Looking back.. at failures

Yday was one of those days when a strong wave of worry hit me and I could sense what "worry" does to you. My body was totally decapacitated. I am sure was mind was blank too.
The worry took a course of its own and I did become calm after a while when I realized that "action" and not "worry" helps.

I then wound back the clock and recollected some times...When I saw an ad for Amity yday, I began to think of my college days. I walked into college with 0 expectations. I had no idea about the subject I was studying. I was mortified of geeks and computers. I hardly studied. There were very few classes I remembered attending. Data structures, File systems and some English and Management related classes. As expected I fared well in the latter 2. I passed out not knowing a thing about computer science. I even landed up in a job, which was bad. I then joined and then landed up even in a dream comp.. and I still had no clue abt software. I immediately went to US and it was a nightmare.
I joined the Bangalore team and the team was such a nightmare. Then I joined Mars.. it was good there because I could match up the level of work and I did some really good work there.
Then I went on to Matisse, which was a totally new domain but with a lot of hard work and a little stress, I did well. Then came Brocade.. I did work very hard but the team turned into a nightmare.

Going back I realized a few things.
1) I have worked in fear and anxiety for most part of my life. It's the most unproductive form of working. It decapacitates you and drains you so badly. I used to be so drained every day.
2) The feeling of inadequacy. I always wanted to be the best, but there are better people than you, always. For me, it was very difficult to match up to them. Either you accept who you are or maturely strive towards competition. This constant fear of failure attracts more failure.
3) Fear of learning new things. Take out that 10 mins or 30 mins to learn the new tool.
4) Unwanted analysis of what others think of you. Don't give a damn about it. Just do your job.
5) Not standing up for my beliefs and myself.
6) Not showcasing my extra work.
7) Giving others more credit and not giving onseself enough credit. We tend to focus so much on others positives and our negatives. That's an unequal playing field.
8) Your work is no longer what it was 1000s of years ago. Your livelihood is not based on your passion and talents anymore. Accept that.
9) Let go of ego. Accept mistakes but don't cry over them.
10) Seek help shamelessly.
11) Never procrastinate. This one quality in itself can help get work done, in the first place. The rest of your energy use it to get the work "well" done.
12) Stay in one place long enough to learn more. People who stay in the same group for 6 or more years get a natural upper hand. Go for that.
13) Use your energy wisely. Energy management, more than time management, leads to success.
14) Address issues immediately. Whether it's people issues or your own emotional issues. Never let it drag.
15) Recite this mantra: I am happy, successful, talented, adequate and I have abundance. This universe works

Lastly, have a long term goal and a short term goal. Evaluate constantly on short term goals. So many times we do a lot of work that goes unacknowledged. Because it's not part of the goal setting, it makes us feel like we did less. Set your own goals and when you meet them, reward yourself. Else, after 5 years you can sit and think, what progress have I made? You will have nothing to look back to if you did not set goals and track them.

Also, long term goals help you grow. Chart a path which you want to take. Else you could get lost and stay stagnated. You end up making wrong career choices which do not align with the master plan. Any deviation or dispersion of energy eventually leads to a sense of failure. Watch that..

Ashtanga Yoga

The ancient Sage Patañjali codified an eight-limbed or Ashtanga approach to discover our higher state of consciousness in his Yoga Sūtras. The text dates between the fourth centuries of BCE and ADE, and has been held, since that time, as an authority on yoga practice and philosophy. In sutra 1:2 Patañjali stresses that yoga is “the cessation of modifications of the mind” (Yogaś citta-vritti-nirodhaḥ). The Yoga Sutras provide Ashtanga Yoga as a means to detach from our thoughts—inherent in the Raja Yoga’s transcendental meditational practices—so that we may find liberation, or moksha , from the suffering that arises from identifying with our physical form.
Three states of mind
Bhoja noted in How to Know God: The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali (Ishwerwood & Prabhavananda, 1981) that Patañjali defined yoga as “an effort to separate the Atman, the reality, from the non-Atman, the apparent.” In order to allow this “apparent” consciousness to reveal itself, Patañjali stressed that the thought waves in the mind must be controlled. He classifies the mind’s three states as:

• Manas: receives incoming sensory information;:
  
• Buddhi: the discriminating intelligence, interprets and classifies this information
• Ahamkara: the ego-sense that identifies with our interpretations and attributes these experiences to our persona.

Patañjali s eight-limbed system seeks to uncover the underlying, omnipresent reality of unmanifest spirit, our Atman, and alleviate the suffering that accompanies the physical form.
The eiight limbs of Ashtanga Yoga:

• Yamas: social conduct
• Niyamas: inner observances
• Asana: physical postures
• Pranayama: manipulation of breath
• Pratyahara: control of the senses
• Dharana: concentration
• Dhyana: meditation
• Samadhi: absorption

Yoga purifies and conditions the body and mind through the lower limbs of Patañjali’s Ashtanga Yoga: yamas, niyamas, pranayama, and asana. The practices of the next two limbs, dharana and dhyana, move us beyond the external practices, which have readied our bodies for the cessation of extraneous thoughts, in order to have a greater focus on the task at hand–whether it be trading or any other pursuit.
At this stage an effortless flow will arise from acting without the temporal urges of the senses and merge into the object of our concentration. We are no longer burdened by heavy states of anxiety, fear, depression, procrastination, insecurity, anger, hate, or other deleterious behaviours. Beyond pratyahara, sense withdrawal, we enter into dharana, and this is when we truly are at the height of our game, enjoying every minute—regardless of whether we win or lose. The final limbs of dhyana and samādhi take us beyond the physical reality and enter into the meditative states of a zone that no longer has an identity rooted in the physical realm, otherwise known as bhu loka.
What we choose to make a part of our world is our decision, our right and, perhaps, our obligation. The mastery of self-actualization requires the knowledge gained from the consciousness arising from the attainment of our aspirations, and empowers us with a sense of support from an all pervading field of consciousness that is at our disposal— should we choose to recognize it.
We may realize that the fear that grips one aspect of our lives carries over to others as well, such as love, health, or relationships. This is why a holistic approach to living, such as Patañjali’s Ashtanga system, investigates all possible disturbances and their origins so that the body, mind, and spirit are operating together and striving for the same thing. If we find ourselves at odds over what we want from one day to the other, if we sabotage our goals, or, perhaps, if we procrastinate in fulfilling them, then we have  conflicting emotions that could be uncovered in order to be replaced by more positive mind states in regards to the success of our intention.

Mind and Indriyas

Body is only the outward appearance, a projection of the mind. Mind operates through the senses and the sense-organs. If the mind is well then the body is well. If the mind is sick the body becomes ill. Mind is everything. It controls your whole life. Upon it depends your happiness or misery, success or failure.

As you think, so you become. 

Mastery of mind means success in all fields of life. To achieve this mastery you must study the mind. You must understand its nature, habits, tricks and the effective methods of bringing it under restraint.

