I’ve recently launched a new blog detailing my life and the wonderful adventures that take place in it. You can now follow me, and read about these “exciting” life adventures at my new blog My Life in Harmony

I’m taking a different approach with My Life in Harmony than I did with Take 20. First of all, it serves a different purpose. My Life in Harmony is a blog dedicated to the expression of my life purpose (you can read more about that here.  Secondly, instead of doling out advice, I’ll be writing about my life in journal format. Readers will be able to watch my life like a movie and gleam whatever insights they please from my writing. I think this will be a much more effective way for people to learn (although teaching people is not my objective for the site).

Comments are always welcome here at Take 20, and I’m planning on keeping the site up and running for a long time. Thank you for your continued support, and I look forward to seeing you over at My Life in Harmony!

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I returned from India on January 12th at around Noon, and I’ve been recovering from a bout with food poisoning/jet lag ever since. I’m finally feeling much better now, however, and I’m ready to get back to work. I’m guessing it was the Gatorade + soup + crackers + constant sleep for 3 days straight that did the trick. Whatever it was, I’m just glad to have my health back.

Although my previous post was titled “On Vacation in India”, my trip turned out to be FAR from a vacation. The trip was extremely hectic, and we crammed a ton of different activities and events into a small time slot (yes, 18 days is a small time slot when you’re visiting India).

We kicked off the trip by flying into Mumbai to meet up with my grandmother (on my father’s side). We spent two severely jet lagged days with her, and then proceeded to make our way to Poona via a 3 hour car drive to attend my cousin’s wedding.

After arriving in Poona, we met up with my Mom’s side of the family. I didn’t know it at the time, but our arrival in Poona marked the beginning of the most hectic portion of our trip. There was a 3 day line-up of wedding events planned for the guests, and we were gonna attend every single one of them!

Wedding Day 1 – The Mehndi

This was definitely an event for the ladies, however, we men attended too (we were informed there was going to be some excellent food provided for lunch). During this event, the women had their hands painted with traditional Henna artwork in preparation for the wedding. If you click on the link above, you can see some pictures of this artwork.

Following a delicious lunch, we men parted ways with the ladies to start up a “manly” game of cricket. While I’d love to tell you a story about an intense cricket match that lasted 3 days before a winner was decided, the fact of the matter was that the majority of us had never even picked up a cricket bat in our lives.

What can I say? We Americans are an ignorant bunch.

What ensued was a hilarious display of “athleticism” that can’t be done justice through written words. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a camera on me at the time, so there aren’t any pictures either. Let’s just say we lost all of the balls we were using, and a small group of locals gathered in amazement to watch the rare spectacle that was taking place (and to make fun of us too, I assume).

After our play was cut short due to running out of balls to play with, we men returned to where the ladies were located. Soon after, my mother and I returned to the family friend’s house we were staying at to relax for the rest of the day.

Wedding Day 2 –The Sangeet

The next night, all of the friends and family gathered to celebrate the wedding of the couple at the “Sangeet”. This event was a ton of fun, and there was a line-up of dance performances by friends and family planned for the night, along with some great catered food, and a DJ spinning awesome music.

After all of the performances, everyone hit the dance floor to get their groove on, yours truly included. I will admit, I’m not too keen on dancing, but this day was an exception. I tore up the dance floor (at least I thought I did), and had a blast while doing so. It seemed like everyone else had a great time too, so I’d say the Sangeet was a success.

Wedding Day 3 – Wedding Ceremony and Reception

The big day finally arrives. The wedding was scheduled during the afternoon, and it was held at the gardens of a military base. I don’t know how they arranged this, but it was an incredible setup. I have to give my cousin props on the decorations and planning.

As usual, the wedding ceremony itself was quite boring. There was a pundit (priest) reciting the traditional wedding verses from a scripture in Hindi, and I could barely understand what he was saying. It wasn’t entirely boring, however, because I believe the pundit was slightly intoxicated during the proceedings. Either that, or he was extremely happy go lucky. He would randomly start laughing, and just seemed a little too goofy for a wedding ceremony. He cracked me up, that’s for sure.

After the wedding ceremony was over, the cousins, nieces, and nephews came together to plot how we were going to steal the groom’s shoes. I know it sounds crazy, but this is an old tradition in Hindu weddings. Once we managed to steal his shoes, he would have to pay us a significant sum of money to get them back. Easy money? Sign me up!

So, we stole the shoes as planned, and he was prepared. He pulled out a wad of cash, and asked us how much we wanted. We said $400, and he quickly dished out the money. We were surprised he was ready to give up so much money so fast. When we asked him why it was so easy for him to give the money away, he told us that he was willing to pay us $1000! He figured $400 was pocket change. Ouch.

The reception was a lot of fun, and the highlight was the amazing selection of food. There was Italian, Mediterranean, traditional Indian, and barbeque to choose from. I chowed down on everything I could get my hands on. After the main course, there was an exquisite dessert selection to choose from, and of course, I tried a bit of everything. Excellent food is definitely one of the finer things in life.

Here are some pictures from the reception:

My mom's side of the family

Yours truly struttin his stuff

Kerala

On January 1^st, we left Poona at 530am and made the 3 hour drive to Mumbai airport. We caught a flight to Trivandrum, and when we landed we met up with our driver who was going to be with us for the duration of our trip to Kerala.

Once our bags were finished being strapped to the top of our car, we left the airport and made our way towards Kovalam beach, which is where we would be staying our first 2 nights in Kerala. I didn’t know what to expect, which is why I was so pleasantly surprised when we arrived at our hotel.

Kovalam is known for its incredible beaches, and our driver added to this little fact when he told us that the beaches in Kovalam are the best in all of India. Supposedly Goa is “trash” compared to Kovalam (using the words of our driver). I decided I was going to be judge of whether or not the beaches were incredible, and I must say I was not disappointed. The beaches lived up to their hype.

On the second day of our visit to Kovalam, my father had planned to make a 4 hour trip down to Kanyakumari. This city is located at the most southern tip of India, and it’s famous for being the meeting place of three different bodies of water (Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal, and the Arabian Sea).

