Empowering Your Mind – Page 21 – Mindset, Motivation and Empowerment

Focus, the Power Behind Success

November 8, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

by Linda-Ann Stewart

“Your ability to focus is the most important success skill you can ever develop.” Brian Tracy

In today’s world, it’s hard to stay focused. It seems that every minute, there’s something to divert your attention. You probably check your email several times a day. Every time there’s a notification from your phone, you have to see what it is. That’s in addition to interruptions from co-workers, family and friends. After a distraction, studies show it takes at least fifteen to twenty minutes to get focused again.

Also, your mind can focus on only one thing at a time. Each time you shift your attention from one thing to another, you’re “task switching” and it burns up extra mental energy. When the entire day is filled with these intrusions, you end the day feeling drained and exhausted, with very little to show for it.

Benefits of Focus

However, when you’re more focused, you feel more in charge of your world, get in the flow and get more done. You also have less stress and overwhelm, because your mind has one thing to do at a time. In addition, you have more clarity, so you make better decisions, as well as being more efficient, effective, and productive.

Therefore, to achieve your goals and dreams, your ability to focus is vital. Fortunately, it’s a skill that you can cultivate and develop. The more you focus, the more you’re able to focus. It’s just like a muscle. The more you use it, the stronger it becomes.

How to Create the Habit of Focus

You can’t be focused all the time, because the unexpected does happen on occasion. But you can set aside time each day to pay attention to your most important tasks. Schedule time into your day to focus on important projects. Here are some ways you can get started and cultivate your ability to focus.

Motivate yourself to focus. Decide how having increased focus benefits you, and remind yourself of that incentive when you set aside time for it. As you build your motivation, and act on it, focusing becomes a habit. Jim Rohn said, “Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” Once you establish the habit of focusing, your mind will automatically know what to do when you want to do it.

Use visualization. Choose one task that will move you towards your vision or goal. What is it you want to focus on and achieve in this period? Before you get to work on it, take a couple of minutes to visualize yourself performing your task and accomplishing what you want. This increases your motivation, and primes your subconscious to start solving any issues you might encounter. You’re rehearsing your actions, which then makes them easier to execute.

Eliminate distractions. Find a way to minimize the effects of whatever can intrude on your focus time. For instance, research shows that if your phone is in the same room as you’re in, your mind is always tuned to it. Even turning your phone off doesn’t work. Therefore, put your phone in another room, where you can’t see it or hear it. Turn off your email. Close your door.

Minimize multi-tasking. Constant multi-tasking trains your mind to hinder your focus. However, you don’t have to completely avoid multi-tasking. When you’re performing automatic behaviors, such as doing dishes, watching television doesn’t drain you. Or you can pay bills and listen to a podcast. But when you do activities that need you to think, multi-tasking uses up mental bandwidth and exhausts your energy. Your mind is always seeking something new, and when you multi-task, you jump from one attention getting novelty to another. Multi-tasking triggers the reward centers of the brain, therefore gives you an incentive to repeat the process, which makes multi-tasking addictive.

Strengthen your focus muscle. Set aside time to focus on one task without distractions. Start off with as much time as you can before you need a break. You may need to begin with only ten or fifteen minutes. Each week, increase the time. Aim to have a sixty to ninety-minute stretch of focusing on one topic or chore before you take a break. When you take your break, do something that rests your mind for several minutes, such as going for a walk, getting a drink, or something to eat. This gives your mind time to replenish its energy and get ready for your next work period.

Being able to focus is an inherent talent that we all have. But it’s not an skill that is exercised much, so most people have gotten out of practice with it. With the above tactics, you can cultivate your natural ability, strengthen it, and develop it into a habit that will support your success.

Affirmation:
I have a natural ability to focus and pay attention to what’s important to me. It’s a skill that I can develop and grow through practice. The Universe flows Its energy through my focus, supporting my endeavors and smoothing my path to maximize success.

Watch the accompanying video, Guided Meditation to Focus and Accomplish More.

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Focus On What You Want

November 3, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

by Linda-Ann Stewart

In my hypnotherapy practice, when I worked with smokers to help them quit, I told them that if they’re having a hard time giving it up, it’s because for years they’ve told themselves that “I can’t quit,” or “It’s going to be hard.” The subconscious has accepted that declaration and is making sure that it’s giving them what it thinks they want. Even if they’ve made a different decision (to quit), the inner mind is simply obeying the concept with the most energy attached to it.

What have you been unwittingly telling your subconscious? “I’m not good enough,” “I can’t win,” “There isn’t enough (whatever) to go around,” “I can’t find a romantic partner,” “There isn’t enough business,” “There’s a scarcity of jobs,” “I can’t find what I want.” These conclusions are instructions to the subconscious, and it must act on them.

