Tag Archives: Gratitude

Acceptance, Attitude, Celebration, Creator, Energy, Focus, Gratitude, Happiness, Intentional Thinking, Personal Development, Positive Thinking, Self Improvement, Self Talk

Are You Ready To Get Serious About Living & Working Happily?

June 8, 2015 rexsikes Leave a comment

“Some people believe they are positive thinkers but they are not. They may be quite negative. Ask someone, ‘what do you want in a mate?’ This person answers, ‘They must not be a smoker. The shouldn’t lie. I don’t want a person who cheats’. On and on they can go.

Instead of thinking of what they want and what they can do they think of what they don’t want and can’t do. Often, they are not open to what life and others offer. Instead of seeing possibilities they see limitations. Frequently, they may try to enforce those on others.

Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Love them anyway. Don’t argue with them it is most likely a poor use of your time. Don’t try to convert them they will come around when they come around. Let them be and accept them for who they are. Let your light shine rather than try to persuade them.

Don’t let them rain on your parade either. You can be around them but also find positive, inspiring people to hang with. Find positive mentors that have and do what you’d like to. Seek out people who love life and are fun to be with.

Think 80/20 rule. Spend 80%, at least 80%, of your time and energy surrounded by positive people, thoughts and energy. When you do this your life transforms wonderfully and more quickly.

The more time you spend feeling good, speaking good, thinking good the faster your life changes and the more wonderful it becomes! Aim to think and feel your very best. Have fun and enjoy life. Celebrate and be grateful!

What You Think About You Bring About

Keep your thoughts, feelings and words positive. Speak only to bless, heal and prosper yourself and others. When you talk about your circumstances keep them positive and about what you want. Think of yourself as a powerful creator (whether you think it is true or not).

Imagine that whatever you say comes to be. You bring into being what you think about and talk about. What you say to yourself, your self-talk, and what you say when conversing with others. Are you creating more of what you want or more of what you do not want?

That is an important question? With which do you spend most of your time? It is so easy to complain and speak ill of circumstances. Stop it!

Words Have Power: Be Careful What You Say

Speak only to what you what to make happen. EVEN if you don’t yet know how it is possible. You can always say, ‘I don’t know how or when but I know good things are happening’. If someone asks you how you know that you can say, ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I just know’.

What you think about you bring about, What you speak you manifest. Align your thoughts, feelings, words and actions to be of the highest most positive kind and you will live a blessed life. You will heal and prosper. Make a point of it. Celebrate everything and your joy will know no bounds!” Rex Sikes

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Have a fantastic day!!!

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Acceptance, Attitude, Blessings, Creating The Future, Focus, Intentional Thinking, Responsibility, Trust, Unlimited Power

He Turned His Back On The Lions. Could You?

June 7, 2015 rexsikes Leave a comment

“Can you imagine turning your back on the lions if you were stuck in a cage with them? That is what he did. Before we get to that I want to remind you of an ancient piece of wisdom you might like to consider and embrace.

There’s an ancient story to illustrate the way you can remain centered and not get hooked. In order to get unhooked and not buy into drama you have to develop another attitude, a different mindset. Once this mindset is in place all aspects of your world become different. Everything is enhanced.

There was a man whose horse ran away. The villagers exclaimed what a misfortune this was. The man replied, ‘maybe’. A day or two later the horse returned bringing with it three more horses. The town people exclaimed, ‘you are lucky how fortunate to have more’. The man replied again only with ‘maybe’.

A day or two later his son was riding one of the new horses and was thrown breaking his leg. The town people exclaimed what a tragedy this was and again offered him sympathy. The man replied, ‘maybe’.

The next day war broke out and all able bodied men were conscripted. The military officials seeing the condition of the man’s son passed him by. The towns people all exclaimed how lucky he was because now his son would face battle. He and his son had been spared. The man still replied, ‘maybe’.

We only see part of the picture at any time. The man knew anything is possible. The town’s people only saw a portion and reacted. We can let go of the outcome and respond as the man did if we condition ourselves to understand this. We only see a partial bit of any picture.

Anything is possible. It could be a blessing or a curse. It could be true, as they say, or perhaps it could be otherwise. Time would tell. We don’t have to react we can respond.

It was stated this way in the Bible, ‘we see through a glass dimly’. We can’t see everything. We can’t possibly know everything. Yet, we act as if we do and that gets us in trouble. We have to let go, suspend our judgement. This present situation could be horrible or it could be the best thing that ever happened. We don’t know yet.

Often people look back years after hardship and they can trace the path from then to now. From this vantage point, years later, frequently they point to a cataclysmic event and say ,’that was the turning point for me. Had that not happened I wouldn’t be here now’, or ‘I wouldn’t be as successful as I am. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.’

Years later we see what we didn’t see it going through it. At the time of the event It doesn’t occur to us that this may be an incredible opportunity disguised as a disaster. Nor do we see it could be a legitimate disaster within which there is the seed of an opportunity.

We don’t know. Maybe we should suspend judgement. The verdict is not in yet and we should wait and see.

The old man knew you can label any situation however you want to label it and that does not make it so. He didn’t judge it so he didn’t get caught up by it.

He didn’t get hooked into it as the others did.They lived one moment happy and the next upset. Then happy then upset. They were like corks adrift on a sea.

The old man was steady whatever came his way he took it in stride. He was the one in charge. The world still occurred around him and influenced he and his son but he chose how he would respond to his circumstance. The old man was wise. You and I can be too.

If you make a mistake on your journey and you do something that disappoints you, or you are not proud of, acknowledge it. Recognize it. Determine not to do it in the future and choose what and how you want to respond instead.

Focus on what you want. Do not what you don’t want. Praise yourself, be grateful for the awareness and the opportunity to change it. Make restitution with yourself and whomever else may be party to it.

Do the best you have with what you have at the time. If you make a mistake, if you fall, correct it, get up and move forward. Let go of the past. Extract the important lesson to learn. Don’t blame yourself or others or make excuses. Accept it and move forward.

You can evolve when you learn from mistakes and failures. You have the opportunity to clarify what you want when smacked in the face with what you don’t want. All can benefit you in profound ways. So fill yourself with gratitude and celebration.

Condition your mind. What you focus on you become. Develop the belief that you are the type of person who can handle anything in positive ways. If you believe it you can become that person. If you believe you can respond instead of react then you will develop the ability.

Your attitude determines your altitude! Your mindset, what you believe and expect of yourself, determines what results you are able to create or get back.

Focus on living a positive life. Focus on learning to respond. Think ‘this or something better is coming to me’.

There is the biblical story of Daniel and the lions. Daniel was thrown into a den of lions. Once inside he turned his back on the lions and trusted the lord.

What a poignant teaching example.Trust! Have faith! He turned his back on and ignored his troubles. He didn’t look at them. He looked elsewhere. He trusted.

He didn’t focus on his worry, fear, or doubt, he looked away. He turned away from what he didn’t want and towards what he wanted. He let go of the problem and had faith that he would be okay.

Of course, he didn’t know he would be okay. It took faith. It took courage. It took trust that there was something better. It took the conviction that these circumstances would not defeat him.

Whether you take the story literally or as a metaphor there is great value in it. He faced his problems and then turned from his problems to the solution. He had faith that the outcome would be positive. What a great example!

At this time, you could be enduring your own personal “den of lions”. The key is not to put your focus on your current situation but trust that it will all work out. Put your focus on what you want, the solution, and not on the problem. Create and make happen what you want to make happen. Don’t succumb to the circumstances.

