M.J. Blehart's Blog, page 72

Why Be Happy?

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Are you happy?

We often shy away from this question.  Why?  Because when we look at the world around us, and all the troubles going on, we might just find that having our own happiness makes us feel guilty.

It is one of the most ludicrous things I can possibly imagine.  Why?  Because just about everything we are doing with our lives is to find things that make us happy.  I’m not writing about that giddy, superficial, momentary thing that makes you feel happy, I’m writing about that satisfaction and contentment that is the root of being contentedly happy.

Why do you live where you live?  How come you work the job you work?  Why do you date or are you married to or living with that person?  How come you chose that hobby?  While I have certainly seen a good argument for the idea that feeling necessary and needed is a major part of what drives the things we do, I also thoroughly believe that feeling happy is another major reason.

I recognize that all of my above examples are imperfect.  Many people do not live where they most want to live, work the job they most desire, or are in the most ideal relationship or participating in the most desired hobby.  Except the primary reason why they probably desire change is because they would prefer a place, career, relationship or activity that makes them feel happier.

When we seek out more positivity in the world, one of the benefits of it is more happiness.  When you feel more positive, you tend to feel happier, too.  Yet still, because of the less-than-positive state of the world we are frequently presented, being happy seems pretty selfish.

When You are Happy, The World Gets Better

I know that in the face of greed, corruption, inequality, fear and anger we are regularly bombarded with, our own happiness seems pretty selfish, egotistical, even narcissistic.  Quite frankly, it’s not.

You deserve to be happy.  We are all worthy of feeling happy.  Being happy takes nothing away from anyone else, and is totally not selfish.  Does your being happy in some way deny another from being happy?  Likely not.  Ergo, finding things that make you feel happy is not in any way selfish.  It does not make you a bad person.

Unless you are consciously trying to keep others down, actively support people who discriminate, disempower, or hurt people intentionally, then you are not a bad person.  Being positive and content does no harm.  In fact, when you feel positive and content, you gain the ability to spread it.  Share it.  Assist other people to find it themselves.

We cannot change the world until we change ourselves.  Until you and I are reasonable with ourselves and the things we desire to create and have in this world, we are going to have a difficult time doing anything for anyone else.  But when we feel good, and we manage to do things or have things that make us happy, we have more to give.

When we are full, then we have the ability to give from our fullness.  This is how we can share our time, energy, ideas, love and happiness in order to better the world around us.  It begins with you and me, and though it may be a daunting task, we can spread it to make this world better overall.

If you are happy, don’t feel bad about saying yes if someone asks.  Be joyful, and see if you can help them to be happy, too.

Finding positivity is not hard, but it does require action

Knowing that when you are happy, there is no reason to feel bad about it, and it gives you the ability to pass on happiness to others.  When we allow ourselves to be happy, it generates positivity, and when we can share that with others, ultimately we empower ourselves.  When we feel empowered, we become more aware and mindful, and tend to spread that feeling to others around us. As such, we can build more positive feelings.

We can use the positive feelings this generates to dissolve negative feelings. When we eradicate negative feelings, we open up space to let in more positive feelings, and that is something we can be grateful for.

Gratitude leads to happiness.  Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude.  An attitude of gratitude is a positive attitude that begets even more good energies, and that is always worthwhile.

This is the two-hundred and sixty-second entry of my Positivity series.  It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone.  Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

After more than 7 years of weekly blogging, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *NameSubmit

The post Why Be Happy? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Five Truths About Heart and Head

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The heart and head will sometimes pull you in different, opposing directions.

Your feelings will try to take you one way, while your thoughts attempt to take you another.  Oddly, despite these both coming from you, they can make you feel as if you are an outside observer.

When you can reach that place, and be the detached, outside observer, you can best determine how to synchronize heart and head.  More on that later.

It is important to recognize a couple of truths here.

First: It is completely normal to have thoughts and feelings misaligned.  A long time now I have said that the heart and head tend to have different desires, and frequently do not meet in the middle.  Trust me, you are not alone in this.

Second: For some people, heart always trumps head, or vice versa.  Another aspect of human nature is that lots and lots of people are completely out-of-balance in this matter.  Feelers versus thinkers, intellectuals versus sensors, and so forth.

Third: You CAN get where you desire to go even when heart and head are out of alignment, BUT chances are the journey will be much more difficult and complicated than necessary.

Fourth: Sometimes, even when heart and head align, you will still get it wrong.  Many ventures have been entered into with full awareness of the thought and feeling intended, and still they did not get where they meant to.

Fifth: Sometimes this misalignment will actually lead you somewhere better.  It is entirely possible that in trying to bring heart and head together, we will discover that we actually have a very different desire from the point of origin.

Whether aligned or not, recognizing what you are feeling and thinking allows you to build nearly anything.

Heart and Head Are Tools for Manifestation

Consciousness creates reality.  As I have written time and again, it cannot be done from a total vacuum.  There has to be a base that you begin upon in order to manifest what you are desiring.  For example, if you desire to be a brain surgeon, you can’t just *poof* become a brain surgeon.  You have a long, complicated road ahead of you.  It will take a base in science and math and a lot of dedication and effort to achieve.

