Have you ever been called a complainer in the past? I sometimes get told that I am sometimes a complainer. I tend to look at things in the world about me and I find many things that are wrong or things that I would do better. But I sometimes ask myself why is it that I can see things so clearly when I judge them so, and can find so many ways to fix a problem, but when it comes to my own life there are many areas in which I cannot see as clearly?
If this is your problem or if you have ever won...
Getting Smarter Now
We are a ‘symbological’ creatures. Our entire world is based on our ability to create symbolism in order to explain our perceptions to ourselves and to others. Symbolism plays such an important role in our lives that I think it would be fair to say that without it we would not be able to exist as we do. In order to make this point clear, let us contemplate typical human perception:
If you were to close your eyes for 5 seconds and then open them to look at all the things around you, you would ...
The one thing that has caused the most grief in the world, can arguably be said to be limited thinking. The problem with many seems to be their ability to only see things in black and white. That is most people tend to only see things in one or the other extremes and they fail to realize that such extremes do not exist.
The more that we understand the reality around us, the more that we realize that there is no such things as ultimate extremes. A good example of this is black and white and as...
Nietzsche can be an incredibly difficult philosopher to try and understand. Perhaps I know this better than most since he is one of my favorite writers. I have read many interpretative books trying to explain Nietzsche in one way or another. Some have called him a crazy anarchist while others have referred to him as a Buddhist of the highest order. While I do believe that there were some authors that did capture some very interesting points; I fundamentally believe that interpreting Nietzsche...
I have been accused of a number of occasions of taking way too long to answer a simple question. Some say that I will go on about things that absolutely have no bearing on the subject, before I finally get to the answer to a simple question. I must say that more often than not I am guilty as charged, but there is an actual method to my madness.
There is a great difference between simply learning a thing and truly understanding. Learning can be defined as the ability to memorize a certain set ...
Most of us are very educated people. Most of us have spent many years in schools learning a good many useful things along the way. Some of us continue our studies and go to college or university. Others take public courses in order to learn more about their hobbies or about personal interests of different kinds. Jobs often provide on work education and the job itself has a way of teaching you about what you’re doing and about the world in general through experience.
You must realize tho...
Have you ever run across a visual puzzle that you could not solve? Sometimes we are doing crosswords, word jumbles, or sometimes even mathematical formulas that we just can’t seem to crack. Often we get so into it and so focused on what we can’t figure out, that we just can’t see the whole picture. By not being able to see the whole picture, we are not able to access deeper intuitions that might lead us to find a quick and easy solutions.
If you are having such problems, here̵...
Trying to think in a creative solution can be quite difficult sometimes. Trying to make yourself more creative can actually complicate the situation because the more that you try the harder that it gets to come up with a good idea. There are different techniques though that can allow you to change the angle of your focus as it were and bring out your creative side by seeing things in a new way.
A real good way to get you to think more creatively is to begin to use the power of metaphors. A me...
There are many strategies to try and deal with others. Many books are written about persuasion, body language, positive emotional interaction, and just about any other thing that you can think of that would allow you to interact better with others. What many forget is that unless they live somewhere out in the boonies, they are constantly surrounded by people. There is no better resource to learn how to interact with people than to ‘People Watch.’
People watching is something that not many in...
We all want to be more creative. Being creative is something that is considered to be very important because it can help us in all aspects of our life. Whether we are writers or business people, creativity can help us in our personal professions. Creativity allows us to solve problems and to come up with answers that are usually considered to be ‘outside the box’. In this article I would like to focus on creative problem-solving and to give you a technique that can help you in this area.
As I...
Asking good questions is a great skill in life. Good questions can allow you to pursue the correct goal without the need to waste time and effort on something that is not required. With the right question you can solve any problem. Whether these problems are external ones that you wish to solve or whether they are personal internal problems; learning to ask the right questions is essential, without this ability you will be lost and will not be able to know how to go about overcoming any perso...
We certainly do seem to live in interesting times. At this time in human history we all seem to be at odds with ourselves, perhaps this is how it was always and humanity is perhaps destined to always feel fractured. This is definitely the age of the intellect where we have been able to create incredible things through technology and scientific theology. But while the intellect does seem to reign supreme, at least in the west, our emotions have suffered as a consequence. Many of us feel that t...
I am a firm believer, that contemplation is your greatest resource in the acquisition of inner wisdom. Contemplation is basically the ability to let your mind go into a type of free flow, or inner exploration, where on the one hand you might give your mind complete and free reign, to flow in whatever direction it wants, and in the other you stay focused, so that you are able to keep track of every single thought, that enters your mind. This is a tricky give and take, because if you focus too ...
Persuasion is really one of the great human skills. Sometimes the word persuasion can make this art seem negative or underhanded. The reality of the situation though is that persuasion is really the art of great articulation. Seen this way, persuasion, can then be seen for what it really is and for what it should always ultimately become, which is the ability to articulate and to be able to make yourself understood.
You can find many books on persuasion. There are many techniques that are exp...
Sometimes it is difficult to realize that we are all creative people. Labeling by others tends to make this even worse; this happens because others begin to label us telling us from an early age that we are either creative or not very creative.
It is true that some of us have a natural inclination to want to become more creative, pursuing different interests that require us to use our more creative sides. It is also the case that we change as we grow, sometimes we pursue interests that do not...
Always try to nurture your imagination. Your imagination is a powerful ally that you can use in any area of your life. Albert Einstein said that “imagination is more powerful than knowledge”. What he was letting us know is that our logical and objective minds can never encompass the totality of ourselves and the universe.
Your imagination is like a window into an infinite world of the inner self. This world is far, far bigger than the exterior world that we considered to be so real. The ...
Learn to question yourself at all times. Many people tend to take this the wrong way and think that I am advocating personal doubt. But this is not what questioning yourself means. What it means is that you must give yourself the time to explore your own being. Questioning yourself is really the art of personal contemplation.
The bull headed tend to think that to question is to doubt. And we are all told that doubt is a great enemy. Even Yoda tell us that we should, “do or do not.” But Yoda ...
One of the hardest, yet one of the most powerful things that you can do to change your life is to; stop focusing on what you don’t want to happen. We all focus on that which is the most emotional thing in our present reality. What this means is that we dwell on the emotional. Unfortunately our emotions are often negative and we focus all our attention on that.
“&%*&^& happens!” That’s just the way life is, “sometimes good sometimes bad”. The problem lies in the fact that we spend...
I would guess that we have all had times when we wish we were someone else. I certainly would like to be as debonair as James Bond for example. Unless they are already lady magnets, I am sure that most men can identify with me.
This need to want to be someone else can have both positive and negative aspects. On the negative side is the idea that you are so unhappy about yourself at this moment that you wish you could be someone else entirely. Certainly it’s not a good thing to be so pained by...
In our previous article we had discussed the fundamental aspect of genius. I had told you that technical knowledge, which is usually tested through the Intelligence Quotient exam, does not guarantee genius. Genius has much more to do with the ability to let go of all preconceived notions about how things are in order to find a completely new way to do what was previously thought to be impossible.
Do realize though that I am not putting down our concept of intelligence at all. Einstein needed ...