Am I a psychopath? Is anyone I know a psychopath?
July 5, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Answer: Watch this video by Kevin Dutton, expert psychopath researcher, to help you find out:
Kevin Dutton on The Wisdom of Psychopaths
Films to pick you up when you’re feeling discouraged
June 26, 2013 by Leave a Comment
1. It’s a Wonderful Life
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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It’s a Wonderful Life is a 1946 American Christmas drama film produced and directed by Frank Capra, based on the short story “The Greatest Gift“, which Philip Van Doren Stern wrote in 1939 and privately published in 1945.[3] The film is considered one of the most loved films in American cinema and has become traditional viewing during the Christmas season…
The film stars James Stewart as George Bailey, a man who has given up his dreams in order to help others and whose imminent suicide on Christmas Eve brings about the intervention of his guardian angel, Clarence Odbody (Henry Travers). Clarence shows George all the lives he has touched and how different life in his community of Bedford Falls would be had he never been born.
Despite initially performing poorly at the box office due to high production costs and stiff competition at the time of its release, the film has come to be regarded as a classic and is a staple of Christmas television around the world.[4]
The film was nominated for five Oscars and has been recognized by the American Film Institute as one of the 100 best American films ever made,[6] placing number 11 on its initial 1998 greatest movie list, and would also place number one on its list of the most inspirational American films of all time.[7]
Check your critic’s credibility before you accept their damning criticism
June 26, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Some wise words from David Burns (author of multi-million copy, best-selling book Feeling Good) on dealing with other people’s judgements of us, good or bad:
Let’s consider your belief that it would be terrible if someone disapproved of you. Why does disapproval pose such a threat?. . .Suppose you were visiting the psychiatric ward of a hospital. A confused, hallucinating patient approaches you and says,
“You are wonderful. I had a vision from God. He told me the thirteenth person to walk through the door would be the Special Messenger. You are the thirteenth, so I know you are God’s Chosen One, the Prince of Peace, the Holy of Holies. Let me kiss your shoe.”
Would this extreme approval elevate your mood? You’d probably feel nervous and uncomfortable. That’s because you don’t believe what the patient is saying is valid. You discredit the comments. It is only your beliefs about yourself that can affect the way you feel. Others can say or think whatever they want about you, good or bad, but only your thoughts will influence your emotions.
. . .Imagine that you made a second visit to the psychiatric hospital ward. This time a different hallucinating patient approaches you and says,
“You’re wearing a red shirt. This shows you are the Devil! You are evil”
Would you feel bad because of this criticism and disapproval? Of course not. Why would these disapproving words not upset you? It’s simple–because you don’t believe that the statements are true. You must “buy into” the other person’s criticism–and believe that you are in fact no good–in order to feel bad about yourself.
Did it ever occur to you that if someone disapproves of you, it might be his or her problem? Disapproval often reflects other people’s irrational beliefs.
(from Feeling Good:The New Mood Therapy by David D. Burns, p 291-2)
Watch Elizabeth Gilbert’s Your Elusive Creative Genius when you’re feeling discouraged by your lack of progress
June 22, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Elizabeth Gilbert’s TED talk Your Elusive Creative Genius is one of TED’s all-time favourite talks and has been watched by millions. Elizabeth Gilbert explains that creating something good is hard and we mustn’t torture ourselves too much in the process. Our job is just to show up every day and do our best. That’s all we can do. The rest is up to forces outside our control.
It’s a powerful message that speaks to everyone who’s trying to do something really difficult.
