Have you ever had one of those “Ah-ha!” moments? You know what I mean. Those moments when you glimpse an insight into something that is so obvious you wondered how you never noticed it before.

My most recent “Ah-ha!” occurred the other weekend. I was outside chatting to my neighbor, while his children were playing on the front lawn. They didn’t have any toys with them, but a scrap of an old paper streamer (the type you use for party decorations). As I was watching them I was amazed by the games they created in the moment just using that bit of old paper for inspiration. They created chasing games, hiding games, cooperative games. They moved seamlessly from one game to another, and although I am sure they were inventing it as they went, they all seemed to know the rules without having to form a committee or develop a “change management plan”.

As we were watching the boys at play I asked my neighbor “when do we loose that ability to play?”. Between us, we tried to recall the times in our adult lives when we played – really played – just because it was fun.

I can only think of a couple of adults who I personally know who have the ability to play. As adults, we tend to think that in order to play, we need loads of money to buy the expensive toys to play with. After all, how many adults do you know who chase each other around the front yard trying to catch a colored streamer, just for the fun of it? For most adults I know, play is something that is “put off” – until there is enough time, money or whatever.

But as we watched the boys at play, I realized that it is through play that we truly live and give the best of ourselves. How impossible it is to feel down, or worried or ashamed when we are at play. Play is our opportunity to be creative; to share; to connect with others; to discover; to excel and to achieve. Most of all, it is the chance we have to be deeply content – not tomorrow, or next year, or “when I retire” – but today, here and now.

And play is good for you – people who laugh and play are healthier, live longer, are more productive at work.

Play has no purpose whatsoever and as a result, play helps us fulfill our greatest purpose: to live and contribute with joy, enthusiasm, laughter, and pleasure in who we are and what we have to offer.

I’ve always had a very strong Work Ethic – but I began wondering how I could begin to develop a just as strong Play Ethic. I started to make a list. Not just the things that make a bit happy, or that are “nice” to have on a list, but that bring a deep and genuine sense of joy, delight and play to my life.

Here’s just a small sample of things I came up with (in no particular order)…

1.My dog

2.Picking and cooking fresh, organic vegetables from my garden

3.Having freshly washed sheets on the bed, that have been dried in the sun

4.Christmas decorations

5.The smell of (real) vanilla

6.Conversations with friends where you have that feeling of being exactly on the same wave-length

7.Staying in bed on a rainy day

8.Eating honeydew melon and feeling tired after a day of swimming in the ocean

9.A long weekend

10.Indian and Malaysian food

11.Fantastic customer service

12.Cotton and silk

13.Watching people (including myself!) discover they can do something they thought they couldn’t.

14.Orangutans

15.The enormous sense of freedom from having a “to do list” with everything ticked off

16.Public speaking (seriously!)

17.Glitter(ideally the kind that you wear on your finger – but happy to settle for a tube of sparkles from the craft shop)

18.Naughty (but not too naughty) jokes

19.Noticing random things happen that remind you that the world is full of surprise and the unexpected (and often the completely hilarious and absurd)

20.Spending time with friends who I have known, and have known me, my whole life and who don’t expect anything from me other than myself

21.Finding the perfect gift for someone.

22.Any child with good self-esteem

23.Day dreaming (or a trashy Hollywood film is just as good)

24.When someone is willing to put their values on the line (think Erin Brockovich)

25.Reminding myself that “life goes on”!

My Christmas “present” for myself this year is to get at least 100 things on my list.

What would be on your list of the things that bring you real joy? Watching your favorite team win? Bright colors? Your family? Silence? A prawn cocktail? Country music?

Life really is too short to put energy into the things that don’t matter to each of us. I wonder how different our world would be if we spent just one hour of every day playing and actually allowing ourselves to feel real joy?

And even more so, I wonder what the world would be like if we took the time to learn what was on the lists of our loved ones, our friends, our colleagues, our neighbors and even our adversaries – and made an effort to bring a moment of playfulness and delight into their day?

Of course, if you get stuck for ideas, you can always find a child and ask them to show you what can be achieved with an old paper streamer.

