As goes the saying: Change is the only constant!
Without a change in life, you cannot survive, and forget to thrive. Change is a mixed bag, sometimes it brings happiness, sometimes challenges, sometimes opportunities, and sometimes sadness. It depends on your reaction, and how you take it.
Change is necessary to improve and thrive. It is how we adapt to our surroundings and grow personally and professionally. It is not always easy to accept change, but it is essential if you want to see positive results.
Powerful Reasons why change is good for you:
- You gain confidence. When you succumb to change, you find out what you are made of.
- You become more flexible.
- Your lifestyle is enhanced.
- You are more motivated.
- You develop more skills.
- You become more compassionate.
- You attract more opportunities.
As you have embarked on your journey of changing yourself and subsequently changing the world, I continue with a few more tips given by Mahatma Gandhi:
Without action, you are not going anywhere.
“An ounce of practice is worth more than tons of preaching.”
Without taking action very little will be done. However, taking action can be hard. There can be much inner resistance. You may resort to preaching or reading and studying endlessly. It feels like you are moving forward but without getting little or no practical results in real life. To get where you want to go and to understand yourself and your world you need to practice. Books can mostly just bring you knowledge but you must take action and translate that knowledge into results and understanding.
Take care of this moment.
“I do not want to foresee the future. I am concerned with taking care of the present. God has given me no control over the moment following.”
The best way that I have found to overcome the inner resistance that often stops us from acting is to stay in the present as much as possible and to be accepting.
Why? Well, when you are in the present moment you do not worry about the next moment that you cannot control anyway. The resistance to action that comes from you imagining negative future consequences – or reflecting on past failures – of your actions loses its power. It becomes easier to both take action and to keep your focus on this moment and perform better.
Reconnecting with and staying in the now is a mental habit – a sort of muscle – that you grow. Over time it becomes more powerful and makes it easier to slip into the present moment.
Everyone is human
“It is unwise to be too sure of one’s wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err.”
When you start to make myths out of people – even though they may have produced extraordinary results – you run the risk of becoming disconnected from them. You can start to feel like you could never achieve similar things that they did because they are so very different. It is important to keep in mind that everyone is just a human being no matter who they are.
It is important to remember that we are all human and prone to make mistakes. Holding people to unreasonable standards will only create more unnecessary conflicts in your world and negativity within you.
It is also important to remember this to avoid falling into the pretty useless habit of beating yourself up over mistakes that you have made. Instead, be able to see with clarity where you went wrong and what you can learn from your mistake. Then try again.
Persist
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
Be persistent. In time the opposition around you will fade and fall away. Your inner resistance and self-sabotaging tendencies that want to hold you back and keep you like you have always been will grow weaker.
Find what you like to do. Then you will find the inner motivation to keep going, going, and going.
One reason Gandhi Ji was so successful with his method of non-violence was that he and his followers were so persistent. They just did not give up.
Success or victory will seldom come as quickly as you would have liked it to. One of the reasons people do not get what they want is simply because they give up too soon. The time they think an achievement will require is not the same amount of time it usually takes to achieve that goal. This faulty belief partly comes from the world we live in. A world full of magic pill solutions where advertising continually promises us all that which is nearly impossible.
Finally, one useful tip to keep your persistence going is to listen to Gandhi Ji’s which will lighten things up at the toughest of times.
See the good in people and help them.
“I look only to the good qualities of men. Not being faultless myself, I will not presume to probe into the faults of others.”
“Man becomes great exactly in the degree in which he works for the welfare of his fellow men.”
There is pretty much always something good in people. Even in things that may not be so good. You can choose what things to focus on. If you want improvement then focusing on the good in people is a useful choice. It also makes life easier for you as your world and relationships become more pleasant and positive.
When you see the good in people it becomes easier to motivate yourself to be of service to them. By being of service to other people, by giving them value, you not only make their lives better, over time you tend to get what you give. And the people you help may feel more inclined to help other people. Together, create an upward spiral of positive change that grows and becomes stronger.
By strengthening your social skills, you can become a more influential person and make this upward spiral even stronger.
Be congruent, be authentic, be your true self.
“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.”
“Always aim at complete harmony of thought and word and deed. Always aim at purifying your thoughts and everything will be well.”
These are a few “Happiness Mantra” that will go a long way in changing you and the world around you.
Be HappyHo!
