You Aren’t As Bad As You Fear
If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!Letting go of outdated beliefs about what you can’t do
Many of you carry all kinds of beliefs that your lives won’t work out to be as good as you would like. You picked up these ideas when you were [...]
Does Your Life Feel Dull?
Do you sometimes feel that life is against you? People around you appear preoccupied and indifferent to you. There are constant hassles and upsets. Whatever enthusiasm you once had has disappeared and everything feels gray. You have little energy and feel like giving up. There’s no spark. No sense of excitement or joy in life.
If [...]
Why you need more celebration in your life
Setting up your own special days to celebrate key life events can give you more joy and contentment
Americans have many special days in the year which they celebrate. There are national holidays and also events like Mother’s Day or Valentine’s Day.
As an individual you can celebrate special days of your own. There will be [...]
Everyday fiction: thoughts on the stories we tell ourselves
When it comes to telling others what happened, do you prefer dull truth or exciting fiction?
Do you like to hear other people’s views of what’s happening in the news — or would you prefer to find out for yourself? Do you want the ‘truth’; or do you want a good story? How much of what [...]
Apply the daffodil principle to your life
It’s amazing what happens when you stick at something long enough
In today’s world, immediate gratification is becoming more and more an automatic requirement. We want it all—and we want it now. Sadly, life really doesn’t work like that and so we deny ourselves much of what could be possible, if only we were prepared to [...]
Are beliefs really so valuable?
It’s easy to get confused about why beliefs matter and why they don’t
The current tendency to praise belief is, I think, caused by confusing its meaning with faith. Faith is a stronger version of trust: a determined effort to rely on something or someone, no matter what. It’s quite a long way from mere belief.
People [...]
What do you believe about money?
Are your assumptions making you poorer and more stressed out?
Money may or may not be the root of all evil (I think that’s more likely to people’s constant desire to have everything their own way), but it’s definitely the basis for a great deal of stress. One idea is that how you think about it—especially [...]
The truth about strengths and weaknesses
Why focusing on your weaknesses will leave you frustrated and dissatisfied
Your best friend loves playing softball. She’s good at it and looks likely to make it to college level one day. You’re a total klutz at the game. You don’t enjoy it, but you keep trying because your friend is so keen. She does her [...]
Ideas to avoid unhappiness
Much of the misery we all suffer is self-inflicted
It’s easy to blame all the problems we encounter on external forces. Easy, but not sensible or even true. A great deal of our suffering is due to our own responses to those events—plus those habitual behaviors that bring down unhappiness on us by our own choices.
We [...]
Hey, I can take it!
Do you believe that you’re pretty much immune to stress and work pressure? That you can handle levels of activity and involvement that “mere weaklings” would say were ruining their lives? That “when the going gets tough, the tough get going” is exactly your kind of sentiment? That you can cope where others would cave [...]
