I am very excited to share with you all yet another guest post.

This time, I wrote an article for Goodlife ZEN.

“You can find weekly, practical inspiration at Goodlife ZEN. Get a new take on life, find creative ways to make your wildest dreams come true, and become what you aspire to be.”

Warm thanks go out to Mary, who gave me the opportunity to share my thoughts on her great and inspiring blog.

5 ways to escape the escapist weekend

Here is an excerpt form the article:

“It is Thursday. You are already thinking about Friday. It is Friday morning. You are thinking about Friday afternoon. It is Friday afternoon. It is here.

What do you do?

We all look forward to weekends because it is the time for us to relax, become refreshed, and energized. Ironically enough, only a few us manage to do that. The rest of us just use the weekends to escape from our problems, troubles, work, and “reality” all together.”

Click here to continue reading…

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Image: nattu

Nature of life is change. We experience mental, physical, emotional, spiritual changes as we go through our lives. That is all there is to life – managing the changes that occur in our lives. Some of us are conscious of that change, while others are completely blind to it.

Think about it.

It is my understanding that those who are able to manage the change in their lives lead truly fulfilling lives. There are three simply components to in order to lead a rich life:

• Know where you are now
• Know where you want to go
• Know how to get there

That’s it. The above formula is universal to everybody walking this earth. Now you know. There is no mystery.

In order for the above formula to work, all of the three elements must be present.

• Knowing where you are now, will help you figure out where you want to go.
• Knowing where you want to go, requires for you to know where you are now in order to figure out how to get there.

The relationship between knowing where you are knowing where you are going is similar to the one of the chicken and the egg. Which one should happen first?

The solution is pretty simple.

• If you know where you want to go, then you also must figure out where you are now.
• If you don’t know where you want to go, then figure out where you are now.
• If you know where you are now, then use that information to figure out where you want to go.

Once you have figured out your current situation in life and your desired situation in life, just compare the two. The comparison of those two different states of being will reveal to you the change that needs to happen in order to get from now (point A) to then (point B). Once you know what the differences are, then all you have to do is figure out how and what you will have to do to catalyze those changes in your life.

To make things just a little less vague, let us look at personal example.

Were I am now. I am unemployed, looking for a job. I have tons of education, but no experience. I like organizing things, and helping people on an individual basis. I like learning about money and finance. I like planning things. I like working out and basketball. I like philosophy. I love comedy. I like helping people succeed. I live with my parents.

Where I want to be. I want to become a personal coach with a focus on financial planning. I want to travel. I want to continue working out and playing basketball. I want to have my own place. I want to be debt free. I want to do extreme activities: go skydiving, bungee jumping, scuba diving, learn a martial art, learn how to play piano. I want start investing money. I want to be able to help my family with financial matters.

How to get there. I need to get a job where I can gain relevant experience in financial planning. I need to learn how to sell, negotiate, network, give amazing presentations, lead others, become great at verbal and oral communication. I need to continue building my blog to improve my communication and selling skills. I need to structure my life in such a way that I can fit in all of the activities that I want. I need to become more confident and aggressive.

Of course, all of the above are just the bare bones of what needs to happen, but it should make things a little bit more clear.Life is really simple if you are able to understand the above concepts!

NOTE: I am going to discuss how to figure out where you are now, how to know where you want to go, and how to get there in the upcoming articles.

“Be The Change You Want To See In The World” – Gandhi

Yes, it is more of the same old “be the change you want to see in the world”. Yet, no matter how old it is, it never gets old. It is probably one of the most overused phrases in the world that joins that ranks of “Just Do it!”, “Impossible is nothing” and so on.

It is one of the most used, but one of the least practiced ideas in the world.

Everybody is quick to throw it out there: “Be The Change You Want To see In The World” and then they turn around and complain about how unfair life is. At the very best it is hypocrisy, and the very worst it is the attitude that creates the overworked, unhappy and unfulfilled world.

We as people create that world. Our collective choices and attitudes create the world that we live in. We collectively created the 9-5 nation (should I say 9-9 and get paid for 9-5?), the always rushing, never stopping, always miserable and complaining nation. We did that together.

