Stretch Your Mind

Our mind is the most powerful computer ever invented. It has a memory, an operating system & a key board which is used to write all our experiences- negative as well as positive. We need to give commands to our mind to produce results. But unlike computer, it has some mechanisms which make it distinct from the ordinary computers. 

First & foremost, it is never switched off; it works round the clock. Whether you are using it or not, it will continue processing the data that it is getting. It doesn't depend on anyone for the data; it collects it on its own. It gathers data from varied sources, some of the sources that you may not even recognize after a certain period. You might not have observed certain incident that took place around you, but it not only took notice of the same but also saved it to its memory. 

The other distinct feature of human mind is that it is always on auto-save mode; for every bit of experience- real or imaginary. And we can use this feature to our advantage or disadvantage depending upon how we use the experience. The experiences that are painful & demotivating can also be programmed to our advantage if we stop seeing these as negative experiences & treat the same as learning experiences. On the other hand, we can use all positive experiences to solve our problems or to motivate us in troubled time. We can make two separate files of learning experiences & positive experiences & give command to our mind to save all past & current data related to experiences in proper files.

One thing that is absolutely in your control is the interpretation of the data. How you read the data will have a lot of bearing on your future life. Mind computer needs commands to read the data & depending upon the commands given by you, it will interpret the data. Whenever faced with a challenge, your mind will automatically open the files of learning experience & positive experience. Now, it is up to you to choose the data that you want to use. The interpretation of the data will be done by you & will be used to overcome the challenge. One interesting fact is that every time you open a particular file, your computer will store your preference. And after some time it will start opening the file of your preference & rejecting the file that you don't want it to open in problem solving mechanism. If you recall negative experience, every time you are faced with a challenge, your mind will open the negative experience file & discard the other file & vice versa. So, you can either erase all negative experiences from your life by not recalling these or you can use these to your advantage by treating these as learning experiences.

The most important thing to remember is that you should not 'let' your mind work but 'make' it. Make it do certain things that it fears. Scold it if it tries to frighten you. Feed it with commands that work for you not against you. As Emerson said, 

                                       " Do the thing & you will have the power."

Swim Out To Your Ship

There are three kinds of people in this world. 
First kind of people are those who don't react when opportunity knocks their door. In fact, many a time they are not able to even recognize the opportunity. Most often than not, opportunity comes wrapped in problems & an ordinary man looks at problem only as a problem & starts looking for the solution. When any adversity strikes you, the first question you should ask is- "What is in it for me?" Yes, every opportunity, big or small, carries fruits of equal proportion to be had. Your job is to identify & welcome the opportunity. So, these people don't respond because they don't identify opportunity. Opportunity knocks their door but most of the time they are not home. They don't see the ship even when it is at shore waiting for them to board it. 
Second kind of people are the ones who identify these opportunities & respond to these. They know that opportunity will come in different forms & shapes & they are always waiting for it. They grab it with both the hands once they identify it. Not only that, they also keep themselves well prepared to make best use of all the opportunities. So, they are waiting for the ship to arrive & once it does, their  job is to board it & start their journey to success. 
But, third kind of people are those who don't wait for opportunity; they make opportunity even when it is not there. They are the real winners as they never complain about lack of opportunity. They have it in plenty & they also have the ways & means to overcome any challenge & convert it into a huge opportunity. They invite challenges if they are short of the same. Not that they become successful in all their efforts but even when they fail, they make best use of these failures. They become stronger with every failure & every failure becomes the stepping stone to their success. These kinds of people never wait for the ship to arrive;they swim out to meet it !

Love And Be Loved

Being loved by someone is a blessing. It tells you how much you are wanted despite your faults. It increases your worth in your own eyes & in the eyes of others. Many times we underestimate our own worth & try to short sell ourselves but once you are loved deeply by someone, you start realizing that you have the traits to impress others & you start exhibiting those traits. The important thing to remember is not to make any effort to be noticed but to remain happy all the time, in all circumstances. People will take notice if you are at your natural best. It gives you the strength to move forward, to think the unthinkable & achieve the un-achievable.

"You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your sleep." - Dr. Seuss

But loving someone is a greater blessing. It makes you tolerant towards the faults of others & when you do so, you are loved in return. It needs courage to love someone with visible faults. When you love someone, you accept him or her in toto, not in parts. Many of us tend to accept only positive traits of a person, rejecting the gray areas. It is not love; it is compromise. When the husband tells his wife," I love you", he doesn't mean, "Your eyes are all right but i don't like your hair." So, why do we complain when we see some blemish in our partner? In fact, a time comes when we start focusing only on the blemish & completely ignore the traits because of which we fell in love. What if we do just the opposite- ignore all the vices & focus on the virtues. Virtues will first add & then multiply & vices will vanish into thin air. When you love someone you condone even the blunders & on the contrary, when you dislike someone, you look even at small mistakes as blunders. At times people play tennis with each other & score points by catching others doing something wrong. But, you don't score points when you are in love & therefore the result is always love all!
"You don't love someone because they are perfect, you love them in spite of the fact that they're not." - Jodie Picoult

Positive Mental Attitude

Have you ever noticed that some days start on a bad note & end up on the same? Ever tried to figure out the reason? If you remember any such day, try to find out the first thought that came to your mind on that day. More often than not you will find that the first thought was not a positive one. And that was your mood-setter for the day. On the contrary some days pass as if they were gifted to you. And the reason is the same. The beginning of the day must have been a positive one.

