says: Eat less! Exercise more!
• “How can I attract and net a mate?” Common sense says: Make yourself look pretty and then socialize with other single people.
• “How can I quit my caffeine addiction?” Common sense says: Stop drinking all caffeinated beverages ASAP.
• “How can I appear more likable?” Common sense says: Smile more often. Give people honest compliments that come from your heart. Dress nicely. Be modest.
• “How can I stop wasting time doing X?” Common sense says: Cut it out from your life as much as you possibly can.

Common sense always tells you what’s workable with the resources you have. For some people - like myself - this is a fabulous thing! Dreams and fantasies are great, don’t get me wrong! But when I have a goal I’m aching to achieve, as if I can feel all my cells in my body wanting to claim victory, I don’t want wishy-washy, vague ideas for achievement. I want solid, concrete solutions. I want action steps that will guide me to completion if I follow them. This no-gimmicks approach isn’t for everybody, but for me, it works marvelously!

Using Common Sense to Find the Next Action Steps

Once you use common sense to find a solution to your problem, you can then use it to find out how to implement said solution. If I can identify a solution, I want to be able to identify the steps to create the desired outcome. I can’t have one or the other… I need both!

Common sense always guides me to asking this question:

What’s the next logical step in getting the desired outcome?

Here are some examples of using common sense to find the next action step, pulled from the common sense solutions from above:

• To successfully lose 20 pounds, an action step you might take is purging all “junk food” from your home and replacing it with healthy fruits and vegetables.
• To successfully find a long term mate, one possible action step is to buy a few new clothes that you look amazing in and get a brand new hair cut that flatters your face.
• To successfully quit a caffeine addiction, one action step could be to cut out all Starbucks trips from your life. (Blashphemy!)
• To successfully appear more likable, a workable action step would be to practicing giving honest, truthful compliments to other people in the checkout line at any store you may be in.
• To successfully stop wasting time doing X, an action step you can take would be to… stop doing that action.

Remember, you can use common sense to map out an entire goal to completion, not just the next step you can take to achieve that goal. This is often one of the best ways you can plan out a goal, and I highly recommend you give it a shot and try it out. You get simplistic, direct steps to obtain what you desire - they might not be the steps you want to take, but common sense plans will get you results.

See how simple applying a bit of common sense can be? I love this problem solving method so much!

Why is there such a lack of common sense?

My personal opinion is that the lack of common sense by users of self-help material is largely caused by the makers, promoters, and purveyors of self-improvement material. (Matt says what now?!)

Many personal development pursuers who read problem solving material don’t read that stuff to actually solve life problems. They read to escape from their problems. By constantly catching up on the latest tips and tricks to create a “fabulous life”, they can keep excusing their own sucky life. Their rationalize it as the following: “Well, I’m still trying to find the answer to my conundrum!”

And on the other side of the same coin, very few self-improvement providers are actually willing to give you the keys to solving your problems. If they gave others realistic, workable answers, those folks would never come back! Instead, personal development hawkers often talk in sweeping generalities, giving motivational and inspirational hope to people while draining those people’s pockets out of hard earned money.

Is it any wonder that common sense is a non-existent, not talked about skill among the personal development community? Both sides are ridiculously deluding themselves.

Common sense is ridiculously straight-forward, as well. It doesn’t lie to you. It’s brutally honest and not afraid to push your buttons if you feel down in the dumps. Common sense can be harsh and cruel, but you’ll always get results when you apply it to any and every problem. Is it any wonder that so many self-help gurus don’t tell you how important common sense is and why it’s such a vital technique to master?

Applying Common Sense

Take a moment and think of several seemingly monumental problems you need to confront in your life. How can you use common sense to identify a workable solution, and how can you use common sense to plan out that solution to achieve victory?

On the days I haven’t been blogging, I’ve had this uneasy feeling stirred up inside of my soul. Part of me wanted myself to blog for the sake of blogging, for the sake of sharing something I personally know with the world. But every time I would go to write a post - when I had the time - something strange would happen. I could imagine a million things I longed to share, but I couldn’t phrase my words to make them jump off of the page as I was imagining them doing. This entire feeling was almost like a form of personal development writer’s block.

