Monthly Archives: December 2013

Goals, Imagination, life, you

Find your tune

What’s in a name?

What’s in your name?

A lot? Not much? I think there’s quite a lot, seemingly. Anyways, many people are at it .. changing names, that is. A good friend of mine from my undergraduate Uni days  mentioned only a few days ago that he was going to change his name and also his son’s names. Yep, wind of change is in the air for this Father-Son and family relationships.

I am happy for him.

But it got me thinking, about names, and name changing, that is. Companies do it, sometimes with so much speed – designing company logos is a huge industry. Its big business. Who else does it? Whole countries do it. People do it, particularly when they marry and un-marry. Some people drop the name Michael for Mike, because it is more ‘them’.

Being different is important. Being different has its benefits. Being different also has its costs. Changing one’s name can be seen to give you a license to be different, as it can be seen to be an award to the ‘self’, by the self. A ceremony unto itself.

My beautiful wife told me after we got married that she had decided when she was younger that she would only change her name to her husband’s name, surname that is, if she liked it. She now has my name. Phew, I’m very happy she liked my surname – “Valentine”. It is however, very interesting to note that many people these days do not change their names when they marry. Why, I wonder? For many reasons, I guess. Maybe, it’s an indication that they want to be different. Being different sets you apart. Maybe, that’s one reason.

Do you want a license to be different? Have you thought of it? Maybe, changing your name gives you a start to find a ‘new you’? Do you want a ‘new you’? Maybe, it’s a start …. A new start, a new beginning, a rebirth even … of a new – YOU. There are only two questions you need to ask yourself:

  1. Why do you want to forget the ‘old you’?
  2. Who will you decide to be?

Closing the door to the ‘old you’ is very powerful but very difficult to do. Who are you running away from? What are you running away from? Can you run away? Can you out-run the old you? Only you can answer that.

The second question is: Who will you decide to be? You, I hope! Be all you can be. Be – YOU. Being you, is different. Appreciate your difference. You don’t need to be the same as everyone else. Don’t copy your colleagues or friends, instead set your own standards, your own bench-marks. Make your own definition of success. Do you want to live your life as ‘you’ or do you want to one day, die, knowing that you were on earth under false pretences. That you just pretended to live.

So, a very important question you’re probably thinking right now, and which relates to the subject heading of this blog is ‘how do I know when I am me?’ A very good question indeed. Not just for you, but for everyone – every individual, companies, countries even.

I think you’ll probably feel it, rather than see it, when you’re, you. Or maybe, not. Maybe its when you’ve accepted that you’re part of the universe, part of nature – ever changing. Complete. As beautiful as nature. Maybe, one has to get lost or like the philosopher Henry Thoreau said to the effect, something along the lines that ‘not til we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations’.  Should you? Can you? It may be the best thing you will ever do for yourself. You. To find yourself. The real you. Not a pretend you, the real you.

Back to the question: how do I know when I am me? Maybe, its something we cannot define. Maybe, we’ll notice it when we’ll see it … like when we see nature in action. The immense beauty of everything nature has to offer … from the beauty found in a snowflake to the thunderous roar of thunder to the scorching heat of deserts, to the ebb and flow of the sea tide to the myriad of examples of the beauty that is everywhere in nature. We can never have enough of nature, I think. You never tire of the more obvious ones, like a sunset or a sunrise. Just like nature, we can never have enough of beauty.    

Nature does not pose any questions and gives no answers to any which we may ask, but we live and breathe it, nature that is, if we just stop for but a second to appreciate it. You can see, smell, taste, hear, feel that everlasting something to which we are all drawn to. Like a magnetic attraction, ever drawn towards the power that is .. the universe. And all of its glory, and all of its beauty, in every sense of the word.

So, that may be the answer to the question you ask yourself after you have accepted your name, the question of ‘how do I know when I am me?’. You will just know it, like you know it when you see it or hear it. Like beauty or being in tune. Beauty in nature. Beauty in life. Beauty is universal. They say that ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’. So be it. Immerse yourself in yourself. Immerse yourself in you. Immerse yourself in nature. Immerse yourself in life. You have to trust you and above all else, believe that there is a name or tune for you.

Maybe, name-changing is not your thing. That’s ok. Knowing you. Knowing the real you and appreciating your own uniqueness, your own beauty brings you closer to being more aware of being you. Perhaps, you don’t need an extreme measure like changing your name to re-create yourself, to have a new-beginning, a new start.