Mind is a bundle of desires, thoughts, feelings and emotions. It is nothing but a collection of Samskaras, desires arising from contact of the sense-organs with different objects, feeling aroused by worldly botherations, ideas gathered together from various different objects. These desires, feelings and ideas are not steady—they will be constantly changing. Suddenly some will subside and some others will occupy their places like the waves in the seas. Some old ones will depart from the storehouse, the mind and some new ones will replace them at once. It is also a bundle of habits. The bad habits and prejudices, although hidden by one’s own nature will come up and occupy the surface of the mind as and when opportunity occurs.

Mind is the common sensory and an aggregate of the five senses. As all the five senses are mingled with it, the mind is able to see, hear, smell, taste and feel independently of the senses.

Mind assumes the shape of any object instantly it thinks upon it. If it thinks of a mango, it assumes the form of a mango. Then it gets an attachment with the mango. Now a desire arises in the mind to taste it. Then the mind makes a firm determination to eat that mango and satisfy itself. One thought follows another. This is the expansion of thoughts or Sankalpas. The whole world is nothing but the expansion of Sankalpas. This expansion of Sankalpas of mind towards the various objects is called BONDAGE.

The last thought determines the next birth. Whatever thought you entertain at the last breath, accordingly you take your next birth. This thought entirely depends upon the constant desires and ideas you entertained throughout your whole life.

Every man has a definite outlook of life; due to the power of the mind he has got a definite thinking, definite craving, desire and hope and definite character, temperament, taste and attitude. For the gratification of the mind these desires, cravings etc., are constantly repeated again and again, and these acts leave definite impressions upon the subconscious mind. The impressions take indelible forms in the subconscious mind.

Mind havocs through the power of imagination. Imaginary fears of various sorts, exaggeration, concoction, mental dramatisation, building castles in the air are all due to the power of imagination.
Much energy is wasted through imaginary fears. Mind tricks and plays. It always wants to be doing something or other and when it attaches itself with objects, it cherishes, it feels amused and happy. Having no idea that these momentary pleasures will result in misery, people take delight and repeat the same act again and again. These evil acts, in due course form as bad habits. Then it becomes very difficult to divert the mind from such evil habits which were practised from infancy.

Watch your mind always very carefully. Check the surging emotions and bubbling thoughts. Do not allow the waves of irritability, jealousy, anger, lust and hatred to rise in your mind. Do not allow the current of bad thoughts, evil notions, vicious ideas to pass through your mind. If you substitute divine virtuous qualities, the evil qualities will disappear. If you entertain new sublime thoughts, old vicious thoughts will subside by themselves. Courage overcomes fear. Patience overcomes anger and irritability. Love overcomes hatred. Purity overcomes lust. Take this Pratipaksha Bhavana (meditating on the opposite method). At the early dawn, in the precious Brahmamuhurta meditate on a virtuous quality. Think of its various attributes, benefits and some moral stories relating to the virtue. Feel day by day that you are possessing that virtue. Gradually that virtue will be developed. The vice will be destroyed.

Indriyas:
======
The senses or indriyas are desires and have two states, static and dynamic. When the desire begins to operate, the indriyas are put in motion. This is the dynamic state. As soon as the desire is gratified, the indriyas contract through tripti, satisfaction, and remain in the static or passive state.

The senses and the mind

The mind and the indriyas are one. They are an extension of the mind. The sea is fed by the rivers and cannot exist without the rivers. In the same way, the mind is fed by the indriyas and cannot exist without them. If you have controlled the indriyas, you have controlled the mind, because indriya is just another name for mind.
The mind is a mass of senses. It is a higher power than the senses. The mind is a consolidated indriya and the indriya is the mind in manifestation. Just as a minister obeys the king, so the five jnanendriyas, organs of knowledge, act in accordance with the dictates of the mind. The senses represent backwaters. The desire in the mind to eat has manifested as tongue, teeth and stomach. The desire in the mind to walk has manifested itself as legs and feet. If you can control the mind, you can control the indriyas. The eyes can only see. The ears can only hear. The tongue can only taste. The skin can only touch. The nose can only smell. However, the mind can see, hear, taste, touch and smell. The mind is the common sensory, because it can directly see, hear, smell, taste and feel independent of the senses. The mind is an aggregate of the five senses as all the sense faculties are blended in the mind. By yogic practices you can see and hear directly through the mind, which is called clairvoyance and clairaudience.
This blows out the Western psychological theory of perception. In the Bhagavad Gita (15:7), the mind is termed the sixth sense, manah shashthanindri yani. The five senses are the five jnanendriyas, organs of knowledge, sensation or perception. The mind is the substratum of the experiences of all other organs. The senses cannot do anything if the mind is not connected with them. When you are wholly absorbed in the study of an interesting newspaper, you do not hear when your friend loudly calls you, or you are not aware that the clock has struck five. It is everybody's daily experience. The mind was away at that time and not connected with the sense of hearing. The eyes may be wide open during sleep, but they do not see anything, because the mind is not there.
The indriyas cannot do any independent work without the direct help senses the mind. Sufficient practice for a long time is necessary to control them. Then the senses become thin and are starved to death.

Sister indriyas

The nose and anus are sister indriyas. They are born of the same prithvi tanmatra, the earth element, the nose from the sattwic amsa or portion, and the anus from the rajasic portion. These two indriyas are the least mischievous. The olfactory sense and nerve do not trouble you much and can be controlled very easily.
The tongue and genitals are born of jala tanmatra, the water element, the former from the sattwic portion and the latter from the rajasic portion. Eating actually strengthens the reproductive indriya.
The eyes and feet are born of agni tanmatra, the fire element, the eyes from the sattwic portion, the feet from the rajasic portion. The eyes like to see sights. Her sisters, the feet, say, "We are ready to take you to the fair."
The skin and hands are born of vayu tanmatra, the air element, the skin from the sattwic and the hands from the rajasic portion. The skin says, "I want silk and other smooth articles for my enjoyment." Her sisters, the hands, say, "I can feel through my tactile corpuscles. I shall get for you fine soft silk."
Speech and the ears are born of the akasha tanmatra, the ether element, the ear from the sattwic portion and speech from the rajasic portion. They help each other.

Tongue and eyes

The most mischievous and troublesome indriya is the generative organ, followed by the tongue, speech, ears and eyes. Control of the organ of taste is far more difficult than control of the genitals, because you have been enjoying delicious articles of food from your very birth. Passion manifests itself just before the age of eighteen. You indulge in sexual pleasure only for a short period in every birth. However, you have to take food even in advanced senility. Control of the tongue means control of all the senses.
Music, cinema or sight-seeing are enjoyed in human births only. Ants and rats do not enjoy movies in the cinema. The indriya of sight is not as powerful as the tongue. The organ of sight serves as a loving comrade to the organ of taste. The mind is at once tickled at the sight of the yellow colour of a mango. The eyes see a beautiful mango and the different dishes that are served on the table. At once, the saliva and digestive juices are secreted improving the appetite. With the appetite stimulated, the food is rendered more palatable. The desire for food is aroused first by aroma and then the sight of it. Therefore, a person with sharp sight may relish his food more than a blind person.

