Is happiness the purpose, or is happiness the result of another purpose? Is happiness the meaning of life, or is happiness the result of discovering what has heart and meaning for you?

There is not one right answer to this question. The answer lies within each of us regarding what gives meaning to our life.

WHAT GIVES MEANING TO YOUR LIFE?

Perhaps, in seeking happiness, we discover what has heart and meaning for us. Is this how it is for you? Or is it the other way around for you? Is happiness for you the result of loving yourself and others? Do you find that when you are open and loving, that you feel filled with happiness?

Maybe love and happiness are inseparable. Maybe when we are happy, we are naturally loving, and maybe when we are loving, we experience happiness. If this is the case, then is the purpose of life is to seek happiness, or is the purpose of life to evolve in our ability to be loving and compassionate with ourselves and others?

In my view, it is not important to separate out love and happiness. What is important is to discover what gives your life meaning. In my experience, meaning always has to do with love – with loving yourself and discovering how you want to share your love with others. When you discover this, you will likely be happy.

Perhaps the meaning of life is to discover what has heart and meaning for you and, therefore, brings you happiness. The questions to ask yourself are:

• What has heart and meaning for me?
• What brings me joy?

FOLLOWING YOUR BLISS

Gillian decided early in her life that what had heart and meaning for her was getting married and having children. She had decided that if she did not have children by the time she was 43, that life was not worth living. She started working with me when she was 42, unmarried, childless, and contemplating taking her life.

In the course of her deep inner work, Gillian discovered another source of meaning in her life. She discovered that learning to be loving to herself – to the spark of God that she truly is – was extremely satisfying to her. As she practiced getting to know and love her true Self, she discovered another source of meaning – helping others. She realized that working in finance was not fulfilling to her and went back to school to become a chiropractor.

Gillian currently loves helping people attain excellent health. In addition, she adopted a 10-year old girl whose parents had been killed in an accident. She has found great joy and meaning in loving her adopted daughter.

Gabriel consulted with me because he was depressed. He had become an attorney because that is what his father was, but found that he disliked it. It held no heart and meaning for him. In his soul, Gabriel knew that he was a writer. He decided to “follow his bliss”, as Joseph Campbell encouraged us to do. While Gabriel is currently not making nearly the money he made as an attorney, he is finding his happiness. By choosing to love himself and share his love through his creativity, he is finding his joy.

Love, happiness, joy – perhaps they are all One. If you choose to pursue what has heart and meaning to you, you will likely find your joy.

About the Author:
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is a best-selling author of 8 books and co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding® healing process. Join the thousands who have healed their pain and discovered joy! Learn Inner Bonding now! FREE Inner Bonding course: http://www.innerbonding.com/welcome.Phone Sessions Available.

Keyword tags: heart, meaning, happiness, joy, inner peace, bliss, health, self help, self improvement, personal development, Inner Bonding, Margaret Paul

Do positive daily affirmations work? Absolutely!

The people who make fun of this practice and claim it’s not worthwhile are just unhappy, bitter individuals who resent the idea of people they know getting happy and successful. Look more closely at the skeptics you know and see if I’m telling the truth.

The technology behind affirmations is very simple and rock-solid:

Through repetition you can reprogram your subconscious mind to believe pretty much anything you want to be believe. And once your deep, automatic beliefs have been altered in the desirable direction your habitual thinking and automatic actions will be working for you instead of against you.

The forces of belief and habit wield awesome power over a human being’s life. Most of the ruin and despair in the world are caused by negative beliefs and bad habits; and every amazing success story is built on positive beliefs and good habits.

The first and foremost rule in doing affirmations is to be consistent. Do your affirmations at least once a day and preferably twice daily. Get totally religious about this and let nothing (nothing!) stand in your way of stating your affirmations; this is the only way to produce the desired results.

Remember your goal here is to literally reprogram your mind. This takes a lot of repetition.

Here are my other rules in creating affirmations that will make you absolutely unstoppable:

Get Organized

Write your daily affirmations down on standard sized index cards. The simple act of writing them will help cement them into your mind.

