Blog for Self Improvement

Success is not permanent. The achievement, you are feeling happy about will not mean a thing to you tomorrow. You must have taken some journeys when you were young. You must have felt good when a milestone passed as you looked out of the window, and a moment later you were looking forward to next. But were you still excited about the journey you had just taken when you reached the destination?

In fact we are excited for the destinations we want to reach but have not reached as yet. Success is the journey you take towards these un-reached destinations. We feel happy when we reach, but the joy is short lived. Next day, we need something else to feel excited about.

A mother when asked by her child that why they are not as prosperous as their neighbor, advises that she should be satisfied with what she had. The child snapped back that she is very satisfied with the grades she got in her exams. The mother was at loss of words because the grades were not flattering by any means. And if she is satisfied with them, she will never do anything to improve them.

Unfortunately too many people have learned it too well to be satisfied with what they have. They will hate the job that they are doing, but will not do anything to change it, as they have learned to be satisfied. They will struggle hard to make their ends meet, and deny every material pleasure to themselves and their family. But they will not do anything to improve their incomes because they are satisfied with whatever they have got. They will curse God for not answering their prayers, but they won’t do anything to raise themselves spiritually. They will live in darkness of ignorance but do nothing to gain knowledge. After all they are supposed to be satisfied with what they have. Too many people spend a life of mediocrity and under-achievement because they carry with them a superficial air of so called satisfaction.

Dissatisfaction is the one of the greatest motivation for achievement. You have not done enough today if you are still happy with what you did yesterday. This is why the most successful people in this world never say that they have it made. They do not accept to have arrived. They take a never ending journey towards new destinations and higher achievements. In return they create abundance that all of us are supposed to create with our action.

While in college we had a very old gentleman as one of our visiting professor. This retired top government official had a plush bungalow, and he owned four cars (still an extravaganza in India). He had no reason to work. But he would go from college to college in public transport. We thought he is greedy and a miser. We were surprised when we discovered him giving liberal charity. He told us that he feels excited to teach youngsters, and he prefers to be among people so he uses public transport. He was a voracious reader, good listener and full of excitement and enthusiasm for new things. He was dissatisfaction personified. He gave more, so he received more. And the more he received, more he gave. But he never got it made.

This does not mean that one must turn greedy and run only after material things in life. Greed is an obsession with wanting more than the honest efforts that you are willing to put. Greed will make you restless. You will loose peace of mind. In other words you will not be content. What is the feeling of content? You will be content if you are in peace with your self. When you know that you are doing what is required to be done. You are content when you are taking the journey in faith towards more fulfillments.

When you are dissatisfied, you look forward. You will look for new milestones to achieve. They could be financial, career, relationships or spiritual. You come to one milestone, rest, celebrate and then again pack your luggage for yet another exciting journey. And you feel content as you grow towards your potential and move towards fulfilling bigger purpose of your life.

It is the ‘dissatisfied’ people who rule the world. Gandhi was not satisfied with autonomy in British Rule, but he wanted complete independence for India. Mother Teresa was not satisfied helping a few hundreds or thousands of poor destitute and sick, but she wanted to take care of more and more. Buddha was not satisfied with being a king. He searched for supreme knowledge and he still was not satisfied when he got it, because he wanted to spread it around the world. Jesus was not satisfied getting on the cross just one time for our sins. He rose again and continues living in order to save more of us. God is not satisfied with this universe. It is still expanding as the God is still creating. If he is not satisfied how can we be…..?

By: Vivek Ray

Source: http://www.articledashboard.com

Vivek Ray is a Trainer, Motivator and Inspirational speaker. He is the CEO & Mentor of Success-Attitude Educational Services Inc. that is involved in people building activities at all levels. He owns the portal www.success-attitude.com providing free resources for self improvement and mentorship for success.

Self discipline starts with the ability to control your behavior. That means motivating yourself to do what you need to do, and stopping yourself from doing things that are bad for you. The "ability to control" is just the start, though, and real discipline is when you have trained your mind in such way that you consistently get the behavior you want.

Discipline may appear to be a problem of willpower. However, this implies just pushing ourselves harder to do things, even when we feel miserable, or fighting temptations. It's a good recipe for stress and disappointment, but there are better ways to a disciplined life.

Self Discipline Tips

Have you ever stayed up all night talking about something interesting? Then you know what power the mind has over the body. Sleep can be put off when we are motivated by a passionate discussion,and it doesn't take much willpower to keep doing something when you are enjoying it. That gives us a key to self discipline.

