Applied Happiness Coaching

I was talking to my mother today about riddles and how it’s usually the simplest thing that makes them so difficult, and it got me thinking.  What an incredible truth about life.  We are presented a problem – a simple one – and our brains fire off a million solutions, emotions, actions, suggestions, thoughts – ultimately we sometimes end up completely lost.  It’s time to step out of your mind, and just choose the easiest, most novel of choices to solve life’s riddles.  Here, let me give you a couple examples to see how fast you can solve them. These riddles are incredibly easy; you just have to stop think about it, and answer.

A guy rides into town on Friday, stays three days, and leaves on Friday.  How did he do it?

Two coins add up to $0.30, and one of them is not a nickel.  What are the coins?

Are you firing off possible solutions yet?  Try this one.

You walk into a room and close the door.  There is a bathtub, so you get in and start running the water.  It begins to fill-up, so you try o shut off the water and you cannot.  The door is sealed shut, so the water is rising higher and higher.  You see two windows up at the top of the room, so you figure you can just float up to them and get out, but as you near them you learn they are sealed shut too.  How do you get survive?

Life is filled with riddles at every turn.  By default, from years of being turned on, your brain is conditioned to fire a million ideas, suggestions, and emotions every millisecond.  90% of the time this amounts to worry, anxiety, fear – all from too many ‘what-if’ questions running through it.  What if you could stop the madness, and just reach out and select the right answer on a hunch?

The answer, my friends, is faith.  When you let go of the anxiety and have complete faith that you are doing the right thing, going the right way, or choosing the right answer, you will every time.  The secret is to stop thinking so much, and just go with what feels ‘right’ and seems almost trivial in nature. The answers to the riddles above will prove this.

How did he ride into town in Friday, stay three days, and leave on Friday? Friday was the horse’s name.

Two coins add up to $0.30, and one is not a nickel.  Well then the OTHER one is a nickel.

How do you survive the bathtub overflow? Simply pull the plug, and let it drain.

These answers seem so trivial, but they’re correct.  How many of you really thought about it? How many realize now that you thought TOO MUCH about it, and it didn’t end up being the right answer?  Hey, me too. I frequently have trouble turning off my brain, and just following my first hunch.  In life, riddles come at you all day, and if you just have faith that you already have the answer, and it’s going to be easy for you, it will.  You’ll stop thinking and start doing.

Have an outstanding Wednesday!

Blake

A large majority of the LOA community believes that medication is completely unnecessary to happiness.  This is actually pretty true on a lot of levels, but there are always exceptions, and I want to point one out today.  Anxiety is prevalent in a lot of households in this country. With gas prices – hell, all prices soaring to record levels, and income stagnant, it’s sometimes difficult NOT to feel a little anxious!

Someone very close to me wants a great life. She’s actually living a pretty great life, but she has trouble seeing it. Her view of the world is colored with anxiety and worry. She fears everything because she worries about the ‘worst case scenario’ we all forget about.  She could have a great day, but remember one word in a conversation she had in passing that morning, and somehow tie it into a ridiculous turn of events that could impact her negatively.  She would then worry about it.

Well, she just started some medication to relieve that sense of worry, and help her just breathe through it. Let me tell you, she is almost unrecognizable now. She’s full of life from sunrise to sunset, she enjoys the moments of her day, and she doesn’t give a second thought to any frivolous worries.  I love her dearly, and I want to see her happy as a clam, and I think she’s more than well on her way to it now!

The point is that more often than not, we prescribe medication to solve our problems in this country. How many children are now diagnosed as A.D.D. than there were 20 years ago? Sometimes it’s better to let kids be kids, and correct a problem if it actually becomes one later on in life.  On the other hand, sometimes medications can be the difference between living well, and just being alive.  In the case of the woman above, she was just living, and now she’s living well.

Medication helped her to remove the overwhelming sense of worry and guilt – both completely unwarranted. She is able to now focus on her emotions more objectively, and is consciously choosing to experience more positivity and love, rather than worry and doubt.  Sometimes we can only manifest as much as our brain will allow us to. If the right medication can help remove an overwhelming limiting belief, and allow one to begin rationalizing his or her thoughts, I am all for it.

