self self ad self means not selfish

Do you sometimes find yourself unlovable? Learn how to be yourself - your true authentic self. Then learn how to love yourself - that true authentic self you have discovered and created.

To learn to love yourself, begin by finding yourself ...

1. Establish your own identity - Be yourself
2. Set your Direction in life
3. Create conditions that make it easier to love yourself
4. Make the choice that you are worthy of your own love

Be Yourself

Always be a first-rate version of yourself,
instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.
- Judy Garland

It is hard to really love anything that is fake, isn't it? That applies to yourself as well. If you are a fake - a phony - you won't be very lovable -- and you will find it very hard to love yourself. If you try to copy other people, you know deep down that you are a fraud - and no one likes a fraud.

Choose to be the real you - the very best you that you can be. Do what you do well. Talk like yourself. Walk like yourself. Make the choices that feel comfortable to you. Choose the career that you want - rather than the career your parents always wanted you to follow. Choose to hang out with people you really like and feel comfortable with - rather than with those who have the highest status or most money.

Set a Direction in Life

If a man does not know what port he is steering for, no wind is favorable to him.
- Seneca

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

To find yourself, you have to find your direction -- and then begin to move in that direction. Begin by defining your purpose in life. Then establish projects that fulfill your life purpose, and work diligently toward those goals.

Be of Service

The unselfish effort to bring cheer to others will be the beginning of a happier life for ourselves.
- Helen Keller

Contribute to the world, and you will find reason to love yourself. Being of service to the less fortunate gives a tremendously positive boost to life -- gives you a purpose -- and gives you a reason to love yourself.

Know that You are Worthy of Love

You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure about you.
We were born to manifest the glory of God that is within us.
- Marianne Williamson

Although it feels easier to love yourself when you can identify concrete reasons for being worthy of that love - such as being a person of service - the fundamental reason why you are worthy of self-love is because you exist. If the phrase "Child of God" doesn't feel comfortable, substitute your own words that reflect the importance of your being, and are compatible with your belief system.

Show your Love for Yourself

This above all, to thine own self be true.
- William Shakespeare

First, act as if you love yourself, Let the emotion of self-love follow the behavior. Pamper yourself. Treat yourself as you would treat someone you love. Feed yourself healthy food. Get enough restful sleep. Balance work and play. Avoid stressful situations. Find opportunities to relax. Create a daily program to care for your body, mind, emotions, and spirit. Such a daily program might include walking, yoga, or Qigong, and meditation or inspirational reading.

Live a Balanced Life

Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.
- Albert Einstein

Balance activity with serenity, wealth with simplicity, persistence with innovation, community with solitude, familiarity with adventure, constancy with change, leading with following. Learn to love each aspect of your life, but also to love its counterpart.

Don't Take Yourself Too Seriously

Life is too important to be taken seriously.
- Oscar Wilde

Laugh when you can
apologize when you should
and let go of what you can't change.
Life's too short to be anything... but happy.
- Anonymous

You will find yourself a lot more lovable if you take yourself less seriously. Learn to laugh at yourself - enthusiastically and without embarrassment.

Love Others - Love the World

Lord, grant that I might not so much seek to be loved as to love.
- St. Francis of Assisi

As we light a path for others, we naturally light our own way.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Get into the habit of loving. Love your family - love your friends - love the world - even love your "enemies." It becomes easier to love yourself when you love everyone.

Celebrate Yourself

I celebrate myself, and sing myself.
- Walt Whitman

Invite your friends to a party. Give each person a stack of index cards and ask them to write something positive about you on each card. After everyone has left, choose the cards with which you most resonate. Then write additional positive attributes on more cards. Spread out the cards on your desk or pin them to a wall where you can see them each day.

Celebrate Each Day

The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.
- Oprah Winfrey

Create each day as a celebration of your life. Cheer every small victory - even getting out of bed each morning

Keep a Positive Outlook

Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.
- Thich Nhat Hanh

Act positive, and let the feelings of being happy, honoring yourself, and loving yourself follow your actions.

Spend Most of Your Time with People Who Support You

A friend is someone who knows all about you and loves you just the same.
- Elbert Hubbard

With practice, you can love yourself regardless of the negativity and criticism that surrounds you. However, it is much easier to create self-love in the presence of a loving support network.