“Don’t be daunted. Just do your job. Continue to show up for your piece of it, whatever that might be. If your job is to dance, do your dance. If the divine, cockeyed genius assigned to your case decides to let some sort of wonderment be glimpsed, for just one moment through your efforts, then ‘Ole!’ And if not, do your dance anyhow. And ‘Ole!’ to you, nonetheless. I believe this and I feel that we must teach it. ‘Ole!’ to you, nonetheless,just for having the sheer human love and stubbornness to keep showing up.” ~ Elizabeth Gilbert
Quotes offering encouragement when it all feels too hard
June 21, 2013 by Leave a Comment
- Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed no hope at all. Dale Carnegie
- Great works are performed, not by strength, but by perseverance. Samuel Johnson
- It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop. Confucius
- You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it. Margaret Thatcher
- Dreams don’t work unless you do. John C. Maxwell
- Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. Thomas Watson
- It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. Theodore Roosevelt
- Challenges are what make life interesting. Overcoming them is what makes life meaningful. Joshua J. Marine
- Most people never run far enough on the first wind to find out they’ve got a second. Give your dreams all you’ve got, and you’ll be amazed at the energy that comes out of you. William James
- Don’t tell me how talented you are. Tell me how hard you work. Arthur Rubenstein
- If you shoot for the stars and hit the moon, it’s OK. But you’ve got to shoot for something. A lot of people don’t even shoot. Confucius
- When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps. Confucius
- Before the beginning of brilliance, there must be great chaos. Before a brilliant person begins something great, they must look foolish in the crowd. from I Ching written by Fu Hsi
- There has to be this pioneer, the individual with the courage, the ambition to overcome the obstacles that always develop when one tries to do something worthwhile that is new and different. Alfred P. Sloan
- When the world says, ‘Give up,’ Hope whispers, ‘Try one more time.’ Unknown
- It’s kind of fun to do the impossible. Walt Disney
- Every accomplishment starts with the decision to try. Unknown
- Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success. Napoleon Hill
- How you think when you lose determines how long it will be until you win. Gilbert Keith Chesterton
- You can achieve anything you want in life if you have the courage to dream it, the intelligence to make a realistic plan, and the will to see that plan through to the end. Sidney A. Friedman
- Security is not the meaning of my life. Great opportunities are worth the risk. Shirley Hurstedler
- The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make a mistake. Elbert Hubbard
- Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could … Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense. Ralph Waldo Emerson
- He who wrestles with us, strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skills. Our antagonist is our helper. Edmund Burke
- Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm. Winston Churchill
- Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you did not do than by the ones you did. Mark Twain
- The problem human beings face is not that we aim too high and fail, but that we aim too low and succeed. Michelangelo
- What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task. Viktor E. Frankl
- We find comfort among those who agree with us, and growth among those who don’t. Frank A. Clark
- No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking. Voltaire
- Only he who attempts the absurd is capable of achieving the impossible. Miguel Unamuno
- We must get our hearts broken sometimes. This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something. Elizabeth Gilbert
- The only true failure lies in the failure to start. Harold Blake Walker
- Vision is not enough. It must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps; we must also step up the stairs. Vaclac Havel
- A genius! For 37 years I’ve practiced fourteen hours a day, and now they call me a genius! Pablo Sarasate
- It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer. Albert Einstein
- To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. Unknown
- Things don’t go wrong and break your heart so you can become bitter and give up. They happen to break you down and build you up so you can be all that you were intended to be. Samuel Johnson
- Failure is success if we learn from it. Malcolm Forbes
- A great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do. Walter Gagehot
- History has demonstrated that the most notable winners usually encountered heart-breaking obstacles before they triumphed. They won because they refused to become discouraged by their defeats. B.C. Forbes
- Don’t worry about failure. Worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try. Sherman Finesilver
- Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up. Thomas Edison
- It takes 20 years to make an overnight success. Eddie Cantor
- Unless you’re willing to have a go, fail miserably, and have another go, success won’t happen. Phillip Adams
- The worst bankrupt in the world is the man who has lost his enthusiasm. Let a man lose everything else in the world but his enthusiasm and he will come through again to success. H.W. Arnold
- What you get by reaching your destination is not nearly as important as what you will become by reaching your destination. Unknown
- There are three musts that hold us back: I must do well. You must treat me well. And the world must be easy. Albert Ellis
- Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So. . .sail away from the safe harbor. Explore. Dream. Discover. Mark Twain
- We should open ourselves to the impossible and embrace a psychology of possibility. Ellen Langer
- There is always a step small enough from where we are to get us to where we want to be. If we take that small step, there’s always another we can take, and eventually a goal thought to be too far to reach becomes achievable. Ellen Langer
- Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of being. John Wooden
- Nothing will work unless you do. John Wooden
- At God’s footstool to confess,
A poor soul knelt and bowed his head.
“I failed,” he cried. The Master said,
“Thou didst thy best, that is success.” Unknown, but quoted by John Wooden - There isn’t a person anywhere who isn’t capable of doing more than he thinks he can. Henry Ford
- This is hard. This is fun. Carol Dweck summing up the Growth MindsetIf you don’t give anything, don’t expect anything. Success is not coming to you, you must come to it. Marva Collins
Songs to encourage when we feel discouraged
June 21, 2013 by Leave a Comment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoZP9vp2rTc
And if you substitute the word “grief” for “greed”, this song may work:
Prepare to fail on the way
June 21, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Prepare to fail on route to where we want to go
wise words from Chip and Dan Heath’s book Switch:
At different times in our lives, both of us (Chip and Dan) were urged by our significant others to take salsa-dancing lessons. This was not our first choice of weekend activities, but we agreed to give it a shot. The fantasy was an attractive one – we could picture ourselves with our partners, full of passion and artistic flair, drawing envious glances from passersby. No question: This “dancer identity” had appeal.
