In today’s post in The Secrets of Personal Development from A-Z series, I want to discuss the importance of seeing Beauty where ever you are.   For me I think this is really a matter of what we choose to focus our attention on.  We can choose to focus on those things we “perceive as “ugly” or “distasteful”, but when we do that how does that make us feel?

We know from our own experience that whatever we give our attention to expands.  We start to notice more and more things that are like what we are focusing on.  Many people have had the experience of thinking about buying a particular car, and before they were thinking about they hardly notice those cars on the road.  Then when they started to think about that car, they began seeing them everywhere.

What If There Was Only Good News?

What if we were to apply that concept to the news.  Instead of a lot of awful news with maybe short fluff piece at the end, they focused on the truly great things that people are doing in the world. Imagine a whole month of good news and inspiring stories, do you think that might begin to cause people to feel better about the world we live in?  Perhaps cause them to feel a little more hopeful about their future?

To be clear I am not advocating that we stick our heads in the sand and pretend that there aren’t great challenges in the world, or that there aren’t people out there doing ugly and distasteful things.  What I am talking about is how can we put our selves in the most resourceful state of mind that will allow us to face and overcome the challenges that we do face.

Instead of Complaining, Ask “What Can I Do To Make This A Better Place?”

What if instead of always looking for what is wrong with our society and each other, we chose to look at what is right?  Instead of complaining about the way things are, asking the question “What can I do to make this a better place or situation for myself and those around me?”  To me this is a much more uplifting, empowering, and energizing approach.

This type of approach is much more likely to lead to a desirable outcome, where as the alternative just continues a cycle of fear, doubt, chaos, confusion, and hopelessness.  I encourage you to try an experiment over the next week.  Make a point of looking for beauty in everything and in every situation this week.

Look For Beauty In The Eyes Of Those Around You

You may not always succceed, and yet I can guarantee to you that if make this your focus you will find yourself more uplifted instead of run down at the end of the week.  One place I would encourage you to start to look for beauty would be in the eyes of everyone you come in contact with.

The eyes are truly the windows to the Soul, and within each one of us, (even those that may not be aware of it) is a very  and loving Soul. Even if someone is expressing anger (which simply means there is a place inside of them that hurts) do your best to maintain your focus of seeing the beauty within.

You Have A Choice On How You Spend Your Energy

Try this for a week and be aware of any changes that take place with in and around you.  If you don’t like the changes you experience, you can always go back to spending your energy focusing on what is wrong with the world.  However, I think you know how that has worked for you so far.

In the next post in The Secrets of Personal Developemnt From A-Z series we will be moving on to another “B” as I will be talking about the positive impact that Breathing in the correct way can have on our lives.

I welcome your comments, feedback and questions.  Of course I also appreciate your sharing and tweeting this post.

In today’s post on The Secrets of Personal Development from A-Z I will discuss the importance of the Agreements we make in our everyday lives.  There are a couple of reasons that I believe agreements are so vital to our Personal Development.

First of course is that the agreements we make and keep (or don’t keep) are a reflection of our integrity and authenticity.  Second we expend a great deal of energy in either keeping our agreements, or being upset that we agreed to something we really didn’t want to do in the first place.

Everything Is Energy

You’ve heard it said that “Everything Is Energy”.  To me one of the foundational principals of personal development is learning how to use our energy in the most efficient manner possible in furthering our development and serving the highest good of all concerned.

It is for this reason that I would encourage you to really check within yourself before making an agreement with someone else (or even yourself).  Some questions you may want to ask yourself before making an agreement are:

Can I from a place of integrity and authenticity say yes to this agreement and mean it?

Will making this agreement further my life’s purpose?

Is their anyone who would suffer or be hurt by my making this agreement?

Is this agreement for my highest good and the highest good of all concerned?

In order to answer these questions you need to be clear about what your life’s purpose, and what you stand for.  When know your purpose and why it is important to you, it becomes much easier to say no without guilt and say yes with enthusiasm when these are the authentic answers for you.

In time you will know almost instantly whether making an agreement is right for you.  In the process you will release a lot of energy that was previously tied up in guilt, frustration, and annoyance etc.  this newly released energy can than be put to better use in other areas of your personal development.

The keys making authentic agreements for me are:

1.  Never say yes when you want to say no.

2. When you say yes use your energy to do whatever it takes to fulfill that agreement rather than complain about making it.