Make the Choice that You are Worthy of Your Own Love

Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love.
- Erich Fromm

The steps above set the stage, but ultimately you must make your choice to find yourself worthy of your love, and to love yourself.

GEMS OF LIFE

"Imagine LiFE as a game in which you are juggling some FIVE balls in the air. You name them - WORK,FAMILY,HEALTH, FRIENDS and SPIRIT and you're keeping all of these in the air. You will soon understand that

WORK is a Rubber Ball. If you drop it, it will bounce back. But the other Four balls - Family, Health, Friends and Spirit - ARE MADE OF GLASS.

If you drop one of these, they will be Irrevocably scuffed, Marked, Nicked, Damaged or even SHATTERED. They will never be the same. You must understand that and strive for BALANCE IN YOUR LIFE."

How? Don't undermine your worth by comparing yourself with others. It is because we are different that each of us is special. Don't set your goals by what other people deem important. Only you know what is best for you. Don't take for granted the things closest to your heart. Cling to them as they would your life, for without them, Life is Meaningless. Don't let your Life slip through your fingers by living in the past or for the future. By living your life one day at a time, YOU LIVE, ALL THE DAYS OF YOUR LiFE.

Don't give up when you still have something to give. Nothing is really over until the moment you stop trying. Don't be afraid to admit that you are less than perfect. It is this fragile thread that binds us to each together.

Don't be afraid to encounter risks. It is by taking chances that we learn how to be brave. Don't shut LOVE out of your Life by saying it's impossible to find time. The quickest way to RECEIVE LOVE is to GIVE, the fastest way to LOSE LOVE is to HOLD it too TIGHTLY , and the BEST way to KEEP LOVE is to give it WINGS.

Don't run through life so fast that you forget not only where you've been, but also where you are going.

Don't forget, a person's greatest emotional need is to feel appreciated.

Don't be afraid to learn. Knowledge is weightless, a treasure you can always carry easily.

Don't use time or words carelessly. Neither can be retrieved. Life is not a race, but a journey to be savoured each step of the way.

Yesterday is HiSTORY,
Tomorrow is a MYSTERY and
Today is a GIFT , that's why we call it THE PRESENT. 

NO PROBLEM !!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks to Walt Disney's "The Lion King", children the world over know the Swahili expression "Hakuna Matata". It means "No Problem" and we grown-ups should use it more often.


It is easy to turn a minor disruption into a major disaster. Don't do it! It lowers the energy of everyone involved and makes you want to run away. Instead, take the energy you are wasting on worrying and complaining about the "ifs", "buts" and "shoulds" - and direct it toward finding the solution.

Problem-solving requires awareness and becoming aware of the problem is often enough to solve it. To sharpen your awareness, take a look at the problem from three different perspectives:

1. Accept that the problem is really just a FACT, or set of facts.
Situation: You parked in a no-parking zone and your car was just towed.

You may be furious about it, but the fact remains that the car was towed. If you detach yourself momentarily from your feelings, and look strictly at the facts, it will be easier to put things into perspective. Just imagine that someone else's car was towed. Would you feel the same about it? Probably not! You would probably think, "Well that's what happens when you park in a tow-away zone."

So, act as if the problem belonged to your neighbor and not yourself...
Now, there are no more problems - only facts!

2. Be willing to see your problem as a CHALLENGE.What's more fun: dealing with a problem, or facing a new challenge?

Situation: You've just had another fight with someone close. Arguing is not going to achieve anything.

You can treat the situation (or the person) as a problem, or you can choose to see it as a challenge: "How can I create a harmonious, understanding relationship with that person?" Instead of looking backward into the past ("How many times I've tried, and still it doesn't work"), you look forward to the future ("Let's see how I can make a difference").

The heaviness of the situation is gone, and excitement takes over...
Now, there are no more problems - only challenges!

3. Recognize the problem as an OPPORTUNITY.In reality, every obstacle is a chance to learn something new and grow: "The obstacle is the path."

Situation: Your boss just gave you two weeks notice. You're shocked, angry, worried, feeling insecure.

You can see it as a problem ("What am I going to do now?" "Where will I earn money?" "I'm too old to change"), or you can see the possibilities open to you that were not there before: "Now I finally can take the around-the-world tour I always dreamed about", "Now it's time to open my own business", "Here's my chance to find a better job".

