Time For Your “Mind Gym” – How “Mindful” Are you?

Have you noticed the pitfalls of our continuous attention divide? Like that ride to any destination during which you fail to notice how many trees line up on the side? You can ask your friend how they’re doing without actually hearing the distress they hide; and you can read these words oblivious to where inherent messages between the lines reside.

Perhaps to be completely observant of everything all the time is against our human nature. We come equipped with an auto-pilot, luckily, to preserve our mental energy from further labor. Over-reliance on this internal automated-like machine, though, could put us at great danger.

Imagine the overflow of information into your brain each day and how thoughts eventually get jammed in your mind. Are you aware of how such clutter affects all ensuing emotions and how consequently your inner state gets defined?

When was the last time you sat there doing absolutely nothing and just remained still? When did you last attempt to just be all alone with yourself not to watch a movie, or finish a chore, or to get immersed in thought, but to act as an observer, as if from a distance, to the way you’re breathing, to your thoughts that are fleeting, or to the sensations you are feeling?

Perhaps you never attempted doing that before, but being mindful of what’s going on in the moment, and when practiced continuously, has psychological and physiological benefits that you’ll reap enormously.

“A cameraman captures what the regular eye cannot perceive. Why don’t you borrow that irregular lens, once in a while? Put a filter; Zoom in the focus; and examine without judgment what is it that you feel and believe.” ~3Ds

As you become mindful about the moment, remember this: A thought is just a thought. It doesn’t have to be real, nor does it have to define you. Any negative feeling you’re experiencing will ultimately on its own subdue. Other feelings will over-ride it sometimes out of the blue.

Just observe and dismiss any logical interpretation. It is the meaning we give to that we perceive that may spiral negative emotional activation. Just notice; Then let go of it without further contemplation…

During mindful moments, you’re no longer all of you. You become an observer totally accepting and aware of whatever you’re going through.

How about we ask for an upgrade to VIP seats now? We’ll watch the other “you” performing and then bow in awe.

Oh, and is skipping popcorn, this time, something you’d allow? 🙂

Your Personal Coach

Dania

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Time For Your “Mind Gym” – How “Happy” Will You Make The Coming Year?

How many times have you heard the words “happy New Year” lately? Plenty of times, I bet. It’s become like people’s favorite automated expression at the cutoff point of a fresh new year. All attempt to portray what’s coming more brightly.

I’ve heard some people whining about the past year saying it was a horrible one; and they’re wondering whether coming times will be better, or not. They evaluate the year based on horrific events that perhaps negatively impacted their lives a whole lot. Others were more grateful for dominant pleasant occasions; and, for the New Year, have aligned similar expectations. Some minority remained ambivalent to the calendar change as indicative of any potential variations.

“Happy New Year” is, by no means, an empty phrase. We’re generally biased, I believe, to hope for the better days, to surpass any adverse craze, and to find happiness in different ways.

365 new days will constitute the continuation of your biography and are lining up for you in the unseen. We can safely call it all the year 2015. You can accept an extension of what you’ve already experienced so far, or rock the boat and innovate new days like you’ve never before seen.

Whatever your choice is, please remember that our built-in human nature is one designed to eventually conquer any turbulence. Perhaps hard times are part of living and do cause major disturbance, but none of us has the desire to remain long in guttered times. On the contrary, we’re always longing for happiness; and actively search for its permanence.

Keeping that in mind, “For the new year, it is not enough to wish for happier times. The deeper wish is to break free of any happiness confines.” ~ 3Ds

We may be starting off the New Year with certain limitations, but should we allow these to cause continuous frustrations? How determined are you to actually notice and create happier days and other thrilling celebrations?

I, personally, wish you’d remain dreaming bigger, laughing louder, loving deeper, standing taller, bouncing back from setbacks stronger, and moving in STRIDES happily longer…

Say “I” if you’re all in favor!!!

With Your Personal Coach

          Dania

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – How Well Have You Fulfilled Last Year’s Self-Promises?

