How to Stop Being Embarrassed

 By Trevor Johnson 

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We all make mistakes, simply put, it's part of being human. It can be quite embarrassing sometimes to make even the smallest mistakes in front of people, especially ones we care particularly about what they think about us. Here is some advice about how to stop being embarrassed.
Realize we are ALL only human, and make mistakes.
Think about a time when you have seen somebody else make an embarrassing mistake. Were they embarrassed, too? They probably were, even if they did not show it. If every single person in the same room as you were embarrassed, and they told you, you probably would not feel at least just a little less embarrassed, knowing that they all are feeling the same way as you. Everybody has been there, and most of the time, people are not judging you the way you think they are, just like you are probably not judging them the way they think you may be.
Embrace who you are.
One great thing about the human race is the fact that, although we are all a lot alike, we are all so different. We all have our own likes and dislikes. We all have our own quirks and habits. If you feel embarrassed about something that is a part of who you are, whether it is physical, mental, behavioral, or anything else, embrace the fact that because of the fact that it is different, it is unique.
What you may find embarrassing, may actually be really cool to somebody else, and, in most cases, you are not alone and somebody out there is probably going through the same thing as you are. It may help to find or even start a group or club for people with the same thing. If there truly is no one out there, then that makes you even more special and unique, and you should take that as a good thing. Remember, you could really rise above this difference by educating people about it, and who knows, you may help some one else who is in your shoes.
Educate yourself
If you are embarrassed about something that you are not that familiar with, do some research. If you are reading this, chances are that you are already starting to get over your embarrassment. You may not feel it yet, but I hope through doing research and learning, you will very soon. The more you know about something, like a medical condition, for example, the less you may feel embarrassed about it. You may find that it's a lot more common than you thought, which tends to make things a little less embarrassing, knowing that many other people have gone through or are going through the same thing as you are.
Don't forget, that to educate others so that they may understand you, you must educate yourself so that you may understand you.
There will always be times when you really feel stupid, ashamed, or embarrassed, but by following some of my advice, hopefully you won't feel that horrible feeling as much or as strongly. Hopefully you now know how to stop being embarrassed.

Get more help to stop feeling embarrassed and discover how to stop feeling embarrassed all the time.

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How to Accomplish Something You Want

By Rosemary Redfern 

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The first stage to accomplishing something you want it is decide what it is. Limit the boundaries so that it becomes possible. Further additions can be added at a later date if you wish For instance, if you are going on holiday and you want to have some idea of how to order food, find things in supermarkets and go shopping or understand road signs you need some basic words and phrases. To do this you don't need the whole language. A phrase book will give you the basics of food, some useful phrases and the necessary verbs where you can select the most used parts as well as numbers. A small dictionary will cover unexpected words.
If you learn these carefully and try and hear a native speaker pronounce the words, you will have achieved what you need to do. If later you become intrigued with the language you can take it further.
However the project you choose might be bigger. Working for a degree can be dealt with in a similar way. Trying to look at three or four years of hard learning can be daunting for the brightest person. If you break the work to be covered into years, courses, sub subjects and devise a system of learning which suits, you the idea becomes achievable. Everyone learns differently but having a length of wall paper lining paper and breaking down the elements of each section into categories is a start. Research has shown most people can manage to remember seven to nine facts together. If you break down each piece of work into seven or nine elements and each element has a number of parts it is possible to have a pattern in your mind. For visual people using pictures and color associations helps, for aural people singing the work, associating it with a piece of music might help.This way you can accumulate a huge amount of material fairly easily in your mental library and can access it. It still requires the effort of learning but it is now in manageable chunks. Incidentally learning with others seems to be beneficial.
When the project is something physical like learning to make furniture the approach is the same but adapted to the issue. Research the best teacher, school or organization which offers what you want. If the preliminary stages of learning to make joints seems tedious stick with it because that is the basis of the work. Practice in anything becomes easier.
To recap, refine the goal, control the boundaries of the goal, keep the important points in chunks, don't become sidetracked by what is irrelevant at this stage, make sure the goal is possible to avoid disappointment and be persistent. Most individuals can do much more than they believe they can.

