Have you ever had a goal that, despite your best efforts, has not come into realization? This can be the most frustrating thing, and it seems like the more times you fail, the harder it gets to succeed. Many people struggle in this way with dieting. They say, “today will be the day that I’m finally going to get my diet on the right track”, and then someone brings in a birthday cake to work and the diet goes out the window. “Well, I’ll start tomorrow”; Ever heard that one before? I’ve used that excuse many times for many things. I struggle with this often in trying to get myself up early in the morning. I can see such benefit in getting up a couple hours before I have to leave for work. I could work out, take my dog for an extra walk, work on my blog posts… the possibilities are endless. Still, no matter how often I set my alarm early, my brain wakes me up at a certain time (I sleep through all alarms) and I find I have just enough time to get ready and head out the door. Maybe its weight loss, or finding the right person. It doesn’t matter. Once you’ve lost faith in yourself and no longer believe that you can do it, accomplishing that goal becomes more difficult.

SO, how do you get out of that rut? In my mind I always believe it takes a mental shift. At this point, it is entirely your perspective that is setting up the situation for failure. For progress to be achieved, you must change your thinking- not just about the goal, but about yourself. Here are some ways to get yourself back on track.

• Take some time to re-evaluate the goal. What is it you want to achieve? What are the benefits of achieving this goal? What will it take to accomplish? Journal this stuff so that you can return to it if you find yourself off-track again later.
• Meditate, go for a walk or a hike, or go to your sacred space, and discuss with yourself if this goal is truly important to you. Often times our goals are not our own. Maybe you’re trying to lose weight for a significant other. I contend that if the end result of the goal is to please someone other than yourself, it’s not worth it. You’ll have a much harder time succeeding if you aren’t 100% behind it.
• If the goal is in fact something for you, and you are still certain that you want to achieve it, begin setting yourself a time line. It’s important to outline where you’re trying to get to so that you know when you’ve succeeding in completing the goal. For me, the end point would be successfully waking two hours early for 30 days straight and no longer sleeping through my alarm. Sometimes though, the end point might be too far off, making it harder to stay focused and motivated. This is where a time line can come in handy. Create some milestones for success. For instance, my first milestone would be to successfully get up one hour early for the first two weeks. This technique is really helpful for losing weight. Maybe you want to lose 40 pounds in the next 6 months. Setting up “mini-goals” to achieve each of the 10 pounds can really help keep you motivated because you find success along the way.
• Finally, do whatever you need to do to remember your worth and your abilities. Remind yourself that you are capable of doing whatever you choose, and that you can in fact succeed in this. Again, meditation and walks are good for this. I for one find a lot of motivation in going for long walk with my dog. I bring some music that inspires me to want to change, and I just walk.
• If you find yourself having an “off day”, don’t let that dampen your spirit! Everyone has good and bad days. Achievement takes perseverance and patience. Don’t give up on yourself; instead, pick yourself back up and start again (don’t wait until tomorrow either)!

Believing in yourself and your ability is the first step to accomplishing any goal. When you have faith in yourself, you can achieve anything you can dream up.

** Photo by Alice Russell

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For Friday, I thought I would post on the lighter side. A little “food for thought” to work on over the weekend! I wanted to share with you some of my favorite quotes about life. Quotes can be the most profound way to see something from a new perspective, and that I think, is part of what personal development is all about.

The people who are attributed to these quotes are people whom I consider to be my examples of how I want to live my life, and so their quotes have more meaning to me than just the words they speak. Enjoy!