Try to enjoy what you are doing and be energized. Your willpower goes up and down with your energy levels, so play energetic music, move around, laugh, and look for the interesting parts of whatever project you are working on. Once you identify your best energy boosters and motivators, make a list, and train your brain to use them whenever you need discipline.

Make things easier on yourself. If you feel stressed when you think about doing your tax return, for example, don't think about it! Just lay out the forms where you can work on them later. Later do just one form, and then another. Whatever the task at hand, you can find enough motivation for some small step. Start training your mind to take that step as soon as you think of it, and the next steps become easier.

Self Discipline And Self Awareness

What if that cake calls to you. Sometimes it's hard to resist temptation, right? Willpower is a nice idea, but here is a simpler solution: stop standing in front of the cake! It is an easy lesson to understand, so train yourself to apply it habitually. Don't keep beer in the house if you don't want to drink it. Don't go alone to the bar if you want to maintain a faithful marriage. Just stay away from people that lead you to trouble.

Discipline doesn't mean being immune to temptation. Go ahead and develop the willpower to say no, if you can, but why not also have the wisdom to avoid temptation? Know where your resistance is low, and don't put yourself in those situations. Does this make more sense than fighting useless battles with yourself?

Fighting feelings is a losing battle. It's far more effective to learn about yourself. How are you energized and motivated? Where are your strengths and weaknesses? Learn about yourself, and start using what you learn to make the behaviors you want easy. That's the key to self discipline.

Source: www.easyarticles.com

About the Author: Steve Gillman has been studying brainpower and related topics for years. For more on How To Increase Brain Power, and to get the Brain Power Newsletter and other free gifts, visit: http://www.IncreaseBrainPower.com

By: Mario Churchill

Creativity, in its general sense is truly a vague idea that requires compartmentalization of ideas before one can actually arrive to a more concrete concept.

In its primary sense, creativity is one facility that man has. This helps him to create or to reproduce something out from his own interpretation or from the ideas that were copied from another person's concepts.

The possibility of using creativity is endless. We can use this factor on virtually everything that we can think of. Persuasion is one type of creativity. One must use his proper faculties in creating a desired response from a person. Art is full of creativity. As we know it, without the drive to produce something, art would be turned into mere nothing. Music is creativity. Literature is one form of creativity along with others.

However, even if one seems to be creative for very long periods, there are times when he can't help but sit with blank stare. In such moments, creativity is sapped. What could be the reasons? Are there things that we must consider so as to determine what truly affects one's person's ability to create something out from his innate capacities?

These are some of the common ideas that hamper the materialization of creativity in us.

Fatigue and Lack of Inspiration- This actually does not deal on the physical fatigue but on the mental and emotional aspects. This normally roots from the lack of satisfaction in things that we do. When one no longer find sense on what he is doing, the capacity to create suffers. Or say, when the inspiration is redirected towards obligation.

Artists are not meant to be obliged to produce something the inspiration must come from natural environments which were crafted from a necessity within the scope of inner drives and not from outside motivations such as profit, fame and etc.

Stoppage of an activity- Start is never good enough unless it is pushed through to its end. For one reason or another, a person may either stop right after the idea pops out of his mind or stop right before he finishes his project. It may be stranger but there seems to be a common denominator to all those people who practice doing this- they all loose interest eventually after accumulating unfinished stuffs. Thus, as a philosopher once said- all things that were started must be finished, no matter what the consequences may be.

Cluttered thoughts- Especially in writing, it is crucial that thoughts are organized in such a way that they are presented systematically towards the readers. Often, if this is the problem, the artists may either find himself at loss with his thoughts while trying to reorganize stuffs and ideas or it may also be that the onlookers would find his work confusing.

It is observed that cluttered working space is also a great contributor to the gradual gnawing of your creativity. While it is an artist's nature to be disorganized, he must still secure to it that things are put into proper order as this evidently affects the mind.

The inner wisdom- It is the ultimate source for inspiration, some people would even call this as the Divine Guidance. Whichever name you prefer, this seems to be the pipe from which we draw our inspiration to be creative. Most people find this inner self on accident. This does not negate the fact though that it can be outsourced through guidance; say a saying from a book or a teaching from a guru. Nonetheless, this must be nourished and should be well regarded so you would have a continuous supply of creativity in you.

The last thing is to never say no to your calling, you must always be alert that you entertain your thoughts and drives. Say for a poet, when one line of thought passes your mind, you must be eager to write this right away before the moment passes.

Article Source: http://www.articlerich.com

Mario Churchill is a freelance author and has written over 200 articles on various subjects. For more information on business ideas or brainstorming checkout his recommended websites.

Want to be a lucky guy or gal? There are things you can do to become one. In fact, there are at least a dozen luck "techniques" that you can use. I have been using them for years, and yes, they say I'm a lucky guy. Here are two of the most important things you can do.

