Note: This is a guest post by Diane Dutchin of Coaching Alive the Mind, Body & Spirit.

We’ve heard this statement a few times “time stands still for no man”. How true are those words. Time denotes our existence here on earth, the dash – between the dates of our birth to the last day of our life contains a personal history of who we were, how we lived, who we knew and what we did with our lives.

It is filled with memories of love, joy, laughter, pain, sorrow, anger, forgiveness, emotions all entertained, some internalized, some expressed, and some exploded.

In the midst of our living, time continues on its endless journey – time is a gift, though we rarely stop and acknowledge it as such. With every day time is equally allotted to everyone – 24 hours, and what we do with that time is totally up to us.

We can spend our time wisely, or worthlessly, we can squander it, or invest it, we can enjoy it, or abuse it, we can live it, or retreat from it, but it moves on regardless.

Time cannot be contained, only the memories caught within that time can be! With time we have the amazing ability to capture within our memory bank those moments that cause us to become embodied with adrenaline, love, passion, peace, and a revealing awareness of who we are as individuals.

As a result of what time allowed us to live, we can identify with what turns us on, and off. We then find ourselves gravitating towards events and people that will cause us to experience again, and again to what has awaken our being.

The analogy of the effective use of time is demonstrated by first placing large rocks firsts into a jar before adding pebbles, sand and water. This is simply to illustrate the representation of using time wisely by attending first to the most important tasks, and so forth.

Sometimes what is caught we’d like to forget, or have a chance to go back and redo, but we can’t because time does not stand still, and does not rewind. We can only learn from what transpired within that time, grow from it and move on.

Time does however; give us opportunities to make changes within ourselves that would empower us to be better human beings. To seek forgiveness for wrong we’ve incurred, and seek to forgive, to change how we see others, how we view ourselves, to add value and build our self-esteem, which will ultimately have a positive effect on those around us.

Time according to the Webster dictionary is defined as a period; it’s like a capsule of life being caught and preserved by actions and words of humans being that unfolds into what essentially makes up our lives.

Time cannot be seen; a clock simply is used as a gauge to keep us aware of what we need to do, and when we need to do it.

Within the sphere of time we have the ability to do whatever we want, but using time to be effective is time well spent. Unconsciously, we make the decision daily as to how we’re going to spend time, let’s spend it wisely creating memories that will benefit you and those you’ll touch.

Dealing with different aspects of time:

Important Time

Is the time we use to attend to the things that are of high importance in our live; like working to earn a living, filling the role as a parent, and partner. Paying bills, balancing our budget, attending school, and maintaining a healthy lifestyle are all things that usually take up our important time. Prioritizing these tasks will add value to our lives, and leave us with a feeling of fulfillment at day’s end.

Interrupted Time

Are the things that creep into our day that are unexpected, like being delayed in traffic jam, missing the bus connection, and work load increase with other unfinished projects on the go are a few things that shows up in our lives that sometimes can send us back. Recognizing that some of the time interrupted issues are out of our control will help to ease elevation of stress, and we’ll be in a better frame of mind to come up with alternate ways to tackle the issue at hand.

Escape Time

Those moments when we simply need to get away from the daily grind, to step back, step away from the situation and clear our heads. Using times like these are very important to maintain sanity; especially when we find ourselves being short tempered on the job, snapping at others for no reason. Escape time is healthy when we’re in a relationship that is going sour with no hope of reconciliation – not that we’re running away, but simply stepping back to gather our thoughts together to make healthy choices.

Relaxing Time

The time we enjoy good food with great company, get caught up with what’s going on in the lives of our friends, vacationing, watching TV, reading a book, or participating in something that we enjoy doing. Setting aside time to relax is a must; hard work should be rewarded. Taking time to relax will reenergize the mind and body, and we’ll be able to reflect on what we’re grateful for; our jobs, loved ones, health, and whatever earthly possession we have, and sometimes take for granted.

Dream Time

Or what I like to refer to as “me time”. We should take time to dream, this allows our mind to reevaluate where we’re at in life, see what area needs work, and take note of how our dreams are being manifested, and those that we’ve allowed to die.

