Category: Mind Space

It’s NOT Going to be a Long Day

I had to fight with myself to get out of bed this morning. I hit that snooze button more times than I ever have before, it looked like today was going to be a little rough. Then I found this article How to raise the odds that it’s going to be a fantastic day!

So now I’m a little more optimistic about my day! Although I missed one of the suggestions:

Get up early. I know that sounds like punishment, and bed always feels especially comfortable first thing in the morning, but you should allow yourself plenty of time to get ready—and then some.

I follow this suggestion everyday, but it’s made easier because I ride my bike.

Vary your route to work as much as you can. Make it as interesting and varied as possible. Look around you. Enjoy the ride.

Easily get Inspired to Make Change

Previously I’ve posted about getting into the action habit and hopefully everyone is now action-orientated. I’m still trying to get into the habit. To help me get into that good habit I should be eating 11 foods that will kick start my day in the right mood, but I’m vegetarian which cuts some foods from that list. So it goes.

If you’re in a slump there’s no reason to fret as there are 16 things you can do to “get off your butt”!

Even the most motivated of us — you, me, Tony Robbins — can feel unmotivated at times. In fact, sometimes we get into such a slump that even thinking about making positive changes seems too difficult.

But it’s not hopeless: with some small steps, baby ones in fact, you can get started down the road to positive change.

Yes, I know, it seems impossible at times. You don’t feel like doing anything. I’ve been there, and in fact I still feel that way from time to time. You’re not alone. But I’ve learned a few ways to break out of a slump, and we’ll take a look at those today.

Learn More by Studying Less

I’m back in Toronto now and discovered a bunch of people are starting their school year; so to celebrate their return to education I figured a post on studying is needed.

The ever helpful ZenHabits strikes again with a good overview of how to study and retain knowledge. They focus on a holistic approach to studying, which may or may not work for you. The key is to figure out what does work for you and role with it.

For example, the last thing they suggest happens to be a waste of my studying time but the same thing is essential for one of my friends:

Write – Take a piece of paper and write out the connections in the information. Reorganize the information into different patterns. The key here is the writing, not the final product. So don’t waste your time making a pretty picture. Scribble and use abbreviations to link the ideas together.

Start the Action Habit

I’ve been told that some habits are hard to break when referring to bad habits. Let’s reverse that and make a good habit hard to break. Fortunately the people over at Pick the Brain have a great article on the seven ways to grow the action habit.

They encourage people to take action to conquer many aspects of their lives. It’s an inspiring read, and after reading it I’m sure you’ll want to never break the action habit.

4. Use action to cure fear – Have you ever noticed that the most difficult part of public speaking is waiting for your turn to speak? Even professional speakers and actors experience pre-performance anxiety. Once they get started the fear disappears. Action is the best cure for fear. The most difficult time to take action is the very first time. After the ball is rolling, you’ll build confidence and things will keep getting easier. Kill fear by taking action and build on that confidence.

This Magazine

This Magazine is an excellent Canadian publication that simply states that “everything is political” which is something that I entirely agree with. They recently added Things Are Good to their blogroll, so I thought it was perfect opportunity to draw attention to this great Canadian magazine (sorry all you non-canucks, you can skip this post).

The This Magazine Blog is a must read if you’re at all interested in Canada. They cover almost everything from “media navel-gazing” to human rights.

Keep up the good work all those working at This Magazine!