Abundance Blog at Marelisa Online

27 Jubilant Happiness Books

Marelisa — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:02:55 +0000

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the year 2020 will see depression become second only to heart disease in terms of the global burden of illness. Fortunately, there are self-development experts, Buddhist monks, and psychologists who are writing lots of books on how we can be happier. So hopefully we’ll find a way to escape the WHO’s dire predictions.

Here’s a list of 27 jubilant happiness books. I’ve talked about some of these books in previous posts. I hope you enjoy the list!

The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living

The book “The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living” was written by psychiatrist Howard C. Cutler based on a series of interviews held with the Dalai Lama during his visit to Arizona, as well as in his home in India, augmented by some of the Dalai Lama’s public talks.

The Dalai Lama believes that the very purpose of our existence is to seek happiness, and the book contains many of the methods recommended by the Dalai Lama to cultivate happiness. You can read more about this book in my blog post: “Happiness Tips From the Dalai Lama”.

Stumbling on Happiness

From the book, “Stumbling on Happiness” by Daniel Gilbert:

“When I was ten years old, the most magical object in my house was a book on optical illusions. Its pages introduced me to the Muller-Lyer lines whose arrow-tipped ends made them appear as though they were different lengths even though a ruler showed them to be identical, the Necker cube that appeared to have an open side one moment and then an open top the next, the drawing of a chalice that suddenly became a pair of silhouetted faces before flickering back into a chalice again.

[T]his is a book that describes what science has to tell us about how and how well the human brain can imagine its own future, and about how and how well it can predict which of those futures it will most enjoy.”

Zen and The Art of Happiness

The book “Zen And the Art of Happiness”asks you to imagine that God appeared before you and said: “I promise you that everything that happens to you from this moment forward will be of the greatest benefit to you and will bring you the utmost fortune. Even though what happens will sometimes appear unfortunate or hurtful, in the end your life will be wonderfully blessed and hugely benefited by whatever happens.”

Wouldn’t that be the best piece of news you could hear? The author adds that if you are willing to give this concept a chance, you will be rewarded with a lifetime of happiness.

Flow: The Classic Work on How to Achieve Happiness

In “Flow: The Classic Work on How to Achieve Happiness” Dr. Csikszentmihalyi describes flow as “being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.” The flow state is one of the most enjoyable and valuable experiences a person can have, and achieving the flow state on a consistent basis has been found to be one of the best ways to attain happiness.

If you’d like more information on the flow state, head on over to my post “How to Enter the Flow State”.

Thanks!: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier

Robert Emmons, author of “Thanks!: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier” discovered scientific proof that when people regularly engage in the systematic cultivation of gratitude, they experience a variety of measurable benefits: psychological, physical, and interpersonal. In fact, people who regularly practice grateful thinking can increase their set point of happiness by as much as 25%.

Books by Martin Seligman: The Founder of Positive Psychology

Positive Psychology asks the questions: “What are the enabling conditions that make human beings flourish?” This branch of psychology, which was founded by Martin Seligman, studies what actively makes people feel fulfilled, engaged and meaningfully happy. Two books by Dr. Seligman in which he discusses his findings, and how you can apply them in your own life in order to he happier, are:

Books by Tal Ben Shahar

Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar is a Positive Psychologist who has authored several popular books and taught one of the most popular courses in Harvard University’s history, all on the topic of positive psychology. I’ve already written about him in my blog post “Harvard University’s Most Popular Course: Positive Psychology”. Here are three happiness books by Dr. Ben-Shahar:

Here’s a fun video in which Dr. Ben-Shahar gives a brief introduction to Positive Psychology (those reading this by email may need to click over to the blog to watch the video):

Happiness: Unlocking the Mysteries of Psychological Wealth

I love the concept of “psychological wealth”. The authors of “Happiness: Unlocking the Mysteries of Psychological Wealth”–a father and son team–have devoted their professional lives as psychologists to the study of happiness. They have reexamined long-held conclusions about well-being by collecting data from tens of thousands of people in dozens of nations, from the very wealthy to the destitute.

After decades of research they re-confirm some widely held beliefs about happiness and knock others down. Here’s what they claim are the essential components of true wealth:

Life satisfaction and happiness
Spirituality and meaning of life
Positive attitudes and emotions
Loving social relationships
Engaging activities and work
Values and life goals to achieve them
Physical and mental health
Material sufficiency to meet our needs

The How of Happiness: A New Approach to Getting the Life You Want

Notice the pie on the front cover of Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky’s book, “The How of Happiness: A New Approach to Getting the Life You Want”. It is meant to illustrate the following: 50 percent of individual differences in happiness are governed by genes, 10 percent by life circumstances, and the remaining 40 percent by what we do and how we think-that is, our intentional activities and strategies.

The video below shows two identical twins; one is happy and the other is not. Their stories are evidence that genes don’t tell the whole happiness story.

What about life circumstances, which include things such as how much money you make, where you live, and how you look? Both twins participated in the show “Extreme Make-Over”, in which they underwent extensive plastic surgery to completely alter their looks.

They indicate that the increased happiness that they felt over the way that they looked after the surgery lasted for about a year. After that, they went back to their previous happiness levels. This is evidence that life circumstances don’t have that much of an impact on happiness.

So how do you make the most of the 40 percent that is under your control and that depends on how you choose to think and act each day? Dr. Lyubomirsky presents 12 happiness enhancing strategies, which are:

(1) Counting your blessings: Expressing gratitude for what you have and appreciating what others do for you.

(2) Cultivating optimism: Keep a journal in which you imagine the best possible future for yourself.

(3) Avoiding over thinking and social comparison: Minimize worrying about things that are not within your control and comparing yourself to others.

(4) Practicing acts of kindness: Doing good things for others, whether it’s strangers or those you know.

(5) Nurturing Relationships: Investing time and energy in cultivating and enjoying your relationships.

(6) Doing more activities that truly engage you: Increasing the number of experiences at home and work in which you “lose” yourself, which are challenging and absorbing.

(7) Replaying and savoring life’s joys: Paying close attention to and remembering often life’s momentary pleasures.

(8) Committing to your goals: Picking goals that are meaningful to you and devoting time and effort to pursuing them.

(9) Developing strategies for coping: Having strategies in place for dealing with stress, set-backs, and hardship.

(10) Learning to forgive: Letting go of anger and resentment toward those whom you feel have wronged you.

(11) Practicing religion and spirituality: Becoming more involved in your religious institution of choice or reading and pondering spiritually-themed books.

(12) Taking care of your body: Engaging in physical activity, meditating, sleeping well, and eating well.

A Complaint Free World: How to Stop Complaining and Start Enjoying the Life You Always Wanted

A couple of years back Will Bowen was inspired to give a purple rubber bracelet to each person in his 280-member congregation. The bracelet, which says SPIRIT, was to remind people to stop complaining. “Negative talk produces negative thoughts; negative thoughts produce negative results”, says Bowen. To live a happy and prosperous life, you have to stop complaining. He challenged his flock to stop complaining for 21 consecutive days.

You can experience the 21-day challenge for yourself by reading “A Complaint Free World: How to Stop Complaining and Start Enjoying the Life You Always Wanted”.

How We Choose to Be Happy

In “How We Choose to Be Happy”, Rick Foster and Greg Hicks present the nine choices that extremely happy people make. These are:

1. Intention: Happy people have a desire and make a commitment to be happy.

2. Accountability: Happy people take responsibility for themselves. They don’t play the victim and they don’t waste energy blaming others. When something goes wrong, people who are happy look for ways in which they can improve the situation, instead of arguing over who’s to blame.

3. Identification: Those who are happy look within to determine what truly makes them happy (as opposed to what society says should make them happy). This reliance on their internal compass might lead them to decide that the promotion at work isn’t really something they’re interested in.

4. Centrality: Happy people make central to their life that which makes them happy. Foster and Hicks recommend making your dream list the driving force in your life. Become devoted to doing what makes you happy.