This will give us the opportunity to awaken that desire and bring that dream back to life. Dream time gives us that chance to self align and take stock of our life’s journey, and serves to remind us of what our desires are and take steps to live those dreams.

Action Time

This is where we take actions, make movement to execute those dreams, live those desires, and go after our goals. Write down what steps are needed to manifest those dreams, record our mission statement, goals, deadline and reasons why we’re going after that dream. Then implement it! There’s something powerful about walking out what the mind has processed.

Bed Time

This just may be one of the times we look forward to; especially when we’re spent from a hectic day. It is important to get at least 6-8 hours of restful sleep; this not only builds the immune system, but also gets us ready to handle what the new day will bring that requires the use of time.

We need to use the time we have now, to live in the now, to embrace good, to love ourselves unconditionally, to give life to others by showing we care, and by adding value to others.

Time is too precious of a gift to waste, so make the decision to use the time given to you wisely, and you will not only find fulfillment, but enjoyment in the process.

Diane Dutchin works part time as a Writer, Fitness and Lifestyle Coach based in Vancouver BC who blogs about fitness, encouraging, mind stimulating and life changing topics. Check out her work at Coaching Alive the Mind, Body & Spirit and 1-2-3 Fat Loss Solution.

“Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the face.”
Helen Keller

“Whatever we expect with confidence becomes our own self-fulfilling prophecy.”
Brian Tracy

“Confidence is courage at ease.”
Daniel Maher

I believe that one of the most common wishes is simply to feel more confident in various situations in life.

But how?

Confident friends may say: “Well, just be confident, man!”.

However, to a person that doesn’t feel that confident this piece of advice may not be very helpful. At all.

There are however some time-tested and timeless advice. And in this article I’ll explore some of those tips.

You can learn much more about becoming more sure of yourself and building your inner strength and assertiveness in my 12-week Self-Esteem Course.

Now, I hope you will find something useful in this article to help you improve and maintain your own levels of confidence.

1. Take action. Get it done.

“Having once decided to achieve a certain task, achieve it at all costs of tedium and distaste. The gain in self-confidence of having accomplished a tiresome labor is immense.”
Thomas A. Bennett

“Nothing builds self-esteem and self-confidence like accomplishment.”
Thomas Carlyle

“Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.”
Dale Carnegie

The most important step in building self confidence is simply to take action. Working on something and getting it done.

Sitting at home and thinking about it will just make you feel worse (and lazy).

Simple. But not always easy to do.

To make it a bit easier, here are a three of my favorite ways to make it easier to take action:

• Be present. This will help you to stop overthinking and just go and do whatever you want to get done. This is probably the best tip I have found so far for taking more action since it puts you in a state where you feel little emotional resistance to the work you’ll do. And it puts you in state where the right actions often just seem to flow out of you in a focused but relaxed way and without much effort. One of the simplest ways to connect with the present moment is just to keep your focus on your breathing for a minute or two.
• Lighten up. One way to dissuade yourself from taking action is to take whatever you are about to do too seriously. That makes it feel too big, too difficult and too scary. If you on the other hand relax a bit and lighten up you often realize that those problems and negative feelings are just something you are creating in your own mind. With a lighter state of mind your tasks seems lighter and become easier to get started with. Have a look at Lighten Up! for more on this.
• Really, really want it. Then taking action isn’t something you have to force. Taking action becomes a very natural thing. It’s something you can’t wait to do.

2. Face your fear.

“The way to develop self-confidence is to do the thing you fear.”
William Jennings Bryan

“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”
Eleanor Roosevelt

Look, I could tell you to do affirmations or other exercises for months in front of your mirror.

It may have a positive effect. Just like preparing yourself it may help you to take action with more confidence.

But to be frank, if you don’t listen to the quotes above and face your fears you won’t experience any better self confidence on a deeper and more fundamental level.

Having experiences where you face your fear is what really builds self confidence.

There is no way around it.

However, there are ways to face your fears that do not include that much shaking of the knees.

There are ways to make it easier for yourself.

