I was watching a YouTube video of Haramein recently in which he discussed his decades of work on a unified field theory. I never got clear on whether he’s a theoretical physicist or a pure mathematics man, but I was managing to sort of keep up with his presentation (or rather not get too swamped by it), when he said something that knocked the wind out of me, sat me down hard and took me back almost 40 years.

It was 1975 and my parents had just sold their plumbing business in Chicago and moved off to retire in, of all places, Kansas. For their mode of retirement, they had chosen to buy a farm, which, it should be noted, is not too different from buying THE farm.

Anyway, there I was in my early thirties, foolishly volunteering to help my parents settle in on their new homestead, a 120-year-old farmhouse with a hand pump in the kitchen and a 30-yard walk to the outhouse. All the amenities.

Since the farm lay five miles outside the nearest small town of 8,000 souls, and there was little in the way of entertainment , I spent a good deal of time paging through some of Mom’s old magazines. One stack I found particularly novel was some kind of UFO journal. I gave the articles only casual attention until I stumbled over an interview of Bruce Cathey, a retired airline pilot who claimed he had personally witnessed UFOs on many occasions during night time flights. The man sounded less white-eyeball than most of the people featured in the articles, so I read, and then re-read the interview.

Now, I should note here that a couple of Cathey’s books can still be found on Amazon today. One is titled “The Energy Grid: Harmonic 695: The Pulse of the Universe” and another is “The Bridge to Infinity.” Both are classed as Alternative Science.

In that UFO interview Cathey referred to an energy grid inherent to the Earth’s gravitational field, which, he said, accounted for UFOs’ characteristic skipping movement when they fly, which resembles stones skipping across water. He said they were literally propelling themselves in spurts or leaps from one grid intersection point to the next.

The Day Gravity Disappeared

I can no longer recall the chain of logic I followed forward from his grid point theory, but after a week or so of thought experiments, I (reluctantly) reached the conclusion that the phenomenon we call gravity is not inherent in physical bodies as is commonly assumed. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Gravity is not an attractive force at all, but a repelling one.

And it’s all because what we think of as empty space isn’t. It’s much more full than the densest matter.

And that’s what Nassim Haramein, the FBI agent lookalike, was saying in his YouTube interview. Empty space isn’t empty, and our current model of the universe is actually a negative picture. Up until now we have had everything backwards.

Here’s how it would work. Researchers already know about “zero point energy.” That is, more potential energy is contained within a single cubic centimeter of vacuum than we could ever release from our biggest nuclear device. However, they’re not exactly sure yet how to access that energy.

The implications, though, go far beyond energy sources.

What to Use Instead of Gravity

Think about gravity itself. We see our world keeping the moon in orbit, and we say it’s because of mutual attraction. But it may not work that way at all.

Just for a moment, let us imagine that the natural state of the Universe is to be “empty” and void of matter, but that here and there a warp or flaw appears in the seamlessness – a bubble of matter, if you will. Why might this happen? We don’t know that yet, but just for the sake of our hypothesis, let’s say it happens. And further, let’s imagine that the so-called “empty space” tries to push the bubble away, to repel it.

This type of phenomenon is not unknown to us. Go underwater and release a bubble, which is less dense than the water surrounding it. What happens? It moves upward, right? We call that buoyancy.

Water is non-compressible, so the pressure per square centimeter increases with the depth.

Our bubble is surrounded on all sides by water, but the pressure at the deeper side of the bubble is greater than the pressure at the shallower side. The water is pushing harder on the bottom than it is on the top, so the bubble gets moved away from the greater pressure.

The actual mechanism of buoyancy, then, is literally a kind of squeezing action.

Deep Space Bubbles

Now, take that image and transfer it into space. Empty space is the very dense water, and matter is the bubble. In the deepest part of outer space, way out there between galaxies, there would be almost no variation in the “density” of space. And a single world sitting there would have equal pressure being exerted on every side. It wouldn’t be moved in any direction.

However, place two worlds a hundred thousand miles apart, and because the worlds would be mutually shielding each other from the repelling force on the sides facing each other, the pressure gradient in the space between them would be lower. That means the worlds would be squeezed toward each other, like that bubble being pressed in the direction of lower water density.

In other words, gravity isn’t two bodies attracting each other, but space trying to reduce the amount of distortion by combining the two “solid” bodies by pushing them together. The two bodies are being repelled toward each other to take up less space. In short, gravity may not even exist – except in our mistaken explanations of how things work.

Now, I’ve never had the math skills (nor talent) to handle a concept like this, so I laid it down and walked away from it. And there it lay until two weeks ago when I ran across Nassim Haramein, who spouts to anybody who’ll listen, this “heresy” about an inside-out Universe in which everything is the opposite of the way we think it is.

I’m delighted that someone else had the same idea and particularly glad that they had the math to pursue it.

But Wait, There’s More -

Actually much more – to this subject than gravity and UFOs.

For example, all those intricately interwoven atomic and sub-atomic particles that science is so busy discovering? That same science is also telling us that those particles don’t really exist as such, even though their behavior exists. It seems that instead of particles, we have rapidly moving waves of energy that, when there are enough of them acting together as a group, take on the characteristics we call “solid matter.”

But why? Empty space is perfect and pure. All points are filled with limitless potential, and everything that can exist does exist there, although it’s only in potential – only in undifferentiated and non-physical form.

Doesn’t this sound vaguely like the philosophers and teachers who have taught us that everything we desire already exists in potential, waiting only for us to call it into reality?

I have long believed that the force which causes the limitless potential of empty space to suddenly disgorge something solid and corporeal, such as a star or a planet or a new car, is what we call conscious choice.

Until some conscious entity decides something, nothing happens. No new events occur. No new things come into existence.

Way down there in the deepest part of empty space, where we find atomic and sub-atomic particles, there are only two states. One is rapidly moving energy, and the other is perfectly static stillness.

There is either movement, or the potential for movement. What causes this difference?

