Avoid Motivation Bullshit & Energize Your Body!

A quick search on the topic of 'motivation' reveals a ton of websites devoted to teaching you how to be motivated by a 'qualified' motivation coach. Sorry, but WTF? - There are people who will always try anything to make a living, and I feel especially sympathetic to those whom these workshops are targeted at, i.e, desperate unhappy individuals who are willing to part with the remainder of their savings in order to basically 'learn the secret of success'. I'm not going to say anymore, except, close your eyes to such nonsense - I can show you the path for free, and you can thank me by being a good human being.

Motivation; the solution is not to merely tackle the problem by hurling motivational advice and phrases, but by understanding the individual situation. Although there are psychological issues which can often be resolved using NLP techniques, the practitioners of NLP, neuro-linguistic programming,fail to embrace solutions outside their field, because any type of healing, and making someone motivated is a form of healing, needs a holistic approach in order to be successful. NLP, which I am a firm advocate of, is only one approach, and many 'motivation coaches' believe that it is the end-all-be-all-holy-grail answer. I'm telling you it isn't because the mind is affected by the brain, which is an organ of the body. You affect any physiological process of the body, and it will affect the way you think - makes sense right? Such a rationally simple piece of holistic thinking, escapes the NLP believer, and without this foundational logic, most of the people who subscribe to their courses are going to fail.

There are many reasons why someone may not be motivated. When someone feels 'lazy', finds it hard to get out of bed, or have energy to start exercising - they're going to blame themselves - 'why am I so lazy?' Next they'll force themselves, coercing their bodies into physical rigor - it won't last long, there is only so much that physical determination can do. They'll believe that something is wrong with their thinking, and will probably find 'inspiration' in motivational quotes, see a motivation coach, etc. As I see it, it's akin to pushing a wheel barrow with a flat tire.

One major reason for tiredness in many cases is due to the liver being unhealthy. The liver is the second largest organ in the body next to skin. It is responsible for removing toxins, and making energy for the body. If you're eating fatty junk food all the time, then your liver is also going to be clogged up with fat. If you're not drinking enough water, then your kidneys are going to dry up - the job of the kidneys is to clean the blood, your kidneys need water for optimal functioning, if they aren't working that well, then your liver takes over its job. If the liver is busy doing the job of the kidneys, it's not going to do its main job of breaking down fats and making energy for you very well, is it? So keeping your liver in good condition is the FIRST step in overcoming your motivation problems.

Other causes of tiredness could be a build up of toxic metals in your body. In which case, chelation can be used to remove them. I have amalgam fillings given to me by a drill-happy dentist - every time I chew, I'm releasing cumulative amounts of mercury into my body. Naturally, my body gets rid of any poisonous metals if I'm eating the right stuff. A natural chelation supplement is Selenium, which occurs at high levels in Brazil nuts, but be careful you don't take too much - you can overdose on it. Selenium will remove other metals in your body that are useful to you, so make sure you replace metals like zinc and calcium. Selenium is also found in other food substances, here is a list and other useful information.

Digestion problems can also be responsible for lethargy. If you're not digesting your food properly, then you're not able to absorb the nutrients that give you energy and help your body repair. From a holistic point of view, digestion can be the root of many severe problems - I've read so much stuff, that I wouldn't be able to do it any justice by attempting to even begin to cover it. The digestive tract consists of so many organs, including the stomach, that any diagnosis would be specific to any array of secondary symptoms.

Finally, no matter what. Every human should get enough life-giving, nurturing, energizing SUNLIGHT. We've been warned about the dangers, and of course the radiation from the sun can be harmful in the form of UV rays, but the sun is a good source of vitamin D (which is most beneficial to the liver). It is good to get this solar supplement without sunglasses or sunscreen when the sun is at the lowest in the sky - meaning near sunrise and sunset. Sunlight has been known to cure depression, and many people who suffer from SAD, seasonal affective disorder, can attest to the healing effect of sunlight on their mind. The more sunlight you get, the energized you will become in body and mind. Not only will it cure depression, it will also clear your mind of worries or other neuroses. Getting daily sunlight is as essential as breathing!

