You’re reading 3 Steps Guaranteed to Remove Barriers From Your Life, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

‘The biggest obstacles in our lives are the barriers our mind creates’

~ Unknown

We all daydream about our ideal life, but it can be a daunting task to figure out how to turn these dreams into reality. Instead we can find ourselves accepting our circumstances and trying to make the best of them.

It’s quite common to hear people discuss their hopes and aspirations, followed by a comprehensive list of reasons why they will never be realized. Multiple barriers can be created that ensure that your life’s desires remain a fantasy rather than something that can ever be achieved. This frustrates me.

We can drown in our own self pity, convinced that good things only happen to other people and never to us, or we can create our own luck and start making our dreams come true.

During my research I have noticed that the so called ‘lucky’ people, those who are successful and realizing their potential, don’t place barriers in their own way. They remove each real hurdle they face. The ‘unlucky’ people who believe that nothing good will ever happen to them, allow themselves to be controlled by the barriers that they perceive to be blocking their path.

One of the most valuable things I learned from the 3 years I spent living and working in South Africa is the Afrikaans saying ‘maak ‘n plan’ It literally means ‘make a plan’ and is the concept that anything is possible. If you think on your feet and approach something in a new way, no matter what obstacle is presented to you, you will be able to find a way to overcome it.

This powerful philosophy is something I now live my life by. If you truly believe anything is possible (which I do), it helps ensure that you always find a solution for any problem. Any time I am faced with a challenge, my first thought isn’t ‘can this be solved?’ it’s ‘how can I solve this?’

What is the difference between a barrier and an excuse?

We will constantly be faced with barriers as we journey through life. A barrier can be defined as ‘a circumstance or obstacle that keeps people or things apart or prevents communication or progress.’  It’s just an obstacle and obstacles can be removed. A barrier becomes an excuse when we make it into a reason not to achieve something, without even seeing if it is possible.

3 practical steps to overcome any barrier

STEP 1: Get your positive mindset on

You need to face barriers with the right attitude. If you ensure you’re looking at the situation from the point of view of how you can resolve it, rather than whether you can resolve it, you are much more likely to succeed. If you approach everything with the mindset that there is a resolution, you just need to figure out what it is, it makes the chance of overcoming the barrier much greater.

STEP 2: Gather the facts

This step is important to differentiate perception from reality. It is easy to create your own barriers based on thoughts and feelings and possibly fear, but not based on hard facts and evidence. If you document the reality of the situation, you can determine which issues are real and which your mind has invented and placed in the way of your success. Once you understand the difference, they are easier to overcome.

STEP 3: Make a plan

The last part of overcoming barriers is forming a plan to unblock your path. List all the blockers you are facing and for each one come up with as many solutions as you can think of to rectify the situation. You’ll find that each issue can be solved if you put your mind to it and apply the positive mindset previously mentioned. If you can’t find the answer yourself, ask advice from others. When you have the solutions clearly defined, detail out exactly what steps you need to take to implement them and then take immediate action.

Achieving our dreams takes courage. It can be easy to put barriers in place that let us avoid taking risks and prevent us from following our aspirations. By following the simple strategies above, I believe we can reach for the stars and implement our ideal life.

I’d love to hear from you. How do you overcome your barriers?

You’ve read 3 Steps Guaranteed to Remove Barriers From Your Life, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading How To Distract Yourself from the Greatest Distraction in Life: Stress, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

Have you ever thought about the biggest problem you’re facing in life? It’s not related to your career, relationships, friendships, or studies. It’s related to your mental health, and it’s called stress. When you’re under stress, you cannot focus on anything positive. You are not able to do your best job, and you can’t maintain good relationships with your family, friends, and partner. When you think about it, stress s the greatest distraction you face in your life.

There are many ways to put stress under control. You can never get rid of it, though. Stressful situations will keep haunting you throughout your life and there is no way to become immune to them. The point in stress management is not becoming completely senseless. It’s all about changing your own attitude and maintaining control over your thoughts and emotions under stressful situations.

We’ll show you few tricks on how to distract yourself from stress – the greatest distraction in your life.

Understanding Stress

Before you can do something about it, you need to understand what stress is all about. It is the physical, mental, and/or emotional tension that certain circumstances cause. Before we go any further, let’s explain something really important: stress can be positive, too. Imagine yourself being in the jungle and seeing a lion running towards you. Stress is what makes you run. You can’t stay completely calm and relaxed in such situation, can you? Stress is what triggers a father to save his child from drowning, and it’s what makes you defend yourself or run when you’re under attack.

Without this complex mix of hormones and chemicals the human body releases when it’s triggered by stress, the human wouldn’t have functioned properly. However, your mind tends to prolong the reactions to stress. It doesn’t allow you to forget what happened and relax after the stressful moment you went through. When the stress is prolonged, it causes serious consequences to your wellbeing.

How to Handle Physical, Mental, and Emotional Stress

There are three types of stress you may be facing:

• Physical stress

This is the simplest form of stress, which we all experience at one point or another. What happens to your body after a long, strenuous walk or run? Maybe you’ve spent all day working in the garden? We are often putting our muscles under stress, and we can easily recognize the effects: we feel tired and we may experience pain in different parts of the body.

Physical stress is not that bad. You can easily recover from it by resting and sleeping. A nice massage or a spa session will also relieve you from this type of stress.

• Mental stress

Mental stress is slightly more complex. It’s the type of stress you go through when you’re straining your mind too hard. An accountant, for example, is under great mental stress during working hours. Their job may seem monotonous and simple to an outsider, but they have to deal with tons of numbers and a single mistake can cost them their job. When you’re doing intellectual work, you have to remain constantly focused – that’s putting a lot of stress on you.

This type of stress doesn’t easily go away by sleeping. When you’re straining your intellect throughout the day, your thoughts create a total chaos when you finally go to bed. Accountants often dream of numbers and final bills, and that’s not funny at all.

