EQ is the acronym for Emotional Intelligence. So not only do you and I have an IQ
(Intelligence Quotient), we also have emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is not about traditional intelligence. It is about our ability to handle ourselves and others. It is all about our ability to get along with others and build relationships.

The concept of EQ became popularized by Daniel Goleman in 1995. His book (also called Emotional Intelligence), helped us to understand that it is not just technical and analytical abilities that make a successful leader. IQ is not the only predictor of your success, a high IQ is not a guarantee of career success. You do need your technical abilities, your competencies at a specific skill or within a specific subject matter, but to thrive you need your ability to get along with other people. The most successful leaders also have a high degree of emotional intelligence.  And here is the great news; EQ (unlike IQ) can be developed.

Emotional intelligence: “the ability to monitor one’s own and others’ feelings and emotions, to discriminate among them and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and action.” -  Peter Salovey and John D. Mayer.

“The abilities to recognize and regulate emotions in ourselves and others” – Daniel Goleman and Gary Cherniss.

Why should you care about your EQ? Perhaps you will humor me by reading just one more quote:

“75% of careers are derailed for reasons related to emotional competencies, including inability to handle interpersonal problems; unsatisfactory team leadership during times of difficulty or conflict; or inability to adapt to change or elicit trust.”  — The Center for Creative Leadership, 1994

So 75% of careers derail for reasons that relate to something that we can all work on and improve? Of course you care!

What makes up EQ? There are five components:

Self-Awareness – A person who is self-aware understands their own moods and emotions and also how those moods and emotions may impact others.

Self-Regulation – Someone who exhibits self-regulation thinks before they act. Remember that person you worked for? The one who used to get red in the face, yell and scream and throw notebooks across the room? They were not exhibiting self-regulation at all.

Motivation – If you love to work and it is not just for money or for status; if you have a strong drive to achieve; then you know about motivation.

Empathy – The empathetic individual is able to understand the emotions of others and also learns to treat them as they wish to be treated.

Social Skill – Do you know someone who is able to meet new people and immediately develop a rapport with them? It is likely that they are very accomplished in the area of social skill.

Why don’t we take a moment and examine someone who is working on their self-awareness and their self-regulation:

“Do you think you could stop surfing the web long enough to get me a latte? I would hate to think your horoscope for the day includes bad customer service.” For some reason, snapping at the coffee house barista made Jane feel just a bit better. Jane slammed some money on the counter and waited for her coffee. When it was ready she picked it up and marched out of the coffee house, letting the door close in the face of the person walking out behind her.

Wow in the above scenario Jane is definitely not being self-aware and definitely not exhibiting self-regulation.

If Jane came back to the coffee house after she verbally abused the barista and apologized, she would be exhibiting one of the behaviors associated with trustworthiness. Trustworthiness is considered to be a competency of self-regulation; a behavior that is associated with this competency is the ability to admit our own mistakes.

In this version of Jane and the coffee house, we see self-awareness and self-regulation:

Jane took a deep breath as she opened the door to the coffee house. She knew that she was tired and really on edge. Jane also knew that when she was tired she had a tendency to be impatient and say things she would later regret. With this thought in mind, Jane approached the counter, smiled and said, “Excuse me; I would like to order a latte please.”

Because Jane is aware of how she behaves when she is tired, she is also able to exercise self-control. She is able to manage her impulses and disruptive emotions, she remains composed and positive. She takes a deep breath, thinks before she speaks and does not allow herself to behave badly.  She does not need to go back to the coffee house and apologize because she was able to self-regulate.

Self-awareness and self-regulation are the foundation upon which you build and strengthen your emotional intelligence. Think about it, in order to regulate your behavior you must become aware of your behavior and what causes or triggers that behavior. When you become aware, you can begin to manage yourself and to stop yourself from snapping at coffee house baristas (or your co-workers or your friends or family).

To develop self-awareness you need to learn to objectively observe yourself. This means you are keeping an eye out for situations where you felt negative emotions. This is a good start. An even better start is to recognize those negative emotions and then the behaviors that you exhibit when you are experiencing these emotions. A very helpful tool to support you in this process is journaling. Consider keeping a journal that helps you track when you act in a way that you later regret and what you were feeling at the time.  This journal is your first line of defense to building your self-awareness and your self-regulation.

Remember that EQ can be developed and developing your EQ is a journey. By reading this article and becoming familiar with the concept of EQ, you have just taken the first step.