It gives me the chills when I consider that this is my last post for this year. Oh boy, time flew by real fast; and to realize that there are things pending still on my 2014 to-do-list makes me almost shed a tear. How did that happen when I know and practice what I preach about principals of high productivity? How is it possible to be so clear about my yearly resolutions and still fail to perform despite my relentless activity?

At this moment in time, I empathize with myself just like I do with my clients. I certainly was not “wasting” time. That’s more like pseudo-science. Urgent situations came up and necessitated my dealing with rising tension. New opportunities surfaced and required my attention. Some projects were too overwhelming, so I deferred some and put others to suspension.

No, I wasn’t slacking off during the past year. I was, rather, engaged in re-shuffling my priorities based on situational pressing demands. At different times, I found myself exploring novel life territories and adapting to unknown lands.

Yes, I did my best to accommodate without totally losing focus of my principal mission. I truly did maintain an eye on my guiding life vision. Yearly new resolutions are ideal when coupled with a clear plan to accomplish and move toward; and it’s perfectly okay to continuously consider their feasibility, be flexible with some, forget about others, and add a few new with greater reward. Can you similarly assess how much on that to-do-list you’ve scored?

My earlier plans were not meant to be engraved in stone. We have to keep in mind that a martyr cannot do much in a combat zone. It’s like we’re in a battle field out there and we need to remain vigilant to any upcoming rival; and in the end, allow no defeat to be ever final. Adjust the sails when the wind blows; slow down the wheels upon surfing the slopes; and fly higher when the sky is clear and before it, again, heavily snows.

At the verge of a new year, I cannot but give thanks and acknowledgement to how far I have, till now, reached. I would like to silence my inner critic for a while and resist the temptation to self-reprimand. These only leave me painfully impeached.

In my last note for this year, I am calling your attention to differentiate between excuses you may have for leaving things undone and truly exploring reasons for things you haven’t begun. I, hereby, call on you to focus NOT on the losses of the past year, but on all the gains you’ve gradually acquired my dear…

Next year will similarly be like a game of hide and seek. The good and the bad things will remain to bubble and squeak. And aren’t those what flavor life with its special mystique?

Wishing you a new year filled with earned success and best of fortune…

Your Personal Coach (who favors forward motion)

Dania

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – How Do You Use Your Imagination?

 

Are you aware of how you use your imagination? Have you unwrapped, yet, your gift of visualization? This is just a reminder of a powerful tool many misuse or forget to use. Most negative states are partly maintained through mentally replaying horrible scenes. Most fears are retained through imagining scary predictions of the unforeseen.

But what if we alter the contents of those pictures or movie displayed on our internal mental screen? How would it feel like if we were to imagine better outcomes and unleash the power of our inner creativity machine? All limitations, obstacles, and unmet needs were always the inspiration for creative ways to survive, to thrive, and to fulfill certain dreams.

Most Olympic athletes relied on visualization to create successful moves before performance so that winning is granted faster. Arnold Schwarzenegger imagined, since childhood, his becoming Mr. Universe and eventually becoming an actor. Walt Disney, similarly, used what he called “imagineering” to create his entertainment empire gradually after.

And if we really think about it, how do you explain our eventually enjoying the TV, the radio, or phone calls to a remote location? Someone somewhere used their imagination till they actualized its manifestation. The end result was the luring initial temptation.

Ideas of all major inventions did not remain in one’s brain hiding as a seed. They were nourished with active attempts to fulfill specific needs. Trial and error initiatives to make things happen are part of the process till one succeeds. One tool mostly used from inception till the end is creating images of how any restriction one ought to transcend.

To start with, give it some thought as to how you can be happier. “There’s a lot of power in simply imagining a better life filled with bliss. Many often miss to visualize exactly just “how” to effect this.” ~3Ds

Your mind cannot differentiate between what’s imagined and what’s real. It is no secret that visualization automatically changes how you feel…

You can reinvent your future, relax your body, energize it, or imagine succeeding on any interesting goal.

