Tag Archives: reading

21

Being Better

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Develop habits that make you better!! Loose those that make you worse.

There are certain habits a person can participate in, which will make them better in all aspects of their lives. Certain practices, entertained thoroughly, are potent to the value of life because they are not only positive for the body, mind, and spirit, but they also lead to other behaviors that improve one’s life. In this short writing, I will speak of three such habits, taken seriously by a person, which will lead one to be healthier, happier, and wiser for the practice of the thing and for the other benefits each brings into your life.

As you consider adding these things to your life, deep contemplation of one fact should rise to the forefront of the mind. How will being better help me? Well, my friend, in so many ways. It is impossible to rise to your highest level of achievement unless a person is willing to be the best version of themselves in all areas of life. These simple habits are choices a person must make each day, and the practice of the three will lead to overall greater depth and enjoyment of life and the quality of experiencing it.

Read Like Your Life Depends On It

In all of my life, there has never been another force as powerful as reading has been. It has opened up the world to me and a plethora of new ideas with it.  Each original thought led to other recent reviews; each expanded my mind. Whether I liked it or not. Once an account is opened, it can’t go back to its shape before. There is simply no way so that the expansion will also cause other changes.

We can read the opportunity to build the curriculum for our education. Not a plan dictated by institutions or governments for their ends. But the thoughts we are interested in entertaining. We can learn about money, emotions, social skills, better health, relationships, or the ideas of great thinkers from the past. Each choice is usually more relevant and compelling than all of your years at school because education is your choice.  Becoming your director of knowledge provides you with the freedom to become whatever you want to grow in life, and that freedom is priceless. Much more effective than any organized degree, and it is action and results from that matter in this world. Nobody can stop you but you.

Learn the power of Meditation

There are many negative thoughts regarding Meditation, but I wager most are created out of fear and ignorance.  Meditation is the simple practice of quieting the mind and allowing your thoughts and emotions to be under your control rather than the other way around.  Our brains are our most excellent tool, but without any management system, this thing we should be controlling is controlling us.  All thought comes with an emotion attached, and if you don’t like the feeling you are feeling, and it doesn’t serve you, then choose a different idea to focus on.

Meditation will allow you to increase your focus on positive things for your life. It is proven that the tenor of your thoughts and actions dictate the energy of your life. Thinking and acting in a selfish, negative way will lead to the experience of those things in your reality. The practice of kindness, giving, honesty, and acceptance will create a life containing those things.  Meditation will bring about a general feeling of well-being and confidence because when you realize you are in control of your thoughts, you can do almost anything better.  Meditation is a practice the world should learn, and there would be far fewer problems.  I appreciate the moments.

Physical Fitness is a Must

It doesn’t matter your exercise of choice as long as you practice it regularly. It could be running, lifting weights, yoga, biking, martial arts, or any other kind of fitness there is.  It will increase your muscle tone, help you lose fat, and move you toward a healthier weight.  It will also promote heart health, lead to fewer overall health concerns, and allow you to live longer and better in all your life, but fitness also includes another choice: diet.

When a person is engaged in a routine fitness program, it is much easier for that person to develop a diet of healthy eating. In combination, these two factors provide a person with the ability to become the fittest person they can be.  It is not just what a person eats but the portion of that food, which will lead to their overall health in weight and performance.  Making fitness a priority in your life will give you the keys to becoming the best version of yourself.  Take the time to find an exercise you love doing that resonates with you deeply, soulfully.

Try to make these three things regular habits in your life, and you will be on your way to developing as a better person in body, mind, and spirit. Life is a short ride, and your choices in these areas will make you the best version of yourself if you choose to pursue that.  Like all things in life, they involve personal preference.

“When you are at that intersection in the road, and you’ve got two paths to go down, because of the impact of certain people in your life, you’re able to choose the right path.” —Jason Witten

“The dreaming has to be backed up by the doing.” —Carrie Wilkerson

“The time is now. Stop hitting the snooze button on your life.” —Mel Robbins

“Leap off the fence of indecision. Get out of the ‘Want to Lane’ and put yourself into the ‘Got to Lane.'” —Gloria Mayfield Banks

 

21

Creative

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gold-fish-jumping
Sometimes you have to think outside the box (or bowl) to solve a problem.

