Apr
28
It’s funny how reliant I’ve become on technology to remember stuff. I have alerts to remind me of upcoming birthdays - at least 5 days in advance so I can arrange for gifts. I also have phone numbers, recipes, DIYs and other items that would be good to just remember stored in my [...]
Apr
27
“One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.” ~Golda Meir
I don’t like to revisit the past. If I move — I move. If I quit a job, I’m gone — that’s it. A prior home just doesn’t feel right — almost gloomy if I have to spend too much time there.
My friend says I “roll hard”. Meaning that when I roll, I roll on and do not return. If I quit a job, there’s no sense in me going back and hanging out. Back when I was in the dating scene, when I would stop dating someone, she would probably never see me again. I would fail miserably as stalker.
Part of me wonders if this is not true of all “forward thinkers”. I think about tomorrow, the next week, and the next year. Today is okay, but I’m always anticipating.
I like that quality about myself from the perspective of optimism. It tomorrow is going to be better than today, it is tough to get depressed. I am always optimistic about life working out well – even if it appears bleak at times.
But there is a weakness in forward thinking. Since today is better than all days in the past, my past feels bittersweet at best and miserable at worst. Not always… But sometimes.
I’ll sometimes look back to a time when I was having a great day and it feels, how should I say? Creepy. I think to myself “you call that happy? It’s not near as great as it is now.” It is sad to put it into writing because suddenly it feels like I’ll never have one of those “rocking chair moments” when I’m 85 years old. A rocking chair moment is where I am sitting on the porch with my wife as an old man reminiscing about the “good old days.” There is no way to reminisce about “the good old days†if there aren’t any.
I can see why some people run away and never go back. As if someone walks into your past life with an ax to chop up and defile the memories. You just don’t want to go back there.
Sometimes however, going back is required. A funeral of a loved one, a 100-year birthday, or a business trip… The first day of going back is hard, but he gets easier in the coming days.
Why? Because you aren’t really going back. Things are different. People have aged. The endless tick of the clock forges forward. Not even a bad memory can stop it. Today in Kansas is much different than it was 30 years ago. Progress has been made; they even have HDTV and computers! It’s just the filters through which I look are flawed.
The beauty of studying self-development is I have the tools where I can change those filters. Sometimes I do change them. But more often I just leave them be. I leave them alone because of the experience. After all, you can’t go around all day with a goofy grin on your face. There needs to be a balance — the yin and the yang. Awkwardness, sadness, and longing is part of the human experience. Accepting the feelings (as uncomfortable as they may be) is the strong thing to do.
Are you a forward thinker, past thinker or present thinker? How does that frame of mind affect your day to day life? Does it make it easier, more difficult or does it affect you in other ways?
Feb
28
How would you like to be able to memorize virtually anything fast and with very little effort?
I covered a great way a few years back in my post The No-Fail Flashcard technique. Basically, the trick to this method is to put only one question and one answer on each card and to review the [...]
Feb
19
photo by zweetooth
“The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.” — William James
If there’s one emotion that can cut into productivity, it’s stress.
Stress is what happens when we feel we have more to deal with than our minds can handle. There’s an old I Love Lucy episode [...]
Feb
18
It started last week
At lunch, I ordered a glass of water with lemon to drink. My friend (with a disgusted look on his face) warned “don’t you know the latest news on those lemons?!”
I hadn’t heard, but I figured it was some new food scare.
According to him, a recent research experiment found that lemon wedges [...]
Feb
07
What motivates you?
Is it gentle nudging? Or do you need to be slapped around?
Personally, I prefer someone try to appeal to my intellect. But hey, we are all different… I am sure some of you prefer a more aggressive stance.
How do I know?
The Rich Jerk e-book sales for one.
But according to the article Self-help books [...]
Jan
30
A friend sent me this brain teaser this morning with the following blurb:
Doctors have concluded that if you find the man in the coffee beans in 3
seconds, your right half of your brain is better developed than most
people. If you find the man between 3 seconds and 1 minute, your right
half of the brain is [...]
Jan
09
When you have a picture of what your completed goal looks like, capture it!
Some of you may like writing down a description of the completed goal. Others who are more visual can draw out a picture. If it’s an object such as a new car, go to a car dealership and snap [...]
Jan
08
If you feel like you’ve hit a brick wall in your progress and feel like giving up, you are not alone. Pitfalls can sneak in and destroy your party just when it starts getting good.
To combat these little gremlins 2 simple cognitive behavioral methods that will ditch them right away.
First is the Rational [...]
Dec
04
Recently, I went to pick up my kids from school when an accident nearly happened. Like all school days, there was a lot of traffic. Earlier in the day, I had pulled into a parking space, walked into the school and got my kids. When I returned to my car, the line [...]