You can keep mental stress under control by staying aware of it, taking several constructive breaks during working hours, and knowing your limits. If, for example, your boss asks you to write a blog for the website but you don’t have time or skill to do that, stressing out over the situation won’t do you any good. Instead of trying to achieve the impossible, you can start looking for writing services reviews that will help you find a company you can outsource that task to.

• Emotional stress

This is the type of stress that leaves the most serious consequences on our wellbeing. When you’re under physical stress, you can easily recognize it and take a rest to solve the situation. Mental stress is a bit more difficult to deal with, but at least you are still aware of it and you can identify the causes and manifestations. With emotional stress, you cannot always find out the cause. Sometimes you feel bad and you don’t know why.

Every single action you have taken throughout your life left a deep trace in your mental and emotional patterns. You might not remember everything that has happened to you, but your subconscious does remember. That’s where the emotional burden comes from.

When you’re under emotional stress, you experience weird symptoms, such as the feeling of being overwhelmed, frustrated, nervous, and tense. You may also experience several physical manifestations, such as sweating, headaches, chest pain, insomnia, pain in any part of the body, grinding teeth, and much more. You may become forgetful and unable to focus on the work, and you’ll probably be very pessimistic.

The consequences of long-term emotional stress can be very serious. Some people face cardiovascular disease, eating disorder, sexual dysfunctions, and different types of mental problems, including anxiety and depression. It seems like emotional stress can be the root cause of every single health issue you’re facing.

How to Distract Yourself from Emotional Stress

Unfortunately, it’s not easy to get rid of emotional stress. People have emotions, and that’s a good thing. Sometimes those emotions get hurt, and we all need to learn how to handle such pressure. The task of managing emotional stress takes a lot of work, but it’s not impossible. The journey will make you a stronger, more positive, and better person, so guess what: it turns out that all that stress has a positive role in your life after all. Here are some techniques that will help you put this kind of stress under control:

• Meditation

Meditation and relaxation techniques have proven effects for stress relief. Many people perceive meditation as “something you do when you close your eyes and you zone out.” Those are the ones who never tried actual meditation. There are different techniques of meditation, but all of them have something in common: they help you get deeper into your subconsciousness and unveil the reasons for the emotional stress you’re going through. Even Zen meditation, which basically teaches you to think of nothing, has the same effect: it cleans your mind and soul from all accumulated stress.

You can try an online guided meditation for stressful moments, but it would be even better if you started an actual meditation course. Find a good yoga teacher and pay upfront for the course. That will make you responsible to go to every single session and stay committed to the practice. You will notice how you’re becoming calmer by the day. Just like stress leaves traces in your mental and emotional processes, so does relaxation. You’re stressing out every day without even trying, but you have to make an effort to relax.

• Writing

Did you know that keeping a journal can help you relieve yourself from stress? Get a special notebook or start an online diary. It will take only half an hour per day for you to pour your soul out. No one will read it, so you don’t have to be worried about the things you write. But, you do need to be honest with yourself: write exactly how you feel and don’t even think about how it sounds. It’s important to get that entire emotional burden out, so you it will lose its intensity.

• Physical activity

When you’re under a lot of stress, you should keep yourself occupied and distracted with an activity you really like. Gardening, running, walking in nature, exercise… all these things will distract you from the problem and will give you the positive energy you need.

Remember: stress is part of your life, so you shouldn’t be looking for ways to get completely rid of it. The point in stress management is to understand where the tension comes from and control the way you react to it. Hopefully, we gave you the guiding points that will make you a stronger person. Now, you need to make an effort to follow them.

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Louise Coleman is a professional freelance writer with wide experience in covering educational, inspirational, blogging, and traveling topics. Also, she adores writing analytical articles to help people to overview and understand better significant and interesting researches. Apart from writing, reading is her real passion from the very childhood.

You’ve read How To Distract Yourself from the Greatest Distraction in Life: Stress, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading Why What Other People Say and Do is Not About You, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

It always helps to remember that what other people say and do is not about you.

Everyone is just projecting their inner space into their outer world.

The way a person thinks and feels in any moment inclines their choices, behavior, actions and the words that they speak. Other people are then on the receiving end of that.

IT’S EASIST TO SEE YOUR OWN EXPERIENCE OF THIS

If you can logically see how your own words and actions are not about other people, then you will much more easily be able to see that what others say and do is not about you either.

For example, if you’re feeling good and you’re around someone who is negative, you’re still often capable of letting it go and staying positive, you may even notice you’re able to be more patient and tolerant of them because you feel good. But, on the flip-side, if you’re feeling terrible and you’re around someone who is really positive, you might still let out negativity around them or get frustrated with them, even if they are being nice and it’s a calm situation. This is because you don’t feel good.

In both scenarios, how you are thinking and feeling is defining what you project toward the other person. It is not about them.

Your thinking/feeling cycle (nothing to do with anyone else) drives your choices, behavior, actions, and the words you speak. And if that thinking/feeling cycle is negative in any one moment, and you are not consciously aware enough to interrupt yourself and choose differently, then that is what comes out of you.

This doesn’t deny the fact that people can absolutely trigger you, pushing your hot buttons, leading you to think and feel negatively. Yet irrespective of that, anything you project out into the world or at other people is still coming directly and purely from your inner space – coming out of your beliefs, thoughts and feelings, conveyed in behavior, words and actions.

No one else controls you. No one controls what you think or how you feel. That is your domain.

That inner space you hold is founded upon an accumulation of experiences and understanding built up over your entire life to date – everything you have come to believe, which makes up your “paradigm” (your model of reality) – the lens through which you see yourself, life and other people. You then perceive, interpret, think, feel and react/respond to life around you according to that lens. That has nothing to do with other people. What you say and do is not about other people, not even when they trigger you. Your habitual ways of behaving, any judgement, criticism or hurt that comes out of you toward others, is not about them. It is a projection of your paradigm into the world around you.