Use your creative imagination as your positive outcome visual control…

With or without Your Personal Coach

Dania

PS. You can watch me demonstrating “Guided Visualization” as a stress-busting tool live on LBC here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8Iz3Ry2EBQ&list=UUOQcFEEskw8OGYvA4FA89rA

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – How Optimistic Are you?

What do you see if you were given the transparent water glass test (with half of it water)? Would you see the glass as half full, or half empty? Half filled with water and half filled with air? Would you suggest that the glass is twice as big as it should be? Or is it that you express being grateful you have a glass to start with and dismiss appraise? Are you at all a realist who describes it both ways?

To many psychologists, you’re said to be more of an optimist, or a pessimist depending on your answer for such a pop quiz. I wonder what your first spontaneous response is. Perhaps, at different moments, your mood will color what you say, but in general, we can train ourselves to have a default mode in responding to circumstances in certain ways. To be an optimist, you need to practice it, so they say.

At times, it requires tremendous effort to remain optimistic when tough times extend, don’t you think? Even the toughest people have their weak moments during which positivity wouldn’t easily blend with the negativity to dilute it, or even make it shrink. Unless you’re well trained, “tolerance” levels exert their toll and play a negative role on your soul.

At other times, when one forces optimism in all situations despite all signs, this can lead to faulty expectations and eventual aggravation. Surely optimistic people lead a happier healthier life with more solid resilience foundation; yet, to take it too far, and deny that “#%*^” is happening now, or can happen in the future is a misleading temptation.

I am not a pessimist, and contrary to what many think, neither am I a 100% optimist. I am a realist with a holistic view on matters who assesses both sides, but who eventually focuses on the upside. I can’t easily claim horrific matters don’t exist, but I focus on better outcomes as my guide. Realistic optimism remains my preferred ride…

“It is no use to deny it when things go all too crappy. Sit with it and understand it. Process it and embrace it. Get real; then do all you can to make yourself happy.” ~ 3Ds

Rather than sinking in the pile of “#%*^”, you need to seek a better view. Re-arrange the pile and stand on it to get yourself mounted. Realistic expectations and thoughtful consideration are needed to be more grounded. It is the only means to make disappointments less compounded.

Life is much more complicated than that simple glass of water test. And guess what? So are you if the contrary you try to attest. To fight gloom and doom with optimism will remain your contest.

Before I put my case to rest, I’d like you to fill that glass FULLY with water yourself and rise… Hold it high in the air, and throw a toast for all of us: Cheers for the best…

Your Personal Coach

Dania

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – What Do You Doubt?

I have no doubt that most people have a variety of doubts; and these don’t come about haphazardly. We doubt ourselves, our capabilities, other people, and future experiences so rapidly. Often times, a discouraging past acts like the fuel to mistrust in what’s coming; and thoughts of faith aren’t there within us so naturally.

To live with no doubts can lead to grave disappointments especially if those involved things you cannot fully control. I refer here to things surrounding you; not those residing at the core of your heart and soul. To believe totally in others – as you do in yourself – would be like digging in a graveyard for your high expectations a deep hole.

To live with excessive doubts creates a hindrance; and if these doubts revolved around your strengths, they strip you of any potential brilliance. Excessive doubts in people lead you to becoming paranoid and eventually isolation. And if these doubts rotated around life situations, they lead you to a state of “paralysis by analysis” and eventually stagnation.

Some doubt is necessary for a reality check. You’re not expected to remain blinded to what’s real, to prior evidence, and to how things made you or still make you feel. A big picture kind of approach includes probable nuisances; and you may resolve to stay focused on better outcomes as the ideal.

I’m advocating here some sort of balance and for you to be aware of your doubt levels with one exception. At all times…. by all means… doubt your “fears” especially those about your hopeful resurrection. These fears about your abilities to achieve, to reach higher, and to be the ideal you dream are all mere deception.