5. Recasting: When something doesn’t turn out as planned, happy people allow themselves to feel the negative emotions that usually arise in light of a setback. However, they quickly start looking for the lessons and the meaning in the challenging situation. In other words, they look for ways in which to recast the negative in positive ways.

6. Options: Many people feel trapped by situations such as a job they don’t enjoy, a lack of money, toxic relationships, and so on. Happy people are open to possibilities and have a flexible approach: they look for ways out of situations which are holding them back.

7. Appreciation: Those who are happy appreciate the people in their life and stay in the present.

8. Giving: Happy people give to the world at large without an expectation of getting in return.

9. Truthfulness: Happy people are authentic; they’re truthful with others about what they want and what they need.

Books by Robert Holden – Director of the Happiness Project

Dr. Robert Holden is a pioneer in the fields of positive psychology and well-being and the author of “Happiness Now!: Timeless Wisdom for Feeling Good FAST” and “Be Happy!: Release the Power of Happiness in YOU”.

He’s the Director of the Happiness Project in the United Kingdom, an eight week scientifically tested program that promises to rewire your brain for happiness. It’s been running in the UK for 15 years now. The course is now being offered online; if anyone is interested, go here.

Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill

Matthieu Ricard is the French scientist turned Buddhist monk who has been called “the happiest man on earth”. He’s the author of Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill.

Ricard explains that he and another monk were invited to Tahiti. They were staying at a beautiful house with a large, lit swimming pool.

Looking out at the swimming pool they asked themselves whether having a pool like that would make them happy. They concluded that there was no relation between having a pool and happiness. And what if having a swimming pool did make them happy? Would having a pool twice the size make them twice as happy? The answer is, of course not.

They concluded that it’s the way in which you interpret things which determines your happiness, and this conclusion was confirmed the very next morning. Tahiti is hot and humid, and Ricard and his monk friend were sitting underneath a beautiful tree, and there was a soft, refreshing mist falling from the tree. They were both thinking: “Well, this is paradise”.

Then someone walked by and said: “You know, those are pissing flies” (cicadelles install themselves on trees and pump the sap until they “piss” a sticky liquid). Their perception of the world changed right away.

He adds that if we assume that the inner conditions for well-being are really what will determine the quality of everything that happens to us, we realize that we don’t have to modify the whole world to suit our tastes, we just have to change our minds. Ask yourself the following:

Which conditions in your mind lead to a sense of fulfillment?
Which conditions in your mind take you away from that sense of fulfillment (anger, resentment, grudges, jealousy, excessive feelings of self-importance, and so on)?

Ten More Happiness Books

If anyone has read any great happiness books that aren’t on this list, please share the title in the comments section.

Related Posts:

Recommended Products:

Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

My ebook “How to Be More Creative – A Handbook for Alchemists” explains that creativity is not the sole domain of the arts but is important in any field, from medicine to business, and from engineering to developing a creative solution to a negotiation impasse. Whatever you do, creativity helps you do it better. Discover practical advice on how to be more creative in every life endeavor by reading my ebook.

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Have Fun at Work and Increase the Bottom Line

Marelisa — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:59:18 +0000

“The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.”

-Calvin Trillin

Traditional wisdom states the following: “Work is not supposed to be fun. That’s why it’s called work.” A corollary of this principle states that if you see someone having fun at work, that person is slacking off. However, research shows that this dismal view of work is completely wrong.

In “The Levity Effect: Why it Pays to Lighten Up”, bestselling author Adrian Gostick and humorist Scott Christopher use science to reveal the remarkable power of humor and fun in business.

Through interviews, exercises, and case studies, the book reveals how humor in the workplace helps build camaraderie, increases productivity, enhances employee satisfaction and loyalty, and encourages creativity and innovation for a better workplace and bigger profits. Two examples cited in “The Levity Effect” of how some highly successful companies make work fun for their employees are the following:

Employees at Lego America travel around campus on scooters.
At Microsoft they blast music at three o’clock when everyone’s energy is starting to slump: Some people get up and dance and everyone claps when the song is over.

Gostick and Christopher point out that an organization called the “Great Place to Work Institute“–which has asked tens of thousands of employees to rate their experience of workplace factors–has consistently found that companies that are classified as “great” score unusually high marks from employees on the question: “Are you working in a fun environment?” Great companies scored 81% on this, compared to 62% for companies ranked “good”.

Amy Lyman, chair of the board and cofounder of the Institute, says the following:

“If you are interested in increasing the opportunities for fun across an organization, and people genuinely engage and have fun, then that is an indication to me of a strong workplace culture that people will want to commit to. You would see a correlation between fun and reduced turnover, better recruiting, greater camaraderie…all those positive things you see happen in great workplaces.”

Here are some more findings by the authors of “The Levity Effect” :

A study of 737 chief executives of major corporations found that 98% would hire an applicant with a good sense of humor over one who seemed to lack one.

The research firm Ipsos surveyed 1,000 employees, and those who rated their manager’s sense of humor “above average” said there was a 90 percent chance they’d stay at the job for more than a year. Employees who rated their manager’s sense of humor as “average” or “below average” rated their chances of staying at only about 77.5%.

A study in the Harvard Business Review indicates that executives described by co-workers as having a good sense of humor climb the corporate ladder more quickly and earn more money than their peers.

According to Bob Pike, author of The Fun Minute Manager, a fun work environment is one in which formal and informal activities occur regularly that are designed to uplift people’s spirits and remind people of their value to their managers, their organization, and to each other through the use of humor, games, celebrations, opportunities for self development, or recognition of achievements and milestones. (Source).

So how can a company encourage fun at work? Below you’ll find 20 ideas gathered from several different sources:

20 Ways to Have Fun at Work

“A company that has fun, where employees . . . put cartoons on the wall and celebrate, is spirited, creative, and usually profitable.” — David Baum

1. A company in California distributes page-a-day calendars on different subjects to employees at the beginning of each year. The subjects range from “Jeopardy” to Dilbert cartoons to gardening tips. Since everyone’s calendar is different employees share the tips, jokes, or riddles that they get each day with everyone else. Follow their lead and do something similar. (From “301 Ways to Have Fun at Work”).

2. On the third Thursday of the month, go to a pub for food and/or drinks and celebrate achievements, anniversaries, birthdays, and just making it through another month. (From “The Levity Effect”).

3. Decorate the workplace. (Read my post “Make Your Workspace More Creative” for ideas.)

4. Install a basketball hoop in the parking lot and start a tournament for employees during the lunch break. (From “301 Ways to Have Fun at Work”).

5. Organized goofing around can foster team spirit and increase creativity. Contests like relay races in office chairs and team Nerf gun fights help break up a workday and allow everyone to bring a renewed spirit to their work. (From “301 Ways to Have Fun at Work”).

6. Have a Laughter Yoga session before each meeting.

7. Build a Wall of Fame. Decorate it with awards, thank-you notes from clients, news clippings of your company’s successes, and so on. (From “The Levity Effect”).

8. Create a humor bulletin board. Make it a point to look for cartoons and jokes which poke fun at the circumstances that cause negativity or conflict in the office. Start with a blank board each Monday morning. However, keep the old ones and put them together in a scrapbook. Award the scrapbook to the employee who does the most to foster good humor in the workplace. (Source).

9. Have a “Success Bell”. When someone in the office helps a client or makes a new sale they ring a bell and everyone cheers and laughs. (Source).

10. Turn the coffee room into a humor room by stocking it with stand-up comedy routines on DVD or audio tapes. (Source).

11. Mary Owen from Oracle Corp. says the following: “We are under a lot of pressure and toys are our comfort. We need them like Linus needs his blanket.” Toys for the office can include koosh balls, a foosball table, pez dispensers, hula hoops, a sand tray, wooden blocks, origami paper, and so on.

12. Work together to create a mural on an office wall, or create some other type of art together. (From “The Levity Effect”).