Now, it has always been tempting to assume that, between the two states of “real” and “not-yet-real,” the waves of moving energy (the matter) side of the equation are the more important of the two. But investigators are now saying that, after all, it’s the other way around. But more than that, I believe that there is a third state, which we would call consciousness, that can act upon the void of stillness and cause it to differentiate into “reality.”

In the beginning was the Word.

You and I, already act in harmony with these new ideas. We have long believed that the riches and abundance and plenty that surrounds us is real. That it’s limitless. That we only have to claim it – to call it forth from Ali Baba’s cave of vast riches – and that this is all it takes to make the things we desire come into reality.

In other words, for a very long time we have known that making a conscious choice – issuing a personal claim – is all it takes to call something utterly new and wonderful into existence from out of “nothing.” Now, science is increasingly ratifying that knowledge.

And so it is.

Cheers from warm and smiling Thailand,
Charles

How about a self-help article that lists out eleven of the worst self-help books ever, tells you what’s wrong with them, tells you why to avoid those books in particular, and then includes sales links to each one of them at Amazon.

If you’d like to see this for yourself, it’s at The E-Advisor Blog (where, according to their tagline, “Education Meets Edgy”).

Here are just four of their oddly mixed articles:

• Bad Faith Insurance Claims … What You Need to Know?
• Do Not Believe Everything You Read About Your Child?
• Dog Grooming Tips to Keep Your Fido Looking Sharp?
• Finding Financial Aid for Online Colleges

Are you as impressed as I am?

Cheers,
Charles

But have you ever had a teacher come tapping on your shoulder, ready and eager to reveal to you all the secrets of the ages? Most people will laugh and tell you that, no, their teacher is really, really late for their appointment.  Don’t be too hasty, however, to answer this question. If you’re like me – like most people – you may have unwittingly turned away more teachers than you’ll ever realize.

In the first place, have you ever wondered why a teacher would even appear and take you on as a student? Anybody can understand why you’d welcome a teacher to guide you forward. But how do you know when one appears? And what does a teacher look like, anyway? Well, it’s probably not like you were expecting.

If you’ve been thinking of a wise looking personage draped in a bedsheet and carrying a little wad of flowers, you’re almost certainly going to be disappointed.

In real life, most teachers aren’t even people. When was the last time you over-ate and got indigestion?

Or drank too much and felt hung over the next morning?

I’ll bet you never thought of those feelings of discomfort as your teachers. But there they were, tapping on your shoulder, offering you their wisdom, and you may have ignored the lesson they wanted to give you.  Instead, you may have downed a quick stomach-soothing potion or popped a headache pill – some kind of “quick-disconnect” to keep from suffering the results of your own actions. Well, pay attention here. As long as we use quick-disconnects between our actions and their results, we’re refusing to learn from the most common form of teacher.

So do we really welcome lessons?

We all say we’re trying to learn, to improve, to master life’s lessons. We claim that we’re seekers after truth. Yes, that’s what we say…  But not all of life’s lessons involve noble-sounding eternal truths. Life has lots of things to teach us. And so it scatters lessons everywhere amidst our day-to-day affairs.

Often the most important lesson we can learn today awaits us in the humble, nitty-gritty details of life, down in the dirt. And we never have the opportunity to meet that lesson till the day we stumble and fall, and we’re lying face-down in that dirt where the lesson is waiting.  For a lesson like that, we won’t ever learn it until we’re reduced to that level. Only then are we in a position to receive that particular wisdom from life.

Even then, we may not be ready. We may actually meet that problem again and again, each time treating it as an annoyance brought to us by the perversity of life. But that problem can teach us important lessons.  Something has to change, however, before we’re ready to learn from that teacher. Only when something changes – something within us – only then can this “problem” become a teacher.

We all have lots of teachers waiting patiently to teach us their lessons. In fact, there’s a whole faculty crowding around to share their lessons with us. These teachers are all dressed in the rags of problems. But their lessons involve wisdom about:

• Money,
• Love,
• Honesty & honor,
• Confidence,
• Persistence,
• Self worth,
• Health,
• Habits,
• Appetites, and
• Trust.

Although this list is not complete, these ten areas cover most of the problems we all wrestle with on a daily basis.

For years we have probably been trying to avoid, weasel away from, or eliminate problems like these. For years we may have been treating those problems as unwelcome, unfriendly inconveniences. Something to be escaped from as quickly and painlessly as possible.

In fact, I’ll bet you have never looked at your money problems as a teacher. Nor ever seen your marriage agonies as a kindly instructor of spiritual growth.

Well, life’s teachers may not always be gentle, but they ARE endlessly resourceful. And the only reason they ever seem harsh is because they are simply bringing to us what we unwittingly ask them for.  That upset stomach, or that hangover… admit it now, don’t we know – before we start – that this sometimes happens? But we go forward anyway, gambling that this time we may not have to pay the price. Or thinking that there’s always a “cure” that will cancel out the results of our own careless, unwise actions.

We do this everywhere, whether it’s in matters of money, love, or personal relations. We deliberately ignore the results of our own actions, refusing to take responsibility for what we bring on ourselves.

So if we want a real, live human teacher to appear and instruct us in the mastery of life’s mysteries, we’re going to have to meet them half way. Because they’re the advanced teachers. First, we’ll have to graduate from the simple stuff before they ever appear.

But the truth is, we may never see one of the flesh-and-blood teachers. Why? Because we so resolutely resist the ‘simple’ lessons that the Universe may be thinking, “Why waste a ‘real’ teacher on the bad students? These bottom-of-the-class dunces are constantly whining, complaining, dragging their feet, and refusing to learn from the results of their own actions.”

But the real teachers are there. They’re standing back waiting for us to become ready. And what does it take to be ready?

First, are you still ignoring the teachers you already have? If so, you might consider paying more attention to your problems and listening to the lessons you’re already being offered.

That’s it… just listen

Stop the constant, desperate struggle, and just be still. It’s amazing what you can learn when you’re not fighting, not resisting and struggling to escape, not denying.

Every problem we have is a product of our own thinking, our own feelings, our own actions and habits. And that problem is there to do us a service. Its intent on one thing only.

No, not to torture us, but to teach us.