A couple of my favorite Bible verse are: ‘all things work together for good.’ There are many others in all ancient texts I like. I keep them in mind during trying times. Another one, I remind myself of, again and again, is ‘no weapon formed against me shall prosper’.

Expect the best!

I like those two verses because they reminds me I can move through this world, and any situation, with confidence things will always turn out right no matter what. I will always land on my feet. Everything will work out in the end.

There may be an incredible hardship you face right now but ultimately, things will turn out for the best in the long run. They always seem to. Keep it in mind. Learn to respond as the old man. Trust, as Daniel did.

When I remember this I can let things go. I move forward and surprise myself with my ‘enlightened’ responses. When I forget it I get hooked hard. Usually because a big part of me knows I don’t have to be hooked but I go ahead and get hooked anyway. Silly, right?

We are not perfect and shouldn’t hope to be. We are perfectly imperfect. We are living beings we aren’t carved from stone. We live, we change, we grow, we adapt and we don’t.

Sometimes we remain stuck for awhile. Sometimes we walk backwards, but usually for not very far. At times we walk in the light other times we search in darkness. We will make mistakes.

We will disappoint ourselves and others. Make good when we do. Never ignore that. Do what is right by you and by them. Always have faith in a better day. The sun rises tomorrow. It becomes a new day.

Take 100% responsibility for creating all circumstances. Trust that things will work out. Expect them to. Focus on what you want. Make your dreams come true because only you can. Believe it. What you think about the most you become.

Affirm it. Live It! These blog pages give you the keys how to do this. You can develop the champion mindset. Use these principles and methods to evolve your life into something beyond wonderful! You can live, laugh, love! Celebrate!” Rex Sikes

Delight in this day!

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Act As If, Attitude, Celebration, Creating The Future, Creator, Emotions, Energy, Focus, Getting Over The Past, Gratitude, Habit Formation, Happiness, Intentional Thinking, Mental Movie Theater, Neuro Linguistic Programming, NLP, Overcoming Difficulty, Personal Development, Positive Thinking, Rehearsal And Practice, Relaxation, Responsibility, Self Improvement, Self Talk, Success, Visualization

Don’t Blow Your Top! Do This Instead!

June 4, 2015 rexsikes 1 Comment

“If you have ever felt like you were going to blow your top and you don’t want to you can do this to calm down. Getting angry or getting angrier may not be what is most needed in the moment and you want to be able to be productive and not lose control. How do you get a grip?

When unwanted feelings arise you need to shift into neutral, create a break state, a pause and then shift direction. It is too difficult sometimes to just change. You can steer it as in Aikido. You use the energy offered and direct it elsewhere. That is what we are doing.

You Can Easily Make Changes When You Know How

Head on is too difficult. I have discussed why in previous blog posts. When the momentum is great it is hard to just stop it. You will need to do something first if you haven’t stopped it at the onset. That something you need to add in is the neutral, break state.

A neutral space makes making changes easier because you create a pause when you are being flooded with feelings. The key is to catch the emotional flooding right at the beginning.

This is important. So whenever practice becoming aware at that very moment. Still, this is so powerful you can use it anytime too.

This blog is continued from previous blogs. If you have not yet read those or done the exercises please go read those first. Spend some time developing your skills through mental rehearsal and then return to this one.

Use mental rehearsal to learn what to do when unwanted feelings arise. For example, when you drive a car you know there is a neutral position on your gear shift. In essence, you always go through neutral when you shift gears and change direction.

This exercise will have you create an important neutral space from which you can more easily and readily change. You can use it any time, anywhere, whenever you feel stressed or want to change feelings or thought direction in your mind.

Rehearse And Practice The Skill To Acquire The Skill

It is powerful and can be instantaneous. There may be times when you want to repeat it. It is simple and easy and all you have to do is remember to use it.

That is why we mentally rehearse. You travel in advance of the world so as things come up when you want to use it you will. This is the reason actors, musicians and others rehearse and athletic teams practice.

One of the most powerful tools to use when you need to change your emotional reactions so you can respond more wisely and productively is only a breath away. It is literally taking a deep breath.

A deep breath shifts so many things in your being. It changes the energy moving in your body. If you let out a sigh while breathing it is all the better. That sigh of relief, the sound accompanying the breath, enhances relaxation.

When things are getting hot and you find yourself moving in a direction you do want engage the following.

First learn it and practice it. Then use it when every you need to. Do it in everyday life as soon as possible. It will help greatly.

You Want To Create A Space, A Pause – Take A Break

Go back to another difficult time. Mild. See the events unfold. The usual sequence of events that lead up to that point where you would have gotten angry, frustrated, fearful, worried, sad, confused, overwhelmed whatever it may be.

Watch it in your mind in your mental movie theater and when you get to that point where you would lose it STOP and watch yourself take a deep breath! Then another.

Watch yourself create space by stopping and taking a deep breath. Watch yourself shift your physiology. Shift your body, alter how you stand and move. Breathe and shift. Walk it off! Take a break from your problem.

Take a pause when things start to get critical. Everything is moving along and then suddenly you are going in a direction you don’t want. STOP, take a deep breath, shift your body, walk or do something different AND CHOOSE A POSITIVE RESOURCE.

Go through this process just as described and you watch yourself get to the point where you, would have in the past behaved in less than glorious ways only this time, see yourself stop, take a deep breath, shift your physiology and behave in the new resourceful way. From start to finish. Do you like what you see?

Adjust It As Necessary

Stop and take a deep breath and add in the new resource. Realize you have new choices available to you. You you can walk it off right where you are. Manage you self talk. Say positive things. Now you can respond with positive choices. Watch it to the end and then when it finishes shake it off (literally shake yourself a bit).

Once you have recoded one experience from your past then pick at least 3 more times when you have similar response. Change those in your mind. Shake it off after each repetition of the exercise. Let’s say you do one situation 3x you shake off after each time. Then you pick another time and do it 3x with shake 3x and then the last 3x 3x.

Remember to use the shake to change your physiology and end the process. Then take a moment and go back do it again.

Seeing And Hearing And Feeling On The Inside (POV)

Use the other way of seeing and experiencing.

Rerun the process from your POV. Go back and imagine it from this vantage point. From within you can feel the feelings change as you go from the beginning to the critical moment.

Just before that less than glorious eruption you say stop (inside your head) and you feel yourself take a deep breath (and another). You sigh as you let the air out.

Feel the pause or a break in the action, create space, walk it off, manage your positive self talk and choose the resource you have been using for this.

See it, hear it, feel it! Notice how it is different. Feel the changes. Celebrate it and Live it. Then realize that is how it can be in the future. Do it again and again until you feel great about it

Then pick 3 more times when you have similar response. Change those in your mind. Remember, to shake it off after each time.

Maybe once is all you need but since we become what we think about repeat this exercise again and again. Do it daily. Remember you are learning a sequence of behaviors. You are taking charge of your mental behaviors and learning a process.

Take time to go into your past and find resources. Build your library of resources. Go into your past difficulties and change them from being a limitation into a resource. Recode the past by applying a resource where and when it was needed. You are transforming and recoding past memories.

Do you realize this about the situation you changed? That was how it was in the past. It could have been different in the past. It wasn’t you did whatever you did back then and that is okay. That was then and you did your best with what you knew.

It could have been a more resourceful time for you but it wasn’t. Accept it. BUT now you have just recoded it as more resourceful. You have imagined what it would have been like to have had that resource and how things could have been different.

SO stop now and realize you can be more resourceful in the present and the future too. You have more resources you can use when you need to.