When we arrived it was around 5:00pm, so the sun was starting to set. The sight was absolutely breathtaking. We hurried over to a famous temple located at the edge of the beach (the most southern tip of India), and proceeded to watch the sunset from there. I walked down a set of stairs at the temple, and the bottom-most step actually opened into the sea.

Awesome!

After the sun set, we left to head back to our hotel in Kovalam. The 4 hour drive back was terrible, and when we arrived at our hotel most of us were feeling sick and tired. We ate a quick dinner and then went to sleep, because the next morning we were leaving on another 4 hour journey to Kumarakom.

Kumarakom is a city best known for its backwaters, and the houseboat tours that go along with them.  Once we finally arrived at the village, we parked at a dock where we would catch a boat that would take us to our hotel. We boarded the small boat, and took a 20 minute ride to the private island where our hotel, Coconut Lagoon, was located. If you’re interested, click on the link I’ve provided to see some of the pictures of the hotel. It was amazing!

Here’s a picture of the hotel lobby from our boat:

The hotel was laid out like a village, and it had the feel of being totally cut off from the rest of the world. There were two restaurants located on site, and the only way you could get off the island was by boat, obviously. As you can imagine, it was an extremely relaxing environment.  Staying at the Coconut Lagoon was a super cool experience, and I highly recommend it if you’re ever visiting Kumarakom.

We relaxed at the hotel for the first day, and on the second day we planned to do a 5 hour houseboat trip on the backwaters. This was by far my favorite part of our trip to Kerala. The house boat arrived to pick us up from our hotel at 11am, and it was smooth sailing from there. There were couches on the front deck, a dining table, two bedrooms with two full bathrooms, and a magnificent kitchen with two experienced chefs ready to cook up whatever we desired for the duration of our ride.

Here’s a picture of our house boat:

Does it get any better than that?

Up until the houseboat ride, the trip was extremely hectic. I think my family will agree with me when I say the boat was a welcomed interruption in our busy trip. We thoroughly enjoyed the ride as we spent the entire 5 hours relaxing on the front deck while taking in the beautiful view of the Kerala backwaters.

Sadly, the 5 hours came to an end rather quickly, and we docked at around 4pm. We returned to our rooms to relax for a little while, and then made our way to the pool to relax some more. I laid out on one of the lawn chairs by the pool for a good two hours, contemplated my life, and watched the sun set. This marked the end of another wonderful day of our trip to Kerala.

Up next on our trip was the village of Thekkady. It’s a 4 hour drive from Kumarakom (MORE driving), and we left early in the morning so we would have ample time to see all of the village attractions, namely the spice and tea plantations.

Thekkady is famous for its spices, and there are tons of spice plantations and spice shops located around the village. Before checking in at our hotel, we stopped by one of these spice plantations for a tour. On the tour, our guide showed us a number of locally grown spices (black pepper, cardamom, cinnamon, clove, basil, menthol) and allowed us to taste quite a few of them. This was a great experience, and it was cool to try some of the world’s most popular spices directly at their source.

Following the spice plantation, we made our way to our hotel, which was appropriately called “Spice Village”. After checking in we made our way to our hotel rooms, and were startled by how massive the grounds were . There were endless pathways leading in all sorts of directions. Along these pathways there were all kinds of different spices lining the grounds, and each of them was informatively labeled for patrons unfamiliar with spices.

Our hotel was like its own spice plantation!

I thought this was exciting, and I decided to walk the entire grounds to look at all of the different spices they had planted. For example, right outside of our hut was an Egg Fruit tree. I wasn’t sure what this was, but it sounded and looked like pretty interesting.

We were only spending one day in Thekkady, so we had to make the most of it. After checking in to the hotel, we immediately headed out to the next attraction that the village is known for. Tea plantations.

My mom and dad love tea, so they were definitely excited about visiting the tea plantation. We arrived at around noon, which was right on time for a guided tour of a tea factory located on the grounds. Inside we saw the leaves drying, getting crushed, being filtered, and being processed. It was so cool to see the process in action, and I can finally say I know how tea is transformed from a leaf into its more familiar granulated form.

After leaving the tea plantation, we headed back to the hotel and relaxed for the rest of the day. That night we went to sleep early because we would once again be leaving early the next morning for our next destination.

When we woke up we left for the city of Kochi, the capital of Kerala. It was yet another 4 hour drive from Thekkady, and it was the final stop on our trip to Kerala. We were catching a flight from Kochi airport to Bangalore at 7pm. We arrived behind schedule, so we didn’t have much time to see anything in the city. We headed straight to the airport, and once we arrived we finally parted ways with our driver.

This marked the end of our trip to Kerala.

Wrapping the Trip Up

Upon arriving in Bangalore, we met up with my mom’s brother. My mom’s side of the family lives in Bangalore, and our time spent there was the only true vacation time we had on our trip to India. There were no plans, no destinations, and no more traveling to be done. We spent a lot of time with family, and lazed around all day. We did this for 3 days, and after that we headed back to Mumbai where we would see my Grandmother (on my dad’s side) for one more night. The next night we took off at midnight to head back to the states. 24 hours later I was back at home.

All in all I’d say it was an excellent trip to the motherland. Kerala was gorgeous, and this trip marked my first time touring south India. On my last trip to India, I toured north India, so this trip was a totally different experience. If you get a chance to check out south India, please do visit Kerala. I promise it will be worth your time.

Well, that pretty much does it. I left out quite a few details in an attempt to keep the post short. I know it’s still long, and if you made it this far, then you deserve to be congratulated. Congratulations!

I’m so glad to be home. I’ll now get back to writing meaningful personal development articles. Thanks for sticking around while I get back to the grind!

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I’m currently on vacation in India with my family for the holidays. The main reason we decided to come was for my cousin’s wedding. She’s having this whole week long shebang, and it’s going to be crazy non-stop. Supposedly I’m gonna have to learn dance moves from a choreographer, and perform in front of hundreds of people. Damn Indian weddings! Always have to bust out in song and dance for no good reason.

