90 days

Ninenty days have passed since your are gone.
The body has died but your spirit lives on.
Your sage word of wisdom, your big picture views.
The encouraging smile despite your intense pain.
Your ultimate presence and the shining glitter in your eyes.
Nothing could take down your spirit till the last minute of your life.
The mind was sharpely present and the heart full of hope.
Living minute by minute enjoying the gift of life and the essence of existence by always connecting to your higher self, the pure version of you.
Souls are immortal and beautiful spirits never die.
You are still shining on me as long as I am alive
The values, the spirit, the strength, the resilience, the courage to conquer fear, the power to fight the endless pain with a smile.
You never complained and you always pushed forward with a smile and a big heart and an amazingly strong willed spirit.
I know that your spirit is immortal and you must be living now in the hands of God where there is no separation, pain but ultimate joy and the freedom of your kind beautiful soul.
God Bless you Mama!

How is your Spirit Going?

Do you feel tired? Is your body aching? Do you feel you are just too bored to fight another fight even if you are fighting for your life ? Do you have an existential energy deficiency where you just manage to exist without enjoying the spirtual abundance of thriving and the mental clarity of flow?
Where is your energy? Where are your dreams? Where is your focus? Where is your passion? It seems that you are there but your spirit is not there. Where is the glow in your eyes, the smile on your face and the energy that can change the world in your heart.

You were free and then you were born, your spirit is immortal, even when die your spirit goes to another world but your spirit stays alive and is set free again. So there is nothing to be afraid of!  Nothing can let your spirit down , your fear, your greed, your failures , your stupidity,your poverty! This is not your core! Your spirit is your core and its essence is its presence, its influence, its higher values, its honour, its grace ,its sense of cheerfulness and joy! The curiosity, the love, the wonder and the excitment!
Yes, you need to find your spiritual grace because you are already have it! Your grace is within you and without you, just be yourself.
Free your spirit from the separating chains of judgement to the garden of understanding where you find grounds for compassion and view yourself and your world differently, start a , do not judge or fight. Remember, it is very easy and quick to judge and very hard to understand, even your own self. Today, before you judge anything or anyone, stop for 5 seconds,think and try to understand the reasoning behind the actions or the drivers of the situation, not the easy mental shortcut of judging and complaining. It will help you understand and find your spirit and your energy.

COMMON FALLACIES IN REASONING

COMMON FALLACIES IN REASONING

1. FAULTY CAUSE: (post hoc ergo propter hoc) mistakes correlation or association for causation, by assuming that because one thing follows another it was caused by the other.

example: A black cat crossed Babbs' path yesterday and, sure enough, she was involved in an automobile accident later that same afternoon.

example: The introduction of sex education courses at the high school level has resulted in increased promiscuity among teens. A recent study revealed that the number of reported cases of STDs (sexually transmitted diseases) was significantly higher for high schools that offered courses in sex education than for high schools that did not.

2. SWEEPING GENERALIZATION: (dicto simpliciter) assumes that what is true of the whole will also be true of the part, or that what is true in most instances will be true in all instances.

example: Muffin must be rich or have rich parents, because she belongs to ZXQ, and ZXQ is the richest sorority on campus.

example: I'd like to hire you, but you're an ex-felon and statistics show that 80% of ex-felons recidivate.

3. HASTY GENERALIZATION: bases an inference on too small a sample, or on an unrepresentative sample. Often, a single example or instance is used as the basis for a broader generalization.

example: All of those movie stars are really rude. I asked Kevin Costner for his autograph in a restaurant in Westwood the other evening, and he told me to get lost.

example: Pit Bulls are actually gentle, sweet dogs. My next door neighbor has one and his dog loves to romp and play with all the kids in the neighborhood!

4. FAULTY ANALOGY: (can be literal or figurative) assumes that because two things, events, or situations are alike in some known respects, that they are alike in other unknown respects.

example: What's the big deal about the early pioneers killing a few Indians in order to settle the West? After all, you can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs.

example: Banning "head" shops from selling drug paraphernalia in order to curb drug abuse makes about as much sense as banning bikinis to reduce promiscuity.

5. APPEAL TO IGNORANCE: (argumentum ad ignorantiam) attempts to use an opponent's inability to disprove a conclusion as proof of the validity of the conclusion, i.e. "You can't prove I'm wrong, so I must be right."

example: We can safely conclude that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the galaxy, because thus far no one has been able to prove that there is not.

example: The new form of experimental chemotherapy must be working; not a single patient has returned to complain.

6. BIFURCATION: (either-or, black or white, all or nothing fallacy) assumes that two categories are mutually exclusive and exhaustive, that is, something is either a member of one or the other, but not both or some third category.

example: Either you favor a strong national defense, or you favor allowing other nations to dictate our foreign policy.

example: It’s not TV. It’s HBO.

7. FALSE DILEMMA: (a form of bifurcation) implies that one of two outcomes is inevitable, and both have negative consequences.

example: Either you buy a large car and watch it guzzle away your paycheck, or you buy a small car and take a greater risk of being injured or killed in the event of an accident.

example: You can put your money in a savings account, in which case the IRS will tax you on the interest, and inflation will erode the value of your money, or you can avoid maintaining a savings account in which case you will have nothing to fall back on in a financial emergency.

8. FAULTY SIGN: (also includes argument from circumstance) wrongly assumes that one event or phenomenon is a reliable indicator or predictor of another event or phenomenon.

example: the cars driving in the opposite direction have their lights on; they must be part of a funeral procession.

example: That guy is wearing a Raiders jacket and baggy pants. I’ll bet he’s a gang member.

9. DAMNING THE SOURCE: (ad hominem, sometimes called the genetic fallacy) attempts to refute an argument by indicting the source of the argument, rather than the substance of the argument itself.

example: There is no reason to listen to the arguments of those who oppose school prayer, for they are the arguments of atheists!

example: The American Trial Lawyers Association favors of this piece of legislation, so you know it has to be bad for ordinary citizens.

10. TU QUOQUE: (look who's talking or two wrongs make a right) pointing to a similar wrong or error committed by another.

example: Gee, Mom and Dad, how can you tell me not to do drugs when you both smoke cigarettes and drink alcohol?

example: The United States has no business criticizing the human rights policies of the Third World nations, not as long as discrimination and segregation continue to exist in the United States.