Create The Future The Way You Want It To Be

You also are a creator. You can create. You know there may be some situations in the future that could give you difficulty because they may have in the past. These are those situations that seem to happen again and again ever so often. To begin practice pick a mild one of these. Always start with mild. Now let’s recode the future too!

Imagine, in your mental movie theater that future you. Repeat the process watching it unfold up until the point where you stop, take a deep breath and change it from being a difficulty into a resourceful moment. You repeat this exercise as the previous one doing it from start to finish and shaking it off. Repeat 3x or more. Shake it off after each time. Then repeat the process from your POV.

Do this whenever you need to get some space between you and whatever is going on. Perhaps, some driver pisses you off, change it. Take a deep breath, relax slow down, enjoy the drive. Practice this it could be really important some day.

A boss or co-worker is on your back, take a deep breath, sigh and change the energy. Take a break, go to the restroom, calm down and return. Trouble with a family member or loved one. Don’t lose your cool take a breath. Anytime and anywhere this can save the moment Use it.

Re- Cap

This process allows you to recode the past and prepare for the future. During both you search for and apply resources. During both you stop, create a break state or a pause, you use your physiology differently, and you continue forward having chosen a resource.

You are always welcome to add in more than one resource. One is usually plenty, but sometimes adding in two or three presents us with even more awareness and opportunity. So feel free to repeat the exercise (just as described) only with a new and different resource each time.

You may also magnify those feeling 2, or 3 or even 5 times in intensity. It is your mind and you can ramp it up. You already know how to make things more intense in real life. We have volume controls and dials.

You turn it up or press a button. You can do the same thing within your mental movie theater. Re-live it from your point of view and enhance and amplify the wonderful feelings! You know when you have had some energy and when you have been super charged. Pick the more intense examples to use.

Use It And Transform Your LIfe

In the real world you will behave and act more productively as this a becomes habit. Take the time to practice and make it automatic. In the coming days if you have an episode and you respond in the new way, positively, fantastic!

If you don’t and you loose control, no worries! Everyone of us can slip and fall now and then. Pat yourself on the back for becoming aware. Recognize what happened, what you might have done differently, and immediately do the mental exercise for how you’d like to be next time.

Get feedback from the situation, learn from it and continue your practice. What is awesome about the human mind is that you might start off spending 20 or 30 minutes a day, practicing for a month or more to make it a habit.

During this time frame you may be using it too. I hope so! Eventually, you will be do it in less time inside your head. Then even less time. Before long you will run the process in seconds in real life whenever you need to.

Regarding learning and practicing new skills. A flower it takes time to grow. So does a new skill. Stick with it. As you resolve these situations pick other people or situations where you don’t respond as you would like to and work on those too.

Use It Or Lose It

Soon you will have re-coded and re-routed lots of difficult situations. You will have used your mind to change your behaviors. You have taken charge so enjoy it! Celebrate it and validate it.

Any time you fall, get back up, learn from it and do the new behavior in your mind a more productive way. Recognize what you don’t want but stop focusing on it. Drop it and focus on what you do want instead. Remember, we get what we think about most!

Don’t wallow about the old address. You have moved to a new location. Aim your mind in the direction of the new one.

It’s simple to understand, You practice and rehearse what you want for the future. You use your mind the way an actor or athletic team uses rehearsal or practice time. In your mind you act as if you have all the resources you need in any situation. You imagine and act how you want to be.

Our mind doesn’t know the difference between a mental images and images seen through our eyes. That is why this works. We can create a new self image and practice new behaviors. The more you rehearse and practice the better you get. The better you get with it the more you get it in your real life

Use these processes to overcome your difficulties, and learn new ways to be. You can and will transform your life positively if you want to.

What you rehearse, fill your mind with, think about and focus on for most of your time expands. You get and become what you think about. Use your mental movie theater to bring you all sorts of wonderfulness now and in the future! Enjoy making your life more the way you want it to be. Be grateful and be glad! More to come!” Rex Sikes

Use today to live a new way!

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Acceptance, Attitude, Beliefs, Celebration, Creating The Future, Creator, Decision, Emotions, Energy, Focus, Forgiveness, Getting Over The Past, Gratitude, Habit Formation, Healthy Choices, Intentional Thinking, Living In The Moment, Overcoming Difficulty, Personal Development, Positive Thinking, Responsibility, Self Improvement, Unlimited Power

Stop Living In Pain! Connect The Dots To Feeling Better

May 30, 2015 rexsikes Leave a comment

“Have you ever played connect the dots? You know, you start at one dot and follow each until an image emerges. Will you do it with your life? Can you look back and see how each event that stands out in your mind and each decision you made has lead to where you are right now?

At each historic event in your life there may have been many pathways to alternate results. Can you see how your decisions at each point have lead you to where you are today? Can you see that? While it may appear there were any number of possible choices and outcomes can you see that given your decision you are right where you are supposed to be?

I do not mean you were predestined nor do I mean someone other than you is dictating the outcomes. What I mean is given the choices you have had in your life can you, or are you willing to see, looking back, how the decisions you made were stepping stones to the present?

I’ll give you an example. I had someone I deeply loved who broke up with me as a young man. I was horribly crushed. I didn’t want a future without her. Had she not broken up with me I would not have the incredible children I have today.

While it may be true I may have had other children and been happy had we stayed together we did not. What I do have are two children I love and adore and could not be happier as a result. Do I mourn the breakup now? Absolutely not.

I had a car accident that kept me laid up for a long time in a part of the country that wasn’t my home. As a result I eventually met the woman who became the mother of my children. Had I not had the terrible car accident I would never have had these children.

Do you see what I mean? Now, in these examples it appears I am only pointing to events outside my control. Things that happened to me. That is part of it. It is what the universe offered. Events happen. Inside of each I made countless decisions that affected my present at that time and the future outcomes.

For example, I stayed after recovery to have the relationship that lead to my children. Had I chosen to return home and not continue the relationship I would not have my kids. I had to give up certain things in one part of the country to have other things in another part of the country.

One of the points I am trying to make is that each dot leads to another and the entire picture emerges but we don’t see it all at one time. We don’t know the eventual outcome. How we view each dot is important. I could abhor my present and look back and see how each dot has lead to now, and how I might have decided otherwise.

No point crying over spilt milk. Yes, you or I may have decided otherwise at anytime but did not. Get over it is the only thing to do. We can not, nor should we, regret the past. If we can’t change it we should find a better use of our thoughts and our time.

We can use those feelings though to decide to change our present and have a better one. We can determine to have a better future too. This is when past exploration is useful if it leads to a set of wiser choices in the now that we can make.

Otherwise, sifting through the crap in our lives, living hurt and disappointment over and over again is a pointless, devastating use of time. A key to having a happy life is knowing how to use your mind to look for and find what you want. Another key is knowing how to spend your time doing what brings you those results.

Look into the past and recognize choice points. Notice how upheaval events, big boulders, are the stepping stone to now, and without them you would not be who you are today. Whether or not you successfully negotiated those, whether or not you appreciate the outcome they are part of your history.

Therefore, they have helped determine who you are today. For goodness sakes be grateful!!!

Without them, perhaps, everything would be different. However, there is NO without them. They are historically in you past. Examine how those events, no matter how horrible, have contributed to you. You have lived on. Days, weeks, maybe years have passed since that time, those times. Appreciate this!

If you are dragging the boulders with you everywhere you go that is a difficult way to travel. You need to put them down and let them go. You need to examine how, no matter how terrible they may have been and how life crushing they were at the time, those very events are disguised blessings. Appreciate this too!