I could compose posts, but all of feeble writing attempts ended up reading very dry and fake… not like me at all. For example, last Friday I wrote about 25 simple tricks you can use to achieve your goals faster than normal. It was a decent sized post - about 850 words, very organized, very straightforward. But when I posted it online and read it back to myself, it didn’t sound like me. It wasn’t in my personal voice, my own style. It read so mechanical and clunky, as if I was churning out words instead of writing from my heart.

As you can probably tell, this made me so, so frustrated! What’s the point of having a personal development blog - an amazing way to share my ideas and connect with other likeminded people - if I couldn’t express my innermost thoughts on self-help in a way that sounds truthful and honest to me?

It was then that I realized just knowing what to talk about and how I wanted to say something isn’t enough. I also had to have something important to share with the world; something I wanted to say.

A lot of bloggers throw out mindless fluff in order to increase their page rank, make more online income, and so on. But I don’t want to do this with my blog. While mind is nagging at me with “Come on! You need to write a post! It’s been four days since you’ve put anything online,” my heart is whispering “There’s a difference between having an idea to share something and actually having something to say.”

There are a million personal development topics I know about and could explore to the depths for years on end - goal setting, time management, productivity, consciousness, spirituality, creativity, problem solving, etc. But choosing a topic - say, productivity - that’s just the beginning. What do I know that can add to that? What do I know that others don’t know or haven’t quite figured out yet, so I can provide value to what’s already out there instead of feeding even more fuel into a fire that needs to die out ASAP? What can I say that’s truly an extension of who I am, and not something that sounds contrived or wishy-washy?

Are you speaking only for the sake of hearing yourself talk? Or are you choosing your words carefully, knowing you are sharing something valuable and worthwhile?

He offers up a really good argument for keeping it safe and not “tearing down” other personal development topics: Everybody is different, and different self-help methods work for different people. Why should anybody actively tear down another point of view when it could seriously help another person create the life they truly dream of?

Of course, I hold a different view. (Surprise, surprise!) I think actively playing the devil’s advocate is absolutely vital for personal development and growth, otherwise you literally become stuck in a growth rut. When this happens, you become unable to truly blossom into the type of person you desire to be.

Why write such stinging commentary?

Deliberately staking out an argument that’s a scathing critique of the topic at hand is the only way I can outright provoke people to think about their views at hand. When you’re faced with information that directly is the opposite of what you truly believe, and it’s written in a thought-provoking, sharp manner, you can’t help but feel some type of emotional arousal. You can agree with what I say, or disagree, but there virtually will be no middlemen.

“Safe” ramblings on a seemingly innocuous topic don’t challenge people to seriously question what they believe. However, being direct points out strengths and weaknesses on both sides of the argument. How should we find these flaws, strengthen our own viewpoints, and question what we believe if we don’t have somebody else showing us our blind spots?

A common example of this would be analyzing religious beliefs. Unless you have a person who is specifically pointing out the flaws in your belief system, why should you even question what your personal beliefs are? A Christian who only debates with other Christians on the merits of the Bible won’t ever be entertaining other viewpoints that directly challenge his or her beliefs. However, if you throw in a hardcore atheist into the mix… now you’re getting somewhere! In a debate with an atheist, the Christian would be forced to defend his or her beliefs, which in turn could lead to the three things I noted above: finding the flaws in his or her belief system, strengthening his or her own viewpoints, and questioning what he or she believes in.

A Simple Example - My Scathing Critique on Positive Affirmations

People who read a post like my last one on positive affirmations and then accuse me of tearing down a seemingly helpful tool for people to use in their life completely miss the essence of the post. The purpose of the post wasn’t to put myself on a pedestal, cast stones at people who use affirmations, and yell obscenities at those folk who drown out their sorrows with happy thoughts. Instead, I was articulating my own personal viewpoint by writing in the sharpest, most direct way possible.

I could have easily written a kinder, gentler blog post about the several reasons I don’t think positive affirmations work, but at the same time sing a high praise about affirmations for every negative aspect I listed. Some self-help bloggers take this approach, always staying on the beaten middle path. Is there anything wrong with this? Not at all. Most people don’t want to outright offend others. And the middle path is always the safest path, because it works. It’s not offensive, it’s not scary, and everybody comes out of the forest happy.