AND NOW THE GREAT NEWS…

If you can logically see that this is true for you, then you can also see it is true for everyone else too.

What other people say and do is not about you either. You might trigger them, but their beliefs, thoughts and feeling are inclining their choices, behavior, words and actions, which is all about them and the paradigm they live from, being projected outward or at you.

WE CAN BREAK THE CYCLE

We live in a highly reactionary world. Someone does something or says something as a projection of their inner space, another person feels triggered and reacts. From the triggering of their inner space and negative reaction, they then trigger someone else, who in turn also reacts, and this ripples out with more and more people being triggered and reacting.

We so easily get upset about what someone else said or did, taking that behavior personally, taking the look on someone’s face, what they did or didn’t do, and making it mean something about ourselves.

Many people are simply trying to get through each day, while feeling like everything going on around them is about them, perhaps even seeing evidence in each interaction, look they receive or word they hear, as being a personal attack.

Our “personality selves” (egos) get very affected by others. If we can rise above that thinking, and instead remember what is REALLY going on, then there is a chance for greater peace and flow – individually and collectively.

WE CAN PRACTISE

The next time someone says or does something and you feel triggered, take a deep breath and say to yourself , “What others say and do is not about me. I choose not to react. I choose peace.”

The beauty of this awareness and choice, is that when you see someone projecting their inner space e.g. anger, upset, negativity or rudeness, you can remember… if that is what is coming out of them in that moment, then that must be what is IN them in that moment, and how unpleasant that must be for that person!

You can have a little empathy for them. You know what is going on, and you know what it feels like to be in that cycle, because you’ve been there yourself, as we all have!

Our ability to remain detached, aware, and choosing non-reaction, means we don’t dive in and participate in the negativity party of other people, and we break the trigger/reaction cycle in that moment. We serve ourselves and we serve all of humanity at the same time! We chose to cultivate a peace party, to which we invite all others to join. Who knows, the negative person projecting at you might just change their tune in your calm presence, and join the peace party with you!

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Bernadette Logue is a Transformation Coach & Author, and the founder of Pinch Me Living.  To free yourself of limiting beliefs and negative thinking, and create a powerful new paradigm, visit Bernadette at http://ift.tt/1gyqulu for her “MASTER YOUR MIND” program online with live classes, and join her Youtube community for daily inspiration and mind liberation.

You’ve read Why What Other People Say and Do is Not About You, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading 4 Decluttering Hacks: How and Why to Get Organized, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

Getting yourself into an organized lifestyle is not as easy at the morning show hosts would make it seem. After an eclectic run at grad school which featured a half put-together dresser and experiments in paper flooring, I’ve at least learned that much. Looking back on those years, I’ve come to realize that my problem was as much a motivational one as it was a practical one. I simply wasn’t aware of how crucial it was to my health to get organized and, in my brief moments of clarity, I genuinely wasn’t sure where I could possibly begin.

If this sounds like you, then check out my analysis of the science behind organization and some tips of my own to get you off the ground.

Health and Organization

The psychology here is pretty clear: getting organized is good for you. When you’re organized you’re more easily able to identify where the balance in your life lies and, with less clutter, there’s less in the way of stopping you from achieving that balance yourself.

It’s not just the fruit of your labour that’s good for you here. Cleaning things up is itself good for you. Indeed, some therapists use decluttering in their therapy to help patients copes with their organization and other issues.

There’s no two ways about it, then. Getting organized is good for you, but it’s not always clear how to be healthy. I’ll tell you how below!

1. Don’t Just Tackle Little Projects

There are a lot of arenas in which it’s a good idea to divide and conquer, satisfying yourself with completing a few small tasks as frequently or infrequently as you’d like, finally fitting everything together into a completed project long after you started.

Decluttering is not one of these battlegrounds. Unlike other projects, decluttering your life is something that will get undone by waiting around. The good news is that the more organized you become, the less junk will creep up on you over time.

So you need to make a big push to hit your clutter, instead of just moving on thing at a time. Some ways to do this include: scheduling a cleaning party. You can’t clean everything in your house in one day, but a you and your friends can. Try trading decluttering favours and promising food afterwards. Doing a regular spring cleaning is also great idea.

2. Start Big

First things first, try to get rid of larger pieces of clutter. You can make a huge impact on your clutter by getting rid of old appliances or other big items that have stayed past their due. This gives you a morale boost and gives you more space to work with while you figure out the remainder.

Just be careful moving heavy appliances like old washers or refrigerators. These can contain harmful chemicals with greenhouse gasses that can be released if handled improperly, not to mention the backbreaking work of getting this stuff out the door. Don’t be afraid to get some help if you’ve got this kind of clutter.

3. Stay Organized

Don’t let all your hard work be for not. Find ways to preserve your efforts and stay organized. The fact of the matter is that it usually doesn’t take long for clutter to find its way back into your home. Either because we’re always bringing in new things or our haphazard piles of ex-clutter start to unwind.

To attack the first fork of de-organizing, think about frugal living. It’s amazing how much you can do without once you start to really think about what you need. For the second fork, consider how you can store your things in more efficient ways. Often times clutter starts to form when you store a bunch of stuff contrary to the way that you’re going to use it. For instance, throwing a bunch of books that you reference often on a bookshelf far from your desk. One great tip here is to get a set of small lockers and use them to store things. They’ll help out a lot when it comes to keeping stuff of the floor and you’ll find that with several separate compartments you’ll be able to split things up in terms of function. In the spirit of frugal living, you can find discounted lockers that schools aren’t buying up.

4. Be Mindful

Whatever you do to get organized, do it mindfully and with respect for the environment. All too often it’s popular to “get organized” by taking a garbage bag around the house and tossing everything that may or may not be junk inside. Ta-da! Everything’s clean.