It did not take as long to realize how deeply misguided our fantasies were. All too quickly, we discovered that salsa is a sadistic style of dancing created for the purpose of making middle-aged men feel ridiculous. Salsa requires an array of sensual hip movements that we found structurally implausible. We managed to perform this beautiful dance with all the seductive force of Al Gore giving a lap dance.
We did not continue with our salsa lessons.
Here’s the thing: When you fight to make your switch, especially one that involves a new identity, you and your audience are going to have Salsa Moments. (Don’t worry, we’re not going to adopt that as a buzz phrase.) Any new quest, even one that is ultimately successful, is going to involve failure. You can’t learn to salsa-dance without failing. You can’t learn to be an inventor, or a nurse, or a scientist, without failing. Nor can you learn to transform the way products are developed in your firm, or change minds about urban poverty, or restore loving communication with your spouse, without failing. And the Elephant really, really hates to fail.
This presents a difficulty for you when you’re trying to change or when you’re trying to lead change. You know that you or your audience will fail, and you know that the failure will trigger the “flight” instinct, just as the two of us fled our salsa lessons. How do you keep the Elephant motivated when it faces a long, treacherous road?
The answer may sound strange: You need to create the expectation of failure – not the failure of the mission itself, but failure on route. This notion takes us into a fascinating area of research that is likely to change the way you view the world.
Read the following four sentences, and write down whether you agree or disagree with each of them:
- You are a certain kind of person, and there is not that much that can be done to really change that.
- No matter what kind of person you are, you can always change substantially.
- You can do things differently, but the important parts of who you are can’t really be changed.
- You can always change basic things about the kind of person you are.
If you agreed with items 1 and 3, you’re someone who has a “fixed mindset.” And if you agreed with items 2 and 4, you tend to have a “growth mindset.” (If you agreed with both 1 and 2, you’re confused.) As we’ll see, which mindset you have can help determine how easy it will be for you to handle failure, and how dogged you’ll be in pursuing change. It might even determine how successful you are in your career.
People who have a fixed mindset believe that their abilities are basically static. Maybe you believe you’re a pretty good public speaker, an average manager, and a wonderful organizer. With a fixed mindset, you believe that you may get a little bit better or worse at those skills, but basically your abilities reflect the way your wired. Your behavior, then, is a good representation of your natural ability, just as the swirled-and-sniffed first taste of wine is a good representation of the bottle you’ve bought.
If you are someone with a fixed mindset, you tend to avoid challenges, because if you fail, you fear that others will see your failure as an indication of your true ability and see you as a loser (just as bad first taste of wine leads you to reject the bottle). You feel threatened by negative feedback, because it seems as if the critics are saying they’re better than you, positioning themselves that a level of natural ability higher than yours. You try not to be seen exerting too much effort. (People who are really good don’t need to try that hard, right?) Think about tennis player John McEnroe as a young star – he had great natural talent but was not keen on rigorous practice or self-improvement.
In contrast, people who have the growth mindset believe that abilities are like muscles – they can be built up with practice. That is, with concerted effort, you can make yourself better at writing or managing or listening to your spouse. With the growth mindset, you tend to accept more challenges despite the risk of failure. (After all, when you try and fail to lift more weight at the gym, you don’t worry that everyone will mock you as a “born weakling.”) You seek out “stretch” assignments at work. And you’re more inclined to accept criticism, because ultimately it makes you better. You may not be as good as others right now, but you’re thinking long-term, in a tortoise-versus-hare kind of way. Think Tiger Woods, who won eight major championships faster than anyone in history and then decided his swing needed an overhaul.
Fixed versus growth: Which are you? This isn’t one of those Cosmo Personality Quizzes in which there are no wrong answers (“Are you a Labrador retriever or a poodle?”). Carol Dweck, a professor of psychology at Stanford University, has spent her career studying these two mindsets – she is the source of the terms. And her research results are clear: If you want to reach your full potential, you need a growth mindset. (161-164 from Switch by Chip and Dan Heath)
And more from Switch on the importance of preparing to fail en route:
In the business world, we implicitly reject the growth mindset. Business people think in terms of two stages: You plan, and then you execute. There’s no “learning stage” or “practice stage” in the middle. From the business perspective, practice looks like poor execution. Results are the thing: We don’t care how ya do it, just get it done!
