My first thought is to ask whether the personal relationships, referred to in this beautiful quote, are positive or negative. Positive relationships mean that we get on well with people. If we have negative relationships, then that tends to isolate us.

Obviously Ben is taking about positive relationships. The ability to get on well with other people is a golden quality, that oils the success wheels of all kinds of life ventures, where we have to work with other people.

What’s your boss like?

One huge area, where this personal relationship dimension is crucial, is in business. Most businesses are hierarchical, an authority pyramid, with different levels of responsibility for others. A key issue is how the boss treats their workers. Gone are the days when it was simply a matter of dictatorship. What the boss told you to do, you did it. If not, you got fired.

Let’s hope we’re a bit more advanced today. A boss who can command the respect, even the love of their workers, is the boss who builds a successful company. Human relations savvy is essential. Business success, of course, also depends on many other elements; elements such as how the market is doing, whether the product is good enough to compete with competitors, and so on. However . . .

Even if all these other elements are in place, a boss who can’t get on with their staff can undermine the whole business, and lead to failure. An unhappy workplace is a recipe for failure.

Happy Families?

Let’s take another area where relationships are key: families. Countless movies bear witness to what happens when family relationships go wrong. Their storylines depend on disagreements, fights, misunderstandings, etc. On the other hand, Romcoms bear witness to the beauty, joy and happiness that spring from positive relationships – at least by the end of the movie! Yes, “boy still gets girl.”

Politics and Them and Us

We could make a seemingly endless list of different areas of life, where positive relationships are essential, and yet often seem so hard to achieve. A massive area is politics, where the very fibre of political life seems to be a relentless “them and us” battleground.

Of course, this applies in so-called “democratic” countries; but is so much worse in countries still tied in to dictatorial regimes. Countries, where people have to obey like sheep, are hardly likely to result in “advancement, success and achievement” of our Ben Stein quote.

The matter becomes even worse, when we examine the relationship between different countries, especially when they have different models of leadership. That’s the obvious reason why we have so many wars, and today’s no different.

Is there a better, peaceful way?

Many philosophers and spiritual leaders today attempt a paradigm shift in our thinking. They help us to see that it’s possible to move from the duality of “them and us” to the “oneness” of us all. I fear they have a long, uphill struggle.

There are just so many “dualities” we still cling to in life. Dualities, where there are just two options to choose from: them and us, right or wrong, for or against, etc. We experience such dualism is race, religion, politics, rich and poor – to name just a few.

Will the day ever come when we see ourselves as family, as “brothers and sisters?” It’s a beautiful dream, but it seems a long way off.

Maybe you can help?

Maybe not in our lifetime. Utopia still seems an impossible dream. All we can do, as individuals, is to try to live that mindset within our little piece of the world: our family, our friends, and our local community.

How could you do even one little thing to move from division towards unity? What will you do today, tomorrow . . .?

Gerry McCann

@themerry_monk

P.S. How are Unity and Division working out in your life? Please let us know by leaving a comment.

This quotation suggests a radical difference between being clever and being wise. To me, it would seem that, what he means is, that being clever may stop short at amassing information. However, information alone is  not enough.

We also need wisdom, having a good idea how best to use that information. We need to move on from merely clever, and become wise.

Life’s winners and losers

Being wise provides exactly what can be missing in mere cleverness. A wise person knows that information on its own is like having a lot of money, but now knowing how to spend it. I’m sure there are many people who come into money, and then squander it on silly and selfish things.

They only wake up when they’ve spent it all, and realise too late that there were many much better ways they could, and perhaps, should have spent it. They become “wise after the event.”

Classic examples, of course, are some people who win the lottery, and suddenly have an obscene amount of money. We imagine they’re “lucky.” Often, however, they go a bit mad, and suffer a kind of temporary insanity.

They go off and engage in a crazy spending spree, throwing money around, as if it were confetti. After a few months of such extravagance, they’re back to where they started. Were they “lucky”? Perhaps that’s when the regrets begin.

