“May you live all the days of your life.”

Jonathan Swift was a writer that lived a couple of centuries ago (1667-1745).

He is perhaps most known for classics like “Gulliver’s Travels” and “A Modest Propsal”. The latter being the ironic and shocking essay where he suggested that impoverished Irish people should sell their babies as food to rich people. Such works has earned Swift a reputation as one of the finest satirists of all time.

Since Swift was a writer there is a ton of things to quote. Here are seven of my favourite words of wisdom.

1. Don’t fear to be wrong.

“A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying… that he is wiser today than yesterday.”

So much of what we learn in society is about how you should not fail and not make mistakes. In school we are taught to get good grades and play by the rules. And so always taking a safe route and not taking risks can become an ingrained behaviour as we learn to associate failure with shame and pain.

But one should really not be afraid of making mistakes. Or admitting that he or she has been wrong. By recognizing that you can release the negative emotions that may dwell within and move on to the next thing. Admitting that you have been wrong also makes it easier to clearly analyze what you did and what you can learn from the experience.

2. Money is useful. Love of it is hazardous.

“A wise man should have money in his head, but not in his heart.”

Money is very useful. But if you let it take the wrong place in your life it can wreck havoc.

It can create greed and much negativity in your life. And if you love the money, you’ll probably just want more and more. No matter how much you get. And it may not fill you up and finally make you happy as you may have hoped.

The drive to always want more can become like filling a bucket with a hole in it. And as you slowly realize that this won’t work as you had hoped bitterness and negativity can start to feste.

Now, it’s important to not let this reasoning lead you to believe that money is evil. Money is a tool. It can help you to achieve many positive things.

3. Dig where you stand.

“Although men are accused of not knowing their own weakness, yet perhaps few know their own strength. It is in men as in soils, where sometimes there is a vein of gold which the owner knows not of.”

It’s very easy to fall into an addictive pattern of criticizing yourself and others. But what are the positive things in you and the people around you?

If you just look for things to criticize then that is what you will see. If you look for things to criticize in yourself that is what you will see in yourself and pay attention to in others.

So what can you do? You can start digging where you are standing. Instead of asking yourself those negative questions continually, ask yourself: what is good about me? Ask yourself where your strengths and talents lie. And don’t give up at once just because a negative mindset may initially not let you see what’s good and positive about you.

What you focus on most of the time is what you will see of reality. Knowing your weaknesses and learning from mistakes is helpful. But to dwell on criticism and the negative parts will just keep you in a loop where you create more of that for yourself.

At some point it’s useful to move on from that and start to shift your focus to the positive. And see what gold that will help you uncover.

4. Go further than you may think you can.

“I’ve always believed no matter how many shots I miss, I’m going to make the next one.”

One big problem with success is that you may want it right now. Or at least very soon. No wonder, advertising continually bombards us with messages of how we can become thin or rich in just 30 days. And people often want to believe in that.

Now, I’m not saying that a lot of the stuff out there doesn’t work. They probably do work. I’m just saying that it may take more time, patience and work than advertised to get you where you want to go.

It’s useful to take a break from advertised perspectives and let more realistic perspectives seep into your mind. Learn from people who have gone where you want to go. Talk to them. Read what they have to say in books or online. This will not give complete plan but a clearer perspective of what is needed to achieve what you want.

And then you plug away. You don’t let setbacks or failure discourage you. You go out and try again. And just when you feel like giving up you go on a little further. And a little further.
Because it’s often darkest before the dawn.

5. Put down the extra, unnecessary baggage you are carrying.

“The latter part of a wise person’s life is occupied with curing the follies, prejudices and false opinions they contracted earlier.”

We pick a whole lot when we are young. Some of it is helpful. A lot of it will hold you back and create a lot of unnecessary suffering in your life.

You may have learned things from society – or sometimes gotten stuff drilled into your head – when you were young. You may have taken what someone said or did to you once or repeatedly as an absolute truth about you and your life.