Margaret Meloni is a Guest Blogger for PickTheBrain. She is a life coach and personal consultant, dedicated to helping you to get through the day in Peace, not in Pieces!

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Harnessing The Power of Your Subconscious Mind

Artwork courtesy of Amy Buchheit

Some days, you wake up early, storm through tons of work before lunch, and come to the evening feeling as though you’ve accomplished a lot. For many of us, though, those days are the exception rather than a rule. Perhaps you’re reading this in the middle of a rather unproductive day. Maybe you woke up late, spent time procrastinating, had to deal with a dozen “urgent” little tasks, or simple got interrupted every five minutes.

If it feels like your day is slipping through your fingers, here’s how to turn things around and make that unproductive day into a fulfilling one:

Stop and Take Stock

So often, we end up in “reaction mode”, responding in a knee-jerk way to things as they come up. This is generally an ineffective way to work: you often end up dealing with fairly low-priority tasks simply because they’re the ones which present themselves.

When your day’s running away from you, take just five minutes to completely stop. Close your email program and your browser, or simply switch off your computer monitor. Think about what you want to accomplish today. Are you on track? If not, what’s gone wrong – and how can you pull things back into line?

Pick One Important Project or Task

As you take stock of your unproductive day so far, work out one important project or task that you want to get done, something that will give your day a sense of meaning and purpose. Perhaps it’s something you’ve been putting off, like writing an important letter or email. Maybe it’s the first step in a new course of action, like signing up for a course or seminar. It could be something that will take you further towards an important goal – perhaps getting your business’s website online.

Spend An Hour Focusing On This

A whole hour of focused attention is long enough to make meaningful progress. Let everything else slide for an hour, and spend that time concentrating on your one important thing. Your emails, and phone calls can wait until that hour’s up. It might help to set a timer. If your task involves writing, try using a full-screen program like Dark Room. Shut down your email – or even disconnect your computer from the internet if it helps.

Eliminate As Many Distractions As Possible

You might have to struggle to find just one hour to devote to something truly important. To keep your day on productive lines, eliminate the distractions that are sapping your focus. That might mean that you close your email and leave it closed until it’s nearly the end of your working day. Perhaps you’ll let your phone go to voicemail. Let your colleagues know you’d appreciate only being interrupted in a real emergency – or if you work from home, explain to your family that you could really use some uninterrupted time.

Challenge Yourself to Be Productive

Some unproductive days aren’t simply caused by us succumbing to distractions – they’re partially influenced by external events. Maybe you have several meetings scheduled, a lot of family duties, or various chores to run. Challenge yourself to squeeze in as much productive work as you can: perhaps you’ll jot down some notes while waiting in line at the post office, or maybe you can blitz through some emails with your toddler on your lap. If you have routine chores to do around the house, listen to audio books or podcasts during them – it’s a great way to fit some learning into your day.

Review Your Day

When you’ve had an unproductive day, don’t waste time and energy feeling guilty about it. See it instead as an opportunity to learn about the conditions in which you work best. Spend ten minutes reviewing how your day went, asking questions like:
•    Where did things start going wrong? (eg. “I woke up late”, “I checked my email first thing”)
•    What distractions did I succumb to?
•    What could I have done differently?
•    What helped me to focus?

There’s nothing wrong with making mistakes – they’re great learning opportunities, and chances to eliminate methods of working that aren’t helpful to you.

Do you find that you regularly have unproductive days? How do you turn things around?

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Some people appear to be hopped up on happy pills, being oblivious to any bad events going on around them. Others are all too quick to express their disgust at anything that doesn’t go exactly their way.

Could it be that the healthiest emotional mix is somewhere between the extremes? Say, four parts good feelings to one part bad feelings, shaken not stirred, and served with a twist of lime?

We all know that some people seem determined to be miserable. The other day on the radio, I heard about a study that found many people actually resist being happy. It turns out that trying to reassure someone when they’re depressed is likely to make them feel worse.

The suspected reason for this is that some people feel the need to stay attached to their perception of reality. They make a negative statement like “I hate my job.” Then someone tries to make them feel better by saying, “It’s OK, your job isn’t that bad.” But this statement conflicts with their perception.

They may resolve this conflict by saying, “Yes, my job IS that bad, and I’ll tell you why…” Feeling that they’re forced to prove their point, they end up making themselves feel worse.

