This video has gone viral on YouTube. I don’t know whether you’ve seen it or not, but it features Matt Harding who traveled to 42 countries in 14 months and recorded himself dancing - often with the locals.

The video runs 4 minutes 29 seconds and is guaranteed to bring a smile to your face. We really are more alike than we sometimes think.

Remember this video the next time one of the world’s power hungry dividers tries to convince you that “they” are evil. Apparently, we all love to dance, smile, and have fun. What would the world be, if we focused on those things instead of our differences?

I’ve noticed a disturbing trend in blogs and information within the self-development community. In an effort to promote their own paths, some seem more than willing to tear down other self-improvement approaches.

It’s hard for me to imagine how tearing each other down builds anyone up or helps shift people or the world in the best directions.

Someone truly wanting to help people would admit that there are many approaches capable of helping people improve themselves, their life status, and their thinking. Each person should evaluate different options and determine what works best with his or her current situation.

 Recently, I’ve read blogs by practicioners of several self-help methodologies just raking affirmations up one side and down the other. The bloggers called them “delusional”, “wasteful”, and “dangerous”.  

I’ve seen stinging criticisms blaming affirmations for manifesting a state of denial. These strawman characterizations paint every user of affirmations as an 87-year old woman wanting to be an Olympic athlete or a depressed person trying to create a fictitious happiness. Obviously, anyone using affirmations to accomplish these things is being unrealistic an unwise.

Mostly, people who use affirmations are salespeople wanting to build their skills and confidence to make or exceed quota this month. Which salespeople do you suppose make quota? Those whose minds are filled with thoughts of “I can” or those whose minds are filled with “I can’t” or “I’m not sure if I can.”?

Athletes use affirmations to gain that razor thin margin of victory that having the mental edge can bring. Writers who face a blank page every day to earn a living use affirmations to keep them inspired through rejection letters and writers block. Dancers trying be mentally prepared for that big audition or looking to advance their careers use affirmations. 

People use affirmations to stay motivated to exercise, to stay focused on a big reward they are giving themselves for their hard work, or to remain committed to their diets. People use affirmations to counter the volumes of negative information that works its way into their brains every day from mainstream media.

And yes, depressed people, like I once was, use affirmations to pull themselves up out of the hole they find themselves in. It’s easy to criticize from the relative safety of a happy, prosperous life. However, when you’re really down and out all you have is the thought, the hope of a better day.

Are all these people delusional? Have they bought into some destructive ideology of happy thoughts that hold no meaning in reality? Hardly. 

I’ve said often in this blog that affirmations are just one tool in your self-development toolkit. Like any methodology they are extremely effective for some people and less so for others. There is no debate, though, that affirmations are very effective at doing one simple, but critical thing. Over time, they replace limiting, negative, and unproductive thoughts with empowering, positive, and productive thoughts.

I’m not sure why affirmations have become the favorite whipping boy for some supposed leaders in the self-development world. Maybe because so many people use them successfully. Maybe because they have a track record of success many other approaches aspire to. Hey, isn’t that kind of positive thinking delusional? :o)

What I do know for sure is that affirmations will keep motivating people to be their best (whatever that is for them at this moment) and aspire to more.  Those who want to tear affirmations down should really consider whether that serves their inferred goal of helping others. 

Stay inspired!

Ray

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Another Monday and for most of us the beginning of a new work week. Our lives are divided into these segments called weeks and it is a very efficient method to keep track of our schedules and the passage of time.                                                                                                                          

There is a tendency, however, for one week to run into the next and run into the one after that. The weeks start looking alike and we start to get that treadmill feeling. We take a lot for granted and we do a lot on auto pilot.

Yet, there are miracles everywhere, if only we choose to see them. Pay attention this week. I guarantee you that you will witness at least one miracle this week, if you’re watching. It might be big or small, but be it will be. It might happen to you, someone you know, someone you don’t; but happen it will.