11. EQUIVOCATION: allows a key word or term in an argument to shift its meaning during the course of the argument. The result is that the conclusion of the argument is not concerned with the same thing as the premise(s).

example: Only man is rational. No woman is a man. Therefore, no woman is rational.

example: No one who has the slightest acquaintance with science can reasonably doubt that the miracles in the Bible actually took place. Every year we witness countless new miracles in the form recombinant DNA, micro-chips, organ transplants, and the like. (the word "miracle" does not have the same meaning in each case)

12. BEGGING THE QUESTION: (petitio principii) entails making an argument, the conclusion of which is based on an unstated or unproven assumption. In question form, this fallacy is known as a COMPLEX QUESTION.

example: Abortion is murder, since killing a baby is an act of murder.

example: Have you stopped beating your wife?

13. TAUTOLOGY: (a sub-category of circular argument) defining terms or qualifying an argument in such a way that it would be impossible to disprove the argument. Often, the rationale for the argument is merely a restatement of the conclusion in different words.

example: The Bible is the word of God. We know this because the Bible itself tells us so.

example: You are a disagreeable person and, if you disagree with me on this, it will only further prove what a disagreeable person you are.

14. APPEAL TO AUTHORITY: (ipse dixit also called ad verecundiam sometimes) attempts to justify an argument by citing a highly admired or well-known (but not necessarily qualified) figure who supports the conclusion being offered.

example: If it's good enough for (insert celebrity's name here), it's good enough for me.

example: Laws against marijuana are plain silly. Why, Thomas Jefferson is known to have raised hemp on his own plantation.

15. APPEAL TO TRADITION: (don't rock the boat or ad verecundiam) based on the principle of "letting sleeping dogs lie". We should continue to do things as they have been done in the past. We shouldn't challenge time-honored customs or traditions.

example: Of course we have to play "pomp and circumstance" at graduation, because that's always been the song that is played.

example: Why do I make wine this way? Because my father made wine this way, and his father made wine this way.

16. APPEAL TO THE CROWD: (ad populum or playing to the gallery) refers to popular opinion or majority sentiment in order to provide support for a claim. Often the "common man" or "common sense" provides the basis for the claim.

example: all I can say is that if living together is immoral, then I have plenty of company.

example: Professor Windplenty's test was extremely unfair. Just ask anyone who took it.

17. STRAW MAN: stating an opponent's argument in an extreme or exaggerated form, or attacking a weaker, irrelevant portion of an opponent's argument.

example: A mandatory seat belt law could never be enforced. You can't issue citations to dead people.

example: What woman in her right mind could truly desire total equality with men? No woman wants the right to be shot at in times of war, the right to have to pay alimony, or the right to have to use the same restrooms as men.

18. SLIPPERY SLOPE: (sometimes called a snowball argument or domino theory) suggests that if one step or action is taken it will invariably lead to similar steps or actions, the end results of which are negative or undesirable. A slippery slope always assume a chain reaction of cause-effect events which result in some eventual dire outcome.

example: If the Supreme Court allows abortion, next think you know they'll allow euthanasia, and it won't be long before society disposes of all those persons whom it deems unwanted or undesirable.

example: If I let one student interrupt my lecture with a question, then I'll have to let others and, before long, there won't be any time left for my lecture.

19. APPEALING TO EXTREMES: A fallacy very similar to slippery slope, which involves taking an argumentative claim or assertion to its extreme, even though the arguer does not advocate the extreme interpretation. The difference between the two fallacies is that appealing to extremes does not necessarily involve a sequence of causal connections.

example: Husband to ex-wife: Well, if you want to be completely fair about dividing everything up, you should get one of my testicles and I should get one of your breasts!

example: Debtor to creditor: Hey, you've already repossessed my car and my television. Why don't you just draw a quart of blood or carve a pound of flesh from my heart too?

20. HYPOTHESIS CONTRARY TO FACT: This fallacy consists of offering a poorly supported claim about what might have happened in the past or future if circumstances or conditions were other than they actually were or are. The fallacy also involves treating hypothetical situations as if they were fact.

example: If you had only tasted the stewed snails, I'm sure you would have liked them.

example: If Hitler had not invaded Russia and opened up two military fronts, the Nazis would surely have won the war.

21. NON SEQUITAR: (literally means "does not follow") in a general sense any argument which fails to establish a connection between the premises and the conclusion may be called a non-sequitar. In practice, however, the label non-sequitar tends to be reserved for arguments in which irrelevant reasons are offered to support a claim.

example: I wore a red shirt when I took the test, so that is probably why I did so well on the test.

example: Mr Boswell couldn't be the person who poisoned our cat, Truffles, because when I used to take Truffles for walks he always smiled and said "Hello" when we walked by.

22. RED HERRING: attempting to hide a weakness in an argument by drawing attention away from the real issue. A red herring fallacy is thus a diversionary tactic or an attempt to confuse or fog the issue being debated. The name of the fallacy comes from the days of fox hunting, when a herring was dragged across the trail of a fox in order to throw the dogs off the scent.

example: accused by his wife of cheating at cards, Ned replies "Nothing I do ever pleases you. I spent all last week repainting the bathroom, and then you said you didn't like the color."

example: There's too much fuss and concern about saving the environment. We can't create an Eden on earth. And even if we could, remember Adam and Eve got bored in the Garden of Eden anyway!

23. INCONSISTENCY: advancing an argument that is self-contradictory, or that is based on mutually inconsistent premises.

Example: A used car salespersons says, "Hey, you can’t trust those other car salesman. They’ll say anything to gt you to buy a car from them."

Example: A parent has just read a child the story of Cinderella. The child asks, "If the coach, and the footmen, and the beautiful clothes all turned back into the pumpkin, the mice, and the rags, then how come the glass slipper didn’t change back too?"

Source: Common fallacies in reasoning ,2011

 

Girl at heart

Hey beautiful charming woman and handsome young man, you beautiful inside out, what's wrong with you? You are full of glamour, your life is rich, your life is meaningful , everything is fine , your intellect, your finances, your looks, your style, the lovely smile on your face. You are full of life, you are full of hope for the future, your dreams never end and the you keep on impressing everyone with your success and the depth and breadth of your personality. You have your habits, you play sports, you read and write and you  have caring friends and business associates who make your life insightful . 