Control of the senses

Observe mouna for a couple of hours daily at any time that suits you. Try to speak little at other times and avoid unnecessary conversations. Don't speak harsh words and obscene language, but talk sweetly and gently. You must develop perfect control over speech. Control over speech means control of the mind. The organ of speech, vak indriya, is a great distracter of the mind. Mouna gives peace and removes anxieties and quarrels. It develops willpower and conserves energy.
The three organs of eyes, ears and tongue externalise the mind and make you altogether worldly. The eyes and ears are the avenues of sense knowledge, vritti jnana. Close the eyes, shut the ears with balls of cotton or with the two thumbs, making shanmukhi mudra, and you have destroyed two-fifths of the world.
The object of sadhana is to internalise the mind by introspection, antar mukha vritti, and to realize the truth within. If you control the three organs of eyes, ears and tongue, then you can discipline the mind and prevent the mental energy from flowing externally. These organs are the main cause of making the mind restless.

Six ways to control the senses

There are six ways of controlling the indriyas: (i) through vichara, enquiry, (ii) by willpower, (iii) by kumbhaka, retention of breath in pranayama, (iv) by dama, restraint, (v) by pratyahara, abstention or sense withdrawal, and (vi) by vairagya and tyaga, dispassion and renunciation.
Vichara: Aspirants can control the mind, the senses and dispel the darkness of ignorance through meditation and vichara, enquiry. They should cultivate indifference towards happiness and misery, love and hatred and all sorts of pairs of opposites. Such mental equanimity can be acquired by self-enquiry, study of sacred scriptures and satsang. There is no vasana or desire in Brahman. The desire is in the mind. If you practice vichara, all desires will dwindle into nothing.
Willpower: Through iron determination, strong willpower, patience and perseverance, you can conquer all obstacles quite easily. Determination and self-reliance are necessary for success.
Kumbhaka: Kumbhaka increases the period of life. It augments the inner spiritual force, vigour and vitality. Prana gives strength to the senses. When you withdraw the prana and try to centralize it, the senses have no vigour to run outside. By gradual practice, the senses will be absorbed in the mind.
Dama: Sense control or dama blunts the senses. Perfect control of the senses, however, is not possible through dama alone. If the senses are very sharp and acute, they carry away impetuously the minds of even good sadhakas, "just as the gale carries away the ship in stormy weather" (Bhagavad Gita, 2:67).
Dama is a rational control of the senses and not deadening the senses by foolish austerities. The body is the moving temple of God. It should be kept healthy and strong. Many silly aspirants amputate the organ of reproduction or swallow tons of nux vomica to kill this organ. They think that passion can be eradicated completely by such a procedure. Lust is in the mind and if the mind is subdued, what can the external organ do? It is only the abuse and misuse of the organs that brings misery and untoward results. What is wanted is judicious control of the senses. They should not be allowed to run riot into sensual grooves. If the senses are disciplined properly, they become useful servants.
Pratyahara: The effect of dama, restraint of the senses, is pratyahara. When the indriyas give up objects, they are drawn into the mind. This is termed pratyahara or abstraction. When the mind is disconnected from the senses, mental abstraction takes place. If you can do pratyahara at will, consciously attaching and detaching the mind to and from the senses, you have gained really great control over the mind. Pratyahara is the stepping-stone to inner spiritual life. If pratyahara is perfected, all the organs are under perfect control.
Tyaga and vairagya: Happiness comes through calmness of mind and senses. When you give up objects, all desires will melt away. When there is a true spirit of tyaga, renunciation, there can never be any idea of old impressions or past relations with your mundane existence.
Vairagya is non-attachment or indifference to sensual objects. It thins out the fatty sensual mind and turns the mind inward, putting a break to the extrovert tendency of the mind. Vairagya is the most important qualification for a spiritual aspirant.

Control of thought

If you have the reins of the horses under control, you can have a safe journey. The indriyas are the horses and they cannot do anything without the help of the mind, their master and commander. The mind is at the bottom of the senses and a tumultuous internal fight goes on between the five organs of knowledge, each trying to have a lion's share of the enjoyment. With viveka, the power of discrimination, the senses cannot tempt and deceive you.
Control of the senses means control of the mind and ensures perfect safety and supreme peace. Control of one's thoughts leads to control of the mind and senses and to the attainment of infinite bliss and eternal life.

 

 

Using karma to know who you are and correct your course

Excerpts from:

 http://karma1stprinciple.blogspot.in/2012/01/law-of-mirrors.html

 

“Young man, your life is a direct reflection of you as is true for any individual you are always the first cause in your own life,” he informed me with smiling eyes. “Every thing in your life is attempting to tell you who you are in any given moment.” Continuing, “What you see in another human is actually you looking at your self in the mirror of life. All of life reflects your image of you.”
We should always be objective with our own actions and activity whether it is external or internal objectivity is the most important approach to understanding and appreciating ourselves and our lives.
This concept of your reflection through life is correct and is part of the reason for the Law of Attraction, the major reason. This is why we attract to us what we are and not what we may want or desire to have in our life. This is the basic idea behind the Law of Mirrors.”
“What we see in another person or, more importantly, what we think we see as wrong about them is actually Karma’s way of showing us what we do not necessarily like about our self.

Is everything there for a reason or just random?
The truth is, every moment and experience, in and of itself, is neither right or wrong, nor good or bad, because they all just are; rather, it is each of us, in and of our self, who simply do not agree with what we are seeing in that particular moment or experience. What am I offering here? We are simply looking at life backwards, from the outside in! Does this make any sense to you? This powerful concept is simply letting us know that we need only spend our time making the necessary internal adjustments in our own mind instead of expending all our energy and effort with making external adjustments to others and our environment. By doing so, we rectify our self rather than the outer world. Master Lobsang simply stated to me, “Change you and this changes how you see events.”
Sometimes it is best to go ahead and climb over the arduous mountain, for it may be the best path even though it appears frighteningly formidable.

When operating under the “you make me” complex, we lay the blame on either the outer circumstance or the other individual, essentially transferring personal responsibility to an external event. By doing so, we dis-own our personal feelings and actions by attempting to dis-connect their integral part from us. By so doing we end up actually denying our ability to control our own emotions and to properly look at our very own mirror, its glaring reflection now showing we are not in control of our own life. Just how can another person or thing, external to our self, physically control how we feel internally in any given moment? If we do this what we are actually doing is admitting another is in control of us and this law is here to assist in this for us so that we see our selves. The Law of Mirrors attempts to correct the current situation, guiding us to reclaim our personal responsibility of our emotional energy by watching what we do in that particular moment, as the observer, instead of what we think we are seeing as the victim of the “you make me” complex. The truth is what we actually see is how we are judging that moment, nothing more.
From my teachings in the Far East, it has been realized that life is not about personal enjoyment; rather, it is solely about personal growth, change, and the comprehension of our true nature, with which difficulty may at times be associated.