And, yet we have the audacity to complain.

How dare you complain about the something that you are part of yourself? If you do everything that makes this world as it is, then you have no right to complain about it. Really. You don’t. Matter of fact, you never have the right to complain. Complaining is a different way of not taking the responsibility for your life.

Do you think you are the only one who feels trapped? I don’t think so. There are millions upon millions of people out there who feel just like you, and do nothing just like you. They feel helpless and powerless. But do you really understand, that we together, as people, have made the world what it is today?

That means that we can all change it – together. We can do it together, if we only choose so. If all us made conscious choices to give in to the routine less, if all of us stood up for ourselves and our values, if all of us together decided that we had enough of this overly materialistic and celebrity run world, then we could do it.

We can do it.

Why hasn’t it happened yet? If everybody is so fed up, why isn’t anybody doing anything?

I know why. Everybody else is waiting. They are all waiting for somebody else to do it first. They are waiting for somebody to take the responsibility of being the first one to stand up from them. They are waiting.

Are you waiting too?

Have you every really thought that you could be that person that “they” are waiting for? I think they are waiting for you to stand up and become the change that you (and they) want to see in the world.

Now you know. Everybody else feels just like you. It’s just like school all over again. Remember when you were afraid to ask a “dumb” question only to realize later that everybody else was wondering the same? Well, this is kind of like that. Except this time, it is a fact that everybody DOES want to change the world for the better and once again, it is the time for you to make a fool out of yourself and stand up for the values that matter to you.

You don’t have to do anything big. Start at home, with your family and your friends, then at work and so on. Before you know it, your attitude will have changed the world. Sometimes people just need an example, a leader to see that change is really possible and that it is not just in their heads.

You can do it! You can be the leader in your own way. You can start the change by changing yourself and leading by example. We have created the rules that we hate, we can just as easily destroy them and create new ones.

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Image: the-tml

I wrote a guest post for Write To Done, which I would love to share with the rest of you! Before, I go into that, I would like to thank Mary for being so open to my ideas and accepting the article! I felt amazing after she said yes! After all, over 15,000 subscribers received my article. Talk about peer pressure :)

The article talks about the blogosphere as playground: a place where we can have fun and just play for the sake of playing. If you want to learn or remember how to play, then you might to check out the article.

Either way, here are some of the bits from the article:

“I have one question for you: “When did you grow up?”

OKAY, that is actually just the first question. Here’s the rest.

Do you remember that exact moment when you decided to stop having fun and start being serious? Do you know when your careless smile was replaced by a frown? Do you know when you stopped believing in your dreams and decided to become reasonable?

Maybe it was around the time when you stopped playing.
Until that point, the whole world seemed to be your playground!”

If you are curious as to what happens next, read on:

The Ultimate Playground: Blogosphere

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Image: soulholder

Do It Now!

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Image: United Nations Development Programme

I am a huge South Park fan. I have seen every single episode ever made. It has some of the best social commentary about everything and anything. However, one of my favorites of all time is the South Park’s movie “Imaginationland”

Here is a reason behind that. People always question what is real and what is not real. The question comes up very often in discussions about God. Is it real or is it a figment of imagination? It almost always comes down to this: can you prove it?

That’s where it all usually stops because nobody can prove or disprove the existence of God.

As I was reading the book called “The Evolution of God” by Robert Wright, I realized that it does not really matter of it is real or not. What really matters is summed up in the following quote by Kyle:

“General: If I’m not mistaken, you’re the one who bet that leprechauns weren’t real. So why do you care what happens?

Kyle:    Because I- [catches himself] I… Um… because I think… they are real. It’s all real. Think about it. Haven’t Luke Skywalker and Santa Claus affected your lives more than most real people in this room? I mean, whether Jesus is real or not, he… he’s had a bigger impact on the world than any of us have. And the same could be said of Bugs Bunny and, a-and Superman and Harry Potter. They’ve changed my life, changed the way I act on the Earth. Doesn’t that make them kind of “real.” They might be imaginary, but, but they’re more important than most of us here. And they’re all gonna be around long after we’re dead. So in a way, those things are more realer than any of us.”

To be honest, I was blown away. So simple and to the point.

