Building Self-Discipline

Usually when we hear the word “self-discipline,” we relate it to things like losing weight or quitting smoking. Self-discipline is extremely helpful when trying to break those bad habits, but it can also be beneficial in other areas of your life.

It is important to realize that we are not born with self-discipline; it is something we must develop as we grow. Generally it begins with teaching from our parents, however it is a personal thing that we must all be responsible for.

Once we develop our self-discipline so many things in life can be achieved. Sounds easy?  Well personally, I can only say that some days I believe I have mastered self-discipline and other days I havent! It takes inner strength and perserverance to push through those tough times and stay focused on your goal. Grab a copy of Brian Tracy’s book, The Miracle of Self-Discipline” where he talks about obtaining and maintaining the discipline to get going and keep going. Well worth it, especially when you are at a low and feel like giving up on your goal.

When we master the art of self-disciple we will then develop an unshakeable focus in purpose! Firstly you must be committed, really committed to reaching your goals. You cannot and I mean cannot entertain a negative thought, an excuse or any doubts whatsoever.  You must be brutally honest with yourself and know that whatever it is you want to see it through to the very end.  Desire alone will not get you there.  Call upon your inner strength, as self-discipline is all about perserverance and inner strength will get you past those challenging moments, those times where you feel like giving up. If you are getting off track your inner strength will get you focused and committed again.

We all have inner strength and most of us have used it on more than one occasion. Trust this inner strength and remember to ask for support from family and friends. Gaining self -discipline to achieve a goal is a big undertaking and sometimes you will feel overwhelmed. Entrust a friend, spouse, or parent with what you’re trying to accomplish and they can be there to support you when your self-discipline is waning, to give you that gentle push to keep going.

If you have the self-discipline to stop smoking for one week, that is excellent, but the only way you are going to build upon your self-discipline is to do whatever is necessary to avoid cigarettes today, tomorrow, and forever. Once you develop patterns of self-discipline they soon become a habit! Everyone of us has something we want to achieve in life, but we sometimes lack the self-discipline to do so.

Remember to practise self-discipline techniques every day staying focused and committed on your goal, go the extra mile when you have to, and call on help through the tough times.

By MaryAnn Roche.

Tags: Brian Tracy, committment, focus, Goal Setting, inner strength, motivation, perserverance, Procrastination, Self-Discipline

Do You Have What It Takes To Lose Weight?

Well do you?  Can you set your mind to losing weight and stick to it?  Are you ready to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve the body of your dreams?

Your biggest barrier to losing weight is quite simply your own self-discipline. Somewhere along life’s journey you have succumbed to a cycle of eating a poor diet full of carbs, fats and undoubtedly processed foods.  These foods actually make you feel tired and sleepy all the time, resulting in lethargy which results in you feeling not at all inclined to exercise!  So you end up with no willpower and you feel hopeless with your inability to change and be motivated.

You can lose the weight if you truly want to!  It comes down firstly to a simple decision. From there once you have decided you will then need to address your willpower. Don’t let life happen to you in the form of a heart attack or trauma, find the strength to make the change now!

Lets start at Step 1 – Watch your portion size! (start by giving yourself a smaller portion size) Use smaller plates if you have to trick your mind into believing its the same size!

Step 2 – allow yourself ONE cheat day per week.  As you transition to healty eating habits allowing yourself one day off will actually help you and motivate you to stick to your changes.  So go ahead and enjoy that piece of chocolate cake, really savor the flavor knowing tomorrow it is back to healty eating habits! I am sure after you have eaten the cake your willpower will begin to kick in and say no more!

Remember to take photographs of yourself.  You would be amazed how motivating this really is.  We generally dont really realize how we truly look until we see ourselves in a photo, so keep a picture of yourself always and when you feel like giving up, bring it out and remind yourself of how far you have come.  Take new photos to compare to your original so you can see your progress!

Make a food list, and write down the healthy foods you actually enjoy eating. Ensure you buy these foods to eat throughout the day. If you need help there is a great ebook/receipt book titled “EASY Veggie Meal Plans” which you can download here.  I dont know about you, but often I dont eat certain vegetables as I simply dont know how to prepare them.  So this recipe book may help.

Approach exercise initially in moderation.  Adding exercise to your routine can very often be offputting so start slow. If you attempt too much in day one, you will have a difficult time finding the motivation to return!  Start with a short walk, and increase the distance daily. Or if you cannot even manage a walk to begin with there are some great exercises to be found here – do them while you sit!