3.  When you say no, trust your decision and let it go.  don’t waste energy feeling guilty or second guessing yourself.

4.  Always remember the most important agreements you make are with yourself.

Be Aware Of Your Feelings When You Make Agreements

In developing yourself to make agreements with integrity, you may want to take sometime this week and just observe what you feel inside when you make them.  As you do this remember all agreements are important.  Even agreeing to meet someone at 6pm and showing up at 6:08pm is agreement not kept.

It’s these “little agreements” that we tend to discount as “not that important”, and yet overtime they create patterns and habits that don’t serve us.  As I mentioned in a previous post about the impoertance of Awareness, we need to be aware fully aware of the agreements we make and why.

So this week simply be aware of your agreements and how you feel about them when you make them, it is quite possible that this will create a dramatic shift in which you are able to easily make your future agreements from a place of authenticity and integrity.

Coming up in the next post we are going to move on to the B’s with Blessings, and discovering how choosing to look at everything in your life as a blessing will go a long way in furthering your personal development.

As always I welcome your feedback, comments and suggestions, and of course I appreciate your tweeting and/or book marking this post.

In today’s edition of the continuing series The Secrets Of Personal Development From A-Z I will discuss the importance of Alignment. What I mean by alignment is when our thoughts, our words, and our actions are all aligned (and support) our purpose in life.

I see too many people expending their energy in a “shot gun” approach hoping that somehow something will stick and begin to manifest their desired outcome.  This usually the result of the chaos and confusion they are experiencing in their mind.

The First Step Toward Alignment Is Clarity About Your Life’s Purpose

In order to align our words, thoughts, and actions with our purpose in life, we have to first be clear about what our purpose is.  Many of us have things that we desire and would like to achieve, but are they really our life’s purpose, or are they simply things we’ve been conditioned to want in our lives.

This is not something that you can figure out at the mental level.  You have to go deeper.  You have to connect deeply to your heart.  If have never done this, a simple way to start would be to sit quietly with your eyes gently closed.  Place one or both of your hands on your heart, and focus on your breathing as you breathe in and breathe out.

Connect Deeply To Your Heart

As you continue to be aware of your breathing, allow yourself to release and let go of all stress tension and anxiety.  Then think of someone or something that you truly love.  This will connect you to your heart.  Once you have made this connection, then ask your heart what it desires.  You may want to ask this question several times to access the deepest part of yourself.  Then simply listen carefully for the answer which may come to you as an image, a feeling, or whisper etc.

If you are unsure of the answer you receive, you can ask your heart to clarify the answer by asking “can you please answer in a way that I can understand.  It maybe that sometimes the answer doesn’t make sense to you in that moment, but in  a day or two it does.  Be patient with yourself.

Once you have your answers and you are clear about what your heart desires (which is the fulfillment of your purpose) you can then begin aligning your thoughts, your words, and your actions in a lazer-like focused manner.

Alignment Makes Decision Making A Graceful And Easy Process

When you are clear about your purpose it becomes very easy to make decisions about what to do in your life.  If the action will move you in the direction of fulfilling your purpose, the decision would be to take the action.  If it will not move you in the direction of your purpose the decision would be to not take the action and move on.

Our words are very powerful, and should always speak in favor of and support our purpose.  Sometime as a result of subconscious programming we have thoughts and beliefs that are contrary to our purpose.  In this case you must re-program these thoughts and beliefs so that they support your purpose.  One of the most powerful ways you can do this is through the use of affirmations during the half hour before you go to bed.

When your thoughts are aligned with your purpose, this will also be reflected in your words.  You will find that once you are clear on your purpose in life, and you align your thoughts, words and actions with that purpose, everything flows more gracefully and easily.  You will also find that instead of expending a lot of energy in many directions and feeling exhausted, you are aligned with your purpose you accomplish much more while experiencing an abundance of joy and vibrant energy.

To summarize what is required for Alignment, you want to:

1.  Get clear about your life’s purpose.

2.  Only take actions that move you in the direction of your life’s purpose

3. Always think and speak in support of your life’s purpose, and never against it.

In the next post on The Secret of Personal Development from A-Z I will be discussing Affirmations.  I welcome you questions, comments and feedback, and of course you can tweet this post if you like.