When anything becomes difficult we are simply applying too much physical, mental, and emotional energy on the event, thereby creating resistance. And it is this very resistance which increases the level of difficulty.
Whatever you resist persists for you. You attract to you what you are, not what you want.
Our higher divine self works in union with Karma, constantly and continually. Not to harm or punish us, please, but as its attempt to bring on a natural and complete healing to every individual involved in our so-called difficult situation.

Our judgment determines whether something is easy or difficult, good or bad, pleasing or objectionable.
Living in grace means: first being grateful for life which naturally leads to grace. Then become totally patient in life and with all people. This allows us to be utterly free of stress, holding a door for another, giving up your place in line for another who is truly in a hurry. Always be aware of honoring and treating others in a graceful manner, remaining calm and peaceful while driving in traffic, and never rude to another. Most importantly, being graceful is fully living to assist others at all times, not just in those moments when it suits our fancy or appears necessary.

No matter where you go in life, there are many things you will do. Some will seem very special and important to you, and some will seem very insignificant and irrelevant. You must treat them all the same.
The only thing separating importance and irrelevance is a judgmental mind. We tend to express a stronger commitment and perseverance towards those matters which we judge as important; on the other hand, we may very well become lackadaisical in what we do or even procrastinate from that which we judge as trivial.
“All things are important. In truth, no one thing is more important than another, and both should be treated with the same level of diligence, no matter the importance or seeming insignificance and this includes each and every human in our world along with each and every experience.”
If you think life as hectic then it is so for you, a planted seed of karma along with its particular return activity. Life is hectic solely because you are interrupting it by seeing life possibly as it is not, or attempting to control it which you cannot. If you are, in fact, doing these things, then it is genuinely suggested you let go and relax, release your grip before arthritis sets in. Allow life to be exactly what it is! Simply step out of the way and learn to “allow” this is all that is required.
No monk needs to be told what they need to do because they can easily see and do what requires attention in that moment, on a voluntary basis, working in union with each other without an inkling of opposition. They honor all of life and each other, recognizing every thing as awe-fully important, no matter how seemingly small it may appear, from the tiniest insect to the entire planet. To them there is only equality. And equal with you and me.
“What is important to me, and what is unimportant?” Your answers may very clearly reveal how duality has slyly entered your life
Every thing is connected, from the tiniest insect to the human; in fact, from a single atom to the farthest star in the farthest galaxy
We are just as important as the stars in the night sky. We are the only ones in our world who have the ability to realize these stars are even there. Does any other creature realize their existence? Instead of understanding our connection to them, we have established the notion of separation from them along with all things, which is falsehood. Not only this, but we have even separated ourselves from what we term as God, our Creator.”

Whatever is important to you has the power to control you - whether you career or family or money.You - the individual are the most important idea in your life.
For any other thing to be important to you then it must be in you first. By so doing it actually brings things closer to you and may even give you the impression of a closer relationship to all of life. All things are special including you simply treat all things in this manner and separation melts from you.

===========================

You see, an empowered individual must first have power over them self, over their lower carnal nature.

What goes on in our mind and what we think creates our life and experiences, both of which are 100% Karma and the action on its return; in other words, our circumstances or experiences are precisely what we each have produced.
We are not in the grip of so-called circumstance, that we are instead in a world of natural principles and forces which may be used to bring about all we desire, as long as we understand them, not violate them as we do constantly.

Awesome philosophy quotes from Peaceful warrior...

Quotes from the Peaceful Warrior book/movie:

"Maybe you're still asleep.  You can live your whole lifetime without ever being awake"

"There's no higher purpose than service to others"

"You need to start asking better questions"

"Sloppy.  You practice gym, I practice everything"

"Everyone tells you what to do and what's good for you.  They don't want you to find your own answers, they want you to believe theirs.  Gather information from the inside.  People are afraid of what's inside and that's the only place they're ever going to find what they need"

"Can't sleep cause you're scared cause everything feels so empty."

"Want to be more?  Be someone who uses his mind and body in ways that most people would never have the courage to.  Be a warrior." 

"People are not their thoughts.  They think they are, and it brings them all kinds of sadness."

"The mind is just a reflex organ it reacts to everything.  Fills your head with millions of random thoughts a day.  None of those thoughts reveal any more about you than a freckle does at the end of your nose."

"Did you notice how the right leverage can be very effective?  That's what your training, even your life is about.  Developing the wisdom to apply the right leverage in the right place at the right time.  Take out the trash, the trash is up here (in your head).  Learn to throw out everything you don't need."  

"Falling into the water emptied your mind.  You were present and devoted 100% to the experience you were having.  

Youre out of your mind.  It's taken a lifetime of practice.  We want you out of your mind too.  

Your mind's filling up again.  You're missing out on everything that's going on.  There's never nothing going on."

"Take out the trash.  The trash is anything that's keeping you from the only thing that matters, this moment, here, now.  And when you truly are in the here and now you'll be amazed at what you can do and how well you can do it."

"Reading their minds?   Maybe you just never really listened to them before."

"Sometimes you have to loose your mind before you come to your senses."

"You have to be strong if you're going to do this.  You're gonna need strength, and you're gonna need to trust me."  

"When you become a warrior you learn to meditate in every action.  Letting go of attachments, like you're pride, and giving  up your addictions."

"All you have is right now.  When you act like a jack ass, like now when you're letting your emotions control you."  

"What are you holding onto anyway.  Do you know who you are without me?  No.  What r you doing?"  

"First realization of a warrior, not knowing.  Emotions are natural, like the passing wx."

"Everything has a purpose, even this.  And it's up to you to find it.  Find your answers from within."

"The people that are the hardest to love are ones that need it the most."

"There's never nothing going on.  There are no ordinary moments."

"There is no better.  You'll never be better, same way you'll never be less than anybody else."

"The habit is the problem.  All you need to do is be conscious of your choices and responsible for your actions."  

"How do you know I'm not your own intuition speaking to you right now?"

"Every action has it's price and it's pleasure, recognizing both sides, a warrior becomes realistic and responsible for his actions."  

"Knowledge is not the same as wisdom, wisdom is doing."  

"Death is a transformation.   More radical than puberty but nothing to get particularly upset about.  Death is not sad, the sad thing is most people don't live at all."  

"I took for granted what i could do.  I was sloppy with my life.  I'm scared but i feel like i got rid of all the old stuff and I think it iwas the right thing to do."

"When you feel fear, use the sword.  Take it up here and cut the mind to ribbons.  Slash through all those regrets and fears, anything else that lives in the past and the future."  

"Service to others right?"  

"A warrior does not give up what he loves.  He finds the love in what he does."

"A warrior is not about perfection or victory or invulnerability.  He's about absolute vulnerability, that's the only true courage."  

"The accident is your training."  

"Life is choice.  You can choose to be a victim or anything else you'd like to be." 

"A warrior acts, only a fool reacts."  

"That's the future, throw it out."

"There is no starting or stopping, only doing."

"You can't hold onto it forever.  Nearly all of humanity shares the predicament.  If you don't get what you want, you suffer.  And even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold onto it forever."

"You don't need him or any letter to get up on those rings and do what you love." 

"The gold is a craving, if only I had it i'd be happy."  

