Passion Vs Obsession

By Derek Fredrickson

What am I passionate about? Skiing - pretty much everything about it. I ski every weekend from November to April and do the same with my kids. I like other crazy and outrageous outdoor activities but pretty much anything to do with snow on the ground and two boards on my feet will make me a happy camper.
However, I'm beyond passionate for skiing. I have to say I am obsessed with skiing. Ask any member of my family. And when I say obsessed I mean beyond just having ski pictures and posters in my office or at home (which I have).
I read ski magazines on summer vacations at the beach. My iPhone wallpaper is skiing. When we play family games about favorites (what's your favorite color, favorite food, etc.) - mine all have to do with skiing. I keep every issue of all four (yes, there are 4) ski magazines. I mostly wear t-shirts to work and they all have skiing references or photos on them (my favorite is the spin off from the "Got Milk" campaign and says 'Got Powder?') I follow the top ski racers on Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, etc. I even bid (and won) on a pair of autographed Lindsey Vonn skis for my daughter.
I think my obsession is good - it teaches my kids to focus on what you believe in passionately - no matter what. My 7 year old daughter Claire now wants to grow her hair really long so she can wear it in a pony tail like Lindsey Vonn. How crazy is that? She's passionate about skiing and almost obsessed. I don't think that's overdoing it.
I see myself as I write this article - I could continue on and on and on - but maybe not everyone is as crazy obsessed with skiing as I am. And, wondering "what does this have to do with authentic internet marketing?" But, it does show people how it is good for the soul (and the business) to embed obsession into their values.
Now, I'm also obsessed with authentic Internet marketing. It started out as a hobby when I began working with my wife under 2 years ago. I read some books, studied some courses online, and followed some of the best online mentors. I learned everything about online marketing and then some. I took this passion and then went even further - to see what I could do for our business.
You could say I took my wealth of online marketing knowledge and turned it into something really authentic. Something people can learn from easily in a step-by-step manner to implement in their own business so they can see similar results. Now, I'm obsessed with teaching and sharing how you can authentically market your business on the Internet.
Your Assignment:
What are you passionate about? Make a list of the 5 things that first come to mind when you ask yourself that question. They must be the first 5 that come to mind. If it takes longer to think about it, they are not front of mind and something that you're probably not always thinking about. They can be values, work, hobbies, etc. For me, it's about helping people, learning, family, skiing and doing the right thing. Now, which of these could you do all day long for free? If you were given $1 million dollars tomorrow, which of those 5 would you still wake up each and every day saying - "I can't wait to get started." This is your obsession. Follow that and do everything you can to make it a reality and good things will come.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/5180696

Affirm the Will to Win

By Lance Winslow 

Back in my younger days, I was a track star and there were other athletes who were genetically superior, had better builds, and clearly they should have won every race. But they didn't, and there was a great equalizer; Will! That's right, the will to win.
Anyone who has ever competed at the highest levels of competition realizes that you have to commit, you have to endure, and you have to push your limits. You can will your body to perform not only at optimum, but beyond its physical limits. Eventually what you learn is there are no such things as limits, except those limits you set for yourself.
It's easy to be in a competition and become intimidated, and back off. It's easy to get psyched out, or feel the presence of another athlete who is ultra-determined to beat you. The question is how strong are you in your mind? How much strength of character can you muster, to face your competitor, look them in the eyes, and not flinch? Can you bring yourself to know in advance that you will win?
The answer is yes, but it depends upon you, no one else can do this for you, and I am sure even if you hypnotize yourself, and tell yourself you are going to win, you will not be able to beat someone who truly believes in themselves, their abilities, and has committed themselves in their mind. Sometimes, I believe that human sporting competition brings out the best of the species.
Not only the strongest, and most fit, but those who are strong in the mind. Indeed, you'll need to have both, that is to say you will have to be in excellent shape, and learn the skills required to compete at the upper levels in whatever sport you choose, but you still must possess to strong will, and strength of character if you are going to be victorious time and time again. You must affirm your destiny.
Now then, it's a lot easier to watch someone else compete then actually have to go through the process yourself. Most of the top athletes make it look so easy, when they've had to endure so much to get to that upper-level. Some of them have beaten their bodies into oblivion, and got up, time and time again, and persevered through the pain and agony of defeat along the way. Still, they affirmed to never give up.
Sometimes, I wish that we could see strength of character and will in others, yes sometimes you can feel it, sense it, but wouldn't it be nice if they had a certain aura or glow around them based on their level of will and intensity, showing the strength of their affirmations coming in to fruition. Of course, it takes one to know one, and if you develop that level of strength inside, you will easily recognize it and others. Indeed, I hope you will please consider all these philosophical thoughts on sports competition and think on it. I want you to win, affirm it, be that winner.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6457899