Contemplate many of the opportunities you've had in your life; probably many opened up when you were in trouble...
Now, there are no more problems - only opportunities!


The key element in this problem-solving process is the conscious act of taking personal responsibility.

Reshaping problems into facts, challenges and opportunities will allow you to accept that you are in charge of your "problem".

You can no longer play the "blame game" because the problem is no longer something that was forced upon you from an outside source (other people, circumstances, etc...)

You are no longer a powerless victim!

If it's affecting your life, you must have something to do with it; therefore you can do something about it.


Often, you don't even have to take action in the physical sense. Simply changing your point of view may be sufficient for the problem to disappear on its own.

The closer you are to an issue, the harder it can be to be creative about it. So try taking a step back from your situation and invite others who are not close to it to brainstorm solutions with you.

Ask yourself these questions:

• What are the facts?
• What are the challenges?
• What opportunities are presented?
• How will a solution make my life better than it was before?
• What is it that I have to learn in order to deal with the situation differently?

Remember that NOTHING is IMPOSSIBLE.

When people tell me that something is impossible, I ask them, "How can you do it anyway?"

That simple question has the power to transform lives.

Imagine what would have happened if people like the Wright Brothers, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, J.F.K. and Gandhi used the word "impossible"? Where would humanity be today?

We all tend to look at some problems as impossible to solve or beyond our power. "It's impossible to talk to my mother, she just won't listen!"

But if you ask yourself instead, "How can I talk to her?" then, suddenly, ideas emerge (i.e. take her for a quiet lunch, include a third person in the conversation, write her a letter).

Changing your language changes your outlook.

Really, most "impossible" things are just "difficult" and can be achieved with some effort and a new "no problem" attitude.

FINAL SATISFACTION>>>>>>>>>

Are you looking for satisfaction and fulfillment?

To be satisfied and fulfilled you must do something you love to do. But it is not always easy to do that.

You will find yourself drifted away from doing what you love and do other things to just make a living.

You may be successful but not satisfied and your soul may be looking for something bigger to pursue.

Without being clear about the reason why you are here in life you will not feel passionate about what you do and you will not experience true satisfaction and fulfillment.

Everything in life has a reason for existence. Until you discover the reason for your existence you will not live a life of awakened soul.

Without a purpose you will be sidetracked in your life’s journey. You will drift from your right path and achieve little. You will not be able to inject passion and enthusiasm in the activities you do.

Without a purpose you will lose your power in front of hard times. When you face challenges you need a strong will and a motivator to help you persist and stand against challenges. You need a guide to help you decide how to respond to difficult moments in your life. So, having a purpose and a big dream empower you against obstacles in your life’s journey.

Without a purpose you will not excel at what you do. You only become your best when you do something you love because it reflects your highest talents. You will find yourself gaining energy from your work and feel like you want to be working on it forever. And you will be willing to learn and improve yourself everyday.

Without a purpose you will not be able to give your best and serve others. When your actions align with your life purpose you will find yourself automatically serving others.

Having purpose makes it easier to achieve what you want. Because when you have a clear vision and purpose you will radiate powerful positive energy that will attract people, resources, and opportunities that will help you achieve what you want.

Everyday your mind receives tons of information and will only filter what is important to you. So your purpose will act as a powerful filter that will fine tune all the information you receive and select what matches with your life purpose.

Be clear why you are here and discover your purpose of existence. This will create a meaning to your life and work and attract all people, resources and opportunities to help you achieve your goals faster than you can imagine.

Start now discovering the purpose behind everything you do and live life full of passion and satisfaction.

My friend you can make a difference.

I believe in you.

BORING LIFE .............. AVOID IT ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

