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For most of us, there won’t be a magic stroke of lightning that takes us to success (however you define it). For most of us success comes in steps. There is a momentum gained as each step is achieved. That momentum gives you the feeling you can succeed. One of the reasons so many business plans and self help systems focus on goals is to set the steps for victory. It is unlikely that you can jump right from “go” to “mission accomplished.”

Clearly visualize what you want to achieve. Then work backwards to you current place as best you can. In doing you will find the milestones moments that are the steps. If you find you have a gap between where you want to be and where you are, then start again from where you are visualizing towards where you want to be. In the end, you should have a fairly defined road map.

With your map in hand you can take the first step. Be prepared to re-plan your roadmap, there are always changes in the landscape that couldn’t be foreseen. Celebrate the milestone moments, but not too long. Use the feeling of achievement to drive you to the next step. If you stay to long in that warm moment of achievement you may find you have lost drive or lost your way.

Good luck with your journey to success.

Everyone gets overwhelmed. It doesn't matter if your problems are large or small, they are your problems and they take a toll. It's natural to wish for a break. Sometimes we are lucky and a break comes our way out of nowhere. Usually though, we have to make our own breaks. A break you make for yourself is the only think you can realistically hope for.

Sometimes the only break you need is some space and time to relax and collect yourself. These breaks may seem impossible to obtain, but in reality they are the easiest types of breaks to make. If you need a break in your finances, relationships, work, or other aspects of life, that is a tougher prospect.

To make a break for yourself you first have to clearly identify what is the most important thing driving your feelings of desperation or despair. If you find a way to fix something that isn't the big issue you may have some short term peace, but the big issue is going to come back to haunt you soon. take the time to asses what is really driving your feeling of bing overwhelmed. Sure the dirty refrigerator or that pile of dirty laundry might have been the trigger of your bad mood, but those likely aren't the things driving the bad mood. If you truly asses it, you should be able to limit the driving forces of your anxiety and despair to a few topics. When you do, be ready for battling the first hurdle. You are going to feel like those few issues are impossible to fix or out of your control. You have to maintain perspective and convince yourself you can make some change. Otherwise you will just drive yourself deeper into the overwhelmed feeling and that does no good.

Once you have a clear idea of what you are letting control your moods, then set out to figure out what could change it. Remind yourself that a break like what you seek is going to take time. It will take less time than just wishful thinking though, just wishfully hoping for an answer to fall out of the sky could take forever.

You are blessed with a keen mind for problem solving. All humans are. It is a part of why we are the dominate species on the planet. Trust yourself to be able to find a solution. Look for real things you can do to change the situation. It may be that you need to delegate to another (such as hiring an attorney, a counselor or a maid). It may be that you have to take back control of something you had delegated to others (if that pile of laundry is really killing you, and it is a job assigned to a kid, maybe assigning them a task less important to you and taking back the laundry task would bring you peace). If it is your job, perhaps it is time to look for another job. It could be that you need to change the way you work, or to seek a new position at work. If it is finances, there are likely small changes you could make in the budget, some lifestyle changes that could be made, or perhaps a new or second job would make the break. If it is a relationship... that's probably the toughest... then be sure what you need and seek solutions to those needs. With regard to relationship issues, I'd point you my post about assertiveness. http://www.shtexaslawyer.com/blog/blog1.php/2008/06/04/assetiveness.

Whatever the break is you seek. You are better of trying to make the break than to wish for one. Be open to seeing the breaks as they occur. Understand that making breaks takes time. It is unfortunate, but life isn't easy. Make your breaks, take them and keep moving.

It is important to every aspect of your life to realize what is in your control, what is in your influence, and what is completely outside of anything you can affect. Why is it important? Because trying to do more than you can is a waste of energy and a source of trouble for you and those around you.

First, you must realize you are in total control of the core you. How you think, the decisions you make, the emotions you follow are all 100% in your control. If you are in a bad mood, you have the power to change it. If you want something, you have the power to satisfy the desire or ignore it. You can give up that control, by deciding to allow another person or circumstance’s influence to control what you feel and think. But in reality you still have the control to think contrary to that influence or to rid yourself of that influence.