But to create and sustain change, you’ve got to act more like a coach and less like a scorekeeper. You’ve got to embrace a growth mindset and instill it in your team. Why is that so critical? Because, as Harvard Business School professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter observes in studying large organizations, “Everything can look like a failure in the middle.” A similar sentiment is expressed by marriage therapist Michele Weiner-Davis, who says that “real change, the kind that sticks, is often three steps forward and two steps back.”
If failure is a necessary part of change, then the way people understand failure is critical. The leaders at IDEO, the world’s preeminent product design firm, have designed products and experiences ranging from the first Apple mouse to a new Red Cross blood donation procedure. They understand the need to prepare their employees – and, more important, their clients – for failure.
Tim Brown, the CEO of IEDO, says that every design process goes through “foggy periods.” One of IEDO’s designers even sketched out a “project mood charge” that predicts how people will feel at different phases of a project. It’s a U-shaped curve with the peak of positive emotion, labelled “hope,” at the beginning, and a second peak of positive emotion, labelled “confidence,” at the end. In between the two peaks is a negative emotional valley labelled “insight.”
Brown says that design is “rarely a graceful leap from height to height.” When a team embarks on a new project, team members are filled with hope and optimism. As they start to collect data and observe real people struggling with existing products, they find that new ideas spring forth effortlessly. Then comes the difficult task of integrating all those fresh ideas into a coherent new design. At this “insight” stage, it’s easy to get depressed, because insight doesn’t always strike immediately.
The project often feels like a failure in the middle. But if the team persists through this valley of angst and doubts, it eventually emerges with a growing sense of momentum. Team members begin to test out their new designs, and they realize the improvements they’ve made, and they keep tweaking the design to make it better. And they come to realize, we’ve crack this problem. That’s when the team reaches the peak of confidence.
Notice what team leaders at IEDO are doing with the peaks-and-valley visual: They are creating the expectation of failure. By telling team members not to trust that initial flush of good feeling at the beginning of the project, because what comes next is hardship and toil and frustration. Yet, strangely enough, when they delivered this warning, it comes across as optimistic.
That’s the paradox of the growth mindset. Although it seems to draw attention to failure, and in fact encourages us to seek out failure, it is unflaggingly optimistic. We will struggle, we will fail, we will be knocked down – but throughout, we ‘ll get better, and will succeed in the end.
The growth mindset, then, is a buffer against defeatism. It reframes failure as a natural part of the change process. And that’s critical because people will persevere only if they perceive falling down as learning rather than as failing. (p 168-169, Switch by Chip and Dan Heath)
Our bad ego versus our mature self – or how to be a beautiful person
August 21, 2012 by Leave a Comment
The slow, hard-slog way to becoming a beautiful person:
Our bad ego hates failing, so it only does things it believes it can do.
Our mature self accepts failure might happen as a natural consequence of doing hard things.
- The problem human beings face is not that we aim too high and fail, but that we aim too low and succeed. Michelangelo
- The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make a mistake. Elbert Hubbard
- Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. Thomas Watson
- How you think when you lose determines how long it will be until you win. Gilbert Keith Chesterton
- All progress has resulted from people who took unpopular positions. Adlai E. Stevenson
- Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. Ralph Waldo Emerson
- It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. Theodore Roosevelt
- Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm. Winston Churchill
Our bad ego feels threatened and gives up when a task gets hard.
Our mature self doesn’t take difficulties personally and keeps trying different things until it succeeds.
- Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in getting up every time we do. Confucius
- You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it. Margaret Thatcher
- Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed no hope at all. Dale Carnegie
- Great works are performed, not by strength, but by perseverance. Samuel Johnson
Our bad ego likes to feel sorry for itself and unfairly victimized when things go wrong.
Our mature self accepts bad luck happens sometimes and owns up to its contribution to bad outcomes.
- Feeling sorry for yourself, and your present situation, is not only a waste of energy but the worst habit you could possibly have. Dale Carnegie
- Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened. Dr. Seuss
- Most of my major disappointments have turned out to be blessings in disguise. So whenever anything bad happens, I sit back and feel it’ll turn out that this was good, so I shouldn’t worry too much. William Gaines
Our bad ego criticizes and judges others harshly and complains about things.