For the New Year, maybe you just need to set some new goals, not many, just a handful, based on the priorities you have at this particular point in your life. Then, break these goals down to sub-goals or ‘bite-sized pieces’ which have specific focus areas. Set some key habits that will help you achieve these sub-goals, done on a daily basis and maybe monitoring them regularly, like weekly, monthly etc. You can refer to my earlier blog on this: “the Power of Habitual Self-Regulatory Behavior”.

This of course, is just a suggestion. A suggestion that you don’t have to go to an extreme thing like changing your name, if that is a marker, a drawing of a line in the sand, of a ‘new you’. I think, to some extent, as long as you are living your life, with beauty and balance in mind, you are never in danger of leaving this planet, with people thinking or rather, having a perception of you, that you had lived a life that was less than real. That you were a pretender.

That you were a fake?!

Appreciate the beauty in nature. Appreciate all that you have and can experience. Appreciate the beauty in you.

Find your tune. Find beauty. Find your balance. Find you.

All the best for 2014.

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a better life, accountability, adaptation, attitude, awareness, Beliefs, better choices, brain, change, choices, consciousness, decisions, examined life, game of life, Goals, gratitude, Imagination, life, long-term perspective, love, mind, respect, responsibility, self, self discipline, self improvement, self-image, self-respect, strengths, success, you, your life

The Power of Habitual Self-regulatory behaviour.

I love Pirates … I love skulls.
Why the skull? Well, it holds and protects the most important organ we have –
Our brain. The organ that allows us to think and do and feel whatever it is that we desire.
Thank God for skulls.

Good, Winning Habits

One of the goals in life, as I see it, is to develop a lifestyle that is appealing and inspiring to you and simultaneously setting a healthy guideline and example for those who look to you for guidance and encouragement in their own lives. If you don’t see this as a goal in your life, that is totally fine. It is your life, after all.

I think, the most important thing is to believe in yourself, but more importantly believe in the person you imagine yourself to be. On a daily basis, as sure as you brush your teeth the first thing in the morning, you need to develop a habit of simulating how you imagine your life to be … of projecting that image of yourself that you would most like to become and living and breathing that ‘person’.

That is key.

All habits are learned. That means that just as you work on developing good habits, you can also, unintentionally, develop bad habits. Losing habits. Losing habits like self-criticism, smoking, excessive drinking, overeating, laziness, anxiety, depression, sloppiness, dishonesty, cruelty and insensitivity, amongst many others are all developed in to a part of a person’s character through deliberate and relentless practise. So are positive good, winning habits – learned and retained through the same deliberate practise!

It’s a choice. So, choose well.

Lets make a concerted effort to deliberately practise the latter habits – good, winning habits.

To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Building a World Class Natural Physique takes patience and deliberate practise of key daily habits.

Life ain’ts a dress rehearsal

Life is like a big stage or theater and we play many roles. We do our very best to learn these different roles and play them to the best of our ability. We soon find out that the better we play life, the better life gets for us. Part of this comes from understanding and becoming aware of you, of yourself. When you get better at playing the various roles you’ve been asked to play in life, life gets better for you.

When you work on improving your self-awareness, you begin fantasizing or dreaming your own new ‘scripts’ or better roles, as if your life were a magnificent, epic motion picture opening on all the big screens around the world. Breaking ‘box-office’ records, as you walk down your red carpet.

Play it well, my friend, play it well. Your dreams … your thoughts … your scripts … your epic movie has been written, produced, directed and starred in by no one else but YOU!

There is only one catch: life ain’t a dress rehearsal!

Each second of the 86,400 seconds in each day allows you to get to know YOU, better. Do so. Start by becoming more self-aware. Sometimes, in life, to move ahead, one needs to take a step backwards … so, try stepping back from your own life … and take a long, quiet walk … along pathways in a mountain …or in a quiet park … on the beach.

Absorb the beauty of nature and all its wonders, through all your senses. Bask in its beauty. Become one with it. Then, make an honest assessment of what you are doing, where you are going in your life and most importantly, who you are becoming.

Helping someone achieve his best, in one of the best ways I know how: through increasing self-awareness.
Vv.

Love Life and it will love your back

Then, stop!

Stop to appreciate and be in awe of your own uniqueness, of your strengths and beauty. Sit still or stand still. For a second. For a minute. For 10 minutes. Become aware of the one truth that you and many, may have not have stopped to fathom to date and that is that – you have been selling yourself short in evaluating your own potential in the whole stage rehearsal of life.

Do me a favour. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Stop whinging. Look around you. There’s enough whingers in the world today, already. Stop it. Please. Stop pitying yourself! If you’re breathing right now, than it means that you’re alive.