Begin Getting into Shape Strategies: PART 2

So you've started detoxifying your body, and you've slowly accustomed your muscles to exercise by going for long and longer walks, now you push your training level up a notch, and begin more serious exercise. Before you begin any exercise, it helps to develop a habit of putting yourself into the correct frame of mind before you start. This involves clearing your mind of any pressing problems or deadlines you have to meet, you're not going to entirely get rid of all these current issues, but it helps to unload the majority of them because although you may think they weigh only on the mind, just having them there can increase risk of injury and reduce your performance ability.

Begin, by standing with an upright posture, and slowly breathe in and breathe out. This will help remove tensions from your diaphragm which controls your lungs. Breathe all the way in, and exhale all the way out. Imagine that you are breathing in focus and clarity and exhaling troublesome thoughts. Do this until you feel comfortable and relaxed. Then proceed to do some stretching - you'll find that stretching comes much easier after this, as most tension in the muscles originate from the mind. Keep your mind clear while you stretch your body thoroughly. I won't explain any stretching exercises, you can do a search on YouTube if you don't know how - but it is important to do this before you initiate any kind of strenuous exercise to prevent cramp and injury, also it allows you to perform longer without your muscles stiffening up.

Nowadays, I do most of my exercise outdoors, for reasons I will explain another time, but for beginners, the gym is a safe environment to begin working out. At first it may be slightly intimidating for the first timer to a gym, but most people are too focused on their own exercises to care what anyone else is doing. Make sure you are familiar with the equipment before you begin using them by seeking the advice of a qualified instructor - if you're using the equipment incorrectly you could hurt yourself or others. When you start, like I said in my previous post, think LONG term - this is something you want to keep doing for the rest of your life, so don't burn yourself out by trying to overachieve your goal in a short period of time - this will have the effect of putting you off exercise and making you mentally and physically weaker in the long run. It is best to proceed slowly at a pace that is not relaxed but enough to challenge your heart rate - if you're too relaxed then you're not going to benefit, if you're going too hard, you're going to burn yourself out, you want to be in the middle so your heart is getting a good workout and the blood is really pumping around your body.

The most important part of maintaining a workout routine is frequency - Someone who works out twice a week benefits more than someone who does twice as much once a week. This is because unlike your brain, the body does not have a memory, it won't remember how much work it did two weeks ago. The longer you leave it, the more unfit you get. If you're extremely busy, and can't find to go to the gym, just doing a few minutes of 'maintenance' exercises at home is better than doing none at all, this is how you keep your body in shape - instead of waiting to make up for the lost time by doing a big bout in the gym when you do go - remember, the body has no memory, your fitness level drops quite fast if you're not maintaining it.

On some days, you probably won't feel in the mood to workout - everyone gets it, it's completely normal; we're not robots which can turn it on and turn it off. Sometimes, I feel too tired, or the idea of all those repetitions and sets makes me feel tired - but once I get the blood pumping, I forget about it. Your psychology plays a big role in determining how motivated you are. Most people when they see a hill, they look all the way to the top and think, 'pheww, that's a big hill!' and immediately feel exhausted just from thinking about it! That is a psychological weight, it burdens the body as much as the mind, and can exist in any form, whether it be about work or relationships, it can be the obstacle to our goals. Some motivators will tell you 'attack it! face your obstacle and charge at it!', but I take a different stance, obstacles are obstacles because they are seen as such. A mountain cannot be overcome by a single bound, but it can be done slowly with each step and each breath. So the trick is not to look at the top of the hill/mountain, but to focus on each step that brings you closer, because that's what each step does, it brings you closer to your goal - no matter how small.

When I go running, there are parts of my regular route which has long straights where I can see stretching all the way to the distance, I avoid looking that far, instead I gaze at the ground just a few metres ahead, looking up now and then to make sure that I'm not going to hit something. By concentrating on each stride I take, I'm not overwhelming myself with the entire task - I'm breaking it down and making it more manageable, I'm not giving myself something bigger than I can chew, and this is all mental as all things are in life. People who give up easily, tend to be those who expect the prize at the end. Each step that you take should be a reward in itself, because each step makes your healthier and fitter, and that is all you should keep in your mind, the more steps you take, the narrower the gap becomes between you and your target. When you train, you should remember that you're training your mind as well as your body.