Of course, there’s no need to prove that you hate your job. Instead of remaining attached to that perception and defending it against any evidence to the contrary, you could instead change your perception. Everything can be seen from multiple perspectives, and if you choose to look on the bright side of things, you’ll dramatically boost your happiness.

At the same time, do you want to improve your life solely by forcing yourself to see the good side, or do you also want your life to actually get better? Here’s where negative emotions come in. They tell us that something’s not right, thereby steering us towards what we want.

Consider the evolutionary purpose of pain. If you were to stick your hand in a fire, it would hurt. The pain would make you quickly recoil your hand and run off in search of water. Of course, you wouldn’t enjoy the pain, but if you didn’t feel it, you’d leave your hand in the fire and cause serious damage or death. The pain tells you you’re doing something wrong, and provides some very strong motivation to correct it immediately.

It works the same way with emotions. You may not like feeling negative emotions, but if you felt perfectly happy regardless of your circumstances, why would you ever try to make the right choices?

Even homeless people have a lot to be thankful for. But if a homeless person is constantly overjoyed with their life, they won’t be motivated to change it. On the other hand, someone who feels the fear of becoming homeless will do whatever they can to prevent that from happening.

The purpose of pain is to make you avoid danger. But once you’re doing everything you can, feeling more pain doesn’t help. If something is medically wrong with you, then a little pain is good, because it makes you go to the doctor. But chronic pain after you’re already receiving treatment is bad, because it hurts without a purpose. Likewise, negative emotions are bad once they get beyond the point of being constructive.

There are two extremes that you want to avoid. Staying constantly focused on what’s wrong with your life may make you determined to fix the situation, but it will put you through far more misery than necessary. On the other hand, acting like Pollyanna on Prozac all the time may make you feel good, but it won’t inspire you to action when something is going wrong.

The best mix is to enjoy good emotions most of the time, while allowing negative emotions to serve their purpose now and then. By looking for the good side in everything, you’ll make the most of what life has to offer. And by periodically acknowledging what’s not working for you, you’ll keep up the motivation to work towards what you really want.

Hunter is a Guest Blogger for PickTheBrain and a personal development blogger, seeking life lessons wherever they may appear.

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Embracing The Beauty of Sadness

Photo Credit: Niklas
Often we see things that others have and wish that we had the same. Or sometimes, if we see somebody who is very happy, we feel a lack of happiness in our own life and feel jealous of the other person. Jealousy is a very unhealthy, counterproductive feeling that directly results in making us feel discontent and unsatisfied.

As jealousy is an emotional response and almost seems involuntary it feels like it is something that cannot be fought. The biggest problem of a jealous person is that we makes a lot of assumptions and don’t see the clear picture. In order to stop feeling jealous, we need to make an effort to think clearly and rationally. The following are some tips that can help in thinking straight and tempering jealous emotional responses:
1. Count Your Blessings:

In my school life, when I used to see one of my friends with a cool gadget and rant to my mother about wanting the same, I was always told “Look at the people that have less than you.” She would actually take names of specific people that we knew that did not even have the basic necessities of life. This really worked for me because it made me realize the difference between important things and un-important things. She would explain to me that even though I don’t have some of the things I want, I am still more fortunate than the vast majority of the people in this world.

It is the same way when we talk about achievements and success. When we look at somebody’s success, we often forget about the things we have achieved in our life and start feeling sad or negatively. A very good way to overcome this is to take a small piece of paper and start making a list of different things we have achieved/acquired that a lot of other people in this world have not. Even general things that we really take for granted, like having a family, getting an education, having a car, being free, being independent, having a soul-mate, being a cute kid, being grandma’s favorite, having best friends, having a job e.t.c. would make us realize that we indeed have a lot of things in our life that many people miss out on.

This will create a sense of gratification and will help us realize that we have a lot more than we were thinking.

Envy is the art of counting the other fellow’s blessings instead of your own. ~Harold Coffin

2. Trade-offs:

Everything comes as part of a package. If somebody has something that you don’t, you also have a few things that they don’t. You will see that people who are very good at maths, would often suck at creative things like painting pictures or playing a violin. We all have some strengths and weaknesses, and the sooner we realize them, the better it would be.