But as a grown up, as you start to examine your life and beliefs you may discover that those things was just things that happened. They are in the past. You are here now.

And by grasping that it’s you who are always in control of your life – that you are creating it right now – you understand that unhelpful beliefs or what happened doesn’t have to mean that much really.

You can choose to drop them and continue with a lightness in your step down a road that you are creating for yourself now. One tip that can help you with that is to first accept that you are carrying the negative thing and how it is affecting you. And then to let it go. Acceptance of what already is does – even though it may sound counterintuitive – make it easier to let something go.

6. Be good to yourself in simple ways.

“The best doctors in the world are Doctor Diet, Doctor Quiet, and Doctor Merryman.”

It’s nowadays common to run yourself into the ground and then, as you feel like a shadow of your former self, to seek help.

But a big part of keeping your health – mentally and physically – in good shape is to prevent problems before they even show up and force you to go to the doctor.

Swift brings some common sense into this challenge. By doing simple things consistently, by making them ingrained habits one can avoid many problems down the line.

• Doctor Diet. Eat not too little or too much. Eat slowly to really enjoy the taste and avoid overeating, an upset stomach and added stress.
• Doctor Quiet. Always being around noise, other people and stimulation via a lot of information can drain you. It’s important to find some quiet time for yourself regularly to avoid being overloaded. Being out in nature is for instance one good way to reconnect with the quiet and stillness.
• Doctor Merryman. How happy and positive one wants to feel is often to a large degree a choice. You can cultivate a negative attitude towards everything. Or a positive one. 

Now, this may sound like almost stupidly simple advice. And the information is very simple. Many very helpful things are very simple.

More advanced tips can sound intriguing because one may associate complicated with better. But everything has to have foundations. Without those everything you build on top of them will only work at a limited capacity or sometimes just crumble.

7. Be open to the idea that you can always learn.

“No man was ever so completely skilled in the conduct of life, as not to receive new information from age and experience.”

Being open to this will open up your mind. If you think you know everything, great insights and wonderful new paths to explore will just pass you by.

By being open you’ll see, feel and learn things you wouldn’t otherwise. But be careful of focusing too much on learning from books, blogs etc. They have a place and can help you correct things may have done backwards for all of your life.

But the most important thing is to live. And to learn from your experiences. Because it is there you find true understanding of things.

“A well-spent day brings happy sleep.”

If you want tips on how to become more productive, one awesome source would be Leonardo da Vinci.

He painted a whole lot of classic paintings such as the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. His journals contain ideas for inventions like hydraulic pumps, steam cannons, helicopters and hang gliders. He was also, among other things, an anatomist, sculptor, botanist and musician.

Da Vinci got stuff done. A lot of stuff.

How did he do it? Well, here is a guide with his tips for getting things done.

1. Do.

“I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.”

“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.”

If you want to get things done you have to do things. If you want big results you often have to take massive action. There is no way to get around taking action if you want real life results.

But it’s easy to get stuck in a mindset where you in a way substitute thinking for action. You think and think and take action just once in a while.

One thing that gets you stuck in this mindset is that you may see other people doing the same thing. And so your habit of taking action once in a while gets reinforced since it feels like the “normal” thing to do. The fear of failure and what people might say if you try, fail or succeed are powerful factors too.

But to get what you want you need to break out of that. You need to take a lot of action. And if you are an overthinker or procrastinator like I was then there is probably room for a lot more action every week.

I think the first step to taking more action is just to be aware of how much action you are actually taking. To be aware how much time you are spending thinking or planning. And catch yourself when you get stuck in unproductive thought patterns. And then adjust to take more action.

