Mental Diet: The 14 Great Habits (9)

THE HABIT OF SLOWING DOWN AND ENJOYING THE JOURNEY

Life is a journey rather than a destination and to make the most out of life we must slow down and enjoy the journey. We should enjoy our sleeping and waking moments; we should take time and enjoy our meals; our families; our life’s work; and the people that we meet along the pathway of life; we should take some time and smell the roses and view the beauty of nature.

 Most of life is routine and we should learn to enjoy the simple things as well as the great things and build up memories around them. Too many people hurry through life without experiencing the thrills of the moment. We need to have dreams and goals to accomplish; however, we need to enjoy the journey toward fulfilling our dreams and realizing our goals.

We cannot get caught up or so focused on a project or a goal that we miss out on the excitement of the journey. The fact is, after reaching a goal there will be other more goals to reach; after conquering a mountain, there will be other mountains to conquer because humans were designed for growth and for self-expression therefore, the excitement is really in the journey to the finish line.

On the other hand, many people who are always in a hurry have left wisdom behind; they are very busy but not effective. Many people just get busy with activities without really knowing what they want in life; they have no plans, no real goals, or at most they have vague dreams for their lives.

People who take up more commitments than they can effectively handle tend to hurry. I believe one of the most important words we need to say is NO. We must say NO to any commitment that is not really in line with our goals and which will overwhelm us in order to say YES to the most important things in life.

People who are in the habit of putting things off until the eleventh hour also lead hurried lives. When we hurry through life, we become stressed out which leads to a burn-out. People who hurry through life are strangers to peace of mind.

Slow down, enjoy, and appreciate the people in your life. We have one life to live, and we will never pass through this path again. Therefore, we need to live amazed.

THE CONFIDENCE HABIT

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness that frightens us.

We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?

Actually, who are we not to be?

You are a child of God.

Your playing small doesn’t serve the world.

There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.

It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fears,

Our presence automatically liberates others.^”

-A RETURN TO LOVE BY MARIANNE WILLIAMSON

(as quoted by Nelson Mandela in his inaugural speech, 1994)

Confidence is the belief in your capability and ability that produces superior performance. Confidence begins inwardly from your belief system and manifests outwardly in your behavior or performance.

Confidence is inner stability and calmness of the assurance of the best possible outcome.

Confidence should be rooted in the Divinity within us which empowers us to be everything we were created to be; and do everything we were created to do in order to have everything we were created to have.

Our Creator made us in His image and likeness and He has stamped His seal of approval on us, giving us the license to approve of our lives and be validated from within.

We have been fashioned for greatness and designed to lead extraordinary lives. Knowing this, we can face life boldly with a deep conviction in our hearts that despite the circumstances of life; irrespective of people’s opinion of us and no matter who loves us or does not love us, we can create the ideal life of our dreams because Divinity is for us; in us; with us; working in and through us, making our lives into a masterpiece. Therefore, on this foundation, we can build and develop the confidence habit. 

We can act confidently even when we do not feel confident and eventually our feelings will come into alignment.

Remember, we should not allow our feelings to toss us to and fro but rather we should be controlled by right-believing which produces the right behavior or performance and consequently the right conditions of life.

The language of the confident is “I Can”; “I Will”. Meditate on this: “I have strength for all things in Christ Who empowers me (I am ready for anything and equal to anything through Him who infuses inner strength into me; I am self-sufficient in Christ’s sufficiency)”

 –SAINT PAUL.

Therefore, boldly declare: I can do whatever I need to do in life through Christ. Say it several times as you go through each day. Let it become your consciousness; inscribe it in your heart.

 The best prescription for eliminating self-doubt and gaining confidence is to believe that God is in you and with you, guiding and helping you in whatever you set your mind to do.

Become God-conscious rather than fear-conscious. Affirm; visualize and believe that you are in partnership with God and that you and God are an unbeatable team.

Saturate your mind with confident thoughts and thoughts of positive expectancy.

“What we think and believe; we create. We can concentrate on our work. Hence, if we would always hold the ideal suggestion of everything in life-the ideal suggestion of health, the ideal suggestion of ability, the ideal suggestion regarding our career, our success, our happiness, the ideal suggestion of our destiny-it would transform our lives. It would lift us from the common to the uncommon. It would make us artists in life instead of mere artisans”.

–ORISON MARDEN

There can never be any accomplishment in any frontier of life without confidence. You can’t outperform that which your self-confidence dictates.

Therefore, you need to face your fear, and never flee from your fear. Act as if you can’t fail and you will be amazed you won’t.  

After Napoleon’s first exile, when the French Army was sent out to get him, he didn’t go into hiding rather he marched forward boldly to meet them. Napoleon acted as if he expected the army to take commands from him and amazingly the soldiers retreated.

The motto of Stonewall Jackson states beautifully, “Never take counsel of your fears”. Someone once said, “Do the thing you dread and the death of fear is certain”.

Associate with confident people and those who believe in you. Eagles do not dine with chickens. Therefore, if you want to soar to the peak of your destiny, you must quit hanging out with the naysayers; the put-downers; the negative,, and people of low aim.

Mind your business; keep busy on your life’s purpose or goals, until you have no time to stop to think if you will succeed or not.

When you are busy organizing for success, failure has no place in your life because you become success-conscious and it is the success-consciousness that attracts success.

Never give room to self-doubt. Therefore, dress up; stand up up; Look up; move up, and brace up with confidence today and every day.