God, Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference

- Reinhold Niebuhr

This week, I was asked by one of my clients about the formula for a successful, healthy and happy life, but as much as I wanted to give him the formula, I could not.

“But Ronit, you are a life coach. Why not?” he asked.

“Because my formula is mine”, I said.

“What do you mean yours? Are you saying you don’t want to share it with me?” he asked.

“Of course I want to share it with you, but I don’t believe it’s transferable”, I replied.

“Why not?” he kept asking.

“Because every person has his or her own formula with a unique signature that cannot be duplicated. Because no two people experience the same things, not even in the same situation”, I explained.

“So what is life coaching for?” he asked.

“It is a way of helping you on your personal journey to find your own formula”, I said.

Everyone wants to be successful, healthy and happy. If you examine every desire in life, it falls under one of the categories above. When we get up in the morning, the drive to get to somewhere, whether it is an achievement, a feeling or a state, is the essence of life. We want to get to our destination quickly and easily and formulas can help greatly. When we want success, we want to get it fast, without much effort and with as low a price as possible, so if someone could show us the way there, life would be much easier. When we want a feeling, we want to feel it now and without any heartache or doubt. If we only knew how to trigger the feelings we want and turn off the one we do not, life would be an awesome adventure. When we want to be healthy, we want to take a pill and make all the pain and sickness disappear. The harder life is, the more we wish for the easy life formula.

The quest for a successful, healthy and happy life starts very early, although our definition of that life changes with every new experience and change of circumstances. Unfortunately, so does the formula.

I would say that if you examined your desires every three month, you would find new spins on every definition every time. To illustrate this point, think of what you thought success was in primary school or in high school and how different it is from the way you define success today. I always say that the birth of my first daughter changed many definitions for me regarding success, happiness and even health.

Living on the two sides of the fence called life

People are divided into two groups – the ones that live life aimlessly, surviving from one day to the next, and those who look for the formula and wish to direct their efforts towards a chosen destination, rather than get up in the morning and find themselves in a place they do not like.

The first group adopts an “aimless (go with the flow) life style” and the second group a “planned (or purposeful) life style”. Many people think that going with the flow and taking things as they come is everyone lives, until they suffer pain that is too hard to bear. Others think that everybody plans their life, until they must acknowledge things beyond their control and with their wisdom comes calmness and acceptance.

I can relate to both. I remember myself treating my health aimlessly until my daughter got very sick and I changed. I also remember during my own coaching giving up control over areas that concern other people. I used a different formula for each of these experiences.

There is a lot of freedom and joy in aimless living. It involves fewer worries and more acceptance. You get your paycheck, spend it as you like and who cares about tomorrow. After all, “Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift, that’s why we call it the present”.

Those who prefer to plan might look over the fence and frown, but is there really one side that is better than the other? I think not.

For the people who flow, planned living is too rigid and too frustrating, full of people who try to predict the future and live an illusion of a connection between what they do today and what will happen tomorrow. But for planners, certainty is the currency of life and they believe they can avoid pain most of the time and that is better than flowing and getting hit hard.

Everywhere, we head personal development gurus telling us to set goals and focus on desires. They say that desires are the engine of moving forward. They tell us, “Always plan ahead. It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark”, but is there really one side that is better than the other? I think not.

People on both sides of the fence live life and do the only things they think they know how to do – justify their choices! They say, “My side is the right side and the best side”. I believe a lot of heartache, wars, conflicts, relationship breakdowns and pain exist in the world because people are too focused on justifying their own lifestyle and pushing away other choices. We spend lots of energy shouting to the other side, “My choices are better than yours”. Even religious wars are based on “God loves me more. My beliefs are better than yours”. Are they really?!

I believe that living on either side of the fence is not a problem until you try to convince those on the other side that your side is better. Aimless living is cool, as long as you consider it best for YOU! Planned living is great, as long as you consider it best for YOU!