You see, when I take my first breath in the morning, I say thank you to my God, my universe and I jump our of bed, asking myself, who am I going to help and serve today! Yep, I do that every single day. Giving thanks constantly for all my blessings … on a daily basis.

If you’re alive than nothing else, in my opinion, tops that. You’re alive! If you feel like whinging, don’t! If that is the case, then, you’re enjoying some degree of health and vitality. Just for a second or two, put yourself in to the shoes of the many millions of people around the world that are suffering. Every single second. You cannot and should not complain about life, then!

Love life and it will love you back.

Be YOU.
As YOU are.
Accept the uniqueness … and weirdness that you know you are.
Embrace YOU.
Never imitate.

Keep dreaming

I tell anyone that wants to listen that the mind is the most powerful tool that we all have. You become what you habitually think all day. You effectively create to a certain degree, your own horoscope. Your own luck. You are constantly becoming what you are thinking about every waking moment – so it is very important to focus and put your concentration on things and habits that will add to your life. To your feeling of self-worth.

You need to be clear on your desires or dreams and FOCUS on these and not on fears.

So, watch your thoughts. Keep dreaming.

Hold your dreams steadfastly in your mind and focus on them. Let go your fears. Let go ALL fears. Fears do nothing but cause unnecessary stress in your life and this may cause anxiety, depression, ulcers and all sorts of diseases. Stresses, uncontrolled and mis-managed manifests itself in the physical, in the form of diseases, and part of this management comes down to self-awareness as you should also know what your stress tolerance levels are, too.

Its important to keep dreaming. Why? Because they are effectively goals. What are goals? Dreams with a deadline. Set your goals. Set your game plan. Set your game plan or course in the sea of life. Set it with worthwhile goals that are progressive and realistic. Notice, I have said progressive or incremental and realistic. It is very easy when setting goals to not address this two very important factors. Without satisfying these two factors, ones dreams is merely wishful thinking or worse still, delusional thinking.

Very common in the world today. You see it live and well on social media, tv reality programs and just daily living. People struggling to differentiate between positive goal setting and thinking and delusional thinking.

Those who dream … to be different … and aim to share their unique selves with the world, to help … get the love back in return.

Setting goals

I find it easier to put my goals down on paper.

I do it around this time of the year for the next year. Work this in to your New Year’s Resolutions if you’re setting some for 2014. You don’t need to tell anyone. Just you. For you. Try it. Put in down on paper and write down specific daily tasks and weekly and monthly that are aligned to your mean and end goals.

Your subconscious mind and the universe will conspire to help your achieve your goals. Just try it (setting goals, that is) and see. However, this needs discipline but if your heart is in it, if your heart is anything, you will find that you will almost likely achieve the dream or goal.

Real discipline as I see it is being able to imagine you have already achieved the goal even if you haven’t yet. Discipline in the physical daily habits is one thing. Discipline in simulating in your mind the achievement of it is another. This is not easy. Matter of fact this is darn right difficult. It takes a lot of practise. Your brain has to be re-wired or hard-wired and this is done by deliberate practise. It is worth achieving though. It deserves practise.

“Why? ” I hear you ask –

Allow your mind to ”connect’ with infinite intelligence.
With consciousness.
It is like nothing you’ve ever experienced before.
The subconscious mind is part of the ‘mind’
Question is: what does the conscious mind do that the subconscious mind doesn’t

Instant gratification

Because, I believe one of the biggest problems facing human-kind today is ill-discipline of the mind.

You can see it everywhere in everyone’s insatiable desire for instant gratification. No one believes in delayed gratification anymore. No one believes in the old fashioned value of ‘patience’ anymore. Its great for business and commerce, as youngsters want the latest gadgets – NOW, not tomorrow or next month. Now!

Lack of discipline. Lack of mental discipline. This is why discipline is necessary. Because discipline, as I have read somewhere in the past, is the ability to ‘practise within, when you are without’. We can summarize this very important philosophy on the achievement of goals in life like this:

Visualization + heart + effort + internalization = Realization.

As I close on this blog, keep in mind, amongst your many other archived thoughts, that you, yes, you are no more than the accumulated picture of your thoughts and actions.

I. AM.
GOD?

So, if you haven’t already thought about this yet, I learned from a wise man once that we –

“have to be very careful of our thoughts, as this determines our actions; be careful of your actions as it determines your habits; be careful of the habits you adopt, as it determines your character; and finally, be aware of your character as it determines your destiny.”

If you want to be loved, be loveable

So, you see, where you end up in life begins and ends in your mind. Become a better manager of your mind, my friend. Become an expert at managing your mind. What you achieve out of life and where you end up in life, depends heavily on it.