True religion is real living; living with all one’s soul, with all one’s goodness and righteousness. ~Albert Einstein

If we could see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our whole life would change. ~Buddha

Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive. ~Elbert Hubbard

Follow the three R’s: Respect for self, respect for others and responsibility for all your actions. ~Dali Lama

I have learned, that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. ~Henry David Thoreau

As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world - that is the myth of the atomic age - as in being able to remake ourselves. ~Mahatma Gandhi

The most visible creators I know of are those artists whose medium is life itself. The ones who express the inexpressible without brush, hammer, clay, or guitar. They neither paint nor sculpt. Their medium is their being. Whatever their presence touches has increased life. They see and don’t have to draw. They are the artists of being alive. ~J. Stone

I think sometimes the most meaningful thing we can do in our lives is just to be aware of the moment; Aware of ourselves and of others. I love these quotes because they reflect how I feel about life and what I strive to achieve everyday in my constant “work in progress”.

Happy Friday!

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NFL, that is. As an American, I was naturally underexposed to the real Fútbol (not that I’m knocking the NFL… it’s just there’s very little foot action going on, ya know)? But, I digress. As I watched my Broncos get pummeled on Sunday, I got to thinking about some aspects to the game that emulate real life problems and solutions. Here are 6 ways that we can learn life lessons from watching an NFL game.

1. Winner’s Never Quit, and Quitters Never Win. This is the most obvious lesson I think. If any of you happened to watch the sad, sad game in Denver you know exactly what I mean. It holds true in every game, and in every life situation. If you give up, or believe that you cannot improve your situation, you will inevitably create failure. Any successful team or individual will tell you that they succeeded because they never gave up and they always believed they could do it.

2. Pay Attention to your Quarterback. Your individual QB is your intuition. What happens when you fail to listen? It’s a false start, and you lose yardage. Just like in the game, if you fail to pay attention to your inner voice, eventually you’ll lose ground. It can be difficult sometimes to hear with all the crowd noise, but trust me. If you learn to tune out the external and listen to the internal, everything will click just as it should.

3. Read the Plays ahead of Time. I myself, feel for the middle linebacker. It’s a tough job… one of the toughest, really. He’s got to do a lot of reading and problem solving and he typically has only a few seconds to do it. If he gets it wrong, the defense could give up big yards… BUT, if he gets it right he has prevented a situation from getting out of control. In life, we must read the situation the same way. What are the possibilities? What is the likely outcome? If I make this choice, what are the benefits vs. the consequences, and are they acceptable? Lucky for us, life usually gives us a little more time than the play clock.

4. Penalty’s Suck. You might as well shoot yourself in the foot. In a game, it can mean having a glorious 60-yard pass for a touchdown taken away on a 3rd and 20 because some guy in the line decided to hold. Ughh. In real life, the consequences can be just as severe. Cheating, lying and stealing your way through life may bring you short gains, but in the long run you’ll pay for it. Let’s face it. In all honesty, you might successfully progress through life (or a game) doing this consistently, but it only takes the one time to ruin all the progress you might have made. While sometimes it pays to be a dirty player in the NFL, it almost never plays to live life that way.

5. Change-up Your Playbook. Nothing works forever. Sometimes, you have to make changes to see progress. Change is good! If a defense played zone coverage through an entire game they would get their asses kicked! You gotta change things up and keep the opponent on their toes. Life is the same way. If you do the same thing day in and day out, you’ll find yourself stagnant. Change something… change your routine, change your exercise schedule, pick up a new hobby. Whatever it takes to mix things up. Trust me, it’s good.

6. Sometimes, ya gotta go for it on 4th down. This isn’t always the best idea, because there’s inherent risk. But, when life gets to the point where you feel as though you have nothing to lose… do it. Take the leap, believe in yourself and go for it. And sometimes you should do it even if you don’t feel you’re in dire straits. Why? Because it can often be win-win. If you succeed, you’ll have gained confidence and self-esteem (not to mention the actual success of what you’ve accomplished). If you fail, you learn! That’s no consolation prize either. The only way to grow is to learn from mistakes. If I thought my Broncos had learned from their mistakes yesterday, I might be ok with what I watched them do… but I’ll have to wait two weeks to find out.

See what I mean? I’m entirely sure that all sports probably have some juicy life lessons in them, but football’s the only one I’m even remotely qualified to talk about. Life isn’t a game, and I am in no way trivializing the journey; at the same time, it’s interesting to me to look at life in this way. To break it down into smaller components and compare it to something less “monumental” makes life seem simpler… less complicated.