"You don't surrender your dreams.  You surrender the one thing you never had and you never will, control."

"(What's the funnest part of a roller coster, the complete lack of control.  Life is like that)"

"Accept that you don't control what will happen to you.  That you may or you may not compete and that you are something exceptional, either way."  

A warrior does what he loves.  Chasing gold, living in fear that you might fail?  Is that what you loved?  

"Life has just three rules:  paradox, humor and change

Paradox:  life is a mystery, don't waste time trying to figure it out

Humor:  keep a sense of humor, especially about yourself, it is a strength beyond all measure

Change:  know that nothing stays the same."  

"The whole trip up you were excited.  What changed?"

"The journey is what brings us happiness, not the destination."  

"Where are you?  Here

When?   Now

What are you?   This moment"

Being mentally strong and confident

Mentally strong people have healthy habits. They manage their emotions, thoughts, and behaviors in ways that set them up for success in life. Check out these things that mentally strong people don’t do so that you too can become more mentally strong.

1. They Don’t Waste Time Feeling Sorry for Themselves
Mentally strong people don’t sit around feeling sorry about their circumstances or how others have treated them. Instead, they take responsibility for their role in life and understand that life isn’t always easy or fair.

2. They Don’t Give Away Their Power
They don’t allow others to control them, and they don’t give someone else power over them. They don’t say things like, “My boss makes me feel bad,” because they understand that they are in control over their own emotions and they have a choice in how they respond.

3. They Don’t Shy Away from Change
Mentally strong people don’t try to avoid change. Instead, they welcome positive change and are willing to be flexible. They understand that change is inevitable and believe in their abilities to adapt.

4. They Don’t Waste Energy on Things They Can’t Control
You won’t hear a mentally strong person complaining over lost luggage or traffic jams. Instead, they focus on what they can control in their lives. They recognize that sometimes, the only thing they can control is their attitude.

5. They Don’t Worry About Pleasing Everyone
Mentally strong people recognize that they don’t need to please everyone all the time. They’re not afraid to say no or speak up when necessary. They strive to be kind and fair, but can handle other people being upset if they didn’t make them happy.

6. They Don’t Fear Taking Calculated Risks
They don’t take reckless or foolish risks, but don’t mind taking calculated risks. Mentally strong people spend time weighing the risks and benefits before making a big decision, and they’re fully informed of the potential downsides before they take action.

7. They Don’t Dwell on the Past
Mentally strong people don’t waste time dwelling on the past and wishing things could be different. They acknowledge their past and can say what they’ve learned from it. However, they don’t constantly relive bad experiences or fantasize about the glory days. Instead, they live for the present and plan for the future.

8. They Don’t Make the Same Mistakes Over and Over
Mentally strong people accept responsibility for their behavior and learn from their past mistakes. As a result, they don’t keep repeating those mistakes over and over. Instead, they move on and make better decisions in the future.

9. They Don’t Resent Other People’s Success
Mentally strong people can appreciate and celebrate other people’s success in life. They don’t grow jealous or feel cheated when others surpass them. Instead, they recognize that success comes with hard work, and they are willing to work hard for their own chance at success.

10. They Don’t Give Up After the First Failure
Mentally strong people don’t view failure as a reason to give up. Instead, they use failure as an opportunity to grow and improve. They are willing to keep trying until they get it right.

11. They Don’t Fear Alone Time
Mentally strong people can tolerate being alone and they don’t fear silence. They aren’t afraid to be alone with their thoughts and they can use downtime to be productive. They enjoy their own company and aren’t dependent on others for companionship and entertainment all the time but instead can be happy alone.

12. They Don’t Feel the World Owes Them Anything
Mentally strong people don’t feel entitled to things in life. They weren’t born with a mentality that others would take care of them or that the world must give them something. Instead, they look for opportunities based on their own merits.

13. They Don’t Expect Immediate Results
Whether they are working on improving their health or getting a new business off the ground, mentally strong people don’t expect immediate results. Instead, they apply their skills and time to the best of their ability and understand that real change takes time.
======================================================================

Highly confident people believe in their ability to achieve. If you don’t believe in yourself, why should anyone else put their faith in you? To walk with swagger and improve your self-confidence, watch out for these fifteen things highly confident people don’t do.

They don’t make excuses.

Highly confident people take ownership of their thoughts and actions. They don’t blame the traffic for being tardy at work; they were late. They don’t excuse their short-comings with excuses like “I don’t have the time” or “I’m just not good enough”; they make the time and they keep on improving until they are good enough.

They don’t avoid doing the scary thing.

Highly confident people don’t let fear dominate their lives. They know that the things they are afraid of doing are often the very same things that they need to do in order to evolve into the person they are meant to be.

They don’t live in a bubble of comfort.

Highly confident people avoid the comfort zone, because they know this is a place where dreams die. They actively pursue a feeling of discomfort, because they know stretching themselves is mandatory for their success.

They don’t put things off until next week.

Highly confident people know that a good plan executed today is better than a great plan executed someday. They don’t wait for the “right time” or the “right circumstances”, because they know these reactions are based on a fear of change. They take action here, now, today – because that’s where progress happens.

They don’t obsess over the opinions of others.

Highly confident people don’t get caught up in negative feedback. While they do care about the well-being of others and aim to make a positive impact in the world, they don’t get caught up in negative opinions that they can’t do anything about. They know that their true friends will accept them as they are, and they don’t concern themselves with the rest.

They don’t judge people.

Highly confident people have no tolerance for unnecessary, self-inflicted drama. They don’t feel the need to insult friends behind their backs, participate in gossip about fellow co-workers or lash out at folks with different opinions. They are so comfortable in who they are that they feel no need to look down on other people.

They don’t let lack of resources stop them.

Highly confident people can make use of whatever resources they have, no matter how big or small. They know that all things are possible with creativity and a refusal to quit. They don’t agonize over setbacks, but rather focus on finding a solution.

They don’t make comparisons.

Highly confident people know that they are not competing with any other person. They compete with no other individual except the person they were yesterday. They know that every person is living a story so unique that drawing comparisons would be an absurd and simplistic exercise in futility.

They don’t find joy in people-pleasing.

Highly confident people have no interest in pleasing every person they meet. They are aware that not all people get along, and that’s just how life works. They focus on the quality of their relationships, instead of the quantity of them.

They don’t need constant reassurance.

Highly confident people aren’t in need of hand-holding. They know that life isn’t fair and things won’t always go their way. While they can’t control every event in their life, they focus on their power to react in a positive way that moves them forward.

They don’t avoid life’s inconvenient truths.

Highly confident people confront life’s issues at the root before the disease can spread any farther. They know that problems left unaddressed have a way of multiplying as the days, weeks and months go by. They would rather have an uncomfortable conversation with their partner today than sweep an inconvenient truth under the rug, putting trust at risk.

They don’t quit because of minor set-backs.

Highly confident people get back up every time they fall down. They know that failure is an unavoidable part of the growth process. They are like a detective, searching for clues that reveal why this approach didn’t work. After modifying their plan, they try again (but better this time).