However, I’m abrasive, mildly acerbic, and I like to push people’s buttons to encourage them to question their viewpoints. I would rather have several people flustered and upset at me - for whatever reasons - than have everybody love me because I don’t stray off the marked path. The creatures in the woods aren’t as scary as you would think!

Tearing down or building up?

As mentioned before, the best way people can question their own personal line of thinking is if they are offered up stinging commentary on a specific viewpoint they hold near and dear to them. Growth won’t occur if people are ambushed with the same information they’ve always known.

I don’t view any sort of harsh critique - whether it be personal development or otherwise - as ripping a viewpoint to shreds. I see this type of commentary more of an analysis on a specific viewpoint.

I also don’t see sharply critiquing personal development topics as harmful or contrary to my goal of challenging people to seriously question what they believe in. If anything, it makes them rethink, ever so slightly, what their personal beliefs are. Even if their questioning moves them to solidify their views, they still thought about their sentiments on the topic. That means the seed of growth has been planted, and one day they might entertain a totally different view.

“Tearing down” implies that nothing else is growing in that newly created void. I disagree that this is what happens when a person is provoked by newly received, abrasive information that’s contrary to their current belief system. When you rethink your views, something has to grow in that empty space… whether it be a brand new view, a new line of questioning and thinking, or the same old view that’s slightly more solidified. Something is newly created in that seemingly empty space.

And I personally think it’s awesome to offer up different views and have them debated on their merits. Who knows what kind of viewpoints I might inspire people to take on, and what questions I might provoke people to ask about themselves and the world?

I’ve read about them. I’ve used them. I’ve read about them some more. And I loathe them.

Do positive affirmations work? Yeah, sure. Maybe for the 1% of people who fool themselves into thinking they work. Last time I checked, the 1% was in the clear minority… and since those are the people who need this advice the most, I’d like to share my points of view on this very interesting topic that many people are interested in.

This whole air of “let’s think happy thoughts and constantly strive towards our goals”, the model Pollyanna outlook of the pop psychology, of self-help blogs… I totally disagree with it. It’s completely wrong and housed on an inaccurate landscape of how human beings actually think, feel, and function.

1. A person’s context might not reinforce the positive self-talk.

I can just hear you say it now, right in front of your mirror…

I am in a constant state of relaxed joy. My career and family areas of my life are constantly improving, and I’m reaching new heights in my personal growth as human being.

CRASH! Wait, what’s that noise?! Oh, it’s your cat, knocking down that beautiful vase you just bought for $150. Whoops! And while you’re at it, take note that the dog peed on the carpet, yet again, because you didn’t get her trained; the kids are hungry because your job pays pennies and whatever little money you have goes towards gas to get to work; and the house is in a constant state of dirt, filth, and grime because you don’t have the time to clean up nor do you have the money to hire a housekeeper or cleaning service for the day. You can’t even afford food!

Are you still locked in a state of relaxed joy?

If your social context does not reinforce the thoughts you want to ruminate, you’ll automatically flip back to your old method of thinking. It won’t matter how many times you… affirmate yourself. If you’re trying to tell yourself “I’m happy!” but everything around you is screaming “Life sucks!”, there is no way on earth you are going to ever believe yourself unless you were seriously deluded in the first place.

Ditch the affirmations, and get to work fixing your life!

2. Positive affirmations might dangerously mask a person’s real problems.

Quick fix solutions are for fleeting, temporary glitches in your life. If you have a broken leg, you don’t slap a band-aid on it and call it fixed - you seek out the necessary treatment. Likewise, if you are dealing with a major life crisis, you don’t want to use personal affirmations to run through the problem as quickly as possible. You want to seek a more stable, long-term solution - possibly including professional help, if needed.

Attempting to wholeheartedly trick yourself into thinking everything is okay when clearly everything is not okay isn’t a great move. In fact, isn’t doing that the complete opposite of what personal development stands for?

Acceptance of your problems is one of the major cornerstones of self-help. First, you accept your life exactly how it is. Then you take the appropriate action steps to change your life into how you exactly want it. But positive affirmations, what good do they do? If you’re feeling bad, you use affirmations to mask your unwanted feelings so you can effectively shun out whatever problem is paining you. If you’re feeling good, you won’t bother to use affirmations because you know how silly and ridiculous they really are.