What would it be worth to you on your journey back to you to differentiate this week by becoming fully aware of a real miracle? How would it inspire? How would it motivate? How would it change things? How would knowing that a tremendously positive turn of events is always possible?

“Miracles, ” wrote St. Augustine, “are not contrary to nature, but only contrary to what we know of nature.”

So do you believe or do you defer? Are you ready to encounter a miracle this week and have it make all the difference in this fourth week of July 2008? 

Well, you already encountered one miracle today - YOU. What will the next miracle be?

Stay inspired!

Ray

Whether you believe the dire environmental warnings pushed by some, the claims of the peak oil apostles, or are more moderate in your energy views; energy is an area we clearly need to address on this planet. Its cost, its growing consumption, and its criticality to the needs of our civilization put it front and center among our top national and global issues.

America and the planet need sensible, sane energy policies that both meet the needs of our growing civilization and respect and take care of Earth -the only home we have. Wind power must find its place in that sane mix.

Harsh solutions will not satisfy anyone and we are going to have to find compromise to succeed. The spirit of that compromise seems to be emerging. They say politics makes strange bedfellows. So too, it seems, does energy policy. With soaring energy prices denting our pocketbooks, a hopeful plan is being floated by an unlikely, but influential individual - T. Boone Pickens. Suprisingly, Pickens’ plan is garnering support from, of all people, Carl Pope of the Sierra Club.

Many Americans are familiar with Pickens - the self-made Oklahoma oil man. He is known for his lavish philantropy and his seemingly unqualified support for President George W. Bush. The latter, honestly, is beyond me at this point.

However, one of my personal mottos is that I will listen to good ideas regardless of their source and ignore bad ideas regardless of their source. Pickens’ misconceptions about the president have no impact on his having an idea worth listening to. Right now, Mr. Pickens has a good idea and I am listening.

He is traveling the media circuit and making smart use of the Internet to promote his proposal dubbed The Pickens Plan. The plan calls for a strategic effort maximize wind power potential in The United States.

Wind power is already succeeding in places like Maui, Hawaii. A test project there, about to be expanded, is now meeting about 10% of the island’s energy needs.

The Pickens Plan calls on The United States to convert the natural wind resource we possess in the Great Plains into wind energy. His proposal calls for wind to replace the 22% of nontransportation energy consumption now covered by natural gas. The natural gas would then be transferred to the transportation sector where it would produce 38% of our needs. That could replace about $300 billion per year in energy imports.

Pickens is a savvy businessman and, no doubt, he has positioned his business interests to benefit from this plan. That’s just smart. If he comes up with a plan that benefits all of us, why shouldn’t he derive benefit? That’s a true free market in action.

Nonetheless, I believe this approach makes a lot of sense and could go along way to satisfying both environmental concerns and energy needs. Click the image below to view PIckens’ video description of his plan.

I’m curious to know what you think. After you watch the video, leave me a comment and let me know what you think of the plan.

Stay inspired!

Ray

We hear a lot about diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure, and even hypothetical epidemics like bird flu. Because of their impact and ubiquity, these conditions deserve the attention they receive.

However, there is a condition that afflicts more people than all of these diseases combined.  In fact, it’s very likely you will be impacted by this condition, or its side effects, several times today. It can stop your life cold.

Symptoms include sweaty palms, a racing heart, self-consciousness, stress, headaches, and life paralysis. This condition affects poor and rich, famous and obscure, young and old. No one is immune.

It has prevented more great thoughts, limited more potential, destroyed more possibilities than anything on the planet. The condition is “What Will Other People Think (WWOPT)?”

Perhaps because our society is so enamored with popularity and status, many of us are deathly afraid to do anything that might be seen as being “out there”. We prefer to stay safely in the herd. Thinking the herd’s thoughts. Following the herd’s lead. Parroting the herd’s conventional (and usually disempowering) wisdom.