Because formulas for living well are not transferable. They are personal. You do not need statistics to feel better with your aimless or planned choice and it does not matter if there are more people on your side of the fence or on the other side. The only thing that matters is that wherever you are, you can be successful, healthy and happy by your own definition. If you spend most of your energy on convincing others you are “right”, it defeats the purpose of getting to your destination quickly and easily.

In different areas of life, we probably sit on different sides of different fences and, whether we are on one side or the other, we choose the side we think will give us what we are looking for.

My client asked me about my formula. Now, I share my life philosophy freely with anyone who would like to hear. I even share it with people I have never met, through the many posts I have published, but I have to make it clear – it is mine and mine alone and it is not meant to be copied, because it just will not work for you as it does for me. My experience is meant to be used as a tool to help you find your own life formula, which will be the best for you, regardless of the side of the fence you choose.

Until next time, good luck on your quest for the formula,
Ronit

Why is this? Better yet, once we know why this is, how can we benefit from this knowledge to become happier?

I am so glad you asked…

First, an introduction to human sensory perception (relax, this is the end of big words, except one). Think about a time when you stepped out of your warm home and into a cold street. At first, the feeling is sharp – your face, your ears and your nose seem to drain heat out of your body and pour it out. Then, you start feeling the cold in your fingers and feet. You shiver. Your muscles tighten.

But then, the strangest thing happens. As time goes by, you feel the cold less and less, until you can stay outside as long as you like. Although the temperature does not change anymore, it seems to be going UP for you, because you feel more and more comfortable.

Turns out the human nervous system mostly notices changes – a drop or a rise in temperature, more or less pressure on the skin or joints, the presence of a chemical in the nose or on the tongue, the presence or absence of a particular sound and the presence or absence of light in a particular color. Scientists call this “excitation”. When the temperature, pressure, chemical concentration, sound or light stays the same, our system gets used to it. Scientists call this “habituation”, from the word “habit”.

To test this yourself right now, fix your eyes on something that is bright white, like one of the lights on the ceiling. Count to 10 and then come back here.

Go ahead, I’ll wait.

What you probably see now is a dark spot in the shape and size of the light but in “negative”. If you blink, you will see the light again when your eyes are closed and the “negative” when they are open.

This happens because as you stare at the light, the cells in your eyes “get used” to the light and become less sensitive to it. When you look somewhere else, it notices all the other colors, but not the color of the light until some time has passed.

The same happens with our emotions and especially with happiness. When something really great happens to us – we bump into someone we like, somebody buys us flowers or our kids give us a hug – there is a difference between our degree of happiness before and after, so we feel very happy very quickly. We get excited.

However, as times goes by, the effect of that encounter, those flowers and that hug fade, our emotional system gets used to them and we blend them into the background until we are back. We become habituated.

It actually gets worse, oddly enough.

Research on porters at a loading dock measured their physical response to going in and out of cold storage. The difference in temperature was 40 degrees Celsius (72 Fahrenheit). Experienced porters adapted so quickly to the temperature changes, they hardly noticed them anymore.

So what happens when you work around people you like every day? What happens when you get flowers every week? What happens when your kids hug you a lot? We get used to it. It becomes a habit and no longer excites us.

This can become a challenge in very common situations, like marriage, parenting and work. The hunt is over, we got the girl/boy, we even have kids together, no more romantic excitement, now what? Kids do well in Math, keep bringing home those good results, nobody gets excited anymore, now what? Work is great and fulfilling, then stops being new, we already know what happens next, now what?

The solution is a combination of variety, gratitude and updating our emotional position in life (our “normal” state).

More variety for more happiness

It is easy to see that a boring life leads to unhappiness. Therefore, it is also easy to see that making changes spices life up and leads to happiness.

Changes can be very small, like rearranging the position of the furniture in the living room, putting flowers on the dining table, switching from plain white napkins to colorful ones, drinking in special glasses for a week and so on.

Changes can be bigger, like painting a room, clearing the garage, doing up the garden or dining at a restaurant. Really big changes might be getting a new car, moving house and changing jobs.

