Tag Archives: Mind

The Essential Lessons

October 19, 2022 Jonathan Hilton Leave a comment

What We Should Teach

There are many life lessons we will learn

Presented with the opportunity to teach anything I wanted, and assuming that anyone wanted to learn, there is no doubt that I would try to teach a few of the things I have learned from life that I think are important.

There were many important things that I never considered early on in life, which have proven invaluable and nearly vital knowledge today.

These lessons may not be mind-blowing, but I think they are essential for you to be all you want to be in life. Whether you believe they have a place in your life or not is up to you.

1. There is Greatness in You

No matter the circumstance of life, each of us has the potential for greatness inside. How that greatness shows itself is different for everyone, but it is nonetheless. The secret is to find your area of expertise and allow it to grow.

Ignore the limiting thoughts of others. DonDon’tt your own negative self-talk discourage you. Follow the feeling in your heart that tells you quietly and confidently what you should be doing. Know that you are great, and allow it to show. Some of us have hidden our talent for so long that we have forgotten what direction to look or what to look for.

The first step to finding out what your skill set might contain is to start to look for it. Once you do, I have found that things tend to fall together quite naturally to develop and present you with a path to follow.

Before any of that can happen, you have to accept that you have greatness in you with the potential to do whatever you dream of.

2. Love or Fear will rule you.

There are two forces inside each of us, and everything we do comes from them: love or fear. You can choose which one you pay attention to in any situation.

Love is not just romantic love. That is a tiny part of the entirety of the emotion, and it includes all branches of this positive emotion. Kindness, acceptance, joy, peace, love, humility, empathy, and truth are all things that come from this positive force.

Fear is the opposite and leaves its calling cards behind, evil, anger, jealousy, greed, resentment, lies, inferiority, and ego. Following these feelings and thoughts will bring more situations to make the same choice. What you think is who you are.

With every situation you encounter throughout life, you will be faced with this simple choice of how you approach it, and your choices will determine what kind of life you experience.

It is important to remember this choice because sometimes you may be in a situation where someone elselse’soice will affect you.

How positive the impact you have in life will, in a nutshell, be boiled down to which of these two opposing forces you align yourself with.

3. Gratitude is the Attitude

I do not know if gratitude can be taught or not, but it is vitally important to have a good life. Often, we spend life looking at what we dondon’tve and wondering why.

This thought pattern will only bring more awareness to what you dondon’tve. Since you spend all of your thought on the lack in your life, that is precisely what you will continue to experience.

The alternative is to focus on what you do have, and even if it isnisn’tch, being genuinely grateful for what you do have will open the door’ for more to come into your life. Since your thoughts are about gratitude and being thankful, the world will find a way to see that you experience more of these things.

Being grateful is recognizing what you have and experiencing some joy about it. Being grateful will allow you to enjoy that thing and experience a feeling of joy surrounding it.

If you are experiencing joy, even on a small scale, it is hard not to be happy. If you are happy, well, isnisn’tat the purpose of this little game called life? I think it should be, and I am grateful to be able to tell you this.

4. Live in the Present Moment

Speaking of being happy, you must learn how to live in the moment. That means you are aware of and appreciate what is happening in your life. It would seem simple to do, yet very few people do it.

Distractions take out minds to all sorts of places rather than where we are. You cancan’tjoy today if your mind is lost in yesterday or tomorrow. If you arearen’tesent, then your happiness will evade you.

Look at people walking down the street today; most are focused on anything other than where they are. On the morning commute, almost every eye is looking at their phone or Apple Watch searching for something that is not with them.

The present moment and all that it has to offer is ignored for a fantasy of thought that takes you anywhere, but at the moment, you are actually in.

This is important because if you live your life half aware of what is going on right in front of you, it will be challenging to experience long-lasting happiness. Simply because if your joy is in the past or uncertain future, it is not with you right now.

conclusion

I would include many other lessons in my lesson plans for life, but that will have to wait for another day. I am grateful to all of you who have read to this point! You just made my day! Remember that the end game of life is to be happy. So if you are making decisions or having thoughts and experiences that arearen’trking to that end, you need to change them. You have the power to do this anytime you want, and you have to like it.