In short, one could say that something is real if it has an impact in our lives. That is all that matters. Weather God is real or not, does not matter. God, at the very least, represents an idea, which can change lives and empower people.

That is all the more reason to respect other people’s view and beliefs and not to try and force ours upon them. What is really real might not ever be understood by anybody. This does not mean that we should try and stop understanding the underlying reality behind our world. No!

The understanding that real things are those that make an impact on our lives gives us a common ground to relate and opens up communication channles with people around the world with different beliefs and worldviews.

In the end, even if we figure out the TRUTH of how this world is put together, would it really change the way we live or the aspiration in our lives? We can look through history looking for an answer and we will see that values of love, honesty, friendship, sacrifice and so on have always been central to our existence.

So next, you are about to challenge somebody else reality think about this simple lesson from South Park and instead of closing the doors you will open them up wide. It does not hurt to explore!

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Image: Bill Doc

Change is inevitable. Change permeates our daily lives. The nature of life is change.

Let it sink. It will be important.

These are some of the ways that people deal with change in their lives:

• Some are not aware of the changes going on in their lives and do not even take the time to think about it
• Some are aware of changes and try to change the things that are out of their control
• Some are aware of changes and try to change the things that are with their control

All of us will find ourselves belonging to a mixture of the above groups. Which one can you identify yourself with the most? Which of the three groups leads the most rewarding and fulfilling life? Do you belong to that group? If not, why?

If I had to answer the above question, I would say that people who are aware of changes going on in their lives and who focus on changing the things that are within their control would lead the most fulfilling life. I would say that they do not waste energy on the things that are out of their reach and focus on things that they have control over therefore doing more in the given amount of time. It comes down to simple economics of life: we have limited amount of time and we have to use wisely to get the most out of life.

Then I would want to know how I can become part of that group.

Here is the recipe. In order to lead a fulfilling life, you will need three main ingredients: awareness, acceptance, concentration.

Awareness. You will need to become aware of the changes that are going on throughout life. Our bodies change, our thoughts change, our friends change, the economy changes, the weather changes, the jobs change, our environment changes. Once you become aware and identify them, your life seem much more interesting and much more complex. However, the danger is that you will want to control everything around you. You will want some things to change and others to stay constant. That is a mistake!

Acceptance. That is why acceptance is the next crucial step. You must learn to accept that certain changes are out of your control! I will repeat this again, because it is that important: you must learn to accept the things that are out of your control. Here are some examples: the economy is out of your control, the weather is out of your control, other people are out of your control, your aging body is out of your control. If you learn to accept that some things are out of your control, then you will be able to spend more time and energy on the things that you can control. The biggest challenge here is to clearly distinguish between the changes within your control and outside of your control.

Concentration. Once you have became aware, identified and accepted the things within and without your control, it is crucial to maintain concentration on the things, which you can control. Many times, you will be tempted to spend energy on the things that you cannot control. That will do nothing but make you feel like the victim of this world. Resist the temptation and just remind yourself that simply there are things which you cannot control and refocus on the right changes in your life which you can control. Some of the examples would be your thoughts, your habits, you actions, your effort, your ethics and your morals.

I have to continuously remind myself and go through all of three steps above to continue leading a fulfilling life. One of the biggest areas that I have used the above approach on is trying to change other people. I used to think that people should be the way I want them to be and that I should be able to change them to my liking. I was getting horrible results! So much resentment, so much anger and negative emotions in general! It took me a while to realize that changing other people are out of my control. Once I accepted that fact it was much easier to accept other people for who they were! Now and then I have remind myself of the above facts, but the more I do it the more natural it becomes!

QUESTION: What is the hardest thing to accept in your life?

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Image: Flickr

I am proud to announce my first guest post on Walter Adena’s blog LionSlinger.com. In this article I reconsidered the way people look at love. The basic idea that love is not an emotion, but a state of being.

Reconsidering Love

When I sat down to write this article, I wanted to call it: “What Love Really Is”. As soon as I started writing, it hit me. All of us are unique and all of us experience life differently. That is why we all have a unique understanding of what love is. Trying to prove to you what love really is would be simply pointless. I would be dissing your intelligence and your experiences in life by stating that you all are wrong and I am right about love.