There’s an old saying, “Energy flows where attention goes.” Wherever your attention is, whatever you’ve been focusing on, the subconscious will create a mold for that belief and make it real. It doesn’t matter whether you’ve been concentrating on what you want, or what you don’t want, a desire or a fear. The subconscious can’t discern between positive or negative emotion. It simply recognizes the force of the energy, associates it with the image or concept you’re dwelling on, and thinks, “They must want this or else they wouldn’t have spent so much time thinking about it.” Energy (emotion) plus image (concept) equals result (your experience).

The subconscious is also quite literal. I told smokers that they needed to keep their attention on their desired result. Instead of focusing on quitting smoking, they needed to keep thinking about being a nonsmoker. I’ve known many people who have quit smoking, only to begin again a few weeks or months later because their stated goal was to “Quit smoking.” Once they’d stopped, their subconscious figured, “Okay, we’ve achieved that goal. Now let’s start smoking again so that we get to accomplish it again.”

The same is true for weight reduction. So many people focus on releasing a certain amount of weight, only to regain it again. Their attention was on the activity of reduction instead of eating and exercising for the weight they wanted to be. The subconscious is only doing what it thinks you want. You have to be specific and focus on the end result instead of the steps to get there. The steps are necessary to break the objective down into goals that can be readily accomplished.

This principle applies to every aspect of your life. Do you want a greater income? Instead contemplating the lack of money (which the subconscious perceives to be your aim), fill your mind with the amount you want and how your life will change. If you want a relationship, instead of complaining there you can’t meet anyone you like (the subconscious will make sure you don’t), realize that there are countless number of people to choose from.

Break your objective into attainable steps, small ones you can easily accomplish. And keep your mind on the eventual goal. What do you need to change to achieve it? For instance, a smoker needs to develop new coping skills, as does anyone reducing weight. For greater abundance, do you need to become more visible and network? For a relationship, find ways to meet people of like mind.

Instead of focusing on the lack or blocks to what you want (which the subconscious will misunderstand as instructions), place your attention on the solution and take the actions necessary to get there. Universal energy will flow in, and even if you don’t know how you’ll achieve your objective, you’ll be guided in the right direction. Remember, your subconscious mind will work just as hard to give you what you want as it will to give you what you don’t want. What you concentrate on and then receive from Life is up to you.

Affirmation:

I become aware of the negative messages I’ve been telling myself. Recognizing that they are outdated and that I want to change them, I find a way to open my mind to the possibilities. I now focus on what it is that I do want. As I identify the positive changes that my goal will manifest in my life, I take the actions necessary to bring about the change I desire. My subconscious finds the way to bring it about, and the Universe guides and directs me in the right direction.

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Book Review: Your Erroneous Zones

October 20, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

Your Erroneous Zones: Step-by-Step Advice for Escaping the Trap of Negative Thinking and Taking Control of Your Life
By Wayne Dyer

This is the book that propelled Wayne Dyer into his path as a self-improvement and spiritual leader. Although I have trouble with Dyer’s authoritarian tone, this is a must have book if you’re working through self-esteem issues. Not only does it address various false beliefs, “erroneous zones,” that have created a low sense of self-worth, it explores the possible reasons we keep them going.

For every belief we have, positive or negative, there was an original purpose for it. And sometimes the subconscious thinks that the reason still exists, despite evidence to the contrary. We also tend to receive benefits out of even negative attitudes. This book examines and dismantles those reasons and benefits. It brings self-defeating beliefs and attitudes into the light of awareness so that the reader can make a conscious decision to either keep them or change them.

The whole message of this book is to take charge of your life and your emotions. Because, by doing so, you can change your life.

~ Linda-Ann Stewart

Get Greater Satisfaction from Living Intentionally

October 20, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

Living intentionally brings better health, happiness, freedom and peace of mind. It’s not always easy to live intentionally, because you have to be pro-active or let other people or circumstances make the choice for you. Learn how making deliberate choices brings you better outcomes and the results you want.

Transcript:

Do you live intentionally? Living intentionally means that you deliberately choose a desired result and follow through to create it. It also means that you chose to live according to your values and beliefs. When you live intentionally, you’re healthier, happier, freer and more at peace. Who wouldn’t want that?

Living intentionally is not easy, because every day, your life is made up of a series of choices. You can either make a decision each time a choice arises or let that decision be made for you by other people or by circumstances. Many times, it’s easier to let other people or circumstances make the choice for you, but then you feel helpless and hopeless. And you probably won’t get the outcome you seek.

