One of the great things about a life crisis is you get to find out what works. When life is easy and no major challenges are on the horizon, you can read all about affirmations, pray, meditate, firewalk or just read self-help manuals written by big-name gurus. Then life throws you a major health challenge, the end of a relationship, the death of somebody close to you and an unexpected job loss. Now what?

Will you turn to a book, seek professional help, and meditate some more or just fall apart at the seams? This is when you get to find out what really works and what doesn’t. Here are a few ideas that have worked time and time again for people who wanted to turn their lives around after experiencing a life crisis. Tactic 1 – Run Toward, NOT Away If there is no growth without discomfort, why do so many people run away when things become uncomfortable? They avoid public speaking, they panic when the partner they know is wrong for them threatens to leave and they beg to keep the job they don’t even like. When my father was diagnosed with a terminal illness and when my marriage ended, I was taking the situation to the end and imagining myself coping. Well, not just coping but moving on with my life and being happy. Everything must come to an end and real peace of mind comes when you accept this.

Tactic 2 – Come Back to the Center The center is the core of YOU, where you sense all your feelings and experience your emotions. A Course in Miracles says that we are never upset or angry for the reason we think. When I lost the job I hated, looking back I wasn’t really upset about that after all, I was frightened that I would end up broke and destitute. I had become comfortable in my crappy job. If you come back to your emotional center and dig deep into the emotions you are feeling, you will eventually realize that it all comes back to the same fear—the fear of death.

Tactic 3 – Do What You Don’t Want to Do During a life crisis, you will be tempted to crawl into your bed and pull the sheets over your head. You may even want to turn to alcohol, drugs, food or something else to help numb the pain. Instead, do this:

• Feed your body fresh, organic food
• Exercise every day, even if it is just walking
• Read books that inspire you
• See a comedy show and laugh

If you have some spare cash, get a nice haircut and treat yourself to a new outfit. The temptation will be to neglect yourself, but you must do the opposite and invest in yourself.

Tactic 4 – Avoid Pity Parties Your friends and family will not want to see you suffer and at times like this, you will be thankful for a support network. When I was having my major crisis, I would spend every night on the phone with friends and relatives talking about what I was going through. Here’s the thing though; is talking about how terrible you feel helping you at all? Sometimes we can fall into the trap of becoming a victim in the story of our life. If you can, share your problem with a professional counselor or hypnotherapist who is there to help you move on with your life. Spend the time with your family and friends doing fun stuff.

Tactic 5 – A Full Life Is…? Do books change your life or just change the way you look at your life? Either way, a book that had a profound effect on me is ‘The Road Less Travelled’ by M. Scott Peck. The first line of the book reads ‘Life is Difficult.’ Does that sound obvious to you? You could have knocked me down with a feather when I read that short sentence. Of course, but then when did we buy into this notion that life was supposed to be all roses? Maybe it is the movies or TV that makes us think this way. If you live a full life, then you will experience great suffering but also great joy. This is life and it is how it is supposed to be. You will lose friends, have health challenges, have your partner walk out on you, but you will also love, travel and meet some very special people who touch your life. Enjoy the ride.

Paul Browning is a writer, Internet marketer and survivor of rock bottom. He is also the author of 7 People Saved My Life, a survival manual for anyone trying to cope with a life crisis.

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It’s all over the news.
You can’t avoid it.
No matter how much we try to deny it…

The world is coming to an end. (Play eerie music here)

Just this year alone we have had a prediction about the end of the world or rapture. The U.S. Government has been downgraded by S&P. Greece and Spain are in utter disarray. People are being laid off, losing their homes and are quickly watching the balances of their retirement savings diminish. I mean with times like this what is the purpose of going on? We might as well give up now. It looks like all is lost, right?

Wrong! The troubles and the issues we face rather personally or as a nation are here for a purpose. Challenges do not arise to kill us, they come into existence so that they can be overcome. I am not afraid of a debt ceiling. I am not afraid of being laid off. I am certainly not afraid of inaccurate predictions, foreclosures, or plummeting investment accounts. What I am afraid of is the lack of faith that we as human beings have in each other.

In the U.S. our ancestors survived the Great Depression. We survived the Great Market Crash of 1929. We survived the financial crisis of 2008. We rebuilt after the devastating attacks on the Trade Center towers on 9/11. We will survive today’s challenges. We are a nation full of people who learn and strive through adversity.