• Be curious. When you are stuck in fear you are closed up. You tend to create division in your world and mind. You create barriers between you and other things/people. When you shift to being curious your perceptions go SWOOSH! and the world just opens up. Curiosity is filled with anticipation and enthusiasm. It opens you up. And when you are open and positive then you have more fun things to think about than focusing on your fear. How do you become more curious? One way is to remember how life has become more fun in the past thanks to your curiosity and to remember all the cool things it helped you to discover and experience.
• Realize that fear is often based on unhelpful interpretation. As humans we like to look for patterns. The problem is just that we often find negative and not so helpful patterns in our lives based on just one or two experiences. Or by misjudging situations. Or through some silly miscommunication. When you get too identified with your thoughts you’ll believe anything they tell you. A more helpful practice may be to not take your thoughts too seriously. A lot of the time they and your memory are pretty inaccurate.

3. Understand in what order things happen.

One of my favorite snippets of movie-dialogue is this one from the 1999 film “Three Kings”.

In this scene Major Archie Gates (George Clooney) wants the small team to save a fellow soldier and steal Saddam’s gold just after the first Gulf War has ended.

The young soldier Conrad Vig (Spike Jonze) has his doubts about the plan:

Archie Gates: You’re scared, right?
Conrad Vig: Maybe.
Archie Gates: The way it works is, you do the thing you’re scared shitless of, and you get the courage AFTER you do it, not before you do it.
Conrad Vig: That’s a dumbass way to work. It should be the other way around.
Archie Gates: I know. That’s the way it works.

Great movie. Great little piece of dialogue. Even though it may not be what people want to hear.

The thing is, when you do things you don’t just build confidence in your ability to handle different situations.

You also experience progressive desensitization.

What that means is that situations – like for example public speaking or maybe just showing your latest blog post to an audience out there – that made you feel all shaky become more and more normal in your life.

It is not longer something you psyche yourself up to do. It just becomes normal. Like tying your shoes, hanging out with your friends or taking a shower

It may seem scary now.

But after having done whatever you fear a few to a dozen times or so you may think: “Is that it?”.

You almost feel disappointed of how anticlimactic it has become. You may even get a bit angry with yourself and wonder why you avoided doing it for so long.

4. Prepare.

“One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self- confidence is preparation.”
Arthur Ashe

When you know nothing of what you are about to do it’s very easy to get lost in vague, foggy fear and worries and start building big horror scenarios in your mind of what may happen if you give it a try.

Preparing yourself and educating yourself can be a big help here. By for example rehearsing and rewriting your speech over and over you can pretty much learn it by heart.

By doing research you can find breathing techniques that can quickly make your calmer and present.

Or simple visualization techniques that make you feel more confident and positive as you step out on the stage.

This is obviously more work than not doing anything about the speech at all before you start giving it. But it can make a huge difference in your confidence levels if you take the time to prepare yourself.

And of course, the speech and the delivery of it will most likely be a lot better too.

So prepare and you will feel more comfortable and confident.

Just don’t make the mistake of getting stuck in the preparation phase and using it as a way to avoid taking action and the possible pain that it may result in.

5. Realize that failure or being wrong will not kill you.

“Confidence comes not from always being right but from not fearing to be wrong.”
Peter T. Mcintyre

“I quit being afraid when my first venture failed and the sky didn’t fall down.”
Allen H. Neuharth

Again, you have to face your fear.

Because it is only then that you discover the thing that billions of people throughout history have discovered before you.

Failure won’t kill you. Nor will being wrong.

The sky will not fall down. That’s just what people that haven’t faced their fear yet think.

The thing is to reframe failure from being something that makes your legs shake to something useful and important for the growth of your self confidence and self-esteem and your overall growth as a human being.

Here are four ways that failure can help you out:

• You learn. Instead of seeing failure as something horrible you can start to view it more as a learning experience. When standing in the middle of a failure, you can ask yourself questions like: What’s awesome about this situation? What can I learn from this situation?
• You gain experiences you could not get any other way. Ideally, you probably want to learn from other people’s mistakes and failures. That’s not always easy to do though. Sometimes you just have to fail on your own to learn a lesson and to gain an experience no one can relate to you in mere words.
• You become stronger. Every time you fail you become more accustomed to it. You realize more and more that it’s not the end of the world. And, again, you get desensitized. You can handle things that would have been very hard to handle a few years back. Failing can also a have an exhilarating component because even though you failed you at least took a chance. You didn’t just sit on you hands doing nothing. And that took quite a bit of courage and determination.
• Your chances of succeeding increases. Every time you fail you can learn and increase your inner strength. So every failure can make you more and more likely to succeed.