13. Have a pizza and ice cream social each time an important goal is reached.

14. Take candid photos of employees at work and hang the pictures up on the bulletin board.

15. Give juggling kits to all your employees and have a “meeting” in which everyone learns to juggle. Once a quarter you can have a meeting that’s not business related. (From “Work Happy Now”).

16. When tensions get high at Social Sauce, a user-generated content and communication platform in New York City, employees break out foam swords. “In an office of mostly Internet and tech males, the sword fights diffuse tension by allowing coworkers to play similarly to the online games they play or develop,” explains Jenn de la Vega, a marketing assistant there. (Source).

17. A high tech company in Reston, Virginia posts a riddle in their weekly newsletter. The first person to answer the riddle correctly receives a small gift valued at $5 or less. The gifts are often nostalgic toys, like a slinky, Play-Doh, and other items that can be played with or shared around the office. A company representative stated, “Everyone in the office looks forward to seeing what is awarded that week. The toys often get passed around and borrowed. It’s a big hit!” (Source).

18. Colleen Barrett, who retired as CEO of Southwest Airlines, sent over 3,000 handwritten notes every month for nearly 30 years thanking employees for specific things they had done to improve the passenger experience for Southwest customers. (Source).

19. A “fun committee” should be formed to find effective ways to add fun to work. The committee should consist of representatives from a wide range of departments, and committee membership should rotate. (Source).

20. Allow your employees to be spontaneous. On a Southwest Airlines flight, Flight attendant David Holmes spontaneously decided to rap the safety instructions at the beginning of the flight. It was a big hit with passengers and now he does it all the time. (Found via Chief Happiness Officer). (If you’re reading this post by email or in a reader, please visit the blog to watch the video).

Conclusion

Thomas Edison knew the value of making work fun. Toward the end of his life he said: “I never did a day’s work in my life—it was all fun.”

I would recommend “The Levity Effect” to those interested in discovering more on how having fun at work has a positive effect on workplace morale, productivity, creativity, and profits. To conclude, I leave you with this creed to Silly Putty (found here):

CREDO

“I BELIEVE in silly putty

I BELIEVE that Silly Putty should be made freely available to all students and teachers of all students, but especially learner drivers;

to people confined to: hospital beds, wheelchairs, prison cells and the passengers seats of poor drivers and inept pilots

to anyone waiting in: a dentists’ waiting room, the lounge of a maternity hospital, a supermarket queue, in front of a pregnancy test kit and behind the kid with the big piggy bank in the teller’s line;

the wives and sweethearts of golfers, fishermen, astronauts and model train enthusiasts

the husbands and lovers of anyone who makes patchwork quilts

keepers of paper filing systems

the person working on the return and refund desk the week after Christmas and on the lingerie counter the week before

parents whose children ask “why?”, are teething, have the car for the first time, on their first date, or who are dating anyone with a Harley or a tattoo of Clinton.”

photo credit: Mykl Roventine

photo credit: Unhindered by Talent

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Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

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Finding Your Life’s Passion: Conduct Experiments

Marelisa — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 05:51:33 +0000

“The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he’s always doing both.” -James A. Michener

Seventy percent of white collar workers are unhappy with their jobs, but they continue to spend more and more time in the office. This startling pronouncement is made by career coach Dan Miller in his book “48 Days To The Work You Love”. He goes on to say that it doesn’t have to be this way, and he makes a distinction between a job, a career, and a calling:

A job is a chore done so you can pay your bills.
A career is motivated by money, prestige, and advancement.
A calling is work done as an end in and of itself.

Miller explains that the word “vocation” comes from the Latin vocare which means “to call”. It suggests that you’re listening to something that is calling out to you. Vocation, then, is not something that comes from wilfulness, but from listening.

This is the same sentiment expressed by Randy Komisar, the Silicon Valley “Virtual CEO” whom I wrote about in my blog post “Zen Capitalism – Randy Komisar”. He says the following: “Passion pulls you toward something you cannot resist. Drive pushes you toward something you feel compelled or obligated to do.”

So then, ask yourself: Is the work you’re currently performing your life’s passion? Or is it just a paycheck or status symbol? Do you look forward to getting started with your work each morning? Or do you feel that you’re postponing your happiness until you get that big promotion you have your eye on?

In another one of his books, “No More Dreaded Mondays: Ignite Your Passion”, Miller suggests that you analyze the following questions:

Are you where you thought you’d be at this stage of your life?
Have you ever had a sense of calling?
How did you hear that calling?
Is your work a fulfillment of that calling?
Do you go home at night with a sense of meaning, purpose and accomplishment?
If nothing changed in your life over the next 5 years, would that be okay?
If you want different results next year, what are you willing to change about what you’re doing right now?

If you’ve concluded from what is written above that you currently have either a job or a career, here’s what you can do in order to discover your life’s vocation or passion:

Conduct Lots of Experiments

One of the best ways to discover what you love to do–and what gives you a true sense of meaning and satisfaction– is to get out there and try new things. Here are three people who advocate this approach:

Scott H. Young

Scott H. Young, from the blog “Get More From Life”, argues in his blog post titled “How to Discover What You’re Passionate About” that the best approach to finding your passion is to try a lot of different things to see what you enjoy. He says the following:

“Dabbling is key to the art of finding what drives you. Dabbling means committing to something for 3-6 months. This amount of time isn’t enough to become really good at anything. But it is enough time to get over the sharp learning curve in the beginning.”

Once you get over the initial learning curve–that is, the frustrating period at the beginning during which you’re just getting your bearings–you can decide whether or not this new activity is something you truly enjoy.

Scott advises that if there aren’t any activities in your life right now that you feel passionate about, then you should create a list of activities outside of your comfort zone which you can practice for a few hours each week. Commit to these activities for at least three months. He adds that, if you dabble in several things, you’ll be creating a broader base to work from in order to determine where your true passion lies.

Allan Bacon

A similar approach is suggested by Allan Bacon, the winner of Chris Guillebeau’s “Unconventional Writing Contest”. Bacon explains in his article “Moving to Paris Without Quitting My Day job: A Lesson in Becoming a Nonconformist” that most people take the wrong approach when trying to determine their life’s passion: they use tests and coaching to look back at their history in order to find the next job that would make them happier.

He argues that this is the equivalent of trying to decide if you like mango ice cream by analyzing your past food choices. Of course, that makes very little sense. If you want to know if you like mango ice cream, you should taste it. This realization led him to conclude that what he needed to do was to “taste” different areas which might bring him more satisfaction. That is, he needed to conduct life experiments. Here’s a quote from Bacon’s article:

“So I started doing Life Experiments by working them into the cracks and crevices of my busy schedule outside of work: visiting art galleries on a lunch break, taking photos on the weekend, exploring Tokyo paper shops between sales calls on a business trip. My guiding principle was to find the fastest, cheapest way to take action and try the essence of all the interests and job ideas I had.”

Randy Komisar

Let’s refer to Randy Komisar and the previous post I wrote about him once again. Randy–who holds a BA in Economics from Brown University and a JD from Harvard Law School–explains that he got to a point in his life where he had no idea what he wanted to do. Therefore, he began pursuing different opportunities until it became clear to him that those opportunities weren’t going to give him the fulfillment or satisfaction that he wanted.

He would then try to find, pursue, or create new opportunities for himself that would lead to a fulfilling life. By following that approach he found his life’s passion: today, he loves his life as a Virtual CEO. Incidentally, he also teaches entrepreneurship at Stanford and is the author of the bestseller “The Monk and the Riddle: The Art of Creating a Life While Making a Living”.

Conclusion

If there’s already something in your life that you feel passionate about–such as knitting, comic books, video games, and so on–but you’ve never seriously considered that you could make a living from it, then you need to take a look at my post “Freedom, Nonconformity, and Unconventional Living“.

However, if you just don’t know what you’re passionate about, then follow Scott’s, Bacon’s, and Randy’s lead: start experimenting with different activities in order to discover your life’s passion. You can start out by doing some of the following:

Seek out new experiences and activities.
Take a class at a local college or attend seminars and lectures.
Apply for a part-time job.
Try a new hobby.
Help a friend with work.

