Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success ~ Henry Ford

A little while back I wrote a guest post in a great blog called Uplift Antidote. I say great, because its author is on a mission to uplift, inspire and motivate you with positive energies within its frequent, lovely posts.

Click to read my guest post: 10 Little Things that Say I Love You Big Time

Just wanted to express my gratitude to Jacqui, the author, one more time, for hosting this very personal post on her blog;  for her positive feedback, and for keeping me inspired through her posts.

Thanks and Happy Holidays!

But we need to know what we’re looking at! What it’s related to! Who put a label on it, when and in which context! Surely, the need to tag everything is easy to understand. In the bottomless ocean of information, in order to find anything, we need at least a name. A description. A tag for cross-referencing. What if we wish to discuss or explore things, which can not be tagged? Things, which cannot be Googled?

I’m talking about what would happen if our known universe of information and communication happened to vanish.

I mean completely offline. Poof!

No Internet. No electricity. No phones. No batteries.

*Scary strings music in the background.

Ah, this can’t happen in my 21st-century country, you say. They’ve got that UPS-thingy for that, you say.
Oh, sure it can. Theoretically.

But we have achieved so much! We’ve got that thing on the Internet that gives Iran our voice of support in their time of need!
No we don’t, and all they have is your clicks and green ribbon avatars. Your voice stayed home, screaming to Guitar Hero.

Dude, come on, we’ve evolved. We’ve got real-estate agents, cellphones salesmen, web designers and SEO marketers.
Exactly.

Ahh, we’ll manage. They went to the moon! To Mars!
And yet, somehow, THEY didn’t invite YOU, did they?

But, but… What’s it called… Globalization! Virtualization! M… Mobilization!
It’s getting all too boring too soon. You don’t really know what it means, do you?

Here’s a simple manual for that, Oh-No!-What’s-Next?! moment.

1) I Want my MTV!
Yes, hours and hours of your precious movies and MP3’s are on that piece of metal, gathering dust in the corner. How would you entertain yourself? Would you get outside, God forbid?

2) Wikipedia?
Maybe there’s a book you never read laying around somewhere, packed with knowledge that you can’t scroll. A short reminder: that action you think of is called “flipping”.

3) What friends? You mean followers?
After Facebook and Twitter, you’d have to readjust the nature of your relationships. Yes, them – get up and speak to real people. Do you remember how it’s done? Or do you have to acquire your people skills all over again?

4) What could I do?
I am sure you’ve got some handy skill, like typing 100 words per minute or programming in PERL. Worthless, now, is it? Don’t you wish you had a real skill?

5) Who am I?
When all the ringing, buzzing, tweeting, blipping and waving stops – the voice in your head will ask you one question, eventually. Who Are You? And then you will have to listen, think, and answer it.

It’s time to be true to yourself and try to answer that question honestly to yourself.

You’re not limited to a number of words or characters.

So, who are you?

Have a great day, everybody

If you read my previous posts, you might have noticed I don’t write about things you don’t already know. I don’t expect you to go “Ooh!” and have sudden realizations about life and personal development. What I do is I gather thoughts that seem interesting to me and hope you find them interesting or helpful as well. With that in mind, I firmly believe that

Positive change in us leads to positive change around us

1. Watch Pay It Forward

For starters, watch this beautiful drama about a boy with pure altruistic intentions. It should set you in the right mood for action later.

2. Visit Kiva.org

The site is based on a simple idea of helping others by loaning money to the people who really need it. Here’s their mission statement (a very powerful one, indeed):

Kiva’s mission is to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty.

Kiva.org has an active community of lenders. The whole process is transparent so you can monitor exactly where your money goes, and you don’t have to be a millionaire to start participating in worldwide lending projects already today.

3. Do What You Do Best

There’s a great chance someone might find your skills really useful and helpful. If you’re reading this post – you probably know how to operate a computer and read English. Some people might need exactly that. And I know of certain grandfathers (no names, though) that still wait for their grand-kids to teach them the very basics of computer use. What do YOU do well that can be useful to others?

4. No Drama!

Your help is not life-changing. The relationships you build with other people and the help you offer them may sometimes seem insignificant or small in comparison to great deeds by famous people. But the more you help, and the more you embrace this pattern, you increase the amount of good you spread in the world. Remember:

5. Words of Support are Help, Too

Listening closely is more than nodding your head. Words of compassion, sympathy or advice might do the trick for the person that needs them most. Most of the long-lasting relationships in my life were based on this kind of basic, yet important trust and support.

