North Star Mental Fitness Blog

Identify Signals; Not Problems; Not Symptoms!

Identify signals is the fifth blog in the series, If You Can Drive a Car, You Can Have Satisfying and Sensitive Relationships.  So far we have established

Fight the Giants in Your Life

There are giants in all of our lives.  The Giants that we face take many forms.  For some it is declining health.  For others it may be the economy; lost jobs, failed mortgages or depreciated savings.  For others it may be big bgovernment or political pressures and fears.  For others it may be relationship conflicts or concerns regarding your children.  For some it may be obtaining an education, finding a job, grieving the loss of a loved one or finding a new relationship.

Everyone has Giants in their lives.  Remember the opening scene from the movie "Troy".  Achilles  faced the Giant Thessalonian.  Everyone feared the Giant except for Achilles.  Remember the conversation with a small child, who questioned the wisdom of fighting the Giant.  The child was afraid to face the Giant and Achilles responded "that is why you will not be remembered".

Remember the story about David and Goliath.  Even when we feel that we can't defeat the Giants in our life, it is important to stand up and fight.  The Giants may be overwhelming.  We may think that what we can do is insignificant.  Even though we feel beaten down, we must not quit and give up.  We must rise up from our doubts, fears and anxiety.

We must become stronger than the Giants in our lives.  We must stand up and face our problems and find solutions.  We must leave a successful legacy for ourselves, family and society.  We must do whatever is necessary to take care of ourselves and defeat the Giants in our lives.

CJ Lee wrote a very interesting commentary regarding Achilles defeat of the Thessalonian Giant.  He entitled his post "Live Life without Regrets".  CJ realized that problems are really opportunities.  He wrote:

"Once in a lifetime opportunities should not be hampered by fear. They should be embraced with positive thinking, will, and determination. This does not ensure that everything will go right every time, but you will certainly live a life without regret, because you were not afraid to pull the trigger. Doing things that will last forever separates you from others, and to do something that will last forever is probably the greatest opportunity a human can get."

Defeating the Giants in your life, will not only solve the immediate problems in your life, it will also make you stronger and you will leave a wonderful legacy for those who follow. 

Remember, You Live within the Environment Created by Your Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

 

New Year's Acceptance

Almost 2 weeks ago, we made our New Year's resolutions.  In my last blog I emphasized the necessity of having New Year's courage to actualize and experience successful resolutions.

New Year's Acceptance is also an important ingredient necessary for successful achievement of your New Year's resolutions. 

In order to courageously persist, achieve and celebrate your successful resolutions, you are going to have to overcome innumerable obstacles and frustrations.

We hate frustrations and obstacles.  However, it is highly unlikely that you will be able to obtain your New Year's resolutions without overcoming frustrations and obstacles.

After two weeks, you undoubtedly are aware of some of the frustrations that you will have to overcome or work through in order to be successful.

I suggest that you make a list of the 10 biggest frustrations that you will have to master and overcome in order to achieve your New Year's resolutions.  Then decide whether you are willing to accept the frustrations in order to achieve your goal. 

If you decide that you can accept these frustrations and obstacles, then you will be successful.

If there are some frustrations that you will have difficulty accepting, then continue to plant the thought in your mind that you can accept even these frustrations.

Whenever these frustrations occur in the pursuit of your New Year's resolutions, remind yourself that you will accept the frustration in order to be successful.

People, who will be successful in reaching their New Year's resolutions, will be willing to accept the frustrations necessary for success and will courageously pursue their goals.

Remember, You Live within the Environment Created by Your Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

When Your Adult Child Is in Trouble or Troubled

His college-age son recently attempted suicide.  Her daughter has made numerous bad decisions and currently is in a dead-end relationship.  Her daughter repeatedly asks for money and never manages her money well. 

Sudden Change: Psychologically Coping with Economic and Political Losses

How do you deal with devastating and catastrophic economic and political losses from a mental fitness perspective?

Let us begin with Expectation.  When you are mentally fit, you have the expectation that things can go wrong, drastically wrong.  Nothing in life is a continual high.  Although times of prosperity are more pleasing to our psyche, we must expect that there will be good times as well as bad times.  We cannot be prepared for life if we do not have an Expectation that there will be good and bad times economically and politically in our lives.

Secondly, there is Acceptance.  When you are mentally fit, you accept the reality and normalcy of highs and lows in our lives.  It is important to accept the fact that there will be economical and political losses in our lives.  Painful emotions associated with losses can be filtered and lessened by applying  Acceptance.  Acceptance is not the same as liking.  We can accept economic and political losses and still not like them.