I could care less about political parties and selfish agendas. I care about my neighbor who is a single parent working two jobs to feed her children. She gives me hope. I care about the guy who just got laid off from his job who has the courage to start his own business. He gives me inspiration. I care about the children who press their way to school, from broken and damaged homes, with no supplies trying to educate themselves. They motivate me to make keep trying to make a difference.

So, instead of wasting our time focusing on everything we see going wrong, lets take the time and do something right. The purpose of adversity is to make us stronger. Who have you strengthened today?

I refuse to be a participant in chaos. I want to be an advocate for solutions. Let’s build from the ashes of our past failures and pour a solid foundation that future generations can stand on.

Here’s some great ways for us to help based on the needs of the people:

• Resume Seminars
• Interviewing Seminars
• Volunteering
• Debt Consolidation Programs (not scams)
• Book sharing- If you read a great book pass it to a friend.
• Donate school supplies
• Career development coaching
• Financial literacy and responsibility programs

The more hands that get involved, the faster we change the news headlines into something worth reading. Let’s make a difference. I understand the purpose of adversity and I am up to the challenge. Who’s with me?

Frank Jenning is the founder of A Spark Starts where he writes inspiring stories to encourage you to reach your full potential. He writes with passion. He writes with purpose. He writes for you.

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Ever seen an ad promising that you can “lose 30lbs in a month” or “make $$$ working from home part-time – with no experience”?

It’s tempting to believe that there’s a magic bullet, some way to fix our problems quickly and easily – without any effort, self-discipline or hard work.

And marketers know that this is how we think. They promise to spill the secrets, teach us easy tips that change our lives radically. They go for highly emotive issues like weight loss and money.

The problem is, there’s no magic bullet. There never is.

How can I be so sure?

Because if it really was that easy, we’d all be doing it.

If there really was some huge secret to making money without any effort, do you really think that one canny marketer would be the only person who knew it?

If it really was possible to lose 30lbs in a month safely and sustainably, do you think the obesity crisis would exist?

Promising a magic bullet is simply a sales tactic – and not one which you want to fall for.

Hard Work Trumps Wishful Thinking

It’s easy to sit around daydreaming about winning loads of money. It’s a lot harder to stay motivated to work your way up to a promotion, or to take evening classes to give you the skills and qualifications which you need for a new career.

It’s easy to swallow an expensive weight loss pill. It’s a lot harder to stay disciplined and resist that slice of chocolate cake, or that candy bar.

The thing is, life is hard work sometimes. And that’s good news.

Why?

Because if you’re willing to put in some work, you can get a very long way in life. You might turn around your financial situation, or go after the career of your dreams, or travel to amazing places – whatever it is you want.

A lot of people never manage to do that. They keep hoping for a magic bullet (and even end up spending a fortune in time and money on chasing that bullet).

I’m not saying that you should run yourself into the ground by working hard. And, in fact, while there might not be any magic bullet, there are a lot of simple tips and tricks to make the road to your goals that bit easier.

You probably know plenty of those tips already. You can pick up many, many more for the price of an internet connection or a library membership.

Here are a few examples of what I mean:

• Instead of the “magic bullet” of diet pills, keep a food diary. (Studies have shown that this is the single most effective way of boosting weight loss.)
• Instead of the “magic bullet” of some internet marketer’s “make money online while you sleep” program, spend a few hours each week doing freelance work.
• Instead of the “magic bullet” of an amazing, but pricy, piece of exercise equipment, go for a brisk walk in your lunch hour.

I often find myself wishing that life would be easy. But then I remember how much more I value things when I’ve worked for them, and how much I learn and grow in the process.

What are you working towards right now? Have you gathered solid tips and tricks to help you (for free, or at least cheaply) – or are you sitting around waiting for an expensive magic bullet?

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Sometimes I have a problem I just can’t seem to solve. Like the other day when I left my car at a friends house and had no way to get to my appointment across town. I tried calling friends for a ride, but no one was picking up. Just when I was about to cancel the appointment, I remembered I left my car at a different friend’s house, the one who lives 2 blocks away!

