North Star Mental Fitness Blog

Acceptance: Can You Really Accept?

Can you accept what you don't like in your husband or wife?  Are you willing to accept what you don't like instead of expecting your spouse to change?

Oftentimes, what we don't like in our relationships or our partners are signals of emptiness! 

Most of time we wish that we would not have to deal with the disgusting, frightening and obnoxious signals of emptiness in our spouses or ourselves.  We expect

Is the Stimulus package Stimulating Learned Helplessness?

President Obama acknowledged an "astounding" number of job losses in February.  In spite of the numerous signs confirming our declining economy, President Barack Obama believes his $787 billion economic recovery plan is saving jobs.  President Obama wants us to believe, "I know we did the right thing."  These quotations are from Darlene Supeville, an Associate Press Writer.  Darlene wrote an article entitled Obama on stimulus, "I know we did the right thing".

We know the intended purpose of the stimulus plan was to save jobs and resurrect our economy.  Psychologically, one would hope that the stimulus plan would empower people to become self-confident, self-determined and committed to actualize their psychological and vocational abilities.

If the stimulus plan is creating learned helplessness,

New Year's Quitting

Quitting New Year's resolutions is something you did not want to happen, but very likely has occurred or will occur.  Most people give up on their New Year's resolutions before the end of February.

Why does this happen?  It is not an accident that people quit!  At The Positivity Blog, there was a very interesting posting on "Do you make these 7 mistakes when trying to keep your New Year's resolutions"?

These seven mistakes are:

1. You really don't want it that much.
2. You can use homeostasis with "time to give up".
3. You don't know how to handle your bad days.
4. You're not changing your environment to suit you.
5. You don't have a realistic plan and expectations.
6. You're focusing on too many resolutions at once.
7. You let temporary failure or mistakes lead to giving up completely. 

Can you see yourself making these mistakes?  These mistakes are all reflective of a stronger motivational pattern.  This motivational pattern can best be summarized as "we wanted to quit".

No matter how desirable and worthwhile your New Year's resolution may be, there will be a very strong power inside of you that wants to quit.

We need to accept the normalcy of wanting to quit.   We need to not deny the reality of our wanting to quit doing the things that are good for us.  We need to confront our motivation for quitting.

The desire for quitting will take many forms, such as the seven mistakes listed above and probably many, many more.

Give yourself freedom to quit and then decide whether you want to quit or not.  The motive to quit will be as strong as the motive to actualize your New Year's resolutions.  Therefore, it is important to make a decision about quitting.

Remember You Live with Environment Created by Your Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

New Year's Wake-Up Call

On New Year's Eve, your New Year's Resolutions were the result of a Wake-Up Call. 

Even if you make superficial, self assessments before the clock struck the entrance of the New Year, your New Year's Resolutions probably reflected a desire, a need or a need to take care of yourself differently.

For many people, their New Year's Resolutions were based upon a very accurate and painful analysis of their lives.  For some, keeping their New Year's Resolutions is a matter of life or death; or a matter of personal growth or stagnation.

Every day throughout the new year, we will have many Wake-Up Calls.  Frequent Wake-Up Calls are necessary for us to successfully achieve our New Year's Resolutions,

You may not have identified much of your experience as a Wake-Up Call.  Oftentimes, Wake-Up Calls are mis-understood as problems, weaknesses, symptoms, or character deficiencies. 

When we feel too tired, too sore, two weak, too depressed, too anxious, too stressed, too conflicted, and too whatever, these are our Wake-Up Calls.  What most people perceive as excuses to remain in our comfort zone and justify their failure to achieve New Year's Resolutions, really function as Wake-Up Calls to ensure that you will successfully achieve your New Year's Resolutions.

Every day throughout the New Year, you will have frequent Wake-Up Calls.  Don't miss them.  Interpret specific Wake-Up Calls as your trustworthy signal for taking care of yourself by actualizing New Year's Resolutions.