Knowledge is like that, yes we can pile it up in our heads, gain more everyday, but it’s wasted if it’s not put to good use.

Who can change the world?

So, can being clever change the world? Perhaps a merely clever person might be able to change some things. They could start a business, have money savvy, and make a profit. The product they’re selling could very well help a lot of people. They do change the world in some way.

However, perhaps they can’t analyse some really important changes that need to be made, and could be made. Wisdom is surely needed for that. A wise person knows how to use their knowledge to help other people. True wisdom includes generosity, service, altruism.

One who is clever, but without wisdom, may tend to be more selfish. Then again, they may not be selfish at all. Which raises the question: how does one grow knowledge into wisdom? One way that springs to mind is to make good use of a wise mentor, a role model that can add a wise dimension to a knowledgeable but immature person.

Start by changing yourself

This ties in with the last part of the quote. First, we need to change ourselves, before we can successfully change the “world” – in other words, before we can truly “win friends and influence people.” The classic advice of Gandhi springs to mind:

“be the change yourself that you wish to see in others.”

Perhaps another way of looking at the difference, is to realise that being clever may just be book knowledge. True wisdom springs from hard-earned life skills. All the priceless learning that comes from being with other people in different situations, and taking on board the lessons learned.

One sees an example of this in some TV survival programmes. It’s not always the clever guy that copes best. Often the one that shines is the ordinary man or woman with plenty of life skills. People who are wise, who know how to apply their knowledge, and work as a team.

Remember wise old Dale Carnegie?

It is a marvellous thing to want to change the world. Just make sure, it would seem, that you’ve become wise, dealing with people and knowing how best to work with them. Dale Carnegie, the wise old master, spells it out brilliantly, in his classic book “How to win friends and influence people”

He explains how to be a wise and useful member of society, how to make friends and be a person of authentic influence.

Gerry McCann

@themerry_monk

P.S. Love to hear from you about your experience of using knowledge wisely. Please leave your comments.

Do you feel you have much more to offer? Do you feel that life is passing you by? Do you want to do more in your life, live life to the full?

What would you say if you were told you’re not just the product of circumstance? That you do have a choice, that those choices have helped make you who you are, and what you have done up to now.

Are you thinking,

“What me, you must be joking? If I had a choice it would be quite different” 

Put away those pitiful, power-leaching thoughts; because you do have a choice to be the person you want to be. You are what you make yourself.

You could be . . . the person you want to be.

You know that the person, deep down inside of you, knows this is true. That part of you that knows who you could be, who you want to be, who you’re meant to be.

Each one of us is the sum of what we alone have decided, or allowed ourselves to be. Once we reach adulthood, we have the opportunity to choose the kind of life we want, the type of person we want to be. Who we want to spend time with, surround ourselves with.

We make daily choices about hundreds of actions, and decisions we make. We alone decide what type of food we enjoy, what music we like, colours we prefer, who we spend our leisure time with.

You alone have the freedom to change who you are, and what you do, every single day.

“Well, Susan, I didn’t choose my life, my parents. my circumstances. So how can you say it’s my choice?”

I agree, we had very little choice as a child. As adults, we’re often already bound on paths we don’t want. But don’t let that stop you from choosing what you want to do, or be, or changing your course. Let go of that past mindset, those beliefs, excuses and boundaries you may have set up for yourself, or feel tied into.

The chains, of limiting thoughts, that had hold you a prisoner of perceived circumstance and choice. I know it’s not easy to admit. I often felt I had no choice, but I did; maybe not the choices I would have preferred, but I still had them. Once this was revealed to me, I realised I had real power; I was no longer a victim to lame limitations.

We cannot change what life throws at us, or what other people do, or say. However, we can change how we act, think and feel about our own life.

We can decide how we will live our own lives, and what we can make of ourselves.

I want to share with you 7 good reasons why you have the power to be the authentic you.

