"When God gives you lemons, make lemonade!" A popular cliche, but what does it really mean?
How can you make lemonade if the lemons are not ripe enough, or, worse yet, overripe? How do you take the bitter fruit on your plate and turn it into something appetizing? It's all in our state of mind and how we perceive the world!
A Harvard professor, researched this idea, and found that people who are merit-finders- who find the silver lining in a dark cloud, make lemonade out of lemons, and look on the bright side of life, are not only happier, but may actually live longer. Tal Ben-Shahar, a lecturer at Harvard University, explains the psychology behind the idea in his article posted in The Guardian. An interesting perspective--Excerpts from his findings follow. Read and enjoy:
I spent close to 30 years of my life unhappily successful. I was the Israeli national squash champion, completed my undergraduate degree at Harvard, and subsequently spent a year at beautiful Cambridge University, studying education while earning my blue in squash.
More than titles and degrees, though, I desperately wanted to be happy, or at least happier than I had been. I started to study psychology in the hope of finding some answers, and it was through my studies that I realised what should have been obvious to me all along - that happiness is mostly contingent on our state of mind, rather than our status or the state of our bank account.
I wish someone had said that to me when I was in college or, better yet, when I was in high school. Which is why I was delighted to learn that Anthony Seldon, the headteacher of Wellington College in Berkshire, is launching an initiative to teach happiness in the classroom. Seldon is taking an important step for his students, and hopefully for the system of education as a whole.
I know what a class on happiness can do for students. After completing my PhD, I created a class in positive psychology, which I am currently teaching at Harvard. The course is in its second year, and is already the largest course at the university, with 855 students; next is Introduction to Economics, with 688 students. The single most common sentiment expressed by students is that positive psychology, more than any other class they have taken at Harvard, changed their lives for the better.
The goal of positive psychology is to help people lead happier lives, not in the sense of experiencing pleasure - of moving from one immediate gratification to the next - but in the sense of leading a meaningful and fulfilling life, of flourishing emotionally, spiritually and intellectually.
Education can be informative or transformative. If we think of the mind as having the shape of a container, then to inform would mean putting something in the form. This model of education has the teacher informing the students, who, in turn, memorise the information and keep it in for as long as they can or need to (usually for a little more than five minutes after the exam). As students put more and more information into the container, they become "educated".
To transform, in contrast, is about changing the form of the container - changing the way students perceive the world and interpret the data that comes in. To help students lead fulfilling lives, information is necessary, but not sufficient.
The late poet, author and Harvard professor Archibald MacLeish commented on the state of the world in the 1960s: "What is wrong is not the great discoveries of science - information is always better than ignorance, no matter what information or what ignorance. What is wrong is the belief behind the information, the belief that information will change the world. It won't."
Neither will more information save our culture from the rising levels of depression and unhappiness. We need education that is transformative as well - which is exactly what positive psychology offers.
Psychological transformation is about changing the way we take in information, whether about our work, our relationships or our education. Shakespeare was partially right when he noted that, "Nothing is good or bad but thinking makes it so." The exact same event can be interpreted in radically different ways by different minds. A poor athletic or academic performance, for instance, can be perceived as a catastrophe and lead to further avoidance of challenge - or it can be considered a learning opportunity and stimulate extra effort.
In another study, researchers showed that people who spend a few minutes a day writing down things for which they are grateful enjoy higher levels of optimism and happiness and are also more likely to achieve their goals. Changing the way we perceive the world - whether by interpreting failures as stepping stones or by refraining from taking the good for granted - contributes to the quality and quantity of our lives. To many people these ideas may seem commonsensical, but, as Voltaire once noted, common sense is not that common and therefore introducing these ideas during the formative years of students' lives is critical.
More information, more money and more prestige will not make our society happier. In the US, material wealth is on the rise, as are levels of depression. Once a person's basic needs are met, making more money, buying a larger car, or being promoted at work can only lead to a short-lived, ephemeral spike in one's level of wellbeing. For sustained happiness, we need to change the way we perceive the world; the internal, our psychology, matters at least as much as our external circumstances. We need transformation to supplement the information.