When you manage to build up frequency in training, like I said already, there are going to be some days which you don't really feel like it. The best way to overcome this is not to set yourself a target for the exercises you do that day - on the treadmill, don't set the timer, just run without looking at the clock until you feel exhausted. If you've decided that you're tired before you've even begun, it's pointless to expect that you'll do each exercise with your normal intensity, so don't count your repetitions because you'll be disappointed and your morale will take a beating. Just exercise without counting or timing, you may even find that you do more than usual! Often it is our own expectation of ourselves that creates the burden, a performance anxiety which comes to those who demand too much of themselves. We all like to see progress, but we kick ourselves hard if we're not making any - it happens to everyone. Forget about numbers, let your body work until you sense it has had enough, you may surprise yourself, because when there is no pressure, we can do much better. Once you're done, be happy that you did something rather than nothing, and the next time you train you'll be grateful that you did your maintenance exercises.

The ability to think long term is unique to human beings, no other animal on this planet can hold a goal in their head for years or even a century. A goal may not appear achievable at first, because we're not able to see the fiftieth step from the first step, but as we draw closer to the fiftieth step, we have a better perspective on how to proceed to the hundredth step. Exercising and building a body to good health and fitness, requires a long term strategy. Your body is what you wear everyday, something that you carry with you for the rest of your life, whatever you have been given, you should make the most of what you've got. A fit body brings confidence and keeps the mind happy.

On Taking Risks, and Life Changing

The term "taking risks" is something that has been stolen by corporate culture. Corporations may have these 'staff team-building' events which are designed to promote loyalty and increase productivity within the company. When corporations talk about 'taking risks', the context often involves a type of 'conquest'. The British SAS (special air service) have a motto, 'Who dares wins', and it is this conquest mentality that corporations want to encourage.

Risks, what are they exactly? A gambler may be someone who is considered to take risks all the time, but he may not necessarily win all the time, and perhaps if he is particularly unlucky, he may end up with nothing. A stunt performer who does action movies, may not see his job as risky, although he may understand that there is risk involved, he has enough confidence in his abilities to not feel there is risk. Risk is something outside of your control - if you jump out off the top of a skyscraper without a safety, then you're going to die, if you run across a motorway blindfolded, you may survive or you may get hit by a car, but these types of risks are situations that you put yourself in, and whether you see them as risks depends on your perspective.

Bungee jumping is now included in the list of corporate team-building events - among other adventure activities - if I ran an adventure company, I'd certainly love to have some large finance corporations as my clients! I would sell them every adventure as a team-building activity to improve their staff qualities and other bullshit. The corporations are willing to spend money on these events because they believe that it builds relationships within the organization, enabling better cooperation, and teaching people to become go-getters! The idea that you can have everything you want if you put yourself outside your comfort zone is a complete falsehood perpetuated by the people that sell these theories.

Let's take for example the typical office worker, who works for a company with complete loyalty yet he hates his job and dreams of doing something else - we'll call him Bob. The company that Bob works for organizes bungee jumping, in the hope that the staff would learn to adopt the 'who dares wins' mentality and become more aggressive in work. Unwillingly, Bob under the pressure of his colleagues takes a jump, he experiences a few seconds of fear as he plummets towards the ground. Do you think Bob will be a changed man? He will most likely forget the incident and continue doing the job that he hates so much.

The idea of taking risks cannot be limited to the micro sense, but must envelope a macro sense of life and take on a grander all encompassing vision. The biggest risk that Bob could have taken would be to quit his job, and pursue his dreams, not someone else's dreams but his own - not a dream sold by an advert on television or a magazine, but something that will enable him grow to his full potential - mentally, physically and spiritually.

So how do we begin to do these tasks which will ultimately transform our lives? Firstly, for most people, their life will not change overnight - It requires patience, and the understanding that being on the path to our goal is better than not being on it. An object in the distance may be further than it looks, but when we change the way we think in terms of scale, then mentally we can bring the target closer to us. This is the first step in life transformation, and it is the hardest step, the choice to choose the way we think - once we change the way we think, then everything else follows without resistance.