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Habits That Improve Memory

 By Dolph Larsson 

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The brain only keeps the information present on things it reckons it needs often. Since we only use around 10% of our brain, it will lack the potential to remember each and every detail in your life. For autistic people this may not be the case but that is because the connections in the brain are wired differently, at the expense of facial emotion recognition for example. It is possible however for us to develop the power of your memory by doing recollection exercises that stimulate our long-term and short-term memory. Here are four to get you started.
Memory Palace
The way a memory palace works is that you create a route through a location that you are very familiar with. The more you know the ins and outs of it, the better. You then pick objects along that route which will be your anchor points. This is something you have to do some time before you want to use it. it is necessary that your route, the objects and their order are firmly in place in your mind. The fact that it is a place you are very familiar with makes this more easy. Once you have solidified your route in your mind, you can start associating different elements to each object along the way. The more outrageous the association, the more likely it is that you will remember it later on. The idea is to create a story of events that happen throughout your route.
Summarize Books
You can read as much as you want, it wont do you any good if you can't remember what you've read. The easiest way to increase the amount of what sinks in is to formulate it again in our own words. An even better result is achieved if we do a mind map of the book we are reading as this requires a more thorough understanding and complex idea association practice. A little tip, don't try to read the entire book before doing your summary or mind map. Add to your summary every time you put down the book, or even the next day to let the ideas sink in properly.
Remember Childhood
We usually get flashes of past events from time to time when they are sparked through a conversation or some other triggering event. In order to really push our brain to limits we can determine a certain age or age range and attempt to remember as much as we can about experiences we lived in that time frame. They essence of this exercise is not to make a list of things we can come up with. What we are aiming for is to visualize the moment we remember and try to recall as many facts and details about it through visualization.
Help a Child with Homework
I have found that whenever I have to help out my youngest sister who is still going to school with her homework that I really have to rack my brains to remember how to do all the exercises. The matter of what is taught doesn't really change much throughout the years but naturally our brain has left aside the knowledge it didn't need since school. well, now you have the chance to give your memory a run for its money. It might take a while and it is possible that you have to read through the explanation of the exercises but after a few goes (and some desperate attempts to save face in front of a youngster) you will slowly feel the facts and methodologies come back to you as the rusty neural connections are reformed to help you overcome this challenge.

Dolph Larsson is a writer focusing on the prevention of mental deterioration such as Alzheimer and dementia. To see some of the latest publications you can visit howtoimprovebrainpower.com where you can read up on articles such as Power Up Your Brain, How to Increase Mind Power, etc.

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3 Reasons You Need To Love What You Do

By Martin J. Gibbons 

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As a behavioural psychologist and career advisor I tell people that it is essential they discover what they were simply born to do. It is essential that you love your work.
Most people feel I am being unrealistic when I say this. They will say things like "times are hard. Jobs are scarce. You should be grateful to have a job at all." But I have to tell you that unless you love what you do, you cannot expect any job security. You cannot expect and sustained career success. You cannot expect to earn any significant income and you cannot expect to get a promotion or a pay rise.
Here are the three reasons for this:
1) You need to invest 10,000 hours
To secure your position in the job market. To have people headhunting you and to have job security for life, you need to move from being good at your job to being great at your job.
Only exceptional performance enjoys exceptional rewards and success. And if you are to become exceptional then you will have to invest about 10,000 hours of effort.
The 10,000 hours rule applies to everyone. Even Mozart put in his 10,000 hours. There was no doubt that Mozart was naturally gifted but the reality was that he had put in this 10,000 hours by the time he was seven years old.
Even when you are as passionate about your subject as Mozart was about music, it still gets tough. This is why you truly have to love what you do. It's the only thing that will get you through the tough times.
Professional musicians experience this all the time, even the most naturally gifted musician will practice 4 to 8 hours per day for years. What you find is that the more natural talent they have, the more they practice.
2) You need to feel appreciated and that what you do matters
It doesn't matter what it is you do or at what level you operate, there is something in the human psyche that insist on feeling appreciated and that what you do matters.
If you do not feel that your work matters then it is very difficult to sustain it. This is one of the reasons we see people leaving highly paid jobs to do something that pays very little. It's simply because they need to matter and not all jobs, no matter how well paid they are, matter.
Being appreciated is also a deeply held human need. You especially need to be appreciated for your work. When this is missing there is a big part of the psyche untended and it's not sustainable.
It leads to work related stress. It leads to depression. It leads to all sorts of self destructive behaviour. The one thing we can do to change the world is to show a little more appreciation to those that provide some service to us.
3) You need to avoid work related stress
Work related stress kills people every day. You wouldn't go on a building site without a hard hat. You wouldn't drive a car without a seat belt. So why would you tolerate work related stress. Treat it like a punch in the face and avoid it with the same enthusiasm.
It's because work related stress is not as obvious as a punch in the face that we tend to ignore it. Yet it will do more harm. It's unlikely a punch in the face will kill you. But stress might.
Corporate culture has create a badge of honour to go with work related stress, so indirectly it encourages us to get some. Employers use it to control you and get more from you.
However it is very short sighted. Stress reduces productivity. It is bad for the individual and the company. Unfortunately many companies are too short sighted to see this. Don't you make the same mistake.
You can control your stress. You have a choice on how you respond to nay given scenario and you ultimately have the choice to leave the job or the environment that is causing you stress. Stress is not something to be proud of. It's not something to be ashamed of either. It should be treated as an industrial injury. The new legislation in the UK effectively does this, but it has little teeth. Better that you take matters into your own hands and carefully manage or eliminate it.
So there you have three reasons you should love what you do. It's not a privilege it's your right and your very life may depend upon it. If you really want to enjoy success and good health then you must insist upon enjoying what you do.