At present, the realm of life-flourishing - of enhancing the quality of our lives - is dominated by pop psychology, which explains why there is so much cynicism about introducing a happiness curriculum into our system of education. In the multitude of self-help seminars and books, there's a lot of fun and charisma, and relatively little substance. They promise five quick steps to happiness, the three secrets of success, and four ways to find your perfect lover.
On the other side, we have academia, with writing and research that is substantive, but does not find its way into most households. The realm of life-flourishing is too important to be left in the hands of charismatic self-help gurus or in the obscurity of academic libraries. The role of positive psychology is to be the bridge between the ivory tower and the high street, between the rigour of academe and the fun of the self-help movement.
Wellington College is leading the bridge-building effort. I hope other schools follow suit and transform their curriculum and the lives of their students.
...So, what do you think? Should "How to Make Lemonade" be in every college curriculum?
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Friday, April 18, 2008
Activity or Accomplishment?
If you haven't already, you must visit Michael Angier's SuccessNet.org. There are days that he is writing to me. I open his email and say, "How did he know?" How did he know that I was busy all day, but haven't accomplished what I set out to do? From the second entry to The Skipper's Viewpoint".http://MichaelAngier.com Read and Enjoy!
Almost everyone I know is busy. Heck, even the RETIRED people I know are busy. It doesn't matter whether you're in business for yourself or work for someone else, you no doubt find your day filledwith activity. You may even feel overwhelmed a lot of the time. But being busy by itself doesn't really amount to much. You can be busy being busy, but not be making much--or any--progress. I heard it from someone just the other day. They said they worked the entire day in their office. I asked what they did all day, but they really couldn't really tell me.All they could say was that they made phone calls, handled email, surfed the Web and worked on "various" projects. But when I asked if any of this generated income--something quite important to this person--they couldn't come up with a single thing. Being busy and working hard may give you some satisfaction, but it's a false sense. The Universe rewards results--not activity. So what do YOU do? Do you confuse activity with accomplishment? I hope not. Do you know the top three most important, high-payoff activities that will contribute to achieving your goals? I hope so. If not, I recommend investing some of your "busy time" to determine what those tasks are. Which ones should you do every day? Which ones every week? And if increasing your revenue is important, here's what I suggest: Set yourself an appointment each day for your 3M (3M stands for Maximum Monetization Minutes). This is a period of time each day or week that you devote exclusively for ideating, planning and implementing income-generating activities. The Pareto Principle--the old 80/20 rule--applies here.Usually 80 percent of your intended results are created by less than 20% of your efforts. The key is to honestly acknowledge what you need to be working on to create the greatest progress. I don't know of a better use of your time than to get clear on your highest pay-off activities and then discipline yourself to only work on those. Here's a list that will help you focus on what those high-priority activities are:* revenue generating* something very important and must be accomplished* something that directly relates to your goals* anything you truly can't delegate Go ahead, make that list. Prioritize your tasks and watch your productivity soar. It's also a good thing to discuss with your
"If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work." --Thomas Watson,founder of IBM Make it a great--and productive--day,------------------------------------Michael Angier
Almost everyone I know is busy. Heck, even the RETIRED people I know are busy. It doesn't matter whether you're in business for yourself or work for someone else, you no doubt find your day filledwith activity. You may even feel overwhelmed a lot of the time. But being busy by itself doesn't really amount to much. You can be busy being busy, but not be making much--or any--progress. I heard it from someone just the other day. They said they worked the entire day in their office. I asked what they did all day, but they really couldn't really tell me.All they could say was that they made phone calls, handled email, surfed the Web and worked on "various" projects. But when I asked if any of this generated income--something quite important to this person--they couldn't come up with a single thing. Being busy and working hard may give you some satisfaction, but it's a false sense. The Universe rewards results--not activity. So what do YOU do? Do you confuse activity with accomplishment? I hope