Or not.

When you do this you’re not only running the risk of discarding dangerous items improperly (like appliances with those GHGs that we talked about earlier). Perhaps even worse, when you treat your junk like junk you can deprive people in need. They say that one declutterer’s junk is another’s treasure and that couldn’t be more true. Find ways of donating the things you don’t need anymore and do good when you declutter.

These are some of my tips for following the science and getting healthy through organization. Let me know how your decluttering projects went in the comments!

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Nick is a violist and writer from Boise, Idaho. When he’s not writing he likes to find new ways to organize his viola practice and ride his bike in the beautiful Boise foothills. You can find Nick on Twitter @cesare_nick.

You’ve read 4 Decluttering Hacks: How and Why to Get Organized, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading 4 Ways to Get Your Motivation Back When You’re In a Rut, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

Do you ever struggle to get motivated?

Maybe you know exactly what you need to do, but when it comes down to it you just don’t have the energy?

I know the feeling.

Sometimes we have plenty of good ideas running around but when we sit down to make them happen, we just don’t have the willpower to follow through. From time to time all of us can get caught out; hitting the snooze button, opting for the unhealthy lunch option or get distracted by Facebook or Netflix.

But the issue isn’t necessarily that we lack intrinsic motivation.

A lot of the time it is that we’re stuck in a lazy or tired state, and just willing our way out of it isn’t going to work. In fact, it could just do the opposite, tiring us out and depleting our mental reserves, particularly if our willpower is low.

Luckily there are some pretty straight forward ways to get ourselves out of that state and get our motivation back.

1. Recharge properly.

Many of us struggle to get motivated not because of a lack of purpose, but because we simply don’t take enough time to recharge properly.

Willpower (and by association our motivation), acts like a muscle – and you need to make sure you are resting properly in order to start the day fresh and ready.

Here are four simple but powerful ways to make sure your body and mind are really recharging:

• Turn off all electronics in your bedroom and stay away from screens for at least two hours before you go to sleep.
• Don’t consume caffeine after 3pm, it has a half-life of 5 to 6 hours and has shown to disturb quality of sleep if taken even 6 hours before bed.
• Sleep with a blindfold, most people allow unnatural light into their room which can also disturb sleep quality.
• Spend regular time doing activities that stimulate your parasympathetic nervous system such as yoga, meditation, stretching and the sauna

2. Energize your body

Most people don’t realize that they are actually running at 50% of their potential a lot of the time.

Remember that our energy primarily comes from the food we eat, but we also get it from water and sunlight.

Make sure first and foremost you are eating foods that are easy to digest. Our body spends 33% of its energy on digestion, and only 12% on physical activity, so eating heavy and processed foods that are not easy to absorb will make you sluggish and not allow you the energy to perform at your best – this is why we experience food comas after eating too much.

Another trick to do this is to splash water on your face and wrists for around a minute. James Zacny at the University of Chicago found that because these areas have more nerve endings this energizes us and makes us more alert.

3. Watch or read something inspirational

A lot of people think that this is just another form of procrastination, but reading an inspirational biography or watching an inspirational movie or documentary can give you just the jolt you need to get started on a new project or just finish what you’ve got on your to do list.

It’s important here to be clear beforehand on exactly how much time you’re going to spend doing this. There’s a big difference between setting aside a couple of hours for a movie and spending the next week re-watching every episode of Game of Thrones!

4. Speak to someone

Sometimes all we need to get out of a funk is just to get out of our own heads.

When you’re feeling tired or lazy it’s good to talk to one of your friends or family members who are usually buzzing with energy.

As social creatures, the vitality of others can be infectious, and when we have positive social interactions our brains release oxytocin which helps motivates us to action.

 

How do you get motivated when you’re feeling lazy and tired? Let us know in the comments!

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Attention Pick The Brain Readers!

Want to ensure you take full control of your mornings and spend less time feeling lazy and tired?

Grab a free copy of our new eBook: MORNING MASTERY: The Simple 20 Minute Routine For Long Lasting Energy, Laser-Sharp Focus, and Stress Free Living.

Ben is a freelance writer, and the co-creator of Project Monkey Mind—a new blog for the 21st century solopreneur and young professional who wants to lead a more free and fulfilling life.

You’ve read 4 Ways to Get Your Motivation Back When You’re In a Rut, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading The Importance of Myopia: Why Multitasking is a Myth, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

If you’re anything like me, you’ll have struggled to multitask. Perhaps you’ve been surprised at how easily you switch off from one task when you’re trying to do two things at once. Even something as seemingly simple as texting while watching TV demands a lot of cognitive energy. It’s actually pretty hard to reply to a message while giving the TV our full attention, which is why we often end up rewinding Breaking Bad after realising we’ve completely missed the last two minutes.

Curiously, despite the mounting scientific evidence that multitasking actually makes us less productive, we continue to treat it as an as aspirational trait. This holds especially true in the workplace. The theory goes that if we can reply to a client email and whip up a presentation in tandem, we’re getting more stuff done…right?

Actually, it couldn’t be further from the truth: multitasking makes us more prone to errors, impairs our performance and renders us ripe for distraction. Focusing on one task at a time boosts productivity, improves the quality of our work and can even make us happier.

The Myth of Multitasking

Have you ever tried reading a book while talking on the phone, or choosing something from a menu while talking to a friend? How about trying to park your car in an awkward space while listening to the radio? Chances are that you probably switched off from one of these tasks.

This is because our brains struggle to give their full attention to simultaneous tasks, which is why we often end up rereading pages of books, asking the waiter for more time to check out the menu and turning off the radio while we try to park!

Switching focus is pretty harmless when we’re doing something like reading, chatting or watching Netflix, but the game changes when it comes to things like driving, cycling or walking. It’s an established fact that using our phones while driving is dangerous. Our brains divert our attention to texting or talking and we become less aware of our surroundings – ergo, we are more susceptible to errors on the road.