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”
Winston Churchil

And of course, you could help me a lot by commenting what you thought of this post, spreading the word on social networks and following me on twitter!

If you talk to God, you are praying. If God talks to you, you have schizophrenia.

On that note, I want to talk about spirituality from the point of view of a drop-out Kabbalah student, that’s me.
Kabbalah is an ancient school of thought, originated in Judaism and kept secret for many years. It’s wrapped in mysticism up to this very day. The word itself means “Receiving”. In brief, a Kabbalist is a person that studies this wisdom and moves up the spiritual ladder to attain oneness with the Creator. I’ve studied the very basics, and there are many reasons why I don’t practice it anymore. I can’t say I’m an expert on the subject, and I may have misinterpreted the whole thing to my own benefit – but there is one lesson that I took with me, and I’d like to share it with you in this post.

One plus One is… One

There are two states a person might experience, according to the Kabbalah.

The first one is when you are in line with the source of energy for this world. This is the “positive” state. You know where you’re headed, there’s a clear goal in front of you, you’re keeping the energy to advance towards your goal and you know and you firmly believe that your Creator is eternally good. No problem here – just keep doing what you’re doing (which is hard sometimes, but that’s not what I want to touch here).

The other is when you don’t feel the light is with you. That’s when you’re down, and losing your direction. Most people treat it as “negative” and the range of responses to this state varies from being disappointed in the Creator, questioning your path, to giving up completely.

Now the thing to remember is that the Creator has only good things intended for you. The source of the world’s spiritual energy is always complete. It never changes and pertains in a state of eternal love and altruism. It doesn’t need anything from you. The one with the needs, with the ego, is you.

Therefore, this condition you’re in cannot be considered “negative” per se, just because there can be no “negative” in the definition of an always-caring, positive universe.

It’s just that you can’t see it. For now, that is. And that, by itself, is a positive and constructive experience.

The Change is Within You

Always keep in mind that the universe has not turned against you and you don’t have to be bitter about it. On the contrary, by being bitter, you’re blocking the possibility of the light filling you from the inside once again. And that’s against the Creator’s intention (which is always positive and giving, remember?)

The positive side of things is not revealed specifically to you in this state you’re in. It might happen gradually. It might “enlighten” you by surprise, at once. Remember that the general state of the world has not changed. It is you who experiences this change in mood and perception. And if your perception of reality at the moment is “negative” – well, that’s just your perception of reality.

From here on you can ask yourself the following questions: what is the purpose of this “dark” side of things? What can you learn from it? Why are you going through this phase right now? And what do you need to do to get in line with the feeling of happiness and fulfillment? The Kabbalists claim to have solid answers to these questions, but I didn’t stick around to find out. I took these questions with me and left.

Down to Earth

Jumping back in to “our world” of personal development, these questions remain actual right here and right now. They are being discussed in countless personal development books, blog posts and websites. I can’t say I know the answers. But I’ll always keep in mind this valuable lesson I learned from the Kabbalah: we are all loved, and we have endless love to give back to the universe. We will always seek happiness and fulfillment. And if we can’t find it right away – that’s fine, too. In the meantime, we have to be grateful for the opportunity to walk our own path, to explore, to ask questions, to stumble and fall, and to rise up again – and to remain positive even when we think we’re facing the “dark” side.

Did you like this post? Do you have an experience you’d like to share? You should comment and spread the word on Social Networks.

Liberty is the prevention of control by others. This requires self-control and, therefore, religious and spiritual influences; education, knowledge, well-being.

While this saying is at least a century old, it’s true today as it was a century ago. I can claim with confidence that all of us seek some sort of liberty. We want to be our own bosses, become financially independent, or control what’s happening in our lives. Many goals we set depend solely on our efforts. And unlike a century ago, the Internet age has enabled us to get the necessary information instantly, and learn how to grow to be who we really want to be. In this post I won’t go into religious or spiritual influences. But if you’re struggling to achieve your dreams and seek ways to get you closer to your own liberation – keep on reading (and no, I’m not selling anything *just_yet*).

Realizing what we control and what we do not – is key to defining realistic goals and making things happen. This article might not teach you anything you don’t already know, but it should be able to put some perspective on things you control versus things that you think control you.

Consider this: we can control our thoughts. Shocking, isn’t it? Don’t take my word for it: google it and get not less than 56 million results. Yes, people are talking about it for some time now, sharing experiences and developing ideas, and you might have missed it while thinking about something else! Don’t worry, you won’t have to read them all. Here’s a sample of what all the buzz is about.

