The world doesn't revolve around you! Practicing Compassion

 Understanding that other people have their own problems and interacting with them with compassion instead of selfishness - will change your life - for the better.

From the online course: Planning for Personal Success. https://humanistlearning.com/planforpersonalsuccess/

Planning for Personal Success - a humanist way.

As the new year approaches, you may be thinking about your New Year's Resolutions. Let me help you plan for your personal success, as a humanist.

Learn how to stay focused and not give up when you hit a roadblock on your road to success! This book discusses how Humanists approach the important business of living a life that is fully realized and understanding what success really means. It is designed to help you think more explicitly about how to live your values fully, using critical thinking to improve your odds of success and to remove the fears that overwhelm you. Topics covered include: The World Doesn’t Revolve Around you – a reality based approach. Life Isn’t Fair: Keep at it Anyway – overcoming obstacles. Your Actions Have Consequences: Choose Wisely – putting critical thinking to work. It’s Not all About You – improving your interpersonal relationships. Finding Happiness – what really matters & how you define success.

Available As:

• Book and E Book: https://amzn.to/2TNCKpH
• Audiobook
• DVD: https://amzn.to/2Efdq6
• Online Course: https://humanistlearning.com/planforpersonalsuccess/

Create a Plan for Your Personal Success

Are you lacking structure? Unsure how to be the person you want to be?

These concerns are quite common. We struggle. Who are we? Who should we be? How can we be better?

I think one of the reasons why people struggle, is because they weren’t taught critical thinking.  To answer the above questions, we have to spend time thinking. The more effectively you think, the more effective your answers to these rather existential questions will be.

First, you have to have an understanding of who you want to be and more importantly why. It’s very easy to create a goal, much harder to work towards it. If you already have a goal, ask yourself – why this goal. Why out of all the possible things you could work on – did you choose this one.

This act of questioning yourself is part of what it means to think critically. What you will find when you question your assumptions is your real motivation. Your real motivation brings clarity. It is much easier to make decisions about life paths when you know what you are really hoping to accomplish.

The other thing people who come to me seem to struggle with is really grasping the concept of consequences and how this impacts your chance of success.

Humanism is all about agency. We humans have the ability to choose our actions – to a certain extent. Every time we make a choice and act, we get consequences. Our goal should be to maximize the good and minimize the harm we do to ourselves and others.  This seems simple enough but I keep meeting people who don’t ever take the time to do the cost benefit analysis for themselves. *cough* Charlie Sheen *cough*

Taking the time to weight the pros and cons doesn’t mean being a buzz kill. It means understanding the risks you are taking and taking precautions to minimize those risks – in advance – so that you can maximize your benefits and minimize the harm.

Now – I want you to imagine what sort of impact this sort of considered decision making will have over the course of your life. Now I want you to consider signing up for my Planning for Personal Success program at: https://humanistlearning.com/planforpersonalsuccess/ 

Overcoming Hurdles

I never ran track, but I still know enough to know that hurdles, when approached correctly, should not slow you down.

I have a confession to make. I am lazy. I don’t like to run. Never have. When I played soccer – I played center lurker. Get me the ball, I can get it in. But don’t ask me to play midfield – that requires too much running.

I never went out for track. I had friends that did and supported them, but it wasn’t for me. The race I like the most is the hurdles. Seeing people run and jump over hurdles while not slowing down is a beautiful thing. I like the human steeplechase the most.

Hurdles are a part of life. Not the racing hurdles, obviously, but the idea that there is something in your way you have to go over or around to keep going on your way. Hurdle is defined as an obstacle or difficulty. Unless you are insanely lucky, you are going to encounter hurdles in your life.  It’s best to prepare for them.

The way to prepare is to know and accept that they are there.  Imagine a hurdler runner just pretending that there are no hurdles on the track. Well, don’t imagine it – this is what it looks like.

It isn’t pretty. Sure – he makes headway for a bit and keeps going, but eventually the hurdles knock him down.

If you want to be successful at clearing hurdles, you need to plan your approach. And you can only plan your approach if you plan in advance for what you are going to do WHEN you encounter a hurdle.

In real life, the same principle applies. I realize that positive thinking is all the rage, but any time you fail to plan for hurdles, you are planning for failure.  My rule is to think of all the various ways things can go wrong and then plan for what I will do if the worst happens.  This way I am prepared and am able to clear the hurdles I encounter instead of going – hey – what’s this and why is it happening? Maybe I can ignore it – uhhh, nope.

To learn more about how to plan for success– take my online course: Planning for Personal Success: A Humanist Approach.