After the total control of your inner-self there is the near total control of your existence. There are those who will argue that other’s can manipulate or control you. This is true, but only to the amount you let yourself be controlled or manipulated. We chose to work, we choose to accept the controls placed on us by our jobs. We chose our relationships, and we choose to give up some control to our partner. We choose to have children (or not) and we chose to accept the controls placed on us as parents. Yes, it is true that things outside our control can completely own us. A tornado is an uncontrollable force of nature. If you are caught in one, it controls you. You can only seek to avoid the control of the tornado. The same is true of all the forces which can overtake our self control. We can limit the exposure to these outside forces, but if we are caught in one all control is lost. Now forces like tornadoes are not the same as bad relationships, or being in bad places. If you chose to stay in a bad or dangerous relationship/situation/environment, you are deciding to live with a greater risk of loss of control.

The next level out form ourselves is the environment you exist in, and the relationships you have with others. To an extent, you can exert control over things outside yourself, especially if the subject allows you to do so. You can change your world by creating, destroying and rearranging the physical nature of that environment. The environment does not have the ability to consciously resist you. Your relationships are harder to control. In reality you can only influence your relationships. Since each individual has total inner self control, you can only influence others. They must decide to give into or resist that influence. This is where most relationships run into trouble. If one partner doesn’t like something about the other, there will be a struggle of influence and control. If the partner desiring change cannot accept that all they have is influence, that partner will feel tremendous frustration at not being able to control the other. The effort to control causes resistance, as the non-changing partner fights to maintain control of their inner self. If a compromise or acceptance does not happen, this struggle can become a war. In a relationship war there is no winner.

The farther out from yourself you go, the less control and influence you have. Spouses have tremendous influence on each other, as do parents to children. Brothers and sisters have less control. Friends can have even less control than siblings. Distant friends and relations have little control or influence, and strangers have the least influence of all.

Realizing what is in your control, in your influence, and out of reach allows you to direct your efforts and energies in the most effective way. Avoiding emotional pain in trying to do what you cannot will lead you to better happiness. Realizing what you can control and what you cannot also empowers you to make decisions that make your circumstances as close to what you desire as possible.

Remember, you control you. You decide what you think, what you feel, and how you want to live. Control what you can, be respectful of what is outside your control, and own your life as best you can.

Sometimes, no matter how good a person you are, no matter how hard you are trying, no matter what intentions you had, it just seems that everything in life is against you. Your finances might be a wreck, your relationships might be a disaster, your health or a loved one’s health could be at risk. Fair? No way! But, as Lamb said in their song “Trans Fatty Acid”;

No one said it would be easy
Did anyone tell you the
road would be straight
and long

I’m sorry if an internet search for answers brought you here. I don’t have answers. But I can tell you what I do when it feels that life has been dealing me a bad hand.

First, just for a moment, consider if the reason things are wrong is because you are on the wrong path. It could be that you are paddling upstream. Don’t dwell on that though to long. When you are down it is easy to give into despair. Sometimes the right path is all uphill. If yours is, then move on to step two.

In step two, accept that the path is difficult. You will find resistance and resentments. There will those who try to draw you away from your goal. There are blockades to your goals put their by those who went ahead and didn’t want competition. When you accept that the path is difficult, it is easier to deal with the hardships along the way. If you cannot accept that the path is difficult, you will be unprepared. Every stumble will seem like the end. Also, in accepting there are hardships ahead you can prepare for them. That is step three.

Step three may seem never ending. Step three involves looking ahead, foreseeing stumbling bocks, preparing yourself emotionally and equipping yourself with the tools to get past the hardships. If your goal is an education or a career, you must see the hurdles ahead. If your goal is to free yourself from a bad situation, you need to foresee the ways the situation will try to hold you down, so that you do not give up.

Step four is also unending. Step four means keeping moving. Always keep your momentum up. It’s easier to recover from a stumble while you are in motion, than once you are already thrown to the ground. If you are waylaid in your tracks, get up! You cannot give up. As the slogan of the firm says, never surrender.

By constantly assessing what you seek, if it is right for you, what barriers lay ahead, and keeping your momentum up, you have a better chance of reaching your goal. Does this make it any easier? No, but you are not alone. No matter what you may think, if your course it true, there are others who will support you. Find them, learn from them, and draw on their energy.

Good luck.