And remember, the world doesn’t revolve around you.

You may like to think so. But it doesn’t.

People really don’t care that much about what you do. They have their own life, problems and worries that the world revolves around them to focus on.

They don’t think that much about you or are constantly monitoring what you do wrong or when you fail.

Maybe a disappointing thought. But a liberating and relieving one too because now you can let go of that worry that everyone is watching you.

6. Get to know who you are and what you want out of life.

“The world has the habit of making room for the man whose words and actions show that he knows where he is going.”
Napoleon Hill

“Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that you can’t do this or that. That’s nonsense. Make up your mind, you’ll never use crutches or a stick, then have a go at everything. Go to school, join in all the games you can. Go anywhere you want to. But never, never let them persuade you that things are too difficult or impossible.”
Douglas Bader

To build and find more confidence in yourself you have to get to know yourself better.

Go exploring. Face some of your fears.

Fail over and over and understand that it isn’t really that big of a deal.

Grow stronger through such experiences and also become more internally relaxed. Figure out what really excites you by simply trying a whole bunch of stuff out.

When you know more about who you are and what you want out of life – not other people say you want – you will have more confidence in yourself and what you can do.

What other people say or think will have less of an impact than it used to because you know who you are better than they do.

And since you have had all these experiences, since you have taken time to really get to know yourself and stretch yourself you will trust your own opinion and ability more than anything outside of you.

You become stable and centered in yourself.

This will of course take time. It may be something that never really ends.

So you might as well get started now.

Want more quotes to help you to feel better about yourself and improve your self-esteem? Then check out 101 Inspiring Self-Esteem and Self-Love Quotes.

Note: This is a guest post by Michael Miles of Effortless Abundance.

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross was a Swiss born psychiatrist who spent much of her career writing and speaking about illness, death and dying. Kubler-Ross, who wrote the famous book, On Death and Dying, developed the idea of the stages of grief at a time when the medical establishment was largely refusing to address these issues.

Her work on death is monumental in scope and importance, and through her writing comes an immense humanity, compassion and wisdom. She has much to teach us about our daily life.

“You will not grow if you sit in a beautiful flower garden, but you will grow if you are sick, if you are in pain, if you experience losses, and if you do not put your head in the sand, but take the pain as a gift to you with a very, very specific purpose.”

The message here is that we can learn from every experience, and that in fact every experience can be regarded as a gift. This, perhaps, is a hard thing for us to hear – we have been conditioned to think of illness and pain in a negative way and we try to avoid suffering at all costs. But all growth involves pain and so perhaps we should be less eager to shy away from it, learning instead to welcome it and take something of value from these experiences.

“People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.”

I once read a beautiful description of the sun shining through the branches of a tree. When the tree is in full foliage, the light cannot get through, but in winter, when the tree is stripped of its leaves and only the bare branches remain, the sunlight can shine through to the other side. Our suffering can teach us profound lessons and allow us to be more sensitive and to add more value to the world. Through our suffering we can become more than the shallow and selfish consumers we often associate with being successful.

“I believe that we are solely responsible for our choices, and we have to accept the consequences of every deed, word, and thought throughout our lifetime.”

If we wish to live a good life, we cannot abdicate responsibility for our lives to someone or something else. We cannot allow other people or circumstances to pull our strings. Realizing that we are in control, frightening though this may seem, is the first step to an authentic, actualized life. This proactivity, as Viktor Frankl calls it, is the cornerstone of all personal productivity, and is the first of Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

“There are no mistakes, no coincidences, all events are blessings given to us to learn from.”

Viktor Frankl wrote that ‘man’s search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life’ and we all have a purpose which, to use Frankl’s language, we have to ‘detect.’ It appears that the unique circumstances of our life are oriented to enable us to detect this meaning, which is different for each of us.

Why, then, spend so much time worrying about all the apparently terrible things which happen the world? It is enough for me that I grow and learn from the experiences of my own life, using my own unique challenges and difficulties to construct a meaningful and fulfilled life. How do I know why my neighbor is experiencing a certain kind of problem? This is his concern, and his alone.

