Before I jump into today’s topic I want you to be self-reflective for a moment. When you read the title for this article, and quickly thought about life being easy, how did it make you feel? Did you immediately disagree with it? Are you curious to explore what it could possibly mean? Or do you fully agree right off the bat? Think on that for a second and determine what it was for you.

The reason I ask is because whatever gut-reaction response you had is significant. It’s your subconscious belief system quickly interacting with the concept to help you figure out what this idea means to you. Now pair this knowledge with your conclusion. If you felt dismissive and resistant to it, that represents your belief that life is not easy. If you felt affirmed by the statement, then that suggests you have a belief that life is meant to be easy.

I’ve found that many people are making life harder than it needs to be simply because they unconsciously believe life is meant to be hard. Your mind is always searching for evidence that confirms its own beliefs. So if you think life is hard, then you’’ll find reasons that prove it to be true.  It’s a lens you put on top of your life.

A way to further audit if you’re in this belief set is in thinking about how things are for you in life right now. Do you first come up with examples of the stresses and challenges in your life? Or do you feel grateful and inspired for life? Again this is unconscious, of course no one would choose to make their life harder than it needs to be, but it happens.

Life can be easy! It really can, and it works in the same way as I described. If you have the belief that life is easy, you’ll find reasons that prove it to be true. That momentum will grow and encourage you to push the boundary and do even more. 

It reminds me of Charlie Rocket’s life mantra “I’m on a winning streak!” which is one of my personal morning affirmations. And it also holds the key to shifting your beliefs. The more you tell yourself life is easy, the more you’ll start to believe it, and the more life will be perceived in that way. One of the ways you can rewire your subconscious mind and belief system is through frequent repetition. So start saying it to yourself “Life is easy”, and start seeing it become more and more true.

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Something that is true for just about everything in your life is it starts with you. Everything involves you, everything affects you, and everything is influenced by you. This concept takes many faces but the one I want to zoom in on today is how other people treat you. 

You might think that the way people treat you is out of your control because the actions they take are ultimately their choice. But we give ourselves too much credit for what we can do and neglect to admit how influenced by our environment. Therein lies the opportunity - You can shape your social environment. If you want people to treat you better, you need to show them how you should be treated.

Let’s say that you’re often taken advantage of. This is a reflection on both the people you choose to surround yourself with and the things you tolerate about other people. When you stand up for yourself and start demonstrating how you deserve to be treated, you’ll find that people start treating you better. This involves being more assertive and speaking up when you feel like something is wrong. It involves initiating confrontation to defend yourself. An expression that really resonates with me is “You can’t guarantee that you get what you wish for, but you certainly will get what you’re willing to tolerate.”

Or let’s say people don’t take you seriously. Give them a reason to take you seriously by taking yourself seriously - Prioritizing your health, following through on the things you say you're going to do, persevering through adversity. It all leaves a subtle impression on others that shapes the way they view you and in that way, how they choose to interact with you.

You need to teach other people how to treat you by first getting clear on how you want to be treated. Then once you've identified that, it’s a matter of enforcing that standard by calling out other people’s actions and leading by example with your own.

In order for this to create an immediate change in your life today, you can gain awareness on the topic by asking yourself this question - How are you being treated unfairly and what can you do about it?

On your personal development journey, you need to be sure you have the right foundation in place. Discover the 7 Fundamentals To Self Improvement and instantly accelerate your growth! (Who knows what you might be overlooking and how it’s holding you back…)

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Something that I’ve learned (and I’ve heard experts say) is the biggest differentiator between being good and being great, is consistency. Coined by Darren Hardy, I’m a huge believer in what he calls “the compound effect” and how small positive actions taken consistently over time lead to unimaginable results. In Hardy’s book titled “The Compound Effect”, he uses a simple analogy to demonstrate how consistency works that I want to share with you.

Imagine you’re standing next to a well and in order to draw water from it, you need to pump a lever. So you start pumping the lever. You pump and pump and pump, and nothing comes out. At this point many people reason that maybe it’s just not meant to work, they’re doing it wrong or something is broken, and they quit. 

But not you. You stay consistent and keep pumping the well, investing more time, energy and effort into drawing water. You pump and pump and pump some more and then finally a few drops come out. This could be disappointing, all of that work for only a few drops… This also causes many people to quit now because it’s just not worth the effort.

But you are resilient and you persevere. So you keep pumping the lever and those few drops turn into a full flow of water that comes pouring from the spout.

Notice what happened over time. The amount of effort you were putting in didn’t change - Each pump of the lever required the same amount of effort. It’s what came from each pump that changed!

Pumping the lever is a metaphor for you doing something consistently. When you are consistent and do the work again and again, you’re pressurizing the well in your life. You’re investing in the system that will eventually reward you with more than you could have ever asked for.

This concept applies for a workout routine, a meditation practice, a money management system, or anything really. You might not see the results you want as quickly as you’d like to, but if you take consistent positive action eventually the results will come in a massive way!