The Buddha achieved enlightenment while sitting under a bodhi tree - once we align ourselves with the universe, we empower the natural spirit inside us - there is no resistance in being one with our environment, and when we move with the flow of the universe, we're effortlessly on the path to self improvement. But in order to be on the path, we have to learn to recognize what is real, and in truth, nothing is real, our desires are externally manipulated so that we become slaves to them and forget who we are. Most people, if they took a few minutes out of their schedule, to just meditate, and clear their mind, they can find their centre and their connection to the universe, this is where they find their strength, away from the distractions that destroy your individuality and creativity. The biggest risk in today's fast moving world, is to step outside of that box, the unknown which is really the core of your self and true nature. It's scary because we like to surround ourselves with what we know and understand, but many people do not really know or understand themself.

There is a Greek aphorism, "Know thyself", your strength lies in your self-awareness. Most people go through life as if on autopilot, letting the current of other people's ambitions and advertisements take them to places that they don't really want to go. Once you discover yourself through meditation, you can begin to see through all the control, and you become more efficient at being you - a more focused, stronger, and patient you. Choose the path of least resistance.

GUILT - A Psychological Mind Control Weapon!

Guilt, something that can completely paralyse us or motivate us. Guilt is the most powerful weapon of religion, for it drives many of those in the Catholic religion to Church every week. The world's leaders understand the potency of the effect of guilt, because if used incorrectly can control our will and our desires to further their own agendas. This is not some arcane knowledge but a science that has been passed down from generation to generation among those who are part of the largest and most influential cults on this planet.

From an early age we're taught to feel guilt, but guilt itself is abstract, it is a feeling of rejection. As a child if we wet the bed, we're made to feel 'guilty' for making our mother change the sheets, scolded for something outside our control, yet somehow our subconscious is hammered like hot iron on an anvil to respect the mysterious feeling of guilt. Some will argue that guilt is the guiding force that stops us from doing evil, but I disagree, guilt is different from conscience, whereas conscience is a voice that offers us a choice to do something, guilt is a voice that punishes for not obeying.

Religious cults will have its followers confuse guilt and conscience. Conscience is what we are born with, guilt is what we are taught. Guilt applies to our ego, whereas conscience applies to our inherent nature. Guilt punishes and conscience rewards - they are on opposite ends of the spectrum, one is negative and one is positive, and they both affect our overall spiritual energy. Guilt is destructive, if not relieved it can cause the afflicted to go insane or even commit suicide, therefore people seek to have guilt removed in order to feel well. Karl Marx once said that religion was the opiate of the masses - religion is designed to implant the idea that you have 'sinned' and thus make you feel guilty, this overriding sense of guilt can only be removed by the 'men of god', and once they remove it, a sense of euphoria is felt, but this does not last long as the religious dogma re-implants this sense of guilt into the masses.

If you look at the psychological profiles of most serial killers, they all have a background of being raised in strict religious families. This goes to show that you cannot use guilt to instill a sense of duty to do good in an individual - it doesn't work, and has the opposite effect; creating a fertile environment for growing sociopaths. Also guilt is infectious, once the thoughts have been implanted in an individual that they have somehow committed a crime, that individual in order to alleviate a partial load of their burden, will make others feel guilt too - it is human nature to feel the need to share one's experience with others. So the preached to, becomes the preacher, and thus the cycle continues. But this can also happen a different way, where the individual who has committed a sin will initiate others into the same sin so they are not alone in the guilt burden. We see that guilt is not a solution to a more conscientious society, but the very cause of many of the problems that plague humanity, and a weapon used by those immune to guilt on the masses in order to control.


Be Aware of Individuals who Display a Predilection Towards Guilt

The most dangerous people you can meet are those who uphold the guilt-based authoritarian system of control. In life, without doubt, you will meet people who appeal to the guilt complex, and those individuals at a superficial level may appear like normal citizens. You'll meet people who may support a very moral cause, appearing to others like a moral beacon to others, on the outside, they may be very likeable and seem to have a direction, but on the inside is an extremely unstable person, balanced on the precipice of insanity and loss of control. These people who are susceptible to guilt, and subscribe to the guilt system, are the most easily manipulated of all personality types. With careful phrasing or language, they can be controlled, their guilt is a leash and they can be led and exploited by whoever so desires.