“There is no need to go to India or anywhere else to find peace. You will find that deep place of silence right in your room, your garden or even your bathtub… Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in this life has a purpose.”

We can pursue happiness in external things – money, success, career, social achievements, religion, even family. But happiness will elude us until we realize that it is not to be found ‘out there’ – it is not something to be acquired, but rather it is found in the silence of our inner world. It is found in the quiet place at the center of our selves, and this silence is available to us every moment. The outside world can only be truly enjoyed when we have come to this realization.

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity and an understanding of life that fills them with compassions, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”

We have a task to perform here on earth. It is not to do with the acquisition of property, money or worldly success.  Although I believe that these things are good in themselves and that striving for them is a worthy pursuit, there is a deeper purpose to our lives, and this purpose is usually (perhaps always) arrived at through suffering and pain of some kind. In the words of Nietzsche, ‘Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich starker,’ That which does not kill me, makes me stronger.

Michael Miles writes at http://effortlessabundance.com.

“Did you ever stop to think, and forget to start again?”
Winnie the Pooh

“The world we have created is a product of our thinking; it cannot be changed without changing our thinking.”
Albert Einstein

When I was younger I used to think that thinking was the best thing since sliced bread. So I thought. And though and thought. And then I thought some more. It had some wonderful and positive effects such as helping me to get good grades in school.

But on the other hand this thinking was also trapping me and limiting me in various ways. One of my biggest insights in recent years is that there are a lot of both positive and negative sides to how you think. So learning to use my thinking in a better way has become a main focus and also one of the most beneficial things I have ever done.

Now, this may sound a little vague so I let’s explore some of the facets of thinking with the timeless help from clever people that have gone before us.

1. You are what you think.

“As you think, so shall you become.”
Bruce Lee

Understanding this is essential to start thinking in more useful ways.

It’s perhaps the most basic statement of how we work. Think about what you are thinking today. What do those thoughts say about you? About your life? And how well do they really match your plans for your life and your image of yourself?

It’s easy to forget about this simple statement in everyday life. It’s easy to be quite incongruent with what you think on an ordinary day compared to how you view yourself and your goals. A simple external reminder such as a post-it with this quote can be helpful to keep you and your thoughts on the right track. A brilliant and beautiful expansion on this thought can be found in James Allen’s “As a man thinketh”.

2. Thinking has its place.

“Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in.”
Napoleon Bonaparte

“Chi Wen Tzu always thought three times before taking action.  Twice would have been quite enough.”
Confucius

Thinking has its place. But it can never replace action. I sometimes think there is some kind of wish when overthinking that thinking will somehow replace action. A wish that if you just think enough you can find some easy way out. Or get what you want without having to actually do something.

Without taking action you’ll most likely not get what you want. Thinking is however seldom as scary or uncertain as taking the leap into the unknown and taking action.

So it can become a place where you hide from taking action and then rationalize to yourself in different ways how all this thinking will help you. Even though you know deep down that what you really want and need is to take action and get going.

3. Your mind can become a prison.

“Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.”
Franklin D Roosevelt

“It is neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so.”
William Shakespeare

“Loving people live in a loving world. Hostile people live in a hostile world. Same world.”
Wayne Dyer

Thinking isn’t always all it may be cracked up to be.

What you believe about yourself and the world is what you will see and find. Here’s the big problem though: when you are in your prison cell you can’t see it. You think your beliefs and what see is reality and that it has you boxed in. But it’s just a perspective.

So you have to take a leap of faith and try out a new belief and viewpoint to actually experience a change in your world. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking: “well, when I see some proof of this being true then I might make a change in how I think”.

Such reasoning doesn’t really work that well because it’s just theory and it’s seen from your current perspective. Your mind won’t allow you to see what isn’t aligned with your current beliefs. Or you will just disregard it as nonsense or something that may work for someone else but not you. You mind wants to keep your perspective of the world stable.

I think it’s better to think about what would be most beneficial for me. Yes, you may see a lot of proof in the world that your current negative attitude is the correct one to have. But don’t you think a positive attitude would be even more useful to make you happy and successful?