But the main reason to do this is to help you remember the exact phrase. It’s important to use the winning format when stating your affirmations and if you write them down you’re guaranteed to say them right every time.

Affirm With Absolute Clarity

Write your affirmations with absolute clarity. Leave no room for doubt as to what you are trying to achieve with each statement, and capture any necessary details for proper reprogramming of the mind.

For example, don’t say things like “more money” or “weigh less”. Be extremely accurate in your statements, i.e. “$50,000″ and “{exact target weight}”.

Affirm With Present Tense Confidence

Always write/state your daily affirmations in the present tense, as if you have already accomplished the specific goal. And always put real authority and confidence into each affirmation.

For instance if you want to make $50,000 extra this year, you would state:

“I have easily created an additional $50,000 this year.”

Did you notice I threw in the word “easily”? Be sure to use adjectives freely when creating your daily affirmations. Say things like “happily” “joyously”, and so forth to really emphasize the appropriate emotion for the affirmation at hand.

Add Emotion And Sensory To Your Affirmations

Writing adjectives into your daily affirmation statements is good, but you need to take this one step further by really feeling these emotions. Put yourself in the state of bliss, victory, joy, health, or whatever is needed to fit the affirmation.

Really feel great about what you are stating as if is already achieved. The fact that you are affirming in the present tense makes this easier to do.

Also when reading your affirmations, be sure to engage your five senses as much as possible. By this, I mean you should really visualize/experience your state of being, having, or doing whatever you are affirming; see, hear, taste, feel, and deeply embody everything about your specific victory while stating the related daily affirmation.

Most Of All: Have Fun!

It’s great to have goals, especially big ones. But under no circumstances should you ever turn the process of setting goals and stating your affirmations into a J-O-B!

Don’t get all tenses and stressed out over this stuff. If it’s not really fun, hang it up and set new goals that you can actually enjoy.

The bottom line is if you can’t enjoy this process your results will not be optimal. So be in the moment, get thrilled by your impending victory, and have fun with your daily affirmations!

About the Author:
Learn how to use the law of attraction and the power of positive thinking to create exactly the life you want. Millions of people have changed their lives with these simple yet powerful techniques, and you too can have the amazing success you dream of. http://thoughtvibes.com/articles

Keyword tags: positive thinking, daily affirmations, self help, power of thought

David sought my help because of chronic feelings of inner emptiness. David is very successful in his manufacturing business, has a good marriage and two adult children. Like Vera, everything seemed fine. Yet the feelings of inner emptiness drove David to overeat, overspend, and indulge in porno on the Internet.

While both Vera and David were successful in their careers, neither loved their work. They worked to make money, but their work had little meaning for them. Yet when they looked inside, neither could discover what did have meaning for them. Both reported that they had never experienced a sense of meaning in their adult lives, and that the emptiness and depression had been with them since adolescence.

As I worked with Vera and David, it became evident that each had made a decision early in their lives to shut down their feelings to avoid the deep pain of unbearable loneliness. Vera shut down because she was unable to tolerate the loneliness of her mother’s behavior toward her. Her mother would say she loved Vera, but Vera never felt her love. Instead, she felt her mother energetically pulling at her, trying to suck the life out of her. As a very sensitive child, Vera could not tolerate this confusing experience, so she put her feelings in a box and decided to live out of her head instead of her gut.

David, also a very sensitive child, shut down because he was unable to tolerate the loneliness of being with two emotionally unavailable empty parents, and the loneliness of rejection from peers.

As adults, both Vera and David were still shut down from their feelings. They were still afraid of feeling the pain of loneliness – a feeling that is actually an everyday fact of life. Loneliness is present when your heart is closed or another’s heart is closed, or when there is no one with whom to share love. Loneliness is the primary feeling when we want to connect with another and the other is unavailable. If you were completely open to your feelings, you would feel moments of loneliness throughout the day. However, most people never feel this feeling and are completely unaware of it, because the moment there is a twinge of emotional pain, they move instantly to various addictions and addictive behaviors, such as substances, activities, thoughts, shame and blame. Yet when we shut out pain, we also shut out joy and a passionate sense of purpose.