Inside each were, as there always IS, choice points we face. There are always decisions we have to make. In each decision we made, whether the result was better or worse, is the seed of opportunity for betterment. Find the seeds! They are within the dots!

Whatever we did, however we chose, brought us to right now. If you don’t like where you are right now, maybe you can imagine, whether true or not, a greater force trying to get your attention to make better decisions. My guess, it is not coming from outside you but from within you. YOU are trying to get YOUR attention.

Negative feelings are your way of signaling YOU that you need to make a change. They are telling you you are focused on the wrong things. You are focused on what you do not want. The signal value will get as loud as necessary for you to hear it and change things.

Some people, instead of recognizing the signal and changing what they are doing, live with the negative feelings. Imagine, a messenger shows up at your home and instead of taking the message and acting on it you invite the messenger to live with you. Some people tolerate negative feelings and pain instead of making change that benefits them.

They are simply mistaken. The don’t realize the feelings are there to get their attention The feelings are yelling “HELLO! IS this bad enough yet? HELLO, HELLO? okay well then we’ll ramp them up and see if this get’s you to pay attention. HELLO HELLO!”

On and on it goes as a vicious cycle because the human isn’t aware of why those less than glorious feeling are there. They are there so you DECIDE to change your focus. That is all they truly are! Use them don’t continue to be abused by them. Stop and change what you are paying attention to. Stop paying attention to the negative thoughts and feelings!!! Use the feelings only as a guide, as a messenger!

You can’t change the past but you can use the past to change what you are presently doing so that you get better results. Part of this evolutionary self change means reframing the past as necessary. Look at it and assign different meaning to it.

Assign a more useful and productive meaning to it. Notice how each dot follows the other in some way as a road map to now. Find the good in each disappointment and you are doing something incredibly valuable for yourself! You will transform the past when you find the good. The result will be a better present and future!

You don’t have to live in regret and personal woe. At this moment there is a choice what to do with the past. You can keep hurting or you can decide to live happily and victoriously. Even considering these notions is a choice point for you. What will you do?

I hope you will look at each moment meaningfully and positively and find the good that has come from each disappointment. Sadly, many people miss all the positive, incredible, stepping stones in their life because they only see the boulders.

That is narrow, limited vision and no way to live. One only lives that way because they made looking for what is wrong a habit. You can change that! There is plenty of wonderful events and good too that should not be missed. Habits should serve you you should not serve habits.

Silver lining surround every dark cloud but we have to look for it. We need to find the good. Train your mind to find the good, especially if you have never trained it to do so. If you have not deliberately trained your mind to find the good, to see the positive, to celebrate everything, then you won’t. Make it a habit!

Your mind will run on and on doing whatever it learned to do haphazardly and carrying out the programming given it by others. That is not how you want to live and use your mind. Claim it back and train it to find the strength, the confidence, the happiness and joy that are there that you are missing because you don’t know where or how to look. You can do it!

This moment is an opportunity for you to take control, resolve the past, forgive and let go. It is an opportunity to make the present marvelous and move into the future with confidence, power and joy. It is the opportunity for you to create what you want instead of living as you don’t want.

You always have choices whether you know it or not. Only, you have to decide. NO decision, to not make one, is actually a decision to do nothing. Waiting is only waiting. Someday never comes, today is all we have. You and I can live it positively, happily with an attitude of gratitude for everything that came before and what we have now.

When we are grateful for everything, truly grateful, there is immense power within you to create and attract anything and everything you want. You become a magnet for blessings, opportunities and advantages. Celebrate everything!

You live with purpose, deliberately using your thoughts and feelings to have fabulous day no matter what crap the world hurls your way. When you are grateful for everything. When you are grateful for every decision you made, regardless of the outcome, you are beginning to take responsibility for you. When you can take 100% responsibility for you is when the miracles begin happening!

Then nothing is left up to chance, nor to anyone else. You are the captain of your life and the master of your fate and the creator of your circumstances. You become more fully alive and dynamically charged. There are no blames, no excuses only celebration and gratitude and this is an incredible way to live.

You can have it all when you decide to take charge. When take responsibility for all your decisions, your thoughts, feelings and actions you are the master of these and your life becomes magical! It is absolutely wonderful. Yes, crap may happen, but life is wonderful.

Won’t you do this now for yourself? “Rex Sikes

Be good and kind to yourself today!

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The Easy Way To Keep Your Life & Career From Going Bad

May 26, 2015 rexsikes 2 Comments

” The goal, as I write in these pages, is to feel the best you are able to at any given moment. Even, if you only feel a little bit better, that is what matters. It matters that you move yourself in the positive direction of feeling good. The results can be amazing!

It absolutely matters that YOU choose what you want to make yourself feel because it has an incredibly powerful and profound lasting effect. Your life can absolutely change from bad to better and from better to best when you apply these principles and practices.

Steer Toward The Positive

I have mentioned numerous times that it is necessary to cultivate the ability to steer back toward the positive. This is a skill that can be developed. ‘How?’ you ask. Take 100% responsibility for your thoughts and feelings. Promise yourself you will learn to be in charge.

Train your mind to see the good in everything. Train yourself to find the best feelings you are able to at all times. Keep your focus on the positive. What seems impossible to do at first and requires discipline becomes easier and easier the more you do it.

Develop These Abilities As Habits

Make your thoughts and feelings work for you instead of you working for them. It is said about the wealthy they don’t work for their money. They have learned how to make their money work for them. It’s true! They make money while they sleep from a variety of sources.

The same is true about your thoughts, attitude and mindset. Make your mind work for you instead of you being a victim of it. Learn to control your thoughts and feelings. Be the master not the servant. They do not teach you this in school unfortunately.

Usually, we are taught we have no control over anything but if we work hard we can succeed. Consider it one of the best kept secrets ‘they’ don’t want you to know about. You can control your thoughts and feelings.

Your Mind Is The One Thing You Can Have Complete Control Of

Once you master your mind you can shut it off. You can give up control once you have it, whenever you like. Once you learn that your thoughts are subject to your will you realize YOU are bigger than your thoughts. You are bigger than your thoughts.

You will be in charge of the thoughts you think instead of you thinking that the thinking is going on outside of your control. Do you get that? It is a silly thought to think that you can’t control what you think. Why would you ever think that. You wouldn’t if you were in charge of your thoughts.

You think those kind of silly things because somewhere in your life time you co-opted the thoughts of others. You didn’t even realize that was what you were doing while it was going on but it was.

You adopted thoughts from others as your own instead of thinking for yourself. Realize you have power to seize control and seize it! Anyone can do it. Few actually will. Be one of the few that do instead of the countless that won’t. Make your live wonderful!

If you think silly, useless or stupid, destructive thoughts, or weak, wimpy, powerless thoughts that is what you get back. You will get back in results THE Results of your crappy ineffective thinking. Is that what you want? If the answer is no then now is the time to learn to take control.

Decide What You Will Think And Feel

Control means you decide what you will think and feel. It means you allow what you want to experience and ignore or eliminate that which you don’t. It means you can start thoughts that help you and stop those that don’t. When you want to meditate or relax you can choose your thoughts or turn them off.

You can’t relinquish control if you don’t have it in the first place. You have to be in control to let go of control. Control means you train your mind and make your mind YOUR servant. Make your mind work for you automatically instead of you working for it.