The story of your life is great ,yet you need to take one idea off your mind.

You don't have a husband! This is the problem! The dilemma many young women approach in their late thirties and forties and probably fifties is a mere illusion and self fulfilling prophecy that takes a lot of the quality of life . You are not alone, social norms are changing and life has a lot to offer to the young lady than just marriage. This is not a feminist anti establishment post but rather magnifies the importance of not missing the big picture and wholeness of life to the tree of marriage.

Marriage is not good or bad, it is a matter of probability and not a must have possibility. Life is always about 50/50 chance, you either make it or not, so you are getting married or not, while the expected value of your life as a whole is the sum of your education, career, life purpose, relationships and the dent you could make in the world. Your legacy is not your marriage. You can see some young girls in rural areas getting married around 18 years old and living a life in informal slavery? Would you trade your life with one of those girls? The taboo of marriage and aging has to be broken, you are not your age and you are not your status. You are valued, loved and appreciated the way you are. Society has to stop putiing any bachelorette under extreme countdown like time pressure with this make believe a FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) mindset, stop it !It doesn't matter!!! If you are 60 and never married, it doesn't matter, if you are a single mom it doesn't matter, if you are widowed it doesn't matter. Live your life and enjoy every breath you take because life is about the moments you live, not the status on your id.

Freeing your mind will make you feel liberated, no anxiety , no waiting, richer relationships with friends and family, a better ability to fulfill your potential as you are waiting for no one but yourself.

When you’re living your life confidently, freely and without restraint, you emit the kind of energy that it just isn’t possible to fake. The kind of energy that’s capable of transforming not just your own life, but the lives of people around you.

Enjoy your life now

Are you Snow White--?

Snow White is innocent, kind, gentle, sweet, and cheerful. Her generous, trusting and helpful nature can cause her trouble, as other people might take advantage of it.Although she is sensitive and soft-spoken, she can be energetic and stern, such as when she told the Seven Dwarfs to wash their hands or when she scolded the birds for "frightening the poor old lady [the Queen disguised as an old peddler woman]". Snow White is motherly, compassionate and delights in keeping house for the lovable Seven Dwarfs while she waits to meet her beloved prince again.With her kindness and ethereal beauty, Snow White charms every creature in the kingdom except the Queen.She also shows great resilience and an inner strength against adversity.

However, having the sensitive and soft-spoken part taking over might make you think like this:

-I am not responsible for my decisions.
-I am not responsible for my own happiness.
-Life is really tough and has always been tough.
-I am a victim of circumstance.
-There is nothing i can do to change things "That's the way it is" is a common statement.
-Others are not helping me.
-Others should understand me.
-Falling apart and being helpless is part of my life.
-The world is a harsh place.

Never forget the following Facts of life:
-Not all people are going to be friendly.
-Some people never change.
-Some people never understand.
-Some people are not going to like you.
-People vary from day to day.
-No one is all bad.
-No one is all good.
-No one will agree with everything you say everytime.

In Order to let yourself develop, adopt this resilient mindset by allowing yourself to change and grow:

-Nobody likes a victim.
-Nobody owes you anything.
-Everybody likes a postive-acting person.
-Happiness is not something to be guilty about.
-Happiness is a choice you make.
-Looking after your happiness is not selfish.
-Life is what you make of it, not what it throws at you.
-Everybody is responsible for his own actions and attitudes.
-Assertiveness is normal and what adults do.

Reference: The Chimp Paradox,Prof Steve Peters

Truth

Truth or an accurate understanding of reality is the essential foundation of any good outcome.

Most people fight seeing what is true when it is not what they want it to be. That's bad, as it is more important to understand the bad stuff as the good stuff will take care of itself.
Be radically open minded and radically transparent to have rapid learning and effective change.
Learning is a real time continious feedback loop as we make decisions, see their outcome and improve our understanding of reality as we see the results.
Being open minded and transparent helps you in having an efficient learning process, the more open minded you are the less likely you will deceive yourself and the more others will give you feedback in an honest way.
Don't let fears of what others think of you stand in your way, being transparent helps you in understanding yourself and understanding others.
When we know what is true, we will have less misunderstandings, will be more efficient and focus on what matters.
Unhide and open up by embracing openess and transparency and this will bring meaningful work and meaningful relationships.

Adapted from Principles, Ray Dalio

Balance

You wake up in the morning, full of hope and looking for the new day.

You go off balance for a reason or another and you temporary lose your focus and your state of relaxed alertness, you subsequently make a mistake, then you start a chain reaction of bad choices and poor judgement that totally spoil your day and can cost you time, money and loss of relationships without any control from your part, like a sea wave that strikes the shore.

What went wrong? You simply lost your balance and when you lose your balance you get pulled in different directions reaching undesired outcomes.

Every action is consequential and can provoke an undesired chain reaction which blows everything off.

You have to train to stick to your core when under pressure, and keep your eyes on the ball, stay focused and relaxed.

It takes a lot of effort, meditation, prayers and relaxed mind to be able to sense and capture the right signals of the mind and the surrounding environment (family, work, business environment, financial markets) adjusting your mindset to the singnals of the environment is another area of development too through having an open mind, being able to entertain an idea without accepting it and eliminating inner conflicts to have the right decision and best response to life events.

Life is not meditation in isolation while running away from reality, it is about finding the right balance between practicality and the ability to dream making a small dent of change in the world.

Find your balance now!

Separation

Imagine an object in space that’s been separated from anything that could cause friction or movement – well, that object will still be in motion. This is the law of conservation of momentum at work, which shows us that it is natural for such objects to be forever in motion without any cause.

Separation is the action or state of moving or being moved apart..
Separation is the division of something into constituent or distinct elements.

Separation can mean many things — from divorce to the absence of a loved one during a leave of duty. Whether you are going through a permanent or temporary separation, you may feel lost to yourself, heartbroken, and disoriented. By taking the time to feel sad, connect with others, and feed your own joy, you will cope effectively with your separation.

Allow yourself to feel what you feel
Let is go the time it goes, there is no time for grief to go.
Remember the good times, allow yourself to have bad days, find your inner peace.
Smile and live your life.