Take the leap and have some fun:

www.creativelife.citymax.com

For the past 18 years M. Campbell has worked with disadvantaged communities and children, using creativity to facilitate change and transformation with children, families, schools and communities. Visit the Creative Life website to hear her true story of working with abused and traumatised children that inspired her to write the “Ten Principles of a Creative Life”.

We humans have always had a need for security. This mechanism has been built into us a long time ago when we were first hunter-gatherers and then later, when we learn to cultivate our land. From our early days, we have learned to survive by preserving meat or store grains in case our hunting expeditions are not good or our harvest fail. However this basic survival instinct does not always benefit us. We often cling on to our various safety nets, refusing to try out new ways of doing things. We become secure in our own comfort zones. Our credit cards, our big homes, our expensive cars, and a good stable job with many benefits – most people believe having these things will give them security. But these illusions may prove to be their undoing. A well paying job may become obsolete as the company outsources the tasks which you may specialize in. No one is indispensable. It pays to always be on a lookout for emerging trends and learn new skills.

There are also some people who go through life with the oppressive feeling that no matter what they do, they will still fail. People with such thinking have lost confidence in their own abilities and believe that they have no control over their future. Instead of taking hold of new possibilities, and accepting life with all its uncertainties, they adapt to life out of sheer convenience. It is the inner voices in them that tells them the rewards in trying are not worth it, it is best to just give up.

Those who choose security above all else are those that are afraid of making mistakes or making any form of decisions. They stay well in their comfort zones and won’t take the risks. Successful people know that failures are not the end of anything but the beginning of something. For within every failure lie the seeds to success. Taking the necessary risk of a second attempt is what separates the leaders from followers. People who don’t try hard enough will always allow small failures to discourage them permanently. How sad.

Leaders in any fields know that real peace of mind come from within. The only safety net that you can truly rely on is your own self-confidence. True leaders know that courage comes from building on their own strengths to venture unto unknown paths and work decisively and confidently towards their goals. If you want to avoid losing this inner security, you must above all, learn to control negative thoughts. It’s true that bad luck seems to follow those who believe in their own bad luck.

To gain courage and energy, you should try to fix your goals clearly in you mind’s eye. Your imagination is the most powerful God-given tool that you can use. You must form an image of what you wish to achieve, and imagine the positive situation you will be in when you have achieved success. For instance, let’s say you want to get a job of your dreams and have secured an interview, you must imagine yourself as a strong, confident candidate. If your thoughts are filled with doubts, of your own previous failures, chances are, you will not be a confident person during the interview. Your lack of confidence will show in your body language and your speech. Seeing yourself as an ideal, indispensable candidate with enough experience for the job will move you forward in the direction of a successful candidate.

Or take another case, perhaps you’re a weak student and every thought of taking any tests or examinations will make you break out in cold sweat. You can learn new study skills, take up simple memory training and learn easy to master memory techniques to improve your memory and help you remember many things like mathematical formulas, historical dates or important scientific facts. You will find that you memory can perform astounding feats of memory recall and this will give you the added confidence in yourself. A calmer student invariably performs better in tests or examinations, all things being equal. This will show up as better grades and every success builds on itself.

Maybe you’re thinking of moving to a different part of the city. Imagine yourself in your new life, in your new home. Think about the colorful new neighborhood, and try to picture the nice people around you. You will find yourself looking forward to a new chapter in your life, a new beginning rich in promises. You have what it takes to make your own more fulfilling, it’s all in you, in your mind.

Martin Mak has developed a new program to help you improve your memory and enhance your learning experience. Find out more with his popular and free ecourse – http://www.mightymemory.com

If there is one single thing that you really need to improve your self esteem,
it have to be confidence. Self confident can do wonders for every part of your
life. But for most of us, it’s easier said than done. Changes in general are
tough to make, and when it comes to habits and lifestyle it is even more
difficult. First, let’s take a look at what confidence actually can do for your
life:

-If you have confidence, you can fully take responsibility for
what you do.

-If you are self confident, other people will respect you
more.

-Self Confidence and integrity go hand in hand.

-With
increased confidence comes an increased pride in the good things you do.


-If you are self confident, you will be more motivated to do the things
you want to do.

-People that are confident can take more chances.


-When you are confident, it is easier to handle criticism from other
people.

-If you really love yourself, you will be truly able to love
other people.