You only have to move yourself incrementally in the right direction bit by bit over time, repeatedly, in order to learn how to manage your thoughts and feelings. It is similar to learning to ride a bike or drive a car or anything else you have ever learned to do. It is a skill, and ability you can get better at and get good at the more you do it.

Correct Repetition Builds Skill And Brings Benefits

The more you do it and the better you get at it the more confidence and competence you develop. The more you do it the more you are able to do and the better you feel. It continues this way. Everything begins getting better because you started making small but purposeful changes.

The art is learning to promote what you want to grow and enjoy and to let go of that which causes pain or suffering. Plenty occurs in the world that we might get caught up in for any length of time. Awareness, is when we notice we are not doing what we want to, we are not working according to plan and we steer back onto track.

Instead of feeling bad about going off course we celebrate getting back on course. All of us can go off course. That is part of living. Getting back on course is what we learn to do. We are gentle and loving and accepting of ourselves through it all. We find reasons to enjoy life and celebrate.

If I Can Do It I Know You Can Probably Do It Even Better

I choose to think about my children. I focus on how lucky I am to have them in my life and how great I feel. I count my blessings in many other ways. Family, friends, opportunity, difficult life lessons, experiences, travels, talents, events, all make up my life and my world. I am grateful for all of it. My life is perfect each moment.

When I focus on these things, before you know it, I feel much better. It is easy to feel better when we devote a bit of time to it. Because birds of a feather flock together once we find the first thing, or first few things to celebrate more flock to our mind. We find other things to become thankful about and celebrate.

Remember all the reasons you usually feel delighted. Don’t just intellectually recount these but feel them. Really allow yourself to feel the gratitude and the celebration.

I write this today because sometimes we can benefit from a nudge in the right direction. Keep at it. Make it a habit. It gets easier and easier. Any bumps in the road are there for you to learn how to not be thrown of course by bumps in the road. Pretty soon you can navigate pretty much any way. Enjoy and celebrate the process!” Rex Sikes

Enjoy today!

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Do This One Tiny Change And You Can Move Mountains!

May 25, 2015 rexsikes Leave a comment

“Some people think in order to make positive, permanent, pervasive, change that they must change everything at once in order to get anything at all. That is just not true. What is true is you must change something but you don’t need an entire make over.

You have heard me say, or you have read in my writings a favorite quote, ‘drop by drop fills the tub’. Or I ask, how do you eat and elephant? Answer, ‘Bite by bite’. You know the famous quote, ‘A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step’.

Small changes can be powerful. When NASA shoots a rocket to the moon its internal guidance correction system is making micro corrections all the while to keep it on course. That’s because if the rocket blasts off and is 1/10 of 1% off course near the time of lift off within a short while it will be hundreds of thousands, even millions of miles off course.

If you were driving straight in the salt flats and you turned your wheel just a tiny bit and locked it in right there soon you would be miles and miles away from the straight line you were traveling in. That small adjustment takes you way off in another direction.

So it is true if you are aiming at a target destination and you get off course by only the tiniest little bit you will be off course by a lot very soon.

The other truth is if you want to change your life it only takes a little bit of change to make a serious amount of large change. That tiny correction you make will take you very far in improving your life.

You exclaim, ‘I don’t have the time, the energy or the money to make changes right now!’ That is okay. Make one small change you can stick with and you will be amazed with the results you can get.

Whatever it is. Perhaps, it is dedicating yourself to reading a page or more of inspirational material each and every day when you get up. That isn’t much to commit to. 1 single page. Certainly, you could do more if you want but you could do at least a page.

Maybe you decide to listen to inspirational audio while you drive. That’s a great time to listen to motivational inspiring speakers. It is also a great time to shout out with enthusiasm your daily affirmations. It’s an excellent time for either or for both.

Or, you decide to spend 5 minutes focused on your goals first thing in the morning when you get up. You visualize yourself seeing yourself as already having all the changes you want. You imagine living and behaving in that positive reality.

Perhaps, you spend 5 minutes laughing when you arise. 5 minutes non-stop laughing. Or you laugh during your drive. You could commit to smiling more though out the day. Maybe, you commit to doing things each day that put a smile on someone else’s face.

You might decide to spice up your life by trying new things. You use your opposite hand to eat, shave, comb your hair. You drive different ways to school or work. You walk places you have never been. You sleep with your head at the foot of the bed. Anything!

You keep a journal of all you are grateful for and as you list each thing you real spend a moment feeling the wonderful feelings. You decide to be nicer to the people around you.

You pay attention and really listen to people to understand. You monitor and manage your self-talk for a certain amount of time during the day. You meditate for 5, 20, 30 minutes a day.

You make it a point to stop complaining and blaming and you only speak about those things that uplift and make you and others feel good. You accentuate the positive. You speak only to bless, heal and prosper yourself and others.

You don’t have to do all of these.You could. Certainly they are all manageable. But don’t bite off more than you can chew.

Pick one and commit to doing for no less than 30 days and perhaps a whole lot more. You will be surprised at what a difference it can make.

A little change, like a little faith, can move mountains.

Maybe, as you go along you discover you want to and can add in other things. DO whatever pleases you and makes you feel wonderful.

But if you do nothing nothing will change.” Rex Sikes

Fill your day with delight!

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Do This: Whenever You Are Frustrated. When It Just Isn’t Happening!

May 21, 2015 rexsikes 1 Comment

“Why are you frustrated? You don’t seem to be making headway fast enough? You probably hate it when someone says, ‘relax. Be patient.’ You don’t want patience right, you want your efforts to pay off now! Don’t you?

That, wanting, that desire, that insisting, THAT IS your suffering.

You are trying to push a rope. You are trying to force the process. You are trying to make water boil faster and you just can’t. Instead of relaxing and letting go you are getting hot. You do need to be patient and that makes it all the more difficult, doesn’t it?

You are split. You want it, it isn’t working. You know you shouldn’t feel this way but you do. You go back and forth, you can’t make it hurry and you are in a hurry. You are divided. Bouncing back and forth as if off walls. Guess what? You really CAN’T force it.

You do have to relax and wait. SO you might as well learn how to.

If you don’t know relaxation methods you should. Learn them when you don’t need them or when you do. Just take sometime and learn to relax, let go and enjoy life in spite of everything. Learn the value and importance of taking a break, a vacation from your woes. Listen to relaxation mp3s online or CDs. Take a class.

Go somewhere nice for a few days. Enjoy something. Actually take your mind off it. Meditate, go work out, work in the garden. Walk. But take a well needed, well deserved break. Seek to develop the abilities to accept, to let go, to relax and to be patient.

Those who are truly successful know what they can and can’t control. If they can’t control time then they use their time to feel better. The unsuccessful use their time to feel worse. Which do you want to be?

Go golfing, swimming, camping. Engage in a hobby. Have some fun. Let go. Successful people take out their yacht, their Porsche. They do anything to take a break. They aren’t going to let themselves feel frustrated when there are better feelings to enjoy!

You can be, do and have anything you want in life when you first determine what it is you want. Then you passionately let it consume you and you pursue it with persistence. You don’t quit until you have it.

You can transform yourself into a relaxed, successful person with a winning attitude and winning behaviors by beginning to imagine yourself as that kind of person, if you aren’t already.

Go back through my blog site and read and review my posts on how to become who you want to become. Learn to do what you want to be able to do. Find out how to get whatever it is you what to have.

Patience is your attitude and behavior while you wait. It is what you think and do in the meantime. It defines who you are. Patience means you are waiting for an expected outcome.

Imagine how different people were a couple centuries ago. There was no instant on anything, no high speed internet, no jet travel, no microwaves. Whatever time it took, took the time it took to complete.