It’s equally as important to be mindful of our surroundings as pedestrians, too. A recent study tested the ability to focus while using multimedia devices on the street. It put college students onto a virtual street and armed them with smartphones and audio devices. It found that the students listening to music or texting were more distracted, putting them at greater risk of collision with vehicles.

The Importance of Focusing on One Thing

The brain performs best when it can focus on one thing – or ‘monotask’. When we give a task our full attention, we are complete it more meaningfully, are less prone to errors and can get into a state of ‘flow’ (that awesome feeling of being completely and utterly engaged in what you’re doing).

A recent Dutch study supports this. The researchers found that people performed best at Sudoku and wordsearch puzzles when they completed the puzzles one at a time, rather than when multitasking. Similarly, an American study found that kids (unsurprisingly) got better exam results when they didn’t multitask revision, texting and Facebook.

So, I think I agree with science – it’s pretty clear that we should eschew multitasking in favour of focusing. Here are some ways that you can improve your focus.

Find Your Distractors

What distracts you in your day-to-day life? Is it texting, emailing, chatting to colleagues? Try to complete this sentence at least three times: ‘I get distracted by…’

Use this to find out what you need to avoid in order to focus properly. If you’re a compulsive texter, put your phone on silent and out of reach at work and social occasions. If you find that colleagues distract you, try ‘plugging in’: wear headphones and listen to some classical music. This will improve your focus and deter people from disturbing you unless it’s urgent.

If you’re a sucker for your inbox, try imposing some structure in your email checking schedule. Check your email only three times per day and work through your emails in batches. If you are required to check your inbox more regularly, where possible, do it after completing a task and answer the most important emails first.

Get Into a State of Flow

Have you ever been fully absorbed in doing something that you’ve completely lost track of time? As well as boosting your productivity, doing one thing at a time makes it more likely to experience ‘flow’, the mental state of being fully immersed in doing something. By encouraging feelings of fulfilment, the state of flow is known to foster happiness.

Artists are famous for being so in the zone that they forget to eat or sleep. This is not limited to art – anyone can experience flow, from businessmen to nurses, to teachers to athletes. The state of flow is characterised by a feeling of mastery, in which one’s attention is so fully absorbed that there is no room to get distracted by thoughts of other things. It is not possible to experience flow when you multi-task, since your full attention is required.

Get into the flow by committing your undivided attention to a task. Try it with something that isn’t too complex or too easy: if it’s too difficult and you may become frustrated, and if it’s too easy you risk boredom.

These simple changes can greatly improve your focus and reduce stress. You will also probably find that dedicating your attention to a task will make you feel a lot more satisfied when you have completed it. (Remember how great it feels to turn in a piece of work you truly completed to the best of your ability?) In turn, this mindfulness can make you feel happier.

So, say it with me: No to multitasking! Use your brain to its full capacity and free yourself from distractions for a more productive and mindful you. I promise you’ll see the benefits both at home and at work.  

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You’ve read The Importance of Myopia: Why Multitasking is a Myth, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading What Stress is Doing to Your Body and How to Reduce It?, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

The American Psychological Association reports that nearly 50% of Americans believe their stress has increased during the past year. According to the Regus Group, China has the highest percent (86%) of stress in a workplace in the world. A Lifeline Australia’s survey indicates that more than 90% of Australians claim they are stressed in at least one important aspect of their life. As claimed by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence in the UK, work-related illness is a major cause of 13.7 million lost working days each year.

Clearly, stress is in every corner of the world and in every sphere of our life. Rarely is one immune to this potentially serious health and social problem. In order to understand how to build stress resilience, we need to understand what stress is doing to our body and what potential health consequences it can bring.

How chronic stress affects our body?

From our heart to chromosomes, chronic stress affects all organs and cells in the body. Adrenal glands are responsible for releasing stress hormones – adrenaline, cortisol and norepinephrine. If stress is activated too often, it can result in hypertension since adrenaline increases the heart rate and blood pressure. High levels of cortisol can lead to atherosclerosis. To sum up, a heart attack or stroke are the potential health consequences of chronic stress.

When you are stressed-out, the autonomic nervous system is activated, which then activates the intestinal nervous system. Anxiety can trigger a digestive imbalance, heartburn and even irritable bowel syndrome. The composition and function of the gut bacteria can be also changed due to stress. Additionally, cortisol is a reason behind weight gain as it increases appetite making you crave for carbohydrates and other energy-rich foods. Finally, high levels of cortisol can increase not only subcutaneous, but also visceral fat, which results in heart diseases, insulin resistance, or diabetes type 2.

Chronic stress can affect immune cells, making you more susceptible to illness. The more nervous and agitated you are, the slower the healing rate. Stress can affect the length of telomeres on chromosomes. Each time chromosomes divide, telomeres shorten. If telomeres become too short, a cell dies, meaning that if you want to live a longer life, you should learn about stress management techniques.

How to raise your stress tolerance?

You cannot avoid stress, but you can decrease your stress response in a variety of ways. Physical activity is one of the most effective ways to reduce the effects of stress. Social engagement creates the experience of safety and releases stress-reduction hormones. Even though you feel that you are caught in the hustle of life and that you cannot get out, try to make more time for yourself. Read a book, spend time in nature, listen to music, or watch a comedy. Consider visiting spiritual retreats as it offers all these positive changes combined.

Yoga and the psoas muscle

Stress is usually stored in the psoas muscle, located on the two sides of the lumbar spine. If you are dealing with stressors constantly and do not respond to them, stress hormones become stored in the body and the psoas muscle becomes chronically tightened. Yoga can help you stretch your psoas muscle. This ancient practice offers a great number of poses, which can help you on your road to a stress-free life.