We often fail to recognize that a lot of things can only be achieved by sacrificing other things. You cannot be a movie star without sacrificing your privacy, or be a supermodel without compromising your diet. It is important to think through the things we would have to give up, to get something else.
3. Take Inspiration:

Look around you and make a list of those people who would be genuinely happy when you achieve something. Now, try to think and analyze their rational behind this. Every one of them would have a different relationship to you but everyone would be truly happy for you because they care about you. They understand that sharing your happiness would make both of you happy and strengthen the relationship. Each one of them would be a source of inspiration when you pause and think “how does this person not feel jealous of me.” People like these are everywhere around us and there is no reason why you won’t be able to do the same thing that they do.
4. They Have Worked Hard For It

Another perspective is to realize the fact that they must have worked really hard to get what they have. How would you feel if at the peak of your career, people start feeling jealous of you without realizing that you have spend countless years getting to that position. It is always good to acknowledge others’ hard work and appreciate it so they do the same for you when time comes.
5. This Is Not What You Want

Jealousy often makes us do things that we don’t really want in the first place. We are all individuals with different needs and desires but we often forget this when we feel jealous. For example, you see a friend of yours in a sports car and wish you had one too, not realizing that what your family really needs is a mini van. We often start working towards things out of sheer jealousy, but once we get them, we understand that they are not in line with our goals and we have used our energy unwisely.

6. Give

If you constantly feel jealous of a person, give them something nice. It can be anything tangible or intangible that would make them really happy. After that, whenever you see them being happy, you’ll realize that you have contributed to their overall happiness and you will start feeling happy for them (and for for yourself).

Envy is a symptom of lack of appreciation of our own uniqueness and self worth.  Each of us has something to give that no one else has.  ~Elizabeth O’Connor
Jealousy comes very easily, but fortunately is not hard to get rid off if we just stop and think for a few seconds. As soon as we realize what we are doing, we will see that it is not right nor fair to be unhappy for someone who is happy. It is really all about keeping an open mind and a positive attitude about other people, and most importantly about ourselves so we can challenge all these negative feelings in positive, productive emotions.

Tehseen Baweja is a Guest Blogger for PickTheBrain and the founder of RechargeYourMind.

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When I’ve got a case of the blues, I sometimes cheer myself up by buying a new book or two on Amazon. Perhaps you have some similar habits: you know what cheers you up, whether it’s going shopping, eating a giant bag of chips, opening a bottle of wine, lighting up…

The problem is, a lot of these little habits don’t really cheer us up, and, over time, they can have a very negative effect on our health, our wallet, or both.

These are some perennially popular ones – and reasons why they’re not a good idea:

1.    Comfort  Eating

Do you ever turn to food when you’re bored, stressed, or feeling low?  Many of us have a long-established pattern of eating for emotional reasons – this may be something we learnt as small children, if parents gave us candy as a comforter (or to keep us quiet!)

The problem with comfort eating is that, even if a king-sized candy bar dulls our misery temporarily, we usually feel worse afterwards. If you’re trying to take care of your health, or lose weight, you’ll probably feel guilty for using your bad mood as an excuse to succumb to temptation.

A short-term sugar crash won’t do much for your state of mind, and your long-term health is likely to suffer if you regularly over-indulge in sweet, salty or fatty snacks.

2.    Alcohol or Cigarettes

When I realized in college that I often felt I “needed” a glass of wine at the end of the day in order to unwind and relax, I knew it was time to go teetotal for a while. You might be far from being an alcoholic – but that doesn’t mean you can’t have a drinking problem.

Turning to the bottle when you’re feeling blue isn’t going to help. At best, you might forget about what’s troubling you for an evening – but your problems will still be there the next day (and they may well be accompanied by a hangover). If you’re starting to feel that you “need” a drink in order to de-stress, be careful.

I’ve never smoked, but a few of my friends are smokers, and from what they’ve said, I know that cigarettes do provide some stress-relief. This comes, however, with a hefty price tag, both in monetary and health terms. If you’re putting off quitting because you can’t relax without a cigarette, start exploring some better stress-busting techniques.

3.    Shopping

There’s nothing wrong with using your money to buy things that bring you enjoyment. If you regularly go shopping to lift your mood, however, there’s a good chance that you’re buying a lot of stuff that you don’t really need and don’t really want.

If you get into the habit of shopping when you’re down, you’ll be more susceptible to succumbing to cunning marketing ploys. As with comfort eating, alcohol and cigarettes, excessive and unnecessary shopping won’t make you feel good about yourself the next day.

Plus, if your financial situation is a bit rocky, shopping will add to your worries.