Anything we desire, consciously or unconsciously, usually comes from heart and head.  The feeling of what it would be like to have something we have thought about is the fuel to bring it into our personal illusion of reality.

The only things we can control is our own thoughts and feelings.  Where we let our heart and head roam and explore is the singular thing you and I can have any real control over.

It is for this reason that when you have the ability to step outside of the self and find that detachment, you can best observe how heart and head can pull in opposite directions, and from there determine what options are available to you.

Often, when we are in the midst of a crisis of heart and head, we cannot see what we are dealing with.  This is why if you find yourself detached, you can better act on changing or aligning your feelings and thoughts.

There is no quick-fix for this.  It’s not something that can be resolved easily – it takes time and concentration.  The more conflicted your thoughts and feelings are, the tougher finding balance or making necessary change will be.  But in the interest of mindfulness and awareness, it is totally worthwhile.

Recognizing cognitive dissidence between Heart and Head is Mindful

Conscious reality creation means being mindful and aware of the here-and-now.  Questions like What am I thinking? What am I feeling? How am I feeling? and What am I doing? all bring you into the now.  When you are aware of your present thoughts and feelings, you can decide where you desire for them to be.  You get to choose to control and focus them.

Our feelings and thoughts, heart and head, are the only things we have any real control over.  Plain and simple.  This, and this alone, is what we can control in our lives.  You and I cannot do anything about what anyone else does, thinks, says or feels.  But when it comes to ourselves, heart and head is entirely in our hands.

Some people shy away from this.  Either they cannot or do not believe they are thus empowered…or they fear it for some reason.

I get that.  We are frequently told by any number of different authorities how little power we have.  But this is something nobody can take from us, unless we give it away.

We are each and every one of us capable of controlling the heart and head.  Our feelings and thoughts may be affected and shifted by outside influences, but we are able to take them over and control them.  When all is said and done, we are empowered to bring the heart and head into alignment, or shift one to meet the other…or change both as necessary.

You can change your heart and head

I know that seems impossible sometimes.  But that doesn’t make it any less true.

We can change our thoughts and feelings, ideas and emotions, heads and hearts.  We have the ability to align them, alter them, create and recreate them.

When we recognize the truths inherent in this, we can see that we are empowered to use this to create, change, and better out lives.  If we use our own power and do not give it away, we can go to incredible places.  If the heart and head pull you in different, opposing directions, you are empowered to use your mindfulness to do something with that.

Can you see how being mindful of heart and head empowers you?

This is the three-hundred seventy-first entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way, and empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here.

After more than 7 years of Pathwalking, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *WebsiteSubmit

The post Five Truths About Heart and Head appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Why Does Aligning Head and Heart Matter?

This post contains affiliate banner links. For more info, see my disclosures.

 

Getting head and heart in sync can build tremendous positivity.

However, getting the head (thought) and the heart (feeling) aligned can be challenging.

One way to get the head and heart in sync is to be more mindful.  Mindfulness, or awareness, can take us to all kinds of incredible places.

This is not awareness of the outside world…it is awareness of ourselves.  It is a matter of being conscious of our own thoughts, feelings, and resulting actions that can synchronize the head and heart so we can do amazing things – like build positivity.

This can be a challenge sometimes.  Our thoughts and our feelings, our heads and hearts, do not always align.  The head may know a thing, but the heart feels another, and they conflict.  This can prove to be uniquely challenging.  But when we practice being mindful, we can better work to bring ourselves in synchronicity.

Why does it matter?  Because with positivity, we can develop and build far more incredible things than with negativity.  When our thoughts and feelings are both positive, we can take intentional actions to create even more positives and positivity.

I know that for me, at least, when I am not being entirely mindful, I often find that though I may be thinking positive, I am not necessarily feeling it.  Because my head and heart are misaligned, sustaining a positive outlook can be seriously challenging.

Sometimes, we know that a thing is not for us…but because of how we feel about the thing, we may hold onto it.  How many relationships hang on long past their breaking point for this reason?  Despite having the knowledge that something is bad, how often does the heart still drive a person to do that something?

Synchronize the head and heart with mindfulness

Being mindful is a way to get head and heart aligned.  When we are mindful, we become aware of both our thoughts and feelings.  Because we become aware of them, we can determine how to align them…or change them, as needs be.

Important note: Just because we are aware of a misalignment of head and heart does not mean that getting them in sync will be easy.  Sometimes it will be, but other times it is going to prove to be a challenge.  Of course this is human nature.  But having the awareness of thought and feeling and being mindful of them is important in and of itself.

When head and heart are out of alignment, we tend to find ourselves challenged in getting just about anywhere consciously.  Because conscious reality creation relies on thought plus feeling plus intentional action, if thought and feeling differ, action is likely to lack intent.  Thinking positive without feeling positive is likely to be like running on a treadmill.  You’re moving, but you are not going anywhere.

Yet when we get head and heart coordinated, we become capable of creation on almost any imaginable level.  As such, building positivity becomes much more realistic and plausible.  Manifesting anything we desire is easier with thought and feeling working together, rather than in opposition.

Building positivity builds any number of other incredible things in our lives.