Accepting is the first step

Stress is a physical and emotional response to a negative change in our life. The impossibility of accepting this negative change causes stress and anxiety. Controlling of the uncontrollable is fighting a losing battle. Stressors cannot be avoided and they cannot be changed. The only thing you can do in order to go on with your life is to accept stressors as they are and to try to see stress in a positive way.

Healthy comfort foods

Adopting a healthy lifestyle includes taking control of the nutrition plan, eliminating bad habits, such as cigarettes and alcohol and getting enough sleep. Instead of comfort food, choose other snacks which can calm you down. Berries, for instance, are a vitamin C-dense fruit and vitamin C is the one associated with successful fighting with stress. Next, a study by the researchers from the University Pennsylvania found that chamomile tea can decrease anxiety symptoms. Chocolate, garlic, asparagus, cashews, walnuts, oatmeal and oysters are all examples of healthy comfort foods.

From deep breathing to a Zen state of mind

Deep breathing techniques allow you to ease physical symptoms of stress. The relaxation response is followed by decreases in blood pressure, heart rate, breathing rate, muscle tensions and aches. Some certified techniques are quieting response, SKY and teddy bear breathing (for children). You can also opt for breathing tools, such as the EmWave and the StressEraser.

Stress is known as a silent killer. You are not aware, it is looming in the background, ready at every moment to have the final say in your life. Coping with stress means happier and longer life and that is what we all strive for.

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Nicole is a lifestyle blogger passionate about travel and healthy living. She always seeks new adventures and enjoys sharing her experiences with others. In her free time, she likes to prepare healthy and delicious food for her friends. You can find her on Twitter and FB

You’ve read What Stress is Doing to Your Body and How to Reduce It?, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading 4 Unexpected Habits That Will Supercharge Your Productivity, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

“Focus on being productive, instead of busy” – Tim Ferriss

You’re busy.

Maybe you wake up early. You work hard and long hours.

All in all, you must be productive.

Right?

Wrong!

Work hours and the amount of tasks you accomplish have nothing to do with productivity.

Instead, productivity is all about results.

You could literally be working 2 hours and accomplish more than you do in 8 hours.

The key is having the right habits in place.

And these habits are not always that obvious.

In fact, most people get them wrong.

With this in mind, here are the top 4 habits you need to have in place to supercharge your productivity.

1. Work Less – And Ditch the 8-Hour Work Day

Most of us think that by working more, we get more done.

In fact, the opposite is true:

By working less, we accomplish more.

A lot of data points to this.

For example, according to an OECD report, countries that work less are more productive.

This in itself is not news.

Back in the day, Henry Ford cut workers’ work day to 8 hours to increase productivity.

But today, this established work day might be outdated.

Research shows that elite performers rarely work for more than 4.5 hours a day. When they do work, they are extremely focused and work uninterrupted 90 minutes at the time.

In other words, to be truly productive, you should work in 90-minute sessions and allow yourself to take breaks between those work sessions.

In the afternoon, you can do general maintenance tasks.

2. Stop Multitasking

Multitasking kills your productivity.

There are several studies that underline this:

A study by the University of London shows that when you get distracted by phone calls, text messages, and email, your IQ suffers a fall of more than twice compared to marijuana smokers. A study by the University of Stanford reinforces that multitasking is bad for your work productivity. Furthermore, your brain gets overwhelmed when faced with multiple tasks.

But how can you stop multitasking?

Focus.

When you work, ignore everything that’s unrelated to the task at hand.

For example, turn off your phone and shut down any email notifications.

When you’ve finished one task, you can move on to the next.

And that’s how you get results.

3. Quit Often

We have this weird idea that we fail when we quit.

But did you know that quitting can increase your productivity?

What you should do is quit strategically.

For example, there are things that aren’t worth your time because your time could be used in a way that yields more results.

Instead, quit these things.

Delegate or outsource them to others who do them more cost effectively.

This saves you time and energy.

At the same time, you can use your time to accomplish those high-value activities.

4. Reserve Empty Time Every Day

You might think that being productive means you should constantly accomplish tasks that take you closer to your goal.

For example, your productive time should consist of things like sales calls, research, answering emails, writing, and so forth.

But the truth is that you should reserve empty time every day.

This is something that LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner does to stay productive.

This empty time is the time when he reflects on things that go on around him, and he takes the time to solve problems.

You should schedule at least an hour of empty time every day.

You can break it into 30-minute blocks and combine it with a walk out in fresh air.

Over to You

It’s time for that one thing that determines whether you’ll be productive or not…

Implementation.

Start implementing these unconventional habits today (otherwise, you’ll just procrastinate on them).

And let me know in the comments:

What’s the first step you’ll take to be less busy and more productive?

Camilla is a freelance writer & enthusiastic about productivity and performance optimization. Get the free worksheet “20 Steps to a Productive Life” to supercharge your productivity.

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You’re reading 25 Blissful Ways to Overcome Social Anxiety and Shyness with Kind Grit, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

The toughest part to overcoming social anxiety and shyness is that we are the ones usually getting in our own way of progress by judging ourselves and others, by being idealistic, by not taking action because we don’t feel good enough yet.  It is an uphill battle of fear and self-doubt.

We are afraid.

Afraid to fail, of judgment, or to take action or to rock the boat, it is a vicious cycle leading nowhere.

You probably have high standards and maybe you have been let down by them.  The truth is that real progress must happen based in reality, which is imperfect.

Take some realistic and encouraging steps towards confidence.

This simple perspective can dramatically shift your day.  This does not mean to have low expectations, it just means to get closer to the ground so you can be honest, join others, and allow for mistakes to learn and expand.  Small actions, based in the here and now, builds confidence.

Be kinder to yourself and take action towards becoming more compassionate and aware with your relationships and situations until it becomes a part of your life.  You will build up foundations to your authentic and creative self.