The teaching, however, will seem like torture for just as long as we continue to struggle against and resist the lesson embedded in the situation.

Fortunately, there are a couple more shortcuts to recognizing the face of these teachers. There truly are simple ways for finding the lessons, for learning them and for leaving the struggle behind.

Mastery Method #1

I’ve already mentioned the first way. That’s simply to stop fighting and listen. Just asking in simple honesty, “What is the lesson in this situation?”

You already know about any number of spiritual or mental practices. You’ve read about meditation. You may be doing it on a daily basis.

But how are you using it?

For the longest time, I was trying to use meditation as a tool for solving my problems. That approach did not work consistently.

Then one day I realized that meditation is not for solving problems. In fact, as long as you’re focused on solving, you’re not receiving anything. You’re not learning.

Try this approach instead and see how much more effective it can be.

Go into your meditative state in your favorite way. That may be chanting, centering, self hypnosis, or repeating a mantra silently. However you like to do it, spend a few minutes becoming still.

Now, instead of floundering around, trying to create the solution to your problem, simply imagine yourself PAST the problem. The difficulty no longer even exists in your life. Feel the peace and the simplicity of your life without the struggle. Let this feeling of being past the problem wash over you and fill you. Feel how you would be living your life when the problem doesn’t even exist.

Then give thanks for this feeling. Let waves of gratitude roll through you, then open your eyes and go about your business. Every time that problem confronts you, just remind yourself that you already know how it feels to live with that problem behind you.

What happens to the problem? Sometimes, believe it or not, it’ll just dissolve and disappear from your life – never even requiring you to solve it.

This most often happens when you find you’ve lost interest in the behavior that causes the problem. Somehow, you are no longer attracted to overeating or drinking too much. Whatever behavior is connected with your particular problem, it may simply fade from your life.

Other times, the solution will come to you during the daily routine of your life, and it will always be far simpler and easier than you ever imagined.

In any case, the best approach to learning from problems is to recognize that you are the one who supplies the energy to them, and you are the one who can withdraw the life from them. You are the source of their power. When you begin ignoring them, you starve them, and they go away.

This approach is simple and elegant.  And it’s vastly disappointing to anyone who loves to talk about all the drama and difficulties in their life. You’ll need to get past this addictive need for drama.

Mastery Method #2

One of the basic truths of psychology is that each person is nearly blind to her or his own weaknesses, even though others can see them clearly.

You can see others’ peculiarities, and they can see yours. Most people, therefore, try to avoid being unmasked by others.

However, there’s a better way to use this principle.

Why not form a mutual aid group dedicated to helping each other see themselves through the eyes of the rest of the group?

This type of group is, in fact, extremely common among highly successful people.

It’s called a MasterMind Group, and virtually every successful man and woman who ever lived has formed or joined such a group.

Let’s say you’re struggling with the marketing aspects of your business. You know your product or service extremely well, but you don’t know the best way to reach the public.

As a member of a MasterMind Group, you find that everyone freely shares their skills and insights with each other. So when you belong to one of these groups, it’s a simple matter to ask the other members for advice on marketing. In effect, you’ve just told the group, I have a weak area that I need your help with.

The strong marketers in the group, on the other hand, may have a blind spot in the area of product development, so you freely help them.

Everybody gains because everybody is there to help the entire group to grow.

Thus, you have access to a whole group of teachers. And your only obligation is to serve as one of THEIR teachers.

Hah! I’ll bet you never expected to discover that you’re somebody’s long-awaited teacher, did you?

Life’s funny that way. Everything you think you know sooner or later turns out to be backwards: your problems are your teachers… you are someone else’s teacher… what else is waiting to be turned upside down?

Why, next somebody may be telling us that life can even be beautiful.

Cheers,
Charles

I don’t know if the following story is true or not, but in either case, it shows how some of the things we unquestioningly believe in don’t  even exist.

Does Evil Exist?

The university professor challenged his students with this question. Did God create everything that exists?

A student bravely replied, “Yes, he did!“

“God created everything?“ The professor asked.

“Yes sir“, the student replied.

The professor answered, “If God created everything, then God created evil since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are then God is evil“. The student became quiet before such an answer. The professor was quite pleased with himself and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth.

Another student raised his hand and said, “Can I ask you a question professor?“

“Of course“, replied the professor.

The student stood up and asked, “Professor, does cold exist?“

“What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?” The students snickered at the young man’s question.

The young man replied, “In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat.“

The student continued, “Professor, does darkness exist?“

The professor responded, “Of course it does.“

The student replied, “Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact we can use Newton’s prism to break white light into many colors and study the various wavelengths of each color. You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn’t this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present.“

Finally the young man asked the professor, “Sir, does evil exist?“

Now uncertain, the professor responded, “Of course as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man’s inhumanity to man. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil.”

To this the student replied, “Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God’s love present in his heart. It’s like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light.“

The professor sat down.

The young man’s name — Albert Einstein.

Of course, the name you use for “God” may be something else. Universal Intelligence. The Law of Attraction. The Order. Or something else entirely. That’s not the important point – or probably shouldn’t be. The real point is, are you still blindly accepting concepts and ideas that have been handed down unquestioningly for generations upon generations.

So back to those bad habits we struggle against so mightily. We know that feeding them energy always makes them stronger and sinks us deeper into a quagmire of our own making.

How much more effective would it be to spend our time mulling – not our failings – but the positives we want? No more struggle. Simply a steady consideration of higher qualities. And if we screwed up – as we sometimes do – what if we gently said to ourselves, “No, what I really wanted to do was this…” and go right back to our higher aspirations?

Indeed, what if?

Cheers,
Charles

Checking out at the supermarket recently, the young cashier suggested I should bring my own bags because plastic bags weren’t good for the environment. I apologized and explained, “We didn’t have this green thing back in my earlier days“.

The clerk responded, “That’s our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations“.

She was right about one thing–our generation didn’t have the green thing in “Our” day. So what did we have back then? After some reflection and soul-searching on “Our” day, here’s what I remembered we did have….