It does not matter which race you are, what creed or place in society you were born in to, understand one basic and critically important life rule:

“If you want to be loved, be loveable. If you want respect, set a respectable example!”

My early days in the catholic church taught me that one should treat others as you want to be treated. I’m certain other religions teach a similar thing. Matter of fact, I think, even if you didn’t belong to any religion, you would innately, think the same. I try and apply this every day. Great and simple teaching I think. Try it. See what happens.

Love life and life may just love you back, better.

I hope you believe in hope. It is a great word that encompasses many good things. Things like faith, courage, good, love etc. Its all encompassing. Just like the universe is. Anyway, I would like to wish all you readers the best that HOPE has to offer you, Each and every one of you, in 2014. Your hope for a better you. Your hope for a better future. Your hope for a better life. Whatever it is. Your hope is dependent on you. On your thoughts. On you mind.

Your Homework: Quiet your mind.

Until next time.

 

Cheers & Ahoy!

The old Cap’n Viking Pirate Evangelist Muscled Monk … & habits

Life is like a Merry-go-round … we’re all turning round and round … within seat-belts, and boundaries

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Energy

Should you use Force or Power?

Interesting question, isn’t it? What would you choose? Which one would yield a better probability of success, all things being equal? To answer this, lets attempt to try and define what Force is. What Power is. Lets try …. Without googling it.

The first thought that comes to my head when I read or hear the word Force, I think of the definition provided to me years ago, in my Year 11 Physics class in High School. If I remember correctly, Force is the product of a body’s mass multiplied by the acceleration that is acting on it. Put simply, in Physics terminology, the formula is:

Force (N) = Mass (kg) x A (acceleration)

where A is gravity acting on the mass, which is about 9.8m.s.s

That’s a little bit of Classical Physics for you.

There are many more definitions of Force. Maybe, we don’t need to go in to definitions. Maybe, its better if we just chat about it.

What about Power. How would you define it? You can see it when it happens – on the sporting field or arena. I particularly, love the power exhibited by sprinters in the 100 m dash – short, very intense and very powerful. There are people who possess more Power than others in all sorts of ways – economic, emotional, spiritual, intellectual and physical, amongst many others. We see examples of it in action every day – on the roads to work or school, on tv, with our friends and family etc … examples of power-play, every day.

I will make a bold statement to say that the universe favors the latter, Power.

A bold statement indeed.

Do you believe in karma? Do you believe that the universe registers everything? Do you believe the universe never forgets? Do you do unto others you would like to be done on to you? Do you think you would have to accept responsibility for every thought, word, and deed you generate for the entire time you’re physical body graces the earth? Do you think, in this sense, that maybe, just maybe, you or we create our own heaven or hell? Some people call it purgatory. It does not matter if you’re religious or not, you would have heard about heaven or hell by now.

How about if I told you that my bold statement reflects exciting new areas of theoretical Physics, that everything in the universe is connected with everything else. Wow, you’re kidding, right? Nope. Am not. It is now a Scientific fact that every act or decision we make, every ripple we create, generates a magnetic field that either enhances your life and lives or it takes away from it. The ripple we created returns to us, giving off a certain energy pattern. A certain frequency. We all know it as ‘karma’.

You could say, from a religious point of view, that every word, thought is known and recorded forever. There are no secrets; nothing is hidden. Our spirits stand naked in time for all to see – everyone’s life, is accountable to the universe. This is very similar to what I learned in Sunday School growing up as a child, that there is one God. He alone is God. He alone is the judge. Science is now saying that God could be … omnipresent … could be everywhere … could be, just could be … the universe. I don’t know. No one knows yet. This is not meant to discriminate against on-christian believers, it is just a statement of deduction, supported by science.

Now, back to Power.

How does Power arise? It seems that Power arises from meaning or purpose. From the Heart. This is why you need to spend a bit more time thinking about your life, what it represents and the extent of influence you would like to leave behind in this world, when you’re gone. How do you do that? Find your purpose or meaning in life. Search high. Search low. Search everywhere. Search your soul. It could be the most important few minutes/hours/days you spend for the rest of your life. Find your purpose. Do it now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. Not after Christmas. Do it now.

Does Power have motive? I think it does. Power is probably more appealing to us, as human beings. Why? Because, it just is. Personally, I prefer Power over Force, any day. For example, I prefer the Powerful humming sound of a Harley Davidson motorbike to a small speedster. You hear Power when it comes towards you.