Whatever you change, as long as it is OK with everyone, the level of happiness around the house will increase for a while. If you keep changing things from time to time, you will generate more happiness.

When you plan your changes, watch out for negative reactions, like worrying about the effects on your finances of buying a new car. Start with smaller changes, get everybody on board and gradually notice together how your happiness increases until you like making changes and can make bigger ones.

More gratitude for more happiness

There is a limit to the things you want to change. A few obvious ones are your family members and most of your physical features.

What you can do is feel grateful for the good things in your life. Make a list of them, read your list every day, express your gratitude to the people around you who make you happy and watch your happiness grow.

Here is a list of things many people take for granted, at least after a while. See if it makes you any happier to notice that you have them:

• Having a home
• Being healthy (even mostly healthy)
• Having access to the Internet
• Living in a free country where you are not afraid of the government
• Being able to send the kids to school for 12 years
• Living in peace
• Being able to buy food in abundance at the supermarket, rather than hunting, gathering or growing all of it

Feeling any better?

How to raise your emotional position

There is a girl we know, who was a school captain, who is a truly fine performing artist, playing violin and percussions, singing and dancing, and who always, always smiles.

We have seen her in stressful situations, being in the middle of a mess and organizing her friends with a big smile on her face. We have seen her playing music, singing and dancing many times with a big smile on her face. She comes from an large family and we know she did not always have all the equipment she needed. To our family, this girl is the ultimate role model.

Smiling takes you to a happier place. As simple as it may seem, smiling works miracles. It is a chemical thing.

Try it.

Yes, now. Come on. Smile.

Feeling any better?

Keep smiling, then.

When you smile, you do things better, quicker and you think they are easier. Then, you get better results and this makes you happier.

When you smile, people tend to smile back at you, making your world a happier place, full of smiling people. Then, it is easier to smile more and you become happier.

When you smile at people, they are far more willing to help you, so you have less friction and more cooperation. Being “on the same wavelength” with others will make it even easier to smile and keep you happier longer.

Not a smiling person? Remember the movie Hook? Grown up Peter Pan needed a happy thought to lift his spirits so he could fly. Think of your kids. If they are no longer cute and cuddly, think of them when they were cute and cuddly and SMILE. Feel the tingle in your ears and neck, show your teeth, raise your cheeks, imagine yourself holding your kids for the first time, throwing them up in the air with excitement, bouncing with them on a trampoline or swinging with them at the playground.

Does this feel good or what?!

Now, do this first thing every morning and your whole day will start on a positive note. Things will go your way, you will be pleasantly surprised and your happiness will keep growing as you smile your way through the day.

Have a happy day,
Gal

Stress is a feeling of pressure that produces adrenalin and creates a sense of urgency. Stress is exhausting and limits our ability to respond. There are so many physical symptoms linked to stress that some theories suggest most of humanity’s problems are caused by stress. Some of the symptoms are irritability, inability to focus, headaches, increased heart rate, muscle tension, insomnia (inability to sleep), confusion, high blood pressure, frequent illness and various types of pain.

Living in stress is like living in an ambulance all your life. You are on the road most of the day, you live in a small space, not many people around, everything is difficult, your decisions are all about life and death, mistakes are critical, there is no time to waste, not time for fun, not enough time and space to make your own meals, you see (too) many doctors, you develop a dark view of the world from frequent exposure to accidents, drink driving, violence and self neglect. Through the eyes of the stressed person life sucks!

There are many reasons for people to feel stressed. Often, it is the accumulation of more than one source of stress that creates enough pressure to exhaust people.

Historically, body’s mechanism to handle a real threat was the “fight or flight” response, which would a massive surge of energy for a short period of time. However, when this mechanism is triggered too often, our body runs out of energy.

Unfortunately, over the years, people started to react strongly to frequent, minor triggers. Something that someone says to us can be a threat, something that does not happen the way we expect can be a threat, but those things build up until our response to them is similar to “fight or flight”.