How can you snap yourself into action? Two tips that works well for me are:

• Pump up your enthusiasm. One way of doing that is to see what’s positive in any situation. Then build on that to get your enthusiasm going. Perhaps it’s just a thing or two. But that glimmer of positivity can be a starting point to change your perspective to a more positive one where you can find enthusiasm. And whatever the situation you are in will often be easier and more pleasurable to handle. Another way to pump up your enthusiasm is to get an enthusiastic vibe from other people. Listen to CDs with enthusiastic people – Brian Tracy and Wayne Dyer are two helpful guys – for perhaps 20 minutes. When you are done listening you’ll probably feel a lot more enthusiastic. Or hang out with enthusiastic people and get them to talk about what they are enthusiastic about. Enthusiasm is contagious, so use that fact to help yourself.
• Just do it anyway. If you don’t feel like you could pump up your enthusiasm, just go and do what you want to do anyway. You may not want to go to the gym. But you do it anyway. And after you’ve been there for a while you are glad you went there, because now you are getting your workout done. And you are feeling proactive, enthusiastic and good about yourself.

2. Do. Experience. Understand.

“Experience does not ever err. It is only your judgment that errs in promising itself results which are not caused by your experiments.”

“Although nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason.”

If you take little action it’s easy to overestimate the value of the results. A failure or a mistake might feel like the end of the world. You may perhaps you beat yourself up about it for the rest of the week.

That won’t help much though. As you learn to take more action, the results contain less emotional power. You don’t get overwhelmed or lost in a sad funk. You also realize that the world doesn’t revolve around you. People will probably not care as much as you think if you try, fail or succeed with something. They have their own lives to worry about.

So instead learn to take the lessons from a mistake or failure. Do not take the failure so seriously but instead see it – just like everything else – as a valuable experience.

So dive into life. Get experiences, because it is only here you will get some real understanding.

3. Be consistent.

“Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.”

It’s easy to get riled up and get going with something new on an enthusiastic high. But that initial enthusiasm tends to dissipate. That’s when you hit a plateau. That’s when you need to keep moving. Doing everything in small spurts and then turning to the next thing when something loses it “newness” makes it hard to get what you want.

You have to be persistent. And consistent. Then you can get pretty much anything done. One of the big reasons why people don’t get what they want is simply that they won’t keep going. Or that they go, stop, go, stop. Persistence and consistency isn’t exactly the sexiest things in personal growth. But they are ridiculously helpful.

Because the results you want may not come to you tomorrow or next week. Improving your life is often hinges on the ability to not go running around for new magic pills all the time or choosing the instant gratification option every time.

So, how do you become more consistent?

• Be aware. Just by being aware of what you are doing – and not doing – you can stop and change how you think and act in your everyday life. This will take time, but little by little you can avoid your own pitfalls – such as for instance the instant gratification route – more and more.
• Set the context for your day. What you do early in the day often sets the context for your day. And your days are your life. We have a tendency to want to be consistent with what we have done before. One thing that can give you a good start is to do the hardest and/or most important thing first. If you start your day like this then you don’t have to worry about that special task for the rest of the day. Taking this route makes the day feel easier and you’ll have less inner resistance to getting the rest of the tasks of the day done. Another way to use this tip is to work out early in the day. It will make you feel energized and more alert for the rest of the day.

4. Move over, through or around obstacles.

“Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.”

Obstacles are tricky. They can easily discourage you. But they are seldom as scary as they look. If you actually start to smash them or move around them you may find that it is easier than you may have thought. The biggest obstacles are often the ones you put up in your mind. Not just in the way that you perceive external obstacles and make them bigger than they are. But also in how you create obstacles that aren’t even out there. They exist solely in your mind.

So be careful and reconsider your assumptions and perception. Realize that you may be making things a lot harder than they actually need to be. Realize that you to some part decide how hard or easy something is.

By diving into reality and taking action you get real life experience of how things are. Then you may see how the obstacles were just in your mind. Or how you can move over, under or through the obstacle by learning and adjusting. Or just by being persistent.

Look at an obstacle as a way for the world to test you and teach you. Instead of a solid brick wall.

5. Know what’s important (for you).

“Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it.”

There is always enough time. You have the same amount of hours in the day that da Vinci had. But the thing is to know what is important to you. And to take action based on that.