Back then, we returned milk bottles, pop bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles repeatedly. So they really were recycled. But we didn’t have the green thing back in our day.

We walked up stairs, because we didn’t have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn’t climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn’t have the green thing in our day.

Back then, we washed the baby’s nappies because we didn’t have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up 240 volts — wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that young lady is right. We didn’t have the green thing back in our day.

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house — not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of Wales. In the kitchen, we blended & stirred by hand because we didn’t have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.

Back then, we didn’t fire up an engine and burn petrol just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn’t need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. But she’s right. We didn’t have the green thing back then.

We drank from a water fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. But we didn’t have the green thing back then.

Back then, people took the bus, and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their mums into a 24-hour taxi service. We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn’t need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint.

But isn’t it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn’t have the green thing back then?

If you’re an old-timer a person of extensive experience like me and getting tired of all those “lessons in conservation” then you may want to pass this post along.

Cheers,
Charles

Everybody else will have the same old year they’ve been repeating for ages. Slapping a new number on the same old stuff and pretending it’s the Emperor’s New Year is either cynical or self-delusional.  Only a change of Actions, Thoughts and Intentions will make 2012 something new for you and me.

So as we go about wishing everybody “Happy New Year,” do we really mean it, from deep down in our guts, or are we just mouthing easy words?

Happy New Year?
Charles

Even apart from the new year period, the fact is, most folks spend their time focusing on the ways things go wrong: What didn’t get done; what I don’t like, can’t do, am not suited to, wouldn’t be interested in, and anyway it’s just an awful lot of bother. That’s the best worn pathway in most of our minds.

Two main ways most folks talk about new year’s resolutions: One way is with great resolve and hope. The future gleams before us anew, and we’re giddy with the thought of making a fresh start. A start in which we won’t be shackled by any failings and weaknesses that might have hobbled us in the past. This attitude is most common around the first week or two in any new year.

The second way we talk about hopeful new ambitions is with a wry, not-quite-cynical-but-close-to-it grin of dismissal. We may be apologetically pushing away our own pretensions of optimism, or we might be discussing someone else’s obviously overblown and hopeless ambitions.

However, as the Buddha said,

“We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.”

And in another place,

“We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves.”

Notice what I wrote above? That the most common habitual way of thinking about ourselves, about our hopes and our aspirations is dismissive, even slightly cynical? Indeed we are what we think.

Notice also that the other way, the optimistic and hopeful way is on the right track, but it has little staying power. At the first signs of opposition it usually cools like stale steam and drips away in tiny dribbles.

So in the spirit of the new (possibly world-changing) new year, I have a different suggestion, one that I like to call New Year’s Realizations.

More about that in a moment, but first, I’d like to share with you some extremely well-thought-out observations and suggestions from guest author Peter Vajda on ways we use to keep ourselves inside the failure fence.

One Way We Might Subvert Resolve in 2012
By Peter Vajda, Ph.D, C.P.C.

New Year’s resolutions are on the tip of most everyone’s pen and tongue. Thousands of suggestions, “how tos,” and “best ways” are being offered to help folks make, and carry through on, their New Year’s resolutions. Sadly, as in past years, 98% of those who make resolutions will have given up or failed by Valentine’s Day.

Three major causes of failure are:

When we understand the nature of the “victim consciousness,” we gain insight into how true and real change occurs.

The victim is rife with self-limiting and self-sabotaging habits and patterns of living, working and relating. It is these self-limiting patterns that prevent us from do-ing and be-ing from a place of integrity, responsibility, maturity, accountability, dedication, and commitment. It is our subconscious drives that cause us pain and suffering.

When we look deeply inside, honestly and self-responsibly, we uncover our shadow self – a self, feeling victimized, that lives a life of greed, ruthlessness, egocentricity, blind ambition, irresponsibility, inaction, and/or self-sabotage. Choosing to reflect and become conscious of these habits, patterns and programming in an effort to release them supports us to evolve to a place where clarity and a truthful picture of our inner and outer realities will serve us well.

When we look deeply inside and reflect, we become more able to transmute the energies of our self-limiting habits and patterns into the energy of authenticity, integrity and trustworthiness – supported by our inner qualities of courage, commitment and steadfastness.

Four characteristics of a victim mentality are:

• lack of clarity about our goals: ping-ponging between and among realistic and unrealistic or illusory expectations and goals, and blaming others for our lack of clarity;
• inability to deal with time and resource limits and constraints and blaming other people and events for our inability to use time and other resources effectively and intelligently;
• confusion around the law of cause and effect – lack of awareness about how we are creating/causing the current events in our life and a lack of clarity about how we can change our thoughts, beliefs, attitudes, intentions, behaviors and actions to effect positive change, believing that my issues are not about “me” but about others who are responsible for my issues; and,
• denial that my life choices have positive or negative mental, physical, emotional and spiritual effects on my overall health and well-be-ing, and that my pain and suffering are caused by some external event or circumstances.

Mired in the quicksand of victimization, we find ourselves constantly projecting our anger and negativity on to events, circumstances and others for our predicament. We project our (unconscious) inner frustration with ourselves out towards anyone or anything we feel we can blame for our state in life. Sadly, we’re actually creating our own universe but blaming others because it’s not what we want.

Taking time for honest and conscious self-reflection supports us to take responsibility for our self – including our “dark side.” Self-reflection sheds light on the “stories” we make up to avoid taking responsibility for how we project our “stuff” on to the world. Self-reflection supports us to identify how our emotional programming – anger, fears – create our lives at work, at home, at play and in relationship.

When we are honest and clear about our wants and needs, and what we are willing to do, we can create a solid foundation for our personal growth and development. We attract and relate with others who share the same self-empowering life view.

When we understand the lessons we need to learn from our current situation, what we need to do becomes obvious. Then we have to choose to take action. However, this understanding requires focus, commitment, consistency and compassion for our self.

Spending time in our inner world through meditation, silence, journaling, etc., is both emotionally and spiritually nourishing. This nourishment supports awareness of the “how” and “why” things appear in our lives – how we are creating our personal universe. Time in our inner world nurtures our capacity for self-love and self-kindness – which support us to create and inhabit a love-based, victim-less personal universe.