Whether or not you live intentionally is like being in a canoe in a swift running creek. Do you want to use the paddle to keep you on course or throw that paddle away and let the creek toss you about every which way? This would be the proverbial, “Up a creek without a paddle” scenario, right?

If you don’t have a paddle, which is your decision making power, your canoe might run onto rocks and be overturned and you’d be in the water. Not a good result, right? Being intentional is like using your paddle to direct your canoe through the water safely.

When you’ve chosen a result you’re willing to work towards, or to live by your values, most of your choices become easier. You discard the possibilities that lead you away from your path, and choose the ones that support the direction you want to go. You’re more focused and fulfilled. You feel empowered, motivated and in control.

How can you become more intentional with your choices today?

For more tips and articles on mindset, motivation and empowerment, please visit my blog EmpoweringYourMind.com.

Have a wonderful and intentional day.

Read the accompanying article Why You Need a Vision and Plan.

Why You Need a Vision and Plan

October 6, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

by Linda-Ann Stewart

When you choose to grow a garden, do you start watering the plot without planning what you want to grow in it? Or do you decide what plants you want, and till and fertilize the soil to make it receptive for those kinds of plants? Don’t you clear the area of growth that doesn’t fit with your plan? And then you choose seeds or seedlings you want and place them in the soil. To care for your garden, you water, feed the plants, and weed out what doesn’t belong.

Your mind and life is like a garden. If you just jump into a garden, or life, without a vision or plan, you’re going to receive what plants and seeds are already in that plot. By not sowing any new seeds, you can only harvest what is already growing there. You won’t reap anything new. In this case, to misquote an investment disclaimer, “Past performance will indicate future results.”

The Downside to Going with the Flow

Many people just want to go with the flow, having no intention, vision or plan. They want to follow instinct or intuition, without any real idea of what they want. This kind of philosophy is fine if you want to float through life. But if you want to change a habit, or achieve something, you have to be more deliberate.

The problem with the idea of just flowing is that it means you’re acting on what’s already in your subconscious. There’s no new destination or goal. It’s like watering a garden without putting any thought into what you want. You’ll get what you get, not necessarily what you want. Your subconscious can only deliver on the ideas you’ve already sown into it. If you’re simply following your subconscious, you’ll wander in circles, never accomplishing anything new. And the weeds in the garden of your life may choke out most of the flowers.

The Role of Your Conscious and Subconscious

Your subconscious has a specific role to play in your life and it’s a powerful one. Your subconscious is your problem solver, and where your creativity and insights come from. But your subconscious can’t make decisions for you. Choices must come from your conscious mind to be fulfilled by your subconscious. Your subconscious uses all your knowledge and experience to help you achieve your intention. But your subconscious can’t seek any outside information to help. New information has to come to, and through, your conscious mind.

Your conscious mind chooses your destination, intentions, goals or vision. Your subconscious provides you with the ideas, innovation and insights to realize them. When you have a vision and plan, you give your subconscious concrete information to work with. With a vision, your subconscious knows what to seek and scans your environment to help you. Your plan creates guiderails and makes it easier for your subconscious to locate and discover opportunities.

Tending Your Intention

In your garden or your life, not all the seeds you sow will germinate and not all of the plants will survive to maturity. The same is true of your vision and plan. You’ll need to discover what didn’t survive and why, and address that problem. It could be that you didn’t tend to your garden as much as it needed or that the soil wasn’t fertile enough. Maybe circumstances changed, and your vision and plan needs to be adjusted.

If you want better results in your life, you’ll tend to the garden of your intention. A garden takes constant attention to support its growth and fertility. Only after putting in the effort will you reap the rewards. Your life deserves the same care, love and consideration as a garden.

Affirmation:

As I choose my direction in life, it gives the Law of Attraction definite details of what to draw to me. The Universe is on my side, and wants the best for me. I’m Divinely Guided and Directed into the right path for my Highest Good. Everything I need is provided in the best way possible.

Watch the accompanying video, Get Greater Satisfaction from Living Intentionally.

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Actions Favor a Prepared Mind

October 4, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

By Linda-Ann Stewart

Trish was an amazing and talented interior designer. When she finished a job, her clients loved the results. Unfortunately, her talent couldn’t overcome the other deficits in her business. She wasn’t consistent when she worked with clients. She’d set appointments, but wouldn’t show up. As a result, she rarely completed a job on time. She undermined herself, not only because she didn’t have business skills, but also because she didn’t have a professional mindset to support her business.