Being creative is one of the gifts of being human. We all can look at the same situation and develop different ways of solving the puzzle and finding a solution. Problem-solving can be one of the most valuable tools we have when making money, excelling in a career, or simply just being as high as ourselves.  Sometimes it can be difficult to muster a creative answer, but there are some things that you can do to make your thought process more creative and perhaps find a solution that you are seeking. Become a monarch of creativity.

Ask the Right Question

questions 22One of the most creative things a person can do is to ask the right question. And to me, the right question leads to a new solution. All questions bring with them an unlimited level of possibility.  How can I do this differently? What would make this easier? What can I contribute to that project? How can we complete it in less time? How can it be done more efficiently?

All of the questions you can ask will allow your mind to roam freely if you let it. Our brains are a great tool, but they can only work as well as we make them. So ask a question, and then allow your mind to work on it. The answers will come in their time, and then you must treat them appropriately.

Answers Lead to More Questions

The right follow up questions can lead to the most original solutions.
The right follow-up questions can lead to the most original solutions.

Each question asked represents the possibility every answer given is a dead-end. It sounds contradictory but thinks about it. Once a solution is determined, there is no more time wasted on the question. In the long run, one seemingly great solution may be only a significant first step in solving the problem, so the answers should lead to a new question.  How can we do this even better? What else can come from this that I don’t see right now? How can we make it even better?

These are just some simple examples of how to move your creativity into overdrive. Keep the mind working. Keep the solutions coming because of the next thought, maybe the one worth a million dollars.

Lose Yourself in Something

Losing yourself in a task is easy when you are young, but it is much more challenging for adults. First, you lose-find-in-lovehave to put in a little effort to find something that will take all of your attention. It can be drawing, painting, putting an engine together, building a model, knitting, sewing, or any other activity on which all your focus can be. As your focus and attention get tested, you lose track of time, and it allows your subconscious mind to work in overdrive, and you can get the answers to other questions that you have asked yourself.

As you work on a drawing or an engine and your conscious attention is captured, the limits of our minds rise, and the subconscious can create new ideas, and we are receptive to hearing them. That is where answers to problems come seemingly out of the blue.  Lose yourself to something creative, and your creativity in thought will grow.

Change things Up

All of us are creatures of habit. Our activities tend to fall into patterns that we find either safe or How-to-change-things-up-and-make-the-everydayenjoyable or both. These behaviors turn into routines that turn into a daily path. One of the most creative things you can do is change your daily activities. Take a new route to work, stop at a different food stop, take a slightly longer way, change things up.  Try something new to eat, talk with a total stranger about life. Try something you have never tried before.

By changing these simple things, you will force your mind to use different thought patterns and know what will result from that. Each new experience will expand your mind and your experience and allow your creativity to grow as well. Perhaps the answer you seek is inside of you all along, and you need the right catalyst to free it.  Changing things up might do this.

Read! Read. Read? Read…………….

The key to every kingdom is located in between the covers of a book
The key to every kingdom is located in between the covers of a book.

One of the most natural things a person can do to increase your creativity is to read quality books about topics that interest you. Reading provides a personal connection with the information in a book that is difficult to replicate in any other way. As a result, your mind can easily expand, and there are many possibilities for that growth. That is where creativity can come in large bounds.

In my experience, a mind expanded through the written word changes for the better permanently. That is why being literate is one of the greatest gifts we have. There are absolutely no limits on what you can learn if you can read. All you need is access to a library and the most exceptional thoughts in history expose to you. Read every chance you get, and your creativity will grow. Read, and you will find roads you never knew existed before. Read and grow to your true potential.

“The creative adult is the child who survived.” — Ursula LeGuin

“The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul.” — Dieter F. Uchtdorf

“Creativity doesn’t wait for that perfect moment. It fashions its perfect moments out of ordinary ones.” — Bruce Garrabrandt

“Everything you can imagine is real.” — Pablo Picasso

“Creativity is intelligence having fun.” — Albert Einstein

Imagine what you can create……….

