Photo by Chuckumentary

I hope this post won’t get me into trouble with ardent fans of Law Of Attraction.

The movie ‘The Secret‘ has garnered a lot of attention via word of mouth. It was also through my friend that I was introduced to this movie, and to the Law of Attraction. Since watching this movie, I got really interested and listened to the audio book of ‘Ask And It Is Given‘, by Esther Hicks and Abraham. The movie and the book teaches the Law Of Attraction, and using this law to achieve happiness and success in our life.

Unlike most personal development philosophies, the Law of Attraction presents a uniquely inviting concept; it advocates that through proper channeling of positive thoughts and emotions, it is possible to attract anything from the universe, all the things that we can ever want or wish for. It states that we are the creator of our reality and that the only thing stopping us from achieving happiness is our own limiting beliefs.

‘The Secret’ even presented a fairy-tale-come-true version of Aladdin’s Lamp, stating that there are forces in the universe like the genie in Aladdin’s Lamp, justing waiting to fulfill every of our desires. Most people will find this a very inviting concept, as can be proven by the amount of success the movie has enjoyed and the large following of the Law of Attraction.

WHAT IS LAW OF ATTRACTION For the uninitiated, the Law of Attraction is a very simple concept; it states that “Like attracts like.” It also states that:

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This blog is about leading a balanced life focusing on career, relationships and money. You can read more about balancing your life here. These articles are written for you. If you find them useful, feel free to subscribe for regular updates as new articles are posted. It's FREE. :)

Photo by Heidi and Matt

If you read about my blog, you will see that I have made it my purpose and mission to create awareness through advocating about personal development. I hope to, through this blog, evangelize and promote an awareness of living purposefully.

I feel that the saddest thing in life, will be to look back at the end of your life journey and found out that you have traveled in vain; without a purpose. Those years lost trying to live up to others’ expectations, dogma, social norms; which may be well-intended, but does not serve your purpose or fulfillment.

It is my deepest belief that everyone of us has a purpose and reason to be at the place that we are at, the people that we meet, the circumstances that we are in. Everything in our life happens for a good cause, to help us grow and become what we are truly meant to be. The big, big difference between a fulfilling life and mediocrity lies in an awareness of purpose and to deliberately direct your own life like you are a masterful creator.

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Photo by The dancing kids

I have always thought that I am NOT a morning person. Just 4 months ago, I was still used to waking up at around noon time on weekends and find it a challenge waking up on time for work on weekdays. The idea of people getting up at 5am was really ridiculous to me. To me, staying up late till 12 am, sometimes 1am, is not uncommon. In fact, I considered myself more effective and alert to work from 11 pm onwards when there’s little disturbance. To people around me, I am a night person, not a morning person.

In general, such labeling and lifestyle wasn’t much of an issue for me; and I never really considered the notion of ‘converting’ to a morning person.

Coincidently, 4 months ago, I came across Steve Pavlina’s article on How to Become An Early Riser. Intrigued, but not expecting too much out of it, I decided to try it out.

Amazingly, it’s been 4 months since I tried out Steve’s tips and I never really got back to my night person lifestyle. Nowadays, I go around professing to be a morning person. Well, I must admit I have been ‘converted’.

Even though it’s just 4 short months, the differences this change in lifestyle has made are subtle yet amazing. I can already see tangible results and positive differences this has done for my life. It’s great just imagining how these results will further benefit me once compounded over time.

As such, with this intention in mind, I like to share these benefits for your consideration.

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Earlier, I wrote about 7 steps to set goals effectively. Today, I like to expand on that a little.

One common challenge I have with my goals is not with setting them, it’s with sticking to my goals. After all, setting goals is only the first step. Taking action is the next step to achieving them. Setting goals without actions is only as good as daydreaming.

Depending on how big your goals are, most of these require you to spend some amount of time and effort to achieve them. The bigger your goals, the longer it will take to see results or fulfillment. Even a simple goal of weight loss can take several weeks for results to show, and several months to hit your target. I believe the most common reason people are not achieving their goals is not because they lack the knowledge of setting goals. It is because they lack the motivation to follow through on their goals long enough for results to show.

I am speaking from my own experiences. I have been setting goals for the past 7 years, and this habit has helped me a lot in whatever accomplishments that I have achieved financially, physically, and professionally till date. Yet I must confess that this has not been a smooth sailing ride. There were times when I just seem to lack the motivation to push myself towards my goals. Logically, I know that there I need to exercise at least 5 times a week to stay fit and healthy. I also know that I need to read widely or write more often. Yet logical thinking alone is seldom enough as a motivator.

There seems to be an opposing voice inside which is dissuading me. Sometimes it’s because I’m feeling discouraged from the lack of results. Sometimes, it’s because I’m feel really tired. Sometimes it’s simply because I’m feeling lazy. Whatever the reason, the feelings that I have are not aligned with my goals and what I know I must do.

I believe you have faced similar situations before. If that’s the case, read on; I have discovered through my own experiences and research, a way to motivate yourself towards your goals, without beating yourself up or feeling guilty about not acting.

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Photo by Meredith_Farmer

A recent post by Steve Pavlina on authenticity strikes a chord in me, and prompted me to write this article. In his post, Steve talks about the importance of authenticity in what he considers good blogging.

It helps me realize the reason why I (and many others) have always enjoyed his posts. Steve is a living example of authenticity. Through his writings, I can almost feel his presence and his sincerity. He may be an expert in self improvement, but he is also very forward about his weaknesses, negative emotion and imperfection; he does not try to be Mr. Perfect. In essence, he is very human.