Martin J. Gibbons has been teaching love what you do for over ten years. He writes about personality, psychology and careers. He is an authority on personality profiling and the founder of www.peoplemaps.com.

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Every Life Is a Story Worth Telling

By Crystal J Casavant 

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Some people keep a journal or a diary as part of therapy or to help them overcome difficulties. You don't need to be going through a difficult time to make journaling a priority. Before we get into the benefits of journaling, let's chat. Does anyone know everything about you? Who knows more about you than you do? Of course, I already know the answers to those questions. No one knows everything there is to know about you. No one knows more about you that YOU do; you even know the deepest, darkest secrets. Allow yourself to become your best friend by journaling with yourself as often as possible. Think of your journaling time as a conversation with your oldest and dearest friend.
When you journal, share whatever is on your mind. This is your opportunity to talk about experiences, feelings, ideas, and nothing is off limits. If you choose to blog instead of journal, consider your audience, but if you are journaling for a private audience of one - there are no rules. Sometimes, just getting those conversations out of your head and into the real world can help you think more clearly. For example, I might think that it would be a good idea to install a swimming pool in the backyard. When I start writing down my ideas I begin to think about risk and I wonder if I should wait a few years until both children can swim? Until I can trust both children to follow instructions without such close supervision? By the time I finish jotting down my ideas, I've talked myself out of the pool and I haven't burdened anyone other than myself with a lengthy debate. With these types of 'conversations', I often include a list of pros and cons. I come across as being much more confident when having conversations with others, because I have rehearsed them with myself already. My ideas and plans come across as being better thought out. Your journal entry does not need to follow any specific structure. When you begin, journaling may look a lot like a list of ideas, or it may be as eloquent as French Poetry with verbs and adverbs, imagery, and grace.
If you set a goal to journal daily and you miss a day, don't let that stop you from going back to it. No one will be judging you; when you get back on track you can always fill in the pieces for your reader and yourself. Similarly, if you are interrupted mid-thought, just go back to it and if you've forgotten what you were writing, just jot that down too. Even if you're using a blog instead of a journal, your reader will understand. Life is filled with interruptions, set-backs, and minor bumps in the road. It happens - be forgiving of yourself and others will be just as forgiving. If you are blogging and are concerned about the forgiveness and/or comments of readers, most blogs offer you the opportunity to review posts/comments before they are published. Allow this to be your filter - approve the comments that are encouraging and positive and disregard the others (it's like advice in life - no matter how well intended, it is your prerogative on how it will be accepted).
Start journaling today. You don't need anything fancy and a few pieces of loose-leaf paper is just fine to start with (or the back of the cell phone bill). Just start - don't put it off until tomorrow. You'll find yourself well-prepared for conversations, better equipped to handle objections, and months/years from now, you'll re-read the stories and find that YOU are your new favorite author. Every life is a story worth telling. Who better to tell yours than you?