In this place of safety and protection, we begin to extricate our self from a victim mentality and move forward from a place of positivity and steadfastness. In our inner world, there can be no victimization as it’s a place of neutrality – a place of soul qualities – clarity, peacefulness, groundedness, stillness, surrender and allowing.

Self-reflecting helps us observe how we use our emotions to create our inner and outer worlds, our worlds of victimization. For example, are we being “nice” to accommodate others in our attempt to feel acknowledged, seen and loved or because we authentically wish to engage in adult, heart-felt, mature relationships – are we holding our physical, emotional and psychological boundaries with others or allowing others to threaten and abuse our boundaries so we can feel wanted and liked?

Once we have cultivated support, self-love and solid ground within, we can expand our space to include others. But we must be very conscious not to include any event, circumstance, idea, thing or person who will take us away from our center, from our self-love and move us back into feeling the victim.

When we surrender to someone else’s agenda, at work, at home, at play and in relationship, we enter their universe as a victim. The important question is why we allow others to control us. Perhaps,

Inner work and self-reflection, done diligently can often support us to

Inner work and self-reflection can support us to focus on what really matters, to let go of what holds us back, to trust our soul and Spirit for guidance and to use our core, inner strength (not “willpower” which hardly ever works) to take positive action for our self instead of engaging in self-destructive and self-sabotaging actions, releasing our self from the stranglehold of victimization.

Many “resolutions” are not conscious choices. They are knee-jerk reactions to something we don’t like about our self – and it’s usually about our “packaging” or some surface issue. True “resolve” requires a deep, inner, and conscious process. The start of 2012 is a wonderful opportunity to change our experience of failed “resolutions” to one of true and lasting change and transformation. We can choose to release the victim within and see what being in true control of our life is really, really like.

So, some questions for self-reflection are:

• Who or what is my guiding authority? How is this authority working for me?
• What are my core values and how do they direct my choices and decisions at work, at home, at play and in relationship?
• How do I choose and implement my personal standards?
• Am I self-reliant? How so?
• Do I ever explore the dynamics of my inner world?
• What bright light shines in my inner world?
• What does not shine in my inner world? Do I know why?
• What feelings and thoughts inhabit my inner world? Are they supportive or limiting?
• Who’s in my personal world? Are they supportive or toxic? Do I want them there? How have I attracted them into my life?
• Did I (or others in my family) experience being a victim when I was growing up? How so? What was that like?
• How can I create a more nurturing, loving and compassionate inner world for my body, mind and emotions?

SpiritHeart – Coaching for Essential Well-BE-ing
— at the intersection of body, mind, emotion and spirit
Values-Based Coaching, Counseling and Training
Phone: 770.804.9125 (Atlanta, GA, USA)
E-mail: pvajda [AT] spiritheart [DOT] net
www.spiritheart.net and www.ahchiyo.com
“What makes you think work and meditation are two different things?”
— Buddha at Work

Back to Charles:
….. We’re not beginners here. We know that our thoughts create our reality. Our thinking forms our path beneath our feet even as we’re stepping forward into it. Yes, we know it, but…

So the question is, why don’t we see more change in our lives, more satisfaction, more positive achievement?

And in that very question lies the answer we’re seeking so desperately. To be satisfied, we find ourselves needing more, more, more.

However, what if we decided to put some of that dissatisfaction on hold for a bit, and – just for a little while – dip a tentative toe into the pool of satisfaction instead?

Rather than keeping that so-elusive satisfaction far, far away, out there in the future somewhere, couldn’t we – just for a little while – find something we have right now to be satisfied with? Even one little thing?

After all, if we’re what we think, what are we thinking? What are we thinking?

New Year’s Realizations

So my big suggestion is really quite small and easily accomplished. Instead of our usual frantic, frenetic round of doing, of running in this and that direction, what if we just think a few of our thoughts differently – just for a little while – and watch what happens?

Now, the conjoined twin of cynicism is impatience. They always walk in together, a matching pair, and where you see one, you’ll find the other as well. Of course it has to be that way. Isn’t it obvious that cynicism and low expectations cannot bear being in the presence of patience? And vice versa?

The other day I mentioned to a friend that this year I’d be doing New Year’s Realizations rather than the traditional resolutions. She asked, do you mean realizations as in “new awarenesses” or realizations as in “things that become real”?

My answer: why make a choice? If we’re doing the new awarenesses properly, then the new things becoming real will follow quite naturally and easily.

That’s why, in 2012, I’ll be spending more time on my thoughts and mental processes, and I’ll be spending less time thinking about all the stuff I want more, more, more of.

Instead, I’ll be directing my thinking toward all the things I’m glad about, all the things I’m thankful are already in my life, all the ways I already have so much joy and happiness and fulfillment and health and friends and family and satisfaction in my life.

I hope you’ll join me – just for a little while – in these New Year’s Realizations.

Cheers from the end of 2011,
Charles

P.S. Leave a comment below and tell me what you think. Even better, tell me what you’re going to do?

Now, I don’t know if this new year will truly mark the end of anything, nor the beginning of anything else. But since I am a hardcore optimist at heart, I find myself expecting some kind of 2013 to be revealed a year from now, once 2012 has unspooled itself onto the cutting room floor of history.

So life goes on – or it may do. Because if it doesn’t, then what the hell, none of this mattered anyway, did it?

More About 2011

As you may have noticed, I haven’t been posting for some time. In fact, I’ve been on a bit of a sabbatical since May of this year. After a solid ten years of writing about self-help and motivation, I just got bored with it and took some time off for myself.

This year has been something of an experiment for me. In my last post, back on May 21st (Discipline – The Unpopular Side of Self Help), I showed you a tiny little form I had started to use for keeping track of my “confidence work.” It’s a simple little table with one cell for each day of the year. And at the time of that posting I’d already spent better than four months with it – a third of a year.

Now this year is ending, and I’d like to share with you what I’ve been doing during my time off.

