Fantastic Fridays-#342  December 8 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

Mistakes Are Some Of My Best Friends

Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes” -Oscar Wilde

It’s not that I love living in mistakes, but it’s that I appreciate myself more when making them. I find that the more I accept and find the joy through them, then the faster I move on from them. The funny thing about wisdom is it can’t really be relayed to you through words…yes, people can give you knowledge and we become wiser from it, but we really only gain wisdom by going through the problem.

Like the which came first…the chicken or the egg philosophical debate…the same can be argued about experience and work. I remember after graduating college how hard it was to find a job because they wouldn’t hire you if you didn’t have the experience, but how were you supposed to get the experience if no one would hire you?

We think that the pathway to success is this straight line. But it’s a befuddled mess of ups and downs, U-turns and little forward movement, back to more U-turns, and more ups and downs. I look at some of the people I admire for their creativity and success, and I see that a good portion haven’t had the normal line of progression that you’d think to make it where they currently are. And I don’t think it’s because they’re so unique, I think it’s more that they did what they wanted to. They studied things that interested them, and they were willing to take jobs or do things that didn’t seem in alignment with where they had their eyes set upon. And by doing things that may not have seemed in alignment with their path, they gained the experience in different industries or subjects that brought a unique perspective towards their work.

We try to manipulate and control life so there’s less mystery and heart ache in our lives. We think that the unknown is a scary place, and that we must do whatever we can to predict our future as accurately as possible. But when we try to control too much of our lives, we miss out on the beautiful happenings along our pathway in life. We’re so focused on what it should be, rather than what it could be. And I’ve found that God always had a bigger plan for me, than I ever realized for myself. And usually understanding the mystery didn’t come before the action, it came after it. Understanding came from being willing to have my path diverted if need be, and to find meaning in that.

In his book Courage: The Joy of Living Dangerously, Osho said, “Don't try to understand life. Live it! Don't try to understand love. Move into love. Then you will know - and all that knowing will come out of your experiencing. The more you know, the more you know that much remains to be known.” 

I’ve come to many great places in my life because I decided to call my mistakes friends. I decided to see them as good things rather than bad. I decided to find the peace, happiness, and joy in them while going through them. And I decided to truly experience my mistakes, not rush through them as fast as possible. The more we resist our mistakes, and the more we fight them and try to eliminate them…then the less we learn. Abraham Lincoln said two great quotes that I think help bring processing mistakes into better context:

• “You can tell the greatness of someone by what makes them angry.” An old Chinese proverb says it’s not that wise men can’t get angry, it’s that they won’t. And I think that’s because they see the meaning behind what mistakes can be.
  
• The second quote and one of my favorites by Lincoln…“My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.”
  

So, are you going through your mistakes seeing them as ways to understand life better? Are you breathing through your mistakes, not finding anger because of them, but finding wisdom by going through them? And are you ok with making mistakes but never content in staying in them?  When we live reactively it can be easy to get upset at the strife mistakes seem to bring in our lives, but if we can step back and see the bigger picture…maybe there might be a better way in enjoying the pitfalls along the way…not just the good times.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
How different do you think your life would be if you called mistakes your friends? What if you welcomed mistakes with open arms, like you would welcome your good friends? I’m not saying that I want you to be constantly messing up and erring in life and never gaining progress…but we are so close to our lives we can’t see the growth that is happening as the change is usually small incremental daily changes. We don’t notice the changes until months or even years later. Think of the person working out daily and not seeing any change until one day they look in the mirror and all the sudden it seems like they lost 50 pounds overnight.

It’s not that the change happened overnight, but it’s that the changes were so small they were hard to notice until one day you see the monumental change that has been taking place inch by inch, day by day. So, this month I’m going to ask you to curb your anger and upsetness with making mistakes and to embrace them and work to understand what you are learning from them. So, at the end of the night look back on your day and see how you handled the mistakes as they came. Were you frustrated because of them, or were you invigorated as it was a chance for you to puzzle solve because of them?

Mistakes Are Some Of My Best Friends

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thoughtful Thursdays-#341 December 7 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Am Free From Concern

I was listening to actor and comedian Jim Carrey in his documentary Jim & Andy on Netflix. He said that when he was doing his stand-up comedy, originally he would just sweat it out and do weird things seeing what would happen. Then at night, he’d lay in bed asking what did the audience want? He knew what he wanted, he wanted to be a successful actor and comedian…and then the lightbulb hit him…”they want to be free from concern….They needed to be free from concern, so I’m gonna appear to be the guy that’s free from concern.”