You may get out of bed on the wrong side, but what stops you to go to bed with a happy mood? The answer is- YOU. Our first thought might have been a trigger to some incidence. It could be an unexpected phone call, bad tea or may be not sleeping properly the night before. Whatever be the reason, the result is same- a depressing day forward. It will be wrong to attribute all your trouble to that initial trigger. No doubt, it started it all but that is the only thing that it did. Rest of the job was done by you. Your spouse unintentionally says you something that hurts; you give it back to her; she starts sulking & shouts at kids; kids get offended; skip their breakfast; you rush to your office; meet traffic on the way; someone tries to overtake you; you stop his way & give him a piece of your mind; you reach office late; your boss behaves like a cat on hot tin roof; you also retort & decide to chuck your job. Sounds similar? It might have not happened exactly in the same sequence or the actions that ensued might have been different but the result must have been pretty depressing.

What causes ugly situation in your life & many a time becomes the source of depression? Some action by others? Their attitude towards you? Your circumstances? None! It is your attitude towards yourself & others that decides your life. What happens to you is only a small portion of your life. How you react to what happens to you determines your life. You don't have control over others or their reactions but you have full control over your attitude towards others & their actions. 

Millions of people suffer from depression, pain & heartaches & remain on treatment life-long. What they don't understand is that treatment is only one of the ways to control depression. Along with medical treatment, they should also give themselves some mental treatment & change their view about life. Life is as beautiful or ugly as you make it & your life is made only by you, not by some obscure figure or reason in your life.

First Class You

Most of our life we try to achieve hard what others have achieved, to be what others look like & to copy what most others do. In the process we lose our own identity which by far is our most precious possession. We live in a world full of copy-cats & also-rans. But there are few who don't belong to this category. They are different in their approach & that is the reason they are different in their achievements. 

There is nothing wrong in modeling your life after someone who has been a success in some field. In fact, this is one of the secrets of a successful life. Following someone is not bad as long as we don't lose our own style. Choosing someone as a role-model is altogether a different proposition. A role model inspires you while someone you copy kills you. We start valuing the person more than we value ourselves. If we don't value self, we don't value anything that belongs to us-our time, our relationship, our uniqueness & most importantly our self-esteem. The other problem with this kind of life is that we become what others want us to be. In short, we give control of our life to others. The world is continuously trying to make us someone else & the real achievement is to resist the pressure of the external world & listen to the voice of the world inside you. Emerson said it quite succinctly when he declared, 

"To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

When we try to copy someone, we kill all our creative & intellectual resources. We start seeing the world from the eyes of someone else. And after a prolonged exposure to someone else's vision, we start living his life. We think & act on the commands of others. We become the genie in the lamp that has immense powers but can't do anything for himself as he is always busy pleasing others. The only original words that you hear from him is, "Your wish is my command." And when we live this kind of life we waste the most beautiful gift given by God- our life.

         "Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are."- Marilyn Monroe

You Know Nothing

The most knowledgeable person is not the one who presumes that he has learnt a lot, but the one who knows that a lot is to be learnt. Knowledge is more dangerous than ignorance if knowledge stops any further growth of itself. Ignorance is good because it tells you that you don't know & also that you can know if you make a little effort. Another problem people confront is that they presume gaining knowledge is good only up to a certain age. This thought comes from a myth that knowledge is good only if it is used to gain something. Since we stop nursing any ambition of earning name, fame or money after a certain age, we stop learning as well. The truth is that knowledge should be gained only to contribute and that can be done at any age. 

An inquisitive mind is the storehouse of knowledge. It gathers knowledge on varied subjects from different sources. But, many a time even such minds fall prey to hoarding. Owner of such minds do so because they want to flaunt knowledge & whenever they get chance they go to any extent to prove that they are knowledgeable. They are the ignorant souls as they don't know that the knowledge they are hoarding is a sham; it is of no use to themselves & to the world. It only spreads jealousy, hatred & ignorance. On the contrary, a person who has little knowledge & imparts this knowledge with his fellow human being, he gains wisdom. 

Thoughts Make A Man

It has been said time and again that thoughts make a man. I'll go a step further & state they do more than merely making a man; they make him & the whole world around him. 

Thoughts are much bigger in size than they originally appear. The important question to be asked is, if we have a large number of thoughts travelling through our mind every day, why only a few seem to make an impact? Why all thoughts don't affect us & shape our destiny?

A thought alone is not powerful but when it is combined with emotions, it gains strength. It is like if you see someone on the road & think about him it won't affect you but if he does something that makes you happy, it will leave an impact. So, it is not thought about a person that influenced your perception about that person; it was his behavior & your emotions towards that behavior that did it. And once that happens, it has a ripple effect. Remember, your thoughts & emotions don't add, they multiply. So, it can be 'good thoughts plus good emotions' or 'bad thoughts plus bad emotions' that decides your opinion about someone. The important thing to learn is that since thoughts are huge in number, you can't do much about all your thoughts. Comparatively, emotions are lesser & can be easily controlled.

So, how do thoughts make a man? It is because dwelling upon a thought also makes it stronger & drives traffic of emotions towards it. If you are thinking about someone negatively & if you keep thinking about him in the same light, it will only attract negative emotions. On the contrary, if there is a person who has harmed you but you forgive him & move on with other activities, it won't affect you anymore. Since you cannot control all your thoughts, it will be important to choose thoughts that affect you positively & reject thoughts that leave a negative influence. Even if we control five or six negative or positive thoughts, rest won't matter much. If you consciously practice it for some time, it will become your second nature & you won't need to make any effort to control your thoughts.