Daily Gratitude: “If the mind can stay with itself and not go out looking for things to criticize or latch onto, it can maintain a natural form of stillness.”

Have you ever said or thought “I wish I could just shut out the world”?

You can. You are in charge of your mind. You can be your own Ring doorbell. You can hear something banging at your door, trying to get your attention. But you don’t have to open the door right away. Use your Ring doorbell (or in the old days, the peephole) and take a peek at who (or what if you’re talking about the mind) is trying to gain entrance.

Is this “visitor” an invited guest (something that will help you reach a goal you’ve set)? Or is it an intruder (something that will distract you or veer you off into a direction that really has no purposeful aim)? Is the visitor there to help or hinder you?

You should be able to tell from that peek but sometimes you need to ask a few questions. If you do, though, make sure you ask them while the visitor is still outside. Once you’ve let them in, your control over them weakens.

You want to let in those thoughts and activities and relationships that further your goals and keep you on track.

You want to keep out the ones that will distract you or once they gain a foothold, carry you along as if you’re a “tuber” traveling down the rapids and you have nothing to steer with.

Don’t let anything in without making a conscious evaluation and decision. You control your mind. Be your own Ring doorbell.

Daily Gratitude: “The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”

If you go into every incident or situation with this attitude, you’ll be amazed at what you might learn.

Even “experts” are able to learn more and more about their field. It might be a new perspective because of a way someone else looked at the situation. Or maybe a new question was asked. Most people who have extensive experience in a field are actually pretty humble and know that the best ideas come from finding out more about the subject they love.

Imagine what you can discover if you look at something thinking you know nothing about it. We get into so much trouble prejudging situations and people. When we do that, we close off the creative portions of our brain. Instead we should want those areas to be as open as possible. You may get thoughts and ideas you never thought possible.

As usual I recommend you practice or try this out. Maybe you have kids and you can enter into a conversation with them with the know nothing attitude. Let them enlighten you.

Do this with your significant other or even just a friend. You both can do it and then exchange thoughts about what you learn and what surprised you.

Try it!

Daily Gratitude: “A life run entirely by the imagined verdicts of others is not your life.”

Why are we so driven by the need for approval? It’s thought to be because we are a tribal species and if the rest of the tribe didn’t approve of you or what you were doing, you were ostracized, kicked out of the tribe and left to fend for yourself. Way back when that was a recipe for disaster. Nowadays it may feel like a psychological disaster but you will survive physically.

Our primitive brains don’t realize this though. So, they continue to operate as they did in ancient times.

Once we recognize this and remove the emotional overlay from any “possibility” for rejection, we can analyze the situation and then figure out what the best thing to do is.

The key is taking the time (the “pause” I write about so much), allowing yourself to feel whatever is stirring up inside you, and then putting on your analytical cap and figuring out whether you really really really need that other person’s approval. Focus, too, on the word “need”. You may want their approval but that’s a totally different thing than “needing” it.

Once you’ve looked at it that way, you should be able to decide what you need to do or not do regardless of what others think.

Pause, Feel, Analyze.