I’ll be returning on January 11th (yes, quite a long time), but will have computer access for the first week of this trip. After that, we’re going down to the southern tip of India to explore! Should be lots of fun traveling the backwaters of Kerala.

I’ll keep you all posted, and hopefully will get a chance to write an article next week. I can’t promise it will be as in-depth as the rest of the articles on this site, and I may just write about my experiences in India. Which means it should be quite interesting!

Merry Christmas to all of you, and a Happy New Year! Enjoy the holidays with your family and friends, and we’ll talk again soon.

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In no way is this meant to sound like a boast, but I’m pretty sure it’ll come off as one anyways.

My greatest talent is my ability to quickly conquer challenges, no matter how difficult they may be, and obtain the results I desire while doing so every time.

Okay, now that I’m done boasting, I’ll shift into selfless mode and share my sure-fire success formula with you. I’ve used this formula to ace countless exams while in college, become an expert in the field of women and dating, become a strong poker player in a short amount of time, and advance leaps and bounds in my spiritual development.

No matter the specifics of your particular challenge (acquiring a new skill, squeezing out an incredible performance in a short amount of time, gaining control over a chaotic area of your life, etc.) apply this formula and I’m confident you’ll achieve the results you desire every single time.

Without further ado, here’s the formula.

1. Cultivate a Burning Desire for Success

This is the first and most important step of the formula. Without a burning desire for success, you won’t have the fuel necessary to stick to your guns when the going gets tough, and will give up way too easily. You won’t want it bad enough.

With a burning desire for success, however, your drive will become even stronger when facing potential obstacles. Rather than stopping you, these obstacles will serve as additional fuel for your burning desire once you’ve overcome them. There’s no better way to boost your self-confidence than to prevail in spite of all the obstacles that stand in your way.

I absolutely love to cultivate a burning desire for success by deliberately putting myself in tremendously tough situations. When I was still in college, I would purposely never go to class, and would wait until a few days before an exam to start studying for it. I thrive under pressure, and there’s nothing I love more than facing a seemingly impossible challenge. I knew that by intentionally putting myself in the tough situation described above, I would cultivate the burning desire for success necessary to ace any exam thrown my way.

Over the past few years, channeling my frustration has been another great method I’ve used to stoke my burning desire for success. Three years ago, I was extremely frustrated with my dating situation. I felt like I had no control over my dating life, and had no selection when it came to women. If I was lucky, a girl may have looked my way once or twice. I hated that I had to rely on chance to land the girl of my dreams.

As this frustration built up, I became more and more motivated to change my bleak dating situation. Finally my frustration reached its flash point, and a raging wildfire suddenly ignited within. I decided I was going to become a master with women and dating, and nothing was going to stop me.

While these two methods of cultivating my burning desire for success have worked for me, they may not work for you. Different methods work for different people, and the key is to identify the method that works best for you.

Ask yourself, what does it take for you to really start wanting something? Look to your past and identify those times when you wanted something really bad, and figure out how this desire started in the first place.

Did you want to prove to yourself that you were capable of achieving something great?

Did you want to prove to others that you were capable of doing something incredible?

Were you highly unsatisfied with the quality of an area of your life?

Did having your back against the wall in a pressure situation motivate you?

2. Decide You’ll Do Whatever it Takes to Get the Results You Desire

By deciding to do whatever it takes to obtain the results you desire, you’re almost guaranteeing your success before you even get started. Understand you can only fail when you throw in the towel, and that whatever obstacles you experience along your path to success will yield to stern resolve. Therefore, failure is not an option.

I’ll admit, it’s challenging to adopt this mindset under normal circumstances. But these are not normal circumstances, my friend. Your burning desire for success will be RAGING so uncontrollably that you’ll have no problem believing that your success is inevitable.

Here’s an awesome quote to illustrate the mindset you need to have:

“Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.”

- Leonardo Da Vinci

I’m pretty sure we can agree that Da Vinci was a wise man. You’d be just as wise to acknowledge that no matter how challenging the path to success may seem, your unshakable commitment to success will always triumph any challenge thrown your way no matter what.

3. Apply Overwhelming Force

Don’t just skim the top of the water with your feet. Dive in head first! Tackle this challenge with your full arsenal of weaponry. Attack it from every angle, and don’t ease off the trigger until it’s been completely annihilated.

When I finally decided I was going to earn a living as a professional poker player, I knew that to succeed I would have to learn how to play the incredibly complex game optimally. I also knew that easing into things wasn’t going to help me conquer this challenge, and that I’d have to hit the ground running right away if I was to have any shot at success.

I immediately applied overwhelming force to my learning efforts.

I started reading poker strategy forums tirelessly, tore through tons of books insatiably, played in nearly a thousand online tournaments, studied and analyzed my hand histories endlessly, discussed tough hands with friends that were better than me into the wee hours of the night, and subscribed to a coaching website and watched hundreds of hours of strategy videos created by top professional poker players.

Can you say overkill?

I estimate I spent 10-12 hours a day, 5 days a week for 2 months learning the game. I ate, slept, and breathed poker. As crazy as this regimen might sound, at the end of the 2 month period I had learned the ins and outs of the game more thoroughly than most people would over the course of 2 years. By applying overwhelming force, I significantly shortened my learning curve, and became a strong poker player in a ridiculously short amount of time. The crazy regimen was well worth the reward.

Don’t dawdle around and spend years conquering a challenge. Your burning desire will most likely fizzle out over such an extended period of time. Instead, decide to apply overwhelming force to the rest of the steps listed below, and conquer that challenge as soon as possible!

4. Learn from the Experts

Actively seek out knowledge from experts who have already conquered your challenge. By doing so, your learning curve will shorten significantly, and you’ll absorb the best knowledge simultaneously.

I can’t stress to you enough how important this step is. Every single time I’ve conquered a challenge, a major factor in my success was the knowledge I acquired from experts.