They don’t require anyone’s permission to act.

Highly confident people take action without hesitation. Every day, they remind themselves, “If not me, who?”

They don’t limit themselves to a small toolbox.

Highly confident people don’t limit themselves to Plan A. They make use of any and all weapons that are at their disposal, relentlessly testing the effectiveness of every approach, until they identify the strategies that offer the most results for the least cost in time and effort.
Author & article source: Daniel Wallen | Lifehack

You create the world..

You are what your deep driving desire is.

As your desire is, so your will. As your will is,

So your deed. As your deed is, so is your destiny.

(Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV.5)

You are the subject. You create desires. You make it all happen.

Then you have the objects of desire and how to attain these objects.

 

To fully understand the law of attraction, we need to understand its origin. That origin begins and ends with you. The world lives in us and is perceived by a body -mind system we have created.

 

We are the creators of everyday lives.

The body - mind system is our tool, a tool of our own making; a tool that allows us to create and live in this world as we travel through life having the experiences we so want to have. 

 

The human mind regularly moves from one desire to another, trying to find fulfillment, trying to regain our original state of bliss. 

 

We are Sat Chit Ananda, existence, knowledge, and bliss absolute. This is our true nature, for we are powerful beings living in a world we have created and surrounded by other parts of ourselves that do reflect ourselves back to us.

 

Instead of remaining the creator, we turn to the desires that we created. 

These desires will be fulfilled in this lifetime or a future lifetime… that is the law. This process of birth continues until all desires are exhausted. These desires become exhausted, as we try on different roles, achieve our goals, and attain the objects we seek, bringing us to the realization after each desire is met, we are still no closer to the state of eternal bliss. We have temporary bliss.. fleeting.. never eternal. 

Then we look inward and ask: who am I? What is the purpose of this life? Where do I fit into the scheme of things? We start to desire to know the Self and awaken to our original state. We are now in the Know thyself mode.

 

The universe conspires to teach you about the self. It draws you into life situations that will satisfy your desires.

Out- of- nowhere situations will present itself to you, so you may learn more about the Self, because your desire to know the Self has been awakened, and the universe is answering that call.

 

The universe always answers. However, our mind often becomes scattered, running in different directions, which is why our life reflects chaos. When all desires cease, even the basic desire to know the Self, we are able to merge with the supreme Self. Desire is what veils the Self and sustains the illusion, allowing the Self to experience its creation.
  

You will never find permanent happiness in the objects of the world; the only place to find happiness is within yourself. Schopenhauer says “It is difficult to find happiness within oneself, but it is impossible to find it anywhere else.” You need to look within to the subject that perceives the object; this is where your focus needs to be. The subject is the perceiver, the part of us that is eternally happy and satisfied; it cares not about material gain or the lack of it.
  

When the perceiver becomes our internal reference point, our anchor, we are always happy and satisfied. The mind becomes calm, yet able to move within the world as a productive creator of life. Spiritual evolution is marked not by your knowledge of the scriptures or how much you are able to renounce, but by stability of the mind. When the mind becomes stable, it allows you to move in the world as a conscious creator, not a victim of circumstance. We start to use the mind as a tool to create the world around us. We use our intellect to make evolutionary choices, and we keep the body healthy, so we can use this birth to realize the “Self”, the ultimate goal of life. 

 

At the core of our being, we are actually whole, the Supreme Self, the Atman which is cloaked in the body- mind system. The Atman is what animates the body and allows it to perceive and act. It animates the mind and lets it feel and allows the intellect to think and contemplate. Yet, the type of perception, action, feeling, and thought that comes from the body- mind and intellect will depend on one’s inherent nature or vasanas. Your present vasanas set the pattern of your life, and only self-effort can modify or change that pattern. It is a choice only human beings have.

Vasanas are unmanifested seeds of action that lie dormant as your potential nature. These seeds wait for the right environment before they will grow, and when that right environment presents, they take root and grow into the proper manifestation. Your vasanas come from and are a result of the past. Your past actions produce your present vasanas, and your present vasanas produce further actions. This cycle continues until all desires are exhausted. When all desires cease, we merge with the Supreme Self. Here we exist in eternal bliss. It is the state we are actively searching for in the world. It is the ultimate goal of human life. That state is here within us; there is no need to search outside, for we carry it everywhere we go.
  

The whole universe that springs forth from the Supreme Self also resides in you, for you are a creator. When you created this world, you spoke its language and told it what you wanted it to do and be for you. You received just what you asked for, but to fully experience the creation, you had to lose yourself in it, forget how powerful you were. You are now asking to become a full participant in your life story, and the universe is listening.

We can all speak the language of the universe. We do so every day; its language is vibration. When you raise your vibration, the universe matches it and sends it back with an experience that matches the vibration. When you lower your vibration, the universe does the same; it does not discriminate. So how do you raise and lower your vibration? With your thoughts… where do your thoughts come from? Your mind.

Here it gets tricky because the mind is a product of your vasanas, and your vasanas are the primary cause or source of desire, thought, and action. This is why when you hold a thought about what you think you want, other thoughts combat that thought because it might not be in line with your inherent nature. That’s not to say that the law of attraction does not work. What I am saying here is that we have to master a lot more than your thoughts because those thoughts won’t stay in line with your desire if the desire is not in harmony with your inherent nature. So, you should not have conflicting thoughts. The thoughts should all work to strengthen your desire, then only action can happen.
 

  

Reality requires absence of mind

http://www.newagekids.com/_blog/Blog/post/Reality/
Reality is seeing things as they are with no elaboration, no thought, therefore no mind, this can happen only in the present. Once the mind steps in you are either in the past or the future, in the past with your memories or in the future with your thoughts (based on your memories, beliefs and conditioning), therefore you’ve stepped out of the present moment, stepped out of reality (what is).

Fragmented mind or complete picture?

The phenomenal intelligence in the making of every life and every aspect of creation is too incredible for any human mind to fully grasp. The very cosmos is a living mind. Intelligence is not within you or me. If we keep the door of perception fully open, all the intelligence of the creation and creator is ours. Otherwise, we live in the limitations of our sense perception that is fragmented and piecemeal.

Spirituality from a mountain angle

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/12/jack-kerouac-golden-eternity/

I have lots of things to teach you now, in case we ever meet, concerning the message that was transmitted to me under a pine tree in North Carolina on a cold winter moonlit night. It said that Nothing Ever Happened, so don’t worry. It’s all like a dream. Everything is ecstasy, inside. We just don’t know it because of our thinking-minds. But in our true blissful essence of mind is known that everything is alright forever and forever and forever. Close your eyes, let your hands and nerve-ends drop, stop breathing for 3 seconds, listen to the silence inside the illusion of the world, and you will remember the lesson you forgot, which was taught in immense milky way soft cloud innumerable worlds long ago and not even at all. It is all one vast awakened thing. I call it the golden eternity. It is perfect.