*** Photo from Doug Pensinger/Getty Images (my own personal statement here: Al Wilson is the BEST middle linebacker ever and Denver misses him)

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Sometimes when looking for our purpose, it’s best to look back rather than forward. Think about what you wanted to do when you were a kid. What was it that you dreamed of being able to do when you became an adult? For myself, I first wanted to be the lady at the circus who rode the white horse standing up (circa 5 or 6 years old), then it was a Navy fighter pilot (circa 9-18 years). The latter dream I followed intensely most of my childhood. In the end I elected not to go the Naval Academy and I think it was good choice. When I think about why I wanted to be a fighter pilot, it was the plane and nothing else. I wanted to fly a fast, maneuverable plane that could do amazing things in the sky. I didn’t, per se, want to shoot people down (I’m a lover not a fighter). Now, as an adult, the two most prominent features of my life (outside of my kids and career of course) are my love of animals and skydiving. I’ve always had a house filled with animals… usually enough to make it feel like a zoo without it being nasty (currently that equates to three cats and a Saint Bernard in my townhome). Before I started skydiving, I volunteered at a stable as a trail guide. My love for animals in general (horses in particular) is still present in my adult life. As far as skydiving goes, it doesn’t take a genius to make the connection to fighter jets. I get to do the things I would have done in a jet, but I do it with my body instead. Sure, I’ll never go Mach 2 or 3, but believe me when I say I’m not getting shortchanged by going 120 miles per hour flying my body.

Look back to your childhood for some insight if you’re trying to figure out what to do with the rest of your life. The passions in your life that have stood the test of time (and of growing up!) are the things that you will likely always love. I am a true believer that if you’re doing what you love, you will find success and wealth and all the things that you want in life.

So, what did you want to be when you grew up?

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So, I was at the gym last night, and as I was running a Black Eyed Peas song (Where is the Love?) came on my MP3 player. I hadn’t heard it in a while (my player’s on random for running purposes) and there was a section of lyrics that really expressed the way I’m feeling about our world… well, my country for the most part. I thought I would share them with you.

I feel the weight of the world on my shoulder
As I’m gettin’ older, y’all, people get colder
Most of us only care about money makin’
Selfishness got us followin’ our own direction
Wrong information always shown by the media
Negative images is the main criteria
Infecting the young minds faster than bacteria
Kids act like what they see in the cinema
Yo’, whatever happened to the values of humanity
Whatever happened to the fairness in equality
Instead in spreading love we spreading animosity
Lack of understanding, leading lives away from unity
That’s the reason why sometimes I’m feelin’ under
That’s the reason why sometimes I’m feelin’ down
There’s no wonder why sometimes I’m feelin’ under
Gotta keep my faith alive to lovers bound

If you aren’t familiar with this song, or you just want to listen to it (I will admit, the lyrics are better heard than read), go here.

I’m really left just wondering how to change a movement in society that seems so different and contradictory to how I feel life should be. I guess the positive thing is that I’m not alone; if I was there wouldn’t be songs like this that I could relate to.

Somewhere I’ve heard an expression… I can’t remember it exactly, but it basically says that individual people are smart; it’s only in large numbers that we’re stupid. I agree with that. As an individual, I think many of us see the same problems and issues and wish something would change. But when you look at us as a whole… as a society, we create the problems and issues everyday. What we think on our own doesn’t manifest itself in society as a whole. I believe it’s a problem of disconnection between us all. As the song says, we’re all on this trip of selfishness, going our own way. If you think about it, we’re really all trying to go the same way. We all want the same thing: happiness.

The Dali Lama talks about having compassion for others regardless of what they might have done in their life to you or to others. He says the key to finding compassion like that is to break things down to the most essential element- that we are all human beings. I hope that just as “going green” has taken hold, we will someday take hold of living with compassion, love and respect for each other.

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