Are We Actually Conscious?
Just how much of what we perceive as ourselves and our life is actually the result of our conscious, intelligent and knowledgeable decisions, and how much is the result of our automatic and unconscious response to the influences of economic, political and social ... Views: 1651
How We See Ourselves
Creative visualization is one of the most powerful tools we have available to us for successfully achieving any objective. It has the power to define our goal with the detail and intensity necessary to enlist the aid of our subconscious mind and thereby set into motion ... Views: 1296
Got Recognition?
It is surprising just how many people simply don't recognize their own successes. I know this sounds funny, but think about it, do you always acknowledge your accomplishments? And just how important is this? And what is it saying about us if we don't give ourselves our props? ... Views: 1535
Self Esteem
The level of self esteem that we take away from our early childhood influences will have a major impact on how much confidence we have or don't have in ourselves. But the impact those influences have on us are not set in stone, since they are set up as thought and behavior ... Views: 2672
The Basic Mindset
What do we mean by self confidence? What do we mean by success? We toss these words around and use them in our communications with each other as well as the thoughts in our own mind, but do we really understand what these concepts really mean? What does self confidence have ... Views: 1092
The Total Approach
The effectiveness of the self hypnosis techniques of the past was limited, while the newer techniques such as NLP and Ericksonian hypnotherapy seem to be much more powerful. When it comes to losing weight and keeping it off, self hypnosis is only one of the many tools out ... Views: 1467
The Basics
Though we had little control over the initial processes that established and configured our self esteem and self confidence simply because we were young and had not developed the knowledge and experiences necessary to defend and protect ourselves against outside influences, that is ... Views: 1690
Tools For Change
Our tools represent capability and therefore power. Personal development has an array of tools specially designed to work with the unique characteristics of Human behavior and here I look at three of the most effective and powerful of these tools, meditation, visualization ... Views: 1252
Hypnosis Weight Loss And Too Much Information
Over weight and obesity are a problem of epidemic proportions in the United States. So many people have been wrestling with this problem for so long, and there are so many real and not so real solutions going around, that it is all but impossible ... Views: 1184
The Two Edges Of Self Talk
It wasn't long ago that the idea of self talk carried the connotations of multiple personality disorder, but that view was the result of a lack of good information. The truth is that self talk has come a long way in recent years and is now considered a powerful ... Views: 1363
Testing Our Strength
Whether talking about one person or the citizens of an entire nation, occasionally events can test the strength of our confidence and let loose the corrosive power of doubt. How much damage we allow doubt to produce will depend a great deal on the sources of our ... Views: 1681
Invisible Forces
Many people today are not experiencing the quality and quantity of success in their lives that they would like and feel they deserve. Why are some people very successful and others seem to be unable to get beyond a certain level? Why is success easy for some, difficult for ... Views: 1111
The Sources Of Identity
When we talk about things like self image, what or who is this self that has this image? Is this self really us? Or is this self only the outside worlds idea of us that we bought into because at the time we had no idea of what was going on? How many of us ever stop and ... Views: 2061
The Sources Of Self Esteem
Our self esteem is determined by our basic self image and that image of ourselves is created by many sources of influence. Although that image is usually a done deal in the early years of our lives, it is by no means set in stone. Once we mature beyond the ... Views: 1873
Self Confidence And Self Esteem
Normally, something as basic as self confidence takes a while to develop, and even with the aid of self improvement tools like affirmations, meditation and hypnosis, it will not be a case of instant gratification which so many of us have come to expect these ... Views: 1101
The Textures Of Life
The Human species has raised self deception and denial to an art form, but how and maybe more importantly why? I can tell already that this will not be the easiest article I've ever written and probably won't be the easiest to read. But regardless of the perceived ... Views: 1752
The Challenge Of Self Discovery
The idea that we can live successfully without achieving a certain level of self awareness probably depends on what we think of as successful living. To me, successful living is not only about having material wealth, but also peace, happiness and spiritual well ... Views: 1184
What Do You Have Faith In?