1. Only you have the right gifts to live your life.  You’re unique; you must develop those gifts, for they give your life meaning. Hone your gifts, every single day, so that they can be used to help others; this is how you can make a difference.
2. Only you can build your confidence and self-respect. Don’t search for these from other people; you must find these yourself. You can earn confidence and self-respect by trusting yourself to do what you set out to do. By learning to have faith in yourself. By believing you are of value.
3. Only you are responsible for your thoughts and actions. Not your parents, not your loved-ones, not your teachers, not your peers. Your thoughts and actions are your job, your responsibility.
4. Only you have the power to motivate yourself, to dig deep and discover the reason (whatever it is) you need to focus on, to keep going when life’s hard.
5. Only you can do the work, or take the steps that you need to take, towards your dream.
6. Only you can make or break you. Nobody else has the power to control your mind, unless you allow them to.
7. Only you have the right to decide what you want to do in life. This is your freedom: it’s why you have free will. Never enslave yourself to someone else’s will. Don’t live someone else’s agenda. Decide for yourself.

You know, deep down inside your heart, what’s right for you. You deserve to be the person you want to be. You can decide today – right now – to build the right life for you.  It’s never too late to change your course. While you’re still alive and breathing, you still have time to go for your dreams.

You have 7 good reasons why I think you can be the person you want to be. I ask you to think about them. Look for your own reasons, and add to them every day.

Continue to strive doggedly to be the person you want to be. Never give up on yourself. You are here for a purpose. That purpose is to live your life to the full, to bring love, joy, peace and happiness to those around you.

In doing so, you will fulfill your life, and the life of others. That is the person you are meant to be, the person you are deep in your heart.

Be that person and live your life to the full.

Susan J McCann

@susanjmccann

PS I’d love to hear what motivates you. Please feel free to share this post.

We’ve all heard of the old cliche “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words cannot hurt me.”

The logic of that phrase is so hard to swallow; it leaves us cold. We cry out in pain,

“You’re wrong. So wrong. Words can hurt me very deeply. I’ll remember them for the rest of my life.”

I’m sure most of us would feel that way. So, let’s look at it again. “Words cannot hurt me.” Or can they?

Logically speaking, of course, the saying does make complete sense. Words can’t hurt us. A word is just a word. However logic’s not the whole story. Far from it.

It’s obvious words can’t hurt us physically.  But we can be hurt in other ways too. We can be hurt in our feelings.

There’s a mountain of deep and powerful emotions in every one of us. These emotions react almost on automatic pilot. We feel hurt. We react with anger.

We get upset, even furious. We think only of how we can get our own back. Sweet revenge beckons. Logic goes out the window.

As Carnegie teaches: “Our logic is like a birchbank canoe tossed about on a deep, dark, stormy sea of emotions.”

So, what can we do? If anything! Must we allow our emotions to dictate how we deal with people?

It’s a times like these that we need to remember, “I’m a mature character.”

Mature people have had to learn self-control, self-discipline. Focus on this fact: you’ve got some control over your emotions. You simply need to “bite your tongue, count to ten.”

Pause. Take “a time out”. Pause again. Pause yet again.

Stop blindly reacting. Now, start to think. Let the anger subside. Let your mature self take over.

Why allow some negative comment to dictate your life? After all, it probably took them all of 5 seconds to say it! You really do have the power to get over it. You’re not a kid. You can move on.

• Why allow a passing comment to steal your happiness?
• Why be upset for the rest of the day? The rest of your life? All because of a 5-second comment!
• Why keep playing it over and over in your mind?

Get on with your life, the way you want it to be. It’s your life, to live as you choose.

Your sense of humor might help here.

Learn to laugh at yourself. No-one’s perfect. Let’s be happy to accept that we, too, have many faults and failings. Even the greatest humans, that ever walked this earth, have had their fair share of weaknesses, mistakes, false beliefs and opinions. So have you. So have I.

Just relax. Let go. Have a good laugh at your immature, negative reaction.