Recognition is the third concept.  Expectation and acceptance of the realities of life are useless if we cannot recognize the signals and nature of economic and political losses.  Too often we become complacent.  Too often we deny and rationalize when things are beginning to go wrong.  We must be aware and vigilant in recognizing economic and political losses.  When economic and political losses descend upon us, we must recognize them before we can take constructive action.

The world of sports provides great analogies and strategies for coping with economic and political losses.  In sports the concept of momentum is important.  It is important to generate momentum and keep momentum going, even when momentum breakers occur.

In our economic and political aspects of our lives, it is important to maintain momentum, when we have times of economic and political losses.  The mortgage crisis, credit freeze, political and economic corruption are all potential momentum breakers.  These momentum breakers can destroy our confidence, hope and motivation.  We do not have to be defeated by these momentum breakers.

The legendary University of Michigan football coach, Bo Schembechler had a wonderful strategy for overcoming momentum breakers.  He called it "Sudden Change".  It did not matter whether the momentum breaker was a fumble or interception.  He taught and trained his players and coach to yell Sudden Change, when there was a momentum breaker.  He also instilled the belief in his players and coaches and trained them to play harder with greater commitment and passion following a momentum breaker.

It also does it matter what the momentum breaker is in our life regarding our economics and politics. 

When we have a momentum breaker in our economic and political lives, it is important to yell Sudden Change and dig in with commitment and passion to defeat the economic and political losses in our lives.  In terms of the old saying "when the going gets tough, the tough get going".

As we live in times of economic losses and perhaps political losses, let us not use our energies to fight the acceptance and reality of the losses.  Let us accept our losses and set appropriate expectations for the future regarding losses. 

Let us energize ourselves with renewed energy, renewed dreams, commitment and passion to overcome whatever economic and political obstacles occur in the process of our self-actualization in the economic and political aspects of our lives!

We must remember We Live within the Economic and Political Environment Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

Do facts and Consequences Matter?

Yesterday, I had the opportunity of observing a mother disciplining her two children.  It was very revealing to listen to their conversation.  The mother was trying to get the children to pick up their clothes and clean their room.

Of course, the children pouted and proclaimed their innocence.  The blamed each other for their mess.  Then the children denied that their room was messy.  Finally out of frustration, they looked at their mother and called her "mean".

It was clear that the girls were trying to avoid the reality of their mess and the consequences derived from their mess by calling their mother "mean".

As I observe the interactions between this mother and her children, I thought about the current election. 

Have you noticed how often politicians call the opponent "negative" or accuse the opponent of engaging in negative advertising?

Have you noticed that politicians avoid facing facts and cleaning up their messes by calling their opponents "negative"?

Have you noticed that politicians avoid admitting consequences deriving from their past decisions and past choices by calling their opponent "negative"?

Have you noticed that politicians avoid accountability, responsibility and honesty by calling their opponents "negative"?

Can you tell me how a child calling his or her mother "mean" is any different than a politician calling his or her opponent "negative"?

Do you think that politicians and the media that label opponents, advertisements and comments as "negative" have sunk to the mentality and maturity of a child?

I ask you, have you been thinking as a child, when you don't see and hear politicians avoiding facts and consequences by claiming their opponent is "negative"?

I ask you, do you want a candidate with the mentality and maturity of a child to become president? 

It is important to choose a president who has character as reflected by self awareness, accountability, responsibility, honesty, and truthfulness!.  It is important to choose a president who is not afraid to clean up their messes, address facts and consequences deriving from these facts! 

Remember, We Will Live within the Country Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

Mental Fitness and Economic Tough Times

Last week was a nightmare for our economy; in fact for the world economy.  We saw the stock market plummet.  We see our savings ripped away from our investments.  The value of our homes has dropped.  We are fearful that we may lose our jobs.  Will we be able to support our families?

We see giant banks fail?  We see incompetence and self-serving interests destroying our Congress and Executive branch of our government.  We see government policies underlying the financial principles of good business.  We see greed on Wall Street.  We see the President and Congress bailing out big industry and we feel we are not being represented.

There is no doubt that our country and the world's economy are on the verge of collapse.  We are experiencing post traumatic stress and the economy is the stress.  We are angry!  We are fearful!  We have been deceived!  We experienced panic!  We are discouraged and depressed!

All of these emotional reactions are understandable and natural.  The economic catastrophe has strangled our lifestyle and is threatening our well-being.