“Always decorate your thoughts around your potentials with faith and compassion. These remain the trendiest and never go out of fashion.” ~ 3DS

Next time you hear yourself saying: “What if I fail?” or “What if I can’t pull it through? And statements like that, please know that these limit what you really can do….Turn the deaf ear to any emerging fear… It’s crazy how loud the cheerleading music gets once you ignore those kinds of doubts dear…

Try this: Say “I’m unstoppable!” with a loud cheer… Feels good, ha? Soon enough you run out of things to worry about or doubt… Ok, now Jump, fly, or shoot the spear… You’ll love it when you’ve mastered it!

Selfie With Your Personal Coach?

Dania

Time for Your “Mind Gym” – What Are Your Rituals?

 

When people consider the word “routine”, they’re often alarmed as if that means spending mostly boring times. The safety of routines is attractive to many, but as a whole and to most people, a routine life weakens one’s drive, kills their spirit, and keeps one confined.

There’s a difference between “routines” and “rituals” if we consider our daily living. While routines are certain acts performed automatically without much thought or intent, rituals differ in purpose, in our attitude towards them, and what they end up giving. In our minds, rituals get us prepared; and the time put forth carrying them out is considered well-spent.

If you scan the biographies of famous leaders, artists, and thinkers, you’d notice their adopting specific rituals to maximize their productivity. Ernest Hemingway rose at dawn; Tchaikovsky walked every day for 2 hours without exception; Salvador Dali was known for his very brief power-naps; Winston Churchill would wake up at 7:30m and stay in bed till 11:00am reading newspapers and dictating to his secretaries; and the list goes on…

Many more genius level creative people who became historical peak performance figures tailored their lives around rituals that kept them rising. They structure their days, wire up their minds, and mobilize their bodies to keep thriving. They don’t wait for events to happen, or for inspiration to come. They’re actively seeking space for creativity triggers and know exactly what they need to refrain from.

Any high achievement and drive gets kicked off by various rituals that serve one well. I wonder if you’ve created your own set of rituals and whether you armed yourself with that kind of magic spell.

“Different strokes for different folks direct how well time is spent. There are routine acts that do nothing but pass time; and there are rituals that serve a higher intent.” ~ 3Ds

Are your thoughts gathered around time killers or mere gap fillers? Or are you more aware of constructive time use that serves the majority of your life pillars?

Are you sucked up in mundane routines? Or have you intently created rituals for self-care and for fulfilling your dreams?

Yah! Just few questions to get you to raise your standards if you haven’t set them high enough….

Gotta run now… Besides issuing this post, my Sunday is rich with other rituals and stuff…

Ciao 🙂

Your Personal Coach

Dania

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – What’s Your Most Important Project?

Unless you’re roaming aimlessly in life and you have absolutely no interests, you’ll find yourself working, from time to time, on different projects. These can be long or short-term; straight forward or more complex. Each adds to your general life fulfillment one way or another and has its spill-over effects.

From earning a good education to getting your dream job to raising a family, you move in phases aiming at succeeding in each. Along the way, you prepare with minor baby targets to be there; and gradual adaptations to your changing situations ensure that these goals you reach.

In a chaotic fast paced life-style, some people drift with the flow. They forget to pause, for a while, and assess whether or not they continue to grow. To their chagrin if they do, can realize they have been for a long time in a status quo. Nothing to look forward to each morning can be death in life and makes living something they can easily forgo.

The real deal in life is to live it as happily as you can. Only you can do that; and, it certainly is added joy if you shared the glee with others across your life span. To make it right, you’ve got to be the best version of yourself equipped with a “how to” manual project plan.

Are you like many who already know and inherently resolved that “the most important project you can ever work on is your own life and how you grow and evolve”? ~ 3Ds

It can overwhelm you to consider how many things you need to refine. Relax now… Pick one thing today, and for the coming few weeks vow to focus on doing one thing in that direction; and little targets assign. Day in, day out, all your resources in doing that align.