Power does not seem to need justification, does it? Force, on the other hand, must always be justified. Think back to your own life, with your own examples of Force or Power. Let me help you jolt your memory with a few more thoughts.

With Power, it seems, no movement is required. Back to my opening Physics formula, you can see that for a Force to happen, it needs to be moved or move. Essentially, Force is a movement – from point A to point B (or tries to) against opposition. You see, Force, automatically, creates a counter-force. Power, on the other hand, doesn’t do this. It is still. Its constant. Its all encompassing. A good example would be something we’re all familiar with –  gravity. A standing field, that doesn’t move against anything. Its immense Power moves all objects within its field, but the gravity field itself does not move.

So, we can see that Power is complete and total. Gravity, for example, does not need anything from outside. It does not need to be fed. Unlike Force, which is always moving, always moving against something. Force has an insatiable appetite as it needs to be fed all the time.

In Year 11 Physics all those years ago, if I remember correctly, every force produces an equal and opposite force. If this is correct, and it is, as we have millions of examples, happening in our daily lives, then, we could say that its ultimate effect is to polarize. Now, if there is a counter-force which leads to polarization, we then have a situation. And what situation would this be? Well, we would create a situation of conflict and as we all know, conflict spells trouble. Trouble most of us don’t need more of in our lives. Conflicts in life inevitably results in somebody losing out and this leads to enemies being created. Constantly faced with enemies can drain you, can suck the life out of you … as you repeatedly have to defend yourself, cover yourself and ‘watch your back’. As you can see, Force requires constant defense. Defensiveness is very costly, whether in politics, personal affairs or the marketplace. It is quite evident in international affairs and the extent of costs associated with countries in conflict.

Ultimately, a source of power is that it is just, “is”! Plain and simple. It just, is. Nothing added. What do you think? It just, is. No extras with that. Only a week ago, one of the greatest individuals that ever walked the face of this earth, passed away. Mr Nelson Mandela. Now he is a great example of an individual that was just Power Personified. His life was lived with purpose, appeared to be one of which was to raise awareness to the world that all men are created equal and that human rights are intrinsic to human creation. This very concept was the source of power for another great human being exuding power: Mahatma Gandhi. These were men that lived by the native principles of our civilization which were noble and not selfish. You could say the same for others like Jesus Christ, Buddha, Krishna and Mother Theresa. There are probably many others you could think of.

I also believe that True Power also, ultimately, evolves or springs from consciousness itself. You see it everywhere. I elaborate on the idea of ‘consciousness’ in my previous blog on ‘mindless’. Have a read if you get a chance. True Power, ultimately, rests or resides in YOU. The question you’ve got to ask yourself is “who are YOU?”. More on that one very important question in a later blog, but for now, just be more aware of you, your environment – internal and external. Power is everywhere. What you are seeing is the physical manifestation of the invisible, just like the body is the physical manifestation of the mind.

How do you want to live? Are you living with meaning? With purpose? Do you want to? Why is this important? Would you like to know how you could live your life with more purpose, more meaning? For one thing, you need to live your life by life principles, and not live without intangibles like pride, honor, love, compassion and valor. One needs to align oneself with the search for balance and beauty or aesthetics. Force does not bring you joy, but Power does. People who align themselves with enhancement and embodiment of beauty, with whatever instrument (musical, sculptor, the human body), vitality and longevity. Wouldn’t we all want to strive towards that?

Yes, I think it would be wise to do so.

So, it follows, that it would be wiser to adopt a philosophy of Power than that of Force. You don’t want to learn everything in your short life on this lovely earth – first hand. Life is too short to try and experience everything first hand anyway. I remember certain older family members saying when I was a kid, especially when it came to exotic foods, “Paul, you won’t know until you try it”. Well, I thought that was the case for a long time, for most things in life. Philosophies change and years of experience has taught me that there are things I know I don’t want to try, simply because I know I don’t want it. I don’t need it. Simply because I am more aware of who I am now than I was, say, when I was a fifteen year old teenager. I know the person who lies behind the eyes that I see when I look at myself in the mirror (I have elaborated on this topic in a previous blog). I don’t need to try something to see if I like it.

Knowing you, helps you know what you need and what you want. Differentiating between the two (a need and a want) can be very difficult for some. The philosophy you base your viewpoints and decisions on will aid in this. Choosing to use Power over Force in your life, will ultimately add to your life. Not subtract from it.

Choose Power over Force to enhance and add to your life. Add to your universe. Add to all Life.