This is one of those instances of a positive attribute being turned against you. Humans are social creatures. Most of us have a strong need to be part of a group. These instincts help us cooperate and collaborate to get things done.

That attribute must be balanced, though, by empowered selfhood that can break from the group and create something unique and special - something all your own. That’s one of the main reasons you are here - to contribute your uniqueness to the universe.

When that process is short-circuited by WWOPT we become paralyzed in our lives.

• “That dress is a little crazy and I like it, but WWOPT?”
• “I don’t agree with the politcal mainstream, but I can’t express it because WWOPT?”
• “I want to wear a bathing suit at the beach, but my body’s not perfect and WWOPT?”
• “I want to be a romance author, but WWOPT?”
• “I’m not happy in my spiritual life, but I can’t change because WWOPT?”
• “My wife and I want to sell our possessions, buy a mobile home, and travel America, but WWOPT?”

The mass media uses this instinct against you to create a kind of subconscious servitude to what’s trendy, acceptable, and popular. It really is a form of not-so-subtle mind control. It establishes boudaries of what is acceptable and what is not (at least in your mind). It’s very powerful and gets more so every time you fail to establish a powerful selfhood as a counterbalance.

It seems OK because almost everyone you know is also stuck in WWOPT. We often provide negative encouragement by using WWOPT to convince our friends to stay where they are (where we are) - comfortable and uninspired.

Here’s what you can do to treat WWOPT. Sometime today - I can almost guarantee it - you’re going to have a thought or an idea that brings you momentary satisfaction at the thought of pursuing it.

If you’re afflicted with WWOPT, your self-talk is going to shoot down your idea. It’s going to tell you all the reasons that would never work and it’s going to employ WWOPT as its closing argument in squashing your dream. Or, maybe the idea survives your self-talk long enough to be shared with a friend who dismisses it as “crazy talk”.

You could feel stupid for even thinking such a thing. You know the drill because you’ve done it a hundred, a thousand times before. You chastise yourself. You feel your happiness drain away as your dream dies…the victim of WWOPT.

Or instead, as soon as this happens, and every time it does from now on, you can choose a different path. You can shout (not literally unless you want to because you’re no longer worried by WWOPT), “I have a right to be me and to think for myself! I am choosing to pursue my dreams!” Say it to yourself two or three times, if that’s what it takes.

Put your internal and external naysayers on notice that you are not going to be stopped by WWOPT anymore. Once you break through that fearful barrier, you will see it was nothing but smoke and mirrors.

You’re going to explore what it means to be you, to think like you, and to act like you. That’s what you’re here to do, my friend. Success comes not to those who wait with the herd, but to those who step out on their own and create something different.

Oddly enough, the herd really loves to follow someone like that. :o)

Stay inspired!

Ray

This really inspired me so I thought I’d share. The story comes from www.darynkagan.com.

The story is about Cami Walker - a young woman who had everything going for her until she was suddenly diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She managed to convert her own struggle into something good in the world.

Watch the video it will really make your day. Click the image to watch it.

If you’d like to take part in Cami’s project, go to 29 Gifts dot org.

Stay inspired!

Ray

They say the eyes are the windows to the soul. When was the last time you looked into your soul?

Do you ever look at yourself in the mirror? I mean really look at yourself? I’m not talking about the kind of superficial looking you do when you comb your hair or put on your make up. I’m not talking about the kind of looking you do when you judge yourself because you added five extra pounds.

I mean really meditating on that person facing you in the mirror. I mean looking deeply into his or her eyes.

You look into the eyes of every other person you care about. Why not your own? Have you ever stopped and really become totally aware of that person staring back at you? Are you ever completely conscious that is YOU staring back?

If you’ve never done that or it has been a while, I want to encourage you to do it today. Take a few moments and really look at the person staring back at you in the mirror. It may seem a little uncomfortable at first, but stay with it until you really connect.