Now one last piece to mention here that’s important - When you start getting results, the spout of your life is pouring with water, you still need to stay consistent to keep producing that outcome. If you stop pumping the well then you’ll lose all of the momentum you earned, and you’ll find yourself right back at the beginning. So your practice is to always pump the well. Always prioritize the small things that compound to create big results, regardless of if you’re getting just a few drops or a full flow of water from the spout.

Consistency can change your life and it takes you to step up and keep pumping the well for yourself. 

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You know how we say all the time that “a memory is priceless” or ”that piece of advice is priceless”. I want to tell you… You are priceless!

The sentiment behind having priceless memories or advice is that there’s so much value in it. And while money is a really effective tool, it’s simply a currency that helps you access the value you’re searching for. So for something to be priceless means that it’s above the concept of money, and it’s a disservice to equate that thing with how much it costs.

Relating this back to you, a similar thing applies. Yes, we all do have a price in that we trade our time for money in our work. But this concept is so much beyond that. You are not defined by your work. The value you offer the world is not limited by how much you output. The typical relationship with compensation in a company is that you’re paid a certain amount to help the company  make money, which ideally is more than what they’re paying you. Of course your work could also create non-financial outcomes, but that’s seen through the lens of how well you solve a problem for someone else.

You are more than just what you’re paid to do to help others. You contribute way more to the world than what you get paid for. Your well-being matters. Your happiness and sense of fulfillment matters. The experiences you have and the moments you share with others matter. And it’s not fair to put a dollar amount on your existence in the world. You are priceless!

And on the flip-side, all of those things that make you who you are - Your dreams, your aspirations, your experiences, your happiness… It’s not for sale! You are worth so much more than that, you are blessed with freedom, and you do not have to give up all of that for a check. 

I’m not saying money isn’t important, of course it is. You must keep yourself alive and well. But no matter how rich or poor you are your life does not come down to how much money you have. Money is a tool to help you do everything else - Take care of a thriving family, have a budget to travel and adventure, create businesses or initiative that change the world. That’s what it’s really all about. Having the freedom and ability to really think that way, that’s you, and it’ priceless.

On your personal development journey, you need to be sure you have the right foundation in place. Discover the 7 Fundamentals To Self Improvement and instantly accelerate your growth! (Who knows what you might be overlooking and how it’s holding you back…)

If you’re in the US or Canada, text me at 949-799-0788 and I’ll send you daily text messages that help you grow and discover yourself every day.

Have you ever gotten caught signing yourself up for something or doing something you didn’t actually want to do? You could have been completely aware of it in the moment, causing you to ask questions about why you went forward with it. Or it could have happened so fast that you didn’t realize the extent of what you committed to until after the fact.

What you’ve done is you’ve been affected by something called competing commitments. Essentially, the moment triggered something in you that caused you to do what you really didn’t want to do. Often the cause of this is subconscious. The situation brought up a need, a desire, or a fear that in the moment you felt motivated to address. 

Here are a few examples: Your friend asked you to help coordinate a birthday party, and even though you definitely don’t have the time for it you say “Yes” because you have a deeply rooted need to be accepted and liked by others. Or maybe you had more to drink than you planned to because you felt a social pressure to belong.

To make this more clear, a competing commitment is an inconsistency between what you consciously want to do (what you’d hope you would choose to do) and what you’re subconsciously motivated to do. The reason this inconsistency exists is because we all have experiences, lessons, and traumas that create wounds and needs that are begging to be fulfilled.

It takes incredible self-awareness to know what might be motivating your behavior and how that that is out of alignment with your best-self. The more aware you become of the activities you’re engaging in, and the path of choices and circumstances that led to those activities, the more insight you'll gain into how competing commitments are at play in your life.

Now to wrap this up let’s try to dive in and gain some insight right now - What do you find yourself doing that you’d really prefer not to do, and what caused that thing to enter your life in this way?

On your personal development journey, you need to be sure you have the right foundation in place. Discover the 7 Fundamentals To Self Improvement and instantly accelerate your growth! (Who knows what you might be overlooking and how it’s holding you back…)

If you’re in the US or Canada, text me at 949-799-0788 and I’ll send you daily text messages that help you grow and discover yourself every day.

An alchemist is someone who transforms or creates something through a seemingly magical process. Historically this skill was used to create potent cures to rare diseases, making valuable metals out of random raw materials, or more specifically how Jesus is said to have turned water into wine. While you might not believe you have these magical abilities yourself, you absolutely do have a version of it. We’re all capable of life alchemy and shaping our reality into whatever form we choose.

One of the most powerful forces for living a fulfilling and purposeful life is choice. We make decisions and choose what we invest our time into. We make big life choices that shape our environment and direct our lives in certain ways. But most importantly we have the choice to determine how we want to perceive certain situations. 