Maybe you can go even further, raise your game. Maybe you could tell yourself,

“You know what, maybe they have a point.”

As we have heard it said, so many times,

“You’ll get more truth about yourself from your enemies than your friends.”

Why? Because your friend doesn’t want to hurt you, tell you the painful truth about yourself. So?

So the friend lies to you. Keeps you sweet. Panders to your “deep, dark, stormy sea of emotions.”

If we were really honest with ourselves, we might even think,

“If they only knew the half of my faults and failings!”

So laugh at yourself. Join the club.

We’re all only human.

May I wish you lots of love, peace and wisdom in your life!

Gerry McCann

@themerry_monk

P.S.   I’d love to learn how you deal with criticism; please share your comments with the rest of us.

P.P.S  Feel free to share this Quote with a friend.

Nobody at all, with an ounce of common sense, is going to believe, trust or invest time, money, and effort in a loser. Make no mistake.

If you have little or no self-belief then – rightly or wrongly – you will be perceived, and treated, as a loser. No-one, unless they’re stupid, bets on a known loser. Ask any venture capitalist.

Successful investors always look for passionate, hardworking people who have enough self-belief to set out, and forge ahead on their own. Brave people, who risk their time and money in providing a new product or service for the benefit of others. It’s a ‘no-brainer’ – self-belief is an essential quality of spirit for entrepreneurs.

It’s also a quality, in fact, that we all need. A quality that’s truly needed, always and in everything: business, relationships, life, love, the lot. Without self-belief, we’ll sabotage our ability to work successfully with others. But that’s not all: we will also self-sabotage.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

“Anyone can do it”

If you lack self-belief, all your ambitions, aspirations and dreams will collapse. They’ll dissolve, and vanish . . . in a sea of doubt. Self-belief is absolutely crucial. Why?

Without essential self-belief, you won’t follow through. On anything.  A business mentor’s hardest job is to convince clients they can be successful. “Anyone can do it,” they suggest.

Yet we rebel at the thought. We build walls to defend our mediocrity. We cling relentlessly to the lie:

“I can’t do it; I’m a nobody.”

Often our negative conditioning in life has convinced us of this debilitating illusion.

You know you have the power – yet you just don’t believe it. Everything happens in strict accordance with how much we believe. Believe you can, and you can. Believe you can’t, and you can’t.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Your special talents

The first step in achieving greater self-belief?

Recognize your own personal value and dignity. Deep down you know you have the unique gifts and talents you need.

You find that hard to believe?

You just need to think, for a moment, of all the many successful entrepreneurs, who perhaps have far fewer talents and gifts, in their niche, than you have in yours. Tell yourself the good news,

“If they can do it, then so could I. What’s stopping me?”

The reason they’re successful is that they went for it, they believed they could.

So? Forget the lies you’ve heard all your life, telling you

“Who do you think you are?”

” What do you know about running a business”?

“You’ll never make it!”

The power of self-belief is within us all, and at our command. We just need to discover it, believe it, and then use it.

Just remember that self-belief is not all or nothing: something we either have or don’t have, like a physical object. Self-belief and self-doubt are qualities of mind and spirit, rather than anything material. Therefore it’s a question of the degree, or level – how much or how little – we have of that quality.

A down-to-earth quality of mind

So, how much self-belief do you have? As with most things in life, the ideal outcome is a balance between the extremes. Neither “I can achieve absolutely anything” nor “I am quite useless, and can’t do anything worthwhile.”

We seek the golden middle way. Neither unrealistic optimism, nor a pathetic learned helplessness. A balanced middle view is the ideal; that would actually be more optimistic than most of us imagine.

So, what’s needed?

Realistic, down-to-earth, solidly grounded optimism! That’s a crucial factor that separates the high achievers from those who settle for mediocrity.

High achievers are so optimistic because they believe that with hard work, determination, perseverance, and creativity, huge success is possible. They’ve proved it, over and over again.