Sometimes “negative thought patterns” (the seemingly favorite phrase of positive affirmation thinkers) are wanted! If you’re going through a truly painful life experience - an emotional breakup of you and your partner, the death of a family member, a traumatic life event, and so on - those negative thought patterns naturally occur as your mind rationalizes and make sense of the painful events. You seriously cannot expect to skip the grieving process with a trite phrase or two about how thrilled you are with life. Not confronting and coming to terms with your innermost feelings only leads to contempt, sharply felt grief, and a whole lot of hurt.

All in all, in my opinion, telling somebody who is going through a painful divorce to spew off positive affirmations to boost up her self-confidence is terrible advice. I can’t believe that anybody would even recommend this to anybody else… then again, some self-help blogs have served up even more amusing advice.

3. What are positive affirmations at their core? Worthless, trite pieces of feel good fluff.

I don’t need to look into the mirror and shout off “I am happy!” 10 times over to make myself thrilled and energetic for life. Why would anybody want to go through this painful ritual of saying positive affirmations every morning? It’s nauseatingly silly.

And positive affirmations totally rely on people’s interpretations of the chosen words in the affirmation… for example, take the following phrase:

I am happy!

Okay, that’s a nice phrase. I love being happy! And who doesn’t want to be happy?

But what does “happy” really mean here? How can we do a ritualistic chant around “I am happy, I am happy, I am happy!” if we haven’t even defined what it means to be “happy”? Does happiness draw from spiritualistic or materialistic means? Is it a broader version of happiness, such as the happiness for living? Or is it a more specific line of thought, such as happiness in work or family matters?

Dissecting positive affirmations always leaves you with one thing - nothing. (I know that “nothing” is nothing and not something, but for the sake of argument, pretend that “nothing” is a thing for now!) Take out the feel-good factor, and you’re left with absolutely nothing worthwhile. You might as well be frantically yelling “I love bacon!” 20 times into your mirror daily… at least then you’d be truthful.

4. Happy sounding pep talk masks what you really need - a good self-esteem.

Just like how positive affirmations can mask a person’s real problem, they can also mask what a person really needs - a good self-esteem.

And I’ve seen so many countless instances where positive affirmations were downright damaging to a person’s self-confidence. They use positive affirmations to blanket their irritating problems that they should be facing head on. But this only works as a temporary shield for a couple hours until their mind lets the problems creep back into existence, and they’re left even more lousy and awful than previously felt.

So what’s this person left with? A broken self-confidence level and soaring levels of scorn and hurtful feelings. The glass house he had just built for himself came crashing down in a thunderous roar with a single stone.

How do I know this? Because I was - at one time - that person. I tried to mask my feelings by telling myself I was actually happy, I could move on immediately, and nothing in the world could stop how great I was feeling. I positively affirmed those feelings. Guess what happened. Once those layers of fake feelings were peeled away, I was only left with me, myself, and I. I had to confront my emotions, feeling more awful than before. (For the record, I don’t suffer from depression or anything related - there’s a difference between feeling bad vs. being clinically depressed.)

Deep down, you know it’s wrong to lie to yourself that you’re okay when you’re not okay. When you partake in something like that, you’re camouflaging your self-esteem when it needs to be out in the open. I know that often times you have no self-confidence when you’re going through a rough time - I certainly had none at that point in my life! And I don’t know of anybody who does ooze self-confidence when they’re in a big pickle - it’s just not natural. But don’t build your fabulous home on sand when you know the ferocious hurricane is coming in six hours, even if that spot is a premium piece of real estate.

* * * * *

Want to immensely enjoy life as a positive person with very few negative thoughts? Go out into the real world and live. Have so much fun that you’re obnoxiously happy! Truly enjoy yourself and live life to the fullest - do what you absolutely love to do! You don’t need to spew ridiculous positive affirmations to trick yourself into thinking you have a great life. All that you must to do is get up and… well, live!

If you need positive affirmations to set yourself into “HAPPY MODE” day in and day out… perhaps your problems have a deeper foundation than you currently realize.

In self-help, it’s easy to feed into people’s hopes and dreams of soaring to new heights in grand, life-changing careers and opportunities they wouldn’t ever have imagined having before. And in some ways, that’s a great thing to do - this inspires people to take action towards their aspirations, it encourages long term goal setting, and it truly can make people more conscious about the way they live.

