Sunday, October 25, 2015

Children Learn What They Live -Dorothy Law Nolte

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.
If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.
If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive.
If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves.
If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy.
If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy.
If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.
If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.
If children live with tolerance, they learn patience.
If children live with praise, they learn appreciation.
If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.
If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.
If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal.
If children live with sharing, they learn generosity.
If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.
If children live with fairness, they learn justice.
If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect.
If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and in those about them.
If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

Monday, June 1, 2015

Our Best Growth May be Unseen

While logging a few years ago, I helped to cut down a tree that was more then 200 years old. In counting the growth rings, we found one series covering eleven years in which the rings were barely discernable. These denoted a cycle of drought.

"The tree sure didn't grow much in that period," I said.

My companion was a wise, philosophical old uncle and he replied, "On the contrary, the tree probably never made more important growth then in those years."

He saw I was puzzled and continued: "It had to put its roots down farther and farther, year after year, to get nourishment where there was moisture enough to help it assimilate needed minerals. Now look here where the next rainy season began. Here are half a dozen years in any of which the tree expanded more then in all the eleven dry years. Why? Because of the deep unseen strengthening of the root system in the adverse years."

He let me think that over, and then concluded, "remember as you go through life, you'll have times when there'll seem no possibility of getting farther ahead. Then is the time to grow inside, and if you do, you will be amazed how you will expand when the right conditions prevail again. -Healthways

Sunday, May 10, 2015

Raising Confident Children

Maltz Maxwell writes that confidence is build upon an experience of success.

When we first begin any undertaking, we are likely to have little confidence, because we have not learned from experience that we can succeed.

It doesn't matter how many times you have failed in the past. What matters is the successful attempt, which should be remembered, reinforced, and dwelled upon.

"HELP YOUR KIDS REMEMBER THEIR SUCCESSES HOWEVER SMALL, AND THEIR CONFIDENCE WILL SOAR."

To many people let failures blot out all good memories. We must look at failure, learn from it, and then dismiss it completely.

"HOW CAN A CHILD WHO GETS YELLED AT EVERY TIME THEY FAIL, NOT VIVIDLY REMEMBER THE FAILURE, THUS DISTROYING THEIR CONFIDENCE."

Dr. Overholser recommends the practice of vividly remembering our past successes and brave moments as an invaluable aid whenever self-confidence is shaken.

Many people shy away from healthy self acceptance because they insist upon identifying themselves with their mistakes. You may have made a mistake but this does not mean that you are a mistake.

"WE CAN HELP OUR CHILDREN WORK THROUGH THEIR FAILURES AND ALSO REMIND THEM OF THEIR SUCCESSES, THEIR CONFIDENCE LEVEL IS UP TO US."

God Bless
Andrew Miller

Your Self is Steaming

According to Maltz Maxwell, we simply must get it through our heads that holding a low opinion of ourselves is not a virtue, but a vice. Jealousy, for example, which is the scourge of many a marriage, is nearly always caused by self doubt. The person with adequate self-esteem doesn't feel hostile towards others, he isn't out to prove anything, he can see facts more clearly isn't as demanding in his claims against other people.

The word "esteem" literally means to appreciate the worth of.

Why do men stand in awe of the stars and the moon, the immensity of the sea, the beauty of a flower or a sunset, and at the same time downgrade themselves? Did not the same creator make man? Is not man himself the most marvelous creation of all?

This appreciation of your own worth is not egotism unless you assume that you made yourself and should take some of the credit.

Do not downgrade the product merely because you haven't used it correctly. Don't childishly blame the product for your own errors like the schoolboy who said, "this typewriter can't spell."

But the biggest secret of self esteem is this:Begin to appreciate other people more; Show respect for any human being merely because he is a child of God and therefore a "thing of value."

Stop and think when you are dealing with people. You're dealing with a unique, individual creation of the Creator of all.

Practice treating other people as if they had some value - and surprisingly enough your own self esteem will go up. For real self esteem is not derived from the great things you have done, the things you own, the mark you've made -  but in appreciation of yourself for what you are - a child of God.

When you come to this realization however, you must necessarily conclude that all other people are to be appreciate for the same reason.

Sunday, March 15, 2015

The Mystery of Imaginary Ugliness

The Mystery of Imaginary Ugliness

    To a person handicapped by a genuine continental defect, or suffering from an actual facial disfigurement as a result of an accident, plastic surgery can indeed seemingly perform magic. From such cases it would be easy to theorize that the cure all for all neuroses, unhappiness, fear, failure, anxiety and lack of self-confidence would be wholesome plastic surgery to remove all bodily defects. However, according to this theory, persons with normal or acceptable faces should be similarly free from all psychological handicaps. They should be cheerful, happy, self-confident, free from anxiety and worry we know all too well this is not true.

The Self-Image - the Real Secret

The secret is this. To really "live," that is to find life reasonably satisfying, you must have an adequate and realistic self image that you can live with. You must find yourself acceptable to "you." You must have a wholesome self-esteem. You must have a self that you can trust and believe in. You must have a self that you are not ashamed to be, and one that you can feel free to express creatively, rather than to hide or cover up. You must have a self that corresponds to reality so that you can function effectively in a real world. You must know yourself both your strength and your weaknesses and be honest with yourself concerning both. Your self esteem must have a reasonable approximation of "you," being neither more than you are, nor less than you are.
     When this self-image is intact and secure, you feel "good." When it is threatened, you feel anxious and insecure. When it is adequate and one that you can be wholesomely proud of, you feel self-confident. You feel free to "be yourself" and to express yourself. You function at your optimum. When it is an object of shame, you attempt to hide it rather than express it. Creative expression is blocked. You become hostile and hard to get along with.
    Today, I am more convinced than ever that what each of us really wants, deep down, is more LIFE. Happiness, success, peace of mind, or whatever your own conception of supreme good may be, is experienced in its own essence as more life. When we experience expansive emotions of happiness, self confidence, and success, we enjoy more life. And to the degree that we inhibit our abilities, frustrate our God given talents, and allow ourselves to suffer anxiety, fear, self condemnation and sulfate, we literally choked off the life force available to us and turn our back upon the gift which are Creator has made. To the degree that we deny the gift of life, we embrace death.

Excerpt from Psycho-Cybernetics

Watch for future blogs on fixing a self image. Because it has to be fixed before the results in your life can change.

Thursday, January 22, 2015

Read Books to Create Life

"THE FUTURE BELONGS TO THOSE
WHO CREATE IT."

    I believe a large part of creating a future involves reading to learn, or stimulate, and not to entertain. Reading should be done with a pen and an open mind. Its not about what you read as much as what your thinking while you read. A book is not writen to conform your thoughts to what the writer was writing about as much as the stimulation of you own thoughts and ideas while you are reading. The ideas that come to mind and the feelings you get while you are reading are more important, and when you do think back to what you've read you can recollect whatever thoughts you had at that moment in time.
   The goal is to somehow store things in your subconscious mind that drive you.
     Its kinda the same way when you think back to an accident, or a very vivid happening in your past, when you think back you usually start putting together what you were doing that day, where you were, and even the people you talked to after that. Here's the crazy part,  something that happened on that day has made its way into your subconscious mind and is altering the way you think and act and you don't even know it.
     So reading about some exciting new concept in a book should stimulate some sort of a chain reaction that creates something that has never been before in your life that spurs you to action. By thinking back to what you've read, it should really bring back the thoughts and ideas that YOU got out of what you were reading. Like right now your thinking about a book you should be reading. So hammer down, go do it.

Fire, Aim, Ready
Andrew