Making choices is part of life. Choices have risks. These risks have consequences. These consequences determines the path you head down in life. Do you make your own path in life? One that resonates with your heart, with your dreams, with your imagination. Do you take a path less traveled, like the path of Nelson Mandela or Mahatma Gandhi, a path of purpose or do you take a well-trodden path, one which appears safer because the majority is doing it – one without a purpose, like a ship floating in the ocean of life, without a rudder and sails, moving aimlessly, where the currents take you?

Choosing Power may help you navigate your ship in the sea of life, better. Getting to your destination a little quicker, and safer, despite the changing currents.

You find purpose when you adopt a philosophy of Power. Not Force.

Choose well. It is your life, after all.

Until next time.

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Energy

Becoming “Mindless” could help YOU.

You = information = knowledge = God

What are you doing at this very moment? As you read this word … this sentence. Are you conscious of it? How do you know you’re conscious of it? What is consciousness anyway?

For hundreds of years, physicists and philosophers have sought to find and understand at least one theory that will give a good description and explanation of our universe. And of our mind. They are still searching.

They prefer to simplify it. To find a theory that have simple principles, an elegant form, balanced, with aesthetics, which, hopefully, makes precise statements. Not possible.

Mathematicians would probably have a better chance at this. Lets just say, its not possible just yet. They are still searching …..

Consciousness could be regarded as the accumulated position of conscious experiences, which is, essentially – the mind. These experiences could be referred to, as one prominent theoretical physicist, Page calls it – sensations. Yep, sensations! Where what we call a “mind”, is nothing but a heap or collection of different perceptions, united together by certain relations.

So, the “self”, or what makes “you”, is nothing more than a bundle or collection of different perceptions. These perceptions, biased or otherwise, formulate from conscious experiences. However, the mind, may also have unique neuronal pathways, whereby the conscious experiences or sensations are arranged in strictly defined sequences, which makes you – YOU.

People ask – “why?” … I /My curiosity continually askS “why not?”
Seek possibilities… always

Your mind makes you, uniquely, you. No one else can be you. Just you.

Your unique mind makes you think certain thoughts, which are conscious responses to not only external but internal stimuli. They happen that way, all the time, unless you, become “mindless”.

What, I hear you say? Mindless? What do you mean? How do you mean?

Mindless.

Ponder on that one for a little while.

A long while, if you prefer. Become increasingly conscious of it, mindless, that is. Become conscious of where your thoughts are taking you. Do you have a few thoughts running through your head at the moment or do you have countless thoughts firing through your mind? Is it in any particular sequence? Is it based on your cumulative conscious experiences to this point in your life? How do you know that? Questions, questions and more questions.

Ponder on that thought for a little while longer: Mindless.

To become mindless, one must firstly, theoretically, understand, true consciousness or ‘presentness’ or what the mind is. Some people refer to “being in the moment”. This is quite difficult to apply in reality, because every individual’s reality is a collection of biased, sequentially, strictly defined, neuronal pathways, unique to the individual or “you”.

So, it follows that, the mind or consciousness could be interpreted in a way to be, a by-product of the functioning of the underlying physical structures of the brain (or hardware), and that mind is confined entirely within the brain’s processes.

Put simply, consciousness could be defined as :“awareness”. You could refer to an earlier blog of mine regarding this topic, on awareness called : “What can you see that lies behind your eyes when you look in the mirror”. Essentially, I tried to elaborate on the first “A” of my philosophy to personal development throughout life – my Tripple A Approach to personal development.

A more complex definition for animals with a brain include: “thoughts, sensations, perceptions, moods, emotions, dreams, and awareness of self”.

Just like life itself, consciousness seems to be one of those things that is easy to recognize but very difficult to define. It has been debated by philosophers in the West since the time of ancient Greek civilization over twenty five hundred years ago.

Eastern culture and philosophers have been wrestling with it for much, much longer and seem to have a better handle on it although still not nearly complete. So, back to being mindless. Knowing what we know now, even though it is of a meagre kind, I will try to simplify the mind in this formula:

Mind = conscious experiences = awareness = sensations = accumulated perceptions

We have some idea, now. Some. Just a snippet of what ‘mind’ is. Lets let the physicians, mathematicians and philosophers continue searching for a more definitive answer.

So, what is mindless and how do we achieve it? You may be thinking you know the answer right now. Well, Paul, its simple, you may be thinking … uhmmm … just ‘not think!’. Yes, that is a plausible position. Matter of fact, I believe, it is a very plausible position. So much so, I have written an earlier blog on it: “Unthink to Think”.

Have a read of it. I give some ideas as to how to unthink. It is obviously not exhaustive, but gives you a pathway to enhance your own thought processes or awareness.