Knowing what you want and following that path is vital for the rest of the tips above. To be able to take all that action, to do it consistently and to crush internal or external obstacles you need to know what you want. That will give you the motivation to keep going. And I’m talking about what you really want. What is most important to you (not what your parents, teachers or society may tell is important).

How do you find out what you really want? I think you need to really think about it. But more importantly, I think you need to just experiment and try things. From all that doing and all those experiences you learn things. Not just about the world but also about yourself.

Experience makes it clearer in your mind if what you thought you wanted is really what you want. Over time your map of yourself and your life becomes more accurate. And by doing things you not only find what is most important to you. You also find the things you really enjoy doing and that makes it so much easier to keep going.

6. Focus.

“As every divided kingdom falls, so every mind divided between many studies confounds and saps itself.”

You need to know what’s important for you. You also need to focus on it. And focus on it consistently.

And this is not just about keeping your focus on what you are doing and what you want each and every day. It’s also about the focus of your attitude. To for instance keep your focus on the positive, on your curiousness and your enthusiasm. On what gets you where you want to go.

Instead of negative doubts, beating yourself up or other things you may focus on from time to time for some reason. That stuff will seldom help you. Of course, if there is a real problem then that needs to be handled. But oftentimes it’s easy to get stuck in negativity because of old habits, what other people may say or just to strengthen a victim identity and get a strange sense of satisfaction and familiarity out of the negativity.

So finally, here are three practical tips that I have found to be very helpful to improve my focus.

• Exercise. This is so key. Regular exercise makes me more focused, positive and energized. The best way to make exercise a consistent part of your life each week is to try different things and find what you like doing and what fits you and your situation.
• Singletask. Do just one thing at a time to get things done quicker and with less stress. For me at least it works a lot better than multitasking.
• Work in a cone of silence. Try to minimize possible distractions. You could do that by for instance unplugging your internet cable, shutting off your phone and closing your door.

If you found this article helpful, please share it with someone on Facebook, Twitter and Stumbleupon. Thank you very much! =)

“Envy consists in seeing things never in themselves, but only in their relations. If you desire glory, you may envy Napoleon, but Napoleon envied Caesar, Caesar envied Alexander, and Alexander, I daresay, envied Hercules, who never existed.”
Bertrand Russell

“Envy is the art of counting the other fellow’s blessings instead of your own.”
Harold Coffin

Envy can be like a tiny devil on your shoulder that whisper words into your ear, gnashes on your soul and makes life into something that is often filled with suffering and much negativity.

Or the envy can just be something that irritates and distracts you from time to time.

In any case, it doesn’t have to be that way. If you want to, then you can at least minimize it in your life.

So that you can spend your time here in a lighter and happier headspace.

Focus on yourself when it comes to comparing.

Comparing what you have to what others have is a good way to make yourself miserable.

It feeds your ego when you buy a nicer car or get a better job than someone else. You feel great for a while.

But this mindset and the focus on comparing always winds up in you noticing someone that has more than you. That someone has an even better job or car than you.

And so you don’t feel so good anymore.

The thing is that there is always someone with better or more than you. So you can never “win”. You just feel good for a while and then you don’t.

A more useful way to compare is to just compare yourself to yourself.

Look at how you have grown and what you have achieved. Appreciate what you have done and what you have.

See how far you have come and what you are planning to do.

This will make you make you more positive and emotionally stable since you are no longer comparing and feeling envious of what the other guy have that you haven’t.

Be grateful for what you got.

Besides comparing yourself to yourself it can be helpful to add a regular gratitude exercise to your life to minimize the envy.

So take just two minutes out of your day to focus on being grateful for all the things you got. Make a list of them in your head or write them down in journal at the beginning or end of the day.

Develop an abundance mentality.

Envy often seems to come from a perceived scarcity in some area of your life.

Maybe you feel envious because someone else got the job you wanted. Or because someone else got the opportunity that you had hoped for.