Lucky Guy Tip - Get Ready For Luck

When we bought a house for $17,500 from the bank, and later sold it for a nice profit, people said "You're so lucky!" Yes, we were lucky that we had the cash saved, because they weren't offering financing at that price. We were lucky that had savings, making it easy to quit our jobs and move to this new town.

A friend who owns a used car dealership had cash flow problems. He could get a couple great cars at auction, but needed $1500. He offered a car as security if I would loan him the money for 10 days for $100 interest. Not only was I lucky enough to make an easy $100, but he was so grateful that he sold me a car for $1,600 that was worth much more.

Preparation puts the odds in your favor. If you were in the situations above, you couldn't necessarily do what I did. But if you had arranged to borrow $17,500 from a someone, you could have split the profits on the house. If you had a credit card in the second situation, a cash advance fee and interest would have cut your profit in half, but then maybe it's even luckier to make money with none of your own money.

In whatever area of your life you want to be a lucky guy, start preparing. There are always things you can do to allow for more luck. When you want to be lucky in love, you comb your hair, right? If you want to have good luck as a singer, start practicing, make a list of places you can audition, read up on how other singers became successful. Start getting ready for good luck.

Lucky Guy Tip - Be In The Right Place

My wife was recently lucky enough to get a good job teaching Spanish. She never was able to find jobs like this when we lived in a small northern Michigan town. When we moved here to Tucson, Arizona, things changed. Not surprisingly, there are often more opportunities in larger towns.

Naturally, you are more likely to get a "lucky break" as a movie star in Hollywood than in Toledo, Ohio. You'll have more opportunities to sail in a city on a coast. If you want to be a great skier, should you move to Alabama or Colorado? You get the point.

It isn't just about moving to "luckier" cities, though. Being in the right place is a matter of daily choices too. "Hanging out" where management does is more likely to lead to a promotion at work than spending time with the other employees. We spend time at real estate investing club meetings, and were just approached with an offer to partner on a great deal.

Find the "right places," and make it a point to be there. Imagine two men looking for the woman of their dreams. One stays home and dreams while the other accepts an invitation to a party. Who's more likely to be the lucky guy?

About the Author: Steve Gillman has been hunting down obscure knowledge and useful secrets for years. Learn more and get a free gift at: The Secret Information Site (http://www.TheSecretInformationSite.com)

Source: www.easyarticles.com

By: Sacha Tarkovsky

Motivation can help you achieve anything you desire but how do you motivate yourself to achieve your goals?

It’s not simply a question of saying I am motivated, if this was the case everyone would achieve there goals and fact is most do not.

To achieve positive motivation and more importantly keep motivated you need to channel two character traits.

Desire

The first road to achieving goals is to have the desire to achieve them. Many people however are frightened of desire. Why?

Quite simply they feel that they may not achieve and will end up disappointed. In this case desire can be termed dreaming.

To have desire you need to not only want something but feel you are able to achieve it.

You need desire then burns within you and you can then channel it into action.

Realism = Belief

To have desire and then motivate yourself to a goal requires realistic aims to give you the belief that you will achieve and believe is a massive motivational tool.

Many people simply set un-realistic goals that are impossible to achieve and get de motivated quickly as they don’t really deep down believe they can achieve it.

The goal is simply to daunting and they cannot maintain motivation to reach it and quickly give up.

The key here is to make goals realistic and set several smaller goals that lead to your ultimate goal.

Break your ultimate goal into sub goals

For example, you want to run a marathon but you have never run one before so you cant achieve it straightway so you set small sub goals of varying distances in time frames.

When you reach a sub goal tick it off, reward yourself and move onto the next goal.

This will keep you motivated, you will see know you will be working toward your ultimate goal in steps and keep in mind the longest journey always starts with “one step”

You cant achieve everything you want

No one can. You need to be realistic about what you can achieve and make sure that it is something you know you can achieve.

If you make your goals realistic and achievable, you can achieve a better life for you and your loved ones.

Staying motivated

When you have set your goals, Write them down and focus on how your life will improve and make sure that you visualise the end result, before you work toward your goal so that you can see and the benefits that will be a consequence of your action.

Keep in mind

Motivation can sometimes be hard to achieve but if a goal is realistic you can do it.

Also keep in mind that if you fail to set realistic targets and goals you will never be able to channel your desire into action.

In fact, your desire will really just remain wishful thinking and dreaming.

There is nothing to stop anyone motivating themselves to achieve goals that

will make their lives better and you can do it to if you adopt the right mindset.
Article Source: http://www.articlecube.com

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