Personal Growth & Transformation

Who Says You Can’t Go Home? — I’ll Take Bon Jovi over Thomas Wolfe Any Day.

home

If you grew up and went to school in Western North Carolina back in the ‘70’s as I did, you couldn’t seem to escape Asheville NC writer Thomas Wolfe and his haunting admonition that “You can’t go home again”. It was one that seemed to threaten an unavoidable and ominous loss, turning up everywhere from lit classes to libraries to shelves in not a few homes.

Thomas Wolfe’s ghost haunted me all the way to my new college as I left home for my freshman year. Following career and family choices led me away from those same beloved mountains about which Wolfe wrote. His whispered doom came to tea a time or three over post-college years spent in the mid-west.

As life took me away, I assumed that the loss was part of the price we pay for simply moving forward through the days and years, another angst-ridden negative talisman hung about the bowed-down neck of life. In those days, it seemed smart and hip to be depressed and cynical. This old set of habitual thought ran head-long into my on-going quest to build a positive life and it demanded a reassessment.

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A Forgotten Key to Personal Growth

healthy living

If you want tips on how to become more productive, how to increase your motivation or even just how to become more confident, there are more than enough resources out there. Many of us feel that all of these little steps ‘improve’ who we are and take us to the next level and in some ways I guess that’s true. On the other hand, I don’t like to think of this advice as changing us as people, but more like exposing who we really are.

Some people get obsessed with self growth and get hooked on looking for the next ‘secret’ and ‘tactic’ they can use to take their life, or just their personality, to the next level. Today I want to cover a personal growth key you may be totally neglecting, and one that probably has more effect on you than any other. What is that key, you ask? That’s easy: your health. As with productivity, motivation, confidence or any other aspects of life you feel are necessary to work on, there’s tons of information out there about your health. So much so in fact, that I’m sure you were already thinking that before my last statement. However, most of the health advice you read is about:

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When a Butterfly Flaps its Wings, Give Thanks

give thanks

I recently celebrated my 40th birthday. It was a real challenge. Everyone tells me its just a number but I believe it is a significant milestone to reach in one’s life. Whilst being flooded with love and attention from family, friends and work colleagues, I took a few minutes out to visit my local animal shelter with food and toys to share my good fortune. I have been quietly giving thanks in this way for the past year. Very few people know that I do this, although by publishing this article I am probably about to change that. I am not looking for praise or credit for being “good”, I just want to share with you a simple little thing you can do to make a difference in your own life.

The Interconnectedness Of All Things

In early 2008 both my husband and I had a strong desire to change jobs. We were both ready for a change of career. This desire became a very strong intention for both of us. Before long we both got the new jobs we desired and started them on the same day.

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The 5 Keys to Transformational Success

success

What separates the average person, from the super successful? I’ve spent most of my life uncovering the differences between the mighty and the mundane. I’ve discovered the following 5 keys which cause the great, to be great. I believe if you practice these keys they will literally transform your mind and your life.

1. Meditation, Affirmation, and Visualization – Every successful person I know either meditates, visualizes, or makes affirmations. If you want to see transformational change in your life, begin by taking 15 minutes to meditate, affirm and visualize the life you desire. This doesn’t work because of its strange “mystical” powers; it works because it reprograms your thinking. “As a man thinketh, so is he.”

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Why You’re Staying Where You Are (& How to Move On)

unhappy

Have you ever been in a situation in life where you weren’t happy with where you were at – but you somehow couldn’t get up the motivation to change? I don’t mean cases where there are good reasons (such as financial ones) to hold back from change, but when there’s not really anything stopping you except yourself.

Here are a few, very very common, examples of where you might be stuck.

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How to Make Your Dreams a Reality: Forget About Them

dreams a reality

All right, I know that title sounds massively depressing, but I wanted to get your attention. Because I’ve got something important to say, I promise.

If you’ve ever looked at the shelf of the self-help section in your bookstore, you’ve probably heard of a guy named Stephen Covey. He’s only slightly famous for writing The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People- voted #1 as one of the most influential books of the 20th Century.

So, in the book one of the habits is “Begin with the end in mind.” Good advice, no doubt. But there’s a slight problem — a simple misinterpretation really — when you take this advice too seriously.

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5 Ways To Learn On The Go

learn on the go

“Learn everything you can, anytime you can, from anyone you can – there will always come a time when you will be grateful you did.” ~ Sarah Caldwell

If you’re reading this article, I’m sure you readily accept the importance of continual learning. However, because modern life can be so busy you may find it challenging to find time to devote solely to learning, whether it be sitting down to read a book or attending an evening class. In this article I will give you 5 ways even the busiest of people -those who are always on the go – can find time to learn.

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Awakening with the Two-Step Dance of Awareness and Release

dance

I write books (www.beyond-karma.com) for two reasons.

One, there is a simple and easy way to release depression, anxiety and the unease of being.

And, two, because awakening is simple.

And what is awakening? Awakening is awakening out of the world of fear and sadness. Leonard Jacobson says, “To awaken simply means to awaken out of the world of the thinking mind into the world of the present moment.” Buddha said very simply: it is the end of suffering. It is finding the joy of being. It is a fundamental shift in consciousness which opens up the world. It is flow.

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How to Succeed at Anything

how to succeed

Success is very simple. But it is not very easy for most people. In fact, success boils down to two simple steps.

Set goals – have an intention to do, have or be something
Keep acting in a way which is consistent with your goals
Just doing these two things will almost certainly bring you success. The trouble is that most people don’t do either of them. Most people drift along aimlessly, not really knowing where they are going and having no clear vision of the future. If you ask most people why the get out of bed in the morning, why they work, what is the purpose of their life, they won’t be able to tell you. The few people who actually set goals are way ahead of the crowd. And those who take the second step, and keep acting to support their goals make up the tiny minority of people who are successful in life. In fact, the second step flows naturally from this first. If you’re serious about your intention, then you cannot help but act in the direction of its fulfillment. The action is effortless.

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When The Price Of Change Is Too High

price of change

I’m a big fan of change, as you can probably guess, since I’m writing on a blog called “The Change Blog”. I’m very much in favour of growth: people finding their path through life, taking the next steps, learning, discovering and doing new and fulfilling things.

Sometimes, though, it’s necessary to hold back from change. Sometimes, you might be tempted to implement a big change in your life – but a nagging feeling warns you against it. Not all changes are appropriate for everyone, and even if a change is right for you, you may need to be cautious about implementing it at the right time.

Over-hasty change can exact a high price. At a minimum, you’ll probably end up wasting some valuable time – and quite possibly some money. In worse cases, you could lose friends, spoil relationships, make yourself ill, or even suffer a financial set-back which takes you years to recover from.

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An Invisible Cup of Tea, and Other Ways to Take Shelter From The Storms of Life

storms of life

The rapid fire pace of daily life takes its toll and often fails to give us even a moment to pause, recover from, or even consider what’s going on around us. Our world is more frenetic, more overwhelming and more opportunity- laden than at any time before in human experience. Modern life has become a hail storm of input, activity, connectivity, and a never ending flow of information. Pressured situations come at us from all sides – at work, in social settings, or at home.

If we’re to make the most of the whirlwind existence sweeping around us, then it’s a good bet that we’ll need some shelter from the storm from time to time. We can’t stay inside forever — literally or figuratively— not unless we want to give up participating in the world and the company of our fellow human beings. So, how do we find a moment of shelter from the storm?

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