Reflections on the way things used to be…….. lead to knowledge

Balance

October 7, 2021 Jonathan Hilton Leave a comment

When you break your life down and put all of your activities into a category, all things we do can be placed in the body, mind, or spirit group. Each of these areas makes up the three sides of your person and your life. It is the great challenge of living to learn to develop a balance between these three areas. Taking care of and strengthening your body in physical fitness through some healthy diet and exercise, continually improving your mind through education, and developing your soul through creative activities and the way you treat the world and its people, including yourself. When you look at your life at any point, the times you are close to achieving a balanced life in all three areas are the good times. Of course, life is continually throwing things at you to force you out of balance, so you have to learn more, develop your body differently, or change your perspective on your soul. It is like standing on a skateboard while life is throwing rocks at you. Development is not an easy path but one we are all on, even if we are not consciously aware of it.

Continual Search for Fitness

Fitness is a goal for everyone. Even though we live in a society that seems determined to undermine any of our health-related goals, all people have an inner desire to be in shape. Most wish it would happen magically by taking a pill, but we all know that is not the way it works. Although we all have the desire to be in shape, we see it as stern and distant. When you are overweight, it is straightforward to give up. But don’t! A life of better physical fitness is simple to accomplish, but of course, it is not easy. Put a consistent exercise program in your life and learn to eat a healthier and more proportionally appropriate diet.

Exercise doesn’t have to involve a gym, an expensive online program, or even cost you any money at all. It can be as simple as walking for about 30 minutes a day, five times a week. You can lift weights, do yoga, run, bike, row, paddle, swim, hike, or any other thing getting your body off the couch and moving around. A consistent commitment to physical activity will be the first step in living at a healthy weight. Of course, there are benefits to your entire body. Diet is much the same. To me, portion control is critical. Don’t eat for any other reason than when you are hungry. Eat less food that is processed and more that is natural. It can be as simple as eating more fruits and vegetables. It isn’t complicated; your body will do what you program it to do and be as large or as small as you train it to be. Anyone can do it. A healthy body is a base for a healthy life because this is where your mind and soul reside.

Your Greatest Weapon

The ability to think is the most excellent tool to create any life we choose. Like a computer, the mind creates a program to guide your life. It is estimated we think somewhere around 70,000 thoughts a day. That is amazing until you realize that only between 3-5% of those thoughts are original, and the rest are all repeats, the same thing we think every day. If you look at your life, are there things you do every day without real thought? A routine you follow or a habit you have that you follow almost unconsciously? We all do because routines are great tools to allow us to accomplish many of our daily tasks. I know my workouts would not be possible without routines. Original thought is the key to mental growth, and we are responsible for this.

Changing your thoughts and developing your mind happens by introducing new information into your experience and reading new books, watching educational videos, and having conversations with people allow you to build your brain. It is estimated the bulk of our mental programming took place before we were seven years old as we tried to figure out how the world works and how we fit in it. Too often, limiting beliefs about money, love, and health were developed then and continue to rule our lives now even though they are not valid. We should evaluate the ideas we follow and how they affect our self-esteem and belief in ourselves. All opinions can change with a bit of effort, and the power of this is you can accomplish the things you always dreamed of doing.

Living from Inside Out

Too often, I have looked for happiness and fulfillment from things on the outside. A relationship, a success in my professional life, how someone treated me, or how life’s circumstances were playing out. The problem with this is that when you look to things and people outside of yourself for happiness, you are at the mercy of those things. You have given all of your power away to something you have no control over. The good news is that it is a minor adjustment to start looking inward for the things that will give your life meaning and bring you a life of joy and enjoyment.

Inside each of us is a creator. Bringing something into the realm of the physical world, which once only existed in your mind, is a magical thing. Some write, paint, draw, and create artwork out of scrap metal; whatever it is you feel called to make, do that. Not for recognition or money, but to express the inner light and love you carry inside. Creativity will bring you home to who you are and allow you to understand your soul’s calling, understand yourself, and hopefully find some form of self-love. We are not encouraged to seek our soul song because it often contradicts the script we learn we should be following. Get an education, get a job, have a family, work for 30 years, retire, and then wait to die. Life is more than this, and we are each more than this. Accept who you are and know your inside greatness, and the outside expectations will matter much less.