So what’s keeping you from being free from concern? What are the things that are holding you back from giving your best self to the world? For me, I admire those comedians and actors on how they can go out in public and act a certain way. I see how they can get in front of a film crew, or an audience on stage, and laugh crazily, cry out loud, or utilize any other sort of emotions that might be seen as boisterous in public. And when I’m not lost in the scene with that actor, I question myself on how they do it…as I know, I’d be embarrassed putting those emotions out on display for others to see.

But maybe there’s something more to it than that. Maybe it’s not that I’m afraid of showing my emotions to people in public, but it’s more that I’m afraid of being someone or something else in front of people. That I would be unauthentic to who I am… and acting would be me faking things.

They say one of the secrets of life is to not be concerned with what others think about us. I had a friend who would constantly say… “your opinion of me is none of my business.” And he wasn’t saying it in a hateful or sarcastic way, but it was a reminder to himself that he wasn’t in control what others thought about him, and that he wanted to put his thoughts and energies into something more productive. He wanted to be free from the concern of others, so he could be concerned with what he was in control of and what he wanted to be doing with his life.

Now my concerns may not be yours. But there are worries we all have, that hold us back from being the people we want to be. So what are your concerns?

I think I want to augment Jim’s initial statement of being free from concern, and instead say living a life of direction. What I mean by that, is we usually are pushed or pulled in one of two directions. It’s the pain or pleasure principle—where we are avoiding what we’re afraid of, or we are going towards what we want.

People tell us to let go of the things that bother us, and I don’t believe we ever let go of anything. I believe we have the choice to put our energy and focus on where we choose to. So we can focus on the negative things in our lives as we try to let go of them, which then, we are putting more energy and focus into the thing we are trying not to. Or we can pivot, and put our energy and focus into the things that help us heal by placing our attention in another direction. It’s not avoiding; it’s making a choice to focus on things that build you up rather than break you down. So where would you like to put your focus? How can you free yourself from the concerns holding you back and begin to live a life of purposeful direction?

Today’s Personal Commitment:
What concerns in your life are keep you from being the person you want to be? I’m not saying you have to change overnight from being fearful into being super confident. But once you can bring to light the things you’re afraid of people finding out about you, you might just find that they aren’t as scary as you thought…or maybe you won’t care about hiding anymore once you air that fear out loud.

Life is not being confident as if fear will never touch you. Life is about doing what’s important to you despite the fear. The fear is just an indicator that something is worth it. If it wasn’t worth it, it might not matter to you as much. So have an honest conversation with yourself, maybe write those concerns down, and talk about why you are letting these things control your life.

What would it be like if you could be free from these concerns? What would it be like if you began choosing to live a life of purposeful direction—not away from your fears but towards them? For fears always look scary from far away. They look huge, powerful, and overwhelming but you will see the closer you walk towards them than the smaller and less menacing they look. And the more steps you take towards them, then the more confidence you will build up…to overpower them.

I Am Free From Concern

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Wisdom Wednesdays-#340 December 6 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

It’s All Coming Together Nicely

I have the tendency to overexaggerate. When something’s going wrong, I find it easy to focus on all the many ways it could continue going wrong or how it could get worse. My buddy Ben used to call me worry wart. He would tell me to stop thinking so hard about things.

I love to think about everything that could happen. For some reason, I think it helps to calm me. It helps me to think about what could go wrong so I’m prepared for it, or to know how to change directions if need be. And I’m not saying this is a bad thing, but what I’ve found is it’s easier to plan and keep planning than to take action and get moving.

And I’m not sure if this is the right emotion, but… I think we feel fear from starting something and not getting it right. We look at all the time we wasted, and maybe even the fear of looking foolish for not knowing better. And we get annoyed with having to start over, if we try something and it doesn’t work out. But we have misunderstood what it means to start over. Starting will only ever happen if we give up. I had a personal training client who belonged to Weight Watchers, and she was disappointed with her progress. So I asked her what was going on and where she was having issues, and she said I’m fine during the week but during the weekends I go out to eat and eat so bad that I stop logging in my points and start over on Monday.

And so I suggested to her, to stop starting over. To log the points in regardless even if it’s not perfect. It was my hope that even if she didn’t do exactly what she wanted to do, that over time she would become more aware of it, find better choices that would make her feel better, and learn not to deprive herself but to be smarter and healthier with her food intake.