I love telling this story because it reinforces the idea that the solution is always contained within the problem. If had taken a second to write down my problem, it would have gone something like this:

“I need to get to an appointment and my car is at a friend’s house.”

The solution to the problem starts right where the problem left off:

“My car is at a friend’s house, a friend that lives 2 blocks away.”

This particular situation is one of the more obvious examples of how you can find the solution contained within the problem, but I have had success applying this concept to more complex problems as well. This led me to break down the concept into a process that can be repeated over and over again.

Here is my 3-step process to find the solution hidden within any problem:

1. Define the problem.

If possible, write down everything you believe about the problem. What is holding you back? Who is involved? What aspects of problem are out of your control? How does the problem make you feel?

2. Step back, take a moment.

Take the problem you have written down and set it to the side (or turn your back to your computer screen). Close your eyes and just breathe for a moment. Focus on your breath. If you begin to think about the problem, catch yourself and re-focus on your breath. This is a mini-meditation exercise that help you solve your problem in step 3. After about 5 minutes (the longer the better), slowly open your eyes and pull out your problem.

3. Read the problem again, look for clues, and solve!

After you come out of the meditation, read what you wrote down and look for clues that will help you solve the problem.

Here is what you should be looking for:

• False Assumptions – Are any of the “facts” not entirely true? Are you making an assumption that could be wrong?
• Limiting Beliefs – Are your beliefs about yourself or someone involved preventing you from finding a solution?
• Fears – Sometimes we know what the solution is, but we are afraid to take the necessary steps.

Try to pick out the false assumptions, limiting beliefs, and fears contained in your original problem statement. Spend time questioning your false assumptions, limiting beliefs, and fears. This will help you look at your problem from a new perspective, which is critical to finding a solution.

If you follow the steps and still cannot find a solution then simply repeat steps 2 and 3. If you have time, take a little longer on step 2 to completely clear and refresh your mind. With enough determination, you will uncover the solution to your problem.

Last Resort

If you cannot find a solution on your own, then it is time to talk to someone. A trusted friend or family member is ideal, but really anyone willing to listen will help.

The goal here is to bounce your problem off someone. If they are a good listener, they will make you feel better about your problem. If they are a good friend that knows you well, they will probably be able to point out a few things you are overlooking.

At my blog, LetGoAndFlow.com, I will listen and respond to anyone that e-mails with a problem. Visit my I’m Here to Help page and we’ll get your problem figured out.

—–
David DiGiovanni is the author of LetGoAndFlow.com. On his blog, David shares his experiences as he creates success and happiness by learning to “let go and flow”. You can also follow @DavidDiGiovanni on Twitter.

What makes solving problems difficult is that we often don’t know everything that we need to solve in order to be able to move forward.

Every problem you face will always present you with at least 3 obstacles.

To be able to overcome the problem you have to identify the 3 chief obstacles and solve them, otherwise you won’t be able to fully remove the problem from your path.

Usually we just solve 1 or 2 obstacles, since they are the obvious parts, but we tend to miss the less obvious parts, which stops us from completely removing the problem from our path.

It was a tough lesson

I learned this lesson the hard way.

I was working with a new employee at the company, she wasn’t having any progress on her sales and we had run into a wall on what to do about it.

We kept working on trying to find her more leads and improve her ability to ask for the order, since they were the obvious problems we had.

The problem was that it wasn’t enough, it wasn’t working.

We sat down and identified all the problems she had, it turned out that she a third problem we hadn’t thought about before.

She had these 3 problems

1. Finding leads

2. Confidence in her body language

3. Asking for the order

As you can see we identified the three problems and then ranked them in order of importance. The order follows the progress her sales do, first leads, then building a report ending with asking for the order.

We started on number 1

Since leads were the largest obstacle we sat down for 1 hour and discussed different solutions. I went through several different techniques with her and we looked for leads together.

After 2 hours of hard work we had filled her pipeline and she felt confident that she could keep it stocked.

We solved number 2 and then the third

Once she has leads we could start working on her confidence in her phone calls and once she had done that she got a lot more opportunities to ask for the order.

Quickly she started making sales and today she is one of the best employees I have.

Identify and prioritize

Start by identifying the 3 key obstacles and prioritize the list in the order of importance and what needs to be done first. By doing this you will quickly get a good overview of your problem and what you need to do in order to solve it.