Self confidence can be a transient experience that can depend on the balance between successes and failures or even our core beliefs about ourselves. For example; we may not believe that we deserve success, or that we are destined to be failures. But is there such a ... Views: 1226
A Ticket To La La Land
For decades I thought I knew what reality was, and in a way I did. Imagine my surprise when, years later after going on a long journey of developing my awareness, I discovered that I was not only clueless but a long time resident of La La Land and didn't even know who ... Views: 1628
Discipline Or Indoctrination
Many of us associate the terms self discipline with images ranging from a grocery list to managing a giant construction project to memories of Mom and Dad trying to get us to conform to the norms of society. But what is self discipline really? And how does it ... Views: 2212
Our Spiritual Journey Through The World Of Things
I am often asked how I can separate meditation from spirituality and the answer of course is that I can't and don't. We are spiritual adaptations of life who are currently in physical form, therefore anything we do is spiritual. We don't ... Views: 1252
Consciousness And Awareness
Our personalities are usually determined by our fears, courage, weakness and strengths, and those are states of mind, where did they come from? It is abundantly clear that these conditions are the result of outside influences and not the result of our natural state ... Views: 1270
The Human Factors
Success is as much about attitude as it is about skills. You can have all the skills in the world and still fail to achieve an objective. Setting goals, defining objectives and creating plans designed to achieve those objectives is essential of course, but really successful ... Views: 1624
Stress Anxiety And The Price We May Be Paying
It is critical for us to understand the relationship between the natural condition of stress and the unnatural condition of anxiety and how we manage them, because of the unseen price we pay. So many of us have accepted this situation as nothing ... Views: 972
Self Imposed Ignorance
The idea that there is a connection between the thoughts generated by our mind and the physical phenomenon we experience has never received much attention. Awareness of this particular reality carries too many potentially dangerous implications for those of us who have ... Views: 1155
Meditation Mindfulness and Mules
When it comes to meditation it is easy to get confused as to just what is going on and how to figure it out. Because feelings of frustration are the first emotions usually encountered by beginners, which is natural by the way, I thought a little clarification ... Views: 1151
The Ring That Rules Them All
Few of us understand the importance of time. We take it for granted, and once we take something for granted we no longer give it our attention, we no longer wonder about it and in so doing, we deny ourselves the deeper understanding necessary to take advantage of ... Views: 1156
The Ultimate Power Tool
Many people still don't realize that meditation is simply a high end tool used to achieve high end objectives. The fact that most of the worlds religions take advantage of this tool should be a testament to it's power. But for the most part, this tool's association ... Views: 1262
The Dysfunctional Landscape
It should be stated from the start that the obstacles mentioned in this article are those of a severe nature. I share the strategies and techniques for dealing with them because they are the same for minor dysfunctionality as they are for major train wrecks, the ... Views: 1619
The Swiss Army Knife Of Self Improvement?
Few of the tools available to us that are designed to help us bring about needed changes in our personality or even our basic spiritual makeup are as powerful and versatile as meditation. It could be said that this is the master key that can ... Views: 1462
The Power To Choose
We tend to over complicate our lives for reasons that we may or may not actually be aware of. We may be looking for excuses to justify some behavior that is itself based on some belief. But when it all gets said and done at the end of the day, the simple truths remain. We ... Views: 2163
The Failure Mindset
We all experience successes and failures during the course of normal creative activity, they are natural indicators of results. But the idea of failure can get out of control and become a complete mindset that begins to feed and perpetuate itself in ways that create ... Views: 1220
What We Don't Want To Know
Can it really be true that we don't live in the real world but rather a conceptual representation of the world? What do we even mean by the idea of living in the world? One of the most powerful realizations that meditation can reveal to us is the true nature of what ... Views: 1648
The Fear of Intuitive Perceptions
What if someone told you that there is a very good chance that you don't live in the real world perhaps 90% of the time, that we only directly experience life maybe 10% of the time? I remember that I laughed when I first encountered this idea. But even while ... Views: 1094
The No Win Scenario
Weight control and management, or any other problematic behavior pattern that adversely affect our lives, are sometimes difficult to overcome because they not only have established themselves over time and through the extremely powerful effects of conditioning, but also ... Views: 924
Power Lost?
