Author: cbarney.45

“Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love.” – Buddha

We’ve all heard the saying, “two wrongs don’t make a right.” We all know that this is true too, but we often try to get back at the other person. But why? If you wrong someone after they have wronged you, you are only prolonging negativity in your life. They hold a grudge against you, or vice versa. Until someone becomes the “bigger man (or woman),” there will always be a resentment and distrust of that other person.

To live your best life, you have to remove negativity from it. Being mean, spiteful, or hating others never brings happiness back to you. Hatred is never ceased by hatred. The only thing that can overcome hatred is love. Treat others with loving kindness and they will be more likely to reciprocate. Even if they don’t, don’t hold a grudge against them. That’s their prerogative. Let it roll off your shoulders and always be willing to be the bigger person.

To build a habit that will stick, make sure that you start small and do it every single day (preferably at the same time, and in the same environment). Do not wait for motivation to do whatever it is that you’re trying to do (work out, read more, etc). If you only do it when you feel like doing it, chances are that it won’t get done.

Associate your new habits with pleasure. When it starts hurting, then stop. But keep coming back to the habit the next day, doing at least the minimum of what you set out to do.

You can also “stack” your habits (from James Clear) where you are adding the new habit to an existing (similar) habit that you have in place. Since you already are doing the existing habit, it won’t be as hard for you to add a new one because you don’t need another trigger.

Sometimes we fail. Sometimes we succeed. But what I’ve found is that I learn just as much, if not more, from failures as I do from successes. Each outcome that we encounter in life can teach us something – we just have to have to look for it.

Having “good” or “bad” days is all relative. You can’t have one without the other. It’s hard to appreciate the good days without the bad, because eventually we begin to take it for granted. How often do you think of how you’re feeling physically? Probably not very often if you aren’t in pain or sick. But when you are sick, you realize how good you had it.

The same can be said for successes and failures. If you only ever succeeded, it would be hard to appreciate. But if you’ve had to grind your way towards success – getting up early, staying up late, working tirelessly on a project, getting knocked down – and then, after all of your efforts, you finally succeed? There’s not much that feels better than that.

As Ellen DeGeneres says in the quote above, there will be times when we succeed and times when we fail, and both are equally important. Embrace failures. Don’t run from them. Have a positive outlook that this too shall pass, and when it does, you’ll be better for it.

“Every man dies. Not every man truly lives.” – William Wallace

Don’t just go through the motions. Life is too short to not enjoy it. Everyone experiences ups and downs – that’s part of life. But take a step back and assess your life if you feel like you’ve have too many “down days” in a row.

Life is meant to be enjoyed. If you’re not having fun, you need to change something…is it as easy as changing your mindset or attitude? Changing your surroundings or who you hang out with? Changing what you eat, how you exercise, or what you read? Do you need to change your job?

What are your interests (you should have many) and what is your passion (you should have one or two)? Do you get to pursue these often? Make time to do what brings you joy and make sure that you’re one of the lucky few who really get to live.

When you learn a tactic, you know one way of doing something. But when you understand a principle (the overall strategy), you understand that several tactics can be applied to achieve the desired result.

Tactics are how you do something. They are techniques used to get the job done. Strategy is why you’re doing something. Strategy is looking at the big picture. You need both to get to where you want to be, but it is important to not focus too heavily on one over the other. Only using one tactic when others would serve you better would be foolish. You need to look at the overall strategy to determine which is the best tactic to be used at a certain time. At the same time, spending too much time on strategy (planning) isn’t going to get the job done. At some point the plan has to be put into action.

Work on understanding all aspects of what you’re focusing on. You should work to know the what’s, how’s, and why’s of a subject and you will be able to plan and act accordingly.