-If you have goals you want to achieve, increased
confidence will help you to take on those challenges and stimulate yourself into
reaching those goals.

-All in all, you are able to fully take control of
your life, and reap all the benefits.

But what does the word really
mean? Some people have mistakenly called this outlook on life egotistical or
arrogant, and some even say that it leads to violent behavior. This is not the
case at all. These are negative attributes, and confidence is the ability to see
things in a positive light. Egotism, arrogance and violent behavior are the
defensive reactions of people who lack confidence in themselves.

People
who are not inwardly confident, tend to mess with others’ lives. They want to
boost their own love of themselves by putting down others, and that’s not love
at all. when you have a high self belief or self confidence you will seek the
challenge and stimulation that’s needed to set and achieve worthwhile and
demanding goals

Can you be too confident? Are there pitfalls that this
kind of thinking can lead to? Confidence is a healthy attribute, and it means
the ability to fully believe in oneself. There can be nothing negative about
that. As long as you don’t put down others or harbor negative feelings,
confidence is always a good thing. In order to be happy, one must keep their
sense of themselves in a healthy balance and believe that they can do what they
want to in life. You are in the drivers’ seat.


by David Richards
David Richards likes to give his readers Self development information and
articles. You can read more at href="http://www.1st-self-improvement.net">http://www.1st-self-improvement.net

You can acquire years of education, accumulate unlimited wealth, win prestigious awards, and be blessed with the most loving relationships and still self-sabotage. Outside barometers of success and happiness won’t satisfy you unless and until you like and approve of yourself.

You’ll only achieve what your healthy or unhealthy self-esteem allows you to achieve.

Healthy self-esteem is the backbone of achievement. The health of your self-esteem determines the level of success. Unconsciously, you will succeed only to the highest (or lowest) expectations you set for yourself.

Hundreds of times each day, you’re placing actions and thoughts under a powerful magnifying glass, choosing to magnify either the negative or the positive. Self-esteem monitors and judges all behavior.

The healthier the self-esteem, the more productive and positive the behaviors. Self-esteem is the over-all value you place on yourself as whole and complete person. It’s an emotional score card calculating the pluses and minuses.

The healthier your self-esteem, the more pluses on that scorecard. Every plus on the scorecard increases your ability to make wise decisions. Pluses reinforce the self-confidence needed to take action from a position of empowerment and strength and not desperation or weakness.

When the negatives in life have more power over attitudes and choices, unhealthy self-esteem begins to dominate your life. You begin nurturing healthy self-esteem by consistently overcoming the negatives and taking positive action.

With healthy self-esteem, you experience success more often than failure. Success affirms confidence in yourself and abilities. The more confidence you have in your ability to think, learn and analyze wisely, the more self-confidence you’ll have in yourself when faced with life’s challenges.

Unhealthy self-esteem, once it takes hold in your unconscious mind, is like a downward spiral. At any time though, you can choose to stop the downward flow and direct it positively upward.

Here are some activities to help build your healthy self-esteem:

1.Begin enhancing self-esteem by writing down an entire page of your positive qualities. Fill the whole page with words, phrases and sentences. You’ll spend less time focusing on the negatives when you’re concentrating energy on your strengths.

2.Start acting the way you’d like to see yourself in the future. If you’d like to be more outgoing, start taking social risks. Go places where you’ll meet new people. Once you begin acting more outgoing, you’ll actually become more outgoing.

3.Take out a photo album and look at yourself. Are you smiling? Are your arms folded defensively across your chest? Is your posture slouched? Use the photographs to help see yourself as others see you.

Healthy self-esteem enables you to thrive in your life, not just survive!

Excerpt from Sharon’s book: How To Give Yourself The POWER to Succeed

Sharon A. Michaels is an e-mentor to women who choose to work for themselves. Sharon has over 20 years of business, speaking and writing experience on issues of ending self-sabotage, living in abundance and wealth and making money in network marketing.

You can learn more about Sharon Michaels at http://SharonIsMyMentor.com

Sharon A. Michaels is also the Editor of the Abundance and Wealth site on BellaOnline.com To read more of Sharon’s articles go to http://abundanceandwealth.bellaonline.com

Copyright Sharon A. Michaels – When using this article please give full credit to Sharon Michaels and use the bio as written above.