When learning about women and dating, I got hold of all of David DeAngelo’s “Double Your Dating” programs, and gobbled up his knowledge on the subject. I then studied the Mystery Method, and completed Zan Perrion’s Enlightened Seduction program.

While pursuing my spiritual growth, I’ve read many books written by different masters explaining various spiritual pathways. I’ve attended a Vipassana Meditation course. I’ve corresponded regularly with a highly evolved spiritual mentor for over a year.

Whenever I was faced with a challenging exam on a subject I knew little about, I always studied with a friend who already had a great understanding of the material. I didn’t waste my time in study groups with people who only had a cursory understanding of the material at hand. Instead, I aligned myself with the brightest students in the class (the experts), and quickly mastered the material by picking their brain.

Who are the experts that have already conquered the challenge you’re facing now? Buy their books, attend their seminars, follow their instruction, and absorb as much of their knowledge as you possibly can. This will clear your pathway to success.

5. Seek a Thorough Theoretical Understanding

Any challenge you face will have a theoretical component, as well as an application component. Theory is the studying part, while application requires you to put what you’ve learned to the test in the real world. Most people tend to neglect theory, and focus their efforts solely on the application component of the challenge instead. These people think theory and studying are worthless, and that real results are only obtained through constant practice and application.

At face value their belief seems to make sense, but in reality it’s only partially accurate. When you examine it a bit closer you’ll come to realize these people are doing themselves a HUGE disservice by choosing to conquer their challenges with this mindset.

An advanced theoretical understanding will lay the foundation necessary to interpret the valuable lessons you’ll learn while tackling the application component of your challenge. Without the theoretical understanding in place, you won’t be able to extract the valuable lessons yielded by your real world application.

Also, a solid theoretical understanding will enrich the overall experience of conquering your challenge because you’ll understand exactly why you’re getting certain results. By understanding the mechanics at work behind the scenes, you’ll have a much deeper experience than someone else who chooses to neglect the theoretical component of the challenge.

During the Vipassana Meditation course I attended in July, there was an extensive theoretical component, as well as an application component of the practice. Every evening there was a discourse that provided all of the theoretical information we students would need to understand what we were learning.

While most students blew off this aspect of the course and only paid attention to the application component of the meditation, I made it a point to thoroughly understand all of the information the teacher was giving us. I used the time allocated for teacher interviews to ask my teacher as many questions as possible to clear up any confusion I had. As a result I was able to reach a deeper stage of meditation than any of the other new students at the course, and the experience was that much more powerful for me.

6. Apply Your Understanding

While theoretical understanding is crucial to your success in any endeavor, it’s only 50% of the equation. The other 50% of the equation is the application of your theoretical understanding.

Reading books and absorbing the wisdom of experts will only get you so far. At some point you’ll have to apply what you’ve learned, and what you’ll usually find is that while understanding is one thing, application is an entirely different animal.

You may have the best theoretical understanding of a subject in the world, but as soon as you try to apply what you’ve learned you’ll crash and burn just like everybody else. Don’t get discouraged! This is a natural part of the learning process, and has to happen. Invite and appreciate failure because it’s your greatest ally on your pathway to success. Success can only be reached after you’ve failed many, many times.

After crashing and burning a few times, you’ll soon find that your thorough theoretical understanding gives you a distinct advantage in the learning process. You’ll learn from your mistakes much faster, because you’ll understand why they’re happening, and will be able to solve the problems causing them at their roots.

When learning how to play poker, I mistakenly believed that by reading tons of books and watching a lot of strategy videos I would get better in no time without any practice. I figured I would be an expert as soon as I hit the virtual felt because of my conceptual understanding of the game.

Boy was I wrong.

Only once I had played in hundreds of tournaments, made thousands of mistakes, and reviewed countless hand histories did I notice a significant improvement in my poker game. I realized that if I was to succeed in conquering the challenge of earning a living playing poker, I was going to have to spend time studying AND practicing.

Balance your theoretical understanding by applying what you’ve learned, and you’ll find that the learning process is much more efficient than it once was when you lacked this balance.

7. Teach Others What You Have Learned

This is the icing on the cake, the final step in the process of conquering any challenge you choose to face.

Teaching others what you’ve learned is the best way to solidify your understanding of what you’ve learned. Find people who are interested in conquering the same challenge you’re interested in, but who don’t yet have the theoretical understanding necessary to do so. You’ll find that in order to teach these people what you’ve learned you’ll need a much higher level of understanding.

The reason for this is because your “students” will ask you many questions you hadn’t considered while learning the material. Their questions will come from all sorts of angles, and your understanding will really be tested. You probably won’t be able to answer all of their questions, and that’s okay! This process is awesome because it’ll expose concepts you previously overlooked, and will give you a chance to further deepen your understanding of these concepts.

When they ask you questions you already know the answer to, that’s great too! This will drill concepts that you already know further into your head, and your understanding of these concepts will become even better than it was before.

After you’ve spent enough time teaching others what you’ve learned, you’ll find that your level of understanding has skyrocketed to previously unknown levels. Also, the application portion of your challenge will be significantly easier because your excellent theoretical understanding will serve as application’s rock-solid foundation.

Parting Words

So there you have it, my secret formula to conquering any challenge.

As I wrote in the beginning of the article, conquering challenges is my super talent (I identified it using the book “Is Your Genius at Work?”) and I’ve been unconsciously using it for as long as I can remember. I’m extremely glad I’ve finally written out the whole process on paper, and I’m even happier that it’s going to help countless others tackle their most daunting challenges.

Apply this formula, and I assure you that you will successfully tackle any challenge you may face, no matter how tough it may be. Through this article I’ve given you the theoretical understanding you’ll need to make this happen. Now, all you have to do is put it into practice!

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I’ve finally been tagged in a game of tag that’s been circulating throughout the Blogosphere for some time now. I didn’t think it would happen, but Bunny over at BunnyGotBlog made it happen. It’s been a while since I played a game of tag, and I think it’s about time I got back to my childhood roots, so here we go.