Finding positivity is not hard, but it does require action.

Knowing that when the head and heart, thought and feeling, come together as part of conscious reality creation, we can work to align them for our own, as well as the greater good.  When we are mindful and aware of what we are thinking, how we are feeling, and intentional actions to take from that point, ultimately we empower ourselves.  When we feel empowered, we become more aware and mindful, and tend to spread that feeling to others around us. As such, we can build more positive feelings.

We can use the positive feelings this generates to dissolve negative feelings. When we eradicate negative feelings, we open up space to let in more positive feelings, and that is something we can be grateful for.

Gratitude leads to happiness.  Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude.  An attitude of gratitude is a positive attitude that begets even more good energies, and that is always worthwhile.

This is the two-hundred and sixty-first entry of my Positivity series.  It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone.  Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

After more than 7 years of weekly blogging, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *CommentSubmit

The post Why Does Aligning Head and Heart Matter? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Are You Being Kind and Supportive?

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Being kind and supportive towards others is a sign of strength.

Somewhere along the way, this has gotten lost.  From the highest offices in the land to the poorest poor, we have become more uncertain and unkind towards strangers.

All too often, people keep to themselves.  But more than that, they are unwilling to reach out to other people for various reasons.  Whether it is their intent or not, their actions or inactions come across as lacking empathy and kindness.

In other words – don’t be a dick.

Why is this such a complicated and difficult concept for people to grasp?  When you are kind and supportive of others, you lose nothing.  In truth, generally speaking, you gain, because likely someone is grateful or appreciative of your gesture.

That, right there, is the rub.  Sometimes, people do not show gratitude and appreciation for acts of being kind and supportive.  Or worse, they demean them in some way.

Hold the door open for the next person behind you at the convenience store?  Saying “thank you” or a grunt of acknowledgment is nice.  When, however, you receive a “I can do this myself” or something equally disconcerting, you feel a fool for your action.

Smile at a stranger passing by?  A smile in return is a pleasant acknowledgement.  However, receiving a “What’s your problem?” or “What do you want?” doesn’t feel so good.

Buy someone a gift of some sort?  “Thank you” is appreciated.  When you are told it’s not something they wanted, or could they trade it for something else, you feel unappreciated, and displeased.

When these negative reactions happen….and they will…the can cause us to be less willing to be kind and supportive to others.  Maybe keeping to ourselves is less distressing.

Being kind and supportive is good for everyone

The truth is, expressing kindness and support towards others actually does us good, too.  How?  By opening us up to positive energies, in addition to more empathy and understanding.

Though similar, empathy and understanding are different ideas.  The former is feeling, whereas the latter is mental.  You can feel empathy without understanding, and understand without feeling empathy.  Both together, however, allow us to better connect with one another in this world.

We live in a world where division is emphasized in order to empower some while disempowering others.  Worse than that, many of those under the illusion of their own power divide and disempower to further their own agenda, which is usually born of fear and beliefs in lack and scarcity.

Why else does Trump use the idea of the “other” in order to scare his base into believing that building a wall will protect them?  Does anything else explain why some men strive to keep women under control through denying forms of birth control to paying them a third less than men?  Bigotry, fear of the LGBTQ community, racism and the like are all borne of this fear that there is an insufficient amount of…well, pretty much anything and everything we can conceive of.

Yet in truth, this is a lie.  The Universe is made of abundance, and there is more than enough good for everyone.  One expression of this truth is being kind and supportive of other people.  It makes a clear statement that there is plenty, and we are sharing it.

When we share what we have, in especial intangibles, we create more to share.  That is the Law of Attraction.  That is how consciousness creates reality.  Like attracts like.

Being kind and supportive spreads abundance

Yes, there are going to be people who do not see your act of kindness and support as altruistic.  They believe, for whatever reason, that you want something in return.  Too many stories of this sort of thing makes people jaded towards acts of kindness and support, in especial from strangers.

Yet knowing this, it is still in everyone’s best interest to be kind and supportive, because it will generate more kindness and support.  Many of the people in the world today are suffering almost exclusively due to lack of kindness, support, empathy, sympathy, trust and understanding.  Most of the artificial divisions between people exist based almost entirely on this.

In a recent episode of The Orville, an entire class of a world’s society was kept down because they were believed to be inferior due to the time of their birth and astrological sign as such.  Even among themselves, acts of kindness and support were rare, in especial when they were told they were prone to violence.

Yes, this is a fiction, but it is still the reality for many people in the real world today.  How many normally reasonable people believe that Muslims are violent, Mexicans are lazy, and black people have criminal tendencies?  Or, on a more impersonal scale, global warming is a lie, trickle-down economics works, and the Earth is flat?

It is easy to scorn people who hold beliefs we see as unreasonable.  In especial beliefs that hurt other people or lack scientific or common sense merits.  To show them kindness and support feels disingenuous, and like a betrayal of our own beliefs.  But when they are rude, being rude in return will just continue the pattern.

Be kind and supportive to strangers in little ways

This does not require anyone to lie or to be phony.  Saying please and thank you, holding open doors, letting an impatient driver merge in front of you costs you nothing.  Don’t scorn the people whom you disagree with.  All that will do is reinforce their belief that they are right to feel they are downtrodden, scorned, or otherwise disadvantaged.