So, if these popular mood-boosters don’t really work, what does? There are a whole host of things you might try, but three that are pretty much guaranteed to lift your mood are:

1.    Exercising

Don’t groan! Getting your body moving is a great way to boost your mood (and, of course, it’s good for your health). Have you ever had that satisfied, completely de-stressed feeling after a workout? Or have you ever gone outside to “walk off” some excess nervous energy, or to get some space and recover from a bad mood?

If you’ve tried exercising in the past, you’ll know how effective it is. Over here in the UK, doctors are increasingly encouraging patients with mild to moderate depression to exercise regularly – it can help people to manage their depression without the need for drugs.

2.    Doing Something for Others

Many volunteers find that giving their time and energy to a good cause helps them to feel fulfilled and satisfied, and that it can be a great way of meeting new friends with similar interests and values. Knowing that you’ve used one of your skills to help someone in need can give your confidence and your sense of self-worth a massive boost.

You don’t necessarily need to join a formal scheme as a volunteer. How about dropping in on a lonely neighbor, doing a favor for a friend, or taking the time to phone someone who you know will appreciate a chat?

3.    Get On With Something Absorbing

When you’re feeling down, it can be hard to feel motivated to start on anything. Perhaps you’ve got a stack of emails to reply to, but you just can’t face them. (Indeed, a backlog of work might even be the cause of your bad mood.) Maybe you’ve got a particular hobby or interest that you never seem to get time for any more.

Getting on with something – anything – can sometimes be enough to lift your mood. It might mean throwing yourself into work, or enjoying a chapter or two of an engrossing novel. Sometimes, all that’s needed for your mood to lift is to simply find an activity that occupies your brain.

How do you lift your mood when you’re feeling down? Do any of the above tips work for you, or do you have some of your own to add to the list?

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6 Motivation Tips When You’re Feeling Depressed

Depression is a difficult illness for even the most iron-willed of individuals. Whether you’re clinically depressed or just in a rut, depression can make basic tasks like cleaning the house, taking a shower and even getting out of bed incredibly difficult and physically and mentally draining. It is important to stay motivated to continue to live your life and work towards feeling better, even when you’re at your lowest point. Here are some simple ways that you can motivate yourself on a daily basis:

•    Don’t be too harsh with yourself. It’s going to take time to get things done like you used to and to feel like your old self. Changes are not going to happen overnight, so don’t be overly critical of yourself if you make mistakes or don’t get as much done as you’d like. You’re having a hard enough time without getting on your own case.

•    Be realistic. Making a laundry list of things to do is a surefire way to set yourself up for failure. Start with small positive changes and work from there. If you’re not realistic you’ll just end up frustrated and more depressed.

•    Surround yourself with people. While you may just want to curl up and be alone, this isn’t the best or easiest route for you when you’re depressed. Having others around you to give you a helping hand, talk to you and provide you with inspiration is important to feeling better and getting back into the swing of things, even if you feel like you just want to shut everyone out.

•    Move around. Lying in bed all day or hunkering down on the couch isn’t going to do much but give you more time to feel bad about things. When you force yourself to get up, even if only for a short walk or to tend to some plants outside, you’ll be helping yourself feel better physically and mentally.

•    Start a project. For many, this may seem like that last thing they want to do but an enjoyable project can give you something to concentrate on that will bring your thoughts away from depression and give you something to feel proud of when you’re done.

•    Make a plan. If even the smallest tasks seem like a chore, start small with planning out what you’re going to do each day. In the morning, write down the things you’d like to accomplish and in the evening, go back and check off what you did. This can help you regain your sense of control over your life at a time when it seems the most chaotic.

Recovering from depression is a hard road, but with some planning and slow but steady progress you may be able to start feeling optimistic about your life again. For a list of more great depression resources, click here.

Meredith Walker is a guest blogger for PickTheBrain.com. She writes about online nursing programs and welcomes your feedback.

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The Real Key To Life

Image courtesy of SeanRock.

One tenet you’ll often hear in personal development circles is that “it’s good to talk” or “a burden shared is a burden halved”. Sometimes, though, when feeling down, you’ll talk to a spouse, parent or friend about how you feel … and you’ll find that you’re just dragging yourself into a deeper and blacker mood.

So why is it that talking doesn’t always help? And how can you help someone who wants to talk to you about their woes?

Talking Often Focuses on the Problem

Perhaps you’ve been feeling a bit down recently. Maybe you have bleak days when it seems like you’ve lost your direction in life. You might talk to a friend about it, detailing all the things you wish you could do (if only you had the money, or the time, or the skills), and endlessly dissecting everything that’s wrong in your life.