These people feel the need to believe that they are doing 'good', so that the guilt is alleviated. Psychologically, these people may have had a history of some kind of mental illness, especially some form of depression. Depression is often related to some kind of unrealized childhood guilt trauma. There is a cure, but psychiatrists in particular favour the more profitable pharmaceutical prescription route. Someone with bipolar disorder swings from being free of guilt to extreme feelings of guilt, many of these individuals come from strict families where they may have been made to feel guilty for 'having fun' or 'enjoying life'. But like I said before, the root of all this behaviour comes from the infectiousness of guilt and the ability it has to be passed from generation to generation like a psychological plague.

Guilt, as we have established already can be used to control individuals. No matter how ridiculous the antidote to guilt, an individual is willing to go to extremes to seek redemption. Rationality does not come into the equation, because clear thinking is not a part of the guilt system of control. Guilt can overcome all rational thought and compel an individual to perform all manner of tasks. The CIA have experimented with different methods of mind-control - most notorious is their project MKULTRA which used hypnosis, drugs, etc on real human subjects to determine the most effect way to place an individual under hypnotic control, and in many cases with the subject unaware and believing that they still have freewill. These people become the perfect automated control subject, and are inserted back into society to function as spies for big brother and to report on those who may challenge the authority of the status quo.


How to Tell if Someone is Dangerous

A dangerous person is like a truckload of dynamite, it only needs the right conditions to be activated and cause damage. As long as the tyrannical guilt system is in place, society will continue to create non-rational individuals who will seek redemption from their induced sense of guilt. Those who are most susceptible swing from cause to cause, like a drug addict who survives each day swinging from drug dealer to drug dealer. The addiction is not the need to do good, although that is what the person may believe, but rather the need to alleviate a feeling of guilt, which is often described as a feeling of 'helplessness' or of 'a need to make the world a better place' How do charities recruit our aid? they do it by subjecting us to images of depravation, making us feel guilty for what we have, and suddenly we feel the need to donate, not to help, but to take away that horrible feeling - once the guilt is (temporarily removed) we do not care to even follow up to see if our money arrived to those it was intended for, or pocketed by some corrupt official. Guilt is inherently selfish because it is targeted at our ego. The bigger the ego, the more effective the control using guilt.

Ego is the way we perceive ourselves through the eyes of others - it cares what others think. Therefore when the ego is big, it cares not for the rationale of the individual, but the acceptance of others, even though the individual may disagree with his peers, he is driven to perform accordingly by the pressure of those around him. The egoistical individual does what he believes other expect of him. Therefore, the most dangerous people are the ones who see themselves as the moral upholder or pillar of society, the self-appointed watchdog and policer of all that is 'right' and 'good', whose own perceived self-worth is based on the views of others. These self-important people build their personality around a guilt-imposed construct, and because they do not like the attention on themself, they are often the first to be critical of others, not giving a care about their own hypocrisy, when in actuality the finger that they point is at themselves.

This type of individual can be a most influential member in society, who if recruited at the highest level can prove to be invaluable to converting and cooercing others. Their ideas will not be radical, and their views will usually reflect the commonly held beliefs of the time, but their ability to induce guilt and therefore control would be respected by those recruited. The person who is afflicted with the abstract concept of guilt is incapable of creativity or critical thinking because those abilities require individual enlightenment, although they are very capable of citing memes or spreading propaganda. They believe their cause is noble, and will give up their life, no matter how ridiculous the reason. The subject is a potential walking time-bomb waiting to go off, and should any organization be able to recognize these types of traits in an informal interview, could recruit the said individual as a loyal member to further their cause.


The Self-Perpetuating Psychological Illness

I can use many examples of the guilt-addicted individual, they all display destructive behaviour, particularly the alcoholic, but I will use the example of the binge eater, since unlike the alcoholic, they remain conscious of their behaviour at all times.

From an early age, we are taught about the Seven Deadly Sins, which originated in Greek philosophy but was later adopted by the Catholic Church. One of those 'sins' which might be considered prevalent in today's society is Gluttony, the over indulgence in the offerings of entertainment; overeating and its associated effects of obesity is a common sight, in the west, large people are made to feel 'guilty' about their size with the aid of advertising, yet it is also advertising in the first place which put them in their dire situation in the first place.