Pain and joy are in the same box. Vera and David could not discover what has meaning for them and what brings them joy while keeping a lid on their feelings. And the very act of keeping a lid on their feelings was creating their depression and inner emptiness.

Imagine that your feelings are a child within. If you ignore this child – by ignoring your feelings – this child feels abandoned. Our refusal to feel and take responsibility for our own pain is an inner abandonment and results in anxiety, depression, and/or inner emptiness.

It is our child within – our feeling self – that has the blueprint for what has meaning for us, for our passion and purpose. Each of us comes to this planet with a deep purpose to express, and when we don’t express this purpose, we end up feeling empty and depressed. Yet we cannot discover this purpose when we keep a lid on our feelings.

Learning to manage the pain of loneliness is essential to discovering your passion and purpose. There is no way of managing loneliness without a deep and personal connection to a spiritual source of love and wisdom. We cannot manage loneliness from our mind alone.

You will find deep meaning in your life when you decide to open to and learn from your feelings of loneliness rather than continue to shut them down. And you will open to these feelings only when you do not feel alone inside due to experiencing the love and wisdom of your spiritual Guidance. Opening to Divine Love and opening to your feelings will bring you the fullness, joy, passion and purpose that are the yearnings of your soul.

About the Author:
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is a best-selling author of 8 books and co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding® healing process. Click here for Your FREE Inner Bonding Course: http://www.innerbonding.com/welcome/step1core.html and visit our website at http://www.innerbonding.com

Keyword tags: self help, self improvement, personal growth, spiritual growth, passion and purpose, meaning of life

Yes, thoughts!

Have you ever had a day off work and did a lot of thinking, and then found at the end of the day you was exhausted? On a day you hoped was for rest, it tired you out just by thinking.

So if you ever needed confirmation that thoughts were powerful, then they can tire you out. If we flipped that scenario slightly, if thoughts can reduce your energy, we must therefore have thoughts that can fill you with energy.

Expanding on that theory that thoughts give us energy, we must consider what out thoughts can project onto others. If we are sad for example and enter a room with happy people, we can sometimes see their happiness subside as my sadness energy over powers their happiness energy. That can also work the other way. Should I walk into a room bounding with happiness the other people’s energy may try to over power mine but invariably if the energy is positive, my happiness will flow through the room.

So if we can see first that thoughts alone are powerful, we can begin to understand where affirmations sit into this system of using energy to empower our life.

Thoughts, when focused on and combined with passion, in time, are manifested into reality. That is the power of positive affirmation, it is the repeated reading of a statement or thought that gets into the sub-conscious mind and radiates from us to attract the necessary means to bring forth that thought into reality.

Affirmations are simply statements that we make to ourselves; it’s our self-talk. You use affirmations all the time, whether you’re doing so intentionally or unintentionally.

Successful people think successful thoughts. They know that entertaining thoughts of failure and defeat is a waste of time. Successful people think of future possibilities, not of past set backs.

Many people think that the way you change your life is by changing your thinking. Many people instead think that once they get the success that they desire, then will be able to be positive and think thoughts of success.

Affirming positive thoughts using positive affirmations dramatically improves life outcomes. Think negative and your life will be negative. Think positive and your life will be a success.

Affirmations help to print within your sub-conscious mind that positive is better than negative.

This link between attitude and outcome is well supported by medical and scientific research. Affirmations are not just a fad, but supported by scientific research.