Monitor your thoughts

In other words: shut up and listen. What is it you’re thinking of right now? Where did this thought come from? How long have you been thinking about it? Try not to get in the way. Don’t do anything, just listen. This, of course, should be done in the right setting, and not in a middle of a business meeting. Just take your time with them one on one and pay attention.

Welcome your thoughts

They are not a burden. They are a welcomed guest. They come and go, but if you let them, they might just bring a present. What will it be? A precious gift of a long lost memory? A surprising angle for looking at what’s bothering you? A sudden realization how to solve a problem you’ve been facing? When you welcome your thoughts – you advance from being passive, and just doing your thing, to actively starting to experience the thought process.

Filter your thoughts

There it is again: a negative thought sneaks in. Fear, sadness, anger, frustration, insecurity… It’s now you against the world and you know what’s coming next. You will waste precious time being sad or mad, and there’s nothing you can do about it, right? Well, not this time. This time stop and ask yourself if what you’re focusing on at the moment gets you any closer to where you want to be. And if it doesn’t, what is the reason for you to linger on negative thoughts? Why not do something about it? Would you rather stay at home miserable when you know your hot date is waiting for you at the coffee shop? No, that’s irrational – you should be there in a minute! Now all is left is some simple reasoning: if you already got to that negative place and you know it’s bad for you – staying in that place doesn’t make you any wiser. Try to filter these particular thoughts out of your thought process and concentrate on your goals, your dreams and how to get there instead.

Control your thoughts

This one gets easier with time and practice, but basically after you’ve been monitoring, welcoming and filtering your thoughts for a while – you are now ready to turn the negative ones into positive notes for future action. Say hello to Insecurity, for example:

Hi Insecurity! What’s that? Am I gaining weight again? Why, thank you! Thanks for noticing that it’s important for me to stay fit! I’ll be sure to remember that next time I’m reaching for that Twinkie. Oh, and I think it’s time to renew that gym membership, as well. Well, thanks a lot and bye for now!

See what you did there? Congratulations! You’ve managed to gain control and turn a common negative thought into a positive future goal and action, instead of beating yourself up in front of the mirror. You don’t need a dialogue with the thought per se, just find what works best for you.

After you begin to actively experience your thought process – it gets much easier gaining control of everything else. The reasoning stays simple: if it’s good for you – do it. If you don’t know if it’s good for you – pay attention, monitor, and learn. If it’s worth your while – invest the time and the required resources into it. And if it stands in the way – filter it out. Be sure to define what you want clearly and concisely, and be persistent. But I guess you knew all that already.

Here’s to one step closer to liberty.

Have you enjoyed this post? Have you tried any of these techniques? What were the results? You should definitely comment and share this article.

Beginnings are the most beautiful parts of… anything, really.

Remember the first time you fell in love – the butterflies, the sleepless nights… Think about how beautiful and exciting everything looked in the beginning. Well, let’s say you’ve spent the last 30 years with that person and the butterflies have been silent for quite some time now.  What does it mean for you after 30 years? Do you regret you’re no longer there or are you thankful every moment you’ve spent together?

It doesn’t have to mean you’ve stopped loving. On the contrary, with time you might have found something more mature, more stable, and more beautiful in that person. A friendship you couldn’t have even imagined at the beginning. A lifetime-lasting adventure together. That’s why even though I am no longer a teenager thrilled by my first kiss, I look back on that time of my life with a smile and a feeling of joy and content.

As with love, this happens with everything else. We get excited in the beginning, but slowly, the excitement starts to fade away. Don’t let it startle you. It’s our choice where to go from there. If we give in to routine – we’re doomed to fail (just like most failed marriages). But if we find ways to treat each day as a new opportunity and a new, beautiful beginning – the possibilities are endless (ask my wife)

When contemplating between playing it safe or betting it all – find a third option.

Most situations in life don’t require full and total sacrifice. You might be able to start that new thing of yours without losing the ground beneath your feet. Find an alternative that lets you keep a bit of what you have or what you know before taking your next step.

It’s easier to foresee failure. Don’t.

Once you’ve decided to take the plunge into new waters – in the first couple of days you’ll try to estimate how it all might turn out. If you’re starting to see all black – fear, failure, stress, etc. – don’t panic. It’s the good-ol’ human probability assessment: failure seems much more probable than success in the beginning. Fortunately for you, this is something very easy to overcome with persistence and practice. Keep doing your thing and shortly after your first success – as minor as it may be – you’ll have a real and substantial event to build upon.