If there are things you think you might truly enjoy but you have previously denied yourself the opportunity to try them out, find ways to test your suspicions. Go out and get yourself a spoonful of mango ice cream.

photo credit: scaredy_kat

Related Posts:

Recommended Products:

Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

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Get A Motivation Boost From Nike

Marelisa — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 05:29:31 +0000

Here are some fabulous quotes and videos from Nike to give your motivation a boost:

“The only one who can tell you ‘you can’t’ is you. And you don’t have to listen.” – Nike

“All your life you are told the things you cannot do. All your life they will say you’re not good enough or strong enough or talented enough; they will say you’re the wrong height or the wrong weight or the wrong type to play this or be this or achieve this. THEY WILL TELL YOU NO, a thousand times no, until all the no’s become meaningless. All your life they will tell you no, quite firmly and very quickly. AND YOU WILL TELL THEM YES.”

Awesome Nike video (if you’re reading this by email or in a reader, please click here to watch):

“Training is the opposite of hoping.” – Nike

Barry Sanders (1992):

“Too often we are scared. Scared of what we might not be able to do. Scared of what people might think if we tried. We let our fears stand in the way of our hopes.

We say no when we want to say yes. We sit quietly when we want to scream. And we shout with the others, when we should keep our mouths shut. Why? After all, we do only go around once. There’s really no time to be afraid.

So stop. Try something you’ve never tried. Risk it. Enter a triathlon. Write a letter to the editor. Demand a raise. Call winners at the toughest court. Throw away your television. Bicycle across the United States. Try bobsledding. Try anything. Speak out against the designated hitter. Travel to a country where you don’t speak the language. Patent something. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain. JUST DO IT.”

Michael Jordan – I succeed, because I fail (if you’re reading this by email or in a reader, please click here to watch):

“That’s right. I’m out of here. Do not chase me down or text me or try to talk me into going out to lunch. I don’t have time to figure out if I have time for a run. I’m just going. The world will not fall apart in my absence. I might miss somebody’s birthday cake or a discussion of last night’s season finale. Even if I do, who cares. I’m coming back with a state of mind three coffees, two flirtatious emails and a week of vacation can’t buy. Just do it.”

Lance Armstrong – Nike Commercial (if you’re reading this by email or in a reader, please click here to watch):

“Everything you need is already inside. Just do it.” — Bill Bowerman

photo credit: Tiago Zaniratti

Related Posts:

Recommended Products:

Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

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The 10 Habits of Zen to Done

Marelisa — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 04:59:25 +0000

I’ve already reviewed two of the major productivity systems out there on this blog: Simpleology and Mark Foster’s Do It Tomorrow. Today, Leo Babauta’s productivity system, “Zen to Done”, is up for review.

Zen to Done (ZTD) is based on David Allen’s “Getting Things Done” (GTD), as well as on the work of Stephen Covey and others. It’s a set of 10 habits that will help you get organized, simplify your life, get things under control, and get things done.

Instead of trying to implement all 10 habits at once, Leo recommends that you choose one habit at a time and focus on it for 30 days. Then move on to the next one.

The 10 Habits of ZTD are:

ZTD Habit 1: Collect

ZTD Habit 2: Process – Make Quick Decisions on Things In Your Inbox

ZTD Habit 3: Plan

ZTD Habit 4: Do One Thing at a Time Without Distractions

ZTD Habit 5: Simple, Trusted System

ZTD Habit 6: Everything in Its Place

ZTD Habit 7: Weekly Review

ZTD Habit 8: Simplify

ZTD Habit 9: Routine

ZTD Habit 10: Find Your Passion

ZTD Habit 1: Collect

Carry a capture tool with you wherever you go–whether it’s a small notebook, a Hipster PDA (a stack of index cards clipped together), a PDA or anything else that works for you-and write down tasks, ideas, projects, phone numbers or anything else that pops into your head.

The key elements of the capture habit are: take your capture tool with you wherever you go, write everything down before you forget, and empty your notes into your to-do list when you get back to your home or office. (Take note that your capture tool is one of your inboxes).

photo credit: annia316

ZTD Habit 2: Process – Make Quick Decisions on Things In Your Inbox

An inbox is any place where you check your messages or read incoming information. The first thing you have to do is minimize your inboxes. List all the ways in which you receive information, evaluate each to see if it gives you value, and find ways to combine or eliminate inboxes.

For example, make sure that all the papers that come into your home get placed in the same inbox. If you have several email addresses, can you get them all forwarded to one service?

The next step is to check and process your inboxes once a day; you may need to check some of your inboxes more often, just don’t do it obsessively.

Start with the top item on your inbox and work your way down, making immediate decisions as you go along:

Delete (or trash it).
Delegate.
If it’s something you can deal with in 2 minutes or less, do it immediately.
File it: if it’s something you need for reference.
Add it to your to-do list or calendar to do later.

Work your way down through each item until the inbox is empty. Leave nothing in the inboxes.

ZTD Habit 3: Plan

At the beginning of each week list the Big Rocks that you want to accomplish–the 3 to 6 most important things you want to get done that week–and schedule them first. Each morning, create a list of 1 to 3 MITs (Most Important Tasks). These could include a Big Rock and a couple of other important tasks. Do your MIT’s early in the day to get them out of the way to ensure that they get done.

Planning gives purpose to your week: you’re not just checking items off of a to-do list, you’re doing what’s important to you and what will take you closer to achieving your goals.

Put in the Big Rocks First

In “First Things First”, Stephen Covey tells a story that one of his associates heard at a seminar. The seminar presenter pulled out a wide-mouth gallon jar and placed it next to a pile of fist-sized rocks. After filling the jar to the top with rocks, he asked, “Is the jar full?”

The group replied, “Yes.”

He then got some gravel from under the table and added it to the jar. The speaker jiggled the jar until the gravel filled the spaces between the rocks. Again, he asked, “Is the jar full?”

This time, the group replied, “Probably not.”

The speaker then added some sand and asked, “Is the jar full?”

“No!” shouted the group.

Finally, the speaker filled the jar to the brim with water and asked the group the point of this illustration.

Someone replied that you could always fit more things into your life if “you really work at it.”

“No,” countered the speaker. “The point is, if you don’t put the big rocks in first, would you ever have gotten any of them in?”

photo credit: shioshvili

ZTD Habit 4: Do One Thing at a Time Without Distractions

Select a task and decide that you’re going to work on it either until it’s done, or for a set amount of time (say 30 minutes). Before you get started, declutter your desk and eliminate all distractions: shut off your e-mail and cell phone, get off the internet if possible, and so on. Focus on the task you’ve selected to the exclusion of everything else during the time that you’ve allotted to that task.

If you get interrupted or think of something else that needs to be done while you’re focusing on a task, write it down and get back to the task.

ZTD Habit 5: Simple, Trusted System

All you need are lists. Instead of getting caught up fiddling with tools and creating complicated systems, concentrate on “doing” and not on the tools. GTD asks you to place your tasks (”next actions”) in a series of context lists, such as the following:

@work: for everything work related
@personal: all your personal tasks
@phone: for calls you can make from anywhere
@errands: your list of errands
@waiting for: a list of things you need to follow up on
Someday/maybe: a list of stuff you don’t want to or can’t do right now, but want to check on later.

Keep simple lists: all you need is one list for each context–which you check daily–and a projects list that you review either daily or weekly. These are not your daily to-do lists; they’re master lists from which you pull your Big Rocks and MITs.

But what about all those little things that need to get done? Reserve time in the afternoon to complete these small tasks.

ZTD Habit 6: Everything in Its Place

Your life can be completely organized with the following two rules: everything you own should have a home, and when you’re done using any item, put it back where it belongs.

Create a simple filing system so that you can quickly file any papers you’re going to need for future reference.