 

21

To Read

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Reading is The Key to Learning Anything

reading is power
All The Power in the world is contained within the binder of books!

If you are looking to be the best you can be, I don’t think there is a better activity for you than reading.  When you talk to people today, it is sad how little we read books that expand our horizons and push ourselves to grow and think a little.

I understand that there is an inordinate number of distractions out there today, all vying for our short attention spans, and books seem to be getting the short end of the stick. But, unfortunately, with that, so are we.

Books Changed My Life

I am going to champion the wonder of books and the magic they carry in their pages, just waiting for you to read their words: the imagination that they provide, the knowledge, and the answers to questions.

I was fortunate to have been a reader since I was four years old, reading books with my parents and myself as often as possible. So, as a child, I was aware of the power of words to catapult your imagination and stimulate thoughts of places you have never been, and expand your mind.

As I grew older, the importance of reading fell behind other interests like sports, girls, and money.  I was subject to the same time restraints everyone else is.  I forgot what power was hidden in the pages of these works of art. Each book possesses an opportunity to learn and grow. Yet, I did not take them right away.

teaching you something through books
Find the book that is just right to interest you.

Eventually, as life has unfolded, I finally started to ask some questions that nobody I knew could answer.  How we positively live life, and what being alive on this planet was all about?  I wasn’t the first one and won’t be the last to ask deep questions. Fortunately, I was able to find some great guides for this journey, and they were all located in the pages and words of books.

The Key to the Kingdom

The first really great book I read was called The Kingship of Self-Control and The Majesty of Calmness, by William George Jordan, which he wrote about 100 years ago, but it is a guide for your behavior, most part applicable today.

Dealing with honesty, greed, calmness, how to treat others was a revelation, and I have him to thank for my reawakening in literature.  Since I read that book, I have read somewhere between 60 and 100 books on various topics, but always being drawn toward philosophy, psychology, and how life works.

william george jordan
The Book that started my journey will make you want to be a better person!

The more I read and learned, the more I wanted to learn. There were many things that nobody had ever told me, so not only was I entering a new world I had never visited, it was a world I didn’t even know existed.

There are other philosophies about reality or that our minds work a certain way because conditioning was an exciting discovery.

There isn’t any force that could stop me from learning more and reading now.  That is a passion and a desire that I would hope for everyone.

One of the saddest conversations I have had recently was with a high school student who stated clearly that most of her classmates didn’t see the value in reading and, in fact, couldn’t remember that last time they read a book.

They stated that they didn’t see the value in it. You can watch things on television or on your computer.  This is true, but you will never have the intricate connection that absorbing words from a page into your mind will give you.

This connection is more powerful than any television show you will ever see and is available to anyone literate.  Once you have the power of literacy, all you have to do is apply it, and there you go, you are off to whatever pinnacle you are reaching for.

The Dream Builder

For myself, reading helped crystallize what my dreams were, and it may help others do the same thing.  Read a book about something you are interested in and then ask questions about the information you learn.  That will inevitably lead you to another book and more knowledge, and before long, you will be smarter than you ever imagined possible.

Knowledge is power, and power will help you get anywhere you want to go, regardless of

be a bookworm
I can’t think of anything better than being a Bookworm!

your economic background or family situation can achieve whatever you want by applying yourself in reading.  You can learn from the mistakes of others, building on their philosophies, adopting what proves right to you, and discarding what doesn’t seem to fit. Unfortunately, this is learning and seems to be a lost art in our overly mandated education system today.

So if you are wondering about anything and curious about how to be successful or how to run a business or climb a mountain or sail a boat, all that you need to know is located somewhere in a book for you to discover, read, and read and master.  All you have to know is where to look.

Read for your mind, read for your soul, and read for your success.  There isn’t anything you can’t accomplish through the power of literacy.

 

Some of the books I have read and would recommend checking this link. 

Get a move on and read, get smarter, become successful.