It does not matter which aspect of life you choose to examine, health, relationships, prosperity, a positive attitude is a key factor in success. “I have done great work today that will advance my career” – not “I hope I get something right today otherwise I’ll lose my job”

Positive affirmations are words that offer power to the subconscious mind … to read more please visit this site: http://www.GlobalTop5.com/affirmations.html

About the Author:
Mr. P. Booker Senior Affirmation Advisor For more information on ‘affirmations’ please visit this site: http://www.GlobalTop5.com/affirmations.html

Keyword tags: Positive affirmations, self esteem, self development, common sense, self help, affirmations, positiv

Complement on yourself. Give yourself good points whether physically emotionally. For instance, tell yourself that you look good on your new dress or you worked on the situation well. Complements tend to make your mood better. Try to focus on every positive side in any situation.

Do yourself a favor and have a makeover. Looking good can make you feel good. Make an effort to wear something attractive, put on a little makeup and go to a salon for a new hairstyle. This can give you confidence and realize that you can indeed look your best. It is a good idea to pay attention about your health and fitness. You do not need to have a supermodel image but keeping yourself fit by daily exercise can improve your health as well as your mood. Exercise can give you positive energy, which is very important with how you deal with people around you.

Treat yourself occasionally. Take time for yourself and go shopping, watch movies or eat in a nice restaurant. Pamper yourself with relaxing massage and go to health spa. Everybody needs a break after a long week of hard work and you deserve to have one. Traveling with family and friends can make a big difference in your perspective in life. Going to places that you have always wanted to go is a good way to reward yourself.

Make a list of your strengths and weaknesses. Focus on your strengths and on how you can develop them. On the other hand, reflect on your weak points so that you will be able to know how to change them. This way, you can know more about yourself and love yourself even more.

Do an act of kindness everyday. Do something good to other people. Even how simple and small it is, the act can give you a good feeling and a sense of fulfillment for the whole day.

Be aware of what you can and cannot do. Try to evaluate yourself and be honest on your assessment. The way you see yourself is just the same way other people see you. If you think you are funny and lovable, chances are they think of you the same way.

Do not be too hard on yourself. Learn to forgive. Nobody is perfect and it is normal to make mistakes. Many things can attribute to your mistakes and being too tough on yourself will only give you reasons to have doubts and worries. Realize your mistakes and find out ways to prevent doing them again. Learn from your bad experiences and let them serve as lessons, which made you stronger in facing life’s challenges.

Value and love yourself more to be able to get love in return. People around you can surely benefit from the changes you make.

About the Author:
http://selfimprovement-101.blogspot.com/

Keyword tags: self help tips, self help, self improvement tips, self improvement

“One’s good opinion of one-self.”

Many people, and the psychology profession wouldn’t be able to survive without them, use the process of improving SELF-ESTEEM as an important step to the development of feeling good about one-self again.

This pathway back to a ‘good sense of worth’ may not be achieved with improving your self esteem alone, but we can assure you that you will have been elevated sufficiently to see what’s required next.

Positive affirmations are words that offer power to the subconscious mind … please read on.

We all have moments each year, each month, each week, each day and each hour where we may have sensed a period of sadness ensuing. It could have been a verbal attack on our character, it could have been a series of bad events. Whatever happens to you may never happen to anyone else; these routes to the doldrums are very personal.

Negativity is a sore point for any individual, so we need to develop a process of rising through these periods of confusion, and these are best defeated with us in a stronger frame of mind.

Building self esteem is not just about thinking good of yourself, it’s about not thinking bad for no reason!
Notice the small differences as they happen. Persevere and don’t expect everything at once. Beating low self esteem is a wonderful thing, and it’s much easier than you’d imagine.

“The way you overcome shyness is to become so wrapped up in something that you forget to be afraid.” (Lady Bird Johnson).

Assume in this illustration that your ’soul’ or your ‘personality’ is the book.

(Positive affirmations are words that offer power to the subconscious mind … please read on.)

THE BLUE BOOK

This particular book was blue with a gold embossed title. Within the first few pages I noticed its reprint date in 1905. Without telling you the name of the book, would you know from the description so far what book it was? No, I don’t suppose you would.

In 1905 it was a new book, printed and bound to the highest quality. Although translated into a hundred languages the new owner found delight in having bought it.

