Power-Ups

The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in. - Morrie Schwartz The beautiful thing about any relationship (friendship, intimate partnership, acquaintance, etc.) is that it provides a context for you to get to know yourself better. You might say it is like a mirror; in that, it shows you yourself. Are the benefits of friendship solely selfish? Ponder this: to the degree that you don’t be yourself, know yourself, and love yourself may be the degree that there will be friction and sizeable opportunities for learning in the relationship (a.k.a. challenges!). Building a network of healthy relationships (through small, frequent actions over time) is the ultimate support. When your life moves through a chaotic patch, or your roots are shaken by a storm, it most likely won’t be your work that supports you through it! At the end of the day, all you have is yourself, family/friends, food, and the earth. ‘Prune’ and ‘grow’ these things regularly. Other...

It all depends on how we look at things and not on how they are in themselves. - Carl G. Jung It is our experience, that a good relationship starts with you. How do you have a relationship (in any form; be it friendship, colleague, or intimate partner) without losing yourself? At the end of the day, our relationships may come and go, but 24/7 you are going to be with yourself. That is why it is important to commit to knowing and, yes, even loving yourself. Are you taking care of yourself? To be able to have a good and meaningful relationship with someone else, you must first have one with yourself. Below are some gold nuggets to respecting and being confident in who you are. You will find that when you are confident in yourself, you are able to deal with what other people throw your way much easier and be much more tolerant of others. Be kind to yourself. Your needs and desires are equally as important as anyone else’s. Being comfortable to be with just you is a good thing, as long as ...

"Don't adapt to the energy in the room; Influence the energy in the room." The environment in which we find ourselves powerfully influences us. All around us are triggers that can influence our emotions, feelings, and perceptions. This would suggest that a form of hypnotic influence is happening all the time. That is to say that  depending on the environment that we find ourselves in, it can be the cause of the state we find ourselves experiencing . We are all highly susceptible to environmental triggers and these triggers can powerfully plant responses in us. I was reading in an article that  a very subtle background aroma of cleaning products in the air influences people to be notably cleaner and tidier than they would otherwise be .  The same article spoke of an experiment where students were asked to hold a cup of coffee in their hands shortly before reading an information pack about a hypothetical person and then assessing this person's character.  The article s...

"The pain of discipline is much more bearable that the pain of regret." Many people forget that they have a body, and get caught ‘upstairs’ in their heads. The value of health as a foundation to do well (and be well) is greatly underestimated and undervalued. This could largely be due to the common perception that building Physical Health is: Complicated, Inconvenient and Expensive. Ironically, media and parts of the health, medical, and fitness industry are responsible for much of the above mindset conditioning of the general public. For example, a large part of the fitness industry is heavily commercialised to its detriment. This vein and superficial focus on the body’s appearance as an illustration of health, and also of quick fixes, often conditions people in two ways: 1. The “extremist” group – we see this expressed at its most challenging through extreme ends of the scale: anorexia and bulimia, or bigorexia. Note these conditions are at the far ends of the scale. People...

Both men and women should feel free to be sensitive. Both men and women should feel free to be strong. - Emma Watson Sexuality has sparked much debate over the years. Is it not fair to say that   we are all, first and foremost, human beings ? Human beings who all need: A sense of power over their lives. To feel safe and secure. The freedom to choose and make decisions. A conducive environment to have fun. A feeling of being loved, belonging, and able to share their love. Both sexes are also able to  feel, nurture, and express their love , while both are also able when needed to  get into action and labour and be more task and fact-orientated. A man who can  show emotion and speak of how he feels is in balance with himself , not gay or woosy, and a woman who can  speak her mind and can get the job done is action-driven  and not aggressive. When push comes to shove we can play the role that we need to play, but the question comes down to which serves our natu...

[3:57 PM]  Which wolf are you feeding? Our ancestors used to learn a lot through meaningful storytelling. It is something of a ‘lost art’ that we would do well to bring back and practice. Next time you’re at a get-together, or chatting with someone, find an opportunity to share this story with them: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- One evening an elder told his grandson about the battle that goes on inside people. He said, “My son, the battle is between the two ‘wolves’ that live inside us all. One is Unhappiness. It is fear, worry, anger, jealousy, sorrow,  self–pity, resentment, and inferiority. The other is Happiness. It is joy, love, hope, serenity, kindness, generosity, truth and compassion.” The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf wins?“. The old man simply replied, “The one you feed”.

Life's not about expecting, hoping and wishing. It's about doing, being and becoming. After the poppers have been popped, Auld Lang Syne has been sung and the fireworks have lit up the sky, what then? At the beginning of the New Year, we love to think of all the things we would like for the new year, make our resolutions, go to bed - get up, and continue through as we have always done before. In those few short hours, we have forgotten the weight we want to lose, or the new job we want to get, or the Spring clean that your wardrobe was going to have. There is a quote that says: A new year is unfolding - like a blossom with petals curled tightly concealing the beauty within. I believe that we can take this one step further and say that every sunrise is a new day, a new opportunity, a new chance to reach out and fix the mistakes of the past or move into a future that you design. Everyone will have their opinions, but the only opinion that matters is yours. What are you wanting to...

A thankful heart is not only the greatest virtue but the parent of all other virtues. - Marcus Tullius Cicero When the movie Flashdance was released, with its hit song “Feelings”, it left people thinking about and discussing all aspects of freedom of expression, healthy differences, and how people process emotion. This article may make you feel slightly uneasy as it asks something of you (remember, “life begins at the end of your comfort zone”). It asks that you be prepared to fully allow yourself to tap into, and acknowledge, how you truly feel. With a host of things that will help us become “HEALthier”, this one is right up there.  Our feelings are signals. It is our body’s way of helping us get information about our internal or external environment. Feelings, like most things, if left unchecked, can control us, and we can become an emotional wreck, or we can learn to read the signs and act on them before we get lost. I fully believe, that if you allow yourself to truly feel and ...

We can no more afford to spend major time on minor things than we can to spend minor time on major things. Our three most precious commodities:  1) Time 2) Money 3) Personal Productivity (energy) Do you jump out of bed each morning with a plan, feeling excited about what lies ahead for your day? Or do you watch the clock hands tick by and wonder where all that time goes? It is all too easy to feel that if we are not busy working on some project or urgent thing to do, we are wasting time. How we perceive time has a mighty effect on our priorities. If we have a high priority on money for instance, then we will be driven to be more productive to try and use our time as effectively as possible in keeping with the phrase ‘time is money’. What is the price tag on time? If we live by the above phrase, then we will indeed be giving currency to time. How does that affect our confidence and self-value?  This can lead to rating our self-worth by how productive we perceive that we are. Th...

"Opportunities don't happen. You create them."  - Chris Grosser Theodor Seuss Geisel, better known as ’Dr. Seuss was a well-renowned cartoonist and writer.  He had many other pursuits before he was given a request by William Spaulding that would set Theodor’s sights in a whole new way. Theodor was asked to reduce a list of 348 words that Spaulding had compiled, believing they were the most important words for first-graders to learn, and asked Theodor to reduce the words again to 250 and write a book that would engage young readers. This task was undertaken after Life Magazine published an article about the growing issue of illiteracy stating that children weren’t reading due to books being boring. This started Theodor on a journey of great proportion with his first book (using 236 words) of this type being ‘The Cat In The Hat’. It would be a miss of us, however, to believe that Suess’s work is only for young readers.  Keep reading to find the 8 keys of personal success th...