Three Things Most People Do Wrong When Trying to Release Emotions

By Dr Lisa Turner 

Emotions are good. They let us know when something isn't right for us. At least that's what they are meant for.
However all too often the emotion you feel now in the present is actually based in a memory from the past. When this happens it means you can't make the best decisions for yourself. You will find it hard to be 100% present and in the now, because the past is always pulling you back.
Sadly exactly how to recover from the past isn't well known and here are the 3 biggest mistakes that people make when trying to deal with their emotions.
1. Understand them
Do you know someone who knows exactly WHY they have their problems? They know the cause, the events that led to them, how it all happened. They will know and fully understand all the patterns and triggers, and often they will find every opportunity to share them with anyone who seems even remotely interested, they will launch into their "story". The problem is they still have the problem. Knowing why you have the problem and understanding it is a bit like knowing your car doesn't work because its fan belt has broken, but not actually replacing the fan belt.
2. Express them
Many therapies focus on crying, talking about your problem or even shouting and screaming.
Crying does not release the emotions, nor does it resolve the problem. Although crying can give temporary relief and release endorphins, this simply masks the problem and, in fact, reliving the painful event reinforces the problem and makes it worse, rather than better.
Rather than releasing the emotions this actually reinforces them in your neurology. Every time you think a thought, feel an emotion or recall a memory, the neurons fire in your brain along the same original path. Each time you do this you will actually be strengthening that path, making it easier for that pathway to be fired up next time. This is why small events in the present can trigger past trauma. Expressing emotions does not release them.
Therefore each time you relive a traumatic event, you will strengthen the neural pathway. But if you RELEASE the negative emotions new, positive and empowering thought processes can then be installed.
3. Suppress them
This is also called denial and we do this in a variety of ways. Most people will simply kid themselves or deny that they have any problems at all. Often emotions are suppressed or anaesthetised out of consciousness with addictions. Smoking, drinking, video games, TV, eating too much or a compulsion to eat a particular thing, even caffeine will anaesthetise your pain.
However, the pain and the problems are still there. The neurons are still firing, but out of your conscious awareness. So you are radiating out all that energy completely ignorantly until boom some big problem lands in your life and you can't understand where it came from or why it happened when you were thinking happy thoughts.
Telltale signs that you have suppressed emotions
A) Overreactions
You overreact to small things - this is known as emotional leakage. The emotions, denied in one area of your life, literally spill out in other areas. So if you are irritable, overly sentimental, get hurt by small things, even road rage, are signs that you could be suppressing emotions in another area.
B) Low or no Energy
Feeling tired - it takes energy to carry emotions (that's why it's called emotional baggage) and it takes even more energy to suppress them. If you are lacking in energy, need more sleep than most people or just have no get up and go. Many of my past clients were suffering from chronic fatigue or ME, which disappeared once they released their emotions.
C) You have physical pain or even illness
I've received a lot of questions about illness, heart problems, chronic fatigue, auto-immune, chronic pain and so on.
Pain, illness or physical discomfort is one of the ways our unconscious minds communicate with us. Your unconscious mind is communicating with your conscious mind all the time, but in the highly logical, rational, left brain society we have been conditioned to ignore those silly irrational feelings and only to pay attention to rational thinking.
But no matter how irrational they might seem they do have a rational cause. It's just that our conscious / logical mind doesn't have all the information. So it assumes the unconscious mind is wrong and overrules it.
This is what happens with our emotions and illness. Our unconscious mind will tell our conscious mind that something needs to change or move or it will just give us some feedback. But our conscious mind ignores it, so our unconscious mind gives it louder and louder and we turn it off and become numb to our emotions.
The problem is still there so our unconscious mind tries another way of communicating. The unconscious mind runs the body and it governs all those automatic processed like our immune system and muscles etc.
So if we ignore our emotions our unconscious mind gives us the messages as pain or illness. But when we pay attention to the emotions and release them the physical problem can disappear.
This is particularly true of all those psychosomatic illnesses. That doesn't mean they are not real. The pain and the problem is VERY real, but it is caused because we don't have a mechanism to release our emotions so we suppress them.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6432664