How is Your Triangle?

Now it is up to you to look at your life and see where your triangle of body, mind, and spirit is today. It is alright if you are not where you ideally want to be because we are all on a journey. Each of us is moving toward something. I have heard it said we are either in a crisis, coming out of trouble, or moving toward crisis all the time. Through all of these journeys lie the opportunities to develop ourselves and learn about the things we love to do and the ideas which make us happy. No two people are the same, and it is in these differences we find the things only we can bring to the world. Yet, we are all connected in our journey as we all seek the same things in life. To enjoy the experience of living aims to balance your body, mind, and spirit. It is a constant journey to find the balance which will bring us fulfillment. No two people are going to have the same ratio of body, mind, and spirit. But we all gain equal value in the pursuit of it. Enjoy the ride.

“The key to keeping your balance is knowing when you’ve lost it.” Anonymous

“You can maintain a work-life balance even while pursuing careers.” Chanda Kochhar

“Never get so busy making a living that you forget to make a life.” Dolly Parton

“It is better to rise from life as from a banquet – neither thirsty nor drunken.” Aristotle

On Your Mind

April 17, 2021 Jonathan Hilton Leave a comment

Each of us is given a gift of a mind on the day we are born. People spend lives trying to develop it (or not) and build skills that help us experience success in many different phases of life. As we learn all sorts of things, from the rudimentary activities of functioning to the most complex ideas, our mind helps us develop goals and make the plans that allow us to make grand ideas a reality. Our brain is our best friend and most valuable tool. It is designed to learn and grow and has a nearly limitless capacity to accomplish nearly anything you desire. There are some simple things that we can do to enhance the process and avoid destroying the potential that our valuable brain possesses. Improving your mind is a full-time job.

Don’t Do Drugs

This seems to be a “no-brainer,” but apparently, many people still find an acceptable escape from their problems or look for simple entertainment. Whatever the reason a person chooses to partake in the use of drugs, they choose to damage their most valuable asset. You may not be where you want to be in life, but the way to change that is to change what you believe, and your mind is the tool that can take you there. Drugs and alcohol are detriments to this process. Addiction is the home of the ego, and these well-ingrained habits are nearly impossible to stop, yet it is possible, and when you do it, your brain (or what is left of it) will be there to help you. When you stop these bad habits, you are going to be improving your mind.

Feed Your Brain

Each person has a brain that likes to learn. You may not think so as you remember your experience in the public school system, but that is not an indicator of your joy of learning but rather an indictment of the rigidity and lack of options provided by schools in our world today. We all like to learn. We all learn differently. To use a tool well, you need to start to understand it.

Much like a mechanic knows the workings of an engine, we should all learn something about the thoughts our brain is producing and how to control them. Some of the basics are that our brain has different parts, how many are really up for debate, and depends on who is talking. It is agreed that there is a conscious mind which is the part we have direct control over, and there is a subconscious mind working in the background all the time, helping us react and remember how to perform rudimentary tasks.

The subconscious is responsible for most of our choices, and if you let it run by itself, it will make choices based on your experience and how much pain one has felt in the past. The conditioning in the subconscious can be affected by the conscious mind with a little work. How much is up to each individual, and how much are they committed to improving their mind?

R.A.S. Improving Your Mind

Our brain has a mechanism called the reticular activating system, which helps us filter information based on what is important to us. We are bombarded with somewhere around 2 million bytes of information at any one time and can only understand and process about 147. That means that much of our “reality” is being ignored. The RAS works through the context of the subconscious mind, so what we hold in our mind is relevant to our interests.

If you can change your interest, your experience changes. Improving your mind is a process of becoming aware of the control you have with a concentrated, focused interest in something. Using your Reticular Activating System to notice the things you want in life will allow you to create a life that is more of what you desire. If you are unhappy with things, try adjusting your focus and seeing how much your life changes.

If you spend your time focused on fear and worry, then you will find more things to fear and be worried about. If you focus on solutions, then you will find things that provide solutions. Your life experience will follow your focus. Where that focus is directed is controlled by each of us.