not. Do you know the top three most important, high-payoff activities that will contribute to achieving your goals? I hope so. If not, I recommend investing some of your "busy time" to determine what those tasks are. Which ones should you do every day? Which ones every week? And if increasing your revenue is important, here's what I suggest: Set yourself an appointment each day for your 3M (3M stands for Maximum Monetization Minutes). This is a period of time each day or week that you devote exclusively for ideating, planning and implementing income-generating activities. The Pareto Principle--the old 80/20 rule--applies here.Usually 80 percent of your intended results are created by less than 20% of your efforts. The key is to honestly acknowledge what you need to be working on to create the greatest progress. I don't know of a better use of your time than to get clear on your highest pay-off activities and then discipline yourself to only work on those. Here's a list that will help you focus on what those high-priority activities are:* revenue generating* something very important and must be accomplished* something that directly relates to your goals* anything you truly can't delegate Go ahead, make that list. Prioritize your tasks and watch your productivity soar. It's also a good thing to discuss with your
"If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work." --Thomas Watson,founder of IBM Make it a great--and productive--day,------------------------------------Michael Angier
Friday, April 11, 2008
Mental Rehearsal
I remember as a little girl lying in the grass on a beautiful summer day, playing with a "buff puff", the feathery remains of a dandelion flower. My mind would wander and I would think about all sorts of things; what I wanted to be when I grow up, what I want for Christmas, and any number of things that I wanted to manifest in my life. Then a voice would startle me back to reality, "Stop daydreaming and get your chores done!" And like so many of those childhood experiences, we are often taken out of our daydreams and get busy with the real world. But now, as we get older and more comfortable in our roles in life, we are constantly being reminded (i.e. The Law of Attraction for one) how important those daydreams can be. The grown up version is "Visualization". We now know how powerful this can be.
In Jack Canfield's Success Strategies, he explains exactly how to do this and why it is so important. Read and enjoy...and Happy Daydreaming!
Visualize and Affirm Your Desired Outcomes: A Step-by-Step Guide
You have an awesome power within you that most of us have never been taught to use. Elite athletes use it. The super rich use it. And peak performers in all fields are now starting to use it. That power is called visualization.
The daily practice of visualizing your dreams as already complete can rapidly accelerate your achievement of those dreams. Visualization of your goals and desires accomplishes four very important things.
1. It activates your creative subconscious which will start generating creative ideas to achieve your goal.
2. It programs your brain to more readily perceive and recognize the resources you will need to achieve your dreams.
3. It activates the law of attraction, thereby drawing into your life the people, resources, and circumstances you will need to achieve your goals.
4. It builds your internal motivation to take the necessary actions to achieve your dreams.
Visualization is really quite simple. You sit in a comfortable position, close your eyes and imagine -- in as vivid detail as you can -- what you would be looking at if the dream you have were already realized. Imagine being inside of yourself, looking out through your eyes at the ideal result.
Mental Rehearsal
Athletes call this visualization process "mental rehearsal," and they have been using it since the 1960s when we learned about it from the Russians. All you have to do is set aside a few minutes a day. The best times are when you first wake up, after meditation or prayer, and right before you go to bed. These are the times you are most relaxed. Go through the following three steps:
1. Imagine sitting in a movie theater, the lights dim, and then the movie starts. It is a movie of you doing perfectly whatever it is that you want to do better. See as much detail as you can create, including your clothing, the expression on your face, small body movements, the environment and any other people that might be around. Add in any sounds you would be hearing -- traffic, music, other people talking, cheering. And finally, recreate in your body any feelings you think you would be experiencing as you engage in this activity.
2. Get out of your chair, walk up to the screen, open a door in the screen and enter into the movie. Now experience the whole thing again from inside of yourself, looking out through your eyes. This is called an "embodied image" rather than a "distant image." It will deepen the impact of the experience. Again, see everything in vivid detail, hear the sounds you would hear, and feel the feelings you would feel.