Being kind and supportive doesn’t mean being fake.  It just means we need to think before we speak, post on the internet, or otherwise interact with our fellow human beings.  When we think, feel, and act on being kind and supportive, in any way, we draw in more kindness and support.  I think the world can use as much of that as we can create right now.

When you interact with other people in the world, do you strive to be kind and supportive?

This is the three-hundred seventieth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way, and empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this. The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here.

After more than 7 years of Pathwalking, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *CommentSubmit

The post Are You Being Kind and Supportive? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

How Can Patience Build Positivity?

This post contains affiliate banner links. For more info, see my disclosures.

 

Patience can be a real stepping stone in generating more positivity.

When we are patient, we allow for the time that may be necessary for change.  When we do not focus on why we need this thing or that right here, right now…we can better focus on the thing coming to us.

More often than most of us realize, patience pays off far more than impatience or rushing about does.  What’s more, when we have patience we are better able to handle the twists, turns and obstacles encountered on the road.

Yet even more impressive than that, patience allows for a different, and potentially better outcome.  When we are rushing, pushing, and forcing something through, we might just miss out on something else.

When you are running late to get from point a to point b, and you haven’t any patience for the traffic you encounter, you might miss a destination you never noticed.  A park, a shop, a restaurant you might otherwise miss.  In a worst-case scenario, your impatience gets you into an accident, and the thing desired is gone because you lacked some necessary patience.

Personally, I am terrible about this.  I have pretty limited patience.  I tend to get easily irked when I get impatient.

Also, important note – there can be a fine line between patience and intentional action.  Pushing past your comfort zones with intentional actions might cause you to feel anxious, but once you do it will start to pass. What’s more, as you advance you tend to gain traction and excitement.  If you are feeling anxiety, and the push to overcome that anxiety is creating even more anxiety, and the struggle only seems to be more upsetting, you are probably experiencing impatience.

Take a deep breath, and focus on releasing the anxiety.

Patience and mindfulness

For those of us who tend to lack a lot of patience, this is particularly challenging.  But the more I work with this, the more I believe that patience can do a great deal of good, in particular with building up positivity.

Practicing mindfulness is an act of patience.  Being purposefully present and still, in particular in our go go go world, requires patience.  But taking just five minutes to be still, aware of only your breathing in the present moment, can be beneficial in so many ways.  You can take stock of where you are, where you are going, and where you desire to be in the here-and-now, and see if you are being intentional or impatient. 

Where am I supposed to find time for this?  No matter how busy we are, finding five minutes in any given day to be still and mindful is in no way unreasonable.  The benefit is too great to ignore.  This doesn’t have to be a meditation, just being aware and present and our breathing can provide insights that will build patience and positivity, and help us check-in with ourselves.

Anxiety rooted in impatience is harmful on many levels.  It feels thoroughly unpleasant; can be super-distracting mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually; it tends to magnify negatives when they pop up; you may question why you are even bothering, and give-up rather than push through.

Knowing this, I am going to challenge you, and myself, to do this: find a minimum of five minutes every day to be still.  This needn’t be meditation, just presence, mindfulness, breathing, calm.  If, like me, you lack patience, this can help us be better aware, and prevent our impatience from derailing intent and taking us off-track from the lives we desire to create.

Finding positivity is not hard, but it does require action.

Knowing patience can be a stepping stone in generating positivity, we can work with mindfulness to create patience in our day-to-day lives.  When we are more mindful and more patient, we are more aware, and ultimately through our mindfulness and awareness we empower ourselves.  When we feel empowered, we become more aware and mindful, and tend to spread that feeling to others around us. As such, we can build more positive feelings.

We can use the positive feelings this generates to dissolve negative feelings. When we eradicate negative feelings, we open up space to let in more positive feelings, and that is something we can be grateful for.

Gratitude leads to happiness.  Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude.  An attitude of gratitude is a positive attitude that begets even more good energies, and that is always worthwhile.

This is the two-hundred and sixtieth entry of my Positivity series.  It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone.  Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

After more than 7 years of weekly blogging, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *WebsiteSubmit

The post How Can Patience Build Positivity? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Why Be Better?

This post contains affiliate banner links. For more info, see my disclosures.

 

The answer for me is simple.  I want to be better because I know I am not at my best.

What does that mean?  That means that, on a deeply personal level, I am aware that I am not all that I can be.  There is room for improvement, and I can be better than I am in many ways.

Why be better?  Because I desire more from my life.  Consciousness creates reality.  Though my life has some pretty awesome bits to it, I know there is more.  I have the ability to be better than I am now, and to manifest some amazing things in my life as such.

This is not about competition.  It has nothing to do with anyone else in my life.  This is all about me, and being the best me that I can be.  Physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually I know that I can be better than I am now.

But why?  Because I know I can be better.  This has nothing to do with the potential that came of my education, or my background, or opportunities I have taken or not taken.  Why be better?  Because I desire to live each and every day to the best of my ability, and I am not doing that as well as I could be.