Even more unfortunately, this trend is only increasing.

What can cause stress?

Poor diet

Unfortunately, when stressed, people tend to eat things that interfere with the absorption of nutrients. Lack of vitamins and minerals can cause stress, creating a vicious cycle – you are stressed, therefore you do not eat well, but then your body lacks nutrients and you become more stressed…

In this case, it is important in stressful situations to stick to healthy eating. Have an emergency plan for emergency situations and stick to it. If you are stressed, ask yourself “What do I need to eat to give my body enough nutrients for me to relax?”

Change

Most people find it hard to deal with change. Even planned changes like moving to a new job or moving to a new house create a sense of pressure, mainly because of the fear of the unknown. If you think about it, the unknown is there all the time, in every second of our life and in order to survive it, we need to stick to controlling what we can. I can control what I do during the move, I can control my actions and behaviors and I can choose a house to suit my needs.

Unplanned changes, like accidents, death, illness or crisis create stress ever more, because of the sudden loss of certainty.

The only thing constant in life is change
- François de la Rochefoucauld

It is important to understand that we are changing all the time and that change and growth go hand in hand. Preparing well to planned changes will help you deal with unplanned changes. In a strange way, you can also be certain that unplanned changes will occur and when they do, your certainty can increase.

No money

Most of the people in the world live a lifestyle that is hard to maintain. Although education is perceived to be free in many countries, children actually cost their parents lots of money. In many places around the world, people do not have enough money for food (have you seen the movie “Slumdog Millionaire“?). If you ask people about the causes of stress (called “stressors”), you will find that lack of money is at the top of the list, causing them many sleepless nights.

Stress regarding money increases during crisis, so the best way to avoid it is to manage your money wisely. Live within your means and always put some extra money for a rainy day.

No time

Lack of time is a growing source of stress in our society. Most people work many hours, long days and do not have time to do all the things they want or have to do. Others are just “time wasters” and are not efficient in their time management. Yet, we all have 24 hours a day and we can manage our time, rather than letting our time manage us. Here are some symptoms of time wasters:

• Being disorganized
• Not knowing how to say “no”
• Planning to do too much for the time allocated
• Not taking time to rejuvenate
• Watching too much TV (this includes YouTube, idle Net surfing and playing video games)
• Inability to delegate properly
• Procrastinating
• Not having good systems
• Having too much clutter and a messy home/desk/shed/office
• Avoiding helpful technology
• Being easily distracted and allowing interruptions

The way to solve the time management issue is to build your time management skills and understand that the difference between being stressed and relaxed is the way you manage your time. Develop techniques and ways to handle your time when you are relaxed. It will help you greatly when you are not.

Relationships

Many people feel pressured regarding their relationships with their boss, partners, friends, parents, in laws, kids, employees, clients, etc. Most of the time, the pressure builds when there is a verbal or non-verbal expectation to behave differently.

The solution to pressure from others is confidence! Personal development is a way of building confidence. You learn about yourself, your desires, your mind and your attitude and you learn to design your life to your advantage.

Inability to switch off

Many people, when feeling stressed, are unable to switch off from working, thinking, taking care of others or any other thing that occupies all of their being. Many times, this can cause insomnia and inability to relax. It is like riding in an ambulance with the siren on all the time. Remember, even an ambulance needs to stop to refuel and recharge. This inability to switch off does not allow people to enjoy coming home from a full day at work or enjoy a holiday they have worked hard to pay for.

Find out how many hours of sleep you need and stick to them. During stressful times, sleep even more, because stress is exhausting. Do not bring work home (if you have to, do it only after your kids are in bed). On holidays, turn your mobile phone (and every other beeping and vibrating device your own) off and avoid checking your emails. During a work day, stop every hour for a stretch, go to the toilet, talk to someone and drink some water. This will help you recharge and function better.