But there are certain things that certain people will never be able to master in their lives, no matter what. A truly mentally handicapped person will never be able to become the next great scientist of the 21th century. The mental capabilities and logical thinking skills just aren’t there for that person to make great strides in a field like science.

A more realistic example would be somebody who loves math but consistently gets awful grades in mathematic classes. No matter how much she studies, she never can pass by with more than a D. She dreams about becoming a prestigious college math professor, but the hours and hours she pumps into learning and reviewing her class’s material is futile - math just isn’t her thing. She does fabulous in classes like English, sociology, and theater. But math… eh, she doesn’t do so hot!

The problem isn’t a lack of study skills, otherwise her other class grades would be low. The problem is that math is a difficult subject for her to comprehend.

Likewise, you will never be an Olympic figure skater if you have two left feet and seriously cannot do anything athletic. You will never be a classical concert pianist if you cannot keep a rhythm for the life of you. You cannot become a professional award winning body builder if you are naturally tall and thin - your genetics will halt you from growing the muscles to the fullest extent so you can win competitions.

You cannot master everything you put your mind to, no matter how much you strive for mastery. Some things will always be out of your reach, with nothing you can do about it.

Don’t fall into the depression and depths of “I love to do X but I’m not getting anywhere, even though I keep practicing and working towards my goals! What’s wrong with me?!” You can ask others what to do, and most of them will tell you to work on various personal skills (time management, goal setting, spirituality, productivity, etc.), but that’s not the core problem. You could fabulously manage your time, set perfect goals, be totally in tune with yourself, and become amazingly productive, but that doesn’t solve your problem. Your personal problem is the fact that you keep working towards what you love but aren’t getting anywhere - that’s not a time management, goal setting, spiritual, or productivity problem. Could it be it’s simply because you can’t do something?

It’s perfectly acceptable to accept the fact that you don’t have the body type, the mental capabilities, stamina, and so on, to achieve the goal you desperately desire. I know that’s hard, but it’s better than deluding yourself into thinking you can achieve something when you are biologically wired so you can’t.

Most things you’ll be able to do absolutely brilliantly if you put in the time and effort. But for certain others rooted in biological causes? You might not stand a chance.

Please note that I’m not discouraging you from taking action towards the things you love to do! By all means, go for what your heart truly desires! But if you’re going after being something that you can’t make any progress in, even after months of effort… it might be time to throw in the towel.

I was a bit busy yesterday and didn’t have time to type up the article until today… so like always, I checked Steve’s personal development blog this morning and… oh my gosh, he wrote a post about the topic I was asked to expand upon! Wow! Maybe he’s secretly reading my forum posts and stealing my post ideas… my, my, my!

Anyways, I read his article, and I must say he brings up some really good points.

And here comes the critique…

Steve Pavlina say what?!

If you�??re attracted to many different pursuits and can�??t commit to any single one of them for your career, college major, or income source, then good for you!

Oh, snap! I’m not even done with the first sentence of the blog and already have some snarky comment to say!

Having a variety of interests is a great thing. There’s absolutely no upper limit to what kinds of interests you can have and take part in. For example, some of my interests include learning about personal development, social psychology, the sociology of crime and deviance, composing classical music, exercising to build muscle mass, window shopping, talking to other people and learning about their past experiences, Starbucks runs, performing on the piano to huge crowds… the list can go on forever.

But what I master completely is piano performance. What my interests are, can be separate or integrated into what skill I choose to master. I can apply social psychology techniques to figure out the best way to market myself. I can apply sociology when it comes to arranging the best way to put on a show. I can use my composing skills to perform new, exciting, original pieces for my audiences. I can use my exercising interest to make myself look better and have more energy while on stage. I can use my window shopping interest to find something cute to give as a surprise gift to an audience member during the show. I can use my interest-in-other-people’s-lives interest to feel a connection with my audience that’s beyond the music that I play. I can use my Starbucks runs to give me energy before a performance!

It’s really hard to explain how I feel about setting up my life this way, but I might as well give it a shot! (Thank God for Wordpress editing!) If I make the central focus of my life doing something I absolutely, truly, positively enjoy doing in every which way, my interests fall around that. What I learn in one interest can feed into my main message (piano playing/piano performance.) Which brings me to…

The benefit of having lots of different interests is that you train your brain to learn many new patterns. The patterns you learn in one field can then be applied to totally different fields to solve problems creatively.

