What shall I do with my negativity?

I hate your negativityWhat shall I do with my negativity?

Most people ask me what they should do about other people’s negativity… but ultimately you can’t change anything there, you can only change yourself.

So, what can you do with your negativity?

There are permanent and temporary solutions. But even if you do permanent solutions, you will need to maintain mental hygiene, just like you need to wash your hands all the time, or cut your nails.

Temporary solutions work best if you have lots of discipline and are able to be self-aware close to 24/7.

negativity is like weeds

The art is catching yourself in the act of negativity, and of course to do that you need to know all the ways negativity expresses itself. It’s a lot like weeding. Weeds are stronger than cultivated plants and grow faster too. Same is the situation with negativity.

Another similarity with weeds is that you can remove the top of the weed plant, or you can remove it from its deep roots.

A few years ago I took a sabbatical, and all summer I worked on a small patch of ground that was full of weeds. Had I suspected that the weeds spread by deeps horizontal shoots on the roots, I would have probably left the whole thing alone, but I didn’t, and once I declared war on the weeds I stuck with it. It was, for me: it is either the weeds, or me! And I needed all the energy from that battle-cry! Some roots were as deep as two feet, but I got to them, and I was relentless.
Continue reading “What shall I do with my negativity?”

What’s your purpose in life?

What’s your purpose in life?

I hear this question and derivations like “what’s my purpose in life?” “What was I meant to do with my life?” etc.

We, human beings, want to do the right thing. It feels that if we did that, then all ADD, all restlessness, all depression, all jumping-around and inconsistent behavior would disappear.

your purpose in lifeWe would joyfully do what we are meant to do, finish what we start, jump our of bed with eagerness, right?

Only if we just could find the one thing we are supposed to do. Be certain, stop doubting ourselves, settle down…

Now, though this is almost the truth, it is not the whole truth, and there is also a lie hidden in its midst.

What? you ask, shocked. You are pulling the rug from under my feet! I thought that the moment I find out… life will be bliss. Continue reading “What’s your purpose in life?”

Context, Mindset, Backdrop… why should you care?

backdrop context mindsetContext, Mindset, Backdrop… why should you care?

This is going to be a mind-bender, and at the end of it you’ll come up a lot smarter, and with a lot more power over your life… interested?

It is all about mindset! Context is decisive… and what the heck is a backdrop?

Let’s start with backdrop. Why? Because it’s the easiest to see what’s going on.

I say that the backdrop is more important than what happens in the foreground.

Someone says something to you and you are hurt.
Your boss assigns someone else to an important assignment.
Your experiment at making money with your first product is a flop.
You continually have trouble and emergency in your life.

The above statements are the foreground.

Depending on your mental attitude (mindset) you say it’s bad, or it’s good, or you have no opinion.

So far so good… are you still with me? Good. Continue reading “Context, Mindset, Backdrop… why should you care?”