Let's analyse this mechanism of indulgence and guilt which bombards and shapes our lives on a daily basis. This very same mechanism drives our consumerism, and also creates a generation of confused and mentally damaged individuals. The Gluton is exposed to advertising which promotes products to make the Gluton feel good, he/she is encouraged to keep buying and using that product, let's say that the product is icecream. The icecream advert sells the product as a feel good escape, the consumer buys the product (because they want to feel good) and perhaps they enjoy the product a bit too much and get fat as a result. Then there is an advert on television selling a low fat food product, and it sells itself by appealing to the guilt of indulgence in the viewers. The only real way out of this situation in this case is to exercise, but the problem with guilt is that it can paralyze us from action if we are not aware of the underlying problem - this is the depression phase, where we feel helpless and unable to move - the helplessness drives us to further indulge in icecream, and temporarily we feel good, and then we feel guilty and feel the need to eat more low-fat food which doesn't do anything, and back into depression again, and round and round we go, a viscious cycle which is hard to break out of if you are not aware of what is happening.

Some people feel so trapped in the cycle of pleasure-guilt-depression that they end up committing suicide, but a few are so desperate to get out that they are willing to do anything to escape it at the cost of their individuality and self-worth. Thus the drug companies target these people, producing drugs such as Prozac, which remove emotions and numb the ability to think freely and as an individual. Some are offered a type of redemption in the form of 'community service' whether it be for the army or being recruited into a cult as mentioned earlier. These people are desperate, and they hand over the reigns of their life to somebody else in the hope that they may be cured.


The Cure, and Freedom

I have been careful in what I have written in this article because the ability to manipulate people is the holy grail for world domination! I decided not to share my techniques, although they can be discovered by anyone who has the ability to analyse and think outside the box, and I do not believe in manipulating people, so I only want to make people aware of the dangers in our media controlled world. You should be suspicious of all information, even this one, never cease to question. Above all, question who you are and who you want to become, for many people, their vision of the person that they want to become is very different from the life path that they have chosen. So look at your upbringing, think about what angered you most in your childhood, your fears and analyse their origins - because if we do not understand why we think the way we do, then we will be forever lost and a slave to other people's wants, which are not always to our benefit.

Politicians will always tell you to 'do the right thing', but the 'right thing' often suits their agenda. Only you know what is right and what is wrong, because you trust your own decision, not anyone elses, because you based your decision on facts and careful analysis and not an abstract feeling or concept. You are a free-thinking individual who has the ability to question, and you understand that others have the same right, you will respect others as they respect you, and free yourself from those who seek to control your thoughts and make you a slave to their plans, and those who want to exploit you and suppress the very people who want to help you be free. You are a freedom fighter who frees others, and nobody controls you except yourself.

Exercise Motivation that Works from the Mind

I cannot stress enough how important it is to maintain good physical fitness and health. Exercise is as important as getting enough sleep or drinking water, but many choose not to do it, in the same way that children don't eat their vegetables. As part of a healthy lifestyle to maintain one's body function at optimum efficiency, exercise is not a choice, but an essential regime.

People do not value their bodies enough until it is too late, and partly the problem is to do with their perception of exercise. Children will not eat greens until the adult explains that their growth will be stunted if they don't eat vegetables. In the same way, adults can delay beginning a healthy exercise routine by creating all kinds of excuses in their heads. Once again, we're dealing with psychology, it has nothing to do with the starting physical condition of the individual, it has nothing to do with willpower, it is all about how one perceives the tasks at hand.

The task of exercising can often be seen as daunting, an enormous vehicle to overcome. People who don't exercise and want to start, generally set their goal too high. The goal exists as an image or phrase within the individual's mind, but when the bar is set too high, then one's morale may start to wane after a few weeks. So the trick is not what the goal is but rather, how one sets the goal. Whether through imagery or linguistically, the goal can be set so it is an easily accessible target for the body and mind to achieve and gain satisfactory results each time. It is common to say, "I want to lose weight", instead this can be rephrased, "I want to become lighter" - the use of the word 'lose' often comes with negative connotations; nobody wants to lose something. So once we begin to apply these newly reworded goals, the tasks magically become easier and more doable.