Now after all of this classic selfhelp, what really happened and what can you do?
Yes you have lost her, you will never see her again, the beautiful smile, the giggeling laughter, the talks, the walks, the dreams evaporating, the destinations that you will never go to again , the restaurants that will eternally smell the sad scent of rupture. You tried to save her but you couldn't, you wanted to but you couldn't, she keept on smiling and fighting cheering you through the way but everything comes to an end and here comes separation with all of its capturing emotions, feelings of irreversible loss and damage to the soul. Separation punches your face, and hammers your head and makes you feel irrelevant like one million little pieces floating in a sea if inexistence and hoplessness.
There is nothing you can do to get your loss back, the time that will never come again, the hurt emotions, the miserable tears and the mountain of existential vaccum that cripples your soul.
You can't get her off your mind, you just can't let go and move forward.

Your moments are what you take from your life, this why photography is the art of preserving moments which will never comeback and this is the nature of life, you have to accept your feelings, absorb reality and live through your moments like a moments in photos, whenever you are missing, get into your memory and roll your imsgination on, get the beautiful moment out, enjoy it and move on through the tough reality for the sake of fulfilling your life purpose and for the sake of love, pure love

The power of Concentration

You Can Do It  if You  Believe You Can

Concentration is the act of focusing the mind upon a given desire until  ways and means for its realization have been worked out and successfully  put into operation.

First is forming a habit which is a mental path that your actions have gone through several times. You have to remove the obtacles, pave the mental path and then travel it while  forgetting the temptations of the old habits. It not who you are , it is who you become.

Next the environment, you have to immerse yourself in books, attend conferences, community, relevant news, socialmedia and have the relevant training within your area of concentration. Your environment will help you in attracting the right ideas and tools necessary to accomplish your definite chief aim. Your environment is a magnet that helps in turning your dreams into reality. Surround yourself with people who inspire you.

Concentration is the ability to keep your mind and expertize on the subject until you finally master it.
Control your attention and focus on a problem until you solve it.

In order to ignite your concentration, you have to restore your ambition and desire. See yourself 5 or 10 years from now, where do you want to be ? Where are your dreams? Do you still have any? There is nothing that can make up a lost imagination.

Get the magic key of concentration, one thing at a time, one step at a time, quit living in the past and the days that would never return.
Re-create yourself!

Can you buy happiness ?

Can you buy happiness ?
You can’t become happy through external things like success or wealth. It’s only by looking inside yourself that you can find real joy

Happiness is thought as a momentary, fleeting feeling. The intensity and duration depend on circumstances outside their control.

Real, profound happiness is something more: it comes with having a healthy state of mind.

The way you think, live and perceive the world around you has a major impact on your mental well-being.

Seek happiness within yourself, not from the outside world.

You can’t buy happiness. In fact, external factors in general have a limited impact on happiness. Wealth and social status do have some effect on your happiness, but they only account for about 10 to 15 percent of it.

Happiness would be out of reach if it was purely an external phenomenon. After all, our desires know no limits; the amount of control we have over the world, in contrast, is very limited.
Consider love, for example. There’s no way to ensure that your lover will always love you back. So if your happiness depends on that, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment and heartbreak.
A person might get excited about buying a new car, for example, only to have that joy squashed when a newer model comes out. That’s what happens when you seek happiness in the outside, instead of focusing on your inner being.
When you have an interior life,” she wrote, “it certainly doesn’t matter what side of the prison fence you’re on.”
Happiness is not the same thing as pleasure.
Long-lasting happiness shouldn’t be confused with pleasure. A lot of people assume that fame or wealth would bring them all they desire, but such things offer only short-term satisfaction and won’t have much influence on your well-being.
Suffering is universal and unavoidable, but that our pain doesn’t actually stem from the suffering we experience. Rather, it stems from the unhappiness we create.
Free yourself from your own ego.
A person who clings to a specific self-image will do anything to make sure that that image is recognized and accepted.
Real confidence and inner peace can only be achieved through egolessness.
Detaching from your ego makes you less vulnerable and gives you inner strength, putting you on the path toward true, profound happiness
Thoughts and emotions can be your best friends – but they can also be your worst enemies.
Examine your negative thoughts and emotions so you can overcome them and achieve inner peace.
You can only understand your negative thoughts by thinking deeply about their roots. You’ll be able to deconstruct them and see that, at the core, they don’t have any substance.
Achieving long-lasting happiness is hard work. It requires overcoming your ego, reconciling yourself to negative emotions, reorienting your world view and re-examining the definition of concepts like “happiness” and “pleasure.” You can’t do those things overnight, but if you stay dedicated to the path, you can bring yourself to a high sense of sukha – an achievement much more fulfilling than any temporary pleasure you might get from wealth or fame.

Practice Gratitude
Love and accept yourself
Learn to let go
Live in the now
Embrace uncertainty
Proritize your health
Take time to play

Reference Happiness by Matthieu Ricard, blinkist.
http://blinki.st/fea8a39b1243?chapter=56b8a8cdd119f90007000014

Confidence is Capital

The day you start trusting yourself is the day you start living.

According to Napoleon Hill, There are six fears in life that you should master in order to have the ultimate confidence:
-Fear of poverty: you will not starve
-Fear of ill health: exercise
-Fear of old age: age is a number
-Fear of criticism: find merit in criticism
-Fear of loss of love: keep your doors open
-Fear of death: value each day of your life

Our decisions shape our destinty, each and every little decision, the decision what to eat, who to marry, where to work, the sort of career you have, whether to have a startup or remain as an employee, each and every decsion has consequences on the short term and long term. So, what's new about this? There is a fine line that connects your self confidence and your ability to make decisions, when life is happening, you trust that everything is falling into place and that you are that incredible genius that the world awaits, that you really matter in history and all of this self agrandizing things. When you just fall back according to some mispriced values, you start to have doubts about your capabilities and you start to overthink and your actions become paralysed.

Why do we all fall sometimes into the trap that we can control the boat through controlling the river flow and direction? We can't actually control the intensity of the journey nor the exact direction, we try to sail but we have to remain open to new possibilities that our own life self perceived drift has created. As long as we trust ourselves that we can be wrong and that most people are wrong most of the time, we will be able to entertain ideas critically and more objectively , we will take off the burden of the daily decision making and focus on what really matters which is the quality of our life jouney, not the destination.
Trust your ability to sail, embrace yourself in making mistakes and never lose trust in your ability to live and make decisions. Live it!