Our mature self focuses on the good, and it tries to understand why people do bad things.
- Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain- and most fools do. Dale Carnegie
- Instead of condemning people, let’s try to understand them. Let’s try to figure out why they do what they do. Dale Carnegie
- We must be the change we wish to see. Gandhi
- The more man meditates upon good thoughts, the better will be his world and the world at large. Confucius
- People deal too much with the negative, with what is wrong. Why not try and see positive things, to just touch those things and make them bloom? Thich Nhat Hanh
Our bad ego rationalizes everything to make itself look good.
Our mature self thinks rationally and honestly about things, even if this makes itself look bad.
- Human beings aren’t rational animals; we’re rationalizing animals who want to appear reasonable to ourselves. Elliot Aronson
- When dealing with people, remember you’re not dealing with creatures of logic. You’re dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bristling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity. Dale Carnegie
- The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. Richard P.Feynman
Our bad ego hates being criticized so it avoids doing anything that might invite criticism and will despise anyone who criticizes it.
Our mature self sees constructive criticism as an opportunity to grow.
- Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things. Winston Churchill
- Honest criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger. Franklin P. Jones
- To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. Unknown
- In criticizing, the teacher is hoping to teach. That’s all.
Bankei
Our bad ego has a closed mind about ideas different from its own.
Our mature self is open to new ideas.
- Belief gets in the way of learning. Robert Heinlein
- It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. Aristotle
- We find comfort among those who agree with us, and growth among those who don’t. Frank A. Clark
- He who wrestles with us, strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skills. Our antagonist is our helper. Edmund Burke
Our bad ego is certain it’s always right.
Our mature self isn’t so sure and is prepared to re-consider.
- When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir? John Maynard Keynes
- The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts. Bertrand Russell
- However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results. Winston Churchill
Our bad ego hates to admit it’s ever wrong so will refuse to change.
Our mature self is OK about being wrong and learns from its mistakes.
- By amending our mistakes, we get wisdom. By defending our faults, we betray an unsound mind. Hui Neng
- A man who has committed a mistake and doesn’t correct it is committing another mistake. Confucius
- Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change. Confucius
- To improve is to change. To be perfect is to change often. Winston Churchill
- Faced with the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof. John Kenneth Galbraith
- After living with their dysfunctional behavior for so many years, people become invested in defending their dysfunctions rather than changing them. Marshall Goldsmith
- The real fault is to have faults and not to amend them. Confucius
Our bad ego loves accumulating money and status symbols to feel successful.
Our mature self loves to create things, do good things, help others and master itself to feel successful.
- Creation is a better means of self-expression than possession; it is through creating, not possessing, that life is revealed. Vida D. Scudder
- The love of money as a possession…will be recognised for what it is, a somewhat disgusting morbidity… John Maynard Keynes
Our bad ego is infatuated with itself.
Our mature self is constantly trying to shed its bad ego.
- For the man who has conquered his mind, it is his greatest friend; but for the man who fails to do so, his mind will be his greatest enemy. Sri Krsna
- It is not what you gather but what you scatter that tells what kind of life you have lived. Helen Walton
Our bad ego gets angry easily and is hyper-sensitive to imagined slights
Our mature self sees anger as a pointless and toxic emotion.
- Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. Buddha
- To be angry is to let others’ mistakes punish yourself. To forgive others is to be good to yourself.
Master ChengYen - Anyone can become angry — that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way — this is not easy. Aristotle
- When anger rises, think of the consequences. Confucius
- If you are patient in one moment of anger, you will avoid one hundred days of sorrow. Chinese proverb
Our bad ego is boastful.
Our mature self doesn’t feel the need to broadcast its accomplishments and qualities to others.
- It is far more impressive when others discover your good qualities without your help.
Our bad ego likes to focus on other people’s faults and exaggerate them even.
Our mature self will downplay others’ faults and focus more on their good qualities.
- Rare is the person who can weigh the faults of others without putting his thumb on the scales. Byron J. Langenfeld
Our bad ego needs constant positive strokes from others to feel good.
Our mature self knows when it’s done well and can give itself a private “Well done!”.
- The man who makes everything that leads to happiness depend upon himself, and not upon other men, has adopted the very best plan for living happily. Plato
- If you look into your own heart, and you find nothing wrong there, what is there to worry about? What is there to fear? Confucius
Our bad ego doesn’t want to know ugly truths about itself
Our mature self wants to know the truth, even if the truth hurts.