I know for me, when things aren’t going great it’s easier to say everything is going wrong. It’s easy for me to throw my hands up in the air and give up. I get overwhelmed, and when I get overwhelmed, I get stuck. I over exaggerate the situation, and build up anxiety instead of seeing the real truth that it’s not all falling apart…but really I’m only sliding. I’m sliding from the habits that help me stay on the best path for me. Sliding is a more subtle word, and it helps to change the anxiety within myself knowing that I have more of a handle on things than I thought…or maybe I should correct that last statement. It’s not that I have more of a handle on things, it’s that I have more of a handle on me and my thoughts and emotions.

By making that anxious thought more subtle, it’s becomes more manageable, and it brings an awareness that I can change directions if I decide to do something about it. And I believe we all have some sort of thing that hinders us…we have those addiction that keeps us from being the people we want to be. And there are the big three that most people will say are addictions such as sex, drugs, and alcohol; but it could be the addictions to overeating, perfectionism, technology, porn, getting into unhealthy relationships, shopping, and I’m sure we could come up with a million more… but really, all an addiction is—is a distraction. I’m sure the origin of the negative action was meant to help us escape from our lives, from our pains, and from our thoughts…even for just a moment at first.

That’s why I believe a lot of us have the tendency to be addicted to focusing on negative thoughts. It’s more exciting and easier to stay in chaos and to be in flight or fight mode than to focus on peace an tranquility. It’s easier to focus on what’s going wrong. It’s easier to focus on how it could get even worse than to do the work of focusing on solutions and appreciating the beautiful things already within your life.

I believe change happens more deeply when we stop beating ourselves up for our mistakes and begin loving ourselves through them…and because of them. So, what if you were to not immediately look at how the world could be ending for your mistakes, but how you might be sliding from the place you want to be? What if you were to look at the habits you are sliding away from, and look towards the habits you want to step towards?

We make change more complicated than it has to be. Every day is a new beginning, and every thought we focus on will either slide us off our path…or be the footsteps that keep us upon it. I’m sure there was a time in your life when it felt like your world was ending…and it didn’t. So let us stop starting over, let us stop focusing on every little mistake by beating ourselves up over it, and instead begin loving ourselves through life. Let us be more subtle in defining our problems as we get away from the end of the world mentality and see the choices we make as either us sliding slowly off our path or either choices that are bringing us back to it.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
What problems are you over exaggerating, and how can you reframe them to being more subtle? What problems are you continually starting over, and how can you stick with them to get to the solution instead of continually spinning your wheels? Write your answers down, and then begin putting those solutions into action this week. Change is always a subtle shift. It’s usually never an immediate 180-degree turn. So be patient and persistent in loving yourself through the problems and the change. Remember, it’s not the end of the world…it’s only a small problem that you’ll fix.

It’s All Coming Together Nicely

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Tag Me Tuesdays-#339  December 5 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Change My Misfortunes By Rising Above Them

Marcus Aurelius said, “Reject your sense of injury, and the injury disappears.”

Our society has become too litigious. We want to find someone to blame for what’s wrong with our lives. If there’s an issue, we want to blame our mothers and fathers for how they raised us; we want to blame our bosses or our work environment for our sense of feeling trapped and unhappy; and we want to find someone, anyone, who’s at fault for our misfortunes in life.

Now I’m not saying that our parents may not have harmed us when growing up. I’ve had the fortune of having very loving parents, where others have had hells I cannot even imagine…but what I’m trying to relay to the masses, is that there comes a time when we must grow up. There comes a time when we have the chance to stop blaming others and to take ownership of our lives to direct them towards how we’d like them to be.

It’s easy to put the blame elsewhere. The reason being is we don’t have to do the hard work then. We don’t have to change. It’s easier to play the victim, to live in self-pity and misery, than to put in the effort to move forward no matter how hard it may be. And it will be hard, because you’ll be working to overturn habits that’ve been with you a long time. But it’s doable, and worth every moment of it.

People will wrong you, and I want to believe that most won’t do it on purpose of hurting you. They’re hurting inside themselves, and they can’t help but hurt others because they don’t even know what they’re doing. It’s become more and more evident to me just perusing today’s social media posts. Everyone has a voice, and sometimes the loudest voices are the ones complaining all the time. And while it gets annoying hearing about the small problems that people have, while they’re missing the amazing parts already in their life, I’m reminded that they’re unaware.

The ones playing the games usually are unaware of the game they play. They are unaware there is another way to live, and so they live in their misery spreading it unconsciously to everyone they come in contact with. If you met ten people today, I bet you would only meet 1 bad egg in the bunch. And that’s what we do, we focus on the one who’s wronged us…forgetting about the other 90% who are good people and brought something worthwhile into our lives, no matter how big or small. We forget the 90% of great things already happening in our lives to focus on that one small thing that’s annoying us. And it’s not that you can’t look at negative things, but people overly focus on them, and sometimes they even fabricate the hurt, and then it’s all they see. They create a filter lens for their eyes and mind to be continually finding negatives and then magnifying them. It gives them the excuse to never be the one at fault. But living that way keeps us from owning our lives.