 

Gratitude

Grateful for Change

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leaves change and so do we
A picture I took at a random location of the fall foliage.

 The lessons that nature teaches us are on display all around us each and every day.  All we have to do is listen and being fortunate enough to live in an area the has a distinct four seasons, I am lucky to experience these changes and I am grateful for it.

For many years I am ashamed to say that I never really enjoyed or contemplated too much about it, but lately, I can’t help but be amazed and think about all that the changes of the season bring to the world.  Right now it is autumn in Maine and that means that each and every day you will see a wide array of colors, red, yellow, orange and even brown.  This change where once there was only green makes you think and often about gratitude.

On the Surface

Seeing the leaves change is a pretty miraculous thing. To think that nature knows exactly how to work itself for the trees to survive is amazing, and further than that there is the show they put on.  I have been fortunate enough to see, bright-colored leaves reflecting on the still waters of a fall lake surface.  It brings many thoughts to my mind as I look at the colors and understand them for what they are. Harbingers of what is to come and we merely need to listen to hear their warnings and to learn from them.

Change Is Constant

One of the best reminders of fall is that change is happening all around us all the time.

fall is a season which depicts change
Leaves are falling all around, it’s time I was on my way.

You may not be able to see it visually, but everything is changing all the time.  These variations are usually never as visual as the leaves but they are as real.  Each relationship, job, and personal journey is changing all the time.

No matter what you do and no matter what you think of your current circumstances, it matters little because soon they will be different because things are always changing.   Just like the fall will eventually give up its life to the oncoming winter, so must we learn to let go of our attachments to this life.

It is the values of these changes that make them appear good or bad.  Yet aren’t they simply just experiences?  The fall season helps me to contemplate and understand the changes that are happening in life all the time.  I have a gratefulness inside for all of the changes that have happened in my life and that growth is not possible without change.

Endings Are Just Endings

Another great thought of fall is the twilight of the year, the ending of summer and how this season represents an ending in our lives.  The phrase “The Autumn of our Lives”, captures this effectively.

I have a problem with this phrase because we simply do not know with any kind of certainty when this life is going to end.   it may be over in five minutes or it may last another 30-40 years.  Nobody knows.

When you look at the fall it will have an ending, just as all of our lives will, but there is a hidden promise in the fall.  It is there in every nostalgic feeling and thought, that eventually, the spring and beautiful summer will come again.  We just need to be patient.  All things will eventually end, that is the way that the universe works.  All things have a beginning, a middle and an ending.

This is not a bad thing, it is only a thing.   So it teaches you to enjoy the summer, or the fall or the winter or whatever season you are experiencing right now because that is all you have right now.  There may never be another summer to look forward to, so not completely enjoying today is a foolhardy choice.

The fall makes me grateful for each and every day and what it has to offer.

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What I Know

Books Are Beacons of Possibility

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Reading books
If you read, you make yourself better!

This is the second article about the things that I know for certain after a few years of trying to answer the questions of life.  The access to and the willingness to read and learn is the great equalizer of all people.  

Books and Reading Changed My Life

I have always been a reader, but not a learner.  The books that I read for much of my life were designed to entertain and tell a story but not to teach me anything in particular.  I am almost ashamed to say that I lived more than forty years before I truly discovered the power of books.  This is what I have learned to be true.  Not everyone is born with great athletic ability, or supportive parents, or money, but once you learn the skill of reading you able to build your intellect to any level that you desire.

You Can Do Anything

If you have access to books, you have the ability to learn from the greatest thinkers that mankind has ever produced.  What you want to learn, you can learn all you want to about. This means that all of the world, science, math, literature, or physics are all there for you to

Reading allows you to do anything
Reading Provides Magic

delve into as deeply as you could possibly want to.

This is what happened to me, once I started to realize that books possess a whole lot of power, I had trouble reading anything for fun.  I didn’t want to waste any of my reading time with something that didn’t make me think or to gain a better understanding of the world around me.  I am certainly no intellectual giant, but I do realize the miles that I have crossed, and the distance I still need to navigate.  What a trip.

Once You Start…….