Find Yourself

Finding yourself could be a very interesting question.

Is it about finding your existing self or the self you aspire to have? What are the values that make you , what values are holding you back? Is your self stable or dynamic, is it stagnant or flowing? What is your core? What do you do on daily basis that goes along your self values, what else stems from your aspiring selves? How some of your actions contradict all aspects of the self?

The self is like a house that has values as foundations while expanding on building bricks each and every day through small acts with people that finally build you into who you aspire to be. A self full of energy keeping the right energy and learning in.
The relationship with the self shouldn't be a love hate relationship, it is a long term relation where you accept your limitations, pour energy on your seeds of growth and allow yourself to flourish and become a better person.

Please escape any label that limits you; you are not old, age is a number, you are not broke, money is an idea, if you are single , life is not marriage.
You are not the type of person who gets annoyed easily, you have just become that and by being loyal to your assumed self, you keep on interacting the same way.

Your view of yourself will expand with your connection to the world and other humans through small acts of goodness, write a blog and send it to your close friends, smile, ask about a friend or relative, try to help someone ir do a free service today, it will definitely enrich your day and add one brick at a time for your future self.

Today, be the joy to the world and try to conceptualize the concept of self from an ego-driven to a reality-driven mindset through your small acts, and if you can't do anything, just smile and you will have a better day

You are a Baby

You are a Baby.

Yes you are, each and everyone has baby inside him/her that has never grown up.

A baby who looks for recognition, a baby who looks for love, acceptance, cheering, delight and pampering.
A baby who wants someone to pick him/her up whenever it falls, a baby who wants a hand for calm, a baby looking for someone to dry the tears and wash away the fears.
You can sometimes go emotional about something and cry over it , whether it is a lover, a business opportunity or big toy like a car or diamond ring! You just can't let it go.

An expansive angle is to enjoy your baby mentality and use the enthuthiasm which is a driving force behind your creativity and mind enriching activities while getting more self control about your crying episodes.
Also.critically, try to understand the elevator's ups and downs by enjoying the ride and being less critical of yourself and those around you.

Babies teach through their creative genius and their deep concentration and undivided attention while doing one thing at a time.

Learn to explore the new, make multiple combinations,make mistakes and keep pushing forward like a baby.

There is no stronger lesson in life than seeing a baby learning to walk, the baby tries, falls, again and again in patience resilience until the baby finally walks. The baby never loses hope and knows it will rise in the end.

Enjoy the baby within you.

Message of Gratitude

"The goodness of human nature is like water tending to flow downward. Just as there is no water that does not flow downward, there are no humans who do not have Goodness".

So proud of my mother; a real fighter, lived her life with a strong spirit, was never afraid of death, was appreciating the gift of life each and every day, giving support to her family and friends and never complaining. The beautiful free spirit will always live in each and everyone they have had a trace with, a smile, an advice, a warm welcome, real sincerity and real gratitude and gratification.
The charm, niceness, unconditional love and beautiful heart and soul will live forever,
I would like to thank you for always being inspiring, with your strength,your wisdom, your humour, your charm, your intelligence and you wit. You always stood by me and you are always my last escape. Your tenderness and foresight are always amazing. Your smile is the most amazing with a lot of confidence and hope.

Today one month after you are gone to a better place, I write this message of gratitude for you and all of my family and friends creating a message of love and hope to help maintain your spark as per your life time values.

Always open up for those who support you , remember when you moved through dark times, when in most in need, those who always noticed the positive about you , took care of you, enjoyed your sheer presence, made contribution with their time, gave genuine advice, stood by each other and reflected on you.

The time of challenge brings light, people sit together, talk with each other , cry with each other, and light the flame with each other. Just be there.

The small acts you make in everyday life can have huge impact on the lives of many though it might look traditional or less exciting.
Always see the positive in everyone and everything, be less critical of situations and embracing of people.

May you be happy
May you be safe
May you be at peace
Love you

Your Spark will Always Live.

Expand Your Boundaries

The world offers different perspectives to different eyes. In order to expand your mind, you have to have to try to see the world differently, imagine you are an old man, you will see the world differently from a toddler, each has the same tool, the eyes and they are both in the same place but they see the world differently. The old man sees a restaurant where he used to hang out with his beloved,  a flowers shop where he used to get her flowers, a walk tbrough where they used to walk together embracing winds of change, intellectual conversations and life hopes.
The child sees the toy shop , his mind wanders around choclate and the immense pleasure and instant gratification the child will get after eating the chocolate fountain.

Today use the same as-if mindset while you have your normal walk, see the world as an old man, see it as a child, see it a married, see it as single, see it as rich,see it as poor, see it as healthy and see it as sick, just as you go along your way, try to change your perspectice continiously, don't limit yourself with one view, wear different lenses and see how this would magnify your experience of the world. It will help you enrich your life and push the boundaries of your existential life9
When we think our perspecrives are universal
We close our minds to different perspectives (The Path)

Will you try not trying?

Life is about trying and failing over and over again.
Whatever bad the situation is, you keep on trying, you lose your job keep trying, you lose your love , you keep trying, you get sick and you keep trying. The trying mantra has become the soundtrack of many of our lives. The decision to give up is as tough as the decision to keep on trying, this paradox paralyses a lot of lives and delays a lot of important decisions.

How can we resolve this trying or giving up paradox?

1- What' s the decision? Is it based on facts or information? If it is based on facts , we can classify facts into important and unimportant; we can disregard information as noise.

2- What values do you use? What sort of metric are you giving to the decision? Are you checking all the angles and do you have the right metric? Does it fit how you want to see your lifelong legacy? Is it useful,or is it fake?

3- Is it worth your time and effort? There are always  different options, you may have to expand your angles to view the decision from different perspectives? Nothing is absolute and nothing is definitive, everything changes and life doesn't follow a linear path, what you love today might ruin you tomorrow and today's struggle might be tomorrow's salvation.

As per Trying Not to Try Book:  In the Chinese conception, you’re encouraged to move with ease throughout life, avoiding any difficulties that might harm your spirit.

Well, Chinese philosophers have a word for this experience – wu-wei. Pronounced “oooo-way,” it roughly translates as “effortless acting.”