Perhaps you are feeling envious because you are afraid of losing something and feel that if you do then you have hit rock bottom.

Focusing your mind on the scarcity can really screw with your thoughts, feelings and life. It can cause much stronger negative emotions than is really reasonable.

And it gets you really stuck in the envy, intensifying it, making it stronger and more long-lasting by feeding it with more thoughts and emotional energy.

To get out of this confining and destructive mentality you can choose to focus on the opportunities and the new chances. You can develop an abundance mentality.

There are always new business opportunities to find, new tests in school to take and new people to date/make friends with.

This way of thinking relieves much of the pressure you may feel if you have a scarcity mentality that makes you think that you only got this shot right now.

Or makes you feel like an utter failure just because you just stumbled and things didn’t work out this time.

So keep your focus steadily on the opportunities, on the new chances, on what you can learn from your failures as best you can instead of confining your mind and your life.

It is sometimes hard to do so from day to day but it is even harder in the long run to live a life where you don’t keep that positive focus.

Think about what’s in it for you.

I have found this to be helpful in many cases when I have negative thoughts or when I’m behaving in a less than useful way.

Basically, I ask myself: What’s in it for me? And each time I fall back into that negative headspace and behaviour I remind myself of this question and the answer.

This reinforces to me the pointlessness of what I’m thinking. And often I just think to myself: “Oh, I’m being stupid again. Time to focus on something useful/fun/positive instead”.

Now, there are upsides of being envious that can make it hard to let go of it.

When you are being envious you may not take chances or go into the unknown. You just judge people that have taken the chances from the safety of the sidelines.

Feeling envious can also make you feel like a victim. Such a mentality may sound very unattractive for anyone to want.

But in reality it brings you attention and validation because you can always get good feelings from other people as they are concerned about you and try to help you out.

And you don’t have to take the sometimes heavy responsibility. Taking responsibility for your own life can be hard work, you have to make difficult decisions and it is just heavy sometimes.

When you are ready to let go of that safety and those somewhat strange upsides it will be easier to change how you act and how you think about things.

Get a life.

Simple and perhaps the best tip in my opinion.

If you find yourself sitting around too much and not having enough to do then it’s very easy to feel stuck and to get stuck in thought loops and go into a downward spiral.

Simply by filling your life with more fun activities and people and the things you want out of life you won’t have time or a reason to be envious. Other benefits of getting a life are that you become a lot more relaxed and less prone to overreacting about the little things.

So spend less time analyzing life and more time living and exploring it in whatever way you’d like.

Image by Florencia Cárcamo (license).

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“The books that help you the most are those which make you think the most.”
Theodore Parker

“Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them all.”
Henry David Thoreau

During the summer I often spend much time in a chair in the sun and just relax and read.

So I thought it may be a good idea to share some of the best books on personal development that I have read so far. In case you also want to spend some time in the sun over summer and don’t know what to read next.

Here is a top ten of my favorite books – in no particular order – out of the 100+ books in this niche that I have read.

1. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.

For 20 years Napoleon Hill traveled around the US and interviewed 500 of the most successful people. This book, released in 1937, was the result and has since then sold over 15 million copies worldwide. A good place to start if you are interested in personal development as it covers a lot of time-tested advice.

I wasn’t as enthusiastic as many others about this book when I first read it. But over the last few years I have become a bigger and bigger fan of it since I have discovered for myself that much of what it says works very well. And Hill sure does a fine job of explaining the ideas in a simple and inspirational way.

2. Pulling Your Own Strings by Wayne Dyer.

Dyer is one of my absolute favorite personal development people and Pulling Your Own Strings is probably my favorite out of all his books (so far at least).

This book deals with who is pulling your strings and how to improve relationships by increasing your own personal power and for instance becoming more assertive. Simple and easy to follow ideas for better relationships and better self esteem.

3. The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem by Nathaniel Branden.

The book that helped me to really understand what self esteem was and how it works. I like how Branden breaks down self esteem into six pillars, that makes it easy to understand how you can increase your own self esteem and to see what pillar that may be weak in your life. An awesome book.