If you’re having difficulty living your life as a normal, funtioning adult, I strongly urge you to seek advice from a medical professional immediately. Imagine finally removing that anxiety, and seeing the world worry-free for the first time.

Peace, Love, and a million successes to you,

Blake

I had a pretty poor day yesterday (Wednesday), and I was unsure how I was ever going to make it out still feeling good about my life.  We all have moments like that.  I am fighting with one of the companies I am doing contractual work for, and it looks like I may not get a paycheck for a while. We’ll just have to see how it all turns out.  I went home, grabbed my dog, and headed out to my friend’s place uptown. She bought me dinner and we just had a great time together watching the Olympics.  I laid my head down a little before 11, and tried to be grateful for the wonderful things in my life – even though I was still pretty worked up about the accounts payable issue from earlier.

I had a dream that spun my world in circles, and threw my train of thought out the window.

As a man, sometimes I dream about automobiles. Well, last night it was a brand new Escalade.

I’m driving around some random city in this beautiful new Escalade. I’ve got the windows down, the stereo up, the sun is shining, and I’m feeling pretty good about it all.  The monstrous truck starts to sputter and I see the gas gauge is broken as it wavers slightly, and then falls lifeless to E.  I look up as I roll to a stop, and suddenly I’m in the middle of nowhere.  I get out and I’m very, very upset. I’m cussing, and flailing my arms, and cursing the truck for doing this to me.

A man appears a couple hundred feet down the single lane road, and begins walking to me. As I’m cursing, he walks over and asks me what happened. I tell him the story angrily, and he smiles and tells me that I’m looking at it all wrong, in a tone that can only be described as uncomfortably mysterious – like any minute he was going to wave his hands and say, “That’s not a truck; it’s a kitten!” Poof, there would stand a kitten.

He asked me if I was just going to stand next to it and complain all day.

“You cannot stand here and expect magic to happen. Blake, keep walking down the road and have faith that another ride will come along.”

I didn’t even hesitate to follow his advice.  His voice was comforting – much like when mom tells you it’s all going to be okay when you’re sad as a kid.  Sure enough, just a couple hundred yards down, another Escalade pulled over and the back door opened.  I got in and looked back to see us pull away from the dead truck and the voice of reason.  I didn’t know where we were, but this nameless, faceless driver knew everything I wanted, and where to take me to get it. I simply requested something and had complete faith the driver would take me to it.  I felt so grateful for the new ride, and the random chance of meeting that man when my dream truck died.  I traveled all over in this new truck – guided only by faith that I would always reach whatever destination I asked for.

I woke up and felt like I had been given a gft in my sleep.  I was able to test drive the power of the Universe last night. I was able to run on faith.  And I would not have been the least bit surprised if I woke up with an Escalade keychain at my bedside.

Today I received a recommendation from a former colleague, a phone call from a friend in Ohio to speak at her company, and a brand new business contact for some design work. On faith alone, I have turned worry into wonderful gifts that will bring me happiness…and income!

Have a little faith, my friends. If one day your proverbial Escalade breaks down, you must keep walking and have faith that you’ll reach your destination. I promise you that you will. Every single time.

Technorati Tags: attraction, dream, faith, lesson, personal power, positive thinking

Your life as you know it is based upon faith. That’s right, even those that say they do not believe in fate, and instead choose to control their own destiny by working incredibly hard, making smart decisions, and following their own path are guided by faith. The faith they have is in themselves. No matter what the situation, the words, “have a little faith” echo through them. “It’s all going to turn out alright. It always does.” These are incredibly powerful affirmations! This is the stuff dreams are made of!

Holy cow…how cliche was that?

Napoleon Hill ["Think and Grow Rich"] wrote, “A mind dominated by positive emotions becomes a favorable site for the state of mind known as faith.”  When you smile in the face of adversity and what could be seen as an impassible crossroad, you have faith that you’ll get through it.  This is nothing new.  However, many people discount the power of faith because they feel more comfortable bonding with others about how “it’s just not possible” and/or “man, I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes.”