People had to wait for water to boil; it took time to build a fire and warm the house. Trips took however long they took by horse, ship, and eventually by rail. To cross the ocean or the country you live in took a long time. You couldn’t be in too much of a rush if things too weeks and months. My guess is they were qualitatively different than we are today.

For everything there is a season. Farmers planted and harvested in whatever time it took. They grew up used to waiting. Waiting was a big part of life. Mail took a long time. Communication and change was slow. There was no emergency medicine as we know it. No 911 responders.

People had a much different relationship to time. My guess is that they were less in a hurry than modern people because they grew up waiting for many things. Either you got used to it as a life style or you suffered. BUT they also didn’t have any difference to compare it to.

Those who have grown up with instant access, drive-up banking, microwaves, high speed this and that, the media and advertisers’ promise of faster, quicker, overnight, you can have it yesterday magic pills and silver bullets, get frustrated when things take time.

We think everything should be quicker, easier, take no effort, take no time AND be better. Our thoughts determine what we experience. We don’t have the same quality of patience as the people who lived long ago. We need to think the thoughts that serve us better. Our thoughts are what we can control!

That farmer, back then, planted and expected to harvest a crop. Sometimes the weather or conditions changed and crops failed, Sometime they were more bountiful but either way that farmer planted, WAITED and EXPECTED to harvest. It took all the required time it took. He had to do other things in the meantime!

Wait and see meant wait and see.

Patience requires faith. In faith you wait for what you believe will happen, what you know will happen. You wait for what you expect to happen. After all you expect the sun to come up tomorrow. It is a given. You expect the Christmas holiday madness near the end of each year. These are givens!

If you chose to take a pleasure cruise across the seas you expect to get to your destination. You don’t doubt that you will get there, although anything is possible. You have faith that you will arrive when you arrive. So you can relax and enjoy the journey.

When it comes to making our dreams come true and accomplishing our goals patience is required. We plant the seeds, we think about it day and night, we visualize, we affirm, we work our plan and we wait.

How we wait is important. Either you are patient and expect good things or you are frustrated, tense, hurried and frazzled.

If we are patient we know it is happening. It is coming there is no question about that. It’s a given! The time doesn’t matter because we have put it into motion. We are initiators. We are creators. We make things happen. It will happen, we know it, it is just a matter of when. We have faith.

Yes, that may be tougher today because of our modern conveniences and our relationship to time but patience is still required. It is an attribute or characteristic that serves us well.

We shouldn’t be making excuses and whining and complaining and blaming others or the era we are born into. We should be cultivating winning behaviors and attitudes that make our success and happiness more likely.

You don’t cultivate new thoughts and behaviors thinking and doing the old ones repeatedly. We must change our thoughts and behaviors if we want changes in our lives. We must develop those areas that help us reliably get what we want.

We need to exercise our positivity, our faith, our patience and our persistence. We must commit to excellence.

We must wait expecting the positive outcome. We can’t dig the seeds up and check. We must not let out circumstances convince us that anything but the outcome we want, or better, is on the horizon.

If we give in to worry, doubt, fear, we undo our efforts. We get mixed results. We take a step forward and then backwards. We get caught up. Then we don’t have faith, patience or positive expectations. We are frustrated. You don’t move forward quickly if you undo each forward step you take.

We are looking at the wrong things. We are looking at results we created previously that are presently manifesting while the new results are growing in darkness. Keep your faith no matter what.

In order to get what we want we must remain laser like focused. We must rest assured. We must be convinced. We must know in our heart we have done the necessary work (when we actually have) and now it is only a matter of time. AND we continue to do whatever is necessary; we continue to have faith and wait expectantly.

How do we live in the meantime? We celebrate, we enjoy, we live in the present to the fullest. We delight and are thankful and live with true gratitude. We let every moment fill us. When there are obstacles we overcome them by utilizing our personal resourcefulness. We have a winning attitude! We know how to relax too.

We live with passion, we live in this moment knowing good things are coming in the future. We know that what we have put in motion and what we keep in motion will be ours soon enough. We know the garden we planted in time will bloom. We nurture it along and enjoy where we are now at. This is a great way to live!” Rex Sikes

Enjoy and have fun today!

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Are You Ready To Transform Your HoHum Life Into A More Positive, Successful, Rewarding One?

May 20, 2015 rexsikes Leave a comment

“You would never think to put anything but the right fuel in the gas tank of your car, would you? Oddly, some people treat their cars and boats and planes better than they do themselves.

What You Feed Yourself Is Important

What you put into your system either nourishes you, builds you up, adds to your health or it does not. If you eat the right healthy food choices you can expect to be healthier than if you eat junk food and empty calories.

When you eat right you feel better, think better, behave better because you have provided your body the proper fuel it needs to go about its tasks. This principle not only applies to your physical health but your mental, emotional, spiritual and social health as well.

What You Focus On Is What You Get

Whatever you fill your mind with will be reflected in your attitude and in the life you live. If your current circumstances aren’t everything you want them to be then it is a sure bet you aren’t maintaining a healthy diet in one or more of these important areas.

If you want an incredible fulfilled life then you must provide your mind, heart and spirit with the proper nutritious fuel. You can’t become rich focusing on lack. You won’t be a success if you are concerned with defeat. You will not be happy if you are worried all the time.

Here is what you must do if you want your life to be more positive, more successful and much more rewarding.

Spend Time Each Day Consuming Positive Reading Material

It isn’t how much your read it is how much time you spend reading that is important. The longer you spend the more you benefit. Some people will complain they have no time. Then read at least a page or two from some excellent inspiring material daily.

Listen To Inspirational And Motivational Speakers

Listen to thought leaders who can help move you in positive ways. Fill your mind and your time with positive messages that lift you up and encourage you. Whenever you drive is an excellent time for listening.

Surround Yourself With Positive Friends

Keep company with positive people and influences who lift you up and move you forward. Eliminate those messages and media influences that are negative. Reduce the amount of time you spend with friends who whine, complain, gossip and bring you down.

Evaluate These

Who do you listen to? What do you read? How much time do you spend each day devoted to your mental, physical, emotional, spiritual, wealth and social well-being? Are you nurturing yourself?

Are you developing and enhancing positive relationships with family, friends, co-workers and love interests? Are you building your bank account and making your dreams come true?

How Are You Spending The Bulk Of Your Time?

Is it invested in you or in distractions and limitations? Are you watching television for hours on end, gaming, spending time on social media?

Are you filling yourself with positive inspiring news or news on how everything is falling apart and sucks? Are you predominantly positive or predominantly negative? What occupies your focus and attention most of the time? To what do you give your energy?

If you are what you eat you also are what you think and what you do. You are known by the company you keep. Your actions speak louder than words. If garbage goes into the system garbagewill come out of the system. This is known as the Principle Of GIGO.

You know how they train animals to behave, don’t you? Repetition and conditioning is the key. They use positive reinforcement as a system of rewards.

Research has determined the best way to extinguish an unwanted behavior in animals and humans is to ignore it. Do not draw attention to it. Let it go. Instead, reward the behaviors you want to flourish. Repeat the behaviors you want to make habitual and automatic. Practice makes permanent.

Successful People Are Conditioned For Success

They learn from birth on because they have the right parents, or they get training and mentoring, or they stumble into it eventually through trial and error. Howeverthey come by it they live and think differently than those who are not successful.

Successful people follow patterns for success. The repeat the patterns again and again making corrections and adjustments as necessary. In going through this process they condition themselves for success. Wash, rinse, repeat. Practice makes permanent.