Instead, I will just give you my unique perspective on love. I will tell you what I think love is not, what it is, and what it ought to be. Maybe, just maybe my insight will enrich your life and add a unique perspective that was not there before.

Continue reading here…

I went skydiving and I survived. I am here to show and tell and share my experience with you all and encourage you to take on more risks in life which will change you forever!

Why Skydiving

Skydiving seems to be the ultimate challenge for the most people in life. It looks so scary and life threatening, but yet at the same time somehow safe.

When I told people that I am going skydiving, the typical response I heard was: “Why would I want to jump out of a perfectly good plane?” I did not know how to respond to those people. Maybe it was not for them. After all, it was their choice and their life.

I did not want to convince them to join me, but I knew that I had perfectly good reasons for skydiving:

• unique experience of a life time
• an exercise in overcoming the fear of fear
• making a tough decision and sticking with it
• challenging myself
• putting myself out of my comfort zone

Why I Went Alone

To my surprise I heard a couple of people saying that they wanted to go skydiving as well! I was excited! I did not want to do it alone!

Almost all of them told me: “Yea! It’s awesome! Let’s do it!”

Then I would follow up with them and all I would hear would be this: “Yea, I am busy that weekend”; “I had change of plans”, etc. I was disappointed, but I was expecting that. I came to expect for people to say one thing and do a different one. It seems that most of us are just scared of taking risks and rather stick with what we know.

Finally, I realized that if I waited for somebody else to come along , I would never end up go skydiving. I had to do it alone. So I just picked a date, signed up and waited to go skydiving. It felt good, but I was already getting nervous.

I Was Afraid

To be exact, I was afraid. No doubt about that. I had a list of questions and images running through my head:

• Am I going to die?
• If I die, is it going to be painful?
• How am i going to feel when I realize that I am going to die?
• Am I going to break my back?
• Is it safe?
• What if the parachute doesn’t go off?
• What if the plane crashes?
• How much experience does every body else have?
• What are the chances of death?
• What’s the worst thing that can happen?
• etc.

Luckily, I realized that skydiving is just like breathing to some people. I realized that I was not alone in my adventure. The Falling Illini president took me to the skydiving spot. He has done over 200 jumps! I did not even think that anybody would jump out of a plane more than once.

He was able to answer many of my questions and concerns and explained how everything worked. That provided me with some peace of mind. However, words did not mean much and I was as afraid as ever.

Still, I stuck with the plan. While we were driving, it all seemed surreal: I wasn’t really going to go skydiving; this is just a dream! Reality kicked in when we finally arrived and I saw the planes, the parachutes, the field, and people landing from 10,000 feet in the air.

I was not alone. People from all different ages, different levels of experience and different walks of life gathered that day to jump out of a perfectly good airplane.

Finally, I paid. The actions were set in motion and there was no turning back. . Slowly but surely, my turn to skydive came. As I was getting ready, I wanted to scream and shout: “Hold up! Can I have some more time? I am not ready! I need more time!” and so on. Yet, things just kept moving and before I knew it I was on the plane. What happened next is history.

I did it!

Lessons Learned

After I landed, I had a lot of time to think and relax. Everything that I just did started to sink in. Here is what I learned from the whole experience:

• Just do it! Just go ahead and do it. If it is something that you want to do, nothing will stop you. All you have to do is decide to do it. Once the first domino falls, the rest will seem seamless and easy. Deciding to do something is key.
• Face the fear. Diving into the unknown, into uncertainty is scary! But the only way to conquer that fear is to face and keep going despite it. Fear is just an emotion saying to you: “You are doing something you have not done before!” That’s great! You are exploring unknown territories within yourself. You are growing!
• Be prepared to go alone. Most people will not face the fear. They will stay where they are. They are not comfortable with the emotion of fear, but you are! That is why there is a chance that you will start alone. It might be discouraging, but rewards in life come with a price.
• You are not alone. You might start out alone, but you will not end up alone. There are other courageous people out there, who are carving their own destiny, their own path in life. Once you leave the ones that are afraid, you will me the ones who are courageous.
• Seek guidance. You are not the first and not the last to travel this new road that you chose. Others have done it. Find them. Find them and ask them questions. Their knowledge will enlighten your path and ease your fears. Uncertainty makes us afraid. We like to know things. So educate yourself about your fear until the uncertainty is gone!
• Prepare for a change. Once you face and overcome your fear, you will change. You will change in ways you did not expect. Your current environment, you current friends and your current lifestyle might not seem appropriate for the person that you have become. But that’s the price of change. Are you willing to pay?

