Goals: Be Specific / Set Dates !

Today I have looked again at my list of goals. I have gone through each of them and applied a date. The psychological effect of this was immediate. Each goal has now taken on a focus that never existed before. This simple act has make the biggest difference and changed both my focus and my mood. I have a much clearer direction than I had previously. Who would have thought? Thanks again to Steve Pavlina for the advice ☺

Mr. Burns: Quick Smithers. Bring the mind eraser device!
Smithers: You mean the revolver, sir?
Mr. Burns: Precisely.

Strengths Finder

I recently did the StrengthsFinder test online via Gallup. What is StrengthsFinder? The Internet-based StrengthsFinder Profile is the product of a 25-year, multi-million dollar effort to identify the most prevalent human strengths. The program introduces 34 dominant "themes" with thousands of possible combinations, and reveals how they can best be translated into personal and career success. In developing this program, Gallup has conducted psychological profiles with more than two million individuals to help you learn how to focus and perfect these themes.

My top 5 main “themes” are shown below:

Command

Significance

Intellection

Maximizer

Achiever

Having read the full explanations for each of these, I consider them quite accurate. I have passed them on to a couple of colleagues for feedback as to whether they also think they are accurate. So far it seems to me that this quick and cheap test could be useful to do when hiring certain employees. It at least appears to give an insight into their personalities in a way that will not necessarily come over in an interview.

“English - Who needs that? I’m never going to England!” - Homer Simpson

Courage

I was reading an article just recently on the Steve Pavlina Personal Development website which struck a chord and I found very interesting. In the article he talks about courage and the article features the following quotes:

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.
- Ambrose Redmoon

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear.
- Mark Twain

and my personal favourite:

Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway.
- John Wayne

The article discusses the nature of courage and how the amount of fear that you have about something is nothing to do with whether you are courageous or not, fear is necessary and courage can exist despite fear. A courageous person is just as afraid as everybody else, it’s just that they have decided that fear will not conquer them or control them.

Here is the full link to the article by Steve.

“It’s not easy to juggle a pregnant wife and a troubled child, but somehow I managed to fit in eight hours of TV a day.” - Home Simpson

Steve Pavlina

I’ve been reading a lot of stuff just recently from a website called http://www.stevepavlina.com. Steve is a former Games Developer turned Personal Development Guru. Since first discovering his site I have come close twice to deleting his feed from my RSS aggregator, this was for two reasons, namely, his posts are sometimes long and he sometimes talks about his spiritual and supernatural beliefs very openly.

I initially dismissed him as some kind of new age preacher nutcase (Steve, if you ever read this .. Sorry !) but for some reason kept looking at his blog entries and articles. The more I looked, the more I realised that this guy is 100% serious and an incredibly knowledgeable and intelligent individual to boot. Only a small percentage of his articles talk about things that I am not totally comfortable with, and why shouldn’t he? It’s his blog and I can stop reading whenever I choose.

This guy writes very well and also produces audio recordings of some of his articles, which are equally professional. So much of what he says makes sense and I think I can use some of his teachings in my own life. This is not for me a spiritual trip, it is about growing as a person using tools such as defining your life’s purpose, setting your goals and thinking positive thoughts. It’s about using your own brain and your own subconscious to bring clarity, discipline, meaning and happiness to your existence.

He site is well worth looking at, whatever your take on Personal Development.

“You know, the courts may not be working any more, but as long as everyone is videotaping everyone else, justice will be done.” - Marge Simpson

Complexities

Why is it that as I am putting considerable effort into achieving a simpler and more organised life, the universe is conspiring against me and trying it’s very best to make things more complicated. I guess this is one of those ‘tests’ that life throws at us occasionally just to try and keep us on our toes.

I am good at dealing with problems. Most of the time I am at my best under pressure, reacting in a calm and capable manner and I firmly believe that problems are there to be solved and sorted, and that we learn and grow from the experience.

Occasionally though, something will test me in a manner in which I am not easily capable of dealing with. Normal rules do not always apply and it is easy for us to confuse matters by inventing our own logical explanation in an attempt to deal with the situation. Logic is most certainly in the eye of the beholder.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place ? Yes, at the moment, I guess I am.

“It takes two to lie. One to lie and one to listen.” - Homer Simpson