Curious about Consequences - Do You or Don’t You Consider Them?

“I believe that we are solely responsible for our choices, and we have to accept the consequences of every deed, word, and thought throughout our lifetime.” - Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

“Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things, I am tempted to think there are no little things.” - Bruce Barton

Ah yes! I would say that it was close to unanimous when I looked up the word “consequences” that great minds from back in A.D. up through today agree that we have the freedom to make choices. These choices will inevitably create consequences - some good, some bad, some big and some small.

Why then, do so many of us make the poor decisions we make? I agree with Grace Jones who wrote, “Everyone has to make their own decisions. I still believe in that. You just have to be able to accept the consequences without complaining.”

If you have read other articles I have written, you probably realize by now that I strongly feel that we are in charge of our lives, our mindsets, our decisions, our actions and how we approach everything that happens. We can’t control what is outside of us - or can we? - but we can control how we react to and/or handle misfortune and failure:

• “Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.” - William James
• “Forget about the consequences of failure. Failure is only a temporary change in direction to set you straight for your next success.” - Denis Waitley
• “Look at misfortune the same way you look at success - Don't Panic! Do you best and forget the consequences.” Walt Alston
• “Underlying all this is the reality that the line between success and failure is wafer-thin, but the consequences are gargantuan.” - Peter Bart
• “I never looked at the consequences of missing a big shot... when you think about the consequences you always think of a negative result.” - Michael Jordan

There are those today who advise us to express our anger. I have never felt that this worked well for me. Basically, I make the choice not to let attitudes or others’ actions make me angry. I found quotations dealing with the consequences of being angry (both mentioned are from centuries ago):

• “When anger rises, think of the consequences.” - Confucius
• “How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.” - Marcus Aurelius

The following quotations were either thought provoking and/or so interestingly written, I have decided to share them with you:

• “It is ironic that in the same year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the discovery of DNA, some would have us ban certain forms of DNA medical research. Restricting medical research has very real human consequences, measured in loss of life and tremendous suffering for patients and their families.” - Michael J. Fox
• “Sooner or later everyone sits down to a banquet of consequences.” - Robert Louis Stevenson
• “However great an evil immorality may be, we must not forget that it is not without its beneficial consequences. It is only through extremes that men can arrive at the middle path of wisdom and virtue.” - Wilhelm von Humboldt
• “Consequences are unpitying.” - George Eliot
• “Where do consequences lead? Depends on the escort.” - Stanislaw Lem
• “You can do anything in this world if you are prepared to take the consequences.” - W. Somerset Maugham
• “The medium is the message. This is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves - result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology.” - Marshall Mcluhan

That’s it for consequences. This past week, I read an article about blogging, and the author suggested that the minimum number of times we should post to our blog is twice a week. Right now, I have been posting a longer article every weekend. I now plan to post a short tip on Wednesdays or Thursdays. Hope you visit then, too!

Curious about Resistance - What Do You Resist? What Are the Benefits of Resistance?

“Every moment of resistance to temptation is a victory.” - Frederick W. Faber

“Commitment is the enemy of resistance, for it is the serious promise to press on, to get up, no matter how many times you are knocked down.” - David McNally

Resistance - what an interesting word! Is resistance good or bad? What should we resist, but what shouldn’t we? Resistance covers the whole gamut from political actions to being in a sales situation to social interactions to our own reactions to what we encounter in our thinking, our approach to life, our goals and on and on.

I hope you appreciate the quotations I use in these blogs and my e-newsletters. Once I have picked a theme and look it up on Google’s www.brainyquote.com site, I am amazed and thrilled with how the quotations (there are often hundreds for many of my chosen themes) give me new and opposing viewpoints to ponder. They make me think - and, isn’t that the reason for this blog, after all?

I decided, going along with my thinking theory, to make some lists (lists are always a help and if we write them out by hand, they will be more beneficial). Divide your paper into three columns, or create a table with three columns. In the first column, list “What I Should Resist (doing, saying, thinking).” In the second column, list “What I Shouldn’t Resist (doing, saying, thinking).” And, in the third column, list the action that you are going to take to help rectify either column one and/or column two (which can relate to each other, if you wish).

These columns will be personal, and for your eyes only. Post the sheet where you can refer to it the beginning of every day, and you will be well pleased with your progress. Below, I am going to share a few of my examples:

Column #1:

• Resist playing my favorite computer games, instead of productive work.
• Resist using my credit cards for unnecessary purchases (and most are unnecessary).
• Resist staying in bed early in the morning when the alarm goes off instead of exercising.