Here are 25 ways to reframe your perspective and take meaningful actions towards progress.  You owe it to yourself to overcome shyness and social anxiety and never underestimate your ability.  You will surprise yourself when you replace negative thoughts with positive and imperfect action.

By applying any of these steps, you will get more out of your day, I promise.

1. Prioritize and balance your health, home, routine, work, and joy.  Start off on the right track first thing in the morning.  I recommend Hal Higdon’s Miracle Morning to get your daily cup of confidence first thing in the morning.
   
2. Reduce CATS.  That’s caffeine, alcohol, tobacco, and sugar (not the cute cuddly creatures).  These cloud your thinking and increase stress and anxiety and by limiting them, you will gain control over your health, how you feel, and how you react with a bonus of not being derailed from progress.
   
3. Lie to Yourself.  Incorporate positive body language.  I’d recommend Presence by Amy Cuddy.  Her research and first hand experience suggests that your mind will follow your body, so stand confident like a starfish and nudge yourself to confident.
   
4. See perfection in imperfection.  Don’t point out the one flaw in a beautiful piece of art.  Life is imperfect and there is a beauty in that.  You are good enough now.  Run to enjoy the view instead of to ‘catch up’.
   
5. Don’t dilute your value or numb yourself.  When did becoming sensitive become a bad thing? When you can sense other people’s emotions without them even saying a word, that is a special gift.  Allow yourself to feel and be vulnerable.
   
6. Feel entitled to a full life and stay curious about the world.  Get out of autopilot and be your creative self.  You are entitled to live authentically because you are here.  I recommend Elizabeth Gilbert’s soul-enriching and hysterical book Big Magic on this topic.
   
7. Learn more about yourself through expression.  Maybe you have learned to hold back for fear of being judged but by finding a simple form of expression, you will discover you are more interesting than you think.
   
8. Be flexible to change, to people, and things outside your control.  Learn to let go of the things you cannot control and give yourself breathing room for increased resilience when bad things happen, there is power and joy in that space.
   
9. Connect mindfully and spiritually.  Jumping from task to task can be draining, fill your well and find your compass through nature, God, and inner peace.  Focus only on the task at hand in the here and now with no judgments.
   
10. Pray, breathe, pause, and take 10 minutes daily to meditate.  Another way to find spirituality, space and peace is to start meditating and praying every day, this is also a great part of the morning routine.
    
11. Visualize and relentlessly pursue your dreams.  Instead of visualizing the end result, visualize the steps you will take to get to that end result and see yourself enjoying these experiences.  This is where the real magic happens.
    
12. Find meaningful work and establish motivation discipline.  Treat each new day as an opportunity.  By starting small and seeing yourself succeed, you will see the glorious potential you have at your fingertips.
    
13. Journal your fears and skills.  Many of us try to hide fear and that only makes it worse, so give it room to breathe, let it sit in the passenger seat, but don’t hand over the wheel.  Also, list your positive traits and accomplishments on a consistent basis.
    
14. Become more compassionate to those in need.  This will bring confidence and help someone.  You don’t have to change the world, you can help just a single person or animal.
    
15. Frequently and intentionally go off autopilot to do something different. Take a Ferriss Bueller day and do something out of the ordinary for you.
    
16. Sweat it out with a workout program to reduce daily stress.  Daily exercise is so rewarding, I don’t have to tell you.  Additionally, if you see an exercise goal through, that confidence gained can be applied to other goals.
    
17. Establish boundaries and find your ‘no’.  Don’t do things to please others.  This takes grit.  Know what you stand for and respect yourself first, which will decrease your fears and anxieties.
    
18. Don’t compare yourself to others. Stop judgment in its tracks. Let go of caring what others think of you and start to challenge your comfort zone in small ways and build upon it. Action is where you will gain strength.
    
19. Be courageous and see fear as an opportunity towards a better life.  After you challenge your comfort zone, take it a step further and challenge your fears and follow your heart.  You might surprise yourself and the world will start to open up.
    
20. Fail fast and accept failing as part of the process.  Every skill requires much effort and failure.  Embrace this fact.  Fail socially, that is the only way you will improve.  “Take chances, make mistakes. That’s how you grow. Pain nourishes your courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave.” — Mary Tyler Moore
    
21. Look to the classics for rich inspiration to refuel the tank.  This will give you more to talk about, directly or indirectly, and the consistency of a simple task like this can boost your confidence and build enrichment in your life.
    
22. Take action and invite joy.  Become a person that makes decisions and you will naturally become your confident, happy self.  Don’t wait for permission, pave your own authentic path and see where it leads you.
    
23. Get a friend and start a weekly social hour.  Seek out the opinion of others and broaden your perspective.  Be sure to listen to other people and give them the spotlight to build genuine connections.  You become like the people you hang out with so you owe yourself to be selective.
    
24. Be rational with your expectations and accountable to them.  Don’t expect the worst or give yourself impossible tasks.  Break down problems into simple and tangible steps and take decisive action. Complete a fun to do list of five things instead of zero out of a daunting 20 to build up integrity.
    
25. Be grateful no matter what, everyday is a new day. This will bring true and everlasting confidence in yourself and in your life.
    

All of these points really boil down to two things: creative compassion and gritty awareness.

Be aware of your choices and be more compassionate with yourself and others by being a creative person.  Life is real and colorful.  Prioritize your time to find balance, accept yourself and others with colorful flaws.  Be resilient to things outside your control and  present-minded and spiritual for real confidence.

Give your inner artist room for expression and sensitivity (creativity) and wait to react.  Be entitled and curious, enjoying meaningful and creative work, visualizing yourself enjoying the steps you will take, and positively nudging yourself, celebrating accomplishments along the way.

Enjoy something different without wondering what others think of you.  Challenge your comfort zone (grit), embrace failure and fear, and use positive words and body language (all grit).  Establish realistic expectations and boundaries and hold yourself accountable, surrounded by positive people who respect your boundaries.