We were never really born, we will never really die. It has nothing to do with the imaginary idea of a personal self, other selves, many selves everywhere: Self is only an idea, a mortal idea. That which passes into everything is one thing. It’s a dream already ended. There’s nothing to be afraid of and nothing to be glad about. I know this from staring at mountains months on end. They never show any expression, they are like empty space. Do you think the emptiness of space will ever crumble away? Mountains will crumble, but the emptiness of space, which is the one universal essence of mind, the vast awakenerhood, empty and awake, will never crumble away because it was never born.

The world you see is just a movie in your mind.
Rocks dont see it.
Bless and sit down.
Forgive and forget.
Practice kindness all day to everybody
and you will realize you’re already
in heaven now.
That’s the story.
That’s the message.
Nobody understands it,
nobody listens, they’re
all running around like chickens with heads cut
off. I will try to teach it but it will
be in vain, s’why I’ll
end up in a shack
praying and being
cool and singing
by my woodstove
making pancakes.

Awesome collection of folktales across the globe

http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/folktexts.html

I had to read the cupid and psyche story and B forwarded this link. My goodness, this prof has collected so many folk tales!

Put in hard work and passion will follow.... or how to work when you don't feel like

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/30/jobs/follow-a-career-passion-let-it-follow-you.html?smid=pl-share&_r=0

Follow a Career Passion? Let It Follow You

 By CAL NEWPORT

Published: September 29, 2012

IN the spring of 2004, during my senior year of college, I faced a hard decision about my future career. I had a job offer from Microsoft and an acceptance letter from the computer science doctoral program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I had also just handed in the manuscript for my first nonfiction book, which opened the option of becoming a full-time writer. These are three strikingly different career paths, and I had to choose which one was right for me.

Enlarge This Image

Daniel Rosenbaum for The New York Times

Cal Newport, a computer science professor at Georgetown, says many people lack a “true calling” but have a sense of fulfillment that grows over time.

For many of my peers, this decision would have been fraught with anxiety. Growing up, we were told by guidance counselors, career advice books, the news media and others to “follow our passion.” This advice assumes that we all have a pre-existing passion waiting to be discovered. If we have the courage to discover this calling and to match it to our livelihood, the thinking goes, we’ll end up happy. If we lack this courage, we’ll end up bored and unfulfilled — or, worse, in law school.

To a small group of people, this advice makes sense, because they have a clear passion. Maybe they’ve always wanted to be doctors, writers, musicians and so on, and can’t imagine being anything else.

But this philosophy puts a lot of pressure on the rest of us — and demands long deliberation. If we’re not careful, it tells us, we may end up missing our true calling. And even after we make a choice, we’re still not free from its effects. Every time our work becomes hard, we are pushed toward an existential crisis, centered on what for many is an obnoxiously unanswerable question: “Is this what I’m really meant to be doing?” This constant doubt generates anxiety and chronic job-hopping.

As I considered my options during my senior year of college, I knew all about this Cult of Passion and its demands. But I chose to ignore it. The alternative career philosophy that drove me is based on this simple premise: The traits that lead people to love their work are general and have little to do with a job’s specifics. These traits include a sense of autonomy and the feeling that you’re good at what you do and are having an impact on the world. Decades of research on workplace motivation back this up. (Daniel Pink’s book “Drive” offers a nice summary of this literature.)

These traits can be found in many jobs, but they have to be earned. Building valuable skills is hard and takes time. For someone in a new position, the right question is not, “What is this job offering me?” but, instead, “What am I offering this job?”

RETURNING to my story, I decided after only minimal deliberation to go to M.I.T. True to my alternative career philosophy, I was confident that all three of my career options could be transformed into a source of passion, and this confidence freed me from worry about making a wrong choice. I ended up choosing M.I.T., mainly because of a slight preference for the East Coast, but I would have been equally content heading out to Microsoft’s headquarters near Seattle. Or, with the advance from my first book, I could have hunkered down in a quiet town to write.

During my initial years as a graduate student, I certainly didn’t enjoy an unshakable sense that I had found my true calling. The beginning of doctoral training can be rough. You’re not yet skilled enough to make contributions to the research literature, which can be frustrating. And at a place like M.I.T., you’re surrounded by brilliance, which can make you question whether you belong.

Had I subscribed to the “follow our passion” orthodoxy, I probably would have left during those first years, worried that I didn’t feel love for my work every day. But I knew that my sense of fulfillment would grow over time, as I became better at my job. So I worked hard, and, as my competence grew, so did my engagement.

Today, I’m a computer science professor at Georgetown University, and I love my job. The most important lesson I can draw from my experience is that this love has nothing to do with figuring out at an early age that I was meant to be a professor. There’s nothing special about my choosing this particular path. What mattered is what I did once I made my choice.

To other young people who constantly wonder if the grass might be greener on the other side of the occupational fence, I offer this advice: Passion is not something you follow. It’s something that will follow you as you put in the hard work to become valuable to the world.

Cal Newport is the author of “So Good They Can’t Ignore You.”