6 Random Facts You Probably Don’t Know About Me:

1. My nickname growing up was “Hulie” (who-lee), and was created by my Godmother when I was 2 years old. To this day, my mom still calls me Hulie regularly.
2. I’m a passionate student of the subject of women and dating, and have completed almost all of David DeAngelo’s “Double Your Dating” programs. I attribute the sparking of my interest in personal growth to his programs, and without them I would be a totally different person today. I regularly help quite a few friends with their women and dating situations, and I’ve been wanting to develop a program of my own on the subject for some time now.
3. I played the Bass Trombone in middle school and in high school. I made the Area Wind Symphony (1st chair) my junior year whilst competing against some of the best bass trombonists in Southeast Texas (I know it sounds like I’m proud of this accomplishment, but I’m actually kinda disappointed because I never practiced and I let my talent go to waste).
4. From March 2008 – October 2008 I considered myself a professional poker player. I played online, had a mentor, studied the game tirelessly, was subscribed to a coaching website, and actually had some good results. I made two trips to Las Vegas during this time to clean up the notoriously extra soft tables. I was on my way up, but towards the end of my journey I realized that professional poker wasn’t the path for me, and I gave it up for good.
5. I dislocated my knee-cap during a Kuk Sool Won martial arts class on August 10th, 2007. I heard a loud POP when it happened, and it was one of the most physically painful things I’ve experienced in my life. It took three days a week of physical therapy for two months to rehabilitate my left knee back to normal. It still isn’t 100%, and when the weather changes suddenly my knee hates it.
6. I’m an avid college football fan, and am a die hard Texas Longhorns fan. Hey, just because I dropped out of the school doesn’t mean I can’t love the team, right?

Now that I’ve shared these random facts about myself, I’ve been given the right to tag up to 6 more people so that they too can share 6 random facts about themselves.

Tag, You’re It!

• Ian @ Quantum Learning – Nonviolent Living
• Marko @ How to Make My Blog
• Vincent @ Hit Your Goals
• Myrko @ AwakeBlogger
• Alex @ The Bridgemaker
• Mike @ Learn This

In addition to these 6 people, I’m going to extend this offer to all of my readers. If you’re bold enough to share 6 random facts about yourself, please do so in the comments section below!

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Today I’m going to share one of my favorite meditation techniques. If you’re unfamiliar with meditation, please click here for an introduction on the subject.

This past summer, while attending a Vipassana Meditation course, I learned the meditation ‘Metta Bhavana’. In English, this roughly translates to ‘loving kindness cultivation’, and it delivers exactly what it promises.

This is one of my favorite meditations because it has immediate short term benefits and tremendous long term benefits. Oh, and did I mention, it only takes up 5-10 minutes of my time each day?

Incorporate this meditation into your daily routine, and I guarantee that you will experience a noticeable expansion in your capacity to Love. The reason I’ve capitalized the letter L in the word love is because this meditation technique will cultivate your capacity to experience unconditional love, a state of being, rather than the traditional surface-level feeling we’re all so familiar with.

Benefits After 6 Months of Practice

I’ve been performing this meditation technique consistently over the past 6 months, and I can honestly say it’s made a tremendous impact on my life. Here are some of the improvements I’ve noticed:

• A noticeable decrease in my judgmentalism towards my fellow human beings (one of my biggest flaws)
• A noticeable increase in my levels of acceptance, compassion, and understanding towards my fellow human beings
• Improvement in my ability to empathize with others (as an ENTP, this has been an area of weakness my entire life)
• An overall increase in Joyful experiences
• A decrease in my overall level of fear in unfamiliar social situations
• The ability to channel deep feelings of Love to improve my mood whenever I’m feeling down
• An increased capacity to accept others as they are (has helped me deal with criticism, and stop wasting my mental energy)
• An increase in my capacity to Love

I’m sure there are many additional benefits I’ll experience as I continue my practice of Metta Bhavana. I predict the improvements listed above will gain even more power, and the internal changes I make will become more visible in my external reality over time.

How to Practice Loving-Kindness Meditation

Note: Before I lay out the steps to this meditation exercise, an important point must be made. Only perform this meditation exercise if you are in a calm, peaceful state of mind. If you’re agitated, stressed out, angry, or experiencing any other type of negative energy, DO NOT perform this exercise. Do it later once you’ve calmed down. The purpose of this exercise is to send out powerful, positive, loving vibrations, and this is only possible if you are in a peaceful state of mind.

Finally, the good stuff!

The list below is a step-by-step outline to properly practicing Metta Bhavana meditation. Follow each of these steps in order to extract the maximum benefit from your meditation.

1. Sit on the ground in a comfortable position (lotus position isn’t necessary, but is optimal) with your back straight. I’ve found that sitting on two pillows makes meditation MUCH more comfortable, so try that out if you’re finding it too painful.
2. Close your eyes. Relax your entire body. Let go of any unnecessary tension in your muscles, and stop thinking about whatever it is you’re thinking about. Allow your mind to drift to wherever it likes for a minute or so.
3. Next, focus completely on the inhalation and exhalation of your breath for 1 minute. This isn’t a breath control exercise, so don’t attempt to change your breath in any way. Just observe the natural inflow and outflow of your breath as it is.
4. Now, recite in your mind “May I be happy. May I be peaceful. May I be free from misery, animosity, judgment, and negativity.” Pause between each statement, and feel the power of what you’ve just recited. Absorb yourself in feelings of happiness, peace, and Love. I like to imagine an immense amount of Love energy flowing into my body from my external environment while doing this step of the exercise.
5. Next, recite in your mind, “May all beings be happy. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free from misery, animosity, judgment, and negativity.” Once again, pause between each statement and feel the power of what you’ve just recited. When I do this, I imagine the faces of as many people as I possibly can, and I send each person a powerful intention of Love. I send this intention by imagining my Love as a tremendous wave of energy flowing out of my abdominal area. Repeat this process 3-4 times.
6. Next, recite in your mind, “May all beings share in my merits, good deeds, compassion, kindness, positive energy, patience, generosity, and Love.” Keep emitting powerful waves of Love energy while reciting this statement in your mind.
7. Finally, recite in your mind, “May all beings I have hurt in the past forgive me for doing so. May I also forgive all beings who have hurt me in the past.” This is my favorite step of the exercise, because I almost always experience an immediate and substantial release of negative energy. I try to pull up the images of the people that I have hurt and who have hurt me, and I imagine us hugging and getting along with one another. I feel the Loving connection we now share between us.
8. Open your eyes. You’re done!