                 Over the centuries, many religions and philosophers (not to mention mothers!) have feared and even damned boredom. he poet Wordsworth described it as a “savage torpor”. Early Christians classified it as one of the seven deadly sins. Even today, we talk about being “bored to death”, “bored stiff” and “bored to tears”. Crime waves are often blamed on disaffected youths who claim they cannot find anything useful to do.
                 However, I propose that we reverse this fear of boredom because, in addition to negatively numbed minds, there are also constructively bored minds. If one is brave enough to hang out with boredom for a while , they will find that boredom can be the great motivator and a push to develop one’s inner self.
                 Writer F. Scott Fitzgerald felt that boredom can be tool for developing creativity. He wrote, “Boredom is not an end product; it is, comparatively, rather an early stage in life and art. You’ve got to go by or past or through boredom, as through a filter, before the clear product emerges.”
                  Boredom seems to have been the mechanism that prompted me to clear my mind and refocus. Sometimes I’d go for a walk or clean the kitchen. But I didn’t stay bored for long, because I began to look around and notice things I hadn’t seen before – including new thoughts. Maybe the unfocused time had allowed my mind to rest and my subconscious to scan the horizon for a new perspective, which was followed by new interest in the task at hand. For whatever reason, soon I would be back engrossed in productive work. And inevitably, that work would be better than what I was producing earlier.
                  
                      I remember as an only child feeling bored sometimes (at least that is how it was labeled at the time), especially during summer vacation when my time wasn’t programmed by somebody else. If my mother noticed, she would nag at me to “do something”, then she might create some busy work to try and alleviate my boredom. It seldom worked, possibly because I was stubborn enough to reject her suggestions on general principle, probably because she confused solitude with idleness, maybe because you can’t alleviate somebody else’s boredom for them, and often because I wasn’t really bored, but tinkering, messing about, just looking like I was doing nothing. And sometimes, my cries of boredom were really cries for my mother’s attention, rather than for one of her projects designed to keep me out of her way. Eventually my down time would end and I would find something new and more challenging to do than the busy work she provided. If left alone long enough, boredom motivated me, forced me to lean on my own inner resources, to develop my imagination and to envision wonderful possibilities. Maybe I was subconsciously looking for things that would let me experience flow! And probably there was lots going on in my subconscious while I was bored, which surfaced at some later time.

                  At other times, I remember being bored because I was disinterested in what the adults around me were chatting about. Bored with the conversation, I would become enthralled with people’s voices and with the sounds of their words and their accents. Later, in the safety of my own room, I would try to replicate those accents, an activity which no doubt increased my vocabulary and trained my ear for future projects.
                  We certainly would, I believe, be a calmer group of people. One morning, as I sat writing at a wimpy  café (churchgate) , I wondered whether all the people speeding by me were really fruitfully engaged in the world, or if their rushing to and fro was mostly an effort to avoid boredom, to keep their minds active and engaged.
What if, I wondered, as I enjoyed the sites and smells of the early morning, more people paid attention to the journey of life, not just the destination? What if they paid more attention to their experiences moment by moment? I suspect they would find that boredom is, as F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, a filter through which emotions, experiences and, yes, solitude can pass, resulting in a soaring of creativity and imagination – not to mention less stress. They might also find that it can be an alarm bell, motivating us to alter the way we are thinking, living and learning. Unlike caged animals whose neural pathways are altered by their boredom to the point that all they can do is pace, we humans have the potential to break through anything that limits our happiness and creativity, boredom included.

ARE YOU LIVING LIFE OR JUST SURVIVING ???????

There’s more to living than only surviving. Maybe I’m not there, but I’m still trying.
— The Offspring, Staring at the Sun

I recently read a self-help book about challenging yourself in the face of adversity, that argued the importance of reacting positively to unexpected life changes.  This was the second time I read Jon Gordon’s The Shark and the Goldfish, and it really got me thinking.
The book uses a short story to draw a parallel to life’s unexpected changes.  It’s about a goldfish that leads a happy life in his bowl until he’s accidentally swept into the ocean during a trip to the beach.  In the open water where no one feeds him, he’s convinced that he’s done for until a friendly shark teaches him to fend for himself.
The story is incredibly corny, and the first time I read it I dismissed it immediately.  It wasn’t until I needed to read it again for a book review I was asked to write that I began to appreciate its message.
The author states that he’s received considerable criticism about just how short and simple The Shark and the Goldfish is.  According to Gordon, critics believe books “must be long and complicated to be significant.”  Typically, I would agree with that mindset — but the fact that this tiny book has inspired me to write more than one article about it makes me recognize how its success is a result of its succinctness.
The most profound dialogue in the story comes from the shark, in a conversation where he challenges the goldfish’s thinking:

“You know what your problem is?”
“I’m starving and no one will feed me.”
“No, you are waiting to be fed.”