6 Important Questions That Can Improve Your Life Quality

By Rolf Trondhjem

Financial pressures can induce stress-related illness, impact your study performance and productivity and restrict your chances to build career shifts.
As a fact:
* 35-40% out of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck.
* Financial trouble is the #1 cause of divorce
* Workers rated personal finance as the #1 root of stress
* 4 out of 10 Americans say they live beyond their means (Strong Employee Assistance Program, 2007)
With all this in mind:
* Would you like to make more money?
* Have you tried to shift your mental attitude in order to achieve financial security?
* Would you wish to save yourself from latent divorcement?
* Do you have the talent and drive, but find things merely don't seem to go your way of life?
* Have you tested other programs for making money only to be frustrated?
* Are you up for a programme to help assist your financial abundance that genuinely works?
If you answered yes to one or more of the above questions, you are open to unlock your right power to get all you prefer with The Sedona Method.
Did you ever noticed that two people with the identical background and education, in the same area, often perform very differently? Why?
Because of their mental attitude. Our feelings produce our thoughts, and our thoughts either place us into action or forbid us from acting.
Our feelings set our own draft for prosperity. See, hear and experience your negativism fade away on the spot.
When you perceive you are being held back by your negative thinking, whether in paying off your bills, negociate a deal, planning your financial goals or in making the steps to attain them, simply ask yourself the easy-to-learn and easy-to-remember queries that make up The Sedona Method.
You will feel the constriction leaving your stomach, shoulders and chest. In its situation, you will feel confidence, relaxation and clearness. You will no longer feel destructive, upset or out of control. You will feel more relaxed and fit to manage whatsoever life throws at you more easy.
The disturbance of your mind will subside, and you will have the clarity of mind to say and do what is appropriate and unaffected in order to control any life situation.
You will have a certain mental attitude without any attempt, thereby creating abundance emotionally and physically. You don't have to struggle to keep a beneficial mental attitude any longer. Although applying affirmations, subliminals and motivation do seem to work in helping you proceed in the direction of thinking more positively, you will see there is a greater way, called The Sedona Method.
The Sedona Method is based on the premiss that we do not have to program self-confident thinking. All we need to do is to release our normal positive nature. Let's analyze the options to exploiting your positive thinking power:
I. You can affirm the positive. Practicing positive thinking sentences involves a sizeable, continual effort to remember and repeat the exact positive words over and over again. It is also only layering positive thoughts on top of the existing negative ones, which clogs up your brain with a lot of needless extra noise.
II. Subliminal programming. Although it may seem simple just to plop in a subliminal tape and make it reprogram your unconscious, practising this comes with risks. Firstly, if you buy pre-made subliminal tapes, you actually don't know what is in the subliminal messages. You are at the mercy of the people who made the tape recording and their consciousness. Not only that, this form actually only layers supposedly "positive" thinking on top of the existing negative thoughts, which only clogs your brain with a bunch of unneeded extra disturbance.
III. Motivation. Have you ever gotten really pumped up by some motivational presentation only to have it wear off in hours or, at the most, days later? Motivation works merely while you are being motivated. It too makes you based on someone or something outside of yourself to retain you motivated. Even self-motivation only temporarily overrides the existing negative.
IV. Your solution to pure positive thinking power and attaining financial security: The Sedona Method.
The scientifically tested Sedona Method is an elegant, easy-to-learn, do-it-yourself system that will teach you how to tap your normal ability to let go of any devastating thought or feeling on the spot.
It can be used in life to achieve blistering relief from the effects of negative thinking whenever it's keeping you back from performing at your greatest.
The Sedona Method supports you to easily stop the patterns of thought and behavior that stimulate your self-sabotage to reoccur and prevent you from getting what you want, including financial safety.
The Sedona Method also contains several really powerful instruments for making decisions and accomplishing goals. As you practice your natural power to release, you'll create a strong, positive psychical posture that will serve you succeed where others might fail, even in today's rapidly changing economic times.
Will The Sedona Method work for You?
As you use the Method, you will discover over time that the real situations and experiences that you used to find the most exhausting or disturbing will get less and less so, until you may even forget that you used to have those sorts of experiences.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6432477