I may not have been writing but I was still trying stuff on myself, which is where it actually counts. In my last report, I was still using brainwave entrainment recordings that combined both alpha-wave (or deeper) sounds with positive suggestions for personality change.

I mainly used three different recording sets. One was the Quantum Confidence set (the so-called Morry Method).

The second was the EmBRACES Belief Entrainment System by Alan Tutt.

And the third was an isochronic recording at five beats per second with a bit of pink noise overlaid. I made this one myself and supplied my own suggestions live during each session. You can download a copy of this recording here if you’d like to give it a try.

Each of these approaches has strong points. In both Morry Zelcovitch’s Quantum Confidence recordings and the EmBRACES recordings from Alan Tutt, there are two separate tracks, with differing suggestions for the left and right ears, plus a third “center track” with still more suggestions.

Listening to these is quite confusing at first. The conscious mind just can’t adequately handle all that relentless input, which leaves the subconscious mind free to listen and absorb without the usual meddling and monitoring of the conscious mind. That’s the theory, anyway, and in my experience it seems to have a good deal of validity.

A word about Alan’s EmBRACES set. It’s massive, and there’s a good reason for that. Alan did extensive testing with something like 150 test subjects, and he found that the more variety there was in the recordings, the more effective the suggestions seemed to be. The only downside to this is that you won’t know what to try first. Honestly – it doesn’t matter. Just dive in. You’ll figure it out as you go.

So, being a compulsive over-deliverer, he set out to give his users all the variety and choice they could ever ask for… and more. I’m talking 360 MP3 recordings in 10 modules – nearly 160 HOURS of material.

You know how, after you’ve used a set of recordings for a while, boredom can begin to set in? Well, that’s much, much less likely to happen here. According to my calculations, boredom won’t be a factor until you’ve been using the set for about 987 years – or longer. You can find out more about Alan’s EmBRACES here.

Now… back to my self-help efforts.

How Persistent Was I?

Instead of telling, let me just show you.

As you can see from the varying colored dots, I experimented with a few different things during the year. Took a few weeks off here and there (more a result of laziness than design.) On the other hand, I spent a 4-week period beginning in mid-September doing four sessions a day. That was a bit much, so after a month I rested a bit then dropped back to the usual two-a-day.

Results

Some objectives, like confidence or leadership, are pretty hard to quantify, especially if you’re self-rating the results. There’ll be days when you’re sure you’ve become a superstar. Other days you’ll wonder if you’re ever going to make any progress.

It’s normal to have ups and downs.

So in the interests of minimizing subjectivity, here are some specific, measurable things that have happened during the past year.

1. I got a call – out of the blue – asking if I’d like to become the M.C. for the Expat Club meetings. The man who had been doing an outstanding job for three years had decided to move on to other activities, and would I be interested? The Expat Club has around 500-600 members overall, but not all are in-country at any one time. Attendance at the meetings varies from around 70 in the low season to upwards of 150 in the high season. I accepted the job and have been having a ball running the monthly meetings.

2. Several writers living here in Thailand have asked me to format their books and get them Amazon-ready. Some were for paperback publishing, and others were for Kindle ebooks. I found that this was not only easy for me, it was actually fun. This led me to start a new service business website MisterEbook.com, where I accept ebook formatting for authors who would rather be writing instead of getting all tied up in the techie stuff. This site is still new, so I don’t have consistent performance data to share yet.

3. In July I had an operation – an angioplasty – to clear some blockage in a coronary artery. Now, was this a negative thing? Or was it a positive step to correct something that I had previously allowed to become negative? Not sure, but I thought I should lay it out and let you decide for yourself. At any rate, I’m still alive and kicking, much to my delight.

4. Because of back injuries when I was young, back pain, cramps and rigid muscles had been a problem for years. This year, I took measures to change that. Twice a week I do go for Thai massage, which if done properly, can free up tight, locked muscles. So morning backache and occasional bouts of my back “going out” have disappeared. Next month I turn sixty-nine, and my back feels better than it has for thirty years. (Now I’m starting to sound like an old geezer, aren’t I?)

5. This one is more subjective and a bit difficult to put into words. However, for what it’s worth, here it is: During the past year I’ve begun noticing that people treat me with more deference and respect than before. This amazes me because, in groups I have usually felt like the wallpaper. Other people sparkled, not me. And when meeting new people, I was just one of the faces. Now when I meet folks, or sit in on a new group, I’m treated like a visiting dignitary. On the one hand, this is flattering, but on the other hand, it’s a bit unsettling. I’ve always tried to avoid being an ego-driven kind of guy, so while it’s pleasant, it puts me on my guard to not let myself get swept away by approval.

Anyway, these are some of the results I’ve noticed after working on my confidence fairly consistently for one year.

Try This at Home, Boys and Girls

I fully intend to continue these efforts in the new year, and if you’d also like to track your own efforts, here’s a chart ready for you to use.

To download your copy, right click on the image, or right click here and save as “2012 Meditation Record” on your computer.

Once you’ve downloaded it, trim it down and tape it somewhere that you’ll see it every day, or keep it on a clipboard, ready to use at any time.

The only thing to avoid is – don’t lay it down on a flat surface. If you do that, it’ll soon be covered up and forgotten. Once a tracking instrument like this goes onto a horizontal surface, it’s useless. Just put it where nothing else can get piled on top of it, and it’ll keep reminding you of your intentions.

Then, next year, I hope you’ll report back and let me know what you’ve been working on and the results you’ve seen.

Cheers from the end of 2011,
Charles

P.S. If you’ve been using the 2011 form that I posted back in May, tell me what results you’ve been getting. No results? Then tell me that too.

The user. Often the user won’t use what they’ve bought.

I was as big a self help junkie as anybody, anywhere. Buy the product, listen to it once (or less), and then put it on the shelf beside all those other products I already had.

To be sure, I have made miles of progress from where I began my journey, but it hasn’t been all forward, straightline motion. And the thing that has held me back the most was always an unwillingness to keep my promises to myself. I would decide to do something and then renege, waffle, sidestep, back out and just generally undercut every promise I made to myself.

