Marcel Legros - Play the Game of Life

There is no real story without a problem. Have you noticed that in any story, from the movie “The Titanic” to any of the background material on people in the Olympics, everyone has to overcome a problem, or at least struggle with a problem, for it to be interesting. The same is true for our lives as well. If you didn’t have problems, you life wouldn’t be very interesting. You wouldn’t have any challenges, anything to keep you sharp, etc. You would be bored out of your mind. The big thing you would miss if you didn’t have problems is PRIDE. You feel good when you overcome problems, you self worth shoots up and you get a real glow, if you solve a problem. And the worse the problem, the better the feeling. Somehow the pain of solving the problem fades away, but the pride you felt afterwards remains forever. So make problems your friend and you will bring a real glow to your life.

[Read more →]

Changing a few words can change your life for the better. Stop saying “if only,” and start saying, “If it’s to be, it’s up to me.” We all have tons of “if only’s,” such as “If only the boss liked me, I could move up,” or, “If only I could win the lottery, my life would be great.” The common theme is that we are relying on someone or something else to make our life good. Do you really think your boss, the government, or something else is going to come and save you? Relying on someone else to save you robs you of your self-esteem and a sense of control over you life. Once you take control of your life, you feel better and you begin to take steps to move ahead. So stop saying “if only,” and start saying, “If it’s to be, it’s up to me.”

[Read more →]

Don’t act like a loser, even if you are losing. Have a winner’s eye view of what you are doing. You want people to be around you, and they won’t be around if you act like a loser. You are not a loser, just because you lost, or are in the losing position. Keep your head up, focus on the positive and project a winner’s image. People can sense a loser, and they can sense a winner. Make it a winner that they sense.

[Read more →]

Listen to what you say you are going to do and then watch what you actually do. Are you walking the walk, the same as you talk the talk. If not, take steps to do what you say you will do. Your self-esteem will go up and you will be motivated to do more, in addition to drawing other people to you because of your integrity. You need to make your behavior reflect your values. You will have inner and outer conflicts, if your beliefs, values, goals and most importantly, actions aren’t in agreement. Look at what you say and do, versus what you believe. Put all the pieces together and go forward as a team.

[Read more →]

Embrace change, you need it in order to be successful. If nothing changes, then nothing changes. If you want a different outcome, you have to do something different. Some of your habits and actions are working fine for you, but you probably have other habits or take other actions that don’t work for you. You need to change things, in order to create change for yourself. Look through the outcomes you are getting and see what you would like to be different, then work backwards and see what may be causing these unwanted outcomes. Perhaps you have to change your education, your friends, your work habits, whatever, but you will find that change is needed. Start to make those changes and you will find that things change for you.

[Read more →]

I am sure you are familiar with the story of filling a jar with golf balls, and it looking full, then putting pebbles in it, and it looking full, then on to sand, and finally a liquid, and trying to decide when it is full. There are many things you can learn from this, but I like to think that the golf balls represent the good things in your life, and if you don’t put them in first, they will never fit in the jar. The same goes for your life, if you don’t plan on putting the good things into your life first, they will never happen, they will be replaced by the small stuff.
Live Life.

[Read more →]

If you want to bring meaning and passion to your work and relationships, you need strong values - but are your values healthy or harmful? Are they rooted in a desire to improve the world, or are they based on ignorance, fear, and greed?

The Odd Couple

A few weeks ago U.S. President George W. Bush invited the Dalai Lama to the White House.

President Bush speaks of peace and goes to war; the Dalai Lama speaks of peace and lives in peace. What do you think each man’s lasting legacy will be? Who’s words carry more power to capture your imagination?

Armed with a strong set of beliefs, we all have the power to manifest peace and happiness or to create immense human suffering. Here are a few photos of famous people you may know. Each of these people were convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that they were doing the right thing.

In your own life, in your own way, are you creating happiness or are you creating suffering?

Choose your values carefully.

Links to learn more about the people shown in this article:

The 14th Dalai Lama - Tenzin Gyatso

U.S. President George W. Bush

Mother Theresa

Adolf Hitler

Martin Luther King Jr.

U.S. President Abraham Lincoln

Joseph Stalin

Mahatma Gandhi

[Read more →]

Saintly patience doesn’t happen overnight - it’s like a muscle and needs to be exercised every day. You don’t just step into the gym and lift 500 pounds on your first day - you patiently work up to it. You build the strength and tolerance to lift 500 pounds over a long period of time by training your body every day. One day, after months or years of training, you are able to lift 500 pounds and everyone will be astounded by your strength. Instead of admiring your strength, they should be admiring the patience that allowed you to train so hard for so long.

Life gives you opportunities every day to exercise your patience, if you recognize them for an opportunity instead of an obstacle. I used to say, “I’d be more patient and calm if everyone else weren’t conspiring against me. The world just keeps throwing obstacles in front of me! Why are people so crazy, slow, dumb, difficult, etc.?” Now I try to look on every delay and every difficult situation as an opportunity to exercise my patience. I simply smile and recognize that the universe is giving me an opportunity to become a better, stronger person. It’s now become a challenge to see just how long I can drive in the city without throwing a fit and cursing out loud (I’m up to four hours now). Bring it on, old people, logging trucks, and red lights; I’m exercising my patience! Pretty soon I won’t be honking my horn and flipping you the bird; how are you going to piss me off then?

Patience Isn’t Inborn - Just Ask a Two Year-Old

I’m not a naturally patient person. In fact, I’ve gone through life continuously moving from one frustrating delay to another. I’m improving my patience by repeating the following phrase whenever I encounter delays and setbacks in my life.

Life’s delays aren’t life’s denials.

Just because you don’t get what you want immediately doesn’t mean you won’t get it eventually. If I’m stuck in a traffic jam and late for an appointment, my plans might not work out according to schedule. Getting angry and upset will do nothing to improve the situation - when I’m angry and impatient, bad things happen.

Develop Universal Patience

The power of water is an example of how patience can be applied to your life with amazing results. One drop of water falling on a stone does nothing but make it wet. But if that same drip is repeated over and over again for thousands of years, water will easily drill a hole right through the middle of the stone. Consider blogging: if you write three, five hundred word articles a week, for one year, you’ll have written an average length fiction novel at the end of that year. Just to give you perspective, J.R.R. Tolkien spent 14 years writing the Lord of the Rings; it’s word count is just over 300,000. If you apply the same blogging example above, you can easily write over 1,092,000 words - enough time to write two epic novels with room to spare!

Write your great novel one blog entry at a time.

[Read more →]