 

Much like a rock rolling down a hill, once knowledge is gained, and you feel like true understanding has started to peek through the haze of your mind, you want to learn more and more as fast as you can.  The great part about this is that once you stretch your brain out,  to accept these new ways of thinking, and thoughts that you have aquired, it will never shrink back again.  There is no turning the light of knowledge off.

This power of gaining knowledge and understanding is the factor that levels the playing field for all people.  you can feel sorry for yourself because of the circumstances that you were born into, or your experiences of life, but there is absolutely nothing stopping you from learning all that you want to from the many books of the world.  All of which can be accessed free of charge at your local library.

You Can Do Anything By Reading

You have the opportunity to learn about business from Andrew Carnegie, or philosophy from Nietzsche. There are no limits to what level of expertise you want to acquire.  The only limit is in the amount of time and thought that you want to invest in a particular project.

If you can read, you can do anything at all and that is a fact that I know to be true.

 

 

 

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Personal Projects

Thirty Questions to Understanding

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by Jonathan Hilton

It all started so innocently. I was looking for a way to improve my writing and to increase the original content on my website.  I was also looking for a way to write more about what I feel without a filter and to express what is going on in my mind.  A friend motivated me to do this, and that led me to watch this video about how this guy had done a string of personal thirty-day challenges to improve his life in some way.

This challenge resonated with me, and I started to think about what kind of project I could work on and improve my writing and expressing myself in thirty days.  That was the day I saw it, thirty questions that will change your life. I didn’t check them out or read over them in advance, the whole project clicked in my mind, and I was committed.  I would answer one question honestly for the next thirty days and publish them on my blog.

I have been right about only reading one question at a time, so I only deal with one a day.  It has been a revelation personally.  Many people say what they would do in a particular situation or are quick to share their opinion, but it takes quite a bit more to put it into writing and to place it out there for anyone to read.  The key for me has been to write honestly from a place that is honest and true, that doesn’t care for approval or worry about disapproval because it is right exactly how it was answered.

Also, I posted only the question on Facebook to get some ideas, and have found some interesting things by doing this.  I have gained some insights from some, and if they ever wonder why I am writing all of these questions, then they can read my answers and see what I am all about in life.  If they aren’t interested, that is ok too.

Here is a list of the questions, you can click on the questions and read my answer if you would like.

  1.  How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?

2.  –  Which is worse, failing or never trying?

3. When it’s all said and done, will you have said more than you’ve done?

4. What is the one thing you’d most like to change about the world?

  1. –Are you doing what you believe in, or are you settling for what you are doing?

6. To what degree have you controlled the course your life has taken?

7. -Are you more worried about doing things right or doing the right things?

  1. –If you could offer a newborn child, only one piece of advice, what would it be?
  2. –Would you break the law to save a loved one?
  3. –Have you ever seen insanity where you later saw creativity?
  4. -What’s something you know you do differently than most people?
  5. –How come the things that make you happy don’t make everyone happy?
    • What one thing have you not done that you want to do? What’s holding you back?

14. -Do you push the elevator button more than once? Do you believe it makes the elevator faster?

  1. –Why are you, you?

16. -Have you been the kind of friend you want as a friend?

  1. –Would you rather lose all of your old memories or never be able to make new ones?

18. Is it possible to know the truth without challenging it first? 

19.  Has your greatest fear ever come true?

20. At what time in your recent past, have you felt most passionate and alive?

21. If not now, then when?

22.  If you haven’t achieved it yet, what do you have to lose?

  1. Have you ever been with someone, said nothing, and walked away feeling like you just had the best conversation ever?

24. When was the last time you marched into the dark with only the soft glow of an idea you strongly believed in?

25. If you knew the world was ending tomorrow, who would you make sure you visited today?

26. Would you be willing to reduce your life expectancy by ten years to become extremely attractive or famous?

27. What is the difference between being alive and truly living?

28. What would you do differently if you knew nobody would judge you?

29. When was the last time you noticed the sound of your breathing?

30. Decisions are being made right now. The question is: Are you making them for yourself, or are you letting others make them for you?