So the questions I want to ask all of us, myself included—I definitely need to be reminded of this:

Do you want to darken the world by exploiting everything that has gone wrong, or do you want to see the negative and move on from it immediately? Do you want to find the beauty behind the negative and create another pathway in your life?

Think of it like this: flying wasn’t invented by focusing on staying on the ground, boats weren’t invented by focusing on the law of sinking, and problems weren’t solved focusing on how things could go even more wrong—they changed by focusing on a solution.

The continual focus upon our injuries keep us blinded, and as Marcus said, “when you reject your sense of injury, the injury disappears.” So let us stop blaming the world for our problems, and let us see the solutions and the visualization of the people we want to become…and let us be willing to work towards that.

There’s a quote I like that gets misattributed to Socrates. Dan Millman wrote a book called The Peaceful Warrior, and in the book the main character meets a mentor and nicknames him Socrates. And that’s where the confusion comes into who really said this famous quote. So I’ll put the credit where it’s due as Dan Millman wrote that:

“The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”

So let us let go of the blame, the hurt, the pains that are holding us back, and the minor annoyances that are not serving us. Let us put our energy and focus on building the new. Let us put our focus on building the things that make us better. We can blame everything and everyone why we are the way we are, why the world is the way it is…or we can focus differently and change not only the way we see the world, but adjust how we move forward in the world…by changing ourselves first to change it.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
I challenge you to go one day without complaining. I know our mind will find a problem to complain about, but it’s not those random thoughts that pop into your mind…it’s more about if you are focusing on complaining about something. I read a book awhile back by Emett Fox, and he had the challenge of going seven days without complaining. If you focused on a complaint, you would have to start over again on day one. I did this for about three months until I finally gave up. The most days I went without focusing on a complaint was four days. It’s a hard task. So see if you can go seven days without focusing on complaining. I know it will change your life.

I Change My Misfortunes By Rising Above Them

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Mindful Mondays-#338  December 4 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Bring Joy To Whatever I Do

In the movie The Bucket List, Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman are chatting while sitting atop of one of Egypt’s pyramids looking at the beautiful scenery, when Morgan says to Jack:

“You know, the ancient Egyptians had a beautiful belief about death. When their souls got to the entrance to heaven, the guards asked two questions. Their answers determined whether they were able to enter or not. ‘Have you found joy in your life?’ ‘Has your life brought joy to others?’”

I wondered what brought me joy, and so I examined all the important events in my life, and I began to question if the joy I had…was real joy. Was I more focused on what I got, rather than what I gave? Did I focus on the time that was being taken away from me rather than the time I got to spend by being with others?

And it got me to thinking as I asked: was I more focused in life on what’s been taken rather than gained? Have I been more focused on myself rather what I brought to others? Because joy, can be an elusive thing, and maybe that’s because we don’t know what brings us lasting joy. Sure, we can find it in the moment of the newness of things. We find joy in the opening of Christmas presents, or the buying of a new car or home, on the day of our wedding, or the birth of our child, or getting that new job. And those can all be great things, but the excitement fades when the newness fades with it.

So I came to find we’ve been looking at joy all wrong. We believe that joy’s brought to us in the new things we receive, instead of understanding what we already have is joyful. So we wait for that new thing to come, in hopes that it will make us feel better. We are bored with what we already have, and we get impatient thinking that our lives aren’t what they should be because of the idea that newness brings joy. And so joy is attributed to the getting, instead of unlocking the beauty in what already is.

We’d rather be pursuing the anticipation of something new, rather than working to find and create the joy in what’s already part of our lives. We believe the new relationship, the new job, or the new circumstance will change our fortunes and our happiness once we get it. But I want to ask you this question… “if you couldn’t find joy in what you already had, how will you find it in the new thing?”

It will always be an endless cycle of having to get rather than continually receiving.  And that may sound like it’s the same thing, but receiving joy from what’s already here is a different concept than an endless searching for a new high.

If you are continually searching for joy in the newness of things, you will bring a heaviness with you… wherever you go. You will be like the hiker climbing the mountain with a sackful of rocks that doesn’t even know are in his pack. And if you were to imagine life as the hiker’s journey, most people want to get to the top. They want to get that feeling, that newness of what they seek, all while never understanding that it was upon every step in their journey to the top. The final destination, the top, was just a point on a map, not a fulfillment towards joy. And until you learn this, you will always be disappointed from an expectation on something you didn’t understand.