Even when things don’t work out, they remain optimistic. We all know stories of world-famous entrepreneurs who’ve failed more times than they’ve succeeded. But they persevered. They never gave up. They just learned another lesson, dug their heels in, and dived right in again.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Most successful entrepreneurs really are ordinary people, much the same as you and me. They only difference is they had the belief, optimism and courage to simply go for it; and then persevere.

They know, better than most, that we all have massive abilities, which often go unrecognized. Such abilities can even be improved. We can all learn a wide range of skills, and so create a greatly enhanced and enriching life-style.

You need to find that belief and courage. You can then fashion a much better life for yourself and your loved-ones.

So . . . how? How do you find this self-belief and courage?

Success notebook

The first place to look is your past triumphs, your own track record. Trust your own experience. It gives you solid, concrete evidence that you can succeed in many things.

I am convinced it’s a brilliant idea to make a list of your greatest achievements up to date. So motivational! Buy a huge notebook, and use it just for this purpose. That list will be your very own self-belief manual.

Even better, add photos and gather physical evidence of past glories. For example dig out certificates, medals, prizes, rewards you’ve earned in the past – a veritable golden treasure chest of memories.

That was YOU, not anyone else.

Think too about the countless ordinary, everyday things you’ve learned and now take for granted. Everything you needed to learn and achieve to grow up into a well-rounded, and competent adult.

Again, that was YOU, not anyone else.

What an inspiring exercise, because that winner you’re looking at is a younger you. You’re still the same person, with even more experience. Why doubt now when you’ve already proved you can do it?

The next step is to add to this list regularly, as you recall other past successes. Look at these successes frequently. This will help continue building your confidence and self-belief.

Another powerful step: begin to jot down new and up-to-date successes. Increasingly, you will be looking forward to future successes and further entries in your self-belief manual, your “success journal,” as some call it.

Whenever you doubt, latch on to those powerful memories. Clear proof that you already succeeded in so many challenges. When you’re afraid and doubt yourself, remember the great things you’ve already achieved.

Maybe you disagree. You may be thinking,

“I’ve never really done anything great. It couldn’t work for me!”

I’m not talking about extraordinary things, like winning Olympic gold. You’ve a ton of experience and learning in everyday things we take for granted.

A toddler programmed to be a winner

Learn from yourself as a toddler. Let’s focus on one simple example. You learned to walk. Remember how?

It was a relentless, in-built drive. You never gave up. Day in, day out, you tried. Day in, day out, you made imperceptible progress. Day in, day out, you kept falling over. However, you just kept on getting back up again. It never entered you’re little mind to think,

“That’s it! I’ve had it! I’ve tried over and over. It’s not working. I’ll never be able to walk. Might as well settle for crawling!”

Think of what you did then, how you simply refused to surrender. I’m still talking about YOU, not some famous person. You too have succeeded in so many things. Use your imagination.

See yourself again in that situation. Feel again how you felt then. Picture it in detail in your own mind. Bring that power and feeling back into the now. It felt so good, didn’t it?

You were able to summon up your self-belief, and you succeeded. You proved you could do it, and you can do it again and again. Always focus on your successes.

What about all my failures?

Don’t worry about the past failures. They don’t mean you yourself are a failure, as a person. Keep it simple.

So-called “failure” is nothing more than a result of some action. You tried something, and it didn’t work out. No big deal. Just learn a better way. Rejoice in this positive “learning from your mistakes.”

Let me repeat: focus on your successes. You’re building your self-belief, not putting yourself down; no point in filling your mind with the times when things didn’t quite work out.

Use your success diary to note and remember all your successes. Keep adding to it, you’ll soon see that you have a lot more to inspire you.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Lastly, one final and extremely important point: create a little team of positive people around you. As a group, you will supercharge the self-belief of each other. You will feed off each other’s energy, belief and wisdom.

Self-belief will go through the roof.

Your success is there for the taking. You deserve it. You know you deserve it. Take it. It’s yours.

Gerry McCann

@themerry_monk