3. Finally, walk back out of the screen that is still showing the picture of you performing perfectly, return to your seat in the theater, reach out and grab the screen and shrink it down to the size of a cracker. Then, bring this miniature screen up to your mouth, chew it up and swallow it. Imagine that each tiny piece -- just like a hologram -- contains the full picture of you performing well. Imagine all these little screens traveling down into your stomach and out through the bloodstream into every cell of your body. Then imagine that every cell of your body is lit up with a movie of you performing perfectly. It's like one of those appliance store windows where 50 televisions are all tuned to the same channel.
When you have finished this process -- it should take less than five minutes -- you can open your eyes and go about your business. If you make this part of your daily routine, you will be amazed at how much improvement you will see in your life.
Create Goal Pictures
Another powerful technique is to create a photograph or picture of yourself with your goal, as if it were already completed. If one of your goals is to own a new car, take your camera down to your local auto dealer and have a picture taken of yourself sitting behind the wheel of your dream car. If your goal is to visit Paris, find a picture or poster of the Eiffel Tower and cut out a picture of yourself and place it into the picture. With today's technology, you could probably make an even more convincing image using your computer.
Create a Visual Picture and an Affirmation for Each Goal
We recommend that you find or create a picture of every aspect of your dream life. Create a picture or a visual representation for every goal you have -- financial, career, recreation, new skills and abilities, things you want to purchase, and so on.
When we were writing the very first Chicken Soup for the Soul® book, we took a copy of the New York Times best seller list, scanned it into our computer, and using the same font as the newspaper, typed Chicken Soup for the Soul into the number one position in the "Paperback Advice, How-To and Miscellaneous" category. We printed several copies and hung them up around the office. Less than two years later, our book was the number one book in that category and stayed there for over a year!
Index Cards
We practice a similar discipline every day. We each have a list of about 30-40 goals we are currently working on. We write each goal on a 3x5 index card and keep those cards near our bed and take them with us when we travel. Each morning and each night we go through the stack of cards, one at a time, read the card, close our eyes, see the completion of that goal in its perfect desired state for about 15 seconds, open our eyes and repeat the process with the next card.
Use Affirmations to Support Your Visualization
An affirmation is a statement that evokes not only a picture, but the experience of already having what you want. Here's an example of an affirmation:
I am happily vacationing 2 months out of the year in a tropical paradise, and working just four days a week owning my own business.
Repeating an affirmation several times a day keeps you focused on your goal, strengthens your motivation, and programs your subconscious by sending an order to your crew to do whatever it takes to make that goal happen.
Expect Results
Through writing down your goals, using the power of visualization and repeating your affirmations, you can achieve amazing results. Visualization and affirmations allow you to change your beliefs, assumptions, and opinions about the most important person in your life -- YOU! They allow you to harness the 18 billion brain cells in your brain and get them all working in a singular and purposeful direction.
Your subconscious will become engaged in a process that transforms you forever. The process is invisible and doesn't take a long time. It just happens over time, as long as you put in the time to visualize and affirm, surround yourself with positive people, read uplifting books and listen to audio programs that flood your mind with positive, life-affirming messages.
Repeat your affirmations every morning and night for a month and they will become an automatic part of your thinking -- they will become woven into the very fabric of your being.
© 2008 Jack Canfield
Jack Canfield, America's Success Coach, is the founder and co-creator of the billion-dollar book brand Chicken Soup for the Soul and a leading authority on Peak Performance. If you're ready to jump-start your life, make more money, and have more fun and joy in all that you do, get your FREE success tips from Jack Canfield now at: www.FreeSuccessStrategies.com
In Jack Canfield's Success Strategies, he explains exactly how to do this and why it is so important. Read and enjoy...and Happy Daydreaming!
