growth | The Caleb Barney Collection

Gratitude versus envy

“It’s a funny thing about life…once you begin to take note of the things you are grateful for, you begin to lose sight of the things that you lack.” – Germany Kent

Many of us live a life of over abundance. We are surrounded with a surplus of food and drink to keep us from feeling hunger, of toys and games to keep us from being bored, etc. But because we are constantly surrounded by more and more things (we can’t even get away from it on social media), our focus often shifts from being grateful for what we have to always comparing our lives to others and wanting more. If we focus on what we lack, we will never have enough. But if we focus on being grateful for what we have, envy, jealousy, and desire will have less control over us.

Worry, fear, and anxiety

Worrying is like a rocking chair. It will give you something to do, but it won’t get you anywhere.

“Worry won’t get you to where you want to go. Action is the only way…”

To me, the only potential benefit to worrying is that it might help you think of ways that things might go sideways, allowing you to plan your next move ahead of it. But if you just get good at thinking of all the angles ahead of time, putting a contingency plan in place, and then still take action, you’ll be better off.

Where people get in trouble is when they let their worries, fears, and anxiety take over. When they overthink a situation, it’s almost like they’re in quicksand and can’t move. But if they realize that many of their worries will never actually come to fruition, they’ll be better off.

Another way to think about fear is this…what do I really fear about this situation? In a worst case scenario, what is going to happen? Maybe someone will tell you no or you’ll be embarrassed. Well, get used to it. All successful people have been told “no” a lot in their lives. All successful people have had to take a chance (and often fail) to get to where they are.

Worrying is like a rocking chair. It will give you something to do (there’s always something we can be worried about), but it doesn’t get you anywhere.

How to stay healthy: 10 things to focus on everyday for your healthiest life.

How do you stay healthy?

1. Stay adequately hydrated. This will help you feel more alert and awake, it will help your body feel better (and more your joints lubricated), and it will help your kidneys.

2. Eat a healthy diet (varied color and type of fruits and vegetables each day; different protein sources each day). The cleaner you eat, the better you feel. Aim for a good variety so you aren’t missing any key nutrients. Take a multivitamin as a true supplement (it’s meant to add to your dietary success, not to be your dietary success).

3. Live a healthy lifestyle (minimize sitting; do meaningful exercise at least 30-minutes per day…do something physically and mentally challenging every day). Be outside – get some sunshine (vitamin D).

4. Maximize quality sleep. A high quantity of sleep can be helpful, but why sleep more than you need to? At that point you’re literally sleeping away time in your day, and time is the most important and scarce non-renewable resource we have. Focus on getting just the right amount of good sleep.

5. Interact with someone you care about each day AND treat them well. Be generous. It will help you mentally and make others feel good too.

6. Forgive yourself and don’t sweat the small stuff. In the grand scheme of life, it probably doesn’t really matter.

7. Be interested/learn something new every day. When you stop growing or getting excited to learn, you slowly start dying and becoming less interested.

8. Be involved with a good church (or other positive community). See, talk with, and interact with positive people in a positive environment often.

9. Spend less than you earn. Automatically set aside money to “pay yourself first” and invest. This will help you feel less financial stress and allow for you to spend on things you actually care about.

10. Have long-term goals. You should always be striving to improve yourself.

On hiring others and getting out of the way

“The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good people to do what he wants done, and self restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.” – Theodore Roosevelt

Delegate them get out of the way! Don’t micromanage! You hired them because they are smart, qualified, and the right person for the job, right?

Once you’ve trained them and have the systems and processes in place for them to succeed, let them do it. There will be bumps in the road and nobody is perfect, but if you let them learn without catastrophic consequences, they’ll be better off for it and you will too.

Train your mind to be stronger than your emotions

It doesn’t matter how much you want something, if you don’t train your mind to be stronger than your emotions, you’ll constantly be taking one step forward and two steps back.

Think about wanting to get in the best physical shape of your life. First, you need to set a SMART goal. Then, you need to figure out why that goal is important to you. After that, you need to put a plan in place to achieve your goal. During the planning period, you may be doing research to complete the perfect plan (which doesn’t exist), but that should not stop you from getting started (done is better than perfect). Lastly, you need to find an accountability partner who makes sure you are actively and consistently working towards your goal.

If you let your emotions take over (especially your negative emotions), you’ll find an excuse to not do what you know you need to be doing! It feels better (at the time) to stay in your warm, comfy bed and sleep in. It feels better (at the time) to eat another serving or to have dessert or to have a bedtime snack. It feels better to sit on the couch and watch tv or scroll on Instagram. For every short-term pleasure, there is a long-term consequence. And if you really want to achieve your goals, you have to train your mind to be stronger than your emotions (and just doing what feels good in the moment).

So what’s more important to you? A little extra sleep? Or getting up, keeping that promise to yourself, and striving towards your goals?

Trust me, in the end, you will feel so much better about yourself knowing that you set a difficult goal and you achieved it. You persisted through the ups and downs. It was simple, but it wasn’t easy, and not many people are willing to do what you do to get what you want.

Train your mind. If you listen to your emotions, listen to the positive ones that are pushing you towards your goals. Use those! But steel your mind. Make it so strong that your negative emotions cannot overcome you when you put your mind to something.