Waiting to be fed.  When the words hit me, I likened myself to the goldfish in the bowl — content with his life as long as he was being fed.  I wondered how many of us simply go through the motions of life without actually living.
Refusing to venture outside of our fishbowl-routine isn’t living, it’s just … surviving.  The fact that we often need something drastic to force us out of the bowl and to quit sleepwalking through our lives is disappointing.
Unexpected things that forever change our lives happen to all of us.
Year 2010 ,I reacted out of necessity.It was the toughest year of my life, and I remember a cycle of emotions where I bounced from being angry, to sad, to worried and back again all the time. Everything was wrong that time .It was a time when I was trying to convince myself that everything was going to be okay.
The positive things that came out of that experience and everything again got right and i eliminated from my life all wrong things. It’s difficult to maintain a positive attitude when the world is shitting on you, but in the face of adversity you manage to find a way.  During these challenging times you recognize how you can’t control the events in your life.  You can, however, choose how you react to them.

The same is true for when you’re living comfortably.  When nothing’s going on outside of your routine, you can choose to stagnate and feel content with the way things are.   You’ll end up waiting until something unexpected forces you to take action.
On the other hand, you can choose to challenge yourself and be progressive by working towards your personal development goals.  Although you may suffer some embarrassment or the occasional blow to your pride when things don’t work out the way you want them to, you’re still trying.  This is the difference between living and surviving, and it’s your choice.
Once you recognize that, you’ll understand that you have more control over your life than ever.

IT FEEL'S HAPPY TO BE ALONE !!!!!!!!!!!

Is it? Is the experience of my own loneliness really that uncomfortable – or transformative?

Depending on where we are in our relationship with our own loneliness, we may have different interpretations for this image.

 I marched right into that space where I often feel inexplicably lonely, and I sat down to wait.
It didn’t take long. Before five minutes had passed I started to squirm. To fidget. To THINK.
Oh god. The thinking. That’s the worst.

Trying to escape from our own fundamental human loneliness is like trying to find lasting comfort while sitting cross-legged. We settle into a position and hunker down for a relaxing rest. But then our knee starts to hurt. So we shift positions. “Ahhhh, much better,” we think. Then our foot falls asleep. So we shift again. “Yup, this is the ticket. I’m fine now.” But then our lower back starts to spasm…

You get the picture.
 Usually we regard loneliness as an enemy. Heartache is not something we choose to invite in. It’s restless and hot with the desire to escape and find something or someone to keep us company. When we can rest in the middle, we begin to have a nonthreatening relationship with loneliness, a relaxing and cooling loneliness that completely turns our usual fearful patterns upside down.
 By resting in the middle is avoiding the temptation to do something – anything – at the first twinges of loneliness. If we have an eating disorder, we might look to the refrigerator – or stay away. If we are single, we might join a dating site. If we are a drinker we might reach for the bottle. If we have an intense job we might throw ourselves more deeply into our work. But if we are not at ease in the presence of our own loneliness, what is sure is that we will do something to try to escape it.

The point is that in all these activities, we are seeking companionship in our usual, habitual way, using our same old repetitive ways of distancing ourselves from the demon loneliness. Could we just settle down and have some compassion and respect for ourselves? Could we stop trying to escape being alone with ourselves?
.
So what did I discover – after forcing myself to just sit still, to observe and experience what it feels like to be “lonely me”?
I discovered that it is possible. To just sit. To be with myself. To feel lonely and not die from it. To feel lonely and survive it without doing one single thing to distract myself or try to push it away.
I also discovered that, behind the space where the lonely feelings hang out, there is a peace. There is direct comparison between loneliness and contentment, and I had never thought of contentment in that way before.
But when I took some time to not just think about it but feel my way into it, I found it to be true. Contentment is accepting and enjoying what is, right in this moment now. Another word for contentment might be mindfulness. And another word for mindfulness might be loneliness. We are often – always – alone with ourselves. This will never change.
Let us  draws another parallel between loneliness and discipline. The discipline of mindfulness and the discipline of loneliness and the discipline of contentment are one and the same.
In other words, loneliness can be a true friend and a mentor to us….if we will let it. Loneliness can teach us that our own company is not a last resort, our only option, or something we should strive to avoid at all costs.
Loneliness can offer a comfort that nothing else can match, as we relax into what is, and begin to enjoy each moment just as it is, whether we are keeping good company with others or with ourselves.