Visualize and Affirm Your Desired Outcomes: A Step-by-Step Guide
You have an awesome power within you that most of us have never been taught to use. Elite athletes use it. The super rich use it. And peak performers in all fields are now starting to use it. That power is called visualization.
The daily practice of visualizing your dreams as already complete can rapidly accelerate your achievement of those dreams. Visualization of your goals and desires accomplishes four very important things.
1. It activates your creative subconscious which will start generating creative ideas to achieve your goal.
2. It programs your brain to more readily perceive and recognize the resources you will need to achieve your dreams.
3. It activates the law of attraction, thereby drawing into your life the people, resources, and circumstances you will need to achieve your goals.
4. It builds your internal motivation to take the necessary actions to achieve your dreams.
Visualization is really quite simple. You sit in a comfortable position, close your eyes and imagine -- in as vivid detail as you can -- what you would be looking at if the dream you have were already realized. Imagine being inside of yourself, looking out through your eyes at the ideal result.
Mental Rehearsal
Athletes call this visualization process "mental rehearsal," and they have been using it since the 1960s when we learned about it from the Russians. All you have to do is set aside a few minutes a day. The best times are when you first wake up, after meditation or prayer, and right before you go to bed. These are the times you are most relaxed. Go through the following three steps:
1. Imagine sitting in a movie theater, the lights dim, and then the movie starts. It is a movie of you doing perfectly whatever it is that you want to do better. See as much detail as you can create, including your clothing, the expression on your face, small body movements, the environment and any other people that might be around. Add in any sounds you would be hearing -- traffic, music, other people talking, cheering. And finally, recreate in your body any feelings you think you would be experiencing as you engage in this activity.
2. Get out of your chair, walk up to the screen, open a door in the screen and enter into the movie. Now experience the whole thing again from inside of yourself, looking out through your eyes. This is called an "embodied image" rather than a "distant image." It will deepen the impact of the experience. Again, see everything in vivid detail, hear the sounds you would hear, and feel the feelings you would feel.
3. Finally, walk back out of the screen that is still showing the picture of you performing perfectly, return to your seat in the theater, reach out and grab the screen and shrink it down to the size of a cracker. Then, bring this miniature screen up to your mouth, chew it up and swallow it. Imagine that each tiny piece -- just like a hologram -- contains the full picture of you performing well. Imagine all these little screens traveling down into your stomach and out through the bloodstream into every cell of your body. Then imagine that every cell of your body is lit up with a movie of you performing perfectly. It's like one of those appliance store windows where 50 televisions are all tuned to the same channel.
When you have finished this process -- it should take less than five minutes -- you can open your eyes and go about your business. If you make this part of your daily routine, you will be amazed at how much improvement you will see in your life.
Create Goal Pictures
Another powerful technique is to create a photograph or picture of yourself with your goal, as if it were already completed. If one of your goals is to own a new car, take your camera down to your local auto dealer and have a picture taken of yourself sitting behind the wheel of your dream car. If your goal is to visit Paris, find a picture or poster of the Eiffel Tower and cut out a picture of yourself and place it into the picture. With today's technology, you could probably make an even more convincing image using your computer.
Create a Visual Picture and an Affirmation for Each Goal
We recommend that you find or create a picture of every aspect of your dream life. Create a picture or a visual representation for every goal you have -- financial, career, recreation, new skills and abilities, things you want to purchase, and so on.
When we were writing the very first Chicken Soup for the Soul® book, we took a copy of the New York Times best seller list, scanned it into our computer, and using the same font as the newspaper, typed Chicken Soup for the Soul into the number one position in the "Paperback Advice, How-To and Miscellaneous" category. We printed several copies and hung them up around the office. Less than two years later, our book was the number one book in that category and stayed there for over a year!
Index Cards
We practice a similar discipline every day. We each have a list of about 30-40 goals we are currently working on. We write each goal on a 3x5 index card and keep those cards near our bed and take them with us when we travel. Each morning and each night we go through the stack of cards, one at a time, read the card, close our eyes, see the completion of that goal in its perfect desired state for about 15 seconds, open our eyes and repeat the process with the next card.