These days the perception that we as individuals have little power over the quality and direction of our lives is common. As our society gets larger and larger our lives get more and more complicated, which is a kind of trickle down affect as a result of the fact that the ... Views: 1145
The Origins Of Self Confidence
If it is true that self confidence is a state of mind, then why do some people have it and some don't? Why don't we just think it and make it so? The answers to these questions have to do partly with chance and mostly with personal creative power. We can be ... Views: 1289
A Critical Piece Of The Puzzle
I normally don't recommend taking the fast and easy way to any achievement, especially in the area of self change and personal development. But skills like meditation and visualization and affirmations can take awhile to develop and perfect, and when it comes to ... Views: 1206
Caught In A Trap We Built
La La Land, an abstract conceptual version of reality that we built with one of our greatest powers for the purposes of helping us deal with the complexities of the material world. But in time, it began to control and consume more and more of our power until it now ... Views: 1047
What Are We Missing?
Why do diets work for some people and not others? Why do so many diets not work long term? Is it the diet plan or is it the person using the diet? If it is the person using the diet, what is the problem and what can we do about it? The answer to this is that we are the ... Views: 1473
Reality? What Reality?
Meditation can be a double edged tool. It can reveal the nature of actual reality, but in doing so it also reveals many other states of consciousness that we experience as real but are not usually aware of their true nature, depending on our present level of awareness. ... Views: 1023
The Insight
The popularity of meditation rises and falls according to the levels of fear, insecurity and uncertainty experienced by any given Human population. But meditation is not like many other disciplines that are less difficult to master, and what makes it so difficult is found in the ... Views: 1238
Strange Reluctance
This article explores the serious subject of our species strange reluctance to wake up and become aware of the world as it truly is. The purpose of course is always the achievement of greater awareness and a higher level of consciousness concerning the true nature of ... Views: 1067
Is It Real?
We explore the frontiers of land, sea, space, the relative universe and the quantum universe, but only a relative few ever think of exploring the mind, and many of them are limited by a specific agenda. Why do we not expend large amounts of resources to explore the most important ... Views: 1047
The Practical Side Of Self Improvement
From changing our core beliefs and fundamental mindsets using techniques like meditation, yoga, self hypnosis and others, to simply fine tuning and sharpening existing success skills, self improvement is not only about improving our lives, but our world ... Views: 3156
The Nature Of Power
The idea that the source and foundation of all things is energy, is not new. Even the idea that objects of reality are basically varying vibrations of energy is not new. But without the idea, does anything exist? And if ideas are created from thought and thought is an ... Views: 960
Going Backwards To Go Forwards
Have you ever encountered one of those people who seem to be happy and peaceful all the time and who seem to be successful at everything they try? Have you ever wondered just how this is possible when so many others struggle so hard to achieve even a little ... Views: 1307
The Foundations Of Success
Self confidence is a key element of success. Self esteem is a key element of self confidence. Both of these are either directly or indirectly dependent on how we perceive ourselves. So, how we perceive ourselves is a critical area of concern if we are having ... Views: 1227
The Origins Of Behavior
When it comes to weight problems, there is a lot of good information and many good strategies out there to help. But these are mostly diet plans and many of those don't address the underlying dynamics of the processes of beliefs, mindsets, perceptions, self image and ... Views: 1186
A Consciousness Of Mind
When we talk about a well disciplined and managed mind, what are we really talking about? Do we mean the tightly controlled and narrowly confined mind of the person consumed by fear? Or are we talking about a mind under the direction of a strong will being applied by ... Views: 2195