Every day you’re alive, you’re experiencing the 86,400seconds of that day, only YOU can experience, that is uniquely – you. You consciously and unconsciously experience everything that becomes a part of you, of who you are. Everyone has there own joys, their own stresses, their own thoughts. Essentially, their own lives.

True?
Neuroscience is still at the level of where medicine was in the 1700s
A long way to fully understand who we are….
Who “I AM.”

Adopting what I wrote in ‘Unthink to think”, may just get you closer to experiencing what it feels to be mindless. Being mindless, even just for a few seconds, even better for a few minutes could and should, theoretically and practically, help you manage your energies in times of great uncertainty and stress in your life.

Try it. Become mindless. Don’t just think. Do.

A great thinker once said that “Knowledge is Power”. With all due respect, I don’t fully agree. Knowledge is not Power. Knowledge is potential Power. APPLIED KNOWLEDGE IS POWER!

I think it was Bruce Lee, the philosopher, who once said that “Knowing is not enough. One must do. Willing is not enough. One must Apply”.

So, apply.

Experience what transpires. Experience the sensations. Experience Mindlessness. Experience, you.

Until next time.

Allow your mind to ”connect’ with infinite intelligence.
With consciousness.
It is like nothing you’ve ever experienced before.
The subconscious mind is part of the ‘mind’
Question is: what does the conscious mind do that the subconscious mind doesn’t

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Energy

Life is like muscle.

We all fall and fail in life. The main thing to focus on is picking yourself back up and …
Trying again.
That’s how most babies learn how to move from crawling to walking … and then to running …
and beyond.

LIFE, could be likened to being a Juggler .. 

Life is like Muscle: It depends on 2 principles:

  1. Continuity
  2. Simplicity

Let me elaborate ….

Continuity

What is life anyway? How would you describe it? How would you define it? Would you consider life a process or a system?

If it is the latter (a system), does it depend on input, a transformation and an output? Think of your life, this definition may come close? Does it resonate with your definition?

Maybe, one could define Life in terms of physics as ‘lag time’ or a momentary line of stopping in the progression towards death or entropy. This, I think could be dictated by some other laws of the universe.

If it is the former, a process, does it have a beginning? How is this similar to muscle and muscle building?

Well, most of you know that there are many variables that go in to building muscles, some of which are: diet, training, number of sets, number of reps, rest, etc etc. These are all important in developing optimal performance of muscle, depending on what one’s goals are.

How do you define a workout? Sweating with weights? Intensity? Reps? All correct.

I define a workout as a ‘continuous progression of 15-45 seconds of focused moments’, where a focused moment is what you may know as a ‘set’, in gym lingo.

Now, to WORK a muscle, one must apply a force – a push, pull or a twist. To do this, one simply has to shorten (concentric) the muscle and lengthen (eccentric) the muscle. So, to build muscle, one must apply maximum tension or force on the muscle, and maintain constant tension throughout the full range of motion. If you do this often enough, with consistency and persistence, you would increase your chances of muscle hypertrophy (growth).

However, work, work, work and NO REST leads to the exact opposite. You don’t increase your chances of muscle hypertrophy but instead have muscle degradation. A simple case of the old adage: more is not necessarily better or one step forward, two steps back.

Not where we desired.

Don’t despair.

There are many variables that go in to optimizing muscle growth. Just like life. There are many variables in to carving out a successful life and you can define success here in whatever terms you choose.

Life could be likened to being a juggler. A juggler with many balls, each representing an area of life. We juggle many balls and occasionally, we drop one or two.

That’s ok. Tomorrow, wake up. Pick yourself up. Begin again, with all the balls.

The Pendulum of Life.

It is the same as life. Work, work, work and no play leads to ‘burn-out’. Too much activity and no time for re-creation (re-charging of batteries/ rest), tips the ‘balance of life’ within yourself and may lead to other problems. Some of which could have negative implication and impact on your life. Refer to my earlier blog on the ‘Pendulum of Life’.

It is the same for muscle building. Training and working of muscle is the catalyst for stronger and bigger muscles. However, most trainees give training too much importance, compared to two other pivotal components of success –

  1. sufficient and appropriate nutrition and
  2. recuperation and rest from training

What you do in the gym provides only the STIMULUS for muscle growth. Its what you do AWAY from the gym that permits your body to repair the muscle damage, and ‘overcompensate’. The compound effect of overcompensation produces “the little extra tissue” which make up more of the sought-after bigger muscles. If you train too often you won’t give your body enough time to repair the broken-down muscle tissue and build the overcompensation tissue.