How To Stop Anger From Controlling Your Life

By Roseanna Leaton

Some people seem to have the knack of avoiding anger; by this I mean that they just don't seem to get angry no matter what provocation they are subjected to. Other people are affected in a hot and heated manner and feel the bile of anger rising in their throats at the smallest provocation. And then there are those who traverse the middle ground between these two opposite positions.
In reality, a little bit of anger can be a very healthy emotion. To feel anger in an appropriate way allows you to express your feelings and let off steam. Anger can also be a good motivator to take important and necessary action. But anger is only a healthy emotion when it is experienced with a certain degree of control.
Unbridled anger can be a very dangerous emotion to experience and it can become your own controller. Uncontrolled anger can be the perpetrator of many a deed which you feel ashamed of at a later time. This type of anger can destroy possessions, relationships and lives.
We know that for some people anger would appear to be a controllable emotion whilst for others it has free reign. If you wish to change your angry responses to situations then it is important to understand that you can learn from those who deal with anger in a different and more productive way.
We often do not appreciate that almost all behavior and emotion can be tempered and changed. It is too easy to think that you are just a "hot headed" person, shrug your shoulders and accept your fate. But that is a complete cop-out.
We happily watch programs on TV like "Dragons Den" and fully appreciate that to work with and be guided by a successful mentor is likely to assist one to become more successful too. We appreciate that financially successful traits can be copied.
In reality, every trait can be copied. And to learn to control your anger will lead to far greater success, as well as comfort, within your life. In learning to control anger you allow your friendships, relationships and every other type of encounter the chance to prosper.
Uncontrolled anger is a negative emotion, which gets in the way of success. It forms a large and uncomfortable barrier, which prevents you from succeeding in almost every arena in life. But anger can be controlled and you can learn how to do this quite easily. You can learn to control anger by watching and copying those who remain calm. You can also learn to control anger with the help of hypnosis mp3 downloads.
Hypnosis allows you to access your subconscious mind, the part where instinctive habits and responses are held. And so a hypnosis download designed to overcome anger can effectively be an extremely good mentor, which guides you to be a far more relaxed and comfortable person.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6450868

Break Bad Habits Now With Affirmations

by: Amy twain


Affirmations can be really helpful to break bad habits if you are persistent about it.

In order for you to really break bad habits you must: a) be aware that the unconscious mind exists and b) learn how to manipulate its existence.

And affirmations are great and powerful techniques in which, if used effectively, could bring out and address directly to your unconscious being.

By uttering simple positive statements of the way you wish to live your life, then reiterating them out loud daily, you teach your unconscious thoughts in order to guide you to a better path to be reflected by your whole senses.

You can use:

1) Situational statements: one of a kind affirmations which provide a definite aim in your life. Some examples are:

a) "My heart and lungs are healthy."

b) "I am very happy to be earning $120, 000 per year."

2) Timeless affirmations. These are statements which can be made use at any point in your life.

a) "My body is healthy and strong."

b) "I am so happy in every aspect of my life"

In speaking these words over and over daily, they penetrate into our subconscious mind till it becomes our reality.

Moreover, the positive language of these "feel-good" affirming sentences blocks off negative thought processes, and in effect, fosters positive attitude.

To fortify this belief, each day, every morning, when you get ready for the day, you can try to spare at least 10 minutes of your time in uttering these affirmations out loud. Simply listen to your own voice as you speak these and try to be detached and unemotional as you can.

And lastly, it is very important that you must try to obstruct any negativity and concentrate 100% of your language and attention to the affirmations that you are saying out loud.