Some people are perfectly content to be as they are.  And to you I say, well done, more power to you!  But for every person who feels that they are living as well as they can be, I know a dozen who would rather be more.  Better.

Why be better?  Because I can be.

As I wrote before, being better is only regarding the self.  We cannot be better than anyone else, because the competition between anyone in the grand scheme of the universe is artificial.  Unless we are competing at a game of some sort where there will be a winner and a loser, we are not in competition with one another.

I am going to share with you how I can be better than I am currently.  This is personal, and it is an ever-evolving process, so bear with me.

Physically better.  I need to get into better shape.  Stop eating as much as I eat, exercise more.  But more than that, I need to stop talking about my weight, creaking joints, and anything else regarding my body consciousness in a negative way.  Further, if I don’t get sufficient exercise, I need to not beat myself up, either.

Mentally better.  It is important that I read more.  I also need to adjust how I think about myself.  Conscious reality creation is born of thought, feelings and actions.  If thoughts about anything are negative, is it any wonder negativity is drawn in?  Also, I need to adjust the bar I set for my own accomplishments.

Emotionally better.  Expressing gratitude gives you more to be grateful for.  Being more grateful for the things I have and the people in my life is important.  I am grateful, but I can certainly be moreso.  Additionally, I need to be better about checking in with myself, and how I am feeling.

Spiritually better.  A lot of this is tied into the physical, mental, and emotional.  But meditation is a wonderful practice for connecting with the spiritual self.  I am also reading and listening to things that expand my spiritual knowledge base.

Why be better?  To live life to its fullest.

One of the great lines in Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist is when the main character, Santiago, recognizes that pursuing his “Personal Legend,” what Coelho describes as that which a person is meant to ultimately quest to do in their life, he says, “When I have been truly searching for my treasure, every day has been luminous, because I’ve known that every hour was a part of the dream that I would find it.”

Because I know that I can be more than I am for myself, I am searching for MY treasure.  As such, every day that I practice mindfulness and being aware of who I am in the now, versus who I desire to be in the future, I live a more illuminated life.

It is too easy to let myself be distracted.  Whether by shiny things, the internet, or avoiding my fears, distractions are everywhere.

Then, because that’s not nearly enough fun, there is the world situation at hand.  Dear gods, look at all the craziness happening out there.  How much longer will our so-called leaders play chicken and mess up millions of lives over one man’s demented ideas?  In the face of that, how can I possibly care about myself and being better?

I have written before that caring for the self and working on being better for ourselves is not selfish.  Why?  Because being better doesn’t deny anyone ELSE the ability to be better.  I am taking nothing away from anyone else in my work to be better for myself.  When we do not take care of ourselves, we leave no room to take care of anyone else, either.

Why be better?  Because I know of no other way.

Try though I might, I am incapable of accepting that life is what it is, and I cannot change it.  I know, because I have done it before, that I can be whom I most desire to be.  It’s just a matter of thought, feeling, intentional actions, patience, and effort.  There are going to be good days and bad days.  I am going to get it right, and I am going to get it wrong.

But I know I can be better than I am, on every level.  Because I believe this to be worthwhile, I am striving to create changes that will manifest my life better than it is now.

I am aware, and working to be more mindful of myself.  From here, I know that I am able to go as far as I allow myself to go.  I see the world as a place of endless possibility and abundance, not one of lack and scarcity.  As such, knowing I can be better, I desire to pursue abundant possibility.

The only time that’s real is now.  In this reality, I am good…but I can be better.

Why be better?  Because the better I am, the better I can become.  It’s not looking for an end-result, it is looking to the ability to keep growing, changing, and improving, in order to live this life as fully as I can.

Care to join me?  Why might you want to be better?

This is the three-hundred sixty-ninth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way, and empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here.

After more than 7 years of Pathwalking, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *MessageSubmit

The post Why Be Better? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

How Can I Be Better?

This post contains affiliate banner links. For more info, see my disclosures.

 

To be better, the first step is to define the most important question – better than what?

Better than whom is irrelevant.  Why?  Because the only person we ever need to be better than is our present self.  Further, in truth, we cannot generally be better than anyone else.  We are, in the grand make-up of the universe, all equal.

Yes, when it comes to certain athletic and academic competitions, there is a winner and a loser.  But aside from these games, we are in competition with nobody.  Being better should also generate positivity.

Unfortunately, one of the artifices of our fear-based society is a sense of competition that, truthfully, does not exist.  We are told we have to compete for jobs, affections, homes, and various other material and immaterial things.  From this false and unrealistic competition, we are led to believe that person ‘x’ is better than person ‘y’, who in turn is better than person ‘q’, and so on.

Self-improvement is only about the improvement of the self.  That is the only reason to take actions to create change in this manner.  If your approach to self-improvement is to be better than another person…you’re in the wrong place.  Self-improvement to be better than who you already are is not an act of selfishness.   But an attempt at self-improvement to be better than anyone else is the very definition of selfishness.

Recognizing this is an important step to answering the question – How can I be better?  If the answer to better than what? is friend/lover/confidant/employee/listener/speaker/giver or anything else regarding the self, you can and will find an answer.