What is courage? Facing near death experiences? That’s what usually comes to mind, thank you Hollywood. There is more to courage than that though. Courage can be much more sublime than that. Wikipedia says, “Courage, also known as bravery, will and fortitude, is the ability to confront fear, pain, risk/danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. "Physical courage" is courage in the face of physical pain, hardship, or threat of death, while "moral courage" is the courage to act rightly in the face of popular opposition, shame, scandal, or discouragement.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courage)

How do I define courage? Courage is when you make a decision and stay with it, even though you are fearful. It can simply be the courage to live another day, the courage to keep searching for a job, the courage to keep trying. For some, it can take a great deal of courage to do things that for others come easy. Courage is a personal experience. It doesn’t take courage for me to do public speaking, it is easy for me (although I get stage fight like anyone else), but for some fierce soldier public speaking can be terrifying. If they face that fear it takes courage. For a person to realize that no matter how hard it will be for their children, but they have to get out of an abusive relationship, takes courage. For those who have been physically broken in an accident, it takes courage to keep doing physical therapy. For a person who has been unemployed to keep sending out resumes takes courage.

Never question if one type of courage is better than another. Applaud courage when you see it. Support the courageous. Humans have several traits which make us what we are, and courage is one of the core traits. It should be celebrated and supported. When we support others, we call it “encouraging” them. Look at the word, it means you are imbuing, empowering, and giving them courage to go on.

Courage can be contagious. Be of a strong heart, and pass on courage to others. Together we can all rise to a better world.

Staying motivated is a tiring experience. Sadly, the more effort you put into staying motivated is energy lost in the effort itself. It is easy to get lost or discouraged, especially when the environment you live in is bringing you down. Let’s face it, times are tough. Gas prices are at record highs, food prices are climbing, the kids are out of school, and just getting your everyday tasks done can seem like a monumental hurdle.

What to do about it?

Read more »

Dreams, like lives, come in all shapes and sizes. Some dreams are small, some are grandiose, some have lots of parts, and some are simple. Dreams all have common features though. All dreams represent something we desire, deep inside of us. They represent something that seems distant from where we are now. They are difficult to pursue, and elusive.

Sometimes dreams need support. Sometimes we need others to give us financial or moral support to help us achieve our dream. Some dreams only require dedication of effort, and a lack of negative blocking by those who don’t support the dream. Some dreams may be impossible, some very plausible dreams get crushed by factors outside of our control.

Is it essential that everyone have a dream? No. But those who have dreams are people who live in hope. They live with a force that spurs them onward in life. They are people who are not adrift in life.

Life is like an ocean, in that it has current and variable winds. If you don’t steer your way through the ocean of life, you are at the mercy of the winds and currents. Where you will go is a matter of where these forces take you. But, boats can sail to their destination despite adverse winds. Competent sailors can tack against the wind, weaving a course that although divergent from the destination, will get them there.

If you have a dream, don’t give up on it. You will face adverse winds, waves may toss you about, and currents may fight you. If you give up on the dream, and don’t have a new destination in mind, you will be adrift.

Now, that said, don’t ignore advice. Others may have sailed the seas you travel. They can tell you things to aid you on your way, or give you sound reason why your dream (as it is conceived) could fail. In the end, a good captain listens to the words of others who have gone before, and makes decisions based of what is known and what there is to prove. Only the captain can decide what advice to accept or reject, and a good captain accepts the results of that decision.

Good Sailing!

Btw... a great movie ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087980/ ).

Sir Edmund Hillary climbed Mt. Everest. The point isn't if he was first, but that he did it. Mountain climbers know the risks. They can see them all around. The closer you get to the top, the more obvious the dangers seem. You can see the drop off to failure on either side of you, getting closer and more dangerous with each step towards the goal. But, mountain climbers don't spend much thought on the possibility of failure. It's just a part of the task at hand. In fact, they are rarely unsure that they will in fact achieve their goal. It is as if they know it is inevitable they will succeed. If they spent more time worrying about the ever increasing potential of failure, they might get discouraged and stop. Instead they stay focused. The more arduous the climb, the more focused they become. I imagine they never say don't so much know the top is just ahead, as much as they find there is nowhere left to go higher and say,"We have arrived at the top."

In whatever you really want to achieve, you should be a mountain climber. Prepare for all the risks in advance, as best you can. Then set off with unerring dedication to your task. Don't fret how far you have to go. Don't dwell on how far you have come. Don't spend too much thought on the possibility of failure. Instead, keep going, keep finding your path to get higher. Eventually, you will see there is no where higher to place your next step, or make that next hand hold, and then you can pause to look at what you have done.

But don't stay at the mountaintop and reflect too long. You have to keep moving, a goal isn't realized until you bring it home. Sir Hillary didn't know he would be knighted, nobody would have known of their achievement if they hadn't come down and returned to the rest of the world.

Just keep moving, stay focused, be mindful of the risk, and take the next step, then the next, and the next...