We are all given the gift of a brain that can help us achieve our goals and live the life we would like to live. It makes sense that we take care of this valuable treasure by any means necessary. All of our decisions will impact the function of the mind and, through that, how much we are capable of achieving. So it is conceivable that you can achieve anything that you want if your mind is healthy and you are using it the right way. Improving your mind is a full-time job and needs our full attention.

Silence

April 2, 2021 Jonathan Hilton Leave a comment

There are a precious few moments that are truly silent and fewer still in life people are aware of. All of our moments seem to be spoken for with a wide variety of visual entertainment available, intensive video game experiences, and the constant attention on our phones. Few moments are free to be silent. But still, the silence is there waiting for us if we take the time and make an effort to hear it. You must do this because it will benefit you in your mental health and help you become the best at whatever you want to accomplish. Listening to the available silence is good for your mood, too, because it is an easy way to bring you into the present moment and out of negatively charged thoughts of the past or the future. So let’s take a moment and start finding the silence.

Listen to Silence

Even though our life experience is probably something else, silence is always available to us. Many are afraid of the quiet because there is only you when you are not distracted by something else. That can be intimidating, scary, and even seem lonely, which creates an uncomfortable feeling that people want to avoid. It doesn’t have to be that way because once you ease into this silence and become more comfortable with yourself, you will recognize the strength in yourself. There is always a silence existing underneath the noise and activity, and it is waiting there for you to access it and experience its power and strength.

Listening to the silence immediately creates a stillness in you. This stillness is like a pond in the early morning with no wind, and it is a soft reflective pool where the best of your possible ideas can go to develop. The stillness in you is rare to find and has been difficult for me to maintain, but the time I do get to spend listening to the silence revitalizes thoughts and allows me to feel what it is I am seeking in my life. A chance to separate the thoughts of value from the thoughts of foolishness. It is also a chance to deal with your emotions and where they come from.

Your Reflecting Pool

You are more than the physical body you travel around in each day. You are more than the job you have or the things you own. Those are just things you have accumulated. Some people are better at accumulation than others. That doesn’t make them great people. Great people understand who they are, and that person is accessible through the silence. We are all trained from childhood to identify with the mind and treat it and the thoughts it creates as if that is us. It isn’t. When you ask a question with your mind, someone answers. Who is that? You can pull back and watch your thoughts come to you, and if you are watching the thoughts, you can’t possibly be the thoughts.

When you are identifying with your mind, you are being cut off from who you really are. If your whole sense of self is identified with thinking and you can’t access and live from the space of who you really are. This leads to underlying feelings of unhappiness, longing for something that you can’t quite put your finger on. That is the true self, struggling to send you a message. The silence allows the message to get through. Becoming conscious of this being is done by reclaiming your consciousness from the mind, and people can do that by allowing all things to be silent and exist in the cool, calm, reflecting pool of your existence.

How to Focus on What You are doing

The focus starts when a person stops Identifying with their thoughts all the time. Our minds are great tools we should use to solve problems, help create things, and weigh our decisions’ value. It is not who we are, and neither are the thoughts we think. Drawback and look at your thoughts. Take five minutes and without a filter, write down everything you think. How many of your thoughts are repeated, or useless, or both. Notice the tenor of your thoughts. Are they kind? Helpful? Mean? Judgmental? Let your thoughts slide by you without reacting to them and their power. Choose to pay attention to the thoughts that honor you and represent what you want them to. Once you let them go, you can find the silence.

Silence is found in between thoughts and emotions. Take time and see how you feel about things. What are you avoiding, denying, or resisting in life? When you see yourself feeling unease or nervous about something, that is something you should deal with. Search your soul, search your mind in the quiet spaces, and it is at this point your journey to self-discovery and personal growth. It all begins with the silence. Take time to find the calm and silence in your everyday life and see what secrets it holds for your life.

“Silence is a source of great strength.”- Lao Tzu.

“He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your words.”- Elbert Hubbard.

“The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls and tenements halls and whispered in the sounds of silence.”- Paul Simon.

Jonathan Hilton Mind Connections