Yes, we are human, and we‘ll fluctuate emotions constantly. But I want to ask you, if there’s a better way to focus on joy more often than you already are? Is there a way to leave behind the expectation of how things should be, and living in the moment enjoying things as they’re happening? I can’t tell you how to be joyful, but I can ask questions to help you find your joy. And so maybe the best reminder I can give you…is to ask this question in the moment:

“Is the way I’m feeling right now serving me? Would I want to spend my time focusing this way…or is there a better way?”

And if there’s a better way, decide to pivot from the unresourceful emotion or actions into more resourceful and joyful things in your life. When you see joy is already in your life, then you’ll find yourself becoming more joyful naturally. And when you are more joyful you can share more joy with others. Maybe heaven isn’t as far off as we think it is.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
When you’re feeling drained, upset, worried or anxious, or anything that feels like a negative emotion to you…first ask yourself, “what’s going on? Why are you feeling this way?” When we can get to the root of the problem, we usually can solve it. And if you are still finding yourself stuck, ask yourself this question: “Is this way of thinking or focusing…serving me? Is this really important to me…to stay in this emotion?”

I Bring Joy To Whatever I Do

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Smiling Sundays -#337 December 3 The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

Every Day Is A New Beginning

Sometimes it may seem like all I do on my podcast is complain about complaining. When you’re bombarded by the unnecessary suffering of people, it can get tiring upon someone's soul. And the reason I say unnecessary, is because a lot of complaining is about things that people have control over. And maybe that’s really a trick statement because people may think I’m talking about controlling or changing the situation when I’m really talking about determining what your response is to an event.

But how can you change someone’s mind when they don’t even know they have an option? I mean sure, they know they’re in control, at least they think they do. But are we truly in control when we allow a situation to determine how we feel?

I think it’s so easy to complain because we are so short-sighted. We see a problem and see it as the end of the world…rather than just a process of life. If you were to look at the wholeness of your life and to recall all the problems…was there not a time you got over the problem? And if you didn’t get over the problem, was that not a personal choice you made…not an absolute? It may have seemed unconscious…but it still was a choice.

And this is where we would rather place the blame on a scapegoat. This is where we would like to defer our decisions of moving on and becoming better…into focusing on playing the victim of the situation. We tell a silent lie in our mind and it spreads like weeds…and that thought is, “I am weak and not in control of how I decide to feel, and that I’m not in control of the choices I make—the event does that.” We become robots thinking the external manifests who we are. But if you were to really think about it, the internal decides how we sculpt our external.

And believe me, I know personally how it’s easier to say well those people have something I don’t, those people are stronger than me, those people are more successful than me, or some people have all the luck while I’m left holding an empty bag. But it’s never been about luck, it’s been about seeing control of ourselves in a variable and uncertain world. And maybe that’s where most of the complaining comes from…it comes from us thinking that until we can be certain…100% certain about an outcome…we will then be anxious about it.

It’s the lie that we need to know the outcome, that we need to be in control of it…because if it doesn’t come out as we planned…then our lives will be in certain sets of chaos and lack of control. And so we come back to the understanding that we are being too short-sighted.  We are too close to the problem to see the end of it…We look too close to our lives forgetting that every problem we’ve ever faced had some sort of conclusion. We had the choice to see it as a defeat or something to overcome…and whatever we decided still came out the same…we made it past that problem somehow. Even if you held onto the problem and didn’t solve it…you still did solve something—you decided to move forward with the problem clinging to you. And sometimes it seems easier to blame the problem on why we can’t be or do what we want, instead of making a commitment to be who we want…regardless of any problems. 

So it’s my hope that you look beyond your complaining and misfortune, to see the beautiful horizon in the moment and the great chances that are ahead for you. As I will remind you that any problem you’ve ever faced seemed like a monster on the surface, but when you dug deeper to face and unravel it…you found a beautiful treasure in the struggle of overcoming it.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
If today was a new beginning, how would it start for you? We never really start over as we hold onto the emotions that plague us, the problems that we’re focusing on, and the continual wearing down and compounding of troubling days we’ve experienced.