Start with the most important

Once you know what needs to be done, start with the most important task and make sure to completely solve it. Then move on to the second and so on.

This way your problems will start to quickly dissipate and you can continue with your development.

The importance of finding all three

By identifying all three obstacles you make sure you can focus on all the most important tasks and can make a smart prioritization. Without it you do not know if you are focusing on the right things and you will move slower towards your success.

Conclusion

To every problem focus on your 3 most important obstacles and try to find solutions. That way you will quickly move towards your goals and be able to solve anything that comes your way.

This was a guest post by Daniel M. Wood a well-known speaker and writer on Personal Development, Sales Technique and Motivation. Visit his blog Lookingtobusiness.com and download your copy of his free e-book, Double Your Income.

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As a graduating engineer myself, I have often found myself hard pressed to solve a particular problem. Everyone experiences these kinds of situations more or less frequently, and even though every single mind has its methods and nuances in how it approaches problem solving in general, there are common pitfalls that everyone seems to fall into. I would theorize this phenomena is related to the structure of thought itself – our highly pattern-based thinking is optimized by evolution to solve certain problems, which comes at a cost. Exploring the biological and physical origins of these phenomena, while certainly interesting, will not be pursued in this short essay, both due to my lack of qualifications on those subjects and the goal of the writing of the essay. What I do intend is to provide insight into some the top three common pitfalls, so you may recognize them when you inevitably run into them. If the short time it takes to read this essay spares someone an afternoon of head-banging, then it will already have been worth it.

As the astute reader will notice throughout the essay, most (but not all) of these pitfalls are related to thinking habits and employment of otherwise good thinking strategies to the wrong problems. At every pitfall I will try to provide an illustrative example, and I’m sure more than a few readers will remember themselves in past experiences where they, too, walked in circles in a frustrating battle against a seemingly unsolvable problem of the same nature. I would also like to point out that in most cases an equilibrium must be found, as for every pitfall there is also the opposite equivalent. Having that said, I’ll begin by exposing a well known thinking flaw.

1^st Pitfall: I can’t see the forest for the trees. (“Why don’t you just walk to work?”)

We all know this proverb – it applies to situations where people get so caught up in the details of a problem, they lose sight of the problem itself. Not surprisingly, this is a very common occurrence. Let’s exemplify: imagine you don’t have a car, and conclude it would be nice to have one so you don’t have to walk 3 km to work every morning. Having that in regard, you begin saving for a car, perhaps even getting a part-time job in addition to your current job, so you can realistically have enough money for a car in a reasonable amount of time. Your part time job hardly pays off though, and you barely have time for yourself between the two jobs! You survive a few months of this until some caring soul asks you the why of all that trouble. And when you tell him, he formulates the question above.

So what was the pitfall here? The character in question tried to solve a problem, which was a mild discomfort caused by a long daily walk. When he began to take the necessary steps to solve it, he ended up in a much worse situation overall, and the worst part, he didn’t notice how the solution he came up with was at odds with his original intent! I’m sure everyone has experienced some more or less severe version of this problem. The pitfall is caused by two distinct factors: the first is a thinking pattern which we are used to. “Divide and Conquer” is a well known maxim and a strategy that we instinctively apply (in the soft sense; whether it actually stems from our instincts or from our education is a quest I’ll leave up to the interested reader). It consists in breaking up a large problem into subproblems we can tackle. However, when sight of the original problem is lost, contradictory paths end up being taken. You might end up breaking something in order to fix it, working more in an attempt to work less, or losing money in an attempt to save it. The second factor is simply forgetting what you were trying to achieve in the first place. This might happen if a certain problem requires a solution that is too widely spread over a great period of time.  The principle by which you avoid this is simple: always make sure you know why you are doing what you’re doing. Otherwise, you might have just thrown a lot of time and work off the window, and, in the worst case, you’ll only notice you’ve been driving down the wrong road when you hit the dead end.

Of course, the opposite side of the coin is that really energetic guy that tries to solve world hunger overnight. The issue is that “Divide and Conquer” really is a very useful strategy, and few work would be done if not for this simple yet powerful maxim. One just needs to make sure everything is kept in perspective at all times (or at least, when frustration starts to kick in!).