Another Chinese approach stop trying to be a specific way, to forget all you’d learned and connect with a raw version of yourself
The only way to wu-wei was to do absolutely nothing
thinking less with the conscious mind and more with the unconscious

You need to guide your whole life by the principle of generosity and dedicate yourself to it in everything you do.

Focus to the present and try to simply notice the moment and avoid analyzing your every thought and action.

Decisive book indicated We think narrowly; we’re biased by previous choices, personal values and short-term emotions; and we’re overconfident about our decisions.

Opportunity Cost is what you give up when you make your choice, it is not just yes or no, it could a set of many other options that you can expand your mind exploring if you have the time,just find the golden balance between the value of optionality and falling in the paradox of choice.

You are not special as you think you are and many people have previously solved similar problems, this also means that you are not cursed or something and that things are just the way they are because of a big picture reason, so why not reserach a role model which can guide you in your decision to try or not to try?

In sum, take it easy in yourself as most of your overthinking will not affect your life in 10 years but rather your actions will determine your future, just value the time and energy you are willing to put through the different angles of your decision making  before the pursuit of "Never Give Up" or "Don't Try".

Reference:
Decisive by Chip and Dan Heath on Blinkist.
http://blnk.to/bee88007
Trying Not to Try by Edward Slingerland on Blinkist.

http://blnk.to/1045947f

Don't Let Yourself Down

One step at a time,one breath at a time, one smile at a time and take it easy on yourself. The more you seek positivity the more negative you will become , don't run after success or you will keep feeling as a failure. Don't seek love and  acceptance in otherwise you will feel lonely and rejected.
Stop looking for positivity and be comfortable with yourself and open to the world as always, it is surprising to let yourself down that you let your emotions control your thoughts and make you feel bad, emotions are just emotions, let them fly in the air
like bubbles and let them go.

Life will have its ups and down as if you are an elevator operator so live with it and take the bumps of change.
The transformation you want and that frustrates you will happen eventually, just give life a chance to unfold and stop trying to force life as life needs to blossom on its own and its pace.
Tip of the day: Stop thinking and enjoy the next breath you take and unchain yourself from hopes, expectations and the past, just take a breath and feel the beauty within you now .
The day you start trusting yourself is the day you start living

Think "As If"

Everything slowly becomes something or part of something else, the baby becomes a boy and the boy becomes a man and the man becomes an old man and the old man becomes a soul.

To manage the change in our lives we have keep an open mind to the world and adopt an "as if" mindest.
The "as if" mindset unblocks the brain's creativity from the existing reality and helps creating the first step of change and transandence.

Let's go through different examples of "as if" situations:

You are overweight , you can't control your food intake as you can't control your thoughts and you spontaneouty eat as you see food, how would the "as if" mindset help you?
How if you act "as if" you are in control, you would ask yourself "I am I eating out of emotion or out of hunger"? You would then trigger self control each time you eat brainlessly.
If you act "as if" you are an athlete, you would avoid unnecessary processed food and eat healthy real food.

What if you just lost a loved one? The "as if" mindset will help you think that you are still acting as if your loved one is still here watching you and would enjoy your thriving and success, you will not let the loved one with deterioration and self pity, they would love to see you strong and you have to create the alternative reality that helps you achieve.

What if you are getting older or sick and think that life is slipping drop by drop from your hand, why don't you think "as if" age is a number and that you are healthy "as if" you have all the time in the world to do whatever you want.
The "as if" mentality will help you in getting clarity on how you unlock your mind and potential, forget your past and create a new reality where you are free.

If you are facing a struggle or a failure in your life, accept it and don't try to change it as trying and failure makes you tired and exhausted. The next step after not trying is creating an "as if" mindset which would help in accepting reality while slowly making ever lasting transformative change .

Awakened Heart.

When life knocks you down, it can be hard to get back up.
We can also learn to approach life in a way that allows us to accept any obstacles that confront us
This strategy allows us to stay strong in times of adversity and keep calm in times of danger.

In these blinks, you’ll also learn

Why loneliness can be cool;
Why fear is nothing to be scared of; and
How we experience death every day.

Fear is our first reaction as we get closer to the truth behind a problem we’re facing.
You need to understand your fear on a deeper level by taking time to reflect on it.
First thing we need to do to change this is to realize that our lives are in constant flux; things fall into place, fall apart and come together again in unexpected ways.
Create space in your life to let things happen.
the shifting nature of life had brought them an entirely new solution

Loneliness is the perfect opportunity for self-observation and self-love.
Every day, we juggle our work lives and social engagements, doing our best to improve ourselves and constantly aiming to achieve bigger and better things. Once you start using the middle way to face your moments of loneliness, you’ll begin to embrace them as opportunities for self-observation; in fact, you could even turn time alone into meditation sessions.

Hope has a surprisingly detrimental impact on our lives.
The Tibetan language captures the relationship between hope and fear especially accurately. In Tibetan, the word for hope is rewa, while fear translates as dopka. The word re-dok refers to the combination of hope and fear, a feeling whose duality captures our perpetual dissatisfaction with ourselves.

Celebrating impermanence, suffering and egolessness brings us closer to the meaning of life.

Why do we exist?
It’s in our best interests to celebrate impermanence,
we can do so by recognizing it during times of new beginnings. When someone is born, when you fall in love with someone new or even when you start the day full of energy, by embracing the idea that these beginnings come with their own unique endings, you’ll become more mindful of impermanence and the way it shapes our lives.

Suffering is another inevitable part of our lives. As the saying goes, there’s no pleasure without pain.
It reminds us that we can’t always get what we want, and helps us feel happier about our current state of affairs.

By embracing egolessness, we can learn to feel at ease with our past and future, and thus learn to live in the moment.

Being compassionate toward others allows us to love ourselves more deeply.
Practicing compassion toward others can make you more accepting of yourself at the same time.
Building relationships with those that society has rejected is much the same as getting in touch with the parts of himself that he’d rejected for so long.
By practicing tonglen, where we turn pain into joy through meditations on our own breathing. Start by thinking of someone who suffers. Hold them in your thoughts as you breathe in his or her pain. Then, as you exhale, breathe out the joy you’d like them to feel

Here are three ancient strategies you can use.
First no more struggle-Embrace
Second using poison as medicine – in other words, using times of suffering as a wake-up call.
The final strategy is the manifestation of awakened energy, or the practice of recognizing that everything is alive and perfect the way it is.