Start your morning off by resetting yourself. Reset the focus on the problems, reset the meter on keeping score of all the complications in your life, and reset the chances you are taking on living this day as a beautiful gift given to you. And one reason we never start over, is we don’t go to sleep efficiently. We go to sleep worrying about all we have to do, or all that’s been building upon us. So this week, go to bed differently. One way, is you could write down the things you are worried about and see if you come to a solution on how you can solve them.  If some problems are too big and you are over worrying about them, then cut up a piece of paper in as many sections as you need and write a problem on one of the sectioned sheets…crumple it up and throw it in the wastepaper basket. And continue this exercise with how many problems you need to rid yourself of. This is actually a very powerful exercise as you are connecting the physical to the mental and emotional. You are physical saying to your mind and emotions I am throwing you away…and  I won’t allow you to clutter my life.

So start your night off differently by refocusing how you look at problems, so you sleep better and then wake up less stressed. And then work on starting your morning, as if it’s a new beginning to enjoy the beautiful gifts that you’ve been given to you by having one more day.

Every Day Is A New Beginning

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Synergy Saturdays-#336 December 2nd The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

My Strength Comes From Willing To Be Different

I saw a quote online that I really like, but it seems the author is unknown. It says, “Small minds cannot comprehend big spirits. To be great, you have to be willing to be mocked, hated, and misunderstood. Stay strong.”

And I’ve found that some of the strongest times in my life, were when I was willing to take another path, when I was willing to stand up for myself, when I was willing to take a chance and not rely on someone else doing it for me, when I was willing to be vulnerable asking for help, or when I was willing to go in a different direction than where everyone else was going.

We think strength is always about saving the day, utilizing our great mental power or physical strength, or doing amazing things. Yes, those can be great showmanships of strength, but courage and strength is born in the small habits, thoughts, and actions that we take every day. We live in a world that tells us to be different but then it frowns upon us for looking weird. We get mixed signals on what is ok and what is not, and so we fall in line to not feel alone or ostracisized.

But some of the strongest people I’ve known were willing to be different. They were willing to speak up when others wouldn’t. They were willing to go a different way than the masses. I’ve found in my pursuit of helping people I’ve been alone through a lot of it. Partly because I’ve chosen to be that way through some of the depression I experienced, as I told myself that I was different and no one would understand, so I traveled my roads alone. But the other reason for being isolated is that I was going another way, a different direction that people would never travel towards.

And that’s alright. It’s ok to be different. You just need to prepare yourself for those alone times because when we stand for something that’s right for us…not everyone will stand with you. And it’s not because they’re bad people, or that they’re too scared. We don’t know everyone’s motives, and it doesn’t matter why or why not they do something. It only matters what we will stand for. And this is not about proving how small their minds are, or how big our souls are…it’s just about doing what ignites our whole essence. It’s being who we truly want to be, as we release the fear we’ve held onto for being seen as different. That’s how we truly share our beauty—by being authentic in revealing our true uniqueness. Be you, be bold, and be willing to be different…no matter the consequences. In the end, it will be worth the lasting fulfillment knowing you allowed yourself to be knownn for being the real you…rather than being afraid to be authentic to the world and taking the easier path of only fitting in.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
What makes you different, and are you allowing the best parts of you be known? Get out a sheet of paper and write on it your unique and different qualities. This can be a hard exercise, so after you write down what you think, go and find a few people who know you and ask them what makes you different.

And once you get this list, look at any patterns you notice. Look at things you like about this list and things you don’t like and write them down. Ask yourself if you are sharing these uniquenesses with the world. And if not, write down how you could share them better. Your distinctiveness will make you stronger, and while we think that will separate us…our differences will be what connects us.

My Strength Comes From Willing To Be Different

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Fantastic Fridays-#335 December 1st The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Let People Share Themselves With Me

I was working with a personal training client at the gym, and we were in between sets. And during those times I like to keep people moving so we took a lap around the track. My client was telling me a story and as I was listening she brought up something that made me think of something totally off topic.

I kept my mouth closed though, as I wanted to hear her story and not interrupt her sharing her knowledge with me. And while it might’ve been fun to share the off story with her, I realized that what we really want is to share parts of ourselves with people. And it occurred to me that sometimes by me wanting to share all of my stuff, I don’t allow other people to share the pieces they want with me.

I love to give advice and help people. I think it’s an inherent trait within me to serve and help people, but I have to remember that sometimes the best thing I can give to someone…is a listening ear. To give people the chance to let out what they need to…whether that be to vent to get over a problem, whether that be to share some exciting news with me that makes them feel good, or to educate me on something they think that would help me out.

I’m a talkative person, and I blame it on the Gemini in me, but today a lightbulb went off that really connected with me. While I’ll continue to share the best parts of me, I will be consciously listening to the intuition within myself to hear when I need to be quiet so I can let others share themselves with me.