2^nd Pitfall: Imposing Arbitrary Restrictions. (The Gordian Knot Syndrome)

The Gordian Knot is a well-known myth: in the third century BC, an oracle prophesied that the one that could untie a particularly complicated knot would become the king of Asia. Many tried, but none succeeded at untying the knot – until Alexander the Great himself came and took the challenge. He solved the problem by taking his sword and cutting the knot in half. Another known variant is the Egg of Columbus, where Columbus succeeds in making an egg stand, feat which the sages present had failed to achieve, by breaking the bottom of the egg slightly (or in other versions, by balancing it on a small pile of salt). This type of problems (and there are a good amount of examples coming from advanced research departments!) often stump even the greatest problem solvers; for problems are already difficult on their own, and when one adds (unnecessary) restrictions unconsciously, they become harder or even impossible to solve. Of course, the stories always include problems where the solution was really obvious; that’s not how this pitfall presents itself most often, though. The most common scenario is a difficult problem becoming more difficult because of restrictions imposed by the problem solvers themselves (although unknowingly). This pitfall stems from prejudice (not in the pejorative sense), or generalizing, the inductive process in general[1]. While that is the feature of our thinking processes that allows us to make useful and practical conclusions (as deduction doesn’t ever produce new information per se), as well as making thinking a lot more efficient by cutting off the least unlikely scenarios automatically, it may also be the source of what seems like an unsolvable problem. Take this lateral thinking problem for instance:

“A little girl was warned by her guardian never to open the cellar door, or she would see things that she was not meant to see. One day, while her guardian was out, she did open the cellar door. What did she see? “

Think for a while before you move on, even if you don’t come to a solution – the important here is that you realize how our prejudices can become an obstacle. Most readers will probably have difficulties in solving this problem. If not, congratulations – you most likely won’t experience this pitfall frequently. For the rest of us, we have to keep an eye out.

So, imagine you’re dealing with what seems an unsolvable problem. After a lot of eaten nails, it might be wise to think about the problem itself. Is the problem really that hard are you making it harder? You will be surprised how often the latter comes up. By the way, the solution of the problem presented earlier is that the girl opened the door and saw the garden through the window – she had never gone outside the cellar as her parents kept her inside it at all times. The key realization of the problem is that the girl is inside the cellar, not outside, which for most is a very hard jump to take – our thinking habits invariably place her on the wrong side of the door.

3^rd Pitfall: Not Having a Proper Plan of Action. (“Why was I doing this in the first place?”)

And we come to the last (but not any less frequent) pitfall in problem solving. Fortunately or unfortunately, everyone has to consistently deal with problems that can’t be tackled without first delineating a plan. However, society has become very impatient – so much that a lot of people come to a fight bare-handed. Our planning skills are one of our greatest intellectual assets, and even the most advanced intelligent systems strive to make a good impression of human brain planning. Yet we still try to avoid using those skills as much as possible – everyone talks about “getting their hands busy”. Not having a proper course of action is the greatest cause of wasted effort – why not spend a little time thinking about what we’re going to do next, so you make sure its relevant?

My perception is that this pitfall often occurs as a result of an incorrect assessment of a task’s complexity. We have a task that seems rather simple and try to tackle it directly (let’s say we were trying to fix the latest computer crash). We think the task is simple, when in reality it isn’t. There’s nothing wrong with incorrectly determining a problem’s complexity – it can be as hard as the problem itself. Now the pitfall is that, too often, our stubbornness kicks in here and we continue to try solving the problem without a plan – even though we’re clearly aware of the task’s true complexity by now. Of course, we’ll probably stop a few hours later, sweating frustration by every pore. And then we’ll delineate a plan. To avoid this we should, when faced with a problem of greater complexity than expected, stop and reevaluate our position and plans (even if you had a good plan already). It will surely consume much less time and resources than having to change it later anyway.

Here, the opposite side of the spectrum is getting over-analytical. There are a lot of tasks that can be solved outright – no need to waste time making a storm out of a cup of water. However, if you’re already 3 hours down trying to solve that “simple” problem, I assure this won’t be the case at all.