Putting things where they belong, immediately, is a habit. Treat it like any other habit and focus on it for 30 days to turn it into something automatic.

photo credit: noahg.

ZTD Habit 7: Weekly Review

You should have a list of life goals; that is, long-term goals. From those long-term goals, you should have between one and three that you want to accomplish this year. If you choose too many long-term goals to work toward on any one particular year, you will lose focus.

For each long-term goal that you choose to work on, choose one medium-term goal that moves you closer to achieving that long-term goal, and which you can accomplish within the next few months. Next, choose one short-term goal that you can accomplish in the next week or so that will move you closer to your medium-term goal. Once you’ve done this, every week’s Weekly Review should be just a review of the progress you’ve made on those goals, and a refocusing on those goals.

Review the notes you made in your capture tool: check that you remembered to add the phone numbers to your contacts, to add items to your context lists, and so on. Also, review your calendar and review your lists.

ZTD Habit 8: Simplify

Reduce your goals and tasks to the essentials. Review your task and projects lists and see if you can simplify them. Simplify your commitments and your incoming information stream. Make sure that your projects and tasks lineup with your yearly and life goals. Take everything that you can off of your to do lists: just do the stuff that matters.

ZTD Habit 9 – Routines

Set and keep routines. A morning routine, for example, could include meditating, going for a run, processing your inboxes, and reviewing your MIT’s for the day. You could also have an evening routine and weekly routines, such as doing the laundry on Monday, planning your menu and going grocery shopping on Tuesday, paying your bills on Wednesday, and so on. Find routines that work for you.

ZTD Habit 10 – Find Your Passion

If you’re passionate about your work, your task list will almost seem like a list of rewards.

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I Give Myself Permission To . . .

Marelisa — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 04:12:07 +0000

IDEO, an award-winning design and innovation firm located in Palo Alto, California, created orange tickets that give people ten minutes of free play.

On a Thursday evening, two IDEO employees started giving out the tickets on their Caltrain ride back to San Francisco. (You can see photos of the passengers’ reactions here.)

They wrote the following over at their blog:

“IDEO believes in the seriousness of play. It is a big part of our design culture. We encourage playfulness in everyday life. But sometimes it’s hard to get permission to play – so we’re giving out permission, 10 minutes of it, right there in that orange ticket.” (Source).

Taking IDEO’s concept a step further, what if you could write tickets to yourself giving yourself permission to do anything you wanted? What would your tickets say? What do you need to give yourself permission for?

Here are twenty things I give myself permission for:

I give myself permission to rest.
I give myself permission to laugh.
I give myself permission to play.
I give myself permission to make mistakes.
I give myself permission to say “no” to demands on my time that are simply draining.
I give myself permission to say “yes” to what I want.
I give myself permission to fulfill my lifelong dreams.
I give myself permission to ask for what I want.
I give myself permission to be who I am.
I give myself permission to try again.
I give myself permission to have fun.
I give myself permission to design my own life.
I give myself permission to ignore naysayers.
I give myself permission to stay focused on what’s important to me.
I give myself permission to be whatever body shape I like.
I give myself permission to be imperfect.
I give myself permission to ask for help.
I give myself permission to stop caring what others think of me.
I give myself permission to write a lousy first draft.
I give myself permission to create.

Please share in the comments what you’re going to give yourself permission for.

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The Tarot as a Creativity Tool

Marelisa — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 17:28:04 +0000

For all those embarking on the NaNoWriMo adventure, I’ve written another post to help you get started. In my post “NaNoWriMo – How to Write a Novel in 30 Days”, I gave you the basic elements of the novel to help you structure your work.

But how do you come up with an idea on what to write about? And what if your creative juices stop flowing in mid-November? Take out your tarot deck, or print one off the internet for free here, and you’ll immediately have a fabulous idea-generating tool at your disposal.

To discover how to use the tarot to prime your creativity pump, head on over to the award-winning blog “Write to Done” where I have a guest post titled “The Tarot as a Tool for Writing Your Novel”. Of course, another excellent source for generating ideas is my ebook, “How to Be More Creative – A Handbook for Alchemists”.

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Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

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Have You Thought of Taking a Sabbatical?

Marelisa — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 07:26:00 +0000

“Embrace all life has to offer, for one spends a long time dead.”

– Dr. Jonathan Sackier

A sabbatical is taking a period of time–usually anywhere from a couple of months to a year–away from your normal routine. It’s a time to immerse yourself in a different environment, try new things, reassess your priorities, and look at your life from a different perspective.

You can fulfill your dream of living in Paris for a year, go on an archaeological dig in Malta, write your novel, check items off your bucket list (go parachuting, scuba diving, and run a marathon), or simply reconnect with yourself.

In addition, in order to create the life of your dreams it’s necessary to slow down and listen to what your heart and soul are trying to tell you. Many people use a sabbatical as a springboard to design a life that makes them feel truly happy and fulfilled.

Below you’ll find examples of people who have taken a sabbatical for different reasons–to recover from career burnout, to rekindle their creativity, and to write a novel. Maybe they’ll inspire you to go on your own sabbatical.

photo credit: Vince Alongi

Taking a Sabbatical to Avoid Burnout

The Wall Street Journal article “How One Executive Used a Sabbatical To Fix His Career” describes how Daniel H. Marcus–a veteran partner at Mercer, a major human resource consultant firm–was constantly traveling and working 60-hour weeks.

When he woke up in a pitch-dark hotel room and it took him a few minutes to remember where he was and who he was supposed to meet with that day, he realized he was burning out and needed a sabbatical. Marcus spent months preparing to temporarily abandon his stressful job.

He drafted a “Sabbatical Framework” in which he described four ideal states–calm, comfort, sharing, enjoyment–followed by intended actions and outcomes for his body, mind and soul. During his eight-month break he spent a week at a Mexican health spa–where he learned yoga, drawing and jewelry making–, he explored teaching part time at UCLA’s business school, and he even played in the World Series of Poker.

Although Marcus returned to Mercer after this sabbatical, he realized almost immediately that it was no longer the right fit for him. He found another job at a tiny pay consultancy. He credits the sabbatical: “I corrected my misjudgment about sticking with Mercer quicker than I would have before,” he notes. A small firm “is where I should be.”

Stefan Sagmeister: The Power of Time Off

Every seven years, designer Stefan Sagmeister closes his New York studio for a yearlong sabbatical to pursue creative experiments and other things that are difficult to accomplish during a regular working year. He also uses this time to refresh his creative outlook. Stefan explains in his July 2009 Ted.com talk that the value of taking time off is often overlooked, and he shares the innovative projects inspired by his last sabbatical during which he travelled to Bali.

Stefan indicates that we spend the first 25 years of our life learning, we spend the next 40 years working, and then tacked at the end we have about 15 years of retirement. Then he proposes that we take 5 years out of our retirement and intersperse them in between the working years. That is, the standard should be the following: work for 45 years, taking a year off every seven years.

In addition, Stefan explains that taking a sabbatical is profitable for him over the long run becomes it improves the quality of his work, so he can charge more for it. Also, the ideas that he comes up with during the following seven years have their roots in what he does during his year off.

During the Ted talk Stefan also mentions others who have done well by taking sabbaticals:

Daniel Gilbert wrote the bestseller “Stumbling on Happiness” while on sabbatical.

Ferran Adrià is considered by many to be the best chef in the world. His restaurant–El Bulli–is about a two hour drive north of Barcelona. The restaurant is only open April through September: Adrià spends the rest of the year in Barcelona, experimenting with new dishes.

some of the dishes

You can see some of the innovative ideas Stefan has come up with in the Ted video below:

Taking a Writing Sabbatical

When Adrienne Jenkins’ husband, a professor of architecture, had the opportunity to teach in Barcelona for four months, Adrienne–disillusioned with her job–decided to go with him. Her husband then issued the following challenge: instead of playing the professor’s wife, she should work on the book she always said she’d write. Thus, Adrienne embarked on her writing sabbatical.