The more you ignore your Wake-Up Calls, the more you will receive more Wake-Up Calls.  Don't misperceive your Wake-Up Calls as excuses to fail, symptoms, problems or weaknesses.

Remember, You Live within the Environment Created by Your Choices!  Your choices on daily basis will determine whether you succeed or fail in achieving your New Year's Resolutions!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

How Can You Have a Good Relationship With Your Spouse?

Steven Stosny wrote about this dilemma in his post "How Can I Be Me, When You're Being You"? 

Perhaps you have experienced how difficult it is sometimes to be yourself, when you have to deal with it the personality quirks of your partner and your disappointments. 

How Many Successes Do You Need Before You Can Conclude You Are Successful

Recently I talked to a middle-aged woman, who was asked to take a position in a large business.  In order to take this advancement, she had to go way beyond her comfort zone.  A hard-working woman with limited work experience, she openly questioned her ability to succeed.

Every day she did the best she could.  At first she was really overwhelmed, but she still applied herself.  She succeeded on a daily basis for over a year.  She was shocked, when she was asked to take a position with even more responsibility.

She once again agreed to take the new position and hoped that she could be successful.  She has now had two years of successes.  She has had over 730 days of successes.

I think she was shocked when I asked her if she considered herself to be successful.  I don't believe she had ever concluded that "I am a success".

Boren Divorces Michigan Football Team

Divorces and blending family issues occur in sports as well in families.  Lloyd Carr resigned as coach of the U of Michigan football team and most of his coaches were not rehired.  Some players including potential stars left the team.  Justin Boren and his team remained with their mother, the U of Michigan.

Problems really started brewing when the new step-father, Rich Rodriquez divorced West Virginia to take over the leadership role at U of M.  Even now, Coach Rod is still in the middle of a very messy divorce from West Virginia with the unfortunate allegations and legal entanglements common in divorce. 

The mother or U of M football hired Coach Rod to change the culture and family values at the U of M.  Too many losses to Ohio State, underdogs liked Appalachian State, spread offenses and bowl games.  Like so many sons and daughters in families of divorce, Justin Boren and some of his teammates did not like the new father figure changing the family dynamics and culture.  Coach Rod has become the "evil step-father" pushing the mother's "lax children" to greater achievement through hard work, strict rules and new expectations.

Justin like many children in divorce has verbally acted-out and ran away from home.   

Reminiscing about Mental Fitness

He was reminiscing about what he had learned in 35 years of being a manager in an auto factory.  Also he has been married more than 35 years, has two grown children and two grandchildren.  During his life he has wrestled with anxiety and panic. 

In spite of his anxiety and panic, he was able to identify that he has "inner strength".  Adjusting and coping with problems on an everyday basis has made him a much stronger person.

He has learned how to successfully take care of himself, which is the object of mental fitness and mental health.  He reported that he has learned two very important things about taking care of himself.  He has learned that:

I Empowered Myself!

Self-doubt and lacking confidence are often experienced by people, who reenter the world of employment after an illness or raising their children. 

Such was the mindset of this middle-aged women. She has raised her children.  Now, she has been successful in her job, but her perceptions of herself have lagged behind her accomplishments.  She struggled with accepting her success and the benefits of her success.

She thought she didn't deserve good things.  She felt she didn't deserve the accolades and consequences from being successful.

She realized that there was a golden ring in front of her.  She always has been ambivalent about reaching for the ring of opportunity and success. She knew it was there, but she just couldn't reach out for this ring of success.  She worried and was fearful she couldn't measure up.  So she remained in an inhibited and fearful comfort zone.

Visualizing Success

Visualizing success opens the window of opportunity for success.  The Law of Attraction can be actualized in your life by thinking thoughts and visualizing your life as successful.

Tiger Woods, one of the most famous and successful professional golfers emphasized the importance of visualization in these words:

"Every Time I Play, In My Own Mind I Am The Favorite"!