• I’m going to exercise more!
  Oh but I don’t really feel like it today.
• I’m going to write one article or short story every day!
  Oh but I can’t think of anything today.
• I’m going to call my family more often!
  Oh but there’s nothing to tell this month
• I’m going to contact two new prospective customers every day!
  Oh but I didn’t meet anybody today.

What always prompted this consistently lax behavior was a serious lack of respect for or honesty with myself.

Some time back I wrote a report titled In a Far and Foreign Place which tells how that promise-breaking habit began changing. It came late to me, but eventually I did begin treating myself with more respect. And one of the prime signs of self respect is keeping one’s promises to oneself. The ability to follow through.

Now, over the years I’ve tried and use a number of different methods for building more consistency in my follow through. Some worked better than others. One of the things I’ve discovered is that without the follow-through habit, no “time management” system on earth will help anybody succeed. The one unspoken assumption in every time management book ever written seems to be that the reader, once they have a system in place, will just do it. But you know, usually they don’t. And it’s not the system’s fault.

Trouble is, most of those systems can only give us a way to manage all our time. One big, multi-piece bite. And I don’t know about you, but I’ve always choked on that. I needed something smaller.

I needed a way to begin building the follow-through habit, but in little, bite-sized chunks. One aspect of my life at a time. And what better place to begin than on self-image building?

So back on January 6th, I decided to break with the past and start doing things a little differently. I already had a recording I’d made for myself that inputs good, solid suggestions about confidence, self worth and persistence. It’s a 30-minute MP3 with brainwave entrainment sounds in the background, and I enjoyed it (when I remembered to use it). So I decided to listen to that recording twice every day. On some days I’d listen to it both times, while on other days, I would listen to a different version without the suggestions – just the entrainment sound alone – and do freeform creative visualizing.

Now, one thing I know from past experience is this: no matter how enthusiastic and determined I am when I start, if I don’t keep some kind of visual record, I’ll lose track and wander off course. So I made myself a small action tracking tool. A simple little table with a square for each day of the year – yep, a calendar – where I can put a little dot for each time I listen to the MP3. And I kept it simple, with only one new behavior and one way to track its consistency.

You know how they say it takes 21 days to form a new habit? According to my records, that simply is not true – at least, it’s not true for me. Take a look at the graphic below. On the left side is the blank calendar, and on the right is my track record. You can see that it took me a bit over six weeks – 45 days or so – before I could consistently remember to do this thing twice every day.

But since passing that 45 day mark, I’ve only missed 4 days out of the last 12 weeks. That’s a hit rate of better than 95 percent.

And that brings us to discipline.

Frankly, this discipline thing is not popular. We give it lip service, and we say we think it’s a good thing… but when it comes to actually acquiring some for ourselves, we aren’t very disciplined.

I’m not trying to point any fingers here. I’m just telling it like it is in most folks’ lives. Getting more discipline has never really been at the top of my wish list. Nor my action list. Maybe things are different at your house. Maybe you’re much more in charge and on top of things and always get stuff done before anybody ever has to remind you. If so, that’s great. But for the rest of us…

In any case, I found that this simple little calendar has been helping me remember what I’m doing, even when I get busy and my mind strays to other things. The main reason this works so well is because discipline, like almost everything else, is largely a matter of habit. We get in the habit of doing what we say we’ll do, and then people praise us like crazy because we’re so “disciplined.” Interesting, huh?

If you think you’d like to try the same thing, here’s a link for downloading your own copy. It’s a one-page PDF, so all you’ll need to do is print it out, trim it down to a convenient size, then tape it in a place where you’ll see it every day. Probably better to put it on a wall or the side of your computer. Laying it down on a table or desk only makes sure it quickly get covered up, pushed to the back, neglected and forgotten.

In my case, I taped the calendar to a clipboard. I even glued refrigerator magnets to the back of the clipboard so I can hang it on the side of my computer. Makes it easy to pick up, mark my day’s dots, then put it back in plain sight.

It’s May right now, so there’s more than half of this year left – plenty of time to start a new habit of your own. Plenty of time to begin mastering this discipline habit. But here’s a little secret… discipline seems to come as a side effect of doing other things consistently.

Like I say, it’s just a habit, and any habit can be made or unmade. All it takes is consistent repetition, plus a little something that lets us track how we’re doing.

Cheers from warm and smiling Thailand,
Charles

To my lurching mind, it appeared that anything could be true, and compounding that confusing thought, I found that I could not hold my mind immobile (not still, but immobile) enough to stop noticing all the contradictions, fallacies or exceptions that seemed inherent in… well… everything.

I recall one day scrawling on the wall of a darkroom lab where I worked at the time:

……….There is no logic
……….No sense nor reason
……….The monkey is wise

Oddly, although I had no idea what they meant, those three lines felt solid in my mind. I found more certainty in that bit of nonsense than in most of what I’d seen, read and heard from all the experts. It wasn’t till years later that I began sensing what my inner mind had been trying to tell me.

At that time it was common to hear the words existentialism and nihilism tossed about, and I was aware that they seemed to involve some lack of meaningfulness in what we called reality. But that was all so damnably depressing. It seemed to be a given that where no meaning existed, there was also no hope, no reason for living, no joy.

I was already depressed enough without all that, so no thanks.

Eventually I found my way through my Slough of Despond (to borrow a phrase from John Bunyan). On the far side of that swampy, hopeless mire, I found sunshine, joy and – best of all – a meaning that I could live with. Where did I find them? We’ll come to that in a moment, but first, I’d like to share with you a note sent to me this morning by friend and frequent contributor Peter Vajda. He writes:

Sharing a Thought on Meaning
By Peter Vajda, Ph.D, C.P.C.

As I was reflecting on topics for this week’s food-for-thought piece, I came across a book of poetry by the Zen Master Ikkyu (1400s). This one resonated with me deeply and I thought I might share it with you.

Skeletons

One night… a pitiful-looking skeleton appeared and said these words:

……….A melancholy autumn wind
……….Blows through the world;
……….The pampas grass waves,
……….As we drift to the moor,
……….Drift to the sea.