What potential does that person possess? What is he or she doing well? Where are the areas of potential improvement? Who are you? Where have you been? Where are you going?

When you look deeply you see that you have so many gifts, talents, and blessings. When you look deeper still you see that the form in front of you is just the shell of something far greater.

You see, we humans have this tendency to get caught up in the physical and the tangible. Those parts of us are the proverbial tip of the iceberg in comparison to the nonphysical and intangible parts of us.

When you have your mirror moment look deeply and with compassion. What you find staring back is full of more potential, more possibility than you could ever have imagined.

Once you get past the shell and see the soul all things become possible.

Stay inspired!

Ray

The world we live in is full of promise, threat, and opportunity. As you look beneath the surface, you begin to understand that none of us is safe unless all of us are safe. None of us is free until each of us is free.

The challenges we face are of our own making and the solutions are within us. As Albert Einstein once said, “The world’s problems will not be solved by the level of thinking that created them.”

This is true on both the micro and macro levels. We need new thinking, better thinking. We need to empower ourselves and move in the direction of a bottom up world promoting individuality and decentralization. Top down and centralization approaches are not working. Violence is not working. Hatred is not working. Division is not working.

Interestingly, one of the most masterful expressions of this point of view is over 2500 years old.

The Buddhist Dhammapada is a book of collected sayings attributed to Buddha. The first chapter usually called Twin Verses says, in part, the following.

1. We are the result of our thoughts. Our present thoughts create our future life. Our life is created by our mind. If a person speaks or acts with a mind grounded in fear suffering will follow him as surely as summer follows spring.
2. We are the result of our thoughts. Our present thoughts create our future life. Our life is created by our mind. If a person speaks or acts with a mind grounded in love happiness will follow him as surely as his shadow never leaves him.
3. ‘He offended me, he hurt me, he owes me, he took what was mine.’ Those who dwell on such thoughts will never be free from hate or find peace within.
4. ‘He offended me, he hurt me, he owes me, he took what was mine.’ Those who dwell not on such thoughts shall be free from hate and find peace within.
5. For hate only feeds on itself; but love overcomes hate. This is an Eternal Law.
6. Few know that our purpose in this world is to live in harmony. Those who become aware of this cease their quarrels immediately.

We need a fresh reality. It begins with our thoughts. We need to think about what our thoughts create when they ripple out into the larger pond that is our world. To do otherwise, leaves us more susceptible to the threatening aspects of our world and less able to access the promise and the opportunity.

The good news is we get to choose.

Stay inspired!

Ray

No, Perfect Time Theory is not the latest physics or cosmology theory. It is the theory - and many of us subscribe to it - that there is some perfect time and place coming when and where it will be possible to pursue our dreams.

Our self-talk supports the theory. Sometimes we even verbalize it to others. You might recognize some of these.

 I’m going to pursue my dreams as soon as:

• the house is paid off.
• the kids get out of school.
• my job is less stressful.
• the economy is better.
• I’m more rested.
• I turn 40…50…60…retire.

The idea is that as soon as the condition is met somehow the skies will open, the sun will come out, and you will have all this extra time on your hands to pursue your dreams.

Here’s the dirty little secret. I’ve been learning it myself in recent years. LIFE IS A VACCUUM.

If you don’t make your dreams a priority, something else will fill the void…always. Every stage of life has its conditions that can prevent you from living your dreams, if you allow it.

One condition that limits your ability to pursue your dreams becomes another condition becomes another condition.

Perfect Time Theory is as disproven as the Flat Earth Theory. There is only one perfect time for anything we want to do or experience in life…now. Trade in Perfect Time Theory for Perfect Now Theory.

If you make your dreams a priority, you won’t sail off the edge of the Earth. It might shake other people up. It might cause you to rethink your priorities. It might even ask you to change your paradigm about what is possible for you.

There is a New World awaiting your choice to pursue your dreams. Climb aboard your personal Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria. Set sail today because there is no perfect time.

Stay inspired!