Talking about everything that’s wrong just reinforces your focus on things that aren’t currently working. If you’re already in a bad mood, it’ll send you spiralling further and further down. Have you ever had the experience of “working yourself into a state” – feeling a bit anxious or angry about something, and dwelling on it until the molehill becomes a mountain?

Tip for Helping: If someone wants to talk to you about everything that’s wrong in their life, encourage them to find something that’s good. Ask “what’s been better recently?” This is a technique that the coach Mark Forster uses and explains in his book How to Make Your Dreams Come True.

Talking May Mean Saying Something You Regret

When you’re in a bad mood, or feeling very fed up about something, it’s easy to think that your state of mind represents your real feelings about a job, relationship, or life situation. The truth is, how you feel when in a bad mood is no more “real” or objective than the way you feel when everything’s going swimmingly.

One danger of trying to talk through your bad moods is that you’ll end up saying something you’ll regret. Perhaps you’ll think, at the time, that you’re telling your friend a few home truths … but later you’ll realise that you don’t really think that of them at all. Maybe you’ll tell colleagues that you hate your job, despite finding it perfectly pleasant most of the time: do you want your words making their way through the office grapevine to your boss?

Tip for Helping: Try to treat anything that someone says in anger, or while upset, as something that they don’t really mean. If you do end up saying something that you regret, don’t be too hesitant to apologize once you’ve calmed down.

Talking Only Works if Someone Listens

Unfortunately, most people in the world are not good listeners – and I include myself here. When listening to someone, it’s easy to let your mind wander, or to stop concentrating on their words in order to think about what you’re going to say next. We often don’t even hear the actual words that are said – let alone the intention behind them, and the wealth of stuff that is implied.

You may get frustrated when you talk about your problems because people just don’t seem to understand. Perhaps they brush off the major issues as unimportant, and attend to the minor ones; perhaps they offer advice when all you wanted was someone to listen patiently. Maybe they’ve completely missed the point.

Tip for Helping: Learn how to listen actively. If you’re seeking help, try going to a life coach, counsellor or someone else who has been trained to listen and to help you work through problems.

Do you find that talking to someone when you’re in a bad mood helps you to feel better – or does it tend to make things worse? Have you been able to help people by listening to them when they’re going through a bleak spell?

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One great question to ask if you’re interested in self-improvement is “Am I investing in myself?”  – particularly when you’re feeling stuck, or when your progress towards your goals hasn’t been so fast as you’d like.

So what does “investing in yourself” mean? This depends on what your goals are, but these are three big areas you might want to invest some time, money and thought in:
•    Your appearance
•    Your skills
•    Your health

All of these are important for success in many walks of life. Here’s why, and some ideas how you can invest in each.

Investing In Your Appearance

This might seem a very shallow thing to put at the top. Unfortunately, like it or not, we all tend to judge on appearances. In some jobs or roles, looking the part can make a real difference to how others perceive and treat you.

Just as importantly, your appearance can have huge effects on your self confidence. Have you ever been at an event where you misjudged the formality and ended up very under-dressed or over-dressed? I’ll bet you felt awkward and out of place. Conversely, you might well have taken extra care over your grooming before a big presentation, and felt more confident as a result.

Investing in your appearance might mean:
•    Saving up for a good suit
•    Getting up ten minutes earlier to have time to look your best for work
•    Asking a fashionable friend for advice on your usual “look”
•    Losing some weight (also important for health reasons)
•    Taking some time to revamp your wardrobe, ensuring you have clothes that mix and match well

If you feel that your appearance is the big area you need to invest in, Trent from The Simple Dollar has some strong advice (particularly if you’re in a fairly traditional job) in his article on The Value of Personal Appearance.

Investing in Your Skills

All of us have a certain skill set, often based on our jobs (current and past), our hobbies and our day-to-day experiences. Employers tend to be interested primarily in skills – what you can do. Some of these will be very specific to particular jobs (technical skills, such as being able to program a computer) and other skills are “transferable skills” that you can use in many careers as well as in day-to-day life (such as public speaking or presentational skills).

Clear five or ten uninterrupted minutes when you can sit down and list your skills. Put down little things as well as big ones – being able to bake the perfect cake is a skill!

What skills could you develop, with the investment of a little time or money? Could any of these form the basis of a new career, a side business, a fulfilling hobby, or something you could offer to your community?