Just because something happened does not guarantee the end result. It’s simply the beginning of your perception of the event. You have the opportunity to decide how you want to make meaning of the things that happen to you. Did you pour yourself into something only to fail miserably? That could discourage you and cause you to quit, or it can be seen as exactly the lesson you needed when you needed it. 

There are multiple ways to perceive any situation, and that’s life alchemy. It’s shaping the events of your life so that you can tell the story you want about it. And as long as you have a clear picture of what success authentically looks like to you, then you can start making that a reality by seeing everything that happens to you as a support to materializing it.

The way your mind makes meaning of things is very complex that involves past experiences, beliefs, emotions, and a lot of other things. It takes a lot of self-growth to truly alchemize the life of your dreams from the events that happen within it. But want to know where to start? Say thank you. Any time something happens, good or bad, say thank you. This injects gratitude into every area of your life and positions you to receive everything in a positive and supportive way. With these two words, you become a life alchemist.

On your personal development journey, you need to be sure you have the right foundation in place. Discover the 7 Fundamentals To Self Improvement and instantly accelerate your growth! (Who knows what you might be overlooking and how it’s holding you back…)

If you’re in the US or Canada, text me at 949-799-0788 and I’ll send you daily text messages that help you grow and discover yourself every day.

Our lives are improved by the presence of others. As much as we’re living out our own passions and missions, we cannot do it alone. We require other people to really make the most out of life. Humans are inherently social creatures that require each other to survive and proliferate. We’re meant to be cooperative, collaborative, and collective.

But the problem is, right now many people don’t trust each other. In an age where information is abundant and unreliable, it’s hard to know what is true and what is not. Not only do we have a collective distrust about information, but we’re also hesitant to trust each other. A shocking Harvard Business Review statistic states that 58% of employees trust a stranger more than their boss. This suggests that we’re in a very skeptical chapter of human where we’re questioning other people’s intentions.

When you reflect on a thought like this, it’s very easy to remove yourself from it and think of yourself as the exception. I want to challenge that thought and encourage you to think about how this applies for you.

So the question becomes, how you can cultivate trust-based relationships? In other words, how can you confidently trust other people more, and how can you be more trustworthy? This is a complex topic but here are a few things to think about.

First, be honest. It’s that simple. People trust others who tell the truth. This means that when you’re struggling with something, voice it. When you were wrong about something, admit it. When you’re feeling something, express it. The more your truth is out in the open for others to see, the less skeptical they’ll be about what you’re holding back (and the more trust you’ll earn).

Then second, hold space. Give people the permission to be themselves without judgment or criticism. Let them feel accepted for who they are. This creates trust because when people get more comfortable with you, they feel like they can confide in you. And through the principles of commitment and consistency the rest of their psyche will be pulled to act in congruence with that.

As with anything, the key to having more trust in your life and relationships is to go first. Set the tone by going there yourself, and you'll see how willing people are to meet you there.

On your personal development journey, you need to be sure you have the right foundation in place. Discover the 7 Fundamentals To Self Improvement and instantly accelerate your growth! (Who knows what you might be overlooking and how it’s holding you back…)

If you’re in the US or Canada, text me at 949-799-0788 and I’ll send you daily text messages that help you grow and discover yourself every day.

Sometimes we don’t give ourselves enough credit for how much we’ve learned, how much we’ve improved, and how far we’ve come. As growth-oriented individuals, we focus on areas where we’re falling short of our own expectations. It dominates our attention (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing), but for every shortcoming we have right now, we have 10 things we’ve mastered without realizing it.

That’s because everything that feels easy today used to be hard when we were first getting started. Our focus is placed disproportionately on the things that require our energy and effort. Things that have become easy don't get the same attention because it’s not as important to allocate resources to - You’re already in the swing of it! But the only way it got to that point is because you were focused on it at one point, you used to spend your energy figuring out how to do it better, which led to your improvement and efficiency.

Here are a few examples. As a kid, we learned how to walk, tie our shoes, and hold objects. If you’ve watched a kid recently learning how to do any of those things, you see their focus. It’s a challenge for them. But once they invest the time to master whatever it is, it has become easy. How about as adults. When we were first learning how to cook, how to pump gas, how to work our smartphones. It was difficult at first, but now you do those things without trouble.

Beyond the awareness and appreciation of this, what does this mean for you today? Take a look at the things that are hard for you to do. It could be improving at a new skill or hobby, or dialing in a new process. It’s hard now but it won’t be that way forever. 

So don’t give up on it, don’t sell yourself short because it’s not working how you want it to now. Have faith in this process that you’ve seen play out time and again in your life, and invest the time and energy required to overcome whatever frustrations this new challenge presents.

Everything easy was once hard to do. These hard things you’re doing now will become easy and integrate into the foundation that allows you to stretch even further.

On your personal development journey, you need to be sure you have the right foundation in place. Discover the 7 Fundamentals To Self Improvement and instantly accelerate your growth! (Who knows what you might be overlooking and how it’s holding you back…)