By incorporating self-acceptance, calm reflection and a deeper appreciation for the present moment into your day-to-day life, you’ll be better equipped to confront challenging times. Taking the time to learn about your fears, flaws and difficulties, while embracing even the most unpleasant parts of life, can also bring you closer to friends and family – and strangers too.

Actionable advice:

Accept the place where you are right now.

Hey, I'm reading When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chödrön on Blinkist. Blinkist offers the best knowledge from nonfiction in powerful, memorable packs.

http://blinki.st/fea8a39b1243?chapter=58b4111b8566cb0004c1f409

Long Term Thinking for a Short-Sighted World

The root of many of the world's problems is our own short-sightedness and inability to see the big picture.
Those blinks will set you on the path of the long term consequences of the actions we take.

Open your mind to a long-term view.
If we hadn’t invented glasses some time ago, shortsighted people would have a serious problem.
It’s not only our eyes but our minds  that are shortsighted.

Once upon a time, our shortsightedness was beneficial;finding food, for instance, and avoiding predators.
When faced with the problem of malaria-carrying mosquitoes on the Asian island of Borneo, the World Health Organization (WHO) responded by spraying vast areas of the island with DDT
Due to WHO’s shortsightedness, the Royal Air Force was forced to airdrop cats into Borneo’s affected areas to bring the rat population back down.

"We are the only species that has the capacity to alter our environment so profoundlyto make it unlivable"

We place a huge importance on time and getting things done efficiently, so why is it so difficult for us to consider the long-term consequences of our actions
We can only truly understand what we’re able to experience, so the longest stretch of time we can really comprehend is around 80 years or so, which is next to nothing relative to 4.6 billion years of earth's life.
Though we struggle to deal with deep time, we excel at living by the seconds and minutes of the clock.
So what are the long-term effects of running our lives by the clock?
This pressure to make snap decisions and provide fast results often adversely affects the quality of our responses.
We also tend to eschew long-term solutions like dieting and exercise, instead favoring drugs that relieve our immediate symptoms.
This mentality can lead to returning symptoms – often worse than before – and deteriorating health.

Automobiles are a prime example of short-term thinking.
No thought was given to the long-term impact they would have on human society.
Wars have been waged and thousands of lives lost in the name of that automotive necessity, oil.
Still worse, number of lives lost in every war, falls far short of the number of lives lost in car accidents.
There are other, more existential issues that cars cause; each driver, for instance, exists within his own personal bubble, separated by glass and steel from his fellow man.
It’s exactly this kind of isolation and dissociation from one’s neighbor that can lead to the erosion of local communities.

Unlike cars, your neighborhood’s small businesses are great at bringing people together.
When a small business opens up in a neighborhood, unlike a chain store, they can’t just pack up and relocate if customers are unhappy, which gives them an incentive to try extra hard.
Local businesses also help their area’s economy by keeping on average 55 cents of every dollar spent within their community.
And with a strong local economy, there’s less need to use resources for long-distance shipping and transportation, both of which damage the environment.
By helping create a strong local economy, new local businesses will emerge and your community will be in good shape for future prosperity..

There’s a good chance you or someone you know has had to deal with the stressful problem of getting out of debt.
Getting in debt in the first place is often the result of short-term thinking.
Credit cards are an easy way to rack up debt, and they’re a shining example of costly shortsightedness.
The logic behind using a credit card is the very definition of short-term thinking. You’re essentially saying, “I’ll buy this now and worry about paying for it later.”
By promoting credit cards, our financial system is actually encouraging us to use short-term thinking and get ourselves weighed down with debt. This system is only concerned with stimulating the economy, and since people who’ve accumulated debt are people who’ve spent money, the individual details don’t matter. The economy is being stimulated.
But this doesn’t change the fact that it’s in the best interest of the economy to give people credit cards and promote mindless consumerism.
If people don’t spend, companies lose money and employees get laid off, which leads to even less spending and even more people losing their jobs.
On the other hand, our economy can’t withstand all this debt either, and there will eventually be a breaking point.
People need to realign their values with the things that bring true, long-term happiness.

A return to long-term sustainability means a return to small farming,
Once you start thinking about long-term prosperity, it becomes clear that new energy sources must be developed.
Even though we tend to focus on our individual problems, we’re also responsible for the world we live in.

Think sustainability and always put the long term generations in your decisions.

Adapted fro. Long-Term Thinking for a Short-Sighted World by Jim Brumm on Blinkist. Blinkist offers the best knowledge from nonfiction in powerful, memorable packs.

http://blinki.st/fea8a39b1243?chapter=58a8da9995f5390004fb0fd2

Irresistable

Understand exactly why you should limit your time in front of screens and devices.

If you are reading this you are almost certainly looking at a screen of a smartphone, tablet or computer. And chances are this isn’t the only time you’ve looked at a screen today.
What's wrong with that?

There’s a heightened risk of getting addicted.
We’ll get down to the roots of this irresistibility and offer some advice to obviate the problem

In this blog you will know
-That you probably spend twice as much time online as you think you do;
-Why answering emails quickly isn’t productive; and
-why you get so much pleasure from all those likes on Facebook.

How would you feel if you couldn’t use your smartphone for a day? How about an entire week?
Perhaps you’ve asked yourself whether you’re spending too much time on your phone and not enough time with your friends and loved ones.
Moment’s purpose is to collect user data and determine exactly how much time people are spending glued to their mobile devices https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.zerodesktop.appdetox.qualitytime

Video games are another majorly addictive technology

We’ll take a closer look at the science behind addiction and what you can do to help keep yourself from getting hooked

The situations we find ourselves in often contribute a great deal to the development of an addiction.
Addiction was now beginning to seem less like an affliction only suffered by the weak of will and more like something that could happen to anyone, given the right circumstances.
Many substances provide feedback that hits the brain’s pleasure centers, and when this is combined with a situation from which we might want to escape – the horrors of war, for instance – you get the perfect recipe for addiction.
Technology also has the power to stimulate our pleasure centers.
Dopamine is released in the brain, which in turn sets off a feeling of intense pleasure.
This initial pleasure gradually decreases when the behavior is repeated. This causes people to make the addiction worse by spending more and more time online
Since behavioral addictions are less intense than drug addictions, they’re also easier to kick.
Email can be addictive, unhealthy and hurt productivity, so disable your notification systems.
Responding to an email within a few seconds of receiving it is just another addictive behavior and it actually reduces the quality of our work.
Disable your email notifications and set infrequent times to check your email.