When you stop judging and are kind, you will see how much kinder the world becomes.  Implement these practices to overcome shyness and anxiety and become confident, creative, gritty, and entitled.

-Photos from http://www.Unsplash.com

———

Rachel Bourne is the creator of an upcoming website Sassy Samurai — dedicated to providing Social Anxiety and Shyness Support for You to build confidence and strength. Just check out the site to sign up for notification when we go live (and for free stuff!)

“The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.” – Anna Quindlen

 

You’ve read 25 Blissful Ways to Overcome Social Anxiety and Shyness with Kind Grit, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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You’re reading 7 Ways to Get Things Done When You “Don’t Feel Like It”, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

You know that feeling you get when you start a new workout plan, or you start building a side business?

The excitement, drive, and motivation!

It makes waking up early easier, working late tolerable and excuses hard to justify.

Then a few weeks go by…

And the harsh reality sets in.

All of a sudden, you don’t “feel like it” as much as you did before. You still want the results, but you’ve lost the desire to get started with the work.

This is normal, and it happens to everyone.

Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to make it better.

1. Handle the Worst Things First

According to the research, willpower is a limited resource.

Imagine you have a daily budget of willpower. Each challenging task, whether mental or physical, requires you to use a bit of willpower.

You slowly spend your daily budget of willpower as you go about your day.

As a result, our willpower is strongest in the morning and weakest at night. (Ask yourself: do I make better decisions in the morning or at night?)

This is why you want to handle the worst tasks first while your willpower is strong. Putting off that email you’re ignoring or firing that client you don’t like is only going to get more difficult as the day goes on.

Instead, you can handle it while you’ve got willpower on your side. Plus, you’ll also build momentum that carries forward throughout the rest of your day.

2. Leverage Your Energy at the Right Time(s)

We have a tendency to romanticize the idea of being a morning person as if that is the secret to success.

In reality, you have to figure out what times work best for you.

I can get the most work done in the early morning and late evening. My energy levels (towards work, that is) are sluggish in the afternoon.

Maybe you don’t get much done in the morning, but you blast through work from 1-5 pm. Instead of trying to change what naturally works for you, why not use this knowledge to your advantage?

Schedule your high-value tasks for the time of day you are most productive. Then handle low-value tasks in the hours when you are coasting.

In other words, try to get the most work done in the times where you do feel like it, and schedule lower-priority objectives for the times when you don’t.

3. Use the Pomodoro Technique

The Pomodoro Technique is a productivity method created by Francesco Cirilio that’s intended to help you get more done in less time.

Here’s how it works:

1. Choose one task to work on
2. Set a timer and work with zero distractions for 25 minutes
3. After the timer goes off, take a break for 5 minutes and then start again
4. After four pomodoros (25 minutes of focused work) take a longer break of 15-20 minutes

The Pomodoro Technique is perfect for the times you aren’t in the mood to work because you know you only have to commit to 25 minutes of focused work at a time. Knowing that you’ll get a break quickly makes it easier to get started.

The best part is how much momentum this technique builds and how quickly it ramps up your motivation!

4. Cut Off Social Media

Humans have always found ways to waste time. Social media is our preference in the modern age.

However, social media is more than a distraction — it’s an addiction. In fact, research shows that Facebook addiction activates the same areas of the brain as drugs. (Source)

Unless you record yourself throughout the day, you probably don’t realize how much time you waste with social media. Think about how many times you open Instagram or Snapchat throughout the day.

Each time you check your social media you are throwing your mind out of flow with what you need to accomplish. (Unless your job requires you to use social media.)

The best solution I’ve found is to turn off ALL notifications from social media apps and only check social media at certain times of the day.

As fun as social media is, it doesn’t bring the same satisfaction as getting things done!

5. Incentivize Yourself

It’s funny how motivated you get when there’s money on the line.

Sometimes all we need is a little incentive.

There’s a company, stickK, that’s 100% free and allows you to bet money against yourself and be held accountable. You set a goal to bet on, pick an amount of money to bet, and then select a referee to approve or decline your bet based on whether you stuck to your goal or not.

What makes it interesting is how you can set the stakes. For example, many people choose to have their money donated to a charity they despise or to a person they don’t like. In other words, they give themselves a convincing reason not to fail.

Another tactic for this strategy of incentivizing yourself is creating a competition with a friend or family member – a method I have personally used many times successfully.

I don’t know about you, but for me, I would rather win bragging rights from a friend than take their money. That said, when they’re willing to put both on the line, I’m more than happy to take both.

6. Force Yourself to Get Started

Motivation comes and goes.

Sometimes motivation finds you and other times you have to seek it out.

The mistake too many make is thinking you are supposed to be motivated before you start working.

Unfortunately, this won’t always be the case — but it’s ok because you don’t need it.

All you need to do is get started, and the motivation will come to you.

If you can just hang in for 10 to 20 minutes, you’ll reach a flow state and find your motivation.

The only time this doesn’t work is when there’s something bigger going on…

7. Check Your Health

Burnout is real, and you want to avoid it.

If you’re experiencing prolonged lack of motivation, there might be some underlying health issues.

Are you getting enough sleep?

Are you eating a balanced diet and exercising regularly?

Are you staying hydrated?

Sure, these are common sense, but I have a tendency to get caught up in the hustle and forget to eat. Perhaps you’re skipping something that’s important for your health.

Remember, health is number one. There’s nothing more important than your health.

You’ll do your best work when you’re performing at your best.

When your body and mind are prepared to perform, you’ll be surprised how often you “feel like” getting things done!

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KW Stout is the author of Health Mind Power — a website dedicated to improving your life through habits and your daily routine. You can download the FREE eBook, 99 Habits For Those Who Want it All, at his website!

You’ve read 7 Ways to Get Things Done When You “Don’t Feel Like It”, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.

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