Conclusions:

I hope this short essay will help the readers avoid frustration in everyday problem solving. The whole premise of the essay is that our thinking patterns, just like our emotions, become much more manageable when we understand their form and causes. The pitfalls I  covered here are very common, and I’m also sure everyone has come to recognize personal pitfalls they themselves have to watch for. Analyzing these pitfalls, figuring when they come up, why, and how to avoid them is a quick path towards self awareness and increased productivity, which naturally comes in inverse proportion to frustration.

David Baptista is Guest Blogger for PickTheBrain. This is his first guest post, so show him some LOVE!

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The only help is a mirror on the other side of the intersection. If you look into the mirror, it is like you are standing in a different position. It is like you cross the road, and now have a clear view straight around the corner. This is the only way to see around blind corners. Looking from this different position makes the way forward obvious.

In life, blind corners are everywhere. You are dealing with a problem or are faced with a challenge and you just can’t see the solution. You are blind to the solution because your perspective is limited by the position you are in. You can’t see the way forward because of who you are, what you believe and how you normally behave.

When you are stuck like this you need to look at the situation from a different perspective, but how?

A quick and easy way to get an alternate perspective is to play a little mind game called “Thinking Around Corners”. This excercise sets up alternate perspectives so that you can see past your own limitations. It works by looking at the situation through the eyes of a completely different person. By imagining how another person would behave in your situation, you can discover some simple but effective solutions.

The process is easy:

1. Make up 3 different characters. Three people that are nothing like you.
2. Give them names, occupations, and try to make a rough mental picture of how they look. Remember that the less like you the better.
3. Spend a couple of minutes thinking about the details of these people’s fictional lives. Give them personalities and a few habits. Base them on someone you know, or just pull the characters out of the air if that is easier. Get to know them because they are going to help you solve a lot of problems in the future.

So far, this should only take you 10 minutes or so. At the end you should have a memorable trio of helpers ready to give you a new perspective on a problem. So put them to work.

Pose your problem to each of your characters in turn. Quickly write down 10 responses from each. Assuming that Steven Styverson is one of your fictional characters, the question would be:

“What would Steven Styverson do in this situation?”

Simply because you are attempting to answer the question on behalf of someone very different from you, you will come up with some remarkable solutions. No matter what situation you put Steven Styverson in, you will come up with solutions that would not naturally occur in your thoughts. You will easily come up with 10 ways forward. All you have to do then is decide which you can use in the real world and then put the solutions to work.

It all sounds too childish to work, but if you develop your characters carefully, it will be effective. Don’t be put off by its simplicity, this is a high powered technique. If you put your imagination to work, you will soon end up with too many solutions rather than too few.

Here are 3 fictional characters that have helped me solve problems as I looked from their perspective.

1. Mrs Ruffle, A friendly old grandmother. Addicted to knitting and gossip. Never without a cup of tea. A shrewd bargain hunter. Shuffling around the neighbourhood talking with everyone she meets.
2. Steven Styverson, a hard nosed business man. Refined and restrained. Perfectly disciplined and cold. Conformist and conventional.
3. Ritz Paris, a celebrity socialite. Famous for being famous. Known by everyone and always in the social pages. Never seen alone.

These caricatures are 100% stereotypical and politically incorrect, but they work. They usually provide about 10 solutions, to any problem that I feed them, very quickly. The reason that they quickly and easily come up with these solutions is because these fictional characters are so different to me. They are different in personality, habits, behaviours and attitudes. Their different perspective is what makes the solutions so useful.

Early this morning I used this method with these 3 characters on a problem that I have been stuck on for a while. I came up with a total of 28 ideas of what these three fictional characters would do. I discovered that I could use (after a little modification) 13 of those ideas.

They include some conventional ideas and some quite remarkable. In looking over them now, they seem so obvious, but from my own perspective I just couldn’t see around the corner. Either way, I am no longer stuck at the blind corner.

Why not try this for yourself? Think up a few personalities that are very different to your own. Flesh out some details about each of them, to bring them to life. Then put them to work on your problems. List everything that they would do, then from that list pick the solutions that will work for you.

I hope this gives you as much success in solving problems as it has for me. And yes, I would like to thank Mrs. Ruffle, Steven Styverson and Ritz Paris for help in writing this article.

Tom O’Leary researches, writes and lives personal development that works. Join him at www.LifeGoalAction.com

image by jayniebell