She extended her writing sabbatical and is now on her second year, and indicates that she’s making steady progress with her book. In addition, she’s spending more time with her husband and is able to visit her parents, who live faraway and are in their seventies, more often than before. Adrienne also feels that she’s following her heart’s desire.

In addition, Adrienne writes the following:

Source

Reader Survey

My next project is creating an ebook–which I intend to sell on this blog–which will serve as a comprehensive guide on taking a sabbatical. Its purpose will be to help you decide whether to take a sabbatical, and, if you decide that taking a sabbatical is something you want to do, provide lots of tips, tools, and resources to help you take the plunge.

I’ve taken two sabbaticals in my life and I’ll draw from my experience–what I did right and what I did terribly wrong–as well as conducting the extensive research I’m known for.

That being said, I wanted to ask for your input. (I’m performing market research on you, my wonderful readers ). Is this ebook something you think you’d be interested in? If so, what would you like to see included in the ebook? You can leave your comments below or send me an email to the following address:

marelisafabrega at gmail dot com

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Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

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NaNoWriMo – How to Write a Novel in 30 Days

Marelisa — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:45:13 +0000

“A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.” ~ Richard Bach

NaNoWriMo is short for “National Novel Writing Month” (the “National” in the title has been rendered obsolete; NaNoWriMo is now a worldwide phenomenon). Every November tens of thousands of people from around the world aim to produce a 50,000 word novel in just 30 days. It’s the perfect opportunity for would-be writers to nurture their creative selves.

Having a firm, short deadline puts the goal of writing a novel solidly within reach. Chris Baty, instigator of NaNoWriMo, explains that the key is to lower your expectations “from ‘best-seller’ to ‘would not make someone vomit’ “.

Some of the things you’ll need to keep in mind while writing your novel are the following:

Genre
Setting
Characters
Conflict
Theme
Plot
Scenes
Climax
Point of View

I registered for NaNoWriMo this year–revealing masochistic tendencies which had thus far remained undetected–and I wrote this post mainly to help myself, since I’ve never attempted to write a novel before. Having said that, I hope that it encourages you to register for NaNoWriMo as well–the registration is free– and that it offers you some guidelines you can put to good use as you get started on your NaNoWriMo adventure.

Incidentally, 50,000 words in 30 days is 1,667 words a day. So that’s probably one to two hours of work a day, every day, for thirty days.

photo credit: smittenkittenorig

The Basic Rules

There are NaNoWriMo rules, but only a few. Here they are:

Write a novel that is at least 50,000 words long between November 1 and November 30.
You can start outlining and researching your novel before November 1st, but you can’t start writing the novel before that date.
Be the sole author of your novel.
Upload your novel for word-count validation to the NaNoWriMo site between November 25 and November 30.
If you write 50,000 words, you won (no one from NaNoWriMo is going to read your work and judge its merit; or lack thereof).

Decide on a Genre for Your Novel

Genre is a term used to group together works that share similar characters, settings, and themes. The basic genres are the following:

Action-Adventure
Drama
Mystery
Fantasy
Horror
Literary
Romance
Science-Fiction
Western
Satire

The best advice in choosing a genre is to write the type of novel that you like to read.

Theme

The theme is the central message of the novel which is conveyed through the characters and circumstances; it’s the statement you want to make about the human condition. In addition, it’s the unifying element for everything you put in your plot. Here are two examples:

The theme of Shakespeare’s “Othello”, is jealousy.

A main theme of the novel “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain is racism.

Setting: When and Where

Setting is the background in which the story takes place. Basically, it’s the when and where, but it can also include lifestyle:

(a) Place: This is the geographical location of the story; it’s the physical environment. Throughout the novel, the story may move from one place to another. Consider creating a map that shows where all the action will take place. This will help you gauge distances and figure the length of time necessary to move your characters from one place to another.

(b) Time: First, this refers to the period of history. Your story could be set in the past, it could be a contemporary novel, or it could even be set in the future. You have to decide at what point in time the story opens and when it will end. When describing the setting you may want to specify the season, month, and even the time of day. Make a timeline for the events of the novel.

(c) Lifestyle: This refers to the daily life of the characters. If a story takes place in a particular historical period, the lifestyle of the characters–poor farmers or part of the aristocracy–is part of the setting.

“Wuthering Heights”–Emily Brontë’s only novel–takes place in the late 1700’s and early 1800’s. All the action is set in or around two neighboring houses on the harsh and desolate Yorkshire Moors of Northern England: Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange.

These two manor houses are just four miles apart, but they could not be more different in terms of the conditions that exist in each house and the people who inhabit them. Emily Brontë grew up in the Yorkshire Moors, and so her depiction of it is very accurate.

Creating Character Profiles

How many main characters and supporting characters will you have in your story? Some authors prefer to come up with the basics of their characters and then simply allow their characters to reveal themselves as the story moves along.

However, a lot of experienced writers recommend that would-be authors create character profiles, at least of their main characters. This helps in bringing to life characters that are as real as possible, and in providing continuity throughout the story. How detailed you make your character profiles depends on what works best for you.

Some of the things you may want to jot down about your characters are the following:

Age
Appearance
Occupation
Income
Education
Marital status
Recent relationships
Children/siblings
Likes and dislikes
Favorite music
Hobbies
Strengths and weaknesses
Special characteristics (movement, speech, laugh, and so on)
Favorite sayings
Idiosyncrasies
Birth date/ Sign of the Zodiac
Nickname

A rule of good storytelling is that the protagonist will confront the thing he fears the most and overcome it in order to win the thing he desires the most. (Source.)

Six More Things You Can Do

Six more things you can do when it comes to creating your characters are the following:

Write what a typical day looks like for your character.
Create your character’s backstory; even if you never include a word of the backstory in your novel, if you know your character’s past you’ll be able to make him or her more convincing to the reader.
Create a profile for each of your characters similar to those of popular socializing networks such as Myspace, Twitter, or Facebook.
Draw a family tree for the character.
Make a sketch of your character so that you can get a better idea of what they look like.
Research your character’s job or career if it’s different from your own.

Character Profile Worksheets

Here are some links where you’ll find worksheets to help you create character profiles:

The Plot: The Story and Why It’s Interesting

The plot is what happens in the novel and why it’s interesting. E.M. Forster explained the difference between story and plot in “Aspects of the Novel” as follows:

“The king died and then the queen died” is a story.
“The king died and then the queen died of a broken heart” is a plot.

Most plots are made up of the Classic Three Act Structure:

Act I. We meet the characters, are given the setting, and discover what the main problem of the story is. This is the preparation act for the reader (set it up).

Act II. The second act presents the complication. The problem that we set up in the first act becomes more dangerous and difficult. The hero’s attempts to solve the problem come crashing down and our hero is lying on his or her back with no apparent means of escape.

Act III. The resolution of the problem. In act three you wrap up the story and tie up loose ends.

Example: The Choking Doberman

Martha walked up the flight of stairs to her second floor apartment and wearily opened the door. As soon as she made her way into the apartment she was greeted by the sight of her pet Doberman pinscher choking and unable to breathe.

Filled with fear and anxiety, Martha rushed him to the vet and was told to leave him there for emergency surgery. Feeling a bit calmer knowing that her beloved pet was being looked after, she returned to her apartment.

No sooner had Martha set her purse down on the small table near the door, when the phone rang. She picked it up and was surprised to hear the vet’s voice urging her to get out of her apartment right away.

Martha quickly grabbed for her purse, ran out of her apartment, and knocked urgently on her neighbor’s door. Fortunately, Marge was home and she let Martha in. Martha told Marge of how she had come home to find her dog choking and of the bizarre phone call she had received from the vet.

A few minutes later the two women heard the sound of sirens nearing the apartment building. Four police cars screeched to a stop outside the building and several cops made their way up the stairs and into Martha’s apartment.

After waiting what she considered to be a prudent amount of time, Martha ventured out of her neighbor’s apartment to see what was happening. She was told by one of the cops that after a quick search of her apartment they discovered a burglar hiding in the bedroom closet bleeding profusely from one hand.