I did an affirmation awhile back that said… “When I speak, I am saying what I already know; when I listen, I am looking to find great wisdom.” So let us balance out sharing our best selves with allowing people to do the same. One of my insecurities is about…being the answer. That if I can give the answer to someone, I can feel important about myself. But that’s not how I want to live my life. I want to help people, but I want them to realize that they are the answer. That while I have suggestions to add, I want to ask better questions to help them come to their a-ha moment. It’s more of a powerful lesson when a person comes to a conclusion on their own.

Some of my greatest teachers in school made me feel that I came to good conclusions. They didn’t force the answers down my throat. They asked questions that made me think instead of handing me the answer. And when I answered, they let me know what a good job I did by thinking critically. They fostered a curiosity in me to find answers by going through the process of asking better questions instead of just trying to get an answer. The answers usually are the easier part…asking better questions is where the work comes in.

So today share your best self with the world…and then be silent for a bit allowing others to do the same. Everyone wants the same thing: to share a good part of themselves and to feel like they have contributed to the world. Even selfish people are still trying to share something, but their sharing is coming from the fear and the boastful side of the ego saying, “I will prove to you how worthy I am. I will take what I can, so I can feel better, and you can see how great I am.” So today let us see behind the ephemeral hurt, the temporary, the passing, the short lived, and see the reasons people are the way they are…and love them anyways. It’s not our job to change them; it’s only our job to share the best parts of ourselves and to let people share parts of themselves back.  

Today’s Personal Commitment:
How can you be quieter today and hear people more? How can you ask better questions to get to the deeper parts of people? Some of the greatest moments in my life weren’t when I was preaching to people on stage as they listened to a talk I gave…it was when I asked better questions and connected with them. When I heard them say their thoughts on a matter and we vibed on a whole different level.

So today, don’t just hand out your opinion constantly—ask better questions and work not to be the answer but to help people find better answers. When you do this, I know you’ll find some better conclusions as well. You’ll find you are connecting with people more deeply. And what seems counterintuitive, is that you’ll actually begin connecting better with yourself as well.

I Let People Share Themselves With Me

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thoughtful Thursdays-#334 November 30th The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Leave Ego By The Door When I Listen

How willing are you to hear new advice? How willing are you to listen to another way? How patient are you before acting? These are hard questions for some people, myself included. We think we are tolerant to people and hearing other sides of the story, but it’s easy to say we are open to suggestions and still only see things our way.

Listening to another way is hard because it might mean we would have to change our story. It might mean that there could be another solution to our problem that we’ve decided was unsolvable. I know when I was younger I was a huge brat, some people might even argue nothing has changed…but I hope that’s not true…at least not too true.

My older brother used to give me hockey advice. He was the better player and he saw the game more clearly than I did. I was the hard worker while he was naturally good at whatever he tried. At least that’s the story I told myself, as I became the hard headed younger brother. I would beat my head against a wall a million times to break through it, never really seeing if there was a better way. I believed more in might and effort than in being smarter in my endeavors. And so anytime my brother tried to give me advice, I wouldn’t have any of it.

I didn’t want to listen to him because of two reasons:

• The first being…that if I listened, I would have admitted that he was a better player than me and that I didn’t know it all.
• Which then meant I would have to actually try something new from what I was doing…and it was easier to beat my head against the wall than to switch directions.

And it sounds so silly hearing that now…that I would’ve rather done things the wrong way, or the harder way than hear someone out. It was the part of my ego that was saying I had to be better by doing it my way, and my way alone. It was my ego saying that I couldn’t accept help from my brother because that would mean I needed help. I couldn’t contaminate my efforts from his advice. And I think it was a way of punishing myself for thinking I could never be good enough or was never good.

And that’s why it’s a slippery slope when we think we have to know it all. We don’t want to hear new information because it means our life might change. It might mean that the story or obstacle we told ourselves, that was unmovable, might actually be able to be conquered or avoided altogether. It might mean that we would feel the purpose of our life was wasted doing what we’ve been doing…and that would make us look stupid, or like a failure, or whatever negative connotation we could use to describe someone who’d look foolish.

And so we go on living in our own world, not changing because it’s easier to live in a lie that there’s no better way. We live in the fear of doing something different because it could hurt ourselves from getting our hopes up and it not working. What’s the old saying, don’t fix something that isn’t broke. But we will never know something is broke or if something better is on the other side if we aren’t willing to put the boastful side of the ego down for a moment.

I get it, it’s scary to change, it’s scary to think that our lives might have been wasted telling a story that wasn’t a good one, or doing something that was a waste of time when we could’ve been more efficient. And so our hard headedness, is not based upon grit and fortitude, but more of fear.