Don’t Get Caught Up In The Negative

Successful people don’t get caught in the negative but encourage patterns that work. Any great athletic, business or life coach knows this too. Place the emphasis on what you want not on what you don’t want because you get back what you focus on. They know that what you think about you become. Affirm what you want!

People who are not successful and who have difficulty in life repeat patterns of defeat. The wash, rinse and repeat that which does not work and that brings them down. The have habits that do not serve to make them happy, healthy or wealthy. Their habits make them miserable and keep them poor.

Successful People Utilize Positive Intentional Thinking

You can too. Focus on what you want, what you intend to create, what you intend to be, do or have and let the other stuff go. Remember, whatever you put your attention on grows in importance. What you think about you bring about!

Keep your attention off the negative, off the worry, off the fear, the doubts and anxiety. Keep it off comparisons to others, the blaming, whining, criticizing and making excuses. Keep talk and self-talk positive!

Focus On What You Want

Focus on the positive, the healthy, the nourishing good food and fuel for your mind, heart, spirit, and body. Then you will become what you want to be, do what you want to do and have what you want to have. What you think about you bring about.

What consumes the mind and fills the heart is what you get back in return. Fill yourself with celebration. Be grateful for whatever you have and whomever is in your life. Be filled with gratitude for everything and you will live a joyous life! Smile frequently!

The more time you fill with positive, productive, successful practices and people the more you will transform your life.

Intentionally choose your positive thoughts and fully express gratitude and celebration. The more you enjoy these positive feelings the quicker and easier you will find delight and joy and transform your experience from ho-hum to absolutely incredible. Don’t wait, begin today!” Rex Sikes

Be thrilled today!

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Accidents Happen And Boy When They Do

May 18, 2015 rexsikes 3 Comments

“It turns out the universe wants me to slow down. This morning, I was exiting the house, keys in hand on my way to a meeting, focused on hitting the button on the keys to open the car when I hit an uneven spot in the walkway and was pitched headfirst into my car.

I slammed into the car, my left knee hitting the pavement, my right foot twisting and turning under me as I fell on it. I got up slowly, it was difficult, my knee scraped and bleeding, my right foot sore. My wrists and forehead worse for wear but ok. I laughed, ‘what was that?’

I hobbled around looking for my keys. Took about 10 minutes when I noticed them about 20 feet away in the driveway in front of the car. Onto my meeting I went, sore but okay. I laughed it off at the meeting and had a most wonderful, marvelous meeting of new beginnings in many ways. Many new doors opened right then.

In olden by gone days I would have sworn, complained, wondered what I had done to cause this, or wondered why I had crappy luck. I would have been miserable. I would have poisoned the pot with negative self-talk, criticisms and negative questions.

Today, I could only think, ‘This is a blessing! Wow, something good is going to come of this. I wonder what it might be. I have no clue. Surprise me.’ It was automatic.

As we were leaving the meeting I took my foot our of my shoe to see if it had swollen and stepped down onto the pavement and that was it. WOW! The pain was unbelievable. Up until then everything was fine, pretty much. I still had errands to run but now I was seriously hobbled and in a lot of pain.

I did them. I limped around doing errands the pain increasing all the while! I drove home. I barely made it into the house and into a recliner. Eventually, I called my daughter and asked if she could take me to urgent care. She came by and she did. What an angel. We got to urgent care about 4 hours after the injury.

At Urgent Care I passed out twice. I don’t recall it but so I am told. I nearly puked. I was hot and sweating. Apparently, I had spent too much time on the injury.

They x-rayed my foot eventually and gave me a diagnosis. The pain grew and grew. They wheeled me from room to room. They were very caring. Finally, they left my daughter and I alone in a room together.

I looked at my daughter and realized I was exhibiting pain in front of her all the while. She was watching Dad suffer. This isn’t a bad thing we all can hurt. Pain is a natural response.

However, recently I have been trying to tell her you can handle tough times, you can get through the pain, it too will pass and here I am passing out from it. I was not the example I hoped I would be. She, of course, already does know everything I am trying to ‘teach’ her. That’s the kind of person she is! Amazing.

I looked at her and focused on her. Inside I thought, ‘it is only pain’. I focused on my daughter, I kept that thought in mind and looked at her and my heart filled with love. Within minutes I knew I could handle the pain. We were smiling. It was wonderful.

During all of this time, from the accident onward, I kept thinking inside, ‘Wow, something good is coming my way, I have no idea what but something incredible is coming’.

I believe it too. I know it is. I began to say it out loud so she would know what I was thinking. ‘There is a blessing in all of this!, Something good will come of this.’ ‘I don’t know what yet, but it is a blessing.’

Speaking it out loud has its own power. It makes it more real too. AND I wasn’t lecturing I was just Dad talking to himself. I was affirming what I knew to be true and she was hearing me and seeing me. Even in crisis any of us can be resourceful. Everything can be a blessing if we only choose to see it that way!

If ever there is a strong, incredibly resilient person it is my daughter. She truly is my teacher as is my son. From the moment they were each born I committed to being the best guide I could be on our journey together.

I promised to love them no matter what. I also knew deep in my soul they would teach me more about parenting than I could ever teach them about growing up. I am the luckiest guy on earth with such incredible children.

Okay, so I know something about pain management and have practiced it for decades. I have taught pain control in workshops and seminars in various locations around the world. People have flow thousands of miles to spend days, weeks and months with me in seminars and live training.

Yet, in the heat of the moment I was caught up in the hurt.

I closed my eyes put my head back and began to think and ask myself, ‘what part of my body feels the very best?’ ‘In how many different ways can I discover myself feeling wonderful?’ ‘What is the best feeling I can find right now?’

‘Where does it feel wonderful? In how many different ways can I discover all the places in my body that feel good?’ I sent my brain on a search by asking questions and it delivered.

I used Directed Questions™ to direct my mind to what were the best feelings I could find. I found them and began feeling those! I began to experience relief. I was beginning to pay attention to what felt good instead of what felt bad. I was looking for what was right instead of what was wrong. I was finding it too.

My mind was attending to what felt the best. It was searching for the ways in which this incident was a blessing right now, in this moment, AND in the future with many good things coming my way. My daughter was here, we were together, she was helping me. This moment IS a perfect moment.

We were blessed in this way right in this moment! The moment was unfolding. It wasn’t just a blessing and an opportunity for the future it was a blessing right now. How lucky we were to be sharing this moment! An accident brought us this realization. How marvelous is that?

I had steered away from the pain back into the positive. You have read this or heard this from me before if you follow my blog or the materials I have shared for decades. I navigated to the more productive. I didn’t resist the pain or try to stop it. I looked for what was better. I dropped the pain and enjoyed feeling wonderful.

Yes, it really hurt but it began to subside. It became manageable. Yes, it was very painful when they manipulated my foot on the x-ray bed, or tried on various braces but as long as I realized ‘it’s only pain’ and allowed myself to be filled with wonder and enjoyed my awesome daughter I could handle it. Hours went by.

I told my daughter that looking at her helped me. I enjoyed and loved her and was feeling relief. Eventually, they found a brace that fit, gave me prescription for an MRI. Surgery may be required. Okay, so now some focus on healing swiftly may be the order of the coming days.

Right now, she is out running errands for us. Picking up food, etc. I am at home with my leg elevated and ice on it. I am fine. Does it hurt, sure but I am at ease with it. I have let go of the hurting and am focused on the miracles in life.