While this entire process only takes between 5-10 minutes, the benefits will usually last the entire day. To ensure you get the most out of this meditation, allow yourself to become completely absorbed in the powerful intentions of Love you experience while performing the exercise. The more powerful the intentions, the more beneficial you’ll find the exercise to be.

At first you may find it difficult to cultivate a powerful feeling of Love within your body, but over time and with practice you’ll develop your own way to quickly summon this powerful energy from within. Don’t get discouraged. Keep at it!

Parting Words

Unconditional Love is incredibly powerful indeed. It can permanently change your life for the better, and once you’ve had a taste of Love, all other feelings and emotions will pale in comparison.

Incorporate this meditative practice into your daily routine, and you will experience a profound positive shift in your personality, perspective, and overall experience of reality. As you cultivate your capacity to Love unconditionally, you’ll begin to realize that the more you Love, the more you can Love. This is the surest path to becoming a better human being.

I’ll be sure to include all of you in my daily Metta Bhavana meditation, and my only request is that you do the same for me!

May all beings be happy.

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“The best of men is he who blushes when you praise him and remains silent when you defame him.”

- Kahlil Gibran

Criticism can actually be a good thing.

Often times it means you’re marching to the beat of your own drum, and in the process you’re reminding others of their own mediocrity. Criticism is their defense mechanism, and by lashing out at you they’re attempting to bring you down to their level so they can feel better about themselves and the decisions they’ve made.

Other times, criticism is directed your way by people you love dearly. Usually well intentioned, it’s often because these people are worried about you or concerned about your future.

Regardless of the source of criticism, we allow people’s attacks to affect the balance of our mind. We get angry, lash back at others, and lose faith in who we are and what we’re trying to accomplish.

Whenever you decide to go against the grain and strive to reach some of your loftier goals, you can bet you’re going to come up against a considerable amount of criticism. For you to succeed in reaching these goals, you must learn to deal with this criticism in a healthy and positive way.

Indian Family + Dropping Out of School = Guaranteed Criticism

When I decided to drop out of school, I had a vague idea of what I was getting myself into.

I mentally prepared for what was sure to be a barrage of criticism in the form of phone calls, e-mails, and personal visits. I determined I was going to tell as few people as possible about my decision, and ignore everyone that tried to force their “wisdom” upon me.

When people called, I didn’t answer. When people e-mailed, I never replied. And when people took the time to visit me at home, I dreaded the prospect of sitting down and chatting with them about my future.

This is how I dealt with the criticism in my life, and let me tell you, running away from it only made things worse. I’ve hurt the people who love me most, and have alienated myself from them in the process. People no longer bother telling me what they think because they know any attempts at conversation will always end up ignored or in an argument.

I’ve closed the door on a potential source of constructive criticism and positive energy in my life, and it’s because I’ve been too immature to learn how to deal with criticism in a healthy way.

15 Months Later

It’s been 15 months since I made the decision to withdraw from school, and the amount of criticism I’ve been subjected to has gone way past even my most extreme expectations.

My mom takes every opportunity she gets to criticize me for not being in school. She tells me I’m lazy. She calls me useless. She makes fun of me in front of her friends. Whenever I tell her a story about one of my friends, she always ends the conversation with, “Well, at least he’s in school Rahul!”

This can be awfully frustrating. At times I find myself engaged in an argument with my mother about my beliefs, or out of anger I’m ignoring her, or in my defense I’m criticizing her for the way she leads her life.

Is this any way to handle criticism? To fight with the person who loves me more than anyone else in the world?

Here I am trying to improve the quality of my life by reading tons of personal development books and attending courses like Vipassana, but for some reason I can’t even do something as simple as leading a proper relationship with my loved ones.

Healthy Ways to Deal with Criticism

As you can tell from my story, criticism can be a terribly negative force if you don’t learn how to deal with it properly. Thankfully, along my journey I’ve learned quite a few healthy ways to handle criticism. I’m nowhere near the expert I strive to be, but I do know that the path I’m on now will eventually get me there. That’s what’s important.

Here are a few techniques and perspectives I’ve learned over the past 15 months that help me deal with criticism in a positive, healthy way. Apply them to your life and I’m confident they’ll do the same for you.

1. Defenselessness - Notice how you always feel the need to defend yourself against the criticism of others. The most important thing you must learn is how to relinquish this need to defend yourself all the time. As long as you defend yourself, criticism always wins the battle over your attempts to maintain a balanced state of mind. This is also the best way to ensure a life of isolation, anger, and broken relationships.

2. Understand the source of peoples’ criticism – Each person will have their own reasons for criticizing you. If you care about the person, it’s your responsibility to figure out the source of their criticism to make sure it doesn’t get in the way of your relationship. Understanding this source will help you lower your guard, because you’ll usually find the person is well intentioned. For example, I’ve come to understand that my mother’s source of criticism is her perceived duty of letting me know when I’m making a mistake. She views my decision to drop out of school as a huge mistake, and she lets me know that whenever she gets a chance. I’m finding it harder and harder to get angry with her as I understand this truth more deeply. Seek to understand others, and you’ll find that the need to defend yourself against criticism will slowly dissolve.

3. Extract the value from others’ perspectives – Once you’ve come to understand the source of a person’s criticism, investigate whether or not his or her perspective has any applicability to your life. Many times you’ll find there is value in what others are trying to tell you, and you’ll be able to mesh their ideas with your own, creating a better approach to reaching your goals altogether. It takes a wise person to set his or her ego aside, and quietly listen to the harsh words of others. It takes an even wiser person to learn a valuable lesson from these harsh words.

