Provocative Life-Changing Thoughts

For 30 years I’ve been a “student of life,” writing on the subject of helping people achieve wealth, good health, and happiness. Below is a summary of some of my thoughts and the thoughts of others whose thinking I greatly respect. Hopefully, in some way, these thoughts can impact and enrich your life! Enjoy!

Change

• Change is the one constant in all our lives that we can affect, the one variable any of us can choose to embrace or be embraced by as we grow through life, and changes for tomorrow must begin today. In order to affect such changes, you must first make a conscious decision to accept complete responsibility for your thoughts, feelings and actions as a means for mentally asserting control over your life; this is not only the key, this is where it all begins.

Success

• Success is like climbing a ladder, as long as you are taking steps and keep an eye on where you are going, you will eventually reach the top. Continue to visualize.

• Broadening your horizons through exposure to new and better ways of thinking and acting expands the power of your mind. No one other than yourself can instill this desire of heart or motivate you to go about changing the way you think. The best anyone can do is inspire you to action by introducing you to alternative and optimistic ideas and concepts in an attempt to help rise your standards and move beyond self-imposed limitations.

• It doesn’t matter where you have been, it is where you are now and the direction in which you are heading.

• The extent to which we realize our potential and succeed in life depends on how willing we are to tread in unfamiliar waters and how open we are to learning from our mistakes and failures.

• Perceived limitations only exist in the confines of one’s mind. All other limitations are unknown until tested.

• Worry alone tends to accomplish little more than waste energy and diminish productivity.

• Each person is a master of self-prophesy and tends to live up or down to his or her personal opinions and perceptions.

• It is amazing what you can accomplish when you don’t know you can’t do it.

• Being a subjective emotion, anger can be managed by choice; how far we allow it to infect and control our thinking processes can come down to a conscious, personal decision.

On Being Happy

• There are those who pass through life thirsting for personal happiness and inner fulfillment. It is unfortunate that we tend to look outwardly and to others for inner fulfillment, when inner fulfillment can be found in each of our hearts.

• If you are going to enjoy life, and by all rights you should, discover yourself first and be content with who you are. One cannot be happy or interact well with others if he or she is not on very good terms with himself or herself. You have to love and respect yourself before you can do the same with others.

• Both the problem and saving grace of self-perception is, whether filled with hate or hope, rejection or acceptance, one’s personality, success, and overall quality of life will inevitably reflect this vision. If you are disappointed by what you see in yourself, elevate your personal perspective and watch the effect ripple through all aspects of your life.

On Making the Most of Who You Are

• We can be our own coach and team, yet we often sideline our best efforts. We all have unique gifts and talents, yet many pass undiscovered. The world is full of opportunities, yet our view of life can blind us to them. We are all capable of such much, yet limited by so little.

• No heart is so carved in stone it is forever inflexible, so lost in darkness it is incapable of seeing light, or so damaged it will never again flourish. But a heart cannot change or improve independent of the mind. One must be consciously open to new and different perspectives, ideas, and approaches, and be willing to accept them as worthwhile. One must believe in, and accept, personal change as a genuine and viable possibility. And one must release enough emotional barriers, with the key of reason and positive reinforcement, to allow one to embrace and utilize change.

Overcoming Loss And Adversity

• Difficult times are sometimes necessary, for they are a yardstick by which we measure how good life can be.

On Appreciating And Enjoying The Gift Of Life

• There is only one chance to enjoy the gift of life; there are no second chances, no do-overs. Each day that passes will never come again. Live it or lose it.

• It is easy to reach a point where the aggravations of daily life seem burdensome and unfair. It is also easy to lose sight of the fact that others dream of the life you find burdensome and unfair. If you still don’t appreciate what you have, visit the terminally ill ward of a hospital. Count your blessings and make the best of every situation. Things could always be worse.

On Growing Older & The Passage of Time

• We may not have a lot of choice in when or how we die, but we can daily decide the way in which we live. Unfortunately, this truth is never more apparent than when death is imminent. But then again, death is always imminent; we are terminally ill, infected by biological processes and the passage of time. Yet, ironically, time is the only window of opportunity afforded us, the one allowance we can choose to use or lose. Appreciate life for what it is: a gift from above!

On Relating to Others

• Don’t judge a person on the opinions of others. Many people judge others’ behaviors based on the fears and biased observations of others. When you judge people without getting to know them, you may deprive yourself of a potential friend and a person who could enrich your life.

• The way we live and those with whom we associate are better reflections of our inner essence than we may know or care to admit.

• Don’t expect to be heard if you are not listening.

On Inner Beauty

• The only true way to raise the standards by which others perceive you and how you perceive yourself is how good you feel about yourself.

• Some of the poorest and most deprived hearts and souls belong to those who have little compassion for their fellow men.