Steps to take to be better

This is not a quick-fix.  Self-improvement involves time, effort, and much to my own chagrin, patience.  Further, there is no One-True-Way to be better.  However, through my own experience and trial and error, these are some broad, general answers I can provide to the question:

Be mindful.  Consciousness creates reality.  Ask yourself – What bar do I desire to get above to be better?  When you can put a name to that, you need to ask – What am I doing?  What am I thinking?  How am I feeling?  When you are aware of these things, you can move on to:

Take intentional actions.  To be a better friend/lover/confidant/employee/listener/speaker/giver and so on, you need to act intentionally.  Action with intent and purpose will allow you to be better.

Dismiss doubt.  One of the biggest obstacles I have encountered in any attempt to be better is doubt.  I don’t think I am worthy or I can’t do this or I’m incapable or even How dare I? tend to work their way through my psyche.  These can be off-putting, depressing, even enraging.  To dismiss the doubts, I work on using affirmations, meditation, and reminders that I am worthy and deserving of self-improvement…I CAN be better.

Be better now.  This is super-important.  When you are working on being better than you perceive yourself to be, who you have been and who you will be, past and future, are irrelevant.  Remember – time is an illusion, the now is the only time that is real.  As such, we need to be better right now.  See the improvement you are making as made.  You’ve done it, and you have succeeded.  Seeing it in the now will help manifest it.

Self-improvement is seldom easy.  But with the right desire and intent, we can be better.

Finding positivity is not hard, but it does require action.

Knowing that the only person we can be better than is ourselves, we can work with all the option available to us for self-improvement.  When we work to be better than we are for our own improvement, we can create a more desirable reality, within which, ultimately, we empower ourselves.  When we feel empowered, we become more aware and mindful, and tend to spread that feeling to others around us. As such, we can build more positive feelings.

We can use the positive feelings this generates to dissolve negative feelings. When we eradicate negative feelings, we open up space to let in more positive feelings, and that is something we can be grateful for.

Gratitude leads to happiness.  Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude.  An attitude of gratitude is a positive attitude that begets even more good energies, and that is always worthwhile.

This is the two-hundred and fifty-ninth entry of my Positivity series.  It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone.  Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

After more than 7 years of weekly blogging, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

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The post How Can I Be Better? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

What is Selfishness?

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Selfishness is not what you think it is.

This can be particularly challenging, because a great deal of the way in which we perceive our universe attributes much to selfishness.  And while there are certainly some tremendously selfish people out there, much of what people see as selfish is not.

I want to begin with a broad definition of what selfishness is NOT. 

Selfishness is not taking time self-care.  It is not making choices and decisions to better your own life.  You are not selfish if you desire to work a good job, have a good career, relationship, friendship, and so on.  It is not selfish to say no when you have nothing to give.

Because we are so oversold on the idea that there is lack and scarcity rather than abundance in our world, we have come to believe that having things we desire denies them from others.  If I have food, they do not have food.  When I have wealth, they do not have wealth.  Why?  Because I am keeping it from them.

THAT IS A LIE.  Unless you are deliberately withholding from others, or doing anything to interfere with them and their efforts, you keep nothing from anyone.

We live in an abundant universe.  There is more than enough of virtually everything you can imagine for everyone.  Tangible or intangible, there is more than enough.

As such, when you have that which you desire in your life, it is not selfish.  Everyone can be empowered to consciously create their reality.  The lack and scarcity we are sold is a lie.

Selfishness is a matter of denying good for others

Let me illustrate selfishness in the same manner I used in a recent podcast.  Let’s say there’s a pie.  You can go ahead and take a slice, because the pie is there to be consumed, and you have been invited to take a slice.  There is nothing selfish about this.

Let’s say there’s a pie, but rather than take a slice, you take the whole damned thing for yourself.  You don’t share the pie.  THAT is selfishness.  When you take and hoard and deny an equal opportunity for others, that is what selfishness is.

Self-care allows us to reset, to reclaim energy for ourselves, in order for us to have more to give.  When you make choices and decisions in order to better your own life, it is not selfish, unless you block another from making choices and decisions.  Just because you have a good job, career, relationship or what-have-you, unless you are acting to prevent another from the same, you are not selfish.

Can you see how it is only by a willful act that you can be selfish?  When the corporate CEO takes a billion dollar bonus off the sweat of his or her employees, but refuses to pay a living wage to them, that’s selfish.  When you work hard and earn a million dollars through your hard work, that is NOT selfish.  The difference is being a giver versus a taker.

We all know people who give of themselves.  They give time, money, encouragement, energy and more to other people.

We also all know people who take for themselves.  They take time, money, encouragement, energy and more from other people.  Givers versus takers. Givers empower, and are not selfish in their actions.  Takers disempower, and are the epitome of selfishness.

Giving versus sacrificing

One important note I need to add here.  Sacrifice is not selfless, and can develop into some unhealthy things.

You can’t drive a car anywhere on an empty tank of gas.  You cannot give to others when you have no fuel for yourself, either.

Many believe that it is noble and good to sacrifice.  The thing is, sacrifice is the acceptance of lack and scarcity.  There is not enough, so I will go without.  The universe is abundant, and it is selfless to give of ourselves from a place of abundance.  Sacrifice comes from a place of lack, and denying ourselves can and usually will lead to resentment.

