Photo by stop.down

Is stress driving you round the bend? Do you feel something has to give in your life? There is a simple remedy: Silence
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Check out your soundscape at the moment. What do you hear?

I bet it’s not waves lapping at the shore, or a dawn chorus! It’s more likely to be traffic noise, or music, or the neighbors TV, or a distant police siren, or voices in the street - especially if you live in a big city.

What I remember most about my one visit to New York was the fact that I could always hear a siren somewhere in the distance. There was always the sound of an ambulance racing to hospital or police rushing to a disaster. This leads to noise stress.

Some of the noises we are subjected too are unavoidable. But maybe you choose to be in a noisy environment? Let me ask you some questions: Do you play music a lot of the time? Do you leave the TV playing whilst you do other tasks? If so, you are adding to noise stress.

Our central nervous system responds to each sound. In response, hormones course through our body, our heart-rate rises or falls, our blood pressure changes.

Some sounds are so calming, they act as lullabies. Imagine camping near a stream in the wilds. You can hear the soft wind in trees, a brook tinkling nearby, the evening song of birds: your mind expands and your body relaxes. Even just imagining such sounds can make you feel more relaxed. But ad to the mix the crunch of steps closing in, or the roar of a tiger and your body immediately responds with high alert!

Sounds are outer noise. But there is also inner noise.

Take a moment to observe what thoughts are rushing though your mind. Most likely you’ll notice a jumble of thoughts. Some may be worries,  “Oh, what’ll happen if …” Others may be plans, “I must ring her and let her know…” And then there are random thoughts, memories, flashes of insight, melody jingles, images - rather like a crazy warehouse stuffed to the roof.
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Particularly pesky are the planning thoughts. The more stressed we are, the more often they appear in our brain. Mostly because we are worried about forgetting them. A good way to deal with them is to write them down.

Other sticky thoughts are ones that are fuelled by intense emotion, such as anger, jealousy, or fear. The underlying emotion triggers the particular thought again and again. One way to deal with that is to pinpoint and mention the relevant emotion.

Another way to deal with pressing thoughts is to do a full-on workout.  Try a run, a yoga class, martial arts training, an aerobics workout.

A great way to create space and silence in your mind is to meditate. If you aren’t sure to meditate, check out my article How to Start Meditating: 10 Important Tips.

They key to peacefulness is to let go of  both outer and inner noise to eliminate stress.

If you want to simplify your life and reduce stress, try silence.

Here are some suggestions that will help you reduce stress:

1. Eliminate background music. Only play music if you are going to listen to it with full attention.
2. Turn the TV off if you are not watching it.
3. Sleep with earplugs if your street is noisy
4. Clear your mind with daily exercise
5. Meditate daily for at least 10 minutes.
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What’s your suggestion on how to manage stress?

Photo by Sklathill

How often have you heard, ‘Fake it till you make it’? It’s recommended behaviour. We’re supposed to pretend until we are the real thing.

I recently was at a conference and listened to a motivational speaker. He told people how happy he was, how successful he was. He boasted of his Porsche, his million dollar mansion, and hauled his young, blond wife on stage to show her off as one of his trophies. The audience was ecstatic. All except me, that is.

Because my teeth were on edge and all I could think of was, “Fake, fake, fake!” I could see the whole thing for what it was: a class act. It wasn’t real. This was not a happy man, not a kind man. I could feel that deep down he was troubled, angry, and deceitful.

What about caring for others? Is it acceptable to fake kindness, or love?

Seth Godin, a well-known blogger suggests that ‘pretending you care’ is an acceptable alternative to showing that you don’t. Is it really?

He goes on to say: If people start out pretending to care, next thing you know, they actually do care. They like the positive feedback and they like the way being kind makes them feel. It spreads. It sticks.

That’s the theory of  ‘fake it ‘til you make it’: at first you pretend, and then it turns into the real thing.
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Putting on a happy face
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The Huffington Post recently interviewed social psychologist Fred B. Bryant:

Putting on a happy face–even if you don’t feel like it–actually induces greater happiness, says Bryant. So be exuberant. Don’t just eat the best peach of the season–luxuriate in every lip-smacking mouthful. Laugh aloud at the movies. Smile at yourself in the mirror.