Ray

A few generations ago our ancestors began trading their family businesses and farms for the upward mobility offered by the corporate world. The tradeoff seemed to be a success. The middle class grew and there was prosperity. Little could our great grandparents have known how unsatisfying and soul-voiding this way of life would become for many in future generations.

So writes Susan Hanshaw, in the introduction to her latest book Inner Architect: How to Build the Life You Were Designed to Live.

With those words, Hanshaw captures the feelings of millions of people who trudge off to jobs each day attracted by the gravitational pull of the paycheck and the inertia of the obligations that have grown up around that paycheck.

Hanshaw was vice-president and second-in-command of a thriving direct marketing firm. She was making good money and “living the American dream.” The only problem is that she wasn’t happy. Her work had become meaningless because it was not aligned to who she wanted to be.

Maybe you have felt that same sense desperation and wondered if there is a way out. You have “tried” a side business or two; or dabbled with your great American novel.

Your heart was in the right place, but the truth is you didn’t really have a plan and your momentary energy turned to disappointment when things didn’t go as you hoped. You found yourself back in your cube less confident and more confused than ever.

Thankfully, Susan Hanshaw chose not to go back to her office. Instead, she writes, “I wrote my resignation letter that night and handed it to my boss the following day.” Thus began her journey of self-discovery and hard-earned lessons about what it really takes to move from the corporation to the life of your dreams.

The great American mythologist Joseph Campbell is often quoted for his affirmation, “Follow your bliss!”

“Yes,” you say, “I want to follow my bliss, but how? How can I abandon the paycheck? How can I develop the confidence? How can I change my vision of myself? How can I develop a plan for success? How can I stick to my plan?”

Inner Architect is a step-by-step master’s guide to charting a course for your heart’s desires and creating success on that path from someone who’s been there and done that. Susan Hanshaw consciously offers encouragement and wisdom through inspiring material and workbook exercises. The exercises are designed to draw out the knowledge, wisdom, and courage necessary for you to answer your questions and to claim your life back.

Hanshaw’s process is comprised of six phases:

• Considering Change
• Designing the Job You Love
• Breaking Through Fear
• Creating Your Plan
• Building from the Inside Out
• Moving into Your New Life

Each phase includes a series of steps and thought processes to work through. Hanshaw’s process is at once logical, emotional, and spiritual. This author really “gets it” that your whole self is engaged in bold, life-changing choices and she expertly provides the tools you need to deal with each aspect of your decision, plan, and implementation.

Inner Architect combines the practicality of a book you’d find in the business section of the bookstore with the insight and compassion of a book from the self-improvement section. This book helps the logical business person connect with the other aspects of his or her being that are needed to succeed in this change. It helps organize the emotional person to develop a concrete plan for action.

Inner Architect offers no illusions that “the leap” is going to be easy or work-free; or that it is not frightening. Hanshaw warmly dispels your worries by acknowledging them and openly sharing her own fears, obstacles, and heartaches from her journey. 

Each step in the book is punctuated with a Key to Evaluate section. Here Susan assumes the role of coach. She asks questions that ensure you have digested the material and that you are committed to moving to the next step. It’s your gut check to see how committed you are to making the choices your change requires.

Inner Architect is not for the casual cube farm daydreamer. Rather, it is for the serious-minded person ready to affect real change in his or her life, but needing some guidance on how to get there. Those readers will walk away from this read with a fully-developed action plan to change themselves and their lives.

Even if you are not yet ready to make the “hand in your resignation leap”, Inner Architect allows you to work at your own pace. You can begin working towards your goal today and arrive when you are ready.

More than anything Inner Architect by Susan Hanshaw offers a tested route to living a happier, more fulfilled life - personally and professionally. It lights the way to your bliss, if only you choose to follow it. 

Links

• Book - http://innerarchitect.com
• Blog - http://innerarchitect.wordpress.com

Stay inspired!

Ray