Needing the right mindset isn’t just necessary for business. It’s true for any short or long term goal. If you want to lose weight, get healthier, get a promotion or finish a painting, then you have to have a clear direction and your beliefs have to support it. Without those, your actions will be scattered or lose momentum, which leads to disappointing results for everyone involved.

Planting the Garden of Your Life

Your actions have to be focused and nurtured by your mindset to help them thrive. It would be like being a gardener who didn’t take the time to prepare a plot for their seeds. Imagine that your actions are seeds and your mindset is the soil.

If you scatter your seeds (actions) in all directions, because you don’t have a clear vision of where they should go, most of them will be lost. The wind will take some, and others will land on rocky ground, where they don’t have the nourishment to sprout. A few will be more fortunate and fall on a more fertile area and will germinate.

The few actions that fall on rich soil will produce moderate success, if you’re able to support them with follow up and follow through. Trish didn’t. Even though she was a talented designer, she lost her reputation and referrals because she wasn’t consistent. The same is true for any goal you have.

How Your Actions Affect Your Life

Suppose you want to market your business, and you go to networking events, but don’t follow up with your contacts. You advertise every once in a while, but not enough for people to recognize your business. Every so often, you post on social media, but because you’re not consistent, you don’t gather many followers. You’re taking the scattergun approach, hoping that you’ll hit something, but you usually don’t.

Maybe you want to begin an exercise program. You choose a gym and pay for membership, but only go once in a while. Because you haven’t changed what’s important in your life, to make it a priority, you eventually give up.

Preparation Is Key

If you want to be successful, in any area of life, you have to make sure all is ready for your actions to flourish. You have to prepare the soil (your mindset) by tilling it to loosen it so a seed can take root and germinate. Any weeds, or conflicting beliefs, need to be eliminated so they don’t crowd out your new plant. You need to apply the fertilizer of positive and supportive attitudes to enrich the soil.

Unless you know where to sow your seeds, and have prepared the ground, you’re going to waste a lot of energy. Only a very small percentage of your actions will germinate and very few of those will bloom. Actions need to be targeted, supporting the vision, nourished by your mindset. People can have a bunch of goals, thinking those goals are taking them in the direction they want to go. But they’re just in motion, without any definite purpose.

Trish treated her business more as a hobby. Instead of respecting her agreements, she figured that since she was the boss, she could complete the job whenever it was convenient for her. She didn’t understand that her clients were her employers and that she needed to keep her promises. Trish lacked business skills, but more than that, she didn’t have a businessperson’s mindset.

Louis Pasteur said, “Fortune favors a prepared mind.” When you’ve prepared your plot, knowing what you want to plant and where (your vision) and having fertile soil (your mindset), the seeds you sow in the area will sprout. Not all of them will, but if they’re watered and cared for, most of them will. Take care of your vision and mindset, and your actions will be successful, bringing you the results you desire.

Affirmation:

The Universe supports all of my endeavors. It wants me to be successful. Any idea that might sabotage my vision and goals are now erased from my consciousness. They don’t serve me. I now open my mind to creating a grand and glorious future. As I take care of my mindset, focusing on what I want, my actions lead to success.

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Sparks of Insight

October 1, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

“A man’s life is what his thoughts make of it.” William James

You view your life through a filter, made up of your thoughts about the matter. That filter then colors what you perceive in the situation. Whether it’s true or not, you then act on that perception. Your life is made up of the actions you’ve taken or not taken, based on your perceptions at the time. Every moment, you have multiple choices of how to view your world and how to respond to it. Consider what kind of life do you want, and then decide on the thoughts you need to have to bring it about.

~ Linda-Ann Stewart

Guided Meditation to Find Powerful Motivation to Achieve Your Goals

September 14, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

When you’re pursuing a goal, you have to have some sort of motivation to either jumpstart your action or keep you going. There are two basic kinds of motivation, and each has their place. But there’s one kind of motivation that will inspire you in the tough times. Learn what that motivation is, and use this guided meditation to uncover the motivation that will see you through.

Transcript:

When you are working towards some goal, you’re motivating yourself in one of two ways: either by external or internal rewards. External motivation is what’s been called the carrot and stick model, or pleasure/pain principle. You’ve heard of that, right?

In essence, you hold something pleasant in front of you to keep going, the carrot, or you remind yourself of something painful that could happen if you stop, the stick. Have you ever done either of those? External motivation works to get you started on a project or goal, but it doesn’t really keep you committed.

However, internal motivation keeps you going through the tough times, because it comes from within you. You’re like an energizer bunny. Internal motivation brings you more satisfaction, fulfillment, and greater productivity. So how do you find your internal motivation to pursue a goal? I’d like to share a short meditation to help you discover it.