4. Believe in yourself – One of the best ways to deal with criticism is to firmly believe in yourself. Believe in your ideas, perspectives, the path you’ve chosen, and the decisions you’ve made. Peoples’ negative comments and criticisms will bounce off of you if you have a tremendous amount of self-confidence. Observe how you react to criticism, and many times you’ll find that whenever you defend your ideas, perspectives, or the decisions you’ve made, it’s because you don’t believe in them wholeheartedly in the first place. If you did, you wouldn’t feel the need to defend them from the attacks of others. Self-confidence is the path to defenselessness.

5. Stop seeking approval – This one has been huge for me. For the longest time I’ve wanted my father’s and mother’s approval, so I would do everything in my power to get it. When they criticized me I would argue persistently, trying to get them to see my point of view. I wanted them to say they believed in me. I wanted them to agree with me so I could feel like I was doing the right thing. I craved their validation. As I’ve progressively relinquished my need for their approval, I’ve noticed I’m not as reactive to their criticism as I was before. Whether or not they believe in me, I realize I have to believe in myself. This is the only way I’ll be able to create the life of my dreams. Who’s approval do you seek? In what way? Why?

Putting it in Perspective

The kind of criticism that hurts the most is from the people who matter most to you in your life. Understand that a majority of the time this stinging criticism originates from a place of love in the critic’s heart. Kindly listen to their words, extract any value these words may provide, and then go back to doing things the way you’ve been doing them.

There’s no need to argue.

There’s no need to defend your ideas, perspectives, and the decisions you’ve made.

There’s no need to prove anything to anyone.

Believe in who you are, the path you’ve chosen, and the decisions you’ve made, and you’ll soon find that criticism no longer stings like it once did.

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I’ve finally taken the time to make a list of all of the best books I’ve read over the past few years, and have hosted a “Library” page on the site. I’m sure you’ll recognize quite a few of the books on the list, but I’m almost certain you’ll notice a few you’ve never come across before.

I left quite a few books off the list because they didn’t meet my standard of incredible in their respective fields. The list you’re looking at was deliberated over for quite a few hours before being compiled. Eventually, I plan to write reviews for each of the books on the list. To access the library, click on the “Library” tab at the top of the page, or click here.

Take a look around and let me know what you think! If you have any book recommendations for me, please let me know about them in the comments section below.

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Today I have a special treat for all of you.

I’m going to share a resource that will allow you to take a deeper look into your personality, and will provide a tremendous amount of clarity on your identity.

Sound like something you might be interested in?

Behold, the MBTI test!

I won’t bore you with an in-depth explanation of the mechanics of the test and how it works. If you’re interested, please click on the Wikipedia link above for a detailed description of all that fun stuff.

Instead, let’s dive right in and get our hands dirty!

Taking and Interpreting the MBTI Test

To take the test, please click here. Answer each question as honestly as you possibly can. Choose the answers that best describe you as you are right now, not the answers that describe who you’d like to be in the future. The more accurate your answers are, the more accurate your results will be.

Once you’ve finished the test and received your results, click here to read a detailed description about your personality type. If you answered all the questions on the test to the best of your abilities, the accuracy of this description may blow your mind. I freaked out because mine was spot on.

The Personality Page also has in-depth personal development tips for each of the types. After reading the general description of your type, click here (scroll down) for a better explanation of your strengths and weaknesses and how to work on them.

One last cool thing the site explains is how your personality type influences your relationships and the way you treat others. It provides a tremendous amount of clarity on why you act the way you do towards your friends, family, lovers, and children. Please click here (scroll down) if you’d like to read further on this subject.

My Personality Type

I’ve taken the MBTI multiple times over the past 2 years, and my result has only changed once during that time. The first time I took the test my result was ESTP, but every time I’ve taken the test after that my result has been ENTP. The first result was inaccurate because I didn’t take the test seriously, and I failed to put the required thought into my answers. When I read the personality type description of ESTP it didn’t sound very accurate, and I unfairly decided the test was a terrible indicator of my personality type.

Six months later I decided to give the test another try, just for fun. This time my result was ENTP, and after reading the detailed description of my type I was amazed at how accurately it described my personality.

Since then I’ve been taking the test every 6 months, and my result hasn’t changed at all. Given the amount of growth I’ve experienced over the past two years, I think that’s pretty incredible. To read more about my type, you can click here.

Making the Most of Your Type

I’m writing this section under the assumption that you’ve already taken the test and read the detailed description of your type. If you haven’t done either and want to keep reading, be my guest. But be warned, some of this terminology may seem a bit cooky to you!

I’ve found that the understanding of my dominant, auxiliary, tertiary, and inferior functions has given me a substantial amount of clarity on where I need to direct my future self-improvement efforts.

For example, my dominant function is Extraverted Intuition. This means my primary mode of living is directed by using my intuition to interpret the information I take in from my external environment. I’m exceptionally good at doing this, and often times I’ll see connections and patterns in my environment that many of the other personality types miss.

Sounds like a wonderful superpower to have, right? Wrong!

This strength is a double-edged sword because of its dominant nature. Unchecked, it could turn into a personal development block by taking over my entire personality. As a result, my auxiliary function of Introverted Thinking and tertiary function of Extraverted Feeling would be overshadowed, creating an imbalance in my personality.

Such an imbalance would lead me to act on my intuitions without thoroughly thinking them through first. This could cause me to put myself in tough situations with problems I would have foreseen had I taken the time to think through my intuitions.

This imbalance would also prevent me from properly weighing other people’s feelings, and I could come across as cold and insensitive to the people who matter most to me in my life. In the worst-case scenario, I may be perceived as so inconsiderate and hurtful by my loved ones that they leave me altogether.

Totally NOT cool.

I’ve spent a great deal of time strengthening my Introverted Thinking function, and I feel like I’ve finally gotten it down. I used to jump from “brilliant” idea to “brilliant” idea without giving the consequences of my choices much thought. However, these days I’ve settled down, and I now think through potential ideas and their consequences much more thoroughly.