……….What can be done
……….With the mind of a man
……….That should be clear
……….But though he is dressed up in a monk’s robe,
……….Just lets life pass him by?

Toward dawn I dozed off, and in my dream I found myself surrounded by a group of skeletons… One skeleton came over to me and said:

……….Memories
……….Flee and
……….Are no more.
……….All are empty dreams
……….Devoid of meaning.

……….Violate the reality of things
……….And babble about
……….“God” and “the Buddha”
……….And you will never find
……….the true Way.

I liked this skeleton… He saw things clearly, just as they are. I lay there with the wind in the pines whispering in my ears and the autumn moonlight dancing across my face.

What is not a dream? Who will not end up as a skeleton? We appear as skeletons covered with skin — male and female — and lust after each other. When the breath expires, though, the skin ruptures, sex disappears, and there is no more high or low. Underneath the skin of the person we fondle and caress right now is nothing more than a set of bare bones. Think about it — high and low, young and old, male and female, all are the same. Awaken to this one great matter and you will immediately comprehend the meaning of “unborn and undying.”

……….If chunks of rock
……….Can serve as a memento
……….To the dead,
……….A better headstone
……….Would be a simple tea-mortar.

……….Humans are indeed frightful beings.
……….A single moon
……….Bright and clear
……….In an unclouded sky;
……….Yet still we stumble
……….In the world’s darkness.

Have a good look — stop the breath, peel off the skin, and everybody ends up looking the same. No matter how long you live the result is not altered [even for emperors]. Cast off the notion that “I exist.” Entrust yourself to the wind-blown clouds, and do not wish to live for ever.

……….This world
……….Is but
……….A fleeting dream
……….So why by alarmed
……….At its evanescence?

……….The vagaries of life,
……….Though painful
……….Teach us
……….Not to cling
……….To this floating world.

……….Why do people
……….Lavish decorations
……….On this set of bones
……….Destined to disappear
……….Without a trace?

……….No one really knows
……….The nature of birth
……….Nor the true dwelling place.
……….We return to the source
……….And turn to dust.

……….Many paths lead from the foot of the mountain,
……….But at the peak
……….We all gaze at the
……….Single bright moon.

……….If at the end of our journey
……….There is no final
……….Resting place,
……….Then we need not fear
……….Losing our Way.

……….No beginning,
……….No end.
……….Our mind
……….is born and dies:
……….The emptiness of emptiness!

……….Rain, hail, snow and ice:
……….All are different,
……….But when they fall
……….They become the same water
……….As the valley stream.

……….The ways of proclaiming
……….The Mind vary,
……….But the same heavenly truth
……….Can be seen
……….In each and every one.

……….Cover your path
……….With the fallen pine needles
……….So no one will be able
……….To locate your
……….True dwelling place.

SpiritHeart – Coaching for Essential Well-BE-ing
— at the intersection of body, mind, emotion and spirit
Values-Based Coaching, Counseling and Training
Phone: 770.804.9125 (Atlanta, GA, USA)
E-mail: pvajda [AT] spiritheart [DOT] net
www.spiritheart.net and www.ahchiyo.com
“What makes you think work and meditation are two different things?”
— Buddha at Work

Back to Charles:
….. Now, I’m not usually one for poetry. I tend to like writers who just come right out and say what the heck they mean, rather than burying their intent beneath obscure images, symbols and metaphors.

And yet… once in a while… something comes along that actually speaks powerfully to me despite its veils. This poem does exactly that. it’s a gentle slap in the face to anyone who seeks meaning – whether within themselves or out there. It’s a reminder that no meaning can ever be found. It can only be originated – assigned by ourselves at this moving point of a moment.

It appears that meaning is not and never will be a set “thing.” It’s only available as a dynamic, instant-by-instant experience. So if your life has been lacking in meaning, cheer up. It’s well within reach. All we need to do is assign our own meanings to each of our experiences.

And this leads me to the concept of reframing. In Neuro Linguistic Programming, we learn that we can back up, take another look at the issues causing us pain, and choose to assign new meanings to those situations.

The wife who is a compulsive vacuumer frets over all the footprints her family leaves in her carpets. She’s constantly re-vacuuming to clear away the imperfections in her perfectly kept carpets.

But when a therapist pointed out that the reason she’s so vigilant about vacuuming is because she’s trying to keep a clean and perfect home for the family she loves. Then he suggested that those footprints represent the presence of the very people she is taking care of. In fact, those footprints are a sign of how much they trust and depend on her. A sign that they are there with her and love her too.

That little shift in perception, just one small adjustment in the meaning of footprints, freed her to relax and stop obsessing over the condition of her carpets. Instead, she became more aware of her family as a positive presence rather than a negative one.

Reframing. Assigning new meanings to the circumstances of life.

When Victor Frankl was dragged away to a Nazi death camp, he never suspected that it would motivate him to one day write “Man’s Search for Meaning,” a classic in literature. I highly recommend reading it. His body was imprisoned within unthinkably brutal, dehumanizing conditions. And yet, he not only found a personal meaning for the experience, he found a life’s purpose as well.

While thousands of the prisoners around him were giving up and choosing to die, Frankl deliberately selected a different meaning and assigned it to the experiences through which he was passing. He wrote that about three-fourths of the prisoners could find no reason to live. He said you could see it in their eyes. Meanwhile, the other one-fourth reached within themselves and created their own reason for living – assigned a meaning that would carry them forward and through to the other side of that impossible place and time. They reframed the death camp experience and created within themselves the power to live on through anything.

Here are a few Frankl quotes:

A human being is a deciding being.

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

Ever more people today have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.

Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life; everyone must carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated, thus, everyone’s task is unique as his specific opportunity to implement it.

Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.

For the meaning of life differs from man to man, from day to day and from hour to hour. What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person’s life at a given moment.

Live as if you were living a second time, and as though you had acted wrongly the first time.

The last of human freedoms – the ability to chose one’s attitude in a given set of circumstances.

Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked.

When we are no longer able to change a situation – we are challenged to change ourselves.