Column #2:

• Shouldn’t resist working on computer projects that are challenging.
• Shouldn’t resist cutting up my credit cards, or paying the full monthly balance.
• Shouldn’t resist jumping up early to exercise at least an hour before starting my day.

Column #3 (action):

• Set aside only 30 minutes at the end of the day for playing a couple of computer games.
• Cut up all my credit cards except the one where I pay the full balance each month.
• Get up early and exercise.

You get the idea. Now, let me share a few of the great quotations I found about resistance:

• “You have to dream, you have to have a vision, and you have to set a goal for yourself that might even scare you a little because sometimes that seems far beyond your reach. Then I think you have to develop a kind of resistance to rejection, and to the disappointments that are sure to come your way.” - Gregory Peck
• “At fifteen life had taught me undeniably that surrender, in its place, was as honorable as resistance, especially if one had no choice.” - Maya Angelou
• “I assess the power of a will by how much resistance, pain, torture it endures and knows how to turn to its advantage.” - Friedrich Nietzsche
• “The first resistance to social change is to say it's not necessary.” - Gloria Steinem

And, then there is physical resistance - which builds lean muscle mass, strength and endurance:

• “The resistance that you fight physically in the gym and the resistance that you fight in life can only build a strong character.” - Arnold Schwarzenegger
• “You increase muscle bulk by training against resistance. For example, weights.” - Deborah Bull
• “My system uses no apparatus. The resistance of your own body is the best and safest apparatus.” - Charles Atlas

What about the “path of least resistance”:

• “The path of least resistance is the path of the loser.” - H. G. Wells
• “Try to find the path of least resistance and use it without harming others. Live with integrity and morality, not only with people but with all beings.” - Steven Seagal

Even though I have many more great quotations, I will leave you with this one. Robert Conklin wrote, “Resistance is thought transformed into feeling. Change the thought that creates the resistance, and there is no more resistance.”

Curious about Challenges - Are They Opportunities, Roadblocks or Necessary Steps?

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.

“The most glorious moments in your life are not the so-called days of success, but rather those days when out of dejection and despair you feel rise in you a challenge to life, and the promise of future accomplishments.” - Gustave Flaubert

Yes, it is sometimes hard to agree that challenges are necessary and, in most cases, offer important opportunities. I was reminded this past week of the need for challenges while listening to a CD of Zig Ziglar’s, The View from the Top. A master of stories and metaphors, Ziglar compared life to climbing a mountain. “You can’t climb a smooth mountain. We need the crags, footholds and imperfections.” And, the challenges.

This past week I really needed the reminder that I love and thrive on challenges. I taught the first Step Aerobics class that I have taught in five months - since sustaining a hip fracture the beginning of January. My challenges consisted of having forgotten several parts of my usual routine, not being sure that I could make it through the full hour energy-wise and wondering if I could even perform many of the high-impact moves. It certainly wasn’t smooth, but I did make it through and am now looking forward to teaching three high-impact classes, along with four lower-impact classes this coming week.

If you are facing challenges - and most of us have plenty - here are some great quotations to help you welcome them and benefit from them:

• “There is no greater challenge than to have someone relying upon you; no greater satisfaction than to vindicate his expectation.” - Kingman Brewster
• “Don't be afraid to fail. Don't waste energy trying to cover up failure. Learn from your failures and go on to the next challenge. It's OK to fail. If you're not failing, you're not growing.” - H. Stanley Judd
• “I challenge you to make your life a masterpiece. I challenge you to join the ranks of those people who live what they teach, who walk their talk.” - Tony Robbins
• “We must accept life for what it actually is - a challenge to our quality without which we should never know of what stuff we are made, or grow to our full stature.” - Robert Louis Stevenson

Ah, and if you are a creative, here are some great quotations for you to chew on:

• “But when I go on a tour, it's too easy, too simple and I need a bigger challenge than that, like a thirty piece orchestra and the sets moving in an out, costumes... . a big show. I love that.” - Sebastian Bach
• “Every artist has to grow, and has to challenge themselves with a new form of expression.” - Terrence Howard
• “Whatever the medium, there is the difficulty, challenge, fascination and often productive clumsiness of learning a new method: the wonderful puzzles and problems of translating with new materials.” - Helen Frankenthaler
• “The worlds I paint leave a lot to engage the imagination by hinting at what lies beyond the four edges of the painting. I think getting beyond the four edges of an opportunity or challenge is one of the basic skills you need in business.” - Thomas Kinkade
• “Each novel is harder than its predecessor because I must work harder at not repeating myself. However, I enjoy the challenge. This is the greatest job in the world.” - Jonathan Kellerman
• “If you are a genius, you'll make your own rules, but if not - and the odds are against it - go to your desk no matter what your mood, face the icy challenge of the paper - write.” - J. B. Priestley

Being a fitness instructor and a strong and dedicated proponent of physical activity, I will leave you with this excellent and true quotation from Twyla Tharp, “Anybody who wants to challenge their mind to operate - any artists, any writer, any economist, any entrepreneur - knows they have to work physically at something on a daily basis. It is a necessary part of the human machine.”