I Changed

Indeed, after skydiving many things changed. Everything seemed so trivial. Skydiving was like whole new world that I have not realized existed. Coming back to “reality” was weird: the sky did not look the same, people did not look the same to me, my fears were not the scary any more.

Most importantly, I became comfortable with uncertainty. I became comfortable with taking risk and facing my fears. I became comfortable with making tough decisions is sticking by them. I felt like I was born all over again.

It’s Your Turn

You do not have to go skydiving to go skydiving. There are so many opportunities in life where you can put yourself at risk, face your fears and realize how trivial they were. You will start looking at a world through a different pair of glasses. Danger will turn in opportunity, fear will turn into growth.

Do you want to go skydiving without going skydiving? If so:

• Go speak in front of a large group of people – you will survive!
• Go ask the girl or guy out – you will survive!
• Stand up for yourself – you will survive!
• Quit your crappy job – you will survive!
• Do what you want to do – you will survive!

Not only you will survive, you will learn and grow and become stronger and stronger with each new experience!

Drop The Victim Mentality

People love to complain, feel helpless and just live in the victim mentality. It puts responsibility out of your own hands and leaves the world at fault. It is easy because you can go on telling yourself that there is nothing you can do about the situation. It is the easy way out. It is also addicting. If you are stuck in that mode of thinking for long enough, you will find yourself depressed with your life spiraling out of control.

It is understandable. Somewhat. Yea, the economy is tough, people do not have jobs, everybody is sad and depressed without any money. What is there to be happy about you ask?

EVERYTHING.

Here’s why! Right now is the best opportunity to appreciate everything that you have and give. Yes! Give! Give when you think that you do not have anything to give. However, understand that you always have something to give. Always! No matter what is going on, no matter how bad the economy is, you can always give something. You can always give your time and your energy to others! That’s right, your time and your energy.

Forget about giving money,things, or food – give yourself. It is the best kind of gift that you can give. You can accomplish that by volunteering!

I was siting at home and complaining that I cannot get a job and how I do not have anything to do and how my life sucks right now. Then, suddenly I realized:

• I do not have a job
• I have nothing to do
• I need experience
• I want to interact and meet others

Go Volunteer

There was only one option left for me. I had to go volunteer! Yes! It all of the sudden made so much sense! And I think that everybody who is unemployed, not sure what to do in life should get up and go volunteer! It is the best thing to do! When times are tough and gloomy go help others by giving yourself for free . There are so many benefits to volunteering:

• you get to help others
• you meet new people
• you gain experience
• you get involved
• you expose yourself to something new
• you spend time with purpose instead of wasting it at home

It is a bit selfish, but sometimes doing things for wrong reasons can lead to do things for the right reasons! So to all the people who sit at home and complain that they can do nothing about their lives, I have answer – go help others! This way you shift your focus from scarcity to abundance. Even when you think you have nothing else to give, give yourself! If you are serious and want to get started there are a couple of great places to do that:

• http://www.idealist.org/
• http://www.volunteermatch.org/

There are opportunities for a variety of individuals with different sets of skills. Are you a recent college graduate, a high school graduate? Are an expert in finance, accounting, marketing, etc? There are opportunities for you.

For example, I am interested in financial planning. I went to those sites listed above and there are plenty of opportunities for financial planners. This way, I will not be wasting my time sitting at home, I will be able to go out and meet new people, I will gain experience in financial planning, I will do something to help others, I will make new connections. I choose life of abundance and leave the life of victim behind me.

There are reasons to only go out and volunteer TODAY! What are you waiting for? What is your excuse? Go out there and help others especially in such a time of need for everybody!

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Image: Flickr