Do you have an experience of a new beginning you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it in the comments.

Alex

Yesterday, I was at a party where a bunch of people played a mime-word-guessing game.

All players are divided into two teams. First team chooses a word and tells it to a selected player from the other team. The task of that player is to display this word to his team and they have to guess it. The catch is he cannot speak and is allowed to show it only using mimics and gestures. If his team wins and guesses the word – they get to choose a word for the other team to guess and so on.

It was very funny to see all the different reactions some people had to the same word or concept and their attempts to display it using only body language. But at one point, I caught myself on a thought that I was enjoying this game for another reason. I found a unique opportunity to observe how different people think and act. And then I started drawing conclusions about their personalities, knowledge or sense of humor. Here’s an example.

We thought of “conservatism“. When the player tried to show it to his team, it took him a while. The team had no idea what he meant (hey, it’s not an easy word to show with only gestures!) and were shouting out lots of funny, yet totally unrelated things.

Through the Looking Glass

At this point, a girl from my team got up and started jumping up and down and screaming – “It’s MY word! MY word! I thought of it!”. We asked her nicely to settle down (“Sheesh! – OK, we got it, it’s YOUR word!). She’s been quiet for 2 minutes. Then she jumped up again and shouted, rather enthusiastically: “How great was MY word?”, “I rule!”, and other stuff of this sort. Some people simply stared at her and said nothing. Some calmed her down. After the other team finally guessed “conservatism” – you could see the joy on her face once again – “Haha! You guessed MY word!” “I’m so great!”…

Here I started inspecting and judging this girl’s personality. Here’s her obsession with the fact that it was she who thought of this word. Here’s how she puts her uncontrolled pride, egoism and immaturity on display. How is she unaware of this? Everything seems just fine to her! There’s no problem!

And then it hit me. Here I am, sitting and judging this girl in her time of pride and childish joy.

Why?

I always try to find new angles for introspection – and this tiny, insignificant, and seemingly stupid incident gave me a lot to think about our own behavior. Do we ever jump in and interrupt with “I’m the best!” sometimes? Maybe we do it without screaming and jumping around, but the outcome is the same? Maybe it might offend or upset other people?

The answer is YES. We do it all the time. Sometimes “I’m the best!”  is our confidence that we’re smarter than some people and try to prove them wrong. We’ve got to set them straight! This instinct of  judging others is definitely there, in us. And it’s so easy to let it out, too – we hardly control it.

It’s All Just a Game

This game illustrated to me the thin line between knowing, guessing and concluding. Becoming aware of this line was the first step. The second was the realization that it’s better to stay clear from judging or “correcting” people we hardly know, without knowing all the facts.  In fact, I even question judging this whole girl incident – she may be a wonderful person and this incident doesn’t overshadow her possible many positive qualities, that I’m unaware of.

So for now I think I’ll stick with observing

1. Dragos Roua - The choice of a personal path
   Founder: Dragos Roua,  Romania
   Why: [...] Don’t expect to find common things here, and in the case you will still find common things, enjoy them, because they will not emerge often. But do expect to find controversial, unexpected, unusual or just plain strange interpretations here. I saw over the time that some of my thoughts or mental connections have the tendency to put people in the dazzling state. Dazzling is good, sometimes. It makes your brains working. I just think we don’t have to raise perception walls between our mindsets, goals or approaches. Our “big picture” might often seem cluttered and foggy, but this is mainly because our knowledge paths are frozen in habits. Unfroze your knowledge paths and let them converge and feed each other. And do not be afraid about the results. We can never fail. We just learn. [source]
   Twitter: @dragosroua
   