Every week set yourself a goal. Decide what you would like to achieve, and take small steps to get there. Small manageable goals such as one pound per week which is attainable.  Setting the bar too high will result in failure and a complete lack of motivation.

Always reward yourself on your achievements, and no NOT with a piece of pie! You have worked hard at losing weight and are continuing to do so, so tell yourself to be proud of your achievements and that you have mustered the willpower to succeed at weightloss so undoubtedly anything else in your life you choose to put your mind to can also be achieved.

By MaryAnn Roche.

Tags: How to Stay Focused on Losing Weight, Lose Weight and Keep it Off, Losing weight, reduce weight, Weight Loss, Weight Loss Strategies

How To Have A Happy and Healthy Marriage

A healthy marriage can form the foundation or building blocks to stable family environment. Having a strong partnership with your loved one can well lead to many years of happiness. However marriage is definately something that requires daily effort.  It is not a set and forget arrangement.  To work together and build a successful marriage takes love, devotion, respect amongst other things.

Michael Web (a guest of Oprah) recently wrote an interesting book on the secret to having a happy and blissful relationship.  To get your copy click here!
Certainly when you look at the statistics for modern day marriages, things are not encouraging, however there is a lot you can do to ensure you do not become one of these statistics. To be married to another individual firstly in my opinion, takes incredible courage.  You stand there and pledge your undivided love and complete devotion to this person for the rest of your days! Do we really know when we make this vow what marriage is going to entail?  If not, is it better that way?

Marriage over the years seems to unfold and develop and change and grow along the way.  There will undoubtedly be many many conflicts and differing of opinions. How one deals with those conflicts and how much they respect the other really is an integral part of the solving process.  Always being right, or having the last word really does not work in a marriage as marriage is full of comprimise and not assigning blame and coming to something that is workable.

In a past life I spent quite a lot of time interviewing for new staff and one of my questions was; “What do you think is the single most important factor in clear effective communication”?”  You would not believe the number of people who went on about honesty, being clear in what they say etc, when really it all begins with LISTENING.  If we do not listen to the other person, our conversation can be fraught with all sorts of problems!

Marriages seem full of decisions.  There are always the small ones such as choosing the centerpiece for the wedding table or big decisions such as where you will both live.  A good marriage will require that you know how to effectively communicate your thoughts and feelings with one another and be prepared to understand that input is required from both parties when it comes to decision making.  It takes two to arrive at a suitable effective decision. Try to understand why your partner wants to make a certain decision and remember if it is not something you agree with, do not react rashly but rather take your time to really hear what they are saying before determining your own feelings on the subject. How important is it to you.

I have a few rules in life but one is that we all have what I call our non-negotiables and these are our core values, the ones that we simply cannot move on.  There are generally about 5 of these.  Then there are our secondary values if you like, those ones that when coming together with another individual in a relationship, are able to be massaged into something workable for both people.

I think at the end of the day, and there will be the most challenging of days when you really will ask yourself what you are doing, and these are the days where you must reflect on the feelings you felt when you met your partner, what they said, what attracted you to them in the first instance.  Reflecting upon this is what carries you through.

Lastly remember saying I love you costs nothing.  It is funny that something that is free is so often overlooked yet undervalued and so often forgotten after a marriage.

By MaryAnn Roche.

Tags: find a loving relationship, happiness, love yourself, loving relationship, marriage, Nurture a Positive Relationship, positive attitude, respect, self respect

What is Burnout and How to Avoid It.

Burnout is one of those things that tends to creep up on you, often without you realizing it.  When it does it can significantly affect your mind and body, causing complete exhaustion, anxiety and often causes depression. If you dont stop burnout before it takes hold, it can lead to more serious issues such as heart attacks or strokes.  As I said, often we do not even see it coming. A few things to be conscious of:

Take a serious look at your Workload. Be realistic about the hours you are putting in at work. Also take into account how many hours you are working without taking a break as this will contribute to burnout.  Remember when it is break time, you must take it, take time away from your job to relax your mind and body, even if it is only a short ten minute break. Breaks are necessary to refresh and rejuvenate your mind. Go for a walk, read a book, or just remove yourself from your source of tension for a few minutes.

Next, be critical of your time management techniques.  I know from my own experience, I would tend to be working on one task and then move to an email when it came in, then back to the task etc. You must learn to work efficiently, complete tasks before moving on, avoid interruption in order to do so and you will find you achive more in less time.

Be in tune with your body and know when you are reaching overload or exhaustion. Look for the warning signs and think through what you can do to avoid things getting worse.  It may be that you need to take a day off, or a weekend away or simply spend time at home relaxing both your mind and body, away from the telephone and the computer.  Work out what it is you need to do in order to take time out to recharge! If you find that you take a short vacation or a day off only to find the old feelings welling up again, then perhaps its time for a re-evaluation of where you are in life, and perhaps a life change is necessary to avoid burnout altogether.

I think the single most important thing you must do if you are to avoid burnout is to learn the art of saying NO. It is great to be accomodating and helpful however not if it is at the expense of your own health.  Quite simply nothing is that important if it comprimises your health to that degree.

For quite sometime I worked overseas with a lot of international travel thrown in. I was expectected to put in the long hours, jump on a plane and head off overseas for a week, then back again and into the 60 hour working week.  Unfortunately I didnt see the warning signs until it was too late.  It took a complete re-evaluation of my life and where I was at and to make some serious life changes before my health suffered more than it already had.  Once you reach burnout believe me, its difficult to work your way back from it.

Michael Licenblat, an Australian who devoted a large part of his life to people as a Shiatsu Massage Therapist with a Bachelor of Science (Psychology), has put together an excellent ebook on recognizing and relieving stresses and pressures whilst increasing your productivity.  Well worth the read and I only wish I had read it sooner!  Get your copy here. Click Here!

By MaryAnn Roche.

Tags: anxiety, burnout, de-stress, exhaustion, life balance, Success, Time Management

Applying the Law of Attraction

I guess it’s a topic everyone has all heard about by now.  How could you not, remember what a splash “The Secret” made a few years ago?  I don’t know that anyone living and breathing didnt hear about it!  The funny thing is, is was all about the Law of Attraction, which really is nothing new right?  Well, if its nothing new then why do so many of us either ignore it, or just fail to incorporate it into our daily lives?

I suppose to do so would mean that we must firstly understand what the Law of Attraction is and how we can utilize it. It really is a simple and easy concept – negative attracts negative and positive attracts positive.  How difficult is that to understand?  Easy isnt it. Well perhaps it is a little more involved -in that the universe knows our subconscious mind and delivers things according to our thoughts. If we are wanting good things in our lives such as peace, happiness, success etc, then we simply need to give thanks for all the good things we currently have. We must be truly grateful for what we have right now and profess our thanks for this on a daily basis. To do so begets more of  the same.

Of course we all have times when its difficult to escape those negative thoughts and feelings, and often times when we are overworked, tired and stressed, it really is too easy to allow those negative thoughts to permeate.  However its moments such as these when it is even more important to focus on the positive and give thanks for all the little things we take for granted. According to the principles of the Law of Attraction, redirecting these feelings immediately attracts more of the positive into our lives.

Imagine you are standing in line at the supermaket, you have had a long and taxing day and this really is the last thing you want to be doing, before you have to go home and face the kids and actually cook dinner!  Difficult to see the positive in that situation isnt it?  Not really.  Give thanks for the fact that your work allows you to buy the food for your children, and imagine how happy they will be when you walk through the front door.

Lastly and the single most important lesson in the Law of Attraction:  Ask for what you want. Honestly it is that simple that we forget.  We actually have to voice what it is we actually want.  We all waste so much time talking about what we dont want, and of course in doing so, we simply attract more of the same. If you want a great relationship or you want happy children, a well paid job etc, you can actually have all that you want but you must ask for it and give thanks for all that you currently have.  If you would like to learn more about applying the law of attraction,Click Here!

When asking for what you want, you have to visualize yourself having it already.  Although its difficult to do and does take practice you have to actually live as though you already have whatever it is you want, taste the tastes or smell the smells etc as this will feed through to your subconscious. If love is what you want in your life, you must visualize yourself experiencing it. Laughing and smiling, enjoying things with someone special etc.

The funny thing about the Law of Attraction is you just can’t fake it, our subconcious is a very powerful tool that can provide us with all that we want in our lives if we just use it correctly.  Imagine how happy you are, the smiles on your faces, and enjoying things together.

* Just remember that you must request this sincerely.

By MaryAnn Roche.

Tags: happiness, Law Of Attraction, peace, positive attitude, Success