This is akin to our own individual ‘pendulum of life’ and how we shift from activity and recreation on a daily basis. Too much activity (paid work or unpaid) and no rest/recovery does not produce an optimal self which leads to unproductive existence and runs us in to the ground. Being away from stress/work environment on a regular basis is necessary and is vital for optimal health as being away from the gym is to building and optimizing muscle growth.

So, recovery time between workouts is necessary but only part of the equation for optimizing the anabolic environment within yourself.

Not only do you need to sleep well each night, you need to rest adequately during the daytime, too. Research shows that grabbing a 20 minute nap during lunch not only helps with re-energising you but also keeps the brain young. Healthy sleep has been empirically proven to be the single most important determinant in predicting longevity, more influential than diet, exercise or heredity.

Having regular, routine-like sleep is better than catching up on sleep. This may seem like a little point, like a little mosquito, but be careful. Be careful of not taking care of the little mosquitoes because they may bite (refer to my earlier blog: Elephants don’t bite mosquitoes do) and this may cause more serious issues and higher than tolerable risk level for your existence.

Put simply: continuity is vital to muscle growth. Just like, re-charging your batteries is to your own growth in your life. This brings me to my second principle of muscle and life:

Simplicity

Putting aside everything else, what are the 4 most important elements necessary for life? Yep, that’s right, correct on the chemistry – they are the most abundant elements: H, C, O, N. For those of you not familiar with the periodic table, these letters represent the elements: Hydrogen, Carbon, Oxygen and Nitrogen.

Is there truth in important things being born out of or resulting from order and chaos? Maybe. Maybe not. You decide. Find out more on this topic. Be more resourceful.

In my 20-plus years of gym experience, I have observed many different styles of training muscle groups. People coming up with many different names for an exercise that had already had an appropriately named name by some bodybuilder, many decades ago. There are some that are so complex, even I have trouble understanding them.

Building muscle needs to be kept simple and you can’t much simpler than my approach to training:

1. Proper Nutrition

2. Adequate Rest (notice I have said “Rest”, not “sleep”)

3. Sufficient and appropriate Training.

All put together with the right mind-set and constant management of one’s “thought-factory”. Simplicity is the key.

Keep it simple, stupid! This is the KISS principle I learned from a wonderful mentor, many years ago. 

This statement is used in many fields and whilst a very simple sentence, is quite difficult to apply in practise. Try it. With the plethora of theories and information on the internet, everyone keeps adding to instead of ‘taking away from’ their bank of exercises that maximizes muscle growth and gain.

Too many people try to complicate things. Complicated solutions are for complicated people. One needs to keep it simple. That is the art of building muscle and more importantly building the right balance of muscles and muscle flow throughout the body towards a more balanced and aesthetically pleasing physique. One that is the epitome’ of physical perfection. One that demonstrates the beauty of the human form, in particular the beauty of the flow of muscle, for example, how the deltoids (shoulders) ‘ties in’ in to the biceps/triceps muscles. Its just simply beautiful. The human form in all its glory.

Back to the topic at hand: Simplicity.

“Stuff’ either ADDS TO or TAKES AWAY from your Life.

Life happens.

Life, is a beautiful gift.

One needs to be kept simple. Too many people clutter their lives with too many ‘stuff’. Stuff that do not add to their lives. Stuff that, instead takes away from their lives. Takes away from their lives because it clutters their most precious asset – their mind. Physical clutter, clutters the mind. Clutters your ‘thought factory’. Not good. Stuff either adds to or takes away from your life.

Why? Well, if a factory’s processes are not operating efficiently and effectively, due to bottlenecks in the processing it produces less output but more importantly, produces less of the desired product, one is working so hard to achieve. Not good, I said! Heard of the computer term”GIGO”. For those of you who don’t, it refers to “Garbage In, Garbage out”.

Put simply, you create rubbish (mind and body) if you eat rubbish (mind and body) or if you have so much clutter that it just creates complexity which leads to unnecessary stress in one’s life which leads to bad decisions and worse results. For everyone. Become better at filtering out what I call “Junk for the Mind”, like you filter out junk for the body. Manage your funnel, better.

Look at what the latter has resulted in – one of the worst epidemics that has afflicted man-kind today: obesity. Just imagine the magnitude of problems we are creating by mis-managing junk food for the mind. Very scary thought, I know. This is a HUGE problem for the future of man-kind. 

Take a breath and know that there is a way. There is a better way to build muscle just like there is a better way to live your life. Find that way. Life is too short, not to.

One word: Simplicity.

Until next time,

All the very best in your decisions … on Life.

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