Indecision

Just like the urgency in making decisions in an ambulance, some people find it hard to make decisions. Deciding what house to buy and what dinner to cook can create the same feeling of stress sometimes. In a way, not making a decision is a decision in itself and people fall into the trap of waiting for divine intervention or circumstances that to make the choice for them, but this only increases their insecurity and makes it harder for them to make new decisions.

The way to handle this challenge is to remember that we are not fortune tellers and at any given time, we do the best we can. Also, we are rarely faced with life or death situations. Spaghetti or rice? Who cares? Bring it on!

Lack of significance

Some people are so insecure they depend on others to feel appreciated and happy. The need for others to fill their significance tank creates lots of stress, disappointment and later anger. Those people usually feel unheard, unappreciated and spend a lot of effort pleasing others to gain some acknowledgment, but this is a vicious cycle, because it increases the feeling of dependency and requires more appreciation from others later on.

The way to handle such stress is to learn self appreciation, self love and develop self confidence. There is always something good you can find in yourself – your smile, your manners, your sense of humor, some achievement at work, a good intention, a kind deed. Seek and ye shall find.

Use of drugs

Use of drugs comes with some physical comfort, followed by some form of panic when the drug wears off. The dependency creates lots of pressure, the need for money creates pressure and sometimes the need to hide the use creates a lot of pressure.

The only solution for this is not to use drugs!

Too much alcohol

Alcohol may be legal, but it is still a kind of drug. In the US alone, about 14 million people have been diagnosed with disorders associated with alcohol (not the occasional social drink or wine with dinner, real heavy stuff). Again, the dependency, the money required and the social shame are huge stressors. By the way, alcohol stress is a matter of life and death, because more than 100,000 deaths each year in the US are caused by excessive alcohol.

The solution is not to drink!

Narrow mindedness

Narrow minded people cannot see options in difficult situations. They feel disappointed and frustrated with many conflicts and crises in their life, but do not see any way out of them. This inability to see options and solutions creates lots of stress and a feeling of helplessness.

The way to overcome this problem is to look at situations from different points of view – big picture, more detailed, future perspective or “What would I do if this were a similar situation in a different setting?” Ask yourself “What are my options?”, “What is the worst thing that can happen if I do <each option>?” and “In two years, what will I think about this situation?”

Negativity

Negativity can cause a lot of stress. Negative people see a black future, they find faults in many things, they lack hope and motivation and this drains them of their energy. Being a negative person is like living in an ambulance while only hearing constant pain and expecting that the next patient will die and the next one and the next one … every time, all the time. Negative people forget that the ambulance is all about saving lives.

To change from a negative to a positive mindset requires the ability to see good, do good and respond in a good way to things. Focusing on a positive outcome, visualizing a good future and having positive affirmations can greatly reduce stress. The funny thing is that good exists everywhere and it only takes a decision to start seeing it.

Difficulty to self express

One of the biggest stress-causing challenges is people’s difficulty to express their feelings and their thoughts. When people bottle up, this creates pressure that may one day blow up, more often than not out of proportion.

The solution is always to find someone to talk to. It can be a friend you trust or a professional. Alternatively, you can find a creative way to express yourself. Art provides wonderful ways of self expression. It is a good idea to have such an outlet long before the tension becomes too heavy to bear. In stressful situations, find a way to rearrange your thoughts and sort out your emotions.

Everyone, without any exceptions, experiences stress in life. Being unpredictable and exciting, life contains many stressors. Instead of letting stress control you, take the responsibility of opening the door and getting out of your ambulance. There is a beautiful, safe world out there.

Happy relaxed life,
Ronit

One day, I was standing at the post office, waiting to be served, and in front of me in life were a few people, who cam to pay their bills there. While I was waiting, I looked around, and noticed a rather large sign behind the counter, which said in red, bold letter, “Avoid Penalties!”

The people who come to the post office to pay their bills are usually (and I’m not saying always) the kind of people who get a short paycheck and calculate every cent of their expenses, while being unaware of, or unable to use, automatic payment means, credit cards, etc. Many of them have bills hanging over their heads anyway, they’re afraid of losing their job, not making mortgage payments, disconnections and other threats, and now they are being warned of penalties?