How often do parents tell their children that it’s going to be okay.  How often do you hear people talk about making it through a disaster or negative event because they “just knew they would get through it”?  Have a little faith in YOU.

It is important to remember three very powerful truths:

1 – Faith is the starting point of all accumulation of riches.
2 – Faith is the basis of al miracles and mysteries that science cannot explain.
3 – Faith is THE ONLY KNOWN ANTIDOTE FOR FAILURE.

In my upcoming book, I spend a little time talking about the power of faith, and using it to propel you into manifesting incredible people, profits, and personal growth.  The greatest point I can make about faith is that it truly is the foundation for all your future success.  Success is built from the ground up, brick by brick. An unwavering faith in yourself, your abilities, and the Universe to back you up is 80% of the build process! The other 20% is action – another chapter altogether!

How do you get the faith you need to be the person you always dreamt of being?

“Know you have the ability to achieve the objects of your definite purpose in life. Demand of yourself persistent, continuous action toward its attainment, and promise to render such action” – Napoleon Hill, TaGR.

Wake up every morning, step onto the floor, and take a deep breath. With each breath, thank the Universe for the incredible day you’re going to have. KNOW how powerful you are, and commit yourself to believing you hold the cards to your success – and the faith that you’ll know when you hold em, and know when to fold em!

When you have complete, unwavering, unadulterated faith in yourself, you’ll never fold! You’ll have one winning hand after another! Trust me! Have a littel faith!

Technorati Tags: affirmations, faith, personal power, success

Ever feel like you just can’t catch a break?  As your day wears on, you just get bombarded with one dose of bad news after another?  It truly brings meaning to the phrase ‘when it rains, it pours.’  I am no different from you. We both experience the same days.  Hell, sometimes you come out of a relationship and all you want to do is start fresh, but it seems like it’s just not in the cards.  Welcome to your current train of thought.  Let me explain what I mean.

We’ve all been there.  We’ve all had our hearts broken.  Some of us have even broken some hearts ourselves.  More often than any other subject, the topic of healing a broken heart comes up in advice columns and support groups around the world. When your life changes, and you find yourself single in a world where you once were part of a pair, it can feel like another country – a hostile country too!  The bills can pile up, the weather can turn cold, you can get sick – these are all symptoms of your current train of thought.  This is not you.  This is NOT your life.  You DO NOT exist for this.  This is just your current state of energy. You need to step back and see what your motivating emotions truly are, and weigh them against your goals.

I was recently discussing with a friend of mine the importance of healing yourself for yourself after a break-up.  Too many people try to cling to what once was, and spin their wheels to keep some semblence of their former existence after their proverbial fall from grace.  Actions like these are motivated by fear, and are admittedly a futile attempt to keep up with the status quo.  When all your attempts to stay strong are motivated by fear, you end up experiencing such loss and pain, that your fears manifest.  You have to clear yourself.

 Define yourself better.  You are NOT the broken windshield wiper on your car at the end of a long day of work. You are NOT the ridiculous electric bill this summer.  You are NOT the shell of a person you think you are as you work past a recent break-up.  That may be your current state, but it isn’t you, and your life does no thave to be defined as such.  Realize that you’re much more than that, and write them all down.  Define yourself.

“I know phenomenal things are coming to me, because I radiate awesome.”

“I am an incredibly loving mother.”

“I am so grateful for my amazing family.”

“I am loved so deeply by everyone around me.”

Define yourself differently and get yourself out of the curret state you’re in.  Current is a funny word, ya know. It can mean now, and it can also mean flow. What I want you to do is change the CURRENT of your current.  When you stop flowing the wrong direction, and letting all the negativity and despair propel you further into what you do not want, you’ll see a bigger, brighter, more promising world before you.  Trust me – I have been there, and I have had to embrace the void left in heartbreak.

Technorati Tags: break-up, breakup, broken heart, clearing, clearing doubt, guilt, love