The book was full of information and although the owner was only aged 10 he began to read from page 1. It wasn’t long before he put his own stamp on the book by writing his name on the inside front cover. He was proud to own it and was happy for everyone to know that too.

It wasn’t a book he read straight through, for it took him 5 years to finish it; but he recalls the journey was well worth the wait. It became a proud possession and moved from shelf to shelf in his bedroom.

His parents were having a clear out and decided to collect some old items and send them to a local jumble sale. It was evident that the blue book was popular, it was soiled, damaged by various accidents, its pages were folded, creased and several were scribbled on while the owner was still young. The parents asked if they could include this in their collection for the jumble sale as it didn’t look too healthy.

It may not have been impressive to look at, but the content was excellent. The value to the owner had not decreased from day one. So, NO the parents could not take it.

The owner grew older and found himself a wife and now engrossed in his new life mislaid the book at his parent’s home. It wasn’t long before his parents had another house clear out and this time the book went to the jumble sale.

During that day at the jumble sale many people picked up the book with almost everyone considered it worthy to buy. It was an old woman who bought the book for a few pence. She referred to the book as revisiting an old friend. Over the next 15 years she read it through about five times. Although the book may not have been in pristine condition the content was still valuable.

The old woman passed away and her belongings taken to a second-hand shop. The blue book was purchased once again for a few pence by a mother who bought it specifically for her own children. Both children read it on several occasions and one kept it in his book collection for 40 years.

This current owner found his house on fire and although many expensive items were destroyed his book collection had been saved; although now the cover of the blue book was dirtier than ever. As it happens with time, the blue book changed hands several more times; one of which had spent time to meticulously clean the book. As I write this recollection the book is 100 years old, a little tatty around the edges but still of value because of the content.

Doesn’t this seem similar to our life and how we sometimes have to drag ourselves off the floor and dust ourselves down?

Many times in our lives, we get dropped, crumpled, and ground into the dirt by the decisions we make and the circumstances that come our way. We feel as though we are worthless.

But no matter what has happened or what will happen, you will never lose your value. Dirty or clean, crumpled or creased, you are still priceless to this life.

By the way the blue book is entitled ‘The Bible’.

Positive affirmations are words that offer power to the subconscious mind … to read more please visit this site: http://www.GlobalTop5.com/affirmations.html

About the Author:
Mr. Phil Booker Senior Affirmation Advisor For more information on ‘affirmations’ please visit this site: http://www.GlobalTop5.com/affirmations.html

Keyword tags: self esteem, self development, common sense, self help, affirmations, positive mental attitude

Negative emotions, such as anger, blame, resentment, misery, jealousy, hurt, guilt, shame, and anxiety, often come from thoughts we are having about another person.

Vernon Howard states:

“It is strange how human beings miss the most obvious facts about their negativities toward others. A hateful man seldom reasons, ‘Hatred toward others makes me miserable, so in the name of common sense I’d better abandon it.’ Rarely does a resentful person think, ‘Resentment of other people drains my strength and destroys my mental powers, so I’d better clear it from my life.’”

At other times, negative emotions are the result of lies we tell ourselves about ourselves, such as “I’m stupid,” or “I’m ugly,” or “I’m worthless.” Even these negative thoughts are often in relationship to other people, fearing that others will think of you as stupid, ugly, or worthless.

Negative emotions such as anxiety and depression can also come from other lies we tell ourselves, such as “I’m going to end up being a bag lady (or a bag man)”, or “I will end up alone my whole life.”

All negative emotions are letting you know that, in one way or another, your thoughts are off track. Negative emotions are like big STOP signs, telling us to stop thinking the way we are thinking because our negative, judgmental, untrue thoughts are never going to get us where we want to go.

What happens when we ignore our negative emotions? What happens when we blot them out with various addictions, or continually believe that they are being caused by the past, by events and circumstances, or by other people?

We get stuck feeling like victims.

The only way out of feeling like a victim is to take full, 100% responsibility for your own feelings by connecting your thoughts with your feelings. By learning to be vigilant about your thoughts, you can gradually move yourself out of feeling like a victim and into personal power.