The other problem is time; in this day and age, with all our modern technology and devices, we're spoilt for instant results, we expect to get trim and fit in just a few weeks rather than thinking in terms of years. Also modern advertising is partly to blame, as many ads for weight loss and gym programs claim big results within a month, but these claims are false, as the companies that produce these adverts often place a disclaimer in small print at the bottom of the screen or poster to say that it won't for everyone. Time and patience is another topic I will cover in more depth later on, but in terms of exercise and fitness, you won't see results very quickly and because of this there is little incentive to keep going or even start. Most people are stuck in the process of preparing for the day when they 'really need to start' but by then it is too late.

Routines are important, and there are many routines that we perform (naturally and unthinking) on a daily basis that don't provide any immediate benefits. A daily routine that most people perform is washing their hands after using the toilet. We cleanse our hands of bacteria invisible to the naked eye, we can't see the bacteria yet we wash with soap and water with the knowledge that it helps remove the germs. We have such confidence in this routine because in our mind, we envision getting some heinous stomach bug and sitting on the toilet with cramp for hours if we were to ignore it. Brushing our teeth is another one, I do not know many people who don't brush their teeth, and the longer we delay to clean our teeth the more we envision our teeth slowly rotting and decaying right inside our mouths - I think it's hard for many people to skip brushing their teeth for long, even after a couple of days, there might not be any sign of visible decay, but the thought and the fear is there, enough so we're willing to take some time out of our daily schedules to take preventative measures. This is something that has been hammered into you from the day you learnt to brush your teeth and learnt about teeth hygiene, and it stays with you because you know that negligence leads to black rotting teeth which you have seen photos of.

So exercise, what are the consequences of not exercising? We already know what they are - weight gain, heart disease, premature ageing, high blood pressure ... the list goes on, but why are they not enough to shock most of us into exercising regularly? The answer is simply that we cannot imagine those things happening to us in the time frame that those things usually occur, we're talking maybe decades. Teeth decay is a different matter, we've all lost teeth, it's a part of growing up, so it is something that we can relate to, thus we continue to perform our teeth brushing, and we're taught that when we aren't brushing our teeth the decay is occurring all the time. Now we should think of exercise in the same terms, people are more motivated to prevent loss than to work towards gain. Someone may be quite reckless in their life, taking risks like drink driving, but if someone pointed a gun at their head, they may view their life differently, most people are not as response to gain as they are to loss. You could tell someone that by exercising, it will improve their looks, but that might not be the type of gain that they're interested in, but if you say instead that they will lose their looks by not exercising, it might be a more persuasive suggestion.

So we learn that in order to motivate ourselves to become better, we should keep in sight the pit that awaits us should we decide to ignore the advice. Think that each day you delay, you are losing your health, the opportunity to preserve your youth, your overall fitness. We do not need to think in terms of years, because you can wake up tomorrow morning with an extra wrinkle, because each day we fall apart, our bodies are continually decaying when we are not servicing them, this is a reason to begin today, for each hour provides an opportunity to preserve what you have, and tomorrow you can be better than without.

Motivation: Work Hard Vs Play Less

Motivation, or the art of getting things done is a subject that goes beyond simply telling yourself repeatedly to do something, and there are other factors involved such as psychology, upbringing, environment and peer pressure. There are numerous websites out there that claim that they can teach you how to be motivated and succeed in life, but they never question whether the motivation is right or suitable for the individual. These sites will motivate you to 'get rich' (for a one time fee), and they'll tell you how and what to do, although I doubt that they really work because such website prey on the vulnerable and the desperate whose minds are already open to suggestion - I suggest that one avoid these type of 'get rich motivation' schemes at all costs.

First of all, let's try to understand what motivation is. For a start, everyone is motivated, people are naturally motivated to pursue happiness, and happiness may be sought in various ways. The mistake is to believe that money is motivation, although money can be a by-product of motivation, money itself is just paper -what you do with the money can be motivation, although it shouldn't be because there are more ways to make money than one can possibly conceive of. If money itself were motivation then there would be many prostitutes standing on every street corner of the world, and some financial professions could be considered to be a type of prostitution.