2. The Fluent Self – When you need some destuckification
   Founder: Havi Brooks, US (…and Germany, and Israel)
   Why: Uhhhh …. thinker-of-thoughts. Writer-of-words. Educator. Trilingual bookworm. Obsessed with patterns. Baker of great (sugar-free) bread. Boggle fiend. Occasional smart-ass. Full-time eccentric. Destuckification: working through the stucknesses that get in the way of doing your thing (you know, the thing!). [source] Why 2: I simply can’t get enough of this blog. And that’s why it has a special “Why 2″ and the others don’t. They’re all great, though.
   Twitter: @havi
3. Dumb Little Man – a handful of tips that will save you money, increase your productivity, or simply keep you sane
   Founder: Jay White,  US
   Why:  [...] I opened the door and now allow anyone to share stories or publish tips and advice. To me, this has been phenomenal windfall of ideas and concepts that I would have never thought of. [...] [source]
   Twitter: @JWhite
4. Positively Present
   Founder:  Dani
   Why: Positively Present is Dani, a twenty-something who, after years of living under a dark cloud of woe-is-me, has decided this will be the year she focuses on the positive. This will be the year she lives in the present, turning all of her attention toward making her life more positively aware. Dani is a former Eeyore learning to live positively in the present moment. Working hard to embrace the idea of “living happily ever after now,” Positively Present focuses on all things positive — quotes, books, stories, songs, situations, people, blogs, websites, ideas, images, notions, emotions. Anything and everything positive has a home here. [source]
   Twitter: @positivepresent
5. The Art of Nonconformity
   Founder: Chris Guillebeau, US
   Why: I write about personal development and life design, with the conviction that you don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to. I write about entrepreneurship and other kinds of unconventional work, with the belief that the work we do should be both fun and meaningful. I write about international travel, travel hacking in general, and my journeys to more than 25 countries every year. [source]
   Twitter: @chrisguillebeau

Have you got anything to add to this list? Do you know a great blog that belongs here? Please let me know.
Alex

Fortunately, good content is out there. Positive, inspiring content. And its’ writers are true gems among the zillions of websites and blogs.

Those are the ones that deserve your attention. Some might answer some questions about life. Others will raise these questions. They might enlighten you on your daily emotions and attitude, inspire you, and give you practical advice. At best, they’ll help you find ways to make more of your life than what it is right now. At worst, they are simply a good great read.

On a personal level, what I drew from those blogs and people behind them is that I should start doing what I really want in life. And what I want right now more than anything is to start blogging. So, as my first post, and as a tribute to my mental gurus – here’s a list of the most brilliant minds of the blogosphere. Note that this list is composed based on my personal opinion and not solicited in any way.

1. Zen Habits – simple productivity
   Founder: Leo Babauta, Guam
   Why: “Zen Habits is one of the Top 100 blogs on the Internet, and covers: achieving goals, productivity, being organized, GTD, motivation, eliminating debt, saving, getting a flat stomach, eating healthy, simplifying, living frugal, parenting, happiness, and successfully implementing good habits.” [source]
   Twitter: @zen_Habits
2. Mnmlist – on life with bare essentials
   Founder: Leo Babauta, Guam
   Why: “It’s about minimalism, and why it’s important today. It’s about stuff, and how it has come to overwhelm us. It’s about distractions and commitments and a neverending task list. It’s about the culture of more, of bigger, of consumption. It’s about how less is the answer.” [source]
   Twitter: @zen_Habits
3. Litemind – Explore ways to use our minds efficiently.
   Founder: Luciano Passuello, Brazil
   Why: “I firmly believe that our own minds are the greatest tool we have to achieve anything we want. [...] Did you know that the brains of more intelligent people are actually less active than usual? [...] I believe that an exploration mindset is the most important thing to have if you want to improve on anything.” [source]
   Twitter: @lucianop
4. Dr. Marty Nemko
   Founder: Dr. Marty Nemko, US
   Why: Dr. Marty Nemko is among the nation’s most sought-after experts on both career and education issues. His blog is about new and [...] potent ideas about career, education, men’s and boys’ issues, the life well-led, libertarian-leaning politics, and improving the world. [blog]
   Email
5. Derek Sivers
   Founder: Derek Sivers, US
   Why: Derek Sivers is best known as the founder of CD Baby.  A professional musician (and circus clown) since 1987, Derek started CD Baby by accident in 1998 when he was selling his own CD on his website, and friends asked if he could sell theirs, too.  CD Baby was the largest seller of independent music on the web, with over $100M in sales for over 150,000 musician clients.  After he won the 2003 World Technology Award, Esquire Magazine’s annual “Best and Brightest“ cover story said, “Derek Sivers is changing the way music is bought and sold… one of the last music-business folk heroes.”  In 2008, Derek sold CD Baby to focus on his new ventures to benefit musicians, including his new company MuckWork where teams of efficient assistants help musicians do their “uncreative dirty work”. His current projects and writings are all at sivers.org. [source]
   Twitter: @sivers

Continued here

Got your own suggestions of great websites and/or people? Leave me a comment.