But there’s good news…you can change at any time. You can decide to give up old stories that really aren’t working for you. You can find another way to heal yourself if you decide to. 

We think life is about truth and fact, but there are many realms we are a part of in this world besides the physical. Such as spiritual, emotional, mental, and environmental; and I don’t claim to have a good command on them all…but I believe when we can learn to let go of gripping onto our old stories, even for just a moment, to hear another way… we open ourselves to a new realm of possibilities.

I’m not here to state fact upon fact or the latest scientific discovery on how to change, as I think there are other truths than just those. It really is my hope not to teach you truth, but to open yourself up…to all possibilities.

It’s my hope that I can share a life manuscript with you not as an end all be all, but a recipe book for you to craft what works for you. Because in the end, I will never know your truth…only you can decide that…and I do hope you open yourself up to the best possibilities out of curiosity and love…rather than being closed off from fear and pain of being wrong, or the excuse that it’s always been like this so it’ll always be like this, or getting your hopes too high, or from laziness from not wanting to try something new. It’s my hope that you leave some of your old stories behind that are no longer serving you.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
What if you were to look at the world with less of a this or that mentality, but more of a what if mentality? Robert Kennedy once said, “There are those that look at things the way they are, and ask why? I dream of things that never were, and ask why not?”

So today what if you were to let go of what you know, to let go of your truths, and to see the world from a different angle. An angle of possibility. An angle of what if. I’m not asking you live in a fairy tale, but what I’m asking of you is to see from the Universe’s point of view…to see that nothing is impossible when you have an unlimited mindset. Because in the end what really stops people isn’t gravity or the laws of physics…it’s their mind and their belief sets.

So today, be a child with new eyes and instead of saying that could never be…start asking what if that were possible. I can guarantee you’ll not only find new things to look at, but you’ll find new possibilities and truths to live. When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. So today change the way you look at your life, and you’ll see your life change by how you decided to see more possibilities.

 I Leave Ego By The Door When I Listen

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Wisdom Wednesdays-#333 November 29th The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Live…In Appreciation

A mentor of mine, J Krsihnamurti talked about the things that we lust for: are really only these images in our minds that we’ve made so illustrious, that when we get the real thing we’re disappointed because the real thing could never compare to an imagination that has no flaws.

And so we set ourselves up for failure in working to be grateful because our mind’s focus on the fairy tale instead of being in the beauty of the moment. We set expectations of how things should be instead of how they are. But that doesn’t mean you can’t tell a better story. I had a conversation with some members at the gym about how their day was going and it went something like this.

I said: I hope you’re having a great day.
And the member replied: It’s better than the alternative.
I said: You mean the Bahamas?
He laughed…
And he said no, being on the couch and not at the gym.

And so we had a quick conversation about our places in life. And while it’s a cold day in Knoxville Tennessee, I said this is a beautiful place and there’s no other place I would rather be…because I’m here and there’s beauty here. We can look at the place we are and see all we don’t like, or we can see it as the place we’ve chosen to be. A place that we can participate in its beauty willingly…or we can grumble and see all the things wrong with it. Everything, and I mean everything will have a flaw. But we can choose to see only the flaws, or we can choose to see the beauty in it. We can choose to be in appreciation not as an act of reflection…but an act of living in the present moment and being beauty seekers towards everything we’re a part of.

And now that Thanksgiving is behind us, we can go back to being ungrateful for 364 days a year…or we can live our appreciation, we can be grateful in the moment, and we can choose to allow the wonder and excitement to become a bigger and better part of our lives. The choice is always yours…you can choose to miss the beauty…or you can choose to see it and create more of it by being the solution…not the person who’s grumbling, or the person who uses their sarcastic humor as a front to hide their displeasure with their life, or the person missing the beauty that’s always been in front of them.

Today’s Personal Commitment:
Do you ever stop and think about what makes you smile? I know I forget to do that a lot. One of the reasons I give so much advice, is it’s not just for other people it’s really for me. I need to be reminded of the simple things. I need to be reminded of the important things. And I need to be reminded about truly living in appreciation all the time. So today, think about what makes you smile and appreciate it. And be aware of what is making you smile when it happens…and truly be in the moment reveling in it.

Oh, and one last thing…see how you can make as many people smile today as you can. Now go forth and be mindful, memorable, and mesmerizing :-D

I Live…In Appreciation

Thanks for listening.  I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together,
Personal Development Life Coach-
Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected]  phone:865-219-3247

Music by:
- Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
- I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license.
Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide