Success is no accident, it takes hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.

For parents, success is something that children should be encouraged to achieve. However, in order for children to be successful, they must first be given the tools and habits that they need to benefit from the advice and words of wisdom from their parents.

Here are five parenting tips that will give you the guidance that you need to help your children be more successful in their current and future endeavors and it can improve your relationship with your child.

“Success isn’t always about greatness. It’s about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come.” – Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson

1. Set Goals

First, have your children set goals, no matter their age.

Goals are an incredible way to help your children achieve heightened levels of success. The goals that you set will need to be based on the specific needs of your child.

Younger children tend to thrive when they are given short term goals. It might be to “make the bed every morning,” or “read a book by the end of the week.”

No matter what the goal is, it should be designed so that they establish good habits.

2. Reward Achievements

It is important that your children are rewarded when they achieve their goals.

From giving them their favorite dessert to letting them play a game before bedtime, there are countless types of beneficial rewards that you can give your children when they achieve their goals.

Remember that the reward should match the level of the goal.

In other words, if your child achieves a minor goal, then they should receive a smaller reward. However, if your child achieves a major goal, then they should be given a larger reward.

The key to the latter strategy is to make sure that your child understands the different levels of goals and subsequent rewards. By understanding the system, your child can more effectively learn to not only achieve their goals but to also set goals of their own.

3. Create a Nurturing Environment

Create an environment where everyone shares their goals.

Success shouldn’t be a singular adventure.

Instead, success should be something that everyone can partake in and enjoy.

To create an environment that nurtures and supports success you can turn to a technique from the Kennedy family.

At dinner ask, “What is one thing you learned today? What is one thing you accomplished today?” These two subtle questions help children to recognize how they were successful in their own unique ways.

For example, they might have (successfully) learned how to solve a new type of math problem. They might have also climbed to the top of the rope ladder for the first time in gym that day.

No matter what thing was learned or accomplished, be sure to support your children as they discover the emotional and mental benefits of sharing their successes with the rest of the family.

4. Use Photographs

Using photographs helps to create a supportive environment. 

Using specific photographs help to support your children on their journeys towards new levels of success.

Have them keep two photos in their room somewhere that is visible to them.

The first photograph should show your child completing an activity that they are good at.

For example, they might be holding a soccer ball next to the goal, or they might be holding up their latest piece of art.

The second photograph should show a happy family moment. For example, the second photograph might show the entire family watching Fourth of July fireworks or smiling before taking the ski lift on a family vacation.

No matter what photos you choose, you want your child to look at the pictures and remember that they are talented, loved, and surrounded by people who support them.

Through two simple photographs, you can help your children have high self-esteem, which leads to greater levels of success.

Your children can look at the photographs and receive the positive affirmations that they need to know that they are both loved and capable.

5. Create Vision Boards

Have your children create a vision board.

Just as you look ahead to achieving new goals in your personal and professional life, your children should also learn to look ahead to the future.

Fortunately, you can turn making a vision board into a fun family event. Once the family creates their own Vision Boards, have a family vision board party.

This will allow you to learn about your children’s goals, as well as share yours with them. By getting them in the habit of visualizing, you can encourage your children to visualize their future successes.

Whether it is getting an A+ on the upcoming Spanish test, or getting into the college of their dreams, visualization is a powerful tool that will help your children succeed throughout the various stages of their lives.

The bottom line here is…

Give your children all of the tools they need to succeed.

No matter their age, you can use the above tips to help your children achieve new levels of success.

In addition to the above tips, you can also encourage your children in middle school and high school to read books with positive messages, attend meditation sessions that will help them to achieve balance and focus, and listen to motivational talks that will inspire them to achieve greatness.

The Law of Attraction is also a fundamental key to success that is important for you, and your kids, to understand. 

Through a cohesive system of setting goals, offering rewards, encouraging sharing, providing support, and embracing visualization techniques, you can help your children achieve heightened levels of personal and professional success.

Do you have your children set goals? How are you instilling success habits in them?

The Law of Attraction is the most powerful law in the Universe, however, some people scoff at the idea because they haven’t been able to harness it for themselves…

A lot of the time people have trouble with the Law of Attraction simply because they have incorrect views of how it works and how to harness it in their lives. The Law of Attraction is very real, and if you truly learn how to use it, can change your life forever.

Don’t believe these 3 most common Law of Attraction myths and continue to keep yourself from experiencing true abundance in your life.

1. MYTH: All You Have to Do is Think About Something

The first myth about the Law of Attraction is that all you have to do is think about something and you’ll get it.

When the book The Secret was published which introduced people to the Law of Attraction folks got the wrong impression about how it works and the myth developed that all you have to do to get what you want is to focus your thoughts on it.

For example, many people think that if you want a brand new red Mercedes, all you have to do is focus on getting the car, imagine it in your driveway, write in your journal that it is yours and, voila! A red Mercedes will appear in your driveway.

Unfortunately, that’s only partially correct. And while this is part of activating the Law of Attraction in your there are a few other things you have to do.

Here’s what they are:

Ask the Universe for what you want 

Keep your thoughts positive and focused on asking for what it is you want to have.

Believe

This is where most people stop.

People think about what they want, they even focus on getting it through positive affirmations, vision boards, and journaling, but they stop there.

What you have to realize is that part of believing is taking action.

The simple truth is that many people simply don’t take action to make their beliefs a reality.

For example, if you want a career as a dancer, you will need to take the action of enrolling in dance classes and auditioning for a role as a dancer.

You cannot just ask the Universe for it. You must believe it AND take action to get what you want.

Receive

The final step is to receive. The Universe gives you what you need and you need to be ready to feel joy and gratitude when you receive what you have asked for. In order to receive, you must be willing to take action.

Realize that this may not happen immediately either. But don’t become discouraged. If you ask and believe, you’re on the path to achieving all of your goals.

2. MYTH: You Don’t Have to Change Your Thinking

The second myth is that you don’t have to change the way you think for the Law of Attraction to work. This myth stands in the way of having the Law of Attraction work for you.

You must change your negative thinking to positive thinking, and be sure you believe that you will get what you ask for.

You can no longer lament about what you don’t have. You must replace your negative thoughts with positive ones. Remember Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous speech? It was titled, “I Have a Dream,” not “I Have a Complaint.”

Take your focus off of how much you hate your job and want to quit. Think instead about all of the wonderful things that will happen in your life when you start your own business and are now doing what you love.

3. MYTH: The Universe Is Working Against You

The final myth is that the Universe doesn’t want you to achieve your dreams or that it’s not “meant to be.” The Universe is not working against you and hoping to prevent you from achieving your dreams.

Quite the opposite is true.

The Universe simply provides you with more of what you give it.

If you are vibrating from a place of judgment and anger, you’ll receive more of the same. When you live in a space of gratitude instead of a space of resentment or judgment, you will find things working better for you.

One reason for this is that when you concentrate on filling your mind with positive thoughts of gratitude, you drown out your negative thoughts of resentment.

These are various indications that the Universe is supporting your positive thoughts in order to provide you what you are asking for and to help you achieve your dreams.

It is a basic law of the Universe that like attracts like. When you are in a good mood, people around you seem to be happy and enjoying life. When you are morose, you find people being rude to you in the grocery store or exhibiting road rage on the highway.

Scientists confirm that the earth, and everything on it, is constantly vibrating at a specific frequency that’s unique to the object or person. According to the Law of Attraction, your thoughts and emotions determine your vibration.

Thoughts of sadness, anger, pain, confusion, and other negative emotions give off negative vibrations. You get back what you send out, so you get negative vibrations in return.

The reverse is also true. If your thoughts are those of happiness, joy, success, and peace, you send out positive vibrations and are rewarded in return with positive outcomes.

Ask for what you want by forming your request in a positive way, believing you will get what you want, and by taking action to help you in getting it. Then, be ready to receive.

Do you believe in the Law of Attraction? What can it do in your life?

Given the opportunity, everyone would love to accumulate more wealth, make more money, and live an abundant life. However, many people have a poor relationship with money. They have trouble manifesting money and wealth into their lives, and as a result, never achieve the financial success they desire.

The truth is that financial success starts in the mind and the number one thing holding many people back is their belief system concerning wealth and money.

With that in mind, leveraging the Law of Attraction is one of the most effective ways to change your beliefs about money into a belief system that will open you up to the prosperity that is all around you. But first, you must take some steps to really see it work to change your life.

1. Identify Your Limiting Beliefs About Money

In order to activate the Law of Attraction in your life, you must identify and change your limiting beliefs about money. Throughout our lives, since childhood, we’ve created limiting beliefs about money that we’ve internalized over time and accepted to be true.” You’ve heard these limiting beliefs before.

They’re things like money doesn’t grow on trees and is therefore extremely difficult to acquire, or the idea that money can’t buy happiness, or the limiting belief that you can’t be rich and be a good person at the same time.

Before you can begin leveraging the Law of Attraction, it’s important to first identify and address any limiting beliefs about money that you might have.

Once you see money for what it really is – an accessible, unlimited supply of a resource you can use in any way that you desire – it’s much easier to form the habits and mindset necessary to acquire wealth.

One great way to address any limiting beliefs about money is through the use of positive affirmations.

For example, if you realize that you view money as something that is scarce and difficult to acquire, you could use a positive affirmation such as, “I’m a money magnet. Everything I touch turns to gold”.

Other positive affirmations you can use are, “I am releasing any and all negative thoughts and emotions about money, and am happy and free to visualize my dreams”.

Or, “I am creating all the money I want and need to accomplish everything I want to do in life.”  

Try the affirmation, “I am making positive choices about what to do with my money and enjoying the energy of abundance that it reflects.”  

What you say to yourself becomes what you believe, and what you truly believe becomes reality. By using positive affirmations to combat limiting beliefs about money, you can develop a mindset concerning money that enables you to leverage the Law of Attraction.

2. Visualize Your Wealth as if You’ve Already Achieved it

The Law of Attraction dictates that the things you believe inwardly and project outwardly will be the things that you attract into your life. If you want to attract something such as money, therefore, it’s important to visualize it as if you already have it.

Visualizing a world where you have all of the money that you desire not only creates a mindset that is more receptive to financial gain, it also enables you to imagine what your life will be like once you have reached your goals.

This, in and of itself, can serve as a powerful source of motivation that will keep pushing you forward when things get difficult.

Visualizing money as if you already have it can also create an abundance mindset, as opposed to a mindset of scarcity.

One of the big reasons why the wealthy have no problem getting richer is that they see the money they don’t have as something that is both abundant and acquirable, while at the same time, seeing the money they do have as a tool that can be used to make more money rather than something that has to be protected or saved.

This type of abundance mindset comes naturally when you have a lot of money, but it can also be developed by visualizing money as something that you already have in abundance.

If you want to create a physical anchor point for your visualizations, try carrying around a hundred dollar bill in your pocket.

Simply doing this can make you feel wealthier and prevent you from ever being able to say that you are broke – and thus prevent the limiting mindsets that go along with being broke.

3. The Universe Will Provide You With More

Finally, remember that the Universe will provide you with more of what you’re grateful for. Never underestimate the power of gratitude.

Ultimately, the things that you are grateful for will be the things that you tend to pursue with the most passion. Truly being grateful for something also tends to eliminate any limiting beliefs you have, and will make you more receptive to new opportunities.

As you go about adopting a beneficial mindset regarding money that enables you to leverage the Law of Attraction, and don’t forget about the importance of gratitude.

Be thankful for the money that you have. Be thankful for every opportunity you get to make more money, and be thankful when those opportunities pay off.

No matter how much or how little money you are currently earning, an attitude of gratitude is essential if you want to earn more.

What are your limiting beliefs about money? Learn more about the Law of Attraction from this free guide.

Everyone has a unique purpose in life, and finding and following that purpose is the key to creating a happy, abundant, meaningful and fulfilling life for yourself.

Sometimes, though, for one reason or another, you may unconsciously drift away from your staying true to your purpose, or you may think you are on the right path when really you’re heading in the opposite direction of where you intended to go.

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If you want to be fulfilled, happy, content, and experience inner peace and ultimate fulfillment, it’s critical that you learn how to find your passion and life purpose. Without a life purpose as the compass to guide you, your goals and action plans may not ultimately fulfill you.

How to Discover Your Life Purpose

After working with more than a million people all over the world, I have come to believe that each of us is born with a unique life purpose.

Identifying, acknowledging, and honoring this purpose is perhaps the most important action successful people take. They take the time to understand what they’re here to do – and then they pursue that with passion and enthusiasm.

For some of us, our purpose and passion in life is obvious and clear. We’re born with a set of talents and through persistent practice, we develop our talents into skills.

My children are prime examples of clear purpose. It was clear from the moment they got on the planet what they were interested in.

One son wanted to draw all the time, and he is now in the art world. Another son was always tapping out rhythms on paint cans and dishes, and he’s now in the music world, along with one of his brothers.

My daughter is in the literary world, and my stepson is definitely in the business world.

My stepdaughter is also in the arts – she began singing and drawing when she was two. And my stepson is in the business world. He was making business plans and selling things to his friends by the time he was in middle school.

They all had natural talents that were clear indicators of what they ended up ultimately being passionate about.

For some people, though, it’s not as easy to identify a passion. You may even have asked yourself at one point or another, “What should I do with my life?”  “What is my passion?” or “What is my life purpose.”

Alternatively, you may enjoy what you do, but on deeper exploration, discover that you’re passionate about something altogether different than what you do.

Below I’d like to give you 10 tips to help you find your life passion and true purpose.

1. Explore the Things You Love To Do & What Comes Easy to You

We are all born with a deep and meaningful purpose that we have to discover. Your purpose is not something you need to make up; it’s already there. You have to uncover it in order to create the life you want. You may ask yourself, “What is my purpose in life?” You can begin to discover your passion or your purpose by exploring two things:

1. What do you love to do?  
2. What comes easily to you?

Of course, it takes work to develop your talents- even the most gifted musician still has to practice-but it should feel natural, like rowing downstream rather than upstream. I love to teach, to write, to coach, to facilitate, to train, and to develop transformational seminars, workshops, and courses. I love to bring other leaders together for conferences and to co-create new approaches to our work.

These things come easy for me. Although I invested many years in learning how to master these skills, I loved every minute of it. In other words, work is required, but suffering is not. If you are struggling and suffering, you are probably not living on purpose.

2. Ask Yourself What Qualities You Enjoy Expressing the Most in the World

First, ask yourself, What are two qualities I most enjoy expressing in the world? Mine are love and joy.

Second, ask yourself, What are two ways I most enjoy expressing these qualities? Mine are inspiring and empowering people.

I inspire people with the moving stories that I tell in my seminars and that I write about in my books, and I empower them by teaching them powerful success strategies that they can apply in their own lives.

3. Create a Life Purpose Statement

Take a few moments and write a description of what the world would look like if it were operating perfectly according to you. In my perfect world, everybody is living their highest vision where they are doing, being, and having everything they want. Finally, combine all three into one statement, and you will have a clear idea of your purpose.

Mine is “Inspiring and empowering people to live their highest vision in a context of love and joy.”

4. Follow Your Inner Guidance (What Is Your Heart Telling You?)

What if I told you that you have your own guidance system within you that can help you get from where you are in life to where you want to go?

It’s called your inner GPS. Your inner GPS is similar to the GPS system you use in your car or on your phone. It tells you how to get from point A to point B.

When you get in your car and are heading to a specific destination, what is the first thing you input into your GPS? First, it finds your current location. Once it’s determined where you are, it gives you directions to where you are heading.

For the system to work, it simply needs to know your beginning location and your end destination. The navigation system figures out the rest by the use of an onboard computer that receives signals from multiple satellites and calculates your exact position. Then it plots a perfect course for you.

All you have to do from that point on is follow the instructions it gives you to reach your destination.

Decide Where You Want to Go

All you have to do is decide where you want to go by clarifying your vision, then lock in your destination through goal setting, affirmations, and visualization, and then start taking the actions that will move you in the right direction.

With every picture you visualize, you’re “inputting” the destination you want to get to.

Every time you express a preference for something, you are expressing an intention.

A table by the window, front row seats at a conference, first-class tickets, a room with an ocean view, or a loving relationship.

All these images and thoughts are sending requests to the universe.

If you stay out of its way—meaning you don’t interrupt the process with a stream of negative thoughts, doubts, and fears, your inner GPS will keep unfolding the next steps along your route as you continue to move forward.

In other words, once you clarify and then stay focused on your vision (you can do this with a vision board or meditation), the exact steps will keep appearing along the way in the form of internal guidance, creating ideas, and new opportunities.

5. Be Clear About Your Life Purpose

Once you are clear about what you want and keep your mind constantly focused on it, the how will keep showing up—sometimes just when you need it and not a moment earlier.

You were born with an inner guidance that tells you when you are on or off course by the amount of joy you are experiencing. The things that bring you the greatest joy are in alignment with your purpose and will get you to where you want to go.

When you present your goals to the universe with all its powerful technology, you will be surprised and dazzled by what it delivers. This is where the magic and miracles truly happen.

Take some time to think honestly and openly about where you currently are in your life and what you want to do with your life.

What is your financial status? How are your relationships going? How is your health? And so on…

Next, think about where you would like to be.

If your life were perfect right now, what would it look like? What kind of job would you have and where would you be living? By continually doing this exercise, you’ll send powerful triggers to your subconscious mind to help you get there.

6. Conduct a Passion Test

Developed by Chris and Janet Attwood, The Passion Test is a simple, yet elegant, process. You start by filling in the blank 15 times for the following statement: “When my life is ideal, I am ___.” The word(s) you choose to fill in the blank must be a verb.

When Janet took me through the process, my statements looked like this:

• My life is ideal when I’m being of service to massive numbers of people.
• My life is ideal when I’m helping people with their vision.
• My life is ideal when I’m speaking to large groups.
• My life is ideal when I’m being part of a spiritual leaders network.
• My life is ideal when I’m creating a core group of ongoing trainers who feel identified with my organization.

Once you’ve created 15 statements, you identify the top 5 choices. To do this, you compare statements #1 and #2 to identify which is most important. Take the winner of that comparison and decide whether it’s more or less important than statement #3.

Then take the winner of that comparison, and decide whether it’s more or less important than statement #4, and so on until you’ve identified the passion that is most meaningful to you.

Repeat the process with the remaining 14 statements to identify your second choice. Then repeat the process until you’ve pinpointed your top 5 passions in life.

Next, create markers for each of your top five passions, so that you can look at your life and easily tell whether you are living that passion.

For me, a life goal would be, “When I’m helping people live their vision I’m giving at least 20 workshops a year for at least 10,000 people total, and at each event, people are coming up afterward and saying, ‘You’ve really empowered me to live my vision.”

Once you know what your passions are and how your life will look when you are living it, you can create action plans to turn your dreams into reality.

7. Think About The Times You’ve Experienced the Greatest Joy In Your Life

Another technique you can use to help you identify your purpose is to conduct a joy review. Simply set aside about 30 minutes and make a list of all the times you’ve felt the greatest joy in your life.

(When I did this it was when I was a patrol leader in the Boy-scouts, when I was an officer in my military high school, when I was a summer camp counselor at a camp in Maine, my years as a leader in my college fraternity, my years as a high school teacher, when I was conducting workshops and training, when I was telling jokes, telling stories and when I was traveling.)

Then look for a pattern among all these times.

In my case, it was when I was teaching, and when I was inspiring and empowering people to go for their dreams and to have more love, joy, and abundance in their lives.

Since we know that joy is part of your internal guidance system telling you when you are on course, you can determine a lot about your life purpose from completing this joy review.

8. Follow This Example of Finding Purpose

One of my coaching students, a successful cardiologist, was struggling to identify his purpose. I suggested another exercise, and asked him to look back over his life and answer the question, When have I felt most fulfilled?

He shared three periods in which he felt the happiest and most fulfilled.

First, he told me about a time with his grandfather when he was growing up in India.

The second was his experience of playing with his own grandchildren.

The third was a time he spent vacationing on a sailboat.

When I asked him what was common to all three of these experiences, he told me that it was the sense of freedom that he felt.

Noticing that none of his three experiences related to his profession in medicine, I asked him to tell me about his most fulfilling experiences as a doctor.

The incidences he reported were when he had donated his services for free or for a lesser fee than his partners thought he should have charged. He shared about a time when he took a much longer time than usual during an office visit to support and encourage a family who were in fear of losing their father during an impending heart surgery.

Take Time for Yourself

As we examined his life further, it became apparent that he took very little time for himself. He was always on call, always working late, always over-scheduled with little or no free time for self-care. I asked him why this was so. He answered that people could die if he didn’t attend to them.

The problem became clear: By attending only to patients and never to himself, he was in a sense- dying.

To drive this point home, I asked him what he would do in the following situation: “A patient comes to you for an operation. If you operate on this patient, you will die. If you don’t operate on him, he will die. It’s him or you. What would you do?” He reflected quietly on this scenario for a long time, and then finally, he said, “I would choose to live, rather than die myself. It doesn’t make sense to kill myself to save others.”

This was a turning point in his life. He later told me that while he still wants to serve people, he now knows he has a right to take care of himself, his mind, his body, and his needs.

This cardiologist now places a higher value on doing what truly comes from his heart, not someone else’s.

9. Align Your Goals With Your Life Purpose and Passions

We’re all gifted with a set of talents and interests that tell us what we’re supposed to be doing. Once you know what your life purpose is, organize all of your activities around it. Everything you do should be an expression of your purpose. If an activity or goal doesn’t fit that formula, don’t work on it.

Aligning with your purpose is most critical when setting professional goals. When it comes to personal goals, you have more flexibility.

If you want to learn how to paint or water ski, go ahead and do so. If your goal is to get fit and lose weight, move ahead with confidence. Nurturing yourself emotionally, physically and spiritually will make you more energized, resilient and motivated to live your purpose on the professional front.

However, don’t ignore the signs that your job or career is not right for you. If you dread Monday mornings and live for the weekends, it may be a sign that it’s time to follow your heart and pursue the work you long to do.

10. Lean Into Your True Life Purpose

Once you have gained more clarity about your purpose, you don’t need to completely overhaul your life completely all at once. Instead, just lean into it, bit by bit.

Start living your purpose a little more fully every day, and pay attention to the feedback you’re receiving from others and in terms of the results you are producing, and also to how you are feeling.

Breakthrough to YOUR Success with this Formula

You’ve got big dreams and ambitions. Now, it’s time to start acting on them while taking your life to a whole new level. I’d like to invite you to sign up for my free webcast called the Success Formula.

I continually ask my students the same exact questions I’m about to ask you:

• Are you where you want to be?
• Have you accomplished all you thought you would by now?
• Are you enjoying the lifestyle, travel, weekends and leisure pursuits you’ve always dreamed of?
• Do you want a more fulfilling career or business?
• Could your relationships be deeper, more rewarding, and more meaningful?

If not, I’d like to challenge you to up-level every single aspect of your life, career, and lifestyle, STARTING NOW. I believe with the right tools, everyone can cultivate a mindset of success, and discover their greatest life purpose.

If you feel like you’re stuck, or you’re in need of a breakthrough, click the button below to sign up today for my free webcast, The Success Formula.

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Is your life in need of some “spring cleaning?”

Almost everyone has too much STUFF in their lives. Things we’ve bought but have never used, or things we used to love but haven’t used in years.

Gifts people have given us that we never needed. Old newspapers, magazines, and junk mail. Clothes we no longer wear. Broken, useless stuff that we’ve never gotten around to throwing out.

All of these things mess up our home and our office, disturb our peace of mind, and fill our world with useless clutter.

And that’s just the physical stuff! I’m not even talking about the way we fill our lives with too much “busy-ness” and too many unnecessary distractions that pull us away from the important things we should be focusing on.

So today I’d like to share five powerful spring-cleaning strategies that you can use to declutter your life at all levels, so you have more focus, clarity, space, and freedom to focus on what truly matters most to you.

I’m pretty sure at least one of these strategies is going to surprise you.

1. Declutter Your Home & Office

My first tip is to physically declutter your home and office.

Put everything you own through the “Love it, sell it, or toss it” test.

If you don’t absolutely love it, then sell it, or toss it.

Giving it to someone who might love it or need it, or recycling it are also options, of course—as long as you get it out of YOUR home or office.

I encourage you to be ruthless with this.

I know it can be hard to let go of old things, especially when you have positive memories attached to them.

But remember, the memories of your childhood aren’t going to disappear just because you give away a bunch of old books, games and broken toys!

Release them with gratitude, and enjoy the space that opens up in your life when they’re gone.

Because when you get rid of the things you don’t want or need, you create more space for the things you DO want and need.

And I guarantee that when you create the space for them, they will begin to show up. It’s pretty magical.

2. Declutter Your Thoughts

My next tip for you is to declutter your THOUGHTS.

Our homes aren’t the only things we fill with too much “stuff” we don’t need.

We could say the same thing about our minds.

We cram our heads full of so many useless or even harmful thoughts that don’t serve us in any way.

We read too much gossip about celebrities.

We get caught up in the negativity of the news cycle.

We watch TV shows that don’t uplift, enlighten or educate us in any way.

We spend too much time listening to our “inner critic,” who tells us we’ll never be good enough or worthy enough to achieve our dreams.

And so our minds become crowded with useless, self-defeating thoughts that hold us back from showing up as our best selves.

A great way to declutter your mind is with the practice of regular meditation.

I am a huge fan of daily meditation – I can honestly say it’s changed my entire life.

You’ll discover that the more you meditate, the more you’ll find yourself no longer giving any attention or power to your negative thoughts, and focusing instead on inspiring, motivating and uplifting thoughts that spur you on to do your best.

3. Declutter Your DIET

My next powerful decluttering strategy is to declutter your DIET.

Many of us consume too much food and drink that doesn’t give us the nourishment and nutrients we need to thrive.

And when you fill yourself up with too much unhealthy food or drinks such as sugar-laden desserts, soft drinks, pastries or alcohol, you rob yourself of the vitality you need to accomplish your goals and achieve more in life.

So I encourage you to spend some time reviewing your eating and drinking habits and look for ways to eliminate the food and drinks that aren’t serving your nutritional needs – and replace them with healthier options that will give you more energy and improve your mental and physical well-being.

4. Declutter Your Friends

My next piece of advice is to declutter your FRIENDS.

Take time to examine who are the people in your life who are always dragging you down and preventing you from showing up as your best self?

I’m talking about the kind of people who are always negative and never support or encourage you.

Maybe they laugh at your dreams and say that you’re crazy for having them.

Or maybe they’re always wanting you to slack off or indulge in your “bad habits” because they’re somehow threatened by your desire to improve yourself.

I encourage you to eliminate people like this from your life, or at the very least seriously limit your exposure to them, because they are holding you back from unlocking your full potential.

And I guarantee that when you get them out of your life, you will find it so much easier to attract the kind of people who WILL give you the support and encouragement you need to stay on track toward your goals and good habits, and create a life you love.

5. Declutter your Goals and Dreams

Finally, my last piece of advice is to declutter your GOALS and DREAMS.

By that I mean, take a good hard look at all the life goals you’re currently pursuing.

Chances are you can’t achieve them all at once.

For example, you may not find it possible to write a novel and take your family to Europe and save money for your child’s university education AND start a new business, all in the same year!

So think about which goals or dreams make the most logical sense to achieve FIRST – because once they’re accomplished, they’ll make it so much easier for you to achieve the next one and then the next one – and then focus on completing those few goals before you put any more effort into the rest of the big goals on your list.

This doesn’t mean you should give up on the rest of your goals — it just means figuring out how to achieve them strategically, in the order that makes the most sense for your life.

Because when you focus your energy and intention toward accomplishing one big goal at a time, you will find it so much easier to attract what you need to achieve that goal, as well as faster than you thought possible.

I want to encourage you to use these tips to “spring clean” your life and make sure 2019 is a year in which you accomplish amazing things. 

Now is the perfect time to get clear on everything you would like to accomplish in the months ahead.

What big goals would you like to achieve this year? On December 31st, 2019, what do you want to be celebrating?

What do you want to be able to look back on and say, “I can’t believe I did that?”

And how will you feel, knowing that you accomplished that thing?

In order to make that vision a reality, you need to know what your goals are – and you need to be able to clearly visualize each of those goals as already achieved and what your life will look like once you have achieved them.

Here are four tips that will help you do just that – so you can stay focused and motivated throughout the year as you work on making your dreams a reality.

1. Create an Affirmation for Each Goal

Positive affirmations are simply statements that allow you to experience what your life will look and feel like once you have accomplished a goal.

For example, if one of your goals in 2019 is to lose weight, you could create a positive affirmation that says:

“I’m so happy and grateful now that I weigh 140 pounds and am so much healthier and stronger in my body.”

The key to creating effective affirmations for your goals is to visualize the benefits that you are looking forward to the most — the ones that motivated you to set the goal in the first place — and include them in your affirmation.

For example:

“I am so proud of myself for finishing my book and putting it out there for people to read it.”

“I am so excited and happy to take the kids camping in our beautiful new motorhome.” 

If you identify the benefits that are most important to you and include them in your affirmation — as well as how you’ll feel when you experience those benefits — it will be a powerful motivator for you.

Because the more you repeat your affirmations to yourself, the easier it will be to keep your goals top of mind and be able to imagine yourself actually achieving them — and the more motivated you will be to experience those benefits for yourself.

2. Visualize and Repeat Your Affirmations

My second piece of advice is to take the time to visualize your affirmations when you repeat them to yourself.

Don’t just say them, imagine yourself living the experience your affirmations describe.

To do this, I encourage you to take some time after this video is done to write out a very clear and detailed picture of what your life will look like, and how you will feel, once you achieve your goals.

Really dive into each scenario, and try to paint a complete picture of everything that accomplishing your goal would bring about.

Then bring that vision to mind whenever you repeat your daily affirmations.

You may even want to read your description aloud once a day until you can bring this image easily to mind.

3. Visualize Your Affirmations Daily

More is better…

An easy way to make it part of your daily routine is to get into the habit of doing it when you wake up every morning.

So, you start off your day with your goals top of mind, and then again at night right before you go to bed, so your subconscious will continue to think about your goals and what you must do to achieve them, even while you’re sleeping. 

4. Create a Vision Board

Finally, my last tip is to create a vision board for what you would like to accomplish in 2019.

There’s no better way to visualize your goals than to create an actual visual representation of them.

A vision board allows you to map out your goals in a visual format that reminds you why you’re doing what you’re doing, and what you have to look forward to once your goals are achieved.

You can purchase a vision board kit or make your own vision board from scratch using poster-board or construction paper and images from magazines.

Choose images that represent your goals and what your life will look and feel like once you have achieved those goals.

For example, if one of your goals is to earn more money in 2019, you could put up images such as pictures of the house you want to buy, pictures of the places you want to visit, pictures of happy people strolling on the beach, and so on.

After you’ve filled your vision board with images that do a great job of bringing your goals to life, put it in a place that you will notice it frequently, such as in your bedroom, office, or living room.

This constant visual stimulus will serve to reinforce the importance of your goals in your mind and help you visualize them throughout the entire year.

What is one goal that you want to achieve in 2019 and how are you planning to use visualization to bring it to life? If you want to learn more about the power of affirmations click here to get my free Affirmations Guide.

Everyone makes mistakes and goes through difficult times in life. But it’s not your mistakes or your difficulties that define you, but rather what you learn from them that truly matters. How you think about the past can be an excellent teacher and a great source of motivation for learning how to move on, or it can interfere with your happiness and hold you back from living your best life.

So, how do you put the past behind you?

Here are four tips I’d like to share with you today to help you heal your old wounds and move on to a better and brighter future.

1. Practice Forgiveness

Whether it’s forgiving yourself for a mistake that you made or forgiving someone who you believe harmed you, forgiveness is one of the best possible things you can do to heal yourself from the past.

You may have heard the saying, “Holding onto anger and resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.” It’s true. When you continue to be angry and bitter about something that has happened in the past, the only person you end up hurting is yourself.

So whatever old grudges or disappointments you’ve been nursing, I encourage you to let them go. You will feel a lot better about yourself and about the world around you if you do.

2. Practice Gratitude

Take time every day to feel grateful for everything that is good in your life. And I do mean EVERYTHING.

Be grateful for the people who love you, and who have helped you, mentored you or taught you something on your journey through life. Be grateful for the roof over your head, be grateful for your health, be grateful for the opportunities you’ve been given in life, the flowers blooming outside your window and the blue sky overhead, the things that make your life easier and more enjoyable, and the people who were involved in making those things and bringing them into your world.

The more you cultivate gratitude and appreciation for everything that’s good in your life right now and focus on those things, the easier it will be for you to forget about the things that have hurt you in the past.

And also remember to be grateful for the people that have made your life difficult at times.

It is because of them that you have developed qualities like courage, perseverance, and compassion. Make sure to develop a daily practice of gratitude, whether it is in meditation, writing in your journal, or just walking around and appreciating everything you see for a few minutes in the morning.

3. Remember Your Thoughts Determine Your Reality

So if you want to improve any aspect of your life your life, make the effort to think better thoughts.

Every time you find yourself thinking about something negative that happened in the past, consciously transform that negative thought into something positive.

For example, if you’re thinking, “I can’t believe I wasted all those years on someone who betrayed me!” replace it with the new thought, “I am so happy and grateful I am now free to find someone who truly appreciates me for who I am.”

Learning how to meditate is also a powerful tool that can help you with this. When you meditate, you can simply assume the position of a witness to your thoughts, which always seem to come in a constant stream.

As you become more aware of your thoughts in meditation, you will more easily and more often begin to recognize when you’re going into a negative spiral and be able to then consciously shift your thoughts toward something more positive.

It takes constant vigilance and work, but the ultimate rewards are so worth it.

4. Remember That You Are Amazing

Focusing on the failures of your past can be crippling to your self-esteem, your self-confidence, and your happiness. But the opposite is true as well. When you focus on your past successes, of which there are always many, you build your self-esteem and your self-confidence.

List Your Past Successes

One great way to acknowledge your past successes is to sit down and make a list of your past successes. Here are a couple of ways to do that.

The first one is a simple exercise I call Nine Successes. To do this exercise, simply divide your life into three major time periods.

For example, if you are forty-five years old, the first time period could be birth to 20 years old, the second would be twenty years old to 33 years old, and the third would be from 33 to 45.

Make the first time period from the present until you are 18 or 20 years old, and then divide the rest of your life in half.

Then list three major successes that you accomplished in each time period for a total of nine successes. Don’t discount things like learning to drive, graduating high school, getting your first job, or buying your first car.

They were all big deals at the time.

Once you complete your list, look back over it and remember that if you were able to accomplish those things in your past, then you can accomplish whatever else you want to accomplish now and in the future. Acknowledge the fact that there are plenty of accomplishments in your past to feel good about, and allow that sense of accomplishment to elevate your self-esteem.

List 100 Successes

Another exercise is to make a list of 100 successes you’ve had in your life. Give yourself several days to accomplish this.

Make sure to include all the things that you may now take for granted, like learning to speak a second language, passing that difficult English literature course in college, achieving sharpshooter status in the military, raising a healthy child or learning to grill the perfect steak.

Or things like learning to play an instrument, learning how to type, saving enough money to take that trip to New York or Europe, beating your dad at chess, learning to swim, making Eagle Scout, painting a picture, learning to take great pictures with your camera, getting a promotion, developing a website, figuring out how to use social media like Pinterest and Facebook, helping a political candidate get elected, talking a friend out of committing suicide, getting sober if you were battling some addiction, learning how to bake a cake, coaching your kid’s little league or soccer league team, and so on.

5. Try Tapping Therapy

Finally, one last tool I would like to call your attention to is EFT tapping or tapping therapy.

As many of you know, EFT stands for “emotional freedom technique” and it’s a powerful way to release old thoughts and beliefs, and the feelings those thoughts and beliefs create, that are no longer serving you.

EFT tapping is similar to acupressure in that it focuses on systematically applying light pressure to key energy points on your head and chest to help you release negative thoughts and emotions and energy. It is a very effective tool that I have used with phenomenal results in my own life and the lives of my students.

Given that EFT exists as a tool, there is no reason to stay stuck in the past.

Do have any old wounds from past hurts that you haven’t been able to put behind you? Going forward, what are some of the strategies you will use to heal those wounds?

The Law of Attraction is one of the most powerful laws in the universe. Just like gravity, it is always influencing your life and reality. And once you are aware of it you can leverage it to create the life of your dreams.

Simply put, the Law of Attraction says that you attract into your life whatever you focus on and feel strongly about.

So, if you focus on the good and positive things in your life, you will automatically attract more of those things into your life.

If you focus on lack and negativity, then that is what you will attract more of into your life. It’s that simple – and that powerful.

Because once you understand how the Law of Attraction works, you can begin to consciously and intentionally change your results and create a better life.

You can begin to choose to respond differently to the situations that arise during your day.

You can choose to think differently by focusing on the things that fill you with joy and purpose.

And you can choose to create the future you want simply by intentionally taking the time to focus on what you want your life to look and feel like – instead of unconsciously living life by default, often creating the exact opposite of what you want.

The fact is, you are constantly creating your own reality at every moment.

Your thoughts determine your feelings, your feelings determine your actions, and your actions determine your reality – so if you want to create a better reality, you have to start by thinking better thoughts.

Because when you are clear about what you want, and you put those clear intentions out into the universe, the resources, the people, and the opportunities you need to achieve your goals will start appearing to you, almost like magic.

Chances are they were there all along, but because you weren’t clear on what you wanted, you never noticed them.

Once you activate the Law of Attraction through your intentional thoughts, these resources and opportunities will light up like neon signs saying, “Here I am! Let’s do this thing!”

Achieve Your Goals With the Law of Attraction

So here are six simple tips on how to more effectively make the Law of Attraction work for you instead of against you.

1. Your Thoughts are Powerful

Remind yourself daily that your thoughts are powerful. They have a very real impact on the world around you.

Your thoughts determine your actions, and your actions declare your intentions to the universe. And the universe will respond to those intentions.

So if you want the better results, you have to think and behave in a way that is in alignment with what you ultimately want to be, do, and have in life.

I suggest you put a 3×5 card or a post-it on your bathroom mirror that says, “The thoughts I think today are creating the reality I will experience in the future.”

2. Dream Big

Don’t censor your dreams or limit your vision with practicalities and probabilities.

You will not be given a dream that you are not capable of achieving. So if you can imagine it, you have the capacity to make it a reality. You don’t need to know every single step of the journey.

Just decide what you want. Know that you deserve it. Believe you can have it, and then take one small step toward it. Then another, and another, and another.

With every step, your path will become clearer to you.

3. Clarify Your Goals

Get really, really clear on what you want your life to look like. Write it all down in as much detail as possible.

The more specific you are about what you want in life, the easier it will be for you to make it a reality.

4. Use Positive Affirmations

Use positive affirmations to keep yourself focused on your goals and to raise your vibrational frequency up to match the frequency of the reality you want to create.

Affirmations work by purposely replacing the limiting beliefs and negative self-talk that you have internalized over the years with positive statements that assert who you want to be and how you want to experience life.

Make sure to phrase your affirmations in the present tense, as if you have already achieved your goals and are living the life of your dreams, and also make sure to include a strong positive emotion in the affirmation, such as gratitude, that you will not only say when you repeat your affirmation but also choose to feel when you are repeating the affirmation.

For example:

“I am so happy and grateful now that I own a six-figure business and I get to spend every day doing something I love!”

Positive affirmations are a powerful tool for self-transformation and a key element in creating the life you desire.

When you make a habit of repeating them daily, you will be amazed at how much easier it will be to stay focused on your dreams and attract what you need to make them come true.

5. Open Yourself Up to Infinite Possibilities

Start by becoming more aware of the amazing synchronicity that already exists in your life.

Look for the miracles – the magically serendipitous events and opportunities that seem to appear out of nowhere at just the right time to bring you closer to your goals.

The more you watch for them, the more you will notice them happening all the time, and when you acknowledge them, you will attract even more of them. That’s the power of the Law of Attraction at work for you!

6. Take Action!

Take positive action to create what you want. When you have an idea of something to do, do it, and do it as soon as possible.

All of the best intentions in the world won’t mean much if you don’t take action when the time comes to make them a reality!

That’s why it’s so important to take at least one or more small actions every day that will move you closer to the fulfillment of your dreams.

How are you using the Law of Attraction to achieve your goals? To learn more about harnessing the Law of Attraction in your life click the button below to download my free guide.

Related Reading:

Daily Affirmations for Positive Thinking

How to Meditate for Clarity, Intuition & Guidance

How to Use Tapping Therapy To Eliminate Fear & Achieve Your Goals

Visualization Techniques to Affirm Your Desired Outcomes

The universe works in mysterious ways. It is constantly working to make available to you the tools, the resources, the people, and the lessons you need to become the person you were meant to be which is why it’s so important to pay attention to signs from the universe.

But, the universe doesn’t always make these things totally obvious, or even always easy.

You might need to go through bankruptcy in order to finally learn the money lessons you need to create a life of true financial abundance.

You might have to get laid off or fired from a job you don’t like, in order to find the job you love.

Or you might have to go through a painful breakup before you’re ready to meet and fall in love with the love of your life.

You might feel at times as if you’re a newspaper caught up in the wind, being blown about with no clear direction.

But if you start paying attention, you will realize that the universe is sending you signals all the time that show you where you need to go and what you need to do to create the life of your dreams.

Here are five powerful signs from the universe to pay attention to that will help you understand what you’re meant to do to become the person you are meant to be.

1. Does it Bring You Joy?

The first clue I’d like you to focus on is the experience of JOY. I always tell my students and clients that joy is the ultimate “GPS system.”

When you experience true joy, it’s a sign you are on the right track and doing what you are meant to be doing.

On the other hand, when you are not doing what you are supposed to be doing, you might feel dissatisfied or deeply unhappy with your life.  

If you‘re not happy with your job, or where you are living, or any other aspect of your life, that may be the universe telling you that it’s time to make a change.

The change might be an external change like quitting your job, or it might be an internal change like changing how you are approaching your job.

As you move through life, start paying close attention to the times when you are experiencing joy.

That’s the universe telling you, THIS is what you are meant to be doing. And once you know what that is, you can start looking for more opportunities to create that in your life.

2. Physical Pain

Pay attention to is any physical pain you might experience.

The whole purpose of pain is to alert your body to the fact that something is not right. So the sooner you pay attention, the sooner you can heal whatever physical ailment might be bothering you.

Sometimes, though, the thing that’s bothering you may not be a problem with your physical body.

Instead, it might be the physical manifestation of stress, anxiety, or an unhealed emotional wound.

So if you ever experience pain that you can’t get to the bottom of, it’s probably a sign that some belief you are hanging on to, or some thought you are thinking, or some emotion you’re not expressing, or something you are doing or not doing isn’t working, and that the universe is using physical pain as a way to draw your attention to it.

Far too often, we’re taught from childhood to ignore pain or to “grin and bear it,” or to numb it out with painkillers, alcohol or drugs.  

But pain should never be ignored or totally suppressed with drugs or alcohol. I’m not talking about post-surgical pain or the pain from a broken finger or a sprained ankle.

Temporary painkillers are useful in that situation. But you especially want to pay attention to chronic pain.

It could be related to something you shouldn’t be eating, some emotions you are not dealing with, or some situation that you need to address that you are avoiding.

Unfortunately, a lot of people numb out their pain of an unfulfilling or abusive relationship or mind-numbing, soul-killing job with alcohol, pot or even heavier drugs.

The problem is that numbing out your pain is like taking the battery out of your smoke detector because the noise it is making is annoying you.

Just like the smoke detector, your physical pain is sending you a message that you need to pay attention to.

Whether that message is telling you that something is wrong in your body or that something is wrong in your life, it’s important to listen to it and take action to resolve it.

3. Something Stuck in Your Head

The third signal I encourage you to pay attention to is anything that gets stuck in your head – like a song that won’t stop playing in your mind, or a recurring dream you keep having.

For example, if you have “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction” from the Rolling Stones stuck in your head, you might be getting a message from your subconscious that you are frustrated with the lack of satisfaction in your life and need to make some changes to increase your happiness.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a song stuck in my head, only to realize that that particular song had the exact message I needed to hear at that moment in time.

If you open your mind to receiving messages such as this, you’ll notice the same thing.

Or if you keep having a dream where you’re back in high school and you have to take a test that you haven’t studied for, maybe that’s a sign that you feel unprepared or unqualified in your job.

If that’s the case, it might be time to invest in more training to level up your knowledge and your skills.

4. Listen to Your Inner Voice 

Another important signal I encourage you to start paying more attention to is your own inner voice or intuition.

When you need to make a decision and you’re not certain what to do, take time to inquire within.

Because the truth always is, that you already have the answer inside you, you’re just not aware of it yet.

Now, that little voice inside you might be hard to hear at times.

One way to make it easier to hear is to meditate regularly.

When you take time to clear your mind of the endless monkey chatter that keeps it so distracted all day long, you’ll find it easier to hear the inner truth that lives deep inside you.

If you don’t know how to meditate, here’s a blog to get you started.

5. Ask the Universe

Finally, remember that you can simply ask the universe what it’s trying to tell you.

The universe’s communication with you is not a one-way street. If you are ever at a loss for the direction you should take in a specific circumstance, take a moment to ask for guidance.

How you do this is up to you. You may want to pray for guidance to whatever Higher Power you believe in, whether you call it God, Source, Spirit, the Universe, or Infinite Intelligence.

Or you may prefer to ask the universe to send you a clear sign.

The more you open yourself to “the powers that be,” (however you choose to define that), the easier it will be for you to find the answers you seek.

Take a moment to write down all the times you’ve ever felt true joy in your life. What is that joy telling you, and how can you bring more of it into your life?

Also be sure to write down any other signals you think the universe is sending you. Maybe you feel stuck at your job, or you’re frustrated with a toxic person in your life, or you’re experiencing some sort of physical pain. What messages is the universe sending you?

Leave a comment below with your thoughts. If you’d like to learn more about the universe and the Law of Attraction click the button below to get a guide.

Researchers estimate that we think about 50,000 to 70,000 thoughts a day – and that about 80% of those thoughts are negative. That is a crazy amount of negative self-talk!

What is Negative Self-Talk?

We spend so much time telling ourselves that we’re not good enough, smart enough, talented enough, or thin enough.

We tell ourselves that we don’t deserve the things we want.

Or that the things we want to have or experience will never happen, and even if they do, they will be disappointing

Our negative self-talk affects us in a very powerful way.

If we think something is possible, we’re more likely to make the effort to achieve it. If we think it’s impossible, we won’t even bother trying.

If we think we are a good person who deserves to live a life we love, we will create that life. But, if we think we are undeserving or not capable enough, we will sabotage our own efforts without even realizing it.

Studies show that your thoughts also have a physical impact on your body. Take polygraph tests (commonly referred to as lie detector tests), for example.

They demonstrate how your thoughts directly influence your blood pressure, muscle tension, temperature, breathing rate, heart rate, even how much your hands sweat. Those are some pretty significant physical reactions to our thoughts!

Effects of Negative Self-Talk

When you experience the effects of negative thoughts – such as thoughts that create the emotional states of fear, anger, anxiety, guilt, shame, or regret:

• The muscles in your body actually become weaker.
• Your stress levels go up.
• You experience changes in your biochemistry and hormone levels, and you may even suffer from gastrointestinal or digestive problems among other physical symptoms.

Studies also show that negative people tend to be more depressed and are generally less satisfied with life.

In contrast, when you experience positive thoughts, you flood your brain with endorphins, which helps you relax so you are more alert and centered.

Not only that, positive thinking increases your experience of pleasure while reducing physical pain.

And as a result, you’re far more likely to be confident, optimistic, and motivated to do what it takes to achieve your goals.

How to Stop Negative Self-Talk

But for some people, shifting their negative thoughts to positive ones is easier said than done.

Some people have a lifelong habit of seeing the bad in everything, including themselves. They might try to justify their negativity by pointing out everything bad that’s happening in the world and saying they are “just being realistic.”

But in reality, all they’re doing is mentally sabotaging themselves.

The good news is, you are ultimately in control of your thoughts – because you are the source of them!

That means you can learn to consciously choose to replace your negative thoughts with positive ones that will make your life better. Not all negative thoughts are the result of your inner critic run wild.

There are other types of negative thinking, that if you can learn to identify them and counter them, you can create a happier, more successful and more fulfilling life.

Negative Self-Talk Examples – And How to Overcome Them

I’d like to share five of the main types of negative thinking – so you can recognize them when they happen and then consciously choose to replace them with something more positive.

1. “Always or Never” Thinking

This is when you find yourself thinking in terms of always, never, every time, everyone, no one, and so on.

For example, thoughts like, “I will never get a raise,” or, “Nobody cares about me,” or, “I always screw up, no matter what.”

This type of thinking is not only detrimental to your happiness, it’s not based in reality. It’s not true that NO ONE cares about you, or that you will NEVER get a raise.

Well, that last one might be true if you never do the necessary work to get a raise. But then you’re the one who is creating that situation. Which means that you can change it.

It’s not an absolute given.  

2. “Focusing on the Negative” Thinking

This is when you’re so busy looking at everything that’s bad in the world, you can’t see the good.

But the truth is life isn’t all bad, just as it isn’t all good. It’s a combination of both. There is a positive side and a negative side to pretty much everything.

And since you get to choose what you are going to focus on, why not choose to focus on the positive?

I promise you it will have a much better impact on your life and your health if you do.

3. Catastrophic Predicting

This is when you imagine the worst possible outcome in any situation and convince yourself of its inevitability– usually without any real facts to back it up.

A good example of this would be that you begin to imagine that you are going to be laid off from work, or that North Korea is going to send a nuclear missile and blow up Los Angeles, even when there is no concrete evidence that supports your prediction.

Even though the worst-case scenario rarely ever happens, you act like it’s just a matter of time and you let it dominate your thoughts and actions.

The truth is we never know what the future holds – and history shows that worst-case scenarios seldom come to pass. So why worry about something that hasn’t happened yet, and most likely never will?

You are much better off to simply focus on what is actually happening in the current moment and focus on that – such as the task at hand.

4. Mind Reading

The fourth type of negative thinking is a sneaky one. This is when you tell yourself you know what another person is thinking – and it’s always something bad.

Do you ever find yourself having an argument in your head with someone?

You imagine them saying all sorts of terrible things that frustrate or anger you, or hurt you and make you feel ashamed?

THAT is mind reading…

In reality, you have absolutely no idea what that person is thinking. But you tell yourself that you do – and you let this false belief negatively impact your relationships.

Remember, most likely you aren’t psychic. The only way you can ever truly know what someone else is thinking is to ask them and have an honest conversation about it. That’s also how you form deeper, more meaningful relationships.

5. Guilt Tripping

Guilt Tripping is when you focus on everything bad you’ve ever done, everything that makes you feel guilty or ashamed, and you allow that to define your perception of who you are.

You tell yourself you’re a loser and a bad person and that you don’t deserve to feel happy or achieve the success you long for.

And so you give up before you even start.

I’ve seen people waste their entire lives because of their feelings of guilt over something they did decades ago – had an abortion, lost a marriage due to their alcohol or drug abuse, created a traffic accident, lost soldiers under their command in battle, spent time in jail, or convinced themselves that someone else’s death or suicide could have been prevented if they had acted differently.  

The thing is, EVERYONE, including me, has done things they regret.

You shouldn’t allow that to define you.

You have also done a lot of really great stuff in your life.

If you focus on the good things and start to see yourself as a fundamentally good person who has made some mistakes but is also capable of achieving great things, you will open yourself once again to a life of unlimited possibility.

Stop Negative Self-Talk Today!

Begin to listen to how you talk to yourself – and how you talk to others.

Do you focus on the negative and assume the worst?

Are you constantly tearing yourself down?

Do you think in terms of “always or never”?

Do you assume you know what others are thinking without checking it out?

Every time you catch yourself thinking a negative thought, say the words silently or out loud, “Cancel-Cancel” and then consciously shift it into a positive thought instead.

Speaking of thoughts, if you have any to share, leave a comment below. I’d love to see what you have to say! If you’d like to learn more about positive thinking, take a look at this free guide.