Often, when I drive on the highway, I see a sign saying “Wear a seatbelt or wear a fine”, another one saying “Speed cameras are operated in this area” or even one asking “Which one would you rather ride tonight?” and showing a taxi and a police car (that one’s for people thinking of driving drunk).

Obviously, we want drivers to behave on the road and to drive safely, but what happens when the incentive given is to avoid being caught? I know I keep my eyes on the speedometer, which is really not where I should be looking when I drive. I should be looking at the road. I know that drivers, especially young ones, see these signs as a challenge and do their best to drive too fast or while intoxicated and not get caught.

Now, I can’t do much about the sign at the post office, but I did write to the government department in charge of the highway and said, “How about writing on the sign something like ‘Thank you for driving safely’?”

Well, after quite a long time, I got a call from a man, who said he was really sorry, but he couldn’t approve such a change. When I asked him why, he said “Because I don’t have the authority to approve sign changes”. I asked him, “In that case, why did you ring me? Go ahead and escalate my suggestion to the person with the proper authority”.

“Oh, no, I can’t do that”, he said. Go figure.

A few months later, I saw a sign that said “Good morning”, which was a nice start, but not quite there yet.

Anyway, my point is that threats send the wrong message to people, a disempowering message, telling them to conform to other people’s rules. Instead, it would be better to use positive reasons, even provide a “what’s in it for me” description to motivate people to do things.

My other point is that you can help change this motivation style in your immediate environment (with your employees, suppliers, kids, etc) and you can also contact the appropriate authorities and ask them if they wouldn’t mind creating a positive world through their messages to the public.

Good luck! Let me know how you go through the comment box below.

This seminar took place in a big room and each participant had to bring a laptop in order to do the various technical exercises, so in front of every person, there was a bright screen, glowing in the overall darkness of the room. During presentations, people couldn’t keep from using their computers – they checked their emails, chatted with friends (some even in the same room), typed their notes and various other things.

But, like I said, much of the presentation content was about personal growth, particularly with respect to operating a business. Obviously, no computers were needed for that. At some point, one of the presenters even asked everyone to close their laptops and interact, make lists and so on. Yet, some laptops stayed open, and over time, more and more were opened and their owners went back to their email checking, document editing and God knows what else.

Eventually, the main speaker came on stage and said to everyone, “You know, the presenters here today are giving you information you cannot find anywhere else on the planet. Some of you have flown here from other cities and paid for hotel accommodations, flights and other things. One of the key messages of this seminar is ‘focus’, and you are letting your laptops control your life”.

There was a very unpleasant silence in the room. He went on, “If you think about it, everything you have on this laptop can wait. You can configure your email to send and receive only when you choose, and you can choose not to do it. You can log out of your chat program and Messenger and IP telephone. You can close the cover of your laptop and it will stop showing you pictures and making sounds at you.”

“More than this”, he continued, “You can turn off you mobile phones, which some of you have been using in the middle of presentations to send SMS messages on. And when you go back home, you can turn the TV off and you can turn your stereo system off and you can even close the door, if that’s what you need in order to FOCUS on getting what you want out of life.”

Because having a laptop computer or a blackberry or a mobile phone can make you feel really important. A TV or a computer can keep you interested and even busy for hours and hours. But if you want to finish the important things in life and get RESULTS, you need to control all of these devices, rather than letting them control you.

All of your software, your computer, you mobile phone and your TV have an “off” button, so you can turn them off when you want. Having them on and paying attention to them is YOUR CHOICE, so remember that every minute away from what’s important is also your choice, and you are free to choose differently!

So a lot of people attend the seminars, buy the books or audio visual programs and do their best to follow the advice of the mostly-self-proclaimed “guru”. However, only few succeed.

Why is this? Why do so many people fail to get the money, the personal growth or the fitness, even when presented with a bullet-proof, step-by-step method, coming from a live example of success?