Analysis of “The Choking Doberman”

As Ronald Tobias explains in “20 Master Plots: And How to Build Them”, “The Choking Doberman”–which is an urban myth that has been retold countless times with endless variations–is completely plot driven; the characters take a backseat. In addition, it has three movements: the story is set up when the woman comes home and finds her pet Doberman choking. She takes the dog to the vet.

The second movement starts when the woman gets home and her phone starts ringing. A startling complication is introduced when the agitated vet urges her to get out of the house. The woman flees the house and the unknown danger.

The third movement begins with the arrival of the police, with the climax (the point of highest interest in the story) occurring when they tell her that they found a burglar hiding in her bedroom closet who had a finger bitten off by her Doberman. By the end of the story the mystery is solved.

Here are some more books that will help you craft a fabulous plot:

photo credit: tinali778

Some Ideas to Save Your Plot

If your plot runs out of steam on day ten of NaNoWriMo, here are some things you can do:

Kill a main character.
Hit shuffle on your iPod and the first song that comes up is the title of your next chapter.
Your main character finds an old letter in a library book.
Include an element of betrayal: someone is having an affair or has lied about their past.
Flip through magazines or art books. Look through the newspaper. Cut out three items which you feel have potential to inspire an interesting scene.
Go people watching: sit at an outdoor café; go to the mall; ride the subway or the bus. Collect five snatches of conversation.
Write a list of words that are common to your genre and combine them in interesting ways to come up with titles for your chapters (dragon, castle, moat, knight). Once you have a title, create a plot twist based on that title.
Think of your family’s stories which you’ve heard your relatives retelling over and over again.
Think of an important, far-off goal your character is striving to reach and write about your character’s quest to achieve this objective.
Your character loses someone or something that is very dear to them.
Your character’s business is in trouble. Brainstorm ten possible ways to solve the problem. Choose the most unexpected approach to write about.
Steal from the best. Think of a novel you love, take elements from the plot, and make them your own.
Use social media for ideas (delicious, Stumbleupon, Twitter). Here’s something I found while stumbling: Armed Thieves Steal Magritte Painting in Daylight Raid.
Visit One Sentence or PostSecret.

Here are some books which will help you generate ideas if you hit a wall while writing your novel:

Conflict: The Struggle

“Conflict is the source of all growth and is an absolute necessity if one is to be alive.” — Jean Miller

Conflict is the struggle between opposing forces in the story. Conflict provides interest and suspense. There are various types of conflict, which can usually be categorized as one of the following:

A character struggling against nature.
A struggle between two or more characters (relational conflict): Here it’s usually the protagonist and the antagonist competing or clashing with each other.
A struggle between the main character and some aspect of society (social conflict): This is a human v. group conflict; the protagonist has a problem with a group of people.
A struggle of opposing forces within one character (inner conflict).

Scene: Miniature Stories

Jordan Rosenfeld writes the following in his book “Make a Scene: Crafting a Powerful Story One Scene at a Time”:

“Scenes are capsules in which compelling characters undertake significant actions in a vivid and memorable way that allows the events to feel as though they’re happening in real time. When strung together, individual scenes add up to build plots and storylines.”

A scene is a specific chunk of the story, one that is its own closed loop. When is a scene a scene? When something changes. What defines the completion of a scene? The moment of change. Every good scene has a purpose and it leads to the next good scene.

Point of View

Point of view is the perspective from which a story is told. Choose the point of view that will most effectively allow you to reveal your characters and tell your story. The points of view you can adopt are basically the following:

First Person

Everything in the first person point of view (POV) comes from one character’s perspective. We can only know what that character knows, and our knowledge may be skewed by that character’s biases. For example: “Twilight” is told from Bella Swan’s perspective (yes, I read the “Twilight” series, it’s one of my guilty pleasures):

“I’d never given much thought to dying-though I’d had reason enough in the last few months-but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this.

I stared without breathing across the long room, into the dark eyes of the hunter, and he looked pleasantly back at me.

Surely it was a good way to die, in the place of someone else, someone I loved. Noble, even. That ought to count for something.

I knew that if I’d never gone to Forks, I wouldn’t be facing death now. But, terrified as I was, I couldn’t bring myself to regret the decision.

When life offers you a dream so far beyond any of your expectations, it’s not reasonable to grieve when it comes to an end.

The hunter smiled in a friendly way as he sauntered forward to kill me.”

Third Person

This is the most commonly used – in other words, third person pronouns such as “he” or “she”. When you write in the third person you have a couple of choices: omniscient, where you can hear the thoughts and see the action from any character’s perspective; objective, where only narration, dialogue and description is used to tell the story and we aren’t allowed into any character’s thoughts; and limited omniscient, where we see the story from one or a few character’s viewpoints and can hear only their thoughts.

Second Person

The second person point of view is uncommon – the “you” form. Most stories we read are in the first or third person, so using the second person may confuse your readers. But if it suits your novel, then go for it.

More NaNoWrimo Tips

Here are some more NaNoWriMo tips:

Don’t worry about the quality of your writing, just focus on getting to that 50,000 word target.
Get into a routine and begin writing at the same time each day.
Make sure that you write every day.
Try not to edit as you go, or at least keep it to a minimum.
Outline your novel so that you have a clear idea of how your plot and characters are going to develop before you start writing.
Follow Sol Stein’s advice: “Write the sentence you want the world to remember you by.”
Make time to write:
- Write while you’re riding the subway to work.
- Write in your car while your kid is in ballet lessons.
- Don’t watch TV during the month of November and use that time to write (save your favorite TV shows and watch them in December).
- Write while you’re on your lunch break.
- Get up half an hour earlier and write.
- Run as many errands as you can in October and use the time when you would be running errands in November to write.
Keep your supplies collected: coffee mug, dictionary, thesaurus, notebook, pens, pencils, index cards, and so on. You could easily lose precious time gathering your supplies each time you’re going to start writing.
Explain to your friends and loved ones that you’re going to be less accessible than usual for the month of November and ask for their support.
Stop writing while you still have something to say so that you can pick up on that train of thought the next day.

Books that Offer Templates for Your Novel

The following books have gotten very good reviews on Amazon and offer templates so you can create your novel by connecting the dots:

Related Posts:

Recommended Products:

Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

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Lessons from “The Science of Getting Rich” (Part 4)

Marelisa — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 05:01:58 +0000

This is the fourth, and last, post in a series based on the teachings found in the success classic “The Science of Getting Rich”, written in 1910 by Wallace D. Wattles (that’s him in the image to the left). As I stated in the three previous posts, this book is essential reading for anyone who wants increased prosperity.

You can read the first three posts of this series here:

Wattles explains that in order to get rich you must think and act in “a certain way”. In addition, by thinking and acting in “a certain way” you will get rich with mathematical certainty. I explained how to think “in a certain way” in Part 2 of this series. In this post, I’m going to share with you how to act “in a certain way”.

You Must Act in a Certain Way

In chapter 11 of “The Science of Getting Rich”, Wattles points out that while it’s true that thought is the creative power which sets the creative force in motion, a person must not rely on thought alone and pay no attention to personal action.

As Wattles states, “A person must not only think, but his personal action must supplement his thought.” You must act in such a way that you can receive what you want when it gets to you. That is, your thoughts bring what you’re thinking about toward you, and by action you receive them.

Your thoughts make everything in the universe, including inanimate things and people, work to bring you what you’re thinking about. However, things will reach you in the hands of others, and you must give each person an equivalent for the things they bring to you. To quote “The Science of Getting Rich”:

“[Y]ou must act in a certain way, so that you can appropriate what is yours when it comes to you and so that you can meet the things you have in your picture and put them in their proper places as they arrive.”

You must act, and you must act now. You cannot act in the past, for the past is gone. To dwell on the past is to cloud your vision. You cannot act in the future, since the future is not here yet. Be confident that you will be able to meet any future contingencies when you get to them. Wattles advises to “Put your whole mind into present action.”