- That which can be destroyed by the truth should be. P. C. Hodgell
Our bad ego abuses power.
Our mature self uses power responsibly for the good of all.
- Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power. Abraham Lincoln
Our bad ego is only interested in advancing itself.
Our mature self is keen to help others flourish, as well as itself.
- ‘Love’ is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own. Robert Heinlein
- Don’t worry about the level of individual prominence you have achieved; worry about the individuals you have helped become better people. Clayton Christensen
- My father gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another person; he believed in me. Jim Valvano (basketball coach)
Our bad ego tries to tear down the dreams and ambitions of others.
Our mature self likes to build others up and to encourage them to succeed.
- Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. Albert Einstein
- Keep away from people who belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great. Mark Twain
- The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated. William James
Our bad ego loves only itself (and perhaps members of its immediate family if they reflect well on it), but everyone else is just seen as objects to be used;
Our mature self loves itself and all others easily and enjoys serving others.
- People are made to be loved and things are made to be used. There is much chaos in this world because things are being loved and people are being used. Unknown
- There is a magnet in your heart that will attract true friends. That magnet is unselfishness, thinking of others first. When you learn to live for others, they will live for you. Paramahansa Yogananda
- The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return. Eben Ahbez
- The only way to have a friend is to be one. Ralph Waldo Emerson
- I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community, and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die. George Bernard Shaw
- Service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth. N. Eldon Tanner
- Want to know something really subversive? Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. It’s really worth fighting for. Erica Jong
- The more you love, the more you can love — and the more intensely you love…If a person had time enough, he could love all those who are decent and just. Robert Heinlein
- A coward is incapable of exhibiting love; it is the perogative of the brave. Mahatma Gandhi
- Once you have learned to love, you will have learned to live. Unknown
Our bad ego cares only about protecting its own feelings, not about the feelings of others.
Our mature self is very sensitive not to hurt the feelings of others.
- A skunk is better company than a person who prides himself on being ‘frank’. Robert Heinlein
- Straight-forwardness, without the rules of propriety, becomes rudeness. Confucius
- To handle yourself, you your head; To handle others, use your heart. Unknown
Our bad ego feels pain when hearing about other people’s good fortune.
Our mature self is genuinely delighted for other people’s good news.
- Anyone can sympathize with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature to sympathize with a friend’s success. Oscar Wilde
- A true friend overlooks your failures and tolerates your success! Doug Larson
Our bad ego easily feels threatened when others do things better than it can.
Our mature self admires excellence in others and tells them so.
- No-one can make you feel inferior without your permission. Eleanor Roosevelt
Our bad ego has a weak and shallow character.
Our mature self has a highly developed character.
- Wisdom, compassion, and courage are the three universally recognized moral qualities of men. Confucius
Our bad ego hates to feel embarrassed.
Our mature self does what it has to do, even if this means it feels embarrassed doing so.
- Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so, you apologize for the truth. Benjamin Disraeli
- Before the beginning of brilliance, there must be great chaos. Before a brilliant person begins something great, they must look foolish in the crowd. Fu His
Our bad ego holds grudges and is unforgiving.
Our mature self forgives easily and tries hard to understand why people do bad things.
- The best way to destroy an enemy is to make him a friend. Abraham Lincoln
- Life is an adventure in forgiveness. Norman Cousins
- Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle. Plato
- One of the keys to happiness is a bad memory. Rita Mae Brown
Our bad ego likes to talk big about what it’s going to do but struggles to deliver.
Our mature self quietly goes about achieving admirable things.
- What people say, what people do, and what they say they do are entirely different things. Margaret Mead
- Instead of worrying about what people might say of you, why not spend time trying to accomplish something they will admire. Dale Carnegie
- A thousand words will not leave as deep an impression as one deed. Henrik Ibsen
- As I grow older I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do. Andrew Carnegie
- You can’t build a reputation on what you’re going to do. Henry Ford
Our bad ego loves to prove it’s right and others are wrong.
Our mature self lets things go when it realizes there’s no point in pushing its point of view.
- Arguing with a fool proves there are two. Doris M. Smith
- Wise men are not always silent, but they know when to be. Unknown
Our bad ego loves to talk and for others to listen.
Our mature self sees conversation as a mutual sharing of ideas and listens attentively when others are talking.
- Never miss a good chance to shut up. Will Rogers
- Listening, not imitation, may be the sincerest form of flattery. Dr. Joyce Brothers
How can I be more happy?
July 30, 2012 by Leave a Comment