I’m sure we’ve all met people like that. You ask them, “How are you?” and they bare their teeth in a fake smile and say, “I’m fine!”

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Affirmations

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Have you ever tried affirmations? They’re another way of ‘faking it ‘til you make it’.  People trying to slim down, look in the mirror and say to themselves, ‘I’m slim and beautiful!’, even though they can see the bulges and sags. We are lying to ourselves and there is a wise part within that knows a lie when it hears one.

We are trying to brainwash ourselves.

(Having said that, there are ways of using affirmations that don’t go down the road of ‘fake it ‘til you make it’. That’s if we focus on the inner knowledge that we have everything that we need for success.)

Dr Annie Kaszina  states:

Before very long, “faking it” has created a new, authentic experience of your desired state.

Does faking it create an ‘authentic’ experience?

Does pretending to be kind lead to kindness?

Does pretending to be happy lead to happiness?

Does pretending to care lead to love?

Let’s be clear about ‘faking it ‘til you make it’:

Faking is lying

My question is:

What happens to your soul in the process?

We lose integrity. Integrity means that and ‘inside’ and  ‘outside’ is congruent. We instinctively trust people of integrity. Because we know in our heart of hearts that they are not faking it. That they are worthy of our trust.

Don’t bother to try and be the best fake you can be.

Focus on authentic experience and leave faking to the con artists.

Be real.

What do you think about ‘fake it ’til you make it’?

Photo by wit>

Do you sometimes wonder what the purpose of life is? If you are not sure, you may be looking at life the wrong way. You may have a view of life as a path. But, there is another way to see life. Read on to find out what that way is.

Let’s first take a look at the conventional way to understand life as a path. Do you see your life as a path? That’s an image that is often used in the realm of spirituality personal growth. I’m guilty of it myself.

This implies that we are struggling towards a pinnacle. We overcome hardship and climb up and up towards…well, towards what, exactly? In the spiritual realm we might say that we climb towards enlightenment, wisdom, awakening, or…what? In the realm of personal growth we might imagine that we are climbing towards, success, wealth,  personal fulfillment, or …what?

We are pulled through life by promises like a donkey by carrots. We  are always moving towards that pinnacle. First we go to kindergarten and then we look forward to primary school. We are told how wonderful it will be when we finally go to college. And then to university. Finally, as good citizens we embark on a career, a relationship, maybe a family. It seems that we are at last approaching the pinnacle of our life. (One of our readers, Jonathan Meads, sent me a funny and enlightening cartoon clip that illustrates this. Do have a look at it here.)

What pinnacle? More often than not, the pinnacle turns out to be redundancy, or illness. And then - one day the sun goes behind a cloud - and we die. Just like that.

Now, tell me again - where was that pinnacle? Did I miss it?

The strange thing is that for a long time the pinnacle seems to be in the future. Just out of reach. Then, from one moment to the next, it seems to be in the past. You’re suddenly beyond it. You’re a ‘has-been’. And you can’t quite remember what the pinnacle should have been. All you know is that you’ve missed it.

That’s pretty depressing, isn’t it? But, stop! What if life isn’t a path?

What if life is a dot?

Yes, I said dot.

A dot doesn’t have dimension. There is no before and after. The dot is now. This moment. Now.

What if this moment right now is the pinnacle of our life? What if each moment is the pinnacle? That is, if we actually live it and don’t miss it through dreaming of the future.

What if the smell of fresh ground coffee is the pinnacle? What if the hug at the door as you go to work is the pinnacle?

It would change things, wouldn’t it?

We would focus on what we enjoy, and not on moving up in our career. We would surf more, and dance more, and sing more, and laugh more, and love more, and hug more.

We would feel the wind in our hair. We would watch the moon rise. We would bask in the sun. We would roll in the mud. We would play in the surf.

We would kick up our heels and feel free. Free to be a bit wild. Even zany. We would live with abandon.

We would enjoy that dot. The dot that is life.

Let’s have a conversation:

What do you think? How is your life? Are you on a path or on a dot?

Second photo by Jeff Kubina