Do not wait to be in the right business or to be in the right environment to begin. Begin where you are: you move to the right business by acting, and you get a change of environment by acting. This is well illustrated in the following quote:

“Hold the vision of yourself in the right business, with the purpose to get into it and the faith that you will get into it and are getting into it, but ACT in your present business. Use your present business as a means of getting into a better one. Your vision of the right business, if held with faith and purpose, will cause the supreme power to move the right business toward you. And your action, if performed in the certain way, will cause you to move toward the business.”

It is likely that in the beginning your actions will be the same that you’ve been performing up to now, but you will begin to perform these actions in “a certain way” which will make you rich. By thinking and acting in a certain way you will set in motion forces that will move you toward where you want to be.

You Must Act Efficiently

As for the way in which you should act, Wattles explains in Chapter 12 of “The Science of Getting Rich” that you need to act efficiently.

First of all, remember that the universe works on the principle of expansion and advancement. Since the universe wants society to move forward, it will come to the aid of those who more than fill their present place, thus helping to speed up the progress of the world. The way to more than fill your present place is to do all that you can do where you are. To quote “The Science of Getting Rich”:

“You can advance only by being larger than your present place, and no one is larger than his present place who leaves undone any of the work pertaining to that place. The world is advanced only by those who more than fill their present places.”

There are countless people who go to work and simply comply with the bare minimum in their job description. They do what they’re told to do by their boss and not one thing more. These people will never get ahead. In order to do things in “a certain way” you have to go beyond your job description and do more than is expected of you. This is what it means to more than fill your present place.

When you begin to think in a certain way, massive forces are set to work on your behalf, and much may depend on you doing a simple act which is to open the door to great opportunities. Your failure to do even one small thing can cause a long delay in getting what you want. Therefore, do every day all that you can do on that day.

However, it is important that you don’t overwork or rush frantically about trying to do the greatest number of things in the shortest possible time. What counts is the efficiency of each separate act. Every inefficient act is a failure, and the more inefficient acts you do, the worse off you’ll be. In order to move forward, you must do enough things, no matter how common place, in an efficient manner.

So how do you act in an efficient manner? If you dwell often on what you want, this will become so firmly fixed upon your mind that throughout the day you need only to refer mentally to that image to cause your best effort to be put forth. As Wattles indicates, “Every act can be made strong and efficient by holding your vision while you’re doing it and putting the whole power of your faith and purpose into it.” In addition, focus on what you want until your next action seems like the next logical step.

Mistakes come from acting out of fear or acting hastily because you think someone else is going to beat you to the thing you want to do. Fix your attention on the mental image of what you want and begin to give thanks that you’re getting it; this will strengthen your faith and renew your purpose. Keep your mind close to the supreme mind by reverent gratitude and you will act efficiently.

The idea is not to act for the sake of acting, but to act with purpose. You act with purpose when you’re taking steps to get what you want, to achieve the mental picture you’ve constructed in your mind. Actions are the last component of the creative process, and they must be in alignment with your mental picture.

In addition, as you begin to move toward larger life, you will increase the magnetic pull toward you of everything that is good. Life attracts life, and the more that you develop yourself in mind, body and soul, the more alive that you become.

Do everything that you can do every day, but do it without haste, worry, or fear. If you don’t do any inefficient acts-that is, if you don’t act out of doubt or fear–, and if you do a sufficient number of efficient acts-by concentrating on the vision of what you want with faith and purpose–, you will become rich.

Wattles points out in “The Science of Getting Rich” that you should add to the life of the world with every business transaction by providing more value than you’re being paid for. First, you should only sell goods and services that bring more life to the person paying for them. Also, the principle of advancement states that every person who transacts business with you should receive more value than the thing he gave you in exchange.

Add to the Life of the World

You need to be attentive to others and to their needs. Successful people know that value must be given in order for value to be received in a business transaction or business relationship. The goal is to share your gifts with as many people as possible. There is a quote by Woodrow Wilson that is a good illustration of this:

“You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget that errand.”

All men and women are looking for increase, for the continuous advancement of life. Therefore, whenever you come into contact with anyone, whether it’s in person, by phone, or in writing, you should strive to communicate to them the impression of increase.

In order to become wealthy, you first have to be wealthy. This doesn’t mean that you have to have money in order to make money; it means that you have to identify yourself as being wealthy even if your bank account doesn’t reflect that wealth at the moment. Wealth is not what a person has; it’s a state of mind. The people who succeed in life from a financial perspective have positive beliefs about money, wealth and prosperity.

In “Think and Grow Rich” Napoleon Hill says the following: “When you begin to think and grow rich, you will observe that riches begin with a state of mind . . . You, and every other person, ought to be interested in knowing how to acquire that state of mind which will attract riches.”

The quote below by Charles Fillmore is a good illustration of what it means to be wealthy:

“Prosperity is not in the possession of things, but in the recognition of supply, and in the knowledge of free and open access to an inexhaustible storehouse of all that is good.”

By following “the certain way” you are in fact creating increase for yourself, and you should convey assurance of this fact to everyone you come into contact with. Do everything with the firm conviction that you’re an advancing personality and that you’re giving advancement to everyone.

Convey the quiet assurance that you’re getting rich and give everyone more value than the cash value you take from them. People will go where they are given increase, and your business will increase rapidly. This applies to the professional person and to the wage earner. As Wattles puts it:

“The person who is certain to advance is the one who is too big for his place, who has a clear concept of what he wants to be, who knows that he can become what he wants to be, and who is determined to be what he wants to be.”

The Right Business for You

When deciding what the right business for you is, Wattles explains that generally speaking, you will do best in that business which will use your strongest faculties.

However, although it will be easier in terms of effort to get rich if you do so in the occupation for which you are best fitted, you will be happier if you get rich by doing what you want to do. If you’re passionate about you’re doing you’re more likely to succeed.

Wattles assures the reader that they can do what they want to do; the fact that someone has a desire to do something is proof that they have within them the power to do it. For Wattles, desire is power trying to express itself:

“The desire to play music is the power which can play music seeking expression and development. The desire to invent mechanical devices is the mechanical talent seeking expression and development.”

Conclusion

In conclusion, a person increases their prosperity by thinking and acting in “a certain way”. In order to think in a “certain way” a person must form a clear mental image of what they want, and they must hold this mental image in their thoughts frequently, coupled with unwavering faith and gratitude.

So as to receive what they want, a person must act in “a certain way”. That is, they must more than fill their present place. In addition, they must give each person a use value in excess of the cash value they receive, so that each transaction makes for more life.

I hope that you have enjoyed reading this series on “The Science of Getting Rich”, and that you begin to apply the lessons presented by Wattles in your own life. Wattles’ daughter, Florence, was quoted as saying the following about her father:

“He wrote almost constantly. It was then that he formed his mental picture. He saw himself as a successful writer, a personality of power, an advancing man, and he began to work toward the realization of this vision. He lived every page … His life was truly the powerful life.”

Get the Book for Free

If you would like to read “The Science of Getting Rich”, you can get the book for free by clicking here: The Science of Getting Rich for Practical Geniuses. The book is a free download; you also have the option of enrolling for a course on “The Science of Getting Rich” created by Rebecca Fine (Rebecca lets you decide how much you’ll pay for the course, how cool is that). Rebecca also offers a lot of interesting free stuff, so stop by, get the book, and have a look. (And yes, should you decide to enroll in the course, I’m an affiliate.)

Related Posts:

Recommended Products:

Learn to meditate, increase your focus and concentration, boost your creativity, and augment your brain power with the Silva Life System, the world’s most popular meditation program.

Visit the Silva Life System web site and get a free course on the basics of the Silva Life System, which includes their famous 30 minute guided meditation.

Did you enjoy this article? Subscribe for free by RSS or e-mail and you’ll always know when I publish something new. (What’s RSS?).

Also, please share it on the social media site of your choice, thank you.