The strengthening of my Introverted Thinking function is actually the reason I came to the realization that sharing my personal development insights with others is the right career path for me. Without developing this function I would have never come to such a realization, and I would still be jumping around between potential career paths.

I’m now shifting my self-improvement efforts towards developing my Extraverted Feeling function. I am aware that I am extremely weak in this area, and I’ve started to use my newly developed Introverted Thinking function to help me understand the way my actions affect the feelings of those around me. It’s definitely a work in progress, and I’m confident that in time I will acquire the required amount of understanding necessary to make this shift possible.

Until that time, please forgive me if I’m unnecessarily cold or inconsiderate towards your feelings!

Develop Your Subordinate Functions

Choosing to develop your auxiliary and tertiary functions is one of the most important undertakings you can commit to on your personal development quest. By doing so, you’ll become a more balanced individual, and will gain control over your rampant dominant function. You’ll gain the ability to strengthen your weaknesses, and further strengthen your strengths. Your auxiliary and tertiary functions will begin to shine, and you’ll unlock access to abilities you never knew you had before.

The MBTI test, coupled with the information on The Personality Page, will give you all of the tips, suggestions, and clarity you’ll need to make this happen.

I love to see the look on people’s faces after they complete the test and read the detailed description of their results. It’s always a look of amazement and satisfaction. Since I can’t see your pretty mug through my computer screen, I would love if you share what you think of the test and your results in the comments section below!

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Do you struggle with setting goals, and actually reaching them?

Time and time again you set lofty goals for yourself, only to watch yourself get off track over and over again.

You went on vacation, and there weren’t any healthy meal options available. You took that opportunity to end the torture you were putting yourself through, and stuffed your face with all of the fatty foods you could get your paws on.

Bye-bye new diet!

You were waking up at 6AM for a week straight; until you realized it would require the sacrifice of those late night hang out sessions with your friends to keep it up.

Sayonara sunrise!

You’ve tried and tried over and over again to reach your goals, but for some reason you keep getting distracted along the way.

Well, you can kiss those days goodbye! I present you with the solution to all your goal setting woes.

Focus on how the goal you’ve set improves your life in the present moment, rather than focusing on the hard work and suffering it will take for you to reach it in the future.

Tah dah! It’s really that simple.

How it Changed My Life

Prior to this shift in perspective, I struggled with goal-setting for a long, long time. I had so many challenging changes I wanted to make to my life. But every time I set goals that would help me implement these changes, I would eventually get distracted and fall off track.

I tried writing my goals down and reading them to myself every morning. I tried making my goals measurable and attainable. I used up my entire tank of self-discipline and motivation on the pursuit of reaching my lofty goals.

I still failed over and over again.

I was beginning to think the whole goal-setting process wasn’t for me, when I luckily happened to stumble upon the perspective of “focus on how a goal improves the quality of your present moment” while reading Steve Pavlina’s wonderful new book.

For the longest time I had wanted to create a daily routine that facilitated my productivity throughout the day.

For the longest time I had wanted to hit the gym every morning and do at least 30 minutes of cardio, so I could work my way down to 8% body fat.

For the longest time I had wanted to get back to writing high quality articles for this site, so I could make progress towards creating the career of my dreams.

This new perspective has allowed me to start moving in the direction necessary to reach each of these goals, and I know I’ll reach them this time. My mind is zoned in on how each one improves the quality of my life right now, so there’s no more mental struggle involved. I no longer adopt goals that cause me pain and suffering in the present moment because, well, what’s the point in subjecting myself to such torture in the first place?

No Improvement? Drop it!

This is one of the most important points of this perspective. Stop adopting goals that cause you pain and suffering in the present moment. Instead, adopt goals that improve the quality of your present moment. Sometimes you don’t have to change your goals at all to make this happen. All that may be required is a simple shift in focus.

For example, I used to dread going to the gym every morning and working out because I was always focused on how long it would take me to reach my goal of slimming down to 8% body fat. I was always looking to the future for salvation, while I viewed the present moment as a form of torture. Eventually it required way too much self-discipline for me to keep up my routine, and I gave up.

After applying the new perspective, however, I now focus on how productive and healthy I feel during and after my workout. I know that whenever I decide to head to the gym for some early morning cardio, I will receive immediate benefits. Why wouldn’t I want to hit the gym every morning when I feel this way?

Here’s another example. I used to feel like writing articles for this site was a drag because I was so focused on when I was going to make enough money to support myself with the site’s income. The results didn’t come as soon as I expected, and it wasn’t long before I gave up.

After applying the new perspective, however, I now focus on the awesome feeling I get knowing I’m progressively creating the career of my dreams by writing these articles. I also focus on the amazing feeling I get knowing I’m providing substantial value to my readers. Why wouldn’t I want to write articles for this site when I feel this way?

Examine Your Goals

Write down a list of the goals you want to reach in the next 3 months. While doing so, focus on how each one improves the quality of your present moment.

Does the goal motivate you? Does it inspire you? Does it excite you? Does it make you feel more productive? If you can’t find a reasonable answer to how it improves the quality of your present moment, drop it.

If you already have a list of goals written down somewhere, apply this perspective to each goal on your list. Cross out the goals you feel don’t improve the quality of your present moment, and replace them with new ones that do.

Remember, sometimes all it takes to move a goal from the “torture” column to the “improvement” column is a simple shift of perspective. Can you focus on the aspect of the goal that improves the quality of your present moment, rather than focusing on the aspect that makes it feel like a grind? If this tactic doesn’t work, then obviously you must drop the goal.

Don’t Make it Harder Than it Should Be

Forget about making goals measurable and attainable. Forget about reciting your goals to yourself every morning. Forget about applying and expending tremendous amounts of self-discipline and willpower in the process of reaching your goals.

None of this is necessary.

Choose to focus on how the goals you set improve the quality of your present moment, and you’ll never find it difficult again to stay on track to reaching these goals. There’s nothing we human beings love more than instant gratification, and what better way to give that to yourself day in and day out than to apply this perspective to the pursuit of reaching your goals?

Don’t make reaching your goals harder than it should be. It really is this simple.

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