Do consider your big and not-so-big challenges. Ask yourself, “What opportunities will come from these? What will and do I learn from these roadblocks? Why are they necessary?” I learned so much from my hip fracture, surgery and rehabilitation - but that’s another story.

Maybe, another blog!

Curious about Push and Pushing - When, Why and How Much?

“You can make it if you try, push a little harder, think a little deeper.” - Sly Stone

“I push myself very hard, and I always think I should do better.” - P. J. Harvey

I can really relate to the above quotations - how about you? And, I am beginning to feel a bit like screaming if one more person tells me, “Don’t push yourself.” I know they mean well. I also know that I can be stubborn about doing things “my way.” But, I also know that we - and I - accomplish much more when we push ourselves.

As some of you know already, I fell the beginning of the year, fractured my hip, had surgery and am in the process now of working on getting back to normal. Physically, “normal” for me is teaching between eight and eleven fitness classes a week. Right now, I am teaching only two and will be adding a high impact one this week and three more the following week - at least, that is my plan.

So, yes, I have been pushing myself.

I decided to expand on this theme while working out on one of the stationary bikes at the gym. I am not a “machine” person - I really enjoy and push hard in a group fitness class. However, I know that I need the machines right now. When I set the timer on the bike, I figured it according to past experience and then added extra minutes. I knew that if it was too much I could always stop it. When I reached the old time I felt like stopping, but knew that if I pushed I could complete those extra minutes. Which I did! Hooray! It not only made me feel good, I even enjoyed it.

I have found that most people don’t like to be pushed by others, for example, in a fitness class, a sales situation or a work related situation. In addition, there are many who don’t and/or won’t push themselves to take the actions that would change their lives even when they know what those success-generating actions are.

So, how do you feel about push and pushing? I decided to find out what the experts say.

Positive quotations about “pushing”:

• “Happiness comes only when we push our brains and hearts to the farthest reaches of which we are capable.” - Leo Rosten
• “Push on, keep moving.” - Thomas Morton (1564-1659)
• “You must not for one instant give up the effort to build new lives for yourselves. Creativity means to push open the heavy, groaning doorway to life.” - Daisaku Ikeda
• “Whatever I engage in, I must push inordinately.” - Andrew Carnegie
• “Nobody ever told me that I'm in charge of what kind of player I can become, but there's no limit to what I can do if I really choose to push myself.” Brandi Chastain

The other side of “pushing”:

• “You just don't want to push people into doing things that they really don't want to do. I don't think it's going to produce much.” - William Scott
• “If I am pushed I will push back, that is the way I am. I am very British. We don't like to be pushed around. When the chips are down we might have to step into grey areas.” - Damon Hill
• “Pull the string, and it will follow wherever you wish. Push it, and it will go nowhere at all.” - Dwight D. Eisenhower
• “Don't push the river; it flows by itself.” - Barry Stevens
• “By pushing or forcing something upon people, you tend to push people further away.” - Christopher Atkins

When pushing or being pushed works:

• “My attitude is that if you push me towards something that you think is a weakness, then I will turn that perceived weakness into a strength.” - Michael Jordan
• “We don't want to push our ideas on to customers, we simply want to make what they want.” - Laura Ashley
• “I want to push people to the edge. I want to elicit a reaction. Have I ever crossed a line? Am I a rabble-rouser? Maybe.” - Neil Cavuto
• “Few things in the world are more powerful than a positive push. A smile. A world of optimism and hope. A ‘you can do it’ when things are tough.” - Richard M. DeVos

And, just a couple more quotations for you to consider and think about during this coming week:

• “I love it: The push and pull, the constant renegotiating of morals, ethics, what to do, how to live... All of us stuck here together trying to sort it all out. It's fun. It can be, anyway.” - Casey Affleck
• “Happiness is a ball after which we run wherever it rolls, and we push it with our feet when it stops.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Are you pushing yourself? I know I am pushing myself, and I am glad!