Even if your painful feelings are being caused by outer circumstances, such as various forms of loss – loss of a loved one, loss of employment, loss of finances – how you respond to these circumstances has a huge impact on how you end up feeling. If you compassionately embrace your loneliness, grief, and helplessness, you will not feel alone and abandoned inside. If you move into anger or blame, you will end up feeling victimized and will be stuck with your painful feelings.

We have all known people who have suffered a lot of loss, yet still maintain their ability to love, care, and laugh. These are people who have made a decision to stay connected with their own feelings and with a spiritual source of love, truth, comfort, and guidance. These are people who have decided to take responsibility for their feelings rather than allow people, events, or circumstance to determine how they think and feel.

Which kind of person do you want to be? Do you want to be like a ship without a captain, being blown here and there by people and circumstances, or do you want to be the captain of your own ship, steering your own course? The choice whether you want to be defined and controlled by externals – by people and circumstances – or by your own inner choices is entirely up to you.

Each moment you can choose to be a victim, or you can choose to come from an inner place of personal power and take responsibility for your feelings.

About the Author:
Margaret Paul, Ph.D., best-selling author of eight books, and co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding healing process. FREE Inner Bonding course at: http://www.innerbonding.com/welcome. Phone sessions available. mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com.

Keyword tags: victim, personal power, love, spiritual guidance, self abandonment, self help, personal development, personal growth, self improvement, Inner Bonding, Margaret Paul

The answer is not The Secret. You cannot simply think your way to happiness. Not that positive thinking isn’t terrific, it is. Positive thinking gets you to focus on your goals rather than your unhappiness, but that is only one step on the road to improving your life.

Successful change requires taking action, handling the problem in a different way than you have in the past. Thinking about it, wishing, daydreaming, repeating old behaviors, none of that works. Only an actual change in your behavior will move you in a new direction to fix the problem.

But if you’re like most of us, much as you may want to change, when the time comes to actually do things differently, negative feelings get in the way. Everybody wants to feel ready to change before they get going. “As soon as I lose 20 pounds, I’ll try to find a guy.” “When I don’t feel so depressed, I’m definitely going to look for a job.”

Or sometimes when people’s feelings resist change, they decide change is totally impossible for them. “It’s my nature to be shy. There’s nothing I can do about that.” “It would make me too nervous to give up cigarettes.” “AA can’t help. My father was alcoholic and so was my grandfather. It’s genetic.”

Wanting to feel ready to change before taking action is exactly backwards. As a clinical psychologist who has spent many years helping people successfully change, I know that if you wait to feel ready to make your move, you could wait forever. But the good news is, with the right roadmap, it’s perfectly possible to move yourself forward without feeling ready. We don’t like to go against our own feelings, but in the situations I’m talking about, it isn’t dangerous to do so, just uncomfortable. And there are techniques you can learn to handle that discomfort and move forward anyway.

What are the real “secrets” to successful change? First off understanding that change takes time, so be patient and remember to pat yourself on the back for the effort you make. You’ll also need a solid plan and techniques like Mindfulness training to help you manage any emotional resistance to change that you may experience. Finally, just as an actor rehearses, you’ll need to practice and fine-tune your new behavior before trying it out in the real world.

Making a personal change that you know will improve your life better is a very empowering experience. Don’t let your feelings and fears stop you. Your life is not a dress rehearsal. Choose to make the most of it!

About the Author:
Marion K. Jacobs, Ph.D. is a Clinical Psychologist in Laguna Beach, California, Adjunct Professor at UCLA and self-help expert. Her book and CD, Take-Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life…One Scene At A Time offer a detailed plan for personal change. To learn more visit http://take-chargeliving.com.

Keyword tags: self help, inspiration, self worth, self growth, self awareness, personal change

It’s easy to mistake this rush to overload for productivity. But UCLA researcher Dr. Russell Poldrack cautions that multi-tasking has its pitfalls. “We have to be aware that there is a cost to the way that our society is changing, that humans are not built to work this way. We’re really built to focus. And when we sort of force ourselves to multitask, we’re driving ourselves to perhaps be less efficient in the long run even though it sometimes feels like we’re being more efficient.”