Want to find out more about taking life's lemons and turning them into lemonade? Follow Crystal's lemon blog by clicking here: http://bringonlemons.blogspot.com/

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How to Talk to People and Break Down Barriers

By Shane Russell  

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The process of communication and talking to people is a learned skill that you must practice over and over to become comfortable. People will talk, and as a current or future business owner, you probably already know that you must learn how to communicate otherwise you won't be able to grow your business.
Becoming comfortable talking to people can take years of practice, but if you're like most people, learning how to communicate can be quite stressful, and because of this, you avoid social situations. The good news is that talking to people doesn't have to be scary at all. With a little hard work and motivation, you can be just as comfortable talking to potential clients and in front of groups of people as you can talking to your best friend.
IT'S ALL IN YOUR HEAD
Most of your fear and negative emotions of talking to people are not real at all. In fact, most communication barriers are made up in your head. Believe it or not, your thoughts can be your best asset or your worst enemy. This is why your arch nemesis oftentimes is yourself. Obviously, you should have learned to effectively communicate when you were younger, but if your parents didn't teach you then you will have to teach yourself. The best way to get those negative thoughts out of your head is to practice saying positive self-affirmations in the mirror every day.
EXAMPLES:

• "You are smart."
• "You are successful."
• "You are happy."
• "You are the best."

By repeating these self-affirmations every day for at least 18 days, you will soon begin to believe in yourself and your abilities. Just in case you are wondering, I said "18 days" because it takes approximately 18 days for something repeated to become a habit.
TRIM THE FAT
Next, you have to trim the fat out of your life. By this, I mean that you have to make a valiant effort to get rid of all the negative people in your life. It's apparent that you can't get every negative person out of your life completely, but you definitely don't have to socialize with those people. There are multiple barriers to communication and you may not realize this but most people are negative because they're either jealous or don't believe in themselves so they try to bring you down to their level. You'd be amazed how much better your life becomes once you get all those people out of your life.
Getting the negative people out of your life significantly helps you to talk to others because you become less and less afraid that you will be ridiculed by the person you are speaking with. After years of practice each time you are confronted by the negative people, you can easily ignore their remarks and comments because you have had positive interactions with others the other 99% of the time.
THE NUTS AND BOLTS
Now that you have all the negative thoughts and negative people out of your life, communicating with others is going to become a breeze. If you're wondering how to start a conversation, then believe it or not, the very best way is to either ask the person a question about him or herself or just to say, "Hi!"
By nature, people will have their guard up when you first approach them because they don't know you or your intentions. However, if you show them that you are a nice person and that your intentions are good, they will quickly and easily open up to you.
The best way to practice talking to new people is to talk to everyone you can without the intention of wanting anything from them. For example, if you are in the live at the grocery store, make a comment to the person standing behind you about the weather. Or, if you are at a restaurant, ask the person next to you what they ordered and whether or not they would recommend it to you. See! Easy!

I am the owner and Chief Marketing Officer of Suited Marketing. I will inspire you to be a better person and to live a fulfilled life and I will also teach you how to build a successful business.

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Small Steps Take Us The Greatest Distance