4. We are emotional creatures.

“People mistakenly assume that their thinking is done by their head; it is actually done by the heart which first dictates the conclusion, then commands the head to provide the reasoning that will defend it.”
Anthony de Mello

“When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion.”
Dale Carnegie

It’s alluring to think you are someone in complete control. Someone who controls his/her life with a good head on those shoulders.

But your emotions play a huge role. Sure, everyone likes to think of themselves as smart and in control. And the mind is fond of thinking that it’s in pretty much complete control too.

The thought that what we do is often based in an emotional response to something that happens to us and we later on rationalize as the right thing to do isn’t as appealing. The ego that is based in the awesomeness of human thinking doesn’t like that. Such theories may make us seem just a bit too much like animals for the ego to be happy about it.

This may sound a bit depressing but I also think it is very important to keep in mind. So you don’t blindly follow what your thoughts are telling you. So you become more attentive to your emotions (and other people’s emotions too). And so you can make decisions that are more based in what’s helpful and positive rather than for example based on old emotional fear patterns you may have.

Word and thoughts are important in our lives. But don’t underestimate the importance and power of emotions.

5. Think for yourself.

“Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so, too”
Voltaire

This is not always easy though. But it is very important to learn to trust your own judgement and thoughts.

It’s easy to assume that someone that you view as an authority is telling is the truth. There is however just opinions, no matter who is speaking. Sure, it can sometimes be easier to just do what someone else says. It takes some of the responsibility off you for your life (you can always blame them when things go wrong). And taking it the other way and becoming totally unreasonable is of course not helpful either.

But you have to make yourself the highest authority in your life. It can’t be your parents, boss or some personal development guru.

Let other people think for themselves. Listen to what they have to say.

But find a lot more freedom within and in your world by holding your own opinion the highest.

6. Don’t worry what others are thinking about you.

“At the age of 20, we don’t care what the world thinks of us; at 30, we worry about what it is thinking of us; at 40, we discover that it wasn’t thinking of us at all.”
Unknown

“I have often wondered how it is that every man loves himself more than all the rest of men, but yet sets less value on his own opinions of himself than on the opinions of others.”
Marcus Aurelius

The biggest part of thinking and doing what you really want is to stop caring so much about what other people think of you.

A lot of the actions you take – or do not take – may be because you need approval from other people. When we are young we get grades in school that tells us that we are “good”. This makes it very easy to create a life where you always go looking for the world to give you the next hit of approval. It may be from your family, boss, friends, co-workers and so on.

But this need creates neediness. And the stronger the need the stronger the neediness. And so other people will sense this. And approval may be withheld or used to manipulate you. Or they may just not like your neediness.

The people on the other hand that does not care that much about getting approval often do more of what they want deep inside. They may be considered courageous for instance. So the way they live their lives will gain appreciation and approval from the people around them. It’s a bit counter-intuitive.

7. When you think, think in a constructive way.

“The ‘how’ thinker gets problems solved effectively because he wastes no time with futile ‘ifs’.”
Norman Vincent Peale.

It’s very easy to spend your time thinking and imagining all the horrible things that may happen if you stand up and face the obstacles and troubles in life. But if you actually do that those negative images seldom come into life. They are just huge monsters that you build in your mind. Just like you did when you were a kid and imagined monsters in the closet or under your bed.

When you actually stand up and face your obstacles you may find that the experience isn’t as bad as you imagined. Sometimes it’s actually a bit anti-climatic. You think to yourself: “What?! Is this it?”.

So, after having done some thinking about how to go about doing something don’t fall into the trap of overthinking and monster-building. Just go and do what you need to do instead.

8. Don’t think. Just be here now.

“Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever have. Make the Now the primary focus of your life.”
Eckhart Tolle

“True salvation is freedom from negativity, and above all from past and future as a psychological need.”
Eckhart Tolle

Many times the best thing you can do is to not think at all. Well, maybe it’s a bit of thinking, I don’t really know but it’s like your mind is empty. You are fully present in this moment. Without dozens of thoughts running through your mind like a wild river. There is stillness within. This is not just a very enjoyable state of mind. It is also practically perhaps the most useful state of mind.

Because when you are present your focus is not split. Your thoughts are not in the past or future. And so there is very little fear or negative emotions inside of you.