This article describes a very different kind of productivity. It’s called Mindfulness, a mental skill that once learned, lets you to relate to your entire world in a way that not only enhances true productivity, but makes you happier doing it.

Training in Mindfulness can benefit many aspects of living. It sharpens your attention, concentration and ability to focus. That means you can use it to help interrupt unproductive mental chatter and move more effectively towards your goals. Mindfulness offers other rewards as well. To take just one example, once you learn how to switch into the Mindfulness mode of thinking, any time you choose you have at your command a refreshing way to take a break from the mental pressures that preoccupy so much of our waking lives. Using Mindfulness just for fun lets us reclaim what children do naturally, see the world through fresh eyes and delight in the wonder of things.

As is true in acquiring any skill—riding a bike, driving a car, communicating effectively—learning how to be Mindful takes practice. I can say from personal experience though, that the learning process is both interesting and rewarding. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Here is how it works. When being Mindful, you intentionally shift your mental focus away from whatever had been going on in your mind and instead observe one single, here-and-now event. The event can be anything, for example, a picture on the wall, a tree on the path where you’re walking, people coming and going on the street outside your office. You can even do Mindfulness by observing a feeling. But for starters it’s best to practice Mindfulness by shifting your attention to an external event, something occurring in your environment as opposed to something coming from inside you. Start with a simple external event, say observing a tree. As experiencing Mindfulness becomes increasingly familiar, pick more complex, but still external, events. Once you are adept at achieving a state of Mindfulness with external events, then you can practice focusing on and dealing with internal feelings. When you are practicing this new form of concentrated attention, if your mind wanders, don’t worry, just gently redirect your attention back to what you are focused on.

The first step in becoming Mindful is always careful observation. As you observe the event you selected, be it pleasant, neutral, or uncomfortable, do not try to change anything. That is very important. During Mindfulness, you do not analyze, solve problems, make decisions, or plan action. You simply stay in the present moment and observe the event.

Next, as you observe the event, silently describe to yourself in words exactly what you are observing. Keep your attention completely focused on what you are observing and describing in the moment. Using all your senses, participate actively, giving yourself as rich and detailed a description of the experience as possible. Include what the event causes you to see, hear, feel, smell, or taste. Note any other sensations it generates in your body. Concentrate. Do this for two to three minutes at first, longer if you wish. As you become more practiced at it, you can lengthen the time you spend being Mindful.

Just as important as what you do during mindfulness is what you do not do. Do not elaborate on what you are observing and describing. If you are watching a bird in flight, do not go beyond describing it and spin off into thinking how the bird is so free, you feel like a prisoner in your marriage, you wish you could soar like that, and… No! Just stick with what you see, hear, and experience in the moment—details of the bird and the sky—the thrill you experience seeing it fly—the warm wind blowing through your hair and across your arms. That is as far as you go when you are being Mindful. You do not let your mind wander into associating what you are seeing now with past memories, or thoughts about the future. If that happens, which it sometimes will, don’t get upset with yourself, just gently redirect your attention back to the present event.

Finally, in the practice of Mindfulness, do not judge whether what you are observing and describing is ultimately good or bad. Being judgmental is not part of being Mindful. Judging can be appropriate if you are problem solving or planning some action. Mindfulness however, is only about observing and describing. You do not judge anything or try to change anything. With Mindfulness, the idea is to stick with what you are observing and experience it as it is. If what you are observing feels pleasant, that’s easy. If it is unpleasant, you learn to tolerate a negative event while still only observing and describing it. Learning to be Mindful even when you are dealing with personal feelings that are creating problems for you has important implications for learning to handle those feelings more productively.