I’ve noticed this to be totally 100% true. He goes on to explain about how people who excel in just one chosen field end up with “tunnel vision” that prohibits them from seeing creative solutions to seemingly obvious problems.

Unfortunately, this still leaves us with one major issue - Are you going to bother with mastering one skill completely? The question itself is a bit biased for several reasons:

• This assumes whatever mastered skill is going to become the centerfold of your life. This is what I’ve chosen to do - and I’m ridiculously happy with it! But a lot of people don’t want any certain skill to be the absolute #1 focus in their lives… so they almost ask this question as if they want reassurance it’s okay to stray along this “normal” path. So here it is - it is perfectly acceptable to not make one major skill, hobby, career, trade, or any other related “job”, the absolute focus in your life. For a lot of people, this path would be an utter mistake.
• This assumes you can’t switch out skills to master. If you decide you want to master the fine art of baking pastries, but after three weeks of lessons you find out you’re a really lousy cook, you don’t have to stay with mastering that skill. You’re fully free to bounce around as many times as you want between mastering various skills. For example, for about a year, I was fully engaged in learning how to compose classical music in the styles of Mozart and Chopin. Both of these composers have very distinct, noticeable stylistic differences, and dedicating just one year on how to compose in the style of these great composers proved immensely valuable as later on, I was hired to compose music for a play that needed numerous, original classical music numbers. I wouldn’t want to dedicate my life to composing music anymore, but the knowledge I learned in that field proved to be exceedingly valuable. (I later switched out skills to piano performance, in case you were wondering!)
• This assumes you only want to pursue one thing at a time. Piano playing may be what I adore, and it may be what I absolutely love, but it’s not the only thing I pursue. If I had to focus my day on purely piano playing, I would slowly die a painful death of absolute boredom. I love my other interests way, way too much to ever want to trade them in for anything. While I can’t go a day or two without touching the piano (I have to get in my finger exercises, after all!), sometimes I scale back the intensity which I go after my main focus. Some days this blog becomes my #1 focus because I need a creative break. Other days I’ll focus just on listening to and composing pop songs and classical music… still on other days, I’ll take a trip to Barnes and Noble and catch up on some personal development reading.

Oh, double snap! So… if the question on “what skills should I master?” is biased to begin with, then it’s a faulty question. And if it’s a faulty question… then is their an answer? When you strip away everything and just ask “What skills should I bother with learning in life?”, what’s the answer?

What does it all boil down to? Conscious choice.

Anything I say, anything Steve says, it’s based on what we consciously chose our lives to be like. For Steve, he chose to dedicate his life to what he calls the “greater good” - making a decision, on his own, to follow his heart and grow as much as he can as a human being. Sharing that growth with other people and encouraging others to follow their hearts and grow, that’s just the essence of who he is. I chose to dedicate my life to becoming the absolute best I can at piano performance and entertaining other people because it’s something I absolutely love to do so much, I can’t explain it.

But while I say “Pick one thing to master, and build your interests around that” and he says “Oh, forget that, go with as many interests as you want!”, our decisions on how to lead our live are consciously chosen. They weren’t preprogrammed into us. We weren’t forced to accept what the social standard is. (Hell, I dropped out of college after three semesters!) We made a decision on how to live our lives, and that’s how the cookie crumbled.

You need to do the same thing. Do you love so many interests that you can’t just chose one to pursue to 100% mastery? They don’t bother going down the “pick one, master it fully, build your life around it!” path. Keep doing what you love to do, and find ways to create value from creatively putting together the various skills that you can do. Do you love one thing more than the whole world? Then keep going down that path, but branch yourself out so that you can synthesize new ideas by learning other points of view that are completely contrary to your chosen field.

Most of the people who incessantly ramble on about “pick one thing, stick with it!” didn’t truly consciously choose what they wanted to do with their life… so please, don’t listen to them. Listen to your heart. Then choose what’s best for you, and not model yourself after those people… or me… or Steve, as tempting as it is.

Will you ever know if your decision to pursue or not pursue any skills to total mastery is the right decision?

No. You’ll never, never know.