The snowball grows once you get it rolling. If you stay at it, that eventual make-over can be mind-blowing…

You yourself will be surprised at how easy and gratifying it all is. This is the one investment that will, eventually, lead you to smile with a grin…

So, when shall we begin? Planning starts just with a paper and pen….

And perhaps Your Personal Coach

Apres vous…

Dania

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – What Are You Resisting?

Have you wondered about the nature of what you often resist? These perhaps fall into two kinds: what’s good for you and what’s bad. You can resist specific things, people, and behaviors, or other things that fall in the more abstract.

 Resisting change, temptation, advice, power, beliefs, or new fads can be such notions. All may include both elements that harm you, or lead to your self-promotion. Many times, and if you have the inclination, resisting any of these can entail using a lot of energy coupled with unrelenting maintenance of emotions. It requires a steal-like mental set and persistent action steps to push and never surrender forward motion.

It has been said: “What you resist persists; what you embrace dissolves”. To me, the case neither applies generally, nor does it predominantly exists. It all depends on what you are resisting and what the target involves. There’s great value in accepting what we can’t change. That one is true…. but there’s, also great value in being stubborn and persisting on what’s good for you…

If I were to argue further, wouldn’t you, now, resist stagnating, feeling weak, being disempowered or ridiculed, ignorance, and the kind? Surely if these dominate lead you to having a restless heart and an un-quieted mind….

To resist your own evolution, is to keep yourself in chains. What you need to persist at is your own growth domains. You probably resist, most, the pain that comes with prospective gains. If you ignore the discomfort that comes with changing to the better, only focus on the rewards remains.

“Ironically what brings us great gain can be, at the same time, the source of grave pain.” ~3Ds

Isn’t that why you may resist initiating the move? It’s simple. You’re not focused enough on how you’ll improve. Just boost up your positive emotions; and make sure the negative ones you remove…

The game, hence, becomes rigged in your favor (eh, with a check-mate kind of move…)

Will you, now, get into the groove?

With your Personal Coach

Dania

Time For Your “Mind Gym” – What’s Your Obsession?

When you think about obsessions, your immediate reaction is that these are necessarily bad; and predispose anyone to becoming sad. After all, they typically imply unwanted persistent thoughts you cannot easily dismiss; and when they’re very intense you’d think you’re on the verge of going mad.

Obsessions can stem from specific or random fears. Many times, and in typical psychological disorders, obsessions are associated with compulsions (i.e. behaviors) to reduce what’s feared. They put one in an addictive cycle like a hamster on a wheel. On and on the “run” continues with great difficulty to change the steer…

But, not all obsessive thoughts lead you to distress. For instance, think about the falling in love experience and how it puts you in a state of bliss. Think about finding your passion, doing it daily, and how consumed in it you become that you’d never consider the quits.

Such obsessions have a different lure. Not only do you allow these; you perpetuate your state. In a charming way, you’re clinging to something that makes you feel more secure. Perhaps, these dissolve every other fear and alleviate any other uncertainty that could leave you unsure…

It is obsessive thoughts about succeeding that lead, in the end, to highly achieving. It is exactly these kind of thoughts that can transform earlier failure to the “yes I can do it” mode of believing.

“To win your way, you need to be armed with Obsessive beliefs in your ability. Such focus, is your tool to act on every possibility.” ~ 3Ds

If you scan history for major accomplishments, you’ll find that this was the secret behind it all. Each falls at least a hundred times, but obsessively rises again tall.

See? That blind to failure obsession isn’t necessarily bad or evil. Each trial creates a new upheaval…

The obsession to succeed doesn’t take “no” as a response. It persists there till, eventually, it gets its applause… To thrive, think and then do; Think and then do; Think and then do… After all, isn’t that how legends eventually yell that woooohooo!!!? Keep preoccupied with it and, soon enough, people will seek your autograph in queue…

I’ll be standing with them in line too. Till then, my thoughts will remain with you….

Your Personal Coach 

 Dania