To sum up, the following are guidelines for what to do when you want to practice Mindfulness:

Observe only one event at a time.
Concentrate. Keep your attention focused on the event.
Describe the event to yourself in detail.
Actively participate. Use all your senses to observe and describe.
Do not elaborate on the event by associating it with other thoughts.
If your mind wanders, simply guide it back to the present event.
Do not judge the event as good or bad. Just observe and describe it.

I hope I’ve interested you enough to want to learn more about the many benefits of Mindfulness. I explain in much more detail how to do it in my book and on my CD, Take-Charge Living: How To Recast Your Role in Life…One Scene At A Time. Another detailed description can be found in a book titled Depressed & Anxious, by Dr. Thomas Marra.

About the Author:
Marion K. Jacobs, Ph.D. is a Clinical Psychologist in Laguna Beach, California, Adjunct Professor at UCLA and self-help expert. Her book and CD, Take-Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life…One Scene At A Time offer a detailed plan for personal change. To learn more visit http://take-chargeliving.com.

Keyword tags: self help, inspiration, self worth, self growth, self awareness, personal change

Yet for many people, this deep and joyous connection eludes them. Try as they might, they cannot seem to find the connected experience that they so deeply desire.

There is a very good reason for this.

Many of us were brought up to distrust our own feelings and experiences. I was consistently programmed to disconnect from and discount my inner feelings, experiences, and inner knowing. Instead, I was taught to trust an external source – my parents – to define what was right or wrong for me, good or bad for me. The more I learned to disconnect from my feelings and my inner knowing, the more I disconnected from my authentic Self and sought connection from outside myself.

I tried to connect with my husband through being whatever I thought he wanted me to be, and he tried to connect with me by trying to have control over getting me to be what he wanted me to be. We were a perfect pair! No wonder our deep connection with each other rarely lasted for more than a few minutes at a time!

The problem is that can cannot authentically connect with another unless we are connected with our authentic selves. If we are not defining ourselves from within, then we consistently attempt to define ourselves eternally, by doing whatever we can to have control over getting love, approval, attention, sex, agreement, and so on. We confuse true connection with the momentary good feeling that comes from getting what we want from another. We think that relating to another from the wounded ego part of ourselves and getting what we want to feel externally validated is connection. It is not.

Connection with another is a mutual experience of sharing our authentic selves with each other and each receiving caring, understanding, and support – the mutual feeling of being received and cherished for who we each really are. It is truly one of the highest experiences in life. But this wonderful experience is not possible unless we are both able to share as our authentic selves. It is only when we are deeply connected with our own feelings, our own thoughts, and our own inner knowing/spiritual guidance that we can authentically share ourselves.

Sharing our wounded ego selves is sharing who we have created ourselves to be to have control over getting love and avoiding pain. There is no reality, no truth, no authenticity to our ego wounded self. Authentic connection is not possible from an inauthentic part of ourselves. No matter how much you may want the joy of authentic connection with your partner or others, it cannot occur until you authentically connect with yourself.

The practice of Inner Bonding is a powerful way of healing the ego wounded self and discovering your authentic self. These transformational 6 Steps start with practicing noticing your feelings with compassion rather than with judgment. As you learn to embrace your feelings rather than avoid them, you can choose to take responsibility for causing them or for nurturing them. You can move into a deep intent to learn about what self-judgments and erroneous beliefs may be causing your painful feelings of anger, hurt, frustration, guilt, shame, anxiety or depression. You can learn how to open to learning with the highest part of yourself – your Higher Self – who is filled with love and wisdom. You can learn from your Higher Self to define yourself rather than to look to others to define you. You can learn to take loving action in your own behalf. And, finally, you can learn to share your authentic love, caring and understanding with your loved ones.

If you want a deep and joyous connection with your loved ones, then first learn to create that deep and joyous connection with your Self.

About the Author:
Margaret Paul, Ph.D., best-selling author of eight books, including “Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You” and co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding healing process. FREE Inner Bonding course at: http://www.innerbonding.com. Phone sessions available. mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com.

Keyword tags: relationships, relationship help, relationship advice, self help, connection, spirituality, ego, love, Inner Bonding, Margaret Paul