Some ways to invest in your skills are:
•    Read a book that teaches you something new in a particular area
•    Attend a local course
•    Take part in an online course
•    Ask someone to mentor you
•    Schedule regular time to practise

Investing in Your Health

Too many of us are storing up health problems for later life – one that could cause financial problems or give us a huge reduction in quality of life. It’s much cheaper to focus on staying healthy than to take preventative action once something’s gone wrong. If you’re in good health, you’ll perform better at work, you’ll have more energy to work towards your goals, and you’ll generally feel happier!

Don’t just think about your physical health, either; mental health is just as important (and, indeed, your mental and physical health can’t be considered in complete isolation). By investing some time and money now, you could save yourself a huge amount of both in the future. Here are some ideas to get you started:
•    If you’re over or under weight, start taking action
•    Get some exercise each day – great for your body and mind
•    Take good care of your teeth (dental hygiene, and regular visits to your dentist) – tooth  pain can be crippling
•    If you work at a computer, learn about RSI and how to prevent it.
•    Eat a healthy, balanced diet, focusing on fruits, veggies, wholegrains and lean proteins.
•    Don’t smoke, take drugs, or drink excessive amounts of alcohol.

What areas could you invest in? Is it worth spending some money or some time now in order to improve your position in the future?

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“You spent the first half of your life becoming somebody.  Now you can work on becoming nobody, which is really somebody.  For when you become nobody there is no tension, no pretense, no one trying to be anyone or anything.  The natural state of the mind shines through unobstructed – and the natural state of the mind is pure love.”  Ram Dass

I recently turned 40.

No, I’m not wearing “old man socks” yet but I certainly understand the trait of being that brings about this tragedy of fashion; which I believe can be summed up quite bluntly in two words:

“Who cares!?”

This carefree trait is one of contentment and it illustrates the process of (and value inherent in) becoming nobody – where “the natural state of the mind shines through unobstructed.”

“Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are.” ~ Chinese Proverb

Have you ever worn old man socks?  These socks are soft, form-fitting and made to be worn comfortably for long periods of time.  The fact that dress socks don’t “look right” with tennis shoes and plaid shorts is barely an afterthought in relation to the priorities of comfort and practicality.

Most of you likely understand the value of comfort, such as the little pleasures found in wearing a t-shirt and an old pear of jeans or staying in your flannel pajamas and slippers all day.

Before I digress entirely away from my point (there actually is a point here), a certain attitude or life perspective that goes beyond material pleasure can be found underneath these old man socks.

“One’s own self is well-hidden from one’s own self; of all mines of treasure, one’s own is the last to be dug up.” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Of course, age or gender certainly does not preclude one’s appreciation of old man socks and the wisdom of becoming nobody.

The realization that the hyper-intentional pursuit of trying to be somebody other than one self is a misguided (and entirely too common) pursuit influenced by the ever-presence and dominance of social conventions and media noise.

From childhood, social messages implicitly and explicitly tell us how to behave, what image to portray, what products will supposedly provide the perception of such an image, what to study in college, what career to pursue (usually based upon money and social status) and how to define “retirement” and how to obtain it in the quickest fashion.

Amidst this noise, and along the path to become somebody, the true self becomes covered or hidden.

“Health is the greatest possession.  Contentment is the greatest treasure.  Confidence is the greatest friend.  Non-being is the greatest joy.” ~ Lau Tzu

I expect many readers of PTB can add their depth of thought to this subject (and I hope many will do so in comments following this post), but here are my thoughts and observations attributable to the values found underneath old man socks – the wisdom of becoming nobody:

•    Contentment:  Being comfortable in your own skin (and socks) and being content with your present monetary, material and social wealth (or lack thereof) actually makes you “rich” – not the attainment of “more.”  As Epicurus said, “If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.”
•    Giving / Unintended Success:  The dedication to a cause greater than oneself, with little or no selfish motives, is the greatest enabler of success.  In other words, not caring about success will sooner provide a higher quality of success than a hyper-intentional desire to quickly create it.
•    Self-awareness:  The simple awareness of who you are, where you are going and why you are going there is essential in separating (and uncovering) your self from social conventions.  As Lau Tzu said, “If you don’t change direction, you may end up where you are heading.”
•    The Power of Nothingness:  Continuing upon the Taoist theme, there is power in “nothingness” and assuming the “low position:” The rivers flow to the ocean because it is in the lowest position; the high inclines toward the low; a ship floats because the hull is hollow; simplicity is stronger than complexity; less is more; creation follows destruction; something comes from nothing; and somebody comes from nobody.