This is the perfect state of mind to take action. When you do something while being present the anxiety or fear that comes from thinking about for example the future (“will I lose this race?”) disappears. This increases the quality of whatever you do while being present.

Being present also makes you more creative because you let your subconscious puzzle together impressions and concepts until you get an idea. Often in the shower or someplace like that. Because there you aren’t actively thinking about a solution. Your subconscious gets some space to work while you focus your conscious mind on not getting soap in the eyes.

Finally, being present makes any activity more enjoyable because the suffering you may feel often comes from a split focus or just too much thoughts running around in your head.

My favorite way to reconnect with the present moment right now it to see everything as I was seeing it for the first time. I imagine it like that, I take that role.

Like someone who has never experienced this before. Like a child or someone who has never been here before. I like this one and I have been doing it from time to time for years (although back then I didn’t really understand why it felt nice when I did it).

We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.
Anais Nin

There is little difference in people, but that little difference makes a big difference. The little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative.
W. Clement Stone

For myself I am an optimist – it does not seem to be much use being anything else.
Winston Churchill

I write a lot about having a positive attitude. But why should work on your attitude and try to make it a more consistently positive one? What are the actual benefits?

And how do you go about changing your attitude from a negative one to a more positive one? I’ll get to that a bit further down in this article.

But first, let’s start with the why and 8 awesome reasons to blast negativity out of your life and replace it with a more positive attitude.

1. Attractiveness. Frankly, I think this is one of the most important reasons to adopt a positive attitude. It just makes you so much more socially attractive in all kinds of ways (with friends and random people you meet, at work/in school or with some cute guy/girl you’re interested in). Plus, a lot of people simply don’t have the patience, time or interest in a lot of negativity. They’ll just spend more time with positive people instead.
2. You focus on the good things in people. Not their flaws. This will make things much better overall and improve all kinds of relationships.
3. It’s easier to be more productive. You simply get more things done when you stop laying obstacles in the middle of the road in the form of negative thoughts.
4. You’ll waste less time and energy. Negativity can be like a self-feeding loop. First you think one negative thought. It leads you to three more. And then you start examining your life in deeper detail through a depressing lens. When you get into vicious cycles like these it can eat up hours, weeks and years of your life. It can drain a lot of your energy whilst trapping you in paralysis by analysis. And you probably won’t become that much wiser in the process. We live for about 24-28 000 days. Don’t waste them.
5. A circle of positivity. Emotions are contagious. Everyone wants positive emotions. And most want to keep them going so they give back positivity to you too. And so a sort of circle of positivity can be created and strengthened. This makes any interactions/relationships a lot more fun.
6. It enables you to see things that aren’t there yet. If you are pessimist or a realist you may get stuck in thinking that things will stay the same and a positive change is unlikely. If you think that way then it will be hard to make a big positive change. You have to be able to see it on your mind and have a belief that you can do it to actually be able to achieve it.
7. Everything becomes more fun. The fun aspect of life and personal development is often a bit overlooked. Positivity makes work, school, relationships, working out and just about everything more fun.
8. Negativity is stupid. If you look at the reasons above it becomes obvious how much better and more useful positivity is for you. When I feel negative I often simply remember that negativity is worse choice in any situation really. And since I don’t want to make stupid choices I choose to change my attitude in those situations.

How I Do It

So how do you create, maintain and strengthen a positive attitude?

Well, here’s how I do it.

These tips and mindsets allow me to stay positive about 80 percent of the time right now. I expect those numbers to improve even more over the coming months and years. Changing your attitude can be a lot of work at first but after a while a positive attitude becomes and more of a default just like the negative attitude once was for you.

It is important to note that these techniques will become more powerful and easier to use after a while because you form a new belief that your emotional states and thought patterns are things you can shift around pretty quickly. This belief makes things a lot easier since your mind is not resisting so much anymore. You just think Oh, I feel negative and that kinda stupid. Let’s change that to a more positive state of mind. And your mind goes: Well, I guess that is what we can do nowadays so OK!.

Realize that positivity isn’t something uncool, corny or stupid.

This is the first step and it can be quite a hurdle even though it may seem obvious. If you have been negative or a realist for many, many years then positivity can seem well, kinda stupid and naive. Your mind and emotional habits are so ingrained that positivity seems a bit too foreign to accept.