Ironically, such authenticity helps us to relate to Steve’s writings and his philosophies, which I believe contributed largely to his success as a blogger.

I like to extend Steve’s argument beyond blogging/writing into career and business life.

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Photo by Behrooz Nobakht

When it comes to self development and personal growth, it is my philosophy that any success in life involves setting meaningful goals, taking real actions, and having the perseverance to see your efforts through to fulfillment.

However, I was constantly running into demoralizing setbacks and failures that threatened to throw me off track. There was this little devilish voice in my mind dissuading me,

Why are you doing this? You’ve failed. Is it worth the struggle? Give up.

Even though I understand that I must remain positive; Sometimes, I still found myself struggling with the notion of positive thinking. Something is missing; it’s not as if simply by maintaining a positive attitude and mindset, success will be ensured, right?

The fact is that deep inside my heart, I was hurting and I felt so bad. I wanted to achieve something, yet I kept failing. It seemed like I was getting further away from my goals than ever before. It felt terrible. I really felt so much like giving up.

Thank God that I had discovered the secrets to recover from failures and get back on track every time.

The good news is that recovery from failures is a skill which can be learned, like cycling and cooking. When you learn to recover from failures effectively, instead of giving up or sweeping the problems under the carpet, you’ll learn to stay on track; you’ll learn to harness what’s negative and turn that into positive, empowering motivations; you’ll learn to constantly persist and persevere, naturally, without having to force yourself or psyche yourself into positive thinking.

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(Photo by Swamibu)

We’ve heard it so many times before, ‘life is tough’. There are so many things that we want; an understanding and supportive lover or spouse, that wonderful house you saw last week, a carefree, stress-free life style, a fulfilling career… the list goes on.

Even though there are some many things that you want to accomplish, you don’t have enough time, so little money, so little that you can afford, limited energy. There’s just not enough to accomplish what you want… How do you ever get to live a life of happiness?

Indeed, it’s not easy, we all know that. Nonetheless, Happiness can be yours; it is possible, really. The modern society presents a lot of ‘noise’ and distractions in your life, which are diverting your focus and attention; detrimental to your pursue of happiness. What you need first is to gain a keen awareness of what constitutes and contributes to a happy life.

To this end, I like to talk about 4 key areas which contribute to happiness. I will explain why I believe they are the 4 key areas and why you should pay attention to them. Lastly, I will end with how these areas need to be balanced to contribute to your happiness.

This new awareness will be like an awakening that allows you to see through the fog of life, and filter out unnecessary pursues; thereby getting you onto a true journey of happiness

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Photo by Le Chef

Have you ever set goals but failed to achieve them because you forgot about them? Or maybe you tried very hard to achieve your goals in the initiate period, but your enthusiasms and efforts just died off after some time? If you are reading this, then chances are you had.

Maybe you have given up on setting goals, because it just didn’t work for you. Maybe you concluded that you are simply not the type of person who has the perseverance or discipline to follow through with goals. In fact, failing to follow through on goals makes you feel so guilt-ridden, that any further goal setting effort is just too much to bear.

To be very honest, I was once like that too; setting goals in my mind and failing to achieve them. I tend to get so excited about certain things and I set a goal for myself to achieve it. In the initial period, I’d even put in a lot of time and effort. However, over time, once the hustles and tussles of our daily life sets in, whatever goals I had in mind just flew with the wind.

It was very discouraging for me; I ended up feeling very guilty about failing on my promises to myself. I felt incapable and incompetent of achieving anything worthy.

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I came across this article, “The Person Responsible For Your Success” by Jack Canfield today. (Yes, Jack is one of the two people responsible for the best-selling ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul‘).

Make a guess. Who’s responsible for your success (or failure)?

It’s You! You are responsible for your success! Only you, yourself is the single most determining factor which decides what, and how much you achieve in your life. This applies to any area of success; be it at home, professionally, financially, spiritually etc….

Accept, embrace, and live this fact and concept; or you’re going to leave your success, your dreams to chance/luck, or into the hands of others and circumstances. You only live once right?

Yes, for sure, there are many things beyond your control. In fact, the only one thing you can truly control is yourself, your thoughts, your action and your reactions. In taking charge of yourself, and by forcing yourself to focus on positive, result-driven thoughts, you can actually influence the people and circumstances around you for a greater, better result/outcome.

On the other hand, by feeling victimized, by complaining, whining, being passive, you actually drive success further away from you. By blaming your current state on circumstances, on others’ shortcomings, you actually relinquish the ability to improve your state to that someone/something else; which is beyond your control. So what happens? You feel helpless, dejected, hopeless.

Think about the people who you are attracted to. Do they project an aura of confidence and endless possibilities, or do they project failure and inability? Think about why you are attracted to these people in the first place. Now will you still be attracted to them if they are constantly blaming, whining and complaining? If you want to be successful like these people that you admire, you have to start thinking like they do. And that means starting from yourself, YOU!

Go take a look into the mirror. Look at the person in the mirror, point at him and say real loud, “I Am Responsible for My Success!“.

Have a great weekend ahead.

(Photo by Verun*)

This seems like an oxymoron, isn’t it. If you aren’t attached to your job, how can you be committed and perform your best at it? Well, I am speaking from my personal experience, and it has certainly worked well for me so far. Let me explain…

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