4. A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle.

It’s hard to choose one book from Eckhart Tolle to recommend since many of them are really good (Stillness Speaks is another one I like very much and Even the Sun Will Die is a long and fascinating interview).

But A New Earth is probably the best one for clearly explaining his ideas (I found it easier to understand and apply than The Power of Now). Ideas that have helped me to simplify my life, improve my social skills, find a lot more inner peace, to live right here right now. And so on.

5. How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

One of the best and most popular books ever (15 million copies sold) on improving your social skills. A must read.

6. The Psychology of Achievement (audio) by Brian Tracy.

Like most of Brian Tracy’s products it’s packed with small nuggets of practical gold and very little fluff. The book covers a lot on how to develop a top achiever’s mindset and improve your life in any area really. A fine place to start if you have just discovered an interest in personal growth.

7. Psycho-Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz.

Maxwell Maltz was a plastic surgeon that became interested in the self image and how it can be changed. He wrote this book about his findings. Contains tons of practical exercises and advice for improving your self esteem, self talk, minimize self sabotage and achieving the success and positive changes you want in your life and in yourself.

Perhaps the book on this list that has lead to most lives being actually changed in real life since it’s so grounded in changing your habits and thought patterns in a way that,I at least believe will work for a lot of people.

It also helps that it has sold over 30 million copies since it was first published in 1960.

8. The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss.

I guess most of you have already read this much talked about book with the tagline “Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich” that was released a few years ago.

I remember that I found it very inspiring when I first got my hands on a copy and it has certainly been a great motivator and source of practical tips as I have grown this blog and my own company over the last few years.

9. As a Man Thinketh by James Allen.

Once upon a time the there was personal secretary in England named James Allen.

During his lifetime he never achieved great fame or wealth. At the age of 38 he retired. He and his wife moves to a small cottage in Illfracome of Devon in England.

During the next decade he produced nearly 20 books. In 1912, at the age of 48, he passed away.

But the same year he retired he also published one of the most inspiring books – well, I guess it is an essay – on personal development I have ever read. Together with Napoleon Hill’s “Think and Grow Rich”, James Allen’s “As a man thinketh” is probably the most well-known of what might be considered old school books on improving yourself and your life.

The book is in the public domain, so you can read it for free at Project Gutenberg for example.

10. The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz.

Another super best-seller. Another book on how your thinking and ideas control your life and success. Another must read and together with Psycho-Cybernetics perhaps the book I most often revisit when I am in need of some motivation or just need to get my positive and constructive thinking going again.

What is your favorite personal development book that you would like to recommend to the other readers?

Image by Darwin Bell (licence).

Image: kalandrakas (license).

“Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.”
Anais Nin

Today I’d like to share a few of my favorite timeless tips for improving your social life.

Here are six of them.

1. Be wary of building walls.

“People are lonely because they build walls instead of bridges.”
Joseph F. Newton Men

The ego wants to divide your world. It wants to create barriers, separation and loves to play the comparison game. The game where people are different compared to you, the game where you are better than someone and worse than someone else. All of that creates fear. And so we build walls. But putting up walls tends to in the end hurt you more than protect you.

So how can you start building bridges instead? One way is to choose to be curious about people. Curiosity is filled with anticipation and enthusiasm. It opens you up. And when you are open and enthusiastic then you have more fun things to think about than focusing on your fear.

Another way is to start to see yourself in other people. To get that there is no real separation between you and other people.
That may sound vague. So one practical suggestion and thought you may want to try for a day is that everyone you meet is your friend.

Another thing you can try is to see what parts of yourself you can see in someone you meet. Try it out and see what you find.