However, to get this to work you will have to take a leap of faith. Because you can theorize about how stupid or practically useless a positive attitude may be for as long as you want. You won’t understand it until you just start using it. And to get it to work you can’t have half your mind protesting all the time and thinking that this won’t work.

Sure, you will have doubts about it and they will decrease when you start seeing some positive results in your life. But if you’re doubts are overwhelming then it will be like rowing forward with one hand and rowing backward with the other hand.

Decide that you will make this conscious change in your attitude. Or at least that you will ignore your doubts and just give it a try during the whole month of February.

Take care of the fundamentals.

This is for me the most important thing you can do to maintain and strengthen your positive attitude. How you eat, sleep and workout is huge factor. A good lifestyle, how you live your life on normal days determine how you feel and think.

For example, exercising and keeping my testosterone levels pretty high consistently – I do that by focusing on free weight exercises that target many and big muscle groups – is a very simple way to get a lot of positive emotions to flow through my body automatically. A good workout always seems to do the trick.

Positive influences.

Fill your mind and emotional system with positive input from people, music and programs/books. Other people’s thoughts have a big influence and emotions are contagious.

Limit your time with negative people. Reduce TV or magazines that may make you feel worse about what you don’t own or your body. Or just create fear and negativity within you (for instance a lot of news shows). Limiting negative influences can make it a lot easier to keep the positive attitude up.

Set the context for your day.

What you do early in the day often sets the context for your day. We have a tendency to want to be consistent with what we have done before. You can use that your advantage in few ways. You can for example do the hardest thing on your to-do list first. When it’s done you’ll feel good about yourself and it makes the day feel easier and you’ll have less inner resistance to getting the rest of the tasks of the day done.

Another example is to start your day of great socially by acting social (even if you don’t feel like it). This tends to make a normal day a lot more fun and positive than if you if you start out by being closed off and feeling guarded.

Act as you want to feel.

Act as if you are feeling positive. After a few minutes you will actually feel it for real. So smile. Use positive language. And so on. It feels weird at first but it really works.

Cut the negative threads of thought quickly.

Do it before you get stuck in them. If I go down a negative spiral of thoughts I quickly – within a minute or two – think Hmm, negativity is stupid and won’t help me. And then I choose to focus on the more positive aspects of whatever I’m thinking about or I start thinking about something else.

Reframe using questions.

I use questions like What’s awesome about this situation?Is this useful? to get myself out of negative perspectives and shift my focus to more positive and useful aspects of anything.

Be present.

I write a lot about being present. One big reason for that is when you are present you are naturally feeling pretty awesome. You become positive, calm and fears you may have are greatly reduced. One way to reconnect with the present is simply to take 30 belly breaths and focus on your in and out-breaths.

Another is to just look at what’s right in front of you right now. Listen to the sounds around you. Feel the fabric of your clothes and focus on how they feel.

Acceptance.

Sometimes you encounter negative thoughts or moods that you just can’t seem to be able to shake. When this happens – for instance in situations where you have little control, like when you are sick or waiting for your exam results – I use acceptance. By accepting how I feel I stop feeding more energy into the negativity. And so it often disappears or is at least reduced.

Take action.

Inactiveness, indecision and procrastination tend to create negativity. A good way to get around this common problem is to set that positive and active context for your day.

Do the right thing.

Indecision and doing what you know deep down is not right will create negative feelings and thoughts within. Do what you think is right and you will create a lot more positive feelings within.

A habit of gratitude.

Being grateful for all the things you have – health, roof, family, friends, opportunities, food etc. – is a great little tool to shift a negative mood to a positive one. It only takes a minute or two.

When you spend some time regularly to focus on all the good things in your life it also becomes natural to expect more good things to flow into your life. And what you expect from the world is often what you get.

Meditation.

I use guided mediations like Paraliminals, but any form of meditation seems to have positive effects on how you feel and think. A favourite of mine to gain a boost of positivity and eliminate negative thoughts and self-talk is the Self-Esteem Supercharger. I use various Paraliminals about four or five times a week right now.

What are your best tips for building and maintaining a positive attitude?