Use Affirmations to Support Your Visualization
An affirmation is a statement that evokes not only a picture, but the experience of already having what you want. Here's an example of an affirmation:
I am happily vacationing 2 months out of the year in a tropical paradise, and working just four days a week owning my own business.
Repeating an affirmation several times a day keeps you focused on your goal, strengthens your motivation, and programs your subconscious by sending an order to your crew to do whatever it takes to make that goal happen.
Expect Results
Through writing down your goals, using the power of visualization and repeating your affirmations, you can achieve amazing results. Visualization and affirmations allow you to change your beliefs, assumptions, and opinions about the most important person in your life -- YOU! They allow you to harness the 18 billion brain cells in your brain and get them all working in a singular and purposeful direction.
Your subconscious will become engaged in a process that transforms you forever. The process is invisible and doesn't take a long time. It just happens over time, as long as you put in the time to visualize and affirm, surround yourself with positive people, read uplifting books and listen to audio programs that flood your mind with positive, life-affirming messages.
Repeat your affirmations every morning and night for a month and they will become an automatic part of your thinking -- they will become woven into the very fabric of your being.
© 2008 Jack Canfield
Jack Canfield, America's Success Coach, is the founder and co-creator of the billion-dollar book brand Chicken Soup for the Soul and a leading authority on Peak Performance. If you're ready to jump-start your life, make more money, and have more fun and joy in all that you do, get your FREE success tips from Jack Canfield now at: www.FreeSuccessStrategies.com
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Kitchen of Life
We all experience major life issues at some point. Sometimes, they are career or financial, and sometimes, they are personal or emotional. How we deal with the adversities that we face, makes us the person that we are today. As a Speaker and Life Transition Coach, I remind people to count their blessings and appreciate the abundance that exists in their life. Just one of the things to get you "Through" it and develop the strength to turn adversity into triumph.
This morning I received an email that drives home this point.The following is an article from my favorite little magazine, "Bits and Pieces". .
IN THE TEST KITCHEN OF LIFE
A young woman was complaining to her father about how difficult her life had become. He said nothing, but took her to the kitchen and set three pans of water to boiling. To the first pan, he added carrots; to the second, eggs; and to the third, ground coffee. After all three had cooked, he put their contents into separate bowls and asked his daughter to cut into the eggs and carrots and smell the coffee. "What does this all mean?" she asked impatiently. "Each food," he said, "teaches us something about facing adversity, as represented by the boiling water." The carrot went in hard but came out soft and weak. The eggs went in fragile but came out hardened. The coffee, however, changed the water to something better. "Which will you be like as you face life?" he asked. Will you give up, become hard -- or transform adversity into triumph? As the "chef" of your own life, what will you bring to the table?
Thank you to The Staff at Resource Associates Corporation(1-800-799-6227 www.rac-tqi.com) for the share.
This morning I received an email that drives home this point.The following is an article from my favorite little magazine, "Bits and Pieces". .
IN THE TEST KITCHEN OF LIFE
A young woman was complaining to her father about how difficult her life had become. He said nothing, but took her to the kitchen and set three pans of water to boiling. To the first pan, he added carrots; to the second, eggs; and to the third, ground coffee. After all three had cooked, he put their contents into separate bowls and asked his daughter to cut into the eggs and carrots and smell the coffee. "What does this all mean?" she asked impatiently. "Each food," he said, "teaches us something about facing adversity, as represented by the boiling water." The carrot went in hard but came out soft and weak. The eggs went in fragile but came out hardened. The coffee, however, changed the water to something better. "Which will you be like as you face life?" he asked. Will you give up, become hard -- or transform adversity into triumph? As the "chef" of your own life, what will you bring to the table?
Thank you to The Staff at Resource Associates Corporation(1-800-799-6227 www.rac-tqi.com) for the share.
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