If you want, close your eyes. Take a deep breath, and let it out slowly.

Think about a goal you have, or something you want to change in your life. Ask yourself these questions:

Why is it you want your goal or change?
What is your reward or how will you feel when accomplishing your goal or achieving the change? When external reasons come to mind, such as money or approval, go beyond them, dig deeper. Find what truly inspires you.
What will encourage you to keep going, even if you have setbacks?

Open your eyes. Just asking yourself these questions will begin to stir up your internal motivation. Pick one of these questions and ask it once or twice a day. You may be surprised to find an answer will pop into your mind when you least expect it. Then use it to keep you on course to your goals.

To achieve your goals with confidence and ease in 4 powerful steps, watch my FREE training video, Set Your Course to Success. Register for the video and accompanying action planning guide at www.SetYourCourseGuide.com. One of the steps has to do with finding and using your motivation. Find the motivation that will keep you committed, and you’ll persist until you achieve your goal.

5 Secrets to Improve Your Chances of Success

September 13, 2021 Linda-Ann Stewart

by Linda-Ann Stewart

When you want to achieve a goal, you focus on that desire. You can create a focus or vision board about it, formulate a list of the steps, and take action to put it into motion. But if the overall tendency of your thoughts isn’t optimistic, even if you’re generally positive about your goal, then you’ll have a hard time bringing it into reality.

When working with the Law of Attraction, practitioners state what they want. They visualize and affirm its fulfillment. But they neglect to address their supporting consciousness. For a seed to sprout, it needs to be planted in fertile soil. If it drops onto parched dirt, there’s no way it can germinate.

For instance, suppose you want to start a new business. You get all the paperwork in order, market your product or service, and have some limited success. The quality of your success depends not only on your belief that you’ll achieve it, but on whether you have a pessimistic or optimistic outlook. If your thoughts are predominantly negative, you’ll have an uphill battle.

Although focusing on the specific outcome you want is necessary to achieve the desired result, that’s not the complete picture. The subconscious acts on the average of your thoughts. If your negative thoughts outweigh your positive ones, then achieving success is going to be like dragging an anvil uphill over a rocky path.

Focusing only on your goal and its plan is like exercising to improve one single area of your body. If you only work on strengthening your stomach muscles, you’ll get mediocre abs and the rest of your body will be in poor shape. But if you exercise the rest of your body too, you’ll find that it increases the response of your abdomen to its workout. This is because the condition of your whole body is now balanced and can support the other muscles that help the abs. Whole body training is much more effective than spot training.

When you improve your overall attitude towards life, to become more optimistic, you’ll find that success comes to you much easier and more quickly. Your subconscious is instructed by your belief that change is possible and good things can happen in an instant. By addressing your supporting consciousness, more energy can be channeled into fulfilling your goal. As a result, you may bump into a contact who can open doors for you, or have opportunities drop into your lap.

Here are 5 ways to improve your overall consciousness of good and increase your chance for success:

State what you’re grateful for. Every night, write down 3 things you’re grateful for. In doing so, you’re directing your subconscious to find more to appreciate. Studies show that doing this can improve your positive attitude for months and increase your productive energy.

Put yourself on a criticism diet. When you criticize anything in your life, you’re focusing on the negative. And that instructs the subconscious to bring more to criticize into your life. Criticism contracts and destroys. Praise expands and builds. That’s why gratitude is so important.

Look for the good in everything. Whenever you seek to find the gold in a seemingly unhappy situation, you’re instructing your creative mind to find a benefit from it. If this exercise is a stretch for you, then focus on the small joys of life. Pay attention to whatever good happens during the day, no matter how tiny or insignificant it might be. Dwell on the delight.

Remember your successes. Bring to mind how you’ve met and overcome challenges, even if they’re small. Linger over them, impressing their positive images and emotions on your mind. Remind yourself that if you could do it once, you can build on it and do it again in a bigger way.

Take time to meditate. Not only does meditation reduce stress, it builds resources for you to draw on in challenging times. To begin with, you can simply observe your breath going in and out for 2 minutes. This trains your mind to quiet down. As you get comfortable with that length, you can extend the session a minute at a time.

Build a well of optimism for yourself, and when you set a goal, you’ll have all of that positive energy that can be used to focus on it. Only by increasing and improving the overall quality of your thoughts will you be able to achieve the success you desire and deserve.

Affirmation:

I know the Universe wants the best for me. When I become aware that I’m being critical, I stop and find something to praise in the situation. Gratitude instructs my creative mind to find more to appreciate, therefore the good in my life expands. I delight in the small and large joys of life. As I do, I open the channel for more Universal good to flow into my life.

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