From a mental fitness perspective, we have a choice: 

1. We can allow the economy to determine our feelings and actions.  
2. We can realize that our thinking determines our feelings and actions regarding the economy.

We can empower ourselves even in bad economic times by how we think.  We do not have to allow the economy to determine our mood and quality of life.   We do not have to allow things outside of our control destroy the quality of our life.

How do we empower ourselves in bad times?   We focus on taking care of ourselves!  We focus on our inner strength.  We focus and make choices to take care of ourselves.  We feel good about out decisions.  If we focus and act to take care of ourselves, our thinking will determine our mood and outlook on life.

With greater urgency we approach our lives in difficult times.  We realize our confidence is not determined by the economy.  Our confidence is the result of our inner thinking, decision-making, and commitment to do what is necessary to take care of ourselves.

In good or bad times, we must take care of ourselves.  Let us focus on what we must do to take care of ourselves and our families.  Let us commit to freedom generated by our choice making. 

Let us unite and commit to reforming our government and economic system.   Let us stop being victimized by our elected officials and companies entrusted to manage our financial resources.  Let us stop listening to the lies and rhetoric from Washington and Wall Street.  Let us become aware.  Let us purge from out government and big business those who are motivated by self-serving interests and party allegiance to the detriment of our country.

Remember, We Live within the Environment and Economy Created by Our Choices.

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

Do You Know Why?

Have you ever wondered why people exercise?

Do you know why they continue to exercise?

In my last post, Do You Believe That Your Life Experiences Have Made You Mentally Fit, I emphasized that life experiences, although grueling at times, do not make us physically or mentally fit.

In order to become mentally or physically fit, it is necessary to go beyond the experiences of everyday living and perform exercises on a regular basis.

So what are the general benefits for becoming mentally and physically fit?

First of all, mental and physical fitness can make us healthier.  Don't we all want to be healthier?

Secondly, mental and physical fitness training makes us stronger for managing our everyday lives.  Mental and physical fitness training can make us stronger for coping with the stresses and demands of everyday living.

Successful managing of life experiences will not necessarily make us physically and mentally stronger.  In contrast, successful mental and physical fitness training will make us stronger in managing life experiences.

If you want to be physically stronger in coping with everyday life experiences, then commit to a physical fitness program.

If you want to be mentally and emotionally stronger for coping with everyday life experiences, then commit to a mental fitness program like The North Star Mental Fitness Program.

Remember, You Live within Environment Created by Your Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

Do You Believe That Your Life Experiences Have Made You Mentally Fit?

Every day of your life you are and have been making decisions.  Basically, you are making good decisions and sometimes very difficult decisions.  Have you been successful in completing your educational vocational goals?  

You will probably agree with the following statement. You could not have obtained your current status in life without sweating, thinking clearly and making difficult decisions. 

Aren't you challenged everyday when you cope with life's frustrations and problems?  Life is full of problems, which you face on a daily basis.  You have made the best choices available to you.  This I firmly believe.

Therefore, it is a no-brainer.  You have been successful and are successful.  You have shown some mental strength, courage, and persistence by coping with your life on a daily basis.  You have used your mental resources on a daily basis.

I must emphasize that I do not wish to offend anyone by suggesting that they need mental fitness training.  I do not want to depreciate anyone's abilities to succeed and their current efforts in coping with their lives.

However, mental fitness is a lot like physical fitness.  There was a time that people thought they did not need physical fitness training.  They thought that coping with the ordinary physical demands of their everyday living would make them physically fit.  We now know that that is a false belief.  Living one's life on a daily basis does not make a person physically fit.  If a person wants to be physically fit, then they must focus and commit to exercising on a frequent basis.

Likewise, coping with the mental demands of everyday living will not make you mentally fit.  You can have mental successes in coping with your life without mental fitness training.  However, coping with the mental demands of everyday living will not make you mentally fit.

Mental fitness and physical fitness are a lot alike.  Coping with the everyday demands of life do not make a person physically or mentally fit.  If you want to be mentally and physically fit, it is important to do mental and physical exercises.

If you thought that coping with everyday problems and life situations would make you mentally fit, might you be missing something?

Remember, You Will Live within the Environment Created by Your Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

Do You Have An Attention Problem?

Life decisions begin the moment you awaken and end when you go to sleep at night.  During your waking hours, you make hundreds of decisions.  The nature of your particular circumstances will not matter.  What matters is the fact that you are perpetually making difficult, life decisions throughout the day.

Life decisions are becoming more difficult, because of the economy and raising fuel costs.