“We get so much in the habit of wearing disguises before others that we finally appear disguised before ourselves.” ~ Francois de la Rochefoucauld

Returning to the primary theme, woven into the lighthearted fabric of old man socks, one can see the value of becoming nobody.

Which of these is more of a tragedy – wearing a “disguise” in the pursuit of becoming somebody or something other than one self or wearing old man socks and being content with becoming nobody?

The former is an empty victory – a tragedy of self.  The latter is a tragedy of fashion; however, it is a victory of self – it embodies the wisdom of becoming nobody.

What are your thoughts?  Have you discovered the wisdom of becoming nobody?

Kent Thune is a Guest Blogger for PickTheBrain. He is the author of the Financial Philosopher.

Have you watched TV programs like Downsize Me? I really enjoy watching this! People who lead unhealthy lifestyles are given a ‘lifestyle makeover.’ They usually end up losing weight and finding more happiness by the end of the show. Obviously they do make great strides over the two months they are being followed by the cameras, but I often wonder how many of these people go back to their old unhealthy ways once the TV cameras have left. The trouble is that these kind of programmes focus on external things – diet, exercise, giving up smoking – but they don’t address the inner world of the individuals they are seeking to treat. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with eating better, giving up smoking, drinking less and doing more exercise, but there’s something deeper here.

The mind-body connection

The connection between mind and body is becoming more accepted in mainstream medicine. If you think about it, this connection is pretty obvious. When you get excited or nervous or panicky, that feeling starts in your mind but has an immediate effect on your body. When you fall in love, you can feel it in your body. When you watch a sad movie, you might start to cry. When you find out you’ve won the lottery or got an ‘A’ grade on an exam, your heart will start to beat faster and you’ll feel all sorts of other physical effects.

R. Veenhoven carried out a scientific study of the effects of happiness on health and concluded that happy people are less likely to get sick and that they live longer. The difference between happy and unhappy people was comparable to the difference between smokers and non-smokers in terms of life span. Veenhoven’s findings can be found in The Journal of Happiness Studies (yes there really is a scholarly journal about happiness!)

Our autopilot

We all run on subconscious programmes. It’s how we manage to survive in the world. If we had to think about everything we did, we wouldn’t be able to function – there would simply be too much to think about! Our subconscious takes control of much of our life so that, in essence, we are running on autopilot. Examples of these habitual patterns are being untidy, being late and being poor. All these things come from the subconscious mind. Being sick is also a subconscious habit. I’m not suggesting that all sickness has its origin in the mind (though it might, and many people believe this), but we all know people who constantly get sick, and if they were ever healthy for more than a few months, their subconscious mind would find a way of getting back on track by bringing along an illness of some kind.

Our subconscious scripts often come from our childhood and they were developed because they gave us an advantage. The benefits of being sick, as a child, are that (for example) people will pay more attention to you, you might get a day off school, you might get some special treats or you’ll get treated better than your siblings. I’m sure we all remember the sheer joy of days off school as a child because of some minor ailment. When we grow up, these scripts stay with us. Sometimes they can still confer an advantage on us – maybe we still get attention from our family or a day off work – but they may also be problematic and destructive to our lives.

The strange thing is that many of us (most of us, in fact) don’t realize this is what’s happening. We are not even aware of the autopilot and think that things are happening to us, and not that we are controlling the way things turn out. But the reality is that we are in control and we do have a choice.

How to re-script your subconscious

Viktor Frankl wrote that ‘between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.’

In that space, we can create ourselves anew. We need the right kind of self-talk. We talk to ourselves all day long, so we need to make sure we are saying the right things. We also see ourselves in certain scenarios in our mind’s eye. We need to make sure these visualizations are of what we want to achieve, how we want to feel and what sort of person we want to be. Ultimately, we are trying to construct a good self image. When we have clear image of the person we intend to be in our mind, then our subconscious will start to run that script and the image will become reality. A change in our mind will work its way out.

We need to take responsibility for our lives. Forcing ourselves to endure exercise and eat salad whilst all the time telling ourselves that we are unhealthy and unable to really change will get us nowhere. We need to do it the other way round – start off with the belief that we are fit and healthy, and this will become part of our reality. Spending a lot of time on our mental preparation makes all the difference to our success or failure. Sharpening the axe will make it a lot easier to cut down the tree.

Michael Miles writes at effortlessabundance.com. You can download his new book, Thirty Days to Change Your Life, at the site.

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