Everything is grand. I decided to share my thoughts while I had time during the day rather than my early morning writing schedule.

Another lesson I learned is: I should pay attention when I walk. Not be caught up in things. I used to practice ‘Zen Walking’, when walking just walk, the basis of Zen – be the activity and nothing more.

If you are going to wash the dish, wash the dish. If you are going to eat, just eat. No distractions, no TV, no phone or reading, just eat. Be one with the moment!

I had much on my mind. Slow down. One thing at a time. It may not need to be a rule but it can certainly be a lesson. I was inattentive walking to the car. Perhaps, I can use this lesson to remember to be more aware and alert when doing any number of things. A reminder to be aware! How marvelous is that?

I certainly remembered I didn’t have to be a victim to the pain. My first thoughts of pain added to what I was feeling. It made it worse. Once, I changed my thinking the pain lessened. I mean it really lessened!

I am not surprised because I teach this stuff. I know it works. I emphasize this because I was caught up in the hurting at first. Once I realized that, during everything that was going, and I utilized what I know works. It did. It worked! It worked quickly and powerfully. I could share other examples from my past but I won’t at this time.

On top of it my daughter is a marvelous nurse. She picked up delicious ‘OH SO GOOD’ authentic East Indian food from a friend who makes great dishes from her native land. We are having a feast. I am sampling while typing. Yes, very marvelous indeed!

I would never have received this delicious Indian dinner today. PLUS, as a result, I learned about a fantastic Indian Restaurant in my neighbor I didn’t know existed!!! Blessings come in all shapes and sizes.

I feel loved, cared for and grateful to have had this experience and to have such an incredible daughter. Thanks my darling! I’m a lucky Daddy!

I will have to slow down and take it easy for awhile. I have crutches and a brace and have been told to see the follow up doctors as soon as possible. Okay, I can do that. Tonight, I will relax, read some inspiring material and chill out feeling grateful.

All in all the events of the day, while not something I would have picked for myself, have been amazing. I have learned much and feel so loved and grateful. Something incredible has already come my way and I know more is on the horizon. Lucky Me!” Rex Sikes

How many blessings will you discover today? I wonder?!

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Acceptance, Affirmations, Attitude, Blessings, Celebration, Emotions, Focus, Gratitude, Habit Formation, Happiness, Learning, Overcoming Difficulty, Persistence, Positive Thinking, Responsibility

Do This When Frustrated, Angry or Feeling Bad!

May 15, 2015 rexsikes 1 Comment

“How can you tell if you are focused on what you don’t want or what you do want? It is actually easy. Your have a signaling system that you can use. It alerts you when you are on or off track. You only need to learn how to recognize it to use it. It requires is becoming aware.

Your Feelings Are Your Signal System

If you are frustrated it is a signal you are focused on what you do not want. Negative emotion is the signal you are focused on what you don’t want. When you are feeling good and have positive emotions it is a signal you are focused on what you want.

Negative emotion only means you are thinking about what you do not want. Whatever you are thinking about mostly is what you get more of. You create the conditions of your life experience. You manifest more of the same. What you think about you become.

If you are frustrated, angry, depressed, anxious, worried, fearful, blaming and accusing, whining and complaining you are spending time and energy in a less than glorious place. The feelings that cause you to blame or complain are the signal.

If you catch yourself criticizing and speaking poorly about self, others, events and situations that is a signal. A clue you are focused in less than productive ways on what you do not want.

Once you become aware you are feeling negative, feeling frustrated, and you don’t like feeling that way you can do two things. First, you can get more frustrated, and more angry, you can get more intensely negative to the point where you think and say and commit to yourself, ‘never again!’ You can ramp it up and get to that ‘this is the last straw’ point. From this point you can make changes you need to.

That is one way of dealing with it. It can and does occur naturally for people. They just get to the point where they know they have to change. That intense emotion is fine as long as it serves to take them to a place where they stop focusing on the negative and begin focusing on the positive.

The negative feelings are the signal you are not focusing on what you want. However, if you don’t change your focus to what you do want you won’t have the relief or get the results you hope for. You must wake up, pay attention to the signal and change what you are doing.

You must switch your attention. THAT IS WHAT your feelings have been trying to get you to do. You feelings are trying to GET YOUR ATTENTION enough for you to notice so you can SWITCH!

Remember, if you always do what you always did you always get what you always got. It is an opportunity to be productively different.

Clarify What You Do Want

Use the powerful negative feelings to figure out what it is you do want. Stop focusing on the negative and start focusing on the positive. Commit to staying focused on the positive. Whenever you feel negative there is an adjustment you should make. That IS the signal you are off course.

You have an internal guidance system. You have an internal GPS. You have a system designed to be self correcting. The unwanted thoughts and feelings inform you that you are off course. Don’t fight them, celebrate when you recognize the signal and make the necessary changes. Less than glorious means time to change!

Some people have spent so many years ignoring or fighting and pushing down and repressing their feelings they have difficulty telling when they are feeling good or less than glorious. Still, you can learn to pay attention and benefit from this internal guidance bit by bit, Awareness is your key! It may be more subtle but you can do it.

Commit to paying attention. Do a self inventory frequently though out the day by asking ‘how am I feeling’ . Take a moment to evaluate and be honest. It is useful to color chart your feelings using crayon or markers to indicate the changes during the day.

Notice predominant colors and notice how frequently you actually fluctuate. This is a great learning tool Give it a shot and you may surprise yourself.

You can ask someone to assist you by pointing out when you are acting in certain ways. Just don’t bite their head off when they help. The goal is to become aware when you are feeling less than glorious so you can change direction.

Second, Make Incremental Change

You change from bad to a little bit better. Step by step. The goal is to feel a bit better. Actually, the goal is to feel the best you can most of the time, but if you are intensely down or angry going from that place to joyous is too big a leap.

Going from angry to frustrated is a smaller step and a worthwhile one. You are learning to lessen the anger and move away from it.

People either get frustrated and then angry or they can get angry and cool off to frustrated. It is like a gate that can move in either direction. A swinging door. So when you are really mad the goal is to cool off and begin to think of what you do want.

If you are down you want to get to a bit better place. A place more okay and begin thinking about what you do want. If you are depressed you may want to get frustrated and angry. At least, from angry you can act.

Because it is intense you create more movement. From there you can more readily change. Regardless, one needs to get to a place where ‘enough is enough’ and then make positive productive change.

What you want makes you feel good when you think about it. If when think about what you want you feel bad you aren’ t thinking about what you do want. You probably are thinking about how you don’t have what you do want.

You won’t feel good if you compare where you are to where you want to be unless you are celebrating closing the gap. If as you inch your way forward you are delighted the entire time then it is fine.

Gratitude Helps Make Everything Better

If you celebrate everything you are on the right track and you will feel better more of the time. How can you feel down and out, frustrated, angry or bored when you are thankful and happy and delighted about everything? You can’t!

Find every little thing you can to enjoy, and appreciate. The more you find the better you will feel.

Once you make gratitude and celebration a daily habit you will be thinking and feeling good most of the time. You will be much closer to making your dreams come true as you live this way. Then your head and heart is clear to find more opportunity and advantages each day. You are better equipped to handle obstacles, and disappointment. You are far more resilient and resourceful!

When you live in gratitude and celebration everything is incredible and getting better at the same time. It is one of the wisest and most powerful choices you can make. Celebrate everything, even the tough stuff! Look for the silver lining and emphasize it. Never waste an opportunity to feel grand!” Rex Sikes

Enjoy today!

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