It is not so hard, after enough sacrifice, to become entitled, and entitlement can lead to withholding from others, which is ultimately selfish.

Self-care is not selfishness

Because we get sold an overblown idea of the nature of selfishness, we tend to think of others before we think of ourselves.

I am not saying that this is entirely a bad thing.  Caring and kindness for others is really important, in especial in the current world climate.  Let’s face it, there are a lot of examples of greed, corruption, hoarding, and extremes of selfishness.

However, neglecting ourselves is unhealthy.  We need to give ourselves care, whether that is a healthy diet, exercise, or time to read and relax.  This is not necessarily about taking a spa day, it is more about looking out for ourselves.

This is not selfish.  When we do not care for ourselves, we break down.  This may occur physically, emotionally, spiritually, or any combination thereof.  As such, we get sick, we lose energy, and we become incapable of taking care of ourselves, let alone anyone else.

Consciousness creates reality.  This is why we need to work with our thoughts, feelings and actions in the here-and-now to give ourselves what we desire to live the best lives we can.  We are worthy and deserving of that.

Note that I wrote “give ourselves”, not “take for ourselves.”  That right there is how we are not being selfish.  When we give, whether to ourselves or others, this is not selfish.  Taking, however, in particular when it will leave others without, is selfishness.

You are worthy and deserving of all the good in your life.  Self-care is not selfish.

What good have you done for yourself today?

This is the three-hundred sixty-eighth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way, and empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here.

After more than 7 years of Pathwalking, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *CommentSubmit

The post What is Selfishness? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

You Know This

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Positivity is better than negativity.  You know this already.

Why?  Because positivity is good.  Good can be applied to any number of things in your life, both tangible and intangible.

Negativity is bad.  Bad can be applied to any number of things in your life, both tangible and intangible.

When it comes to feeling, I think I can safely say that most of us desire to feel good.  Feeling good leads to being capable of getting stuff done, making things happen, and thriving.  Feeling bad, on the other hand, leads to being incapable of getting stuff done, things not happening, and receding.

You already know this.  I am not telling you something new.  However, because we tend to go about our lives unconscious of how we are actually thinking and feeling, we allow ourselves to be drawn away from the positive and into the negative.

Largely, I think this is unintentional.  We talk to our friends, whether via messenger, phone, text or e mail, and they start to talk about something or someone they are having issues with.  Before we know it, as we are being sympathetic and understanding of their issue, we unconsciously have taken it into ourselves, and unintentionally we are now also feeling negative.

Sometimes it’s even more indirect.  Peruse Facebook or Twitter of any other social media outlet, and you are going to come across memes and stories and posts about government atrocities; inequalities; unkind, unsympathetic people being petty, greedy, selfish and otherwise horrid.  Worse, because we are inundated with this information, it can really soak into your psyche before you know it, despite your intent otherwise.

The key word in much of this is intent.

Nothing I write here is new information – you know this already

There are a number of famous quotes about the idea of good intentions, and how they frequently go wrong.  I think most of this is because we mistake the idea of good intentions as being for someone else’s own good as a means for how we can effect change.

Except the truth is, the only person we can do anything for is ourselves.

Sounds super-selfish, right?  The thing is, it’s not.  To be perfectly honest, the only person whom you can change is YOU.  Why?  Because the only thing you have any control over at all is your own thoughts, feelings, and actions.

When you are communicating with that friend or reading through social media, you will come across things that will put thoughts and feelings into your head and heart.  A lot of this is because we are, for the most part, sympathetic creatures who desire good over bad…positivity over negativity.  So we feel with our friends or for those people otherwise suffering.

It’s really important to keep in mind that no matter how much you want to help your friends or other people going through problems, great or small, feeding their negativity or taking it into yourself is not actually going to help anyone. We know this; yet in the interest of empathy, we all tend to get caught up in the drama.  This can allow the negativity to feel pretty overwhelming.

Be there for your friend.  Be sympathetic to the plight of the stranger.  But don’t become a cog in the machine of negativity in the process.  You know this.  You’ve got this.  Keep being amazing.

Finding positivity is not hard, but it does require action.

Knowing that feeling good is more desirable than feeling bad, you are able to be aware and mindful of how outside stimuli, personal or impersonal, make you feel.  When we remember that we know this already, and we can be sympathetic and empathetic without taking in negativity to ourselves, ultimately we empower ourselves.  When we feel empowered, we become more aware and mindful, and tend to spread that feeling to others around us. As such, we can build more positive feelings.

We can use the positive feelings this generates to dissolve negative feelings. When we eradicate negative feelings, we open up space to let in more positive feelings, and that is something we can be grateful for.

Gratitude leads to happiness.  Happiness is the ultimate positive attitude.  An attitude of gratitude is a positive attitude that begets even more good energies, and that is always worthwhile.  

This is the two-hundred and fifty-eighth entry of my Positivity series.  It is my hope these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone.  Feel free to share, re-blog and spread the positivity.

After more than 7 years of weekly blogging, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive a free eBook.

Name *FirstLastEmail *CommentSubmit

The post You Know This appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.

Is the World Yours?