When we were growing up, our parents and teachers will often tell us to 'work hard'. This is part of a global cultural meme that has been passed down generation to generation without questioning whether it is valid advice or not. There is a difference between 'motivation' and 'self-motivation', 'motivation' itself does not guarantee success (success in the sense of achieving one's goals), one needs to be self-motivated. If we take the example of the farmer and the workhorse who pulls the plough to cultivate the land, the farmer is motivating the workhorse to pull, and the workhorse works hard to do the farmer's bidding, yet left to its own devices, the workhorse would not have the self-motivation to pull the plough by itself, but would probably rather be relaxing and eating hay. This concept can be seen everyday in society, in our cities, where the workhorses are the office workers and the motivators are the bosses.

As I already stated, everyone is self-motivated, we're self-motivated to eat when we're hungry, we're self-motivated to explore, have fun, laugh, be creative. Most of these self-motivations are a natural part of being human, and everyone is gifted with these natural abilities. Think about that most things in life are quite pleasurable or fun to do, but we've been taught to separate fun and work, when actually, and ideally, they could become one and the same thing for everyone. Our educational systems teach us that we must 'work harder' towards goals that we don't want, we are like the workhorse who just wants to eat hay, but the farmer drives us forward with his riding crop, achieving his goals rather than our own.

So how do we begin to be self-motivated? First we must discover in ourself for ourself what we want. Usually the things we want most are those things that we pursue when we are not working, ie. our hobbies and interest, these pastimes that become the manifestations of escape from our tiresome work routines. I mentioned in the previous post, that I do enjoy writing, as much as I enjoy the sound of the keyboard when I tap the keys, it is a pleasurable experience for me - I'm also listening to music as I type this, all these factors combined, the writing experience itself is its own reward and therefore motivation for this piece. Some people may see this as hard work because it is not for them, others may think about it, and realize, 'hey you're right, I'm just as self-motivated to continue reading as you are writing!' - now we are beginning to establish a relationship here, and if everyone could alter the way they think about work, we could have a perfect and efficient society where everyone had fun and did their best work without feeling as if it hurt them.

Often than not, some of those things that require self-motivation may not be too pleasant to do, but they may be needed in order to fulfill our overall happiness plan. This is the most psychological part of self-motivation, and that is our perspective on how we look at things. Exercise is something that is essential to our lives as sleep to maintain our health, yet it is one of those things that many people find it hard to build up the self-motivation to even get started. How we change the way we look at something can often make all the difference. In the same sense as looking at deciding whether the glass is half empty or half full, we can apply that linguistic approach towards how we set our goals in our mind. Self-motivation exists as a constant stream of internal dialogue in our minds, and how it appears inside our head, is how we deal with it, and depending on our character, we can either see it as a challenge, a new experience or an insurmountable barrier.

The human mind has an internal dialogue, a debate rages on inside your head to decide whether you do something or not. You throw some words into the debate, like danger, or pain, and the question is quickly resolved. The brain usually responds to a little coaxing with words that it likes. If we tell ourselves to 'work hard' then for most people those two words immediately conjure up images of sweat, exertion and pain; instead, an alternative choice of words that could be just as effective are 'play less'. Instead of 'lose weight', how about 'gain confidence', 'stop smoking' becomes 'breathe more fresh air'. In order to convince ourself and others, we avoid using negative words or phrases, and replace them with positive terms.

Later on, I will go back to some of these topics like exercising, and cover them in more depth. The point I want to make, is instead of 'forcing' or somehow 'coercing' yourself into doing something, as many of these websites and books will teach you how to do, focus on what you want, and what you want to achieve. If you want to achieve a healthier body, and that is what you really want, the motivation to do that is already inside you, you just have to tap into it, and phrase it to yourself in the correct way, and it will be done. Also, self-motivation comes easily to the things you are interested in, turn your hobbies and interests into your job and earn money from it! You do them anyway, why not think of a way to turn that hobby into an investment, and get paid to do something you enjoy.

I will cover the topic of motivation again in the future. In the meantime, avoid those motivation websites and books, the only thing that they motivate is the author's bank account.