2. Your relationships are in your mind.

“As you think so shall you be! Since you cannot physically experience another person, you can only experience them in your mind. Conclusion: All of the other people in your life are simply thoughts in your mind. Not physical beings to you, but thoughts. Your relationships are all in how you think about the other people of your life. Your experience of all those people is only in your mind. Your feelings about your lovers come from your thoughts. For example, they may in fact behave in ways that you find offensive. However, your relationship to them when they behave offensively is not determined by their behavior, it is determined only by how you choose to relate to that behavior. Their actions are theirs, you cannot own them, you cannot be them, you can only process them in your mind.”
Wayne Dyer

“It is not he who reviles or strikes you who insults you, but your opinion that these things are insulting.”
Epictetus

How you choose to interpret people and your relationships makes a huge difference. So much of our relationships may be perceived to happen out there somewhere.

But as mentioned in tip #1 in this article, your underlying frame of mind – do you build bridges or walls? – will determine much about your interactions both new people and people you know.

So you really have to go inside. You have to realize that your interpretations from the past are interpretations. Not reality. You have to take a look at your assumptions and expectations and thought habits. Find patterns that may be hurting you (and others). This isn’t easy. Or always pleasant. You may discover that you have had some negative underlying habits of thought for many years.

But to change you have to do it. Instead of just keep looking at yourself as some sort of unmoving and objective observer of the world and reality. A change in you could – over time – change your whole world.

3. Avoid being boring.

“The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.”
Voltaire

Don’t prattle on about your new car for 10 minutes oblivious to your surroundings. Always be prepared to drop a subject when you start to bore people. Or when everyone is getting bored and the topic is starting to run out of steam.

One good way to have something interesting to say is simply to lead an interesting life. And to focus on the positive stuff. Don’t start to whine about your boss or your job, people don’t want to hear that. Instead, talk about your last trip somewhere, some funny anecdote that happened while you were buying clothes, your plans for the summer or something fun or exciting.

4. Focus outward, not inward.

“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”
Dale Carnegie

A lot of people use the second, far less effective way. It is appealing because it’s about instant gratification and about ME, ME, ME! The first way – to become interested in people – perhaps works better because it makes you a pleasant exception and because the law of reciprocity is strong in people. As you treat people, they will treat you. Be interested in them and they will be interested in you.

5. Don’t get stuck in the questions.

“I wish I had an answer to that because I’m tired of answering that question.”
Yogi Berra

If you ask too many questions the conversation can feel like a bit of an interrogation. Or like you don’t have that much too contribute. One alternative is to mix questions with statements. Just say what band you are really into instead of asking what band they are into. Or say what you think about local sports team’s chances of winning the next game. Or, while using common sense, just what you are thinking about what is happening around you right now.

And then the conversation can flow on from there.

So open up and say what you think, share how you feel. And if someone shares an experience, open up too and share one of your experiences. Don’t just stand there nodding and answer with short sentences. If someone is investing in the conversation they’d like you to invest too.

And like in so many areas in life, you can’t always wait for the other party to make the first move. When needed, be proactive and be the first one to open up and invest in the conversation.

6. Genuineness is awesome.

“Never idealize others. They will never live up to your expectations. Don’t over-analyse your relationships. Stop playing games. A growing relationship can only be nurtured by genuineness.”
Leo F. Buscaglia

I think that one of the most important things in a relationship of any kind is to be genuine. Few things are as powerful as genuine communication and letting the genuine you shine through. Without incongruence, mixed messages or perhaps a sort of phoniness.

It’s you to 100%.

It’s you with not only your words but you with your voice tonality and body language – which some say is over 90% of communication – on the same wavelength as your words. It’s you coming through on all channels of communication.

Being your geunine self – the one where you build bridges and are open and giving – will give you better results and more satisfaction in your day to day life because you are in alignment with yourself. And because people really like genuineness.

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PS. Just thought I’d give you a quick update and tell you that my new ebook will be out and for sale on the blog next week. It is called the Power of Positivity and contains 22 chapters on how to improve your life in areas such as productivity, social skills, attitude, motivation, self-esteem and thought habits.

I am very excited about it and about getting it out there. So be on the lookout for that.