====================================================================

How to Make Yourself Work When You Just Don’t Want To

by Heidi Grant Halvorson  |   12:00 PM February 14, 2014

There’s that project you’ve left on the backburner – the one with the deadline that’s growing uncomfortably near.  And there’s the client whose phone call you really should return – the one that does nothing but complain and eat up your valuable time.  Wait, weren’t you going to try to go to the gym more often this year?
Can you imagine how much less guilt, stress, and frustration you would feel if you could somehow just make yourself do the things you don’t want to do when you are actually supposed to do them?  Not to mention how much happier and more effective you would be?
The good news (and its very good news) is that you can get better about not putting things off, if you use the right strategy.  Figuring out which strategy to use depends on why you are procrastinating in the first place:
Reason #1   You are putting something off because you are afraid you will screw it up.
Solution:  Adopt a “prevention focus.”
There are two ways to look at any task.  You can do something because you see it as a way to end up better off than you are now – as an achievement or accomplishment.  As in, if I complete this project successfully I will impress my boss, or if I work out regularly I will look amazing. Psychologists call this a promotion focus – and research shows that when you have one, you are motivated by the thought of making gains, and work best when you feel eager and optimistic.  Sounds good, doesn’t it?  Well, if you are afraid you will screw up on the task in question, this is not the focus for you.  Anxiety and doubt undermine promotion motivation, leaving you less likely to take any action at all.
What you need is a way of looking at what you need to do that isn’t undermined by doubt – ideally, one that thrives on it.  When you have a prevention focus, instead of thinking about how you can end up better off, you see the task as a way to hang on to what you’ve already got – to avoid loss.   For the prevention-focused, successfully completing a project is a way to keep your boss from being angry or thinking less of you.  Working out regularly is a way to not “let yourself go.”  Decades of research, which I describe in my book Focus, shows that prevention motivation is actually enhanced by anxiety about what might go wrong.  When you are focused on avoiding loss, it becomes clear that the only way to get out of danger is to take immediate action.  The more worried you are, the faster you are out of the gate.
I know this doesn’t sound like a barrel of laughs, particularly if you are usually more the promotion-minded type, but there is probably no better way to get over your anxiety about screwing up than to give some serious thought to all the dire consequences of doing nothing at all.    Go on, scare the pants off yourself.  It feels awful, but it works.
Reason #2     You are putting something off because you don’t “feel” like doing it.
Solution: Make like Spock and ignore your feelings.  They’re getting in your way.
In his excellent book The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking, Oliver Burkeman points out that much of the time, when we say things like “I just can’t get out of bed early in the morning, “ or “I just can’t get myself to exercise,” what we really mean is that we can’t get ourselves to feel like doing these things.  After all, no one is tying you to your bed every morning.  Intimidating bouncers aren’t blocking the entrance to your gym.  Physically, nothing is stopping you – you just don’t feel like it.  But as Burkeman asks,  “Who says you need to wait until you ‘feel like’ doing something in order to start doing it?”
Think about that for a minute, because it’s really important.  Somewhere along the way, we’ve all bought into the idea – without consciously realizing it – that to be motivated and effective we need to feel like we want to take action.  We need to be eager to do so.  I really don’t know why we believe this, because it is 100% nonsense. Yes, on some level you need to be committed to what you are doing – you need to want to see the project finished, or get healthier, or get an earlier start to your day.  But you don’t need to feel like doing it.
In fact, as Burkeman points out, many of the most prolific artists, writers, and innovators have become so in part because of their reliance on work routines that forced them to put in a certain number of hours a day, no matter how uninspired (or, in many instances, hungover) they might have felt.  Burkeman reminds us of renowned artist Chuck Close’s observation that “Inspiration is for amateurs.  The rest of us just show up and get to work.”
So if you are sitting there, putting something off because you don’t feel like it, remember that you don’t actually need to feel like it.  There is nothing stopping you.
Reason #3   You are putting something off because it’s hard, boring, or otherwise unpleasant.
Solution:  Use if-then planning.
Too often, we try to solve this particular problem with sheer will:  Next time, I will make myself start working on this sooner.  Of course, if we actually had the willpower to do that, we would never put it off in the first place.   Studies show that people routinely overestimate their capacity for self-control, and rely on it too often to keep them out of hot water.
Do yourself a favor, and embrace the fact that your willpower is limited, and that it may not always be up to the challenge of getting you to do things you find difficult, tedious, or otherwise awful.  Instead, use if-then planning to get the job done.
Making an if-then plan is more than just deciding what specific steps you need to take to complete a project – it’s also deciding where and when you will take them.
If it is 2pm, then I will stop what I’m doing and start work on the report Bob asked for.
If my boss doesn’t mention my request for a raise at our meeting, then I will bring it up again before the meeting ends.
By deciding in advance exactly what you’re going to do, and when and where you’re going to do it, there’s no deliberating when the time comes.   No do I really have to do this now?, or can this wait till later? or maybe I should do something else instead.   It’s when we deliberate that willpower becomes necessary to make the tough choice.  But if-then plans dramatically reduce the demands placed on your willpower, by ensuring that you’ve made the right decision way ahead of the critical moment. In fact,  if-then planning has been shown in over 200 studies to increase rates of goal attainment and productivity by 200%-300% on average.
I realize that the three strategies I’m offering you – thinking about the consequences of failure, ignoring your feelings, and engaging in detailed planning – don’t sound as fun as advice like “Follow your passion!” or “Stay positive!”  But they have the decided advantage of actually being effective – which, as it happens, is exactly what you’ll be if you use them.

How to generate positive feelings while starting with none!

Ignore your feelings!  Writing isn’t about listening to your feelings.  It’s about writing despite your feelings.  Positive feelings don’t motivate you to write.  Doing the writing is what creates positive feelings.

From: http://thecreativelawyer.typepad.com/the_creative_lawyer/2012/12/how-to-get-writing-done.html

Mindfulness and smartphones

Something I have believed in but never been able to articulate the way this author has.

http://thecreativelawyer.typepad.com/the_creative_lawyer/2013/03/mindfulness-and-smartphones.html

Mindfulness and Smartphones

It has been said that the fundamental adult skill is deferred gratification.  Children who master this skill usually become successful adults, and those who don’t, don’t.
You’d be hard-pressed to discern this truth from any ad for any commercial product, since nearly everything is marketed on the basis of promising immediate gratification.  “There’s an app for that!”TM means “more instant gratification for you.” 
Instant gratification is, indeed, gratifying, but only for an instant, in the same way that eating a potato chip is gratifying.  It doesn’t last, and there are consequences.
In the case of smartphones, texting, checking emails, IM’ing, and internet surfing, there are a few costs associated with the “convenience” and occasional pleasure of doing whatever you want whenever you want. This constant momentary checking taxes you in specific ways.
First, there are task-switching costs.  When you switch from one mental activity to another, there is a loss.  There is no such thing as “multitasking.”  It’s just task-switching – when you multitask, tasks take more time and have higher error rates. Here’s the research.
Second, seeking instant gratification actually makes you less happy:  it impedes development of fulfillment and associated feelings of satisfaction and well-being.  Fulfillment shows up when we have "flow," a term first identified by Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi as an experience of total engagement.  Flow occurs when we are so immersed in something that we don’t notice the passage of time.  Csikszentmihalyi explained that we can find flow by “doing great things, or doing everyday things with greatness.”  The ingredients to flow are:  (1) a high challenge; (2) skills matched to the challenge; and (3) constant feedback.  One of his findings is that people find more flow – and therefore more fulfillment – in work, rather than in leisure.  This is because work requires us to engage.  Instant gratification is pretty much the opposite of engagement.  Flow comes from challenge, not ease.
Third, instant gratification is the opposite of mindfulness, which you might say is the one requirement for being content in life.  Mindfulness means being present – living, experiencing and relishing the present moment, rather than being distracted by other thoughts or feelings.  Mindfulness involves observing how the mind acts – when it gets bored, distracted, annoyed, fearful, etc – and is based on the idea that the mind is not you.  It’s part of you, but it’s not the whole you.  It’s the tool, not the master. Buddhism calls the urge to get out of the moment, to move to something else, whether good or bad, "The Monkey Mind."  The Monkey Mind is endlessly dissatisfied.  When you're having dinner with a friend or loved one and decide you need to check your phone, that's the Monkey Mind in action.  
Smartphones and their ilk are basically The Monkey Mind in physical form.  With their constant ringing, buzzing and urges to “check me! check me! check me!” they are a ceaseless force urging you to leave the present moment and do something else.  Your urge to check your smartphone feels like your real mind, but it's really your Monkey MInd.  The false message of the smartphone is:  “whatever reality you’re experiencing now is not as good as the reality I’m promising you.”  So in addition to your natural Monkey Mind, when you carry around and are a servant to your smartphone, you have created a second, outsourced Monkey Mind.
Feel like slipping out of the moment and checking your device?  Gawker will just have another snarky, celebrity story, similar to a hundred others you’ve read. Facebook will have some updates, but nothing as real as the reality you're in. That email might be good or bad, but it’s just another email.
Just as that additional potato chip is not really going to make you happier.  Just fatter, and experiencing a salty aftertaste. And setting up the urge to do it again in 30 seconds.