The “like” button is a perfect example of an unpredictable reward. When we roll the dice and come up with the winning number, that rush of pleasure is especially addictive.

Children need to be protected from the dangers of technology addiction.
Too much time in front of a screen can actually affect a child’s empathy.
We don’t know the full extent of how digital media will affect the lives of today’s schoolchildren.
It’s important for children to learn that boredom, as well as physical and emotional challenges, are a fact of life that will require patience and hard work. The effortless entertainment of computers and mobile devices can undermine this important lesson.
Relying on willpower alone to change your behavior is a risky proposition; substitution, on the other hand, is a much more reliable method.
Realism, which offers a new routine: looking at the real world around you instead of the virtual world inside your phone.

Before you can move forward, you have to take the first step and acknowledge that the problem is there. So take a moment, turn off your devices and ask yourself: How irresistible has technology become in your life?

Action
Avoid opening more than two tabs on your internet browser

Adapted fron Irresistible by Adam Alter on Blinkist.

http://blinki.st/fea8a39b1243?chapter=58bd5b500d93aa00045b76d6

What We Say Matters

The words we speak establish our relationships with others and ourselves.

Words can build trust and can express sincerity, appreciation and courtesy, but words can also sow the seeds of discord.
Sometimes, we choose words that hurt other people’s feelings,We might not intend to be mean, but it’s the manner in which we express ourselves that causes resentment. So how can we communicate honestly without hurting other people’s feelings?

You’ll also learn:
How to tell your housemate to clean dishes?
Why making requests can be like offering gifts; and
How you can best talk to yourself.

Speaking truthfully and without harming others increases the well-being of everyone involved.
Speaking has profound effects on our well-being and the world around us.
The way we speak reflects how we view ourselves, as well as our opinions of others.
The way we speak also affects the way our discussions unfold.

"You’re so messy, you don’t give a damn about the house!”"
Instead of calmly stating your feelings, instead of communicating clearly about the issue, you both end up angry and argumentative.

So, how can you approach such situations to maximize your well-being as well as that of the other person?
Using right speech, language that’s truthful but not harmful.

Nonviolent communication allows you to speak in an honest, nonjudgmental way.
The first two elements of nonviolent communication are observations and feelings.
An observation is simply a statement of facts, Feelings, on the other hand, are signals sent by your subconscious that tell you whether your needs are being met.
By combining observations with feelings, you can make a nonviolent statement of truth like, “when I see dishes on the kitchen counter, I feel frustrated".
The next step to nonviolent communication is to express needs and requests.
Needs are things like food, security or creative expression.
A request needs to be present and doable.
When you combine all of the above components, you can say something like, “when I see ........ I feel frustrated because my need for ........ isn’t met. Would you be willing to ...... .. within the next 30 minutes?”

The final thing in NVC is making genuine requests, never demands. This means being open to the possibility that your request will not be accepted.

Focusing on your needs and empathizing with others can help you overcome and avoid unpleasant feelings.
Judgment and anger can often prevent people from communicating truthfully without harming others.
Fear of judgment causes people to agree to things that don’t meet their needs.
Acting without meeting your needs will leave a negative residue.
Empathy can help you avoid angry feelings altogether.
Sharing our feelings and needs as a form of gift-giving.
We can use empathy to improve communication  while defending their need for respect and autonomy.

By honestly expressing our feelings and needs while remaining open and avoiding doing harm to others, we can speak the truth without hurting ourselves or others.  

Adapted from What We Say Matters by Judith Hanson Lasater, Ike K. Lasater on Blinkist.

http://blinki.st/fea8a39b1243?chapter=58b4068fafd1210004c15f72

Change your mind & Change your life

At any given time, what we feel is the result of the brain and mind interacting with each other.
Our minds are our mental processes – our thoughts, wishes and feelings.the brain is a highly complex bundle of synapses. Our consciousness is based on the interaction of the mind and the brain.

The purpose of this blog is:
-Be happier
-Stop exacerbating misfortunes
-Become a more compassionate and loving person.

By engaging in self-reflection we can lead happier, more fulfilling lives.
A good example of self-reflection is thinking about what makes us happy?Focus always on the positive.
By actively reflecting on our lives, we enable ourselves to become better people.

Suffering describes all the feelings in life we don’t like and would rather not experience.
Suffering is what we should avoid. Positive feelings is what we should seek out.
The decision is whether to approach something or avoid it.
The approach/avoidance behaviors aid our survival, they can also make us unhappy.
When we can’t attain the things we approach, desire or pursue, or when our desires cause us long-term suffering.
Sometimes,attaining goals can ultimately lead to suffering!

Reactions!Beware of your reactions. When someone strikes you with a dart that causes discomfort, don't through another "Dart of Rage" that causes you more harm.
"Do no harm" to yourself.
For example, if you’re anxious about the speech you have to give tomorrow, that feeling of anxiety can remain for hours – or even days – after you’ve delivered your speech and the source of the first dart has vanished!

The key to happiness lies in certain ways of thinking.
-Mindfulness is the state of complete awareness ;being mindful helps us to feel happy and more relaxed.
-Wholesome intentions, thinking about yourself as strong and powerful. Indeed, by actively thinking “I am strong, it’s good to be strong,
-Practicing composure helps us to control our emotions and reduces any unhealthy desires we may have. Composure is a circuit-breaker. Composure entails understanding how things make you feel, and realizing that your emotional feelings can be separated from your desires. A good example is success. Success makes us feel good, but an endless craving for it can cause us to feel dissatisfied, and even depressed

We suffer, for example, whenever we take things personally, or crave approval or affirmation from others.
Let go of this strong sense of self and immerse ourselves in the world without ego, we feel a sense of peace and fulfillment
However, a strong sense of self often comes in useful, and – through meditation – we can learn when to take things personally and when to step back from ourselves.
With a greater sense of empathy, one can become a more compassionate and loving person.

Action:
-Throughout your everyday life, try to be mindful
-Use mental imagery during interpersonal conflicts.

Adapted from "Buddha's Brain"  by Rick Hanson on Blinkis

http://blinki.st/fea8a39b1243?chapter=53eb4a6d36343300077e0000