Good question.  I’m glad you asked.

In all the personal growth and wealth creation material I’ve heard and read, invariably there is the bit where you must let go of your current thinking and adopt the thinking proposed by the new system. “All you have to do is buy <this, that and the other>, learn <some skills>, spend some time every day <doing what I tell you to do> and voilà, your life will change forever”, says your guide-of-the-day, but, try as you might, you cannot see yourself spending that initial amount of money or that initial amount of time.

Another recommendation we find hard to follow is “Delegate. Don’t do everything yourself. Pay others to do the routine tasks for you and focus on strategy”. This means (oh, my God) having to spend money on an ongoing basis, which is even harder than a one-time amount.

“Well, that’s natural”, you say, “How do I know I won’t just lose that money and time I’ve spent and get nothing in return?” In fact, that’s what most people say, and it’s exactly why they don’t make it big like their mentors say they can.

The missing ingredient is a leap of faith. If you got anything out of “What the Bleep Do We Know” and “The Secret”, it should have been that our beliefs and focus change our universe. The people who fail or get limited success do not have the belief that THEY can do it. Their focus is therefore on justifying this belief by finding reasons for their lack of success and then ways to actually not succeed. They subconsciously ask the question “Why can I not do this?”.

The successful people, on the other hand, have faith in their ability to follow through and in their ability to judge good advice. They immediately start focusing on “How will I do this?”

My life coaching instructor told us time and time again “‘Why’ is a past-facing question. If you ask your coaching clients ‘why’, they will look to their past for the answers. ‘How’ is a future-facing question. This question you should ask your coaching clients often”.

So here’s your chance to coach yourself to riches, fitness or personal growth success. Find a quiet place to sit, close your eyes, take a deep breath and relax. First, imagine your mentor’s success and see yourself with them, having achieved your goals and succeeded. Then, go over all the successes you’ve had in the past, reliving the awesome feeling of completion and achievement. Finally, walk yourself through how YOU will carry out each of the steps in the new method. As you do this, make a note of the challenges you may face along the way, and recall how you’ve overcome similar challenges in your life.

When you open your eyes, for each of the remaining challenges, write down the question “How will I <get the desired result>?” and keep the list in your pocket. Your subconscious will know it’s there and will keep finding solutions for you until it finds them all.

[Solution ideas: save, borrow, plan, network, ask, partner, use the Internet, use the 80/20 rule, breathe deeply, smile]

Repeat this self-coaching session with yourself daily (oh, yes you can!) , until you get all the answers and achieve success, because YOU CAN.

I grew up in a small town, so for me, I used to interpret “lifestyle” as “style of living” or “the particular way in which one prefers to arrange one’s objects, human environment and habits”. To me, it was related to my ability to choose wearing casual clothes, preferring to play basketball over soccer, growing a beard in winter and shaving it in summer.

Well, I’m finding more and more that I’m an insignificant minority in a vast sea of people, who see “lifestyle” as something that is externally designed and bestowed upon them through the media.Take a moment now to open a new window and search in your favorite search engine for “lifestyle” and see what comes up and the amounts of pressure associated with everything.

The pressure cooker of modern life has most of the people I know chasing fantasy clothing and “beauty” products that look good mainly in the ads showing them (on a model, with special lighting, in a special setting, in a super-touched-up image). But, if a famous actress wears them, than so must every other woman, right?

Obviously, when this “lifestyle” keeps changing, people find themselves chasing it year after year and season after season, which cements the feeling of lack more than the feeling of choice.

And feeling is exactly the key to escaping this pursuit of “style” (which is no longer a neutral world). When you want to buy something, you are actually buying a feeling. It could be the feeling of abundance (“because I can”), the desire to attract someone, a need to feel significance of a need to belong. Whatever that feeling is, it is the true aim of any purchase.

So, when you feel that you “must” buy something or paint the house or change your car or become a member of a club, ask yourself “What feeling am I trying to buy here?” or “What feeling am I trying to get rid of with this purchase?”

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