This post contains affiliate banner links. For more info, see my disclosures.

 

The world is only a terrible place if you accept it as such.

You and I, however, have the power to change it for the better.  Yes, I know that this feels like a stretch, but it is still the truth.

I am well aware that many terrible things are happening.  Aware doesn’t even begin to cover it.  Spend a minute scrolling through Facebook or Twitter or G+, and I have no doubt you will be overwhelmed with the latest bad news.  Trump said something stupid again.  North Korea rattled their sabers again.  Someone finding something happening that is unreasonable is complaining, again.  On and on, waves of negativity.

It is depressing, infuriating, maddening, upsetting, and if you give it enough attention it’ll murder your hope completely.  The world looks like it is coming apart, and it’s only a matter of time before everybody feels it.

If you believe this, it will likely be true.  Consciousness creates reality.  Care to see the world as a terrible place?  Congrats, that’s exactly the reality you will live in.

I am in no way advocating for putting on rose colored glasses and ignoring the troubles out there.  We need to work on them and change them.  However, we are not going to be capable of this, unless we start small, and begin at home, inside ourselves.

The only real control and power we possess is our own.  The only person I can do anything for directly is me.  Self-care is not just going to the spa, eating well, and exercising.  No, it is also striving to shift our mindset out of the negativity we are bombarded with.

You and I CAN change the world.  But it starts with changing ourselves.

The world needs more positive outlooks, hope, and happiness

When we see the suffering happening around the world, it’s really easy to not only feel bad, but also feel guilty.

Really?  Guilty?  Absolutely.  Why?  Because we are not suffering as badly.

Our society is pretty heavily out of balance these days.  We are in the middle of a cold war in regards to class, and there are a lot of the “haves” who do nothing to help the “have nots.”  Those who fall somewhere in the middle, which unsurprisingly is the vast majority, are given a pretty extensive guilt trip.  You get to feel guilty for what you have…and you get a double-whammy, because you also get to feel guilty for desiring more than you have.

The root of this guilt is lack and scarcity.  We are force-fed this notion that there is not enough.  We lack resources, money is scarce, time is fleeting, and so on and so forth.  Because this is the view of the world we are most often shown, we tend to buy into it.

Like attracts like.  When you see pictures and stories of lack and scarcity, and take them into your soul, is it really much of a surprise that we draw more to ourselves?

The world is only a terrible place if you accept it as such.  We need to not let the guilt make us feel bad about what we already have, nor what we desire to create.

How?  By recognizing that the Universe is abundant, not lacking.

Choose to see the world for the better

I am actively working on shifting my attention away from all this negativity.  It has gotten so prevalent in the world on so many levels, it’s even beginning to seep into the hobby I escape to from time to time.  Hatred, intolerance, jealousy, lack and scarcity in a game we play to experience another reality within our own.

Each and every one of us can choose to make this world a better place.  It begins by accepting our own worth.  You and I deserve to be content, happy, abundant, and at peace.  When we are not, we cannot help those worse off than ourselves, nor convince those who do harm to change their ways.  You and I have choices for how we approach the world around us.

For my part, I don’t share memes or clickbait on Facebook that acknowledge and further the inundation of awfulness.  Again, I am keeping informed because I need to be aware of the world around me…but I don’t need nor desire to be overwhelmed by it.  I write these blogs to remind myself that I am worthy and deserving of awesomeness…and share them because you are, too.

The world needs more abundance.  People need to be more mindful of themselves.  When we feed the guilt and shame and anger and hate and hopelessness monsters, they don’t shrink…they become giants.

Be mindful of how you feel.  Thoughts, feelings and actions create our world, and when we feel negative, we tend to manifest negative things.  Feeling is the driving force behind creation.  When we let the guilt and lacking and insufficiency we are feeling control us, we disempower ourselves and everyone around us.

This is why the world is only a terrible place if we see it as such.  This, in fact, applies to everything.

If you see money, sex, spirituality, wealth, or any other highly desired thing as bad, be it tangible or intangible, you likely have a bad relationship with it.

See the world for its possibilities and wonders

We work to avoid people, places, and things we dislike.  But when we “dislike” things we actually desire, they tend to avoid US.  Have no money?  How do you feel about money?  Have no sex life?  How do you feel about sex?  Have no hope?  How do you feel about the world around you?

It is all a choice.  You and I can decide, but only for ourselves, what the world we live in contains.  There is hope, and positivity, endless possibility and unimaginable wonders in the world around us…but only we can choose how we see this world.

Be mindful of what you are thinking, what you are saying, what you are reading, and the actions you take.  We are so much more powerful than we realize…let’s use this to our advantage.  It takes nothing away from anyone else to see the world for all its potential.

How do you desire to see this world?  

This is the three-hundred sixty-seventh entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality.  I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way, and empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.

Thank you for joining me.  Feel free to re-blog and share this.

The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here.

After more than 7 years of Pathwalking, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.

Please take a moment to subscribe to my blog.  Fill in the info and click the submit button below and receive your free eBook.  Thank you!

Name *FirstLastEmail *NameSubmit

The post Is the World Yours? appeared first on The Ramblings of the Titanium Don.