By Jenny Flintoft  

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When babies learn to walk, we congratulate every tiny step, every courageous wobble. We cheer all those tiny pieces of progress they make... Isn't it funny how we don't give ourselves that same encouragement and support as adults? Just because we're "officially" grown up (and I reserve the right to be a big kid whenever I want!), we set ourselves mammoth tasks to achieve and then get disheartened when progress is slow!
The more I work with people who show a desire in "getting better" (whether that's to be better in dealing with a challenging situation, better at leading others, better at dealing with difficult people), the more I have seen that grand gestures very rarely make the difference that lasts. It is those small steps - in and amongst the wobbles but constantly focused on "getting better" - which lead to sustained, meaningful change.
Here's the trouble with people like me(!) I run events, workshops and seminars where I'm delighted to say I enable people to feel motivated, fired up and ready for change. I have testimonials and videos and emails from people who have left feeling they've had a real awakening and are going off to rock their worlds! Yay! LOVE that!
But what can sometimes happen after people attend an event, or a teleseminar, or read a self help book is they have the rush.....and then the comedown. Within a couple of weeks they think to themselves - "I'm no further forward. Nothing's changed. That course/book/expert isn't all it's cracked up to be. This stuff DOESN'T WORK." (Ever experienced that? Be honest!)
Being positive and focused on this stuff for one day or one week won't do it. Doing twenty push ups a day isn't going to give you a washboard stomach overnight (more's the pity - sheesh). You've got to keep doing it, putting the effort and energy in - and only then will you start to see a return and some big changes in your life that you didn't even notice happening at the time.
This is where a bit of patience comes in. You all know the principle of sowing and reaping, I'm sure. You reap the harvest after you've done the work. You dig the soil, plant the seeds, water the seeds (effort), wait a while (patience) and then you reap your harvest. Effort + patience = results/reward.
In this day and age, this principle is lost on people. We've lost the art of patience. So people ask - "If I plant my seeds today and put the work in, what do I get tomorrow?" And of course the answer is - wet seeds! Instant results are so rarely seen - we need to put in the consistent small action steps in order to see our results.
You don't eat a meal in one gulp, you eat it one mouthful at a time. It's exactly the same with these actions.
Pick something small - it may even seem insignificant - that you can work on. Get it into your skin and into your psyche. Then choose something else and do the same. Keep chipping away over a period of time and you'll be surprised at how all those little steps and actions add up.
With small, simple actions, NO effort is wasted.
Whenever you try any action at first, it can seem as if you're putting in loads of effort for very little return. Keep persevering, because all those actions and small steps added together and layered on top of one another will bring you the progress and the difference you've been seeking in your chosen area. And that's a promise!

And now I'd like to invite you to claim your Free Instant Access to my "Get Better - Successfully: Personal Positive Power" Action Book when you visit http://jennyflintoft.com/killerbonus
From Jenny Flintoft - The Expert in developing personal leadership and talent, building confidence and credibility and inspiring greater personal success!

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Techniques on Worrying Less

By Jennifer H Santos  

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Some people seem to be compulsive worrier, and tend to worry about just about everything and anything, even to the point where their worrying can become chronic and even obsessive. If you are one of these people who find that worrying is starting to interfere and affect your daily life, then you could probably do with some tips on how to stop worrying. Worrying will not solve the problem that makes you worry. It could even worsen everything.
Here's a few tips to help you learn how to stop worrying so much:
Think positive.
One way to learn how to stop worrying so much is to learn to put a positive spin on every situation you face. Having a positive attitude towards everything you do can actually work wonders on your mind, and help you to greatly reduce your worrying. That's not to say just by being positive you will get the outcome you desire, but with the right attitude you can certainly reduce your level of worry to a more manageable level.
Your thoughts play a huge role in how much you will worry about performing a certain task or getting through an event at some point in the future. Some people will find themselves analyzing things too much and concentrating on all the things that could go wrong and all the bad things that might happen.
You need to be realistic with what the outcome could be, but at the same time, by positively analyzing the situation you are faced with you will learn how to stop worrying more effectively. We need to look at reducing the risks of things that could go wrong but we cannot control everything.
Stop thinking.
Another way to learn how to stop worrying so much is a technique called "thought stopping". This technique basically works by consciously telling yourself to "stop!", every time you get repeated negative and worrisome thoughts. By consciously stopping yourself and replacing your worried thoughts with more realistic and positive ideas and feelings, you can eventually train yourself to learn how to stop worrying in no time at all.
Breathe in, breathe out.
Another technique that a lot of people find helps them to learn how to stop anxiety is to learn to breathe properly. There are numerous breathing techniques and practices available to you, so try a few out and just pick the techniques that best suits your needs depending on the situation you find yourself in.
Distract yourself.
You could also try a number of distraction techniques. Simple activities like calling a friend, reading a book, talking the dog for a walk can help you distract yourself from any worrying thought you might have. Distraction can be a short-term solution to a worrying situation you may have, however, used in conjunction to the other techniques discussed you should be able to control your worries in a much better way.

J. H. Santos is a stop worrying expert. For more great information on worry no, visit http://www.techniquestostopworrying.com

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Why Are You Not Pursuing Your Goal?

By Jolyon Hallows  

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Too many people have a wonderful goal of things they might achieve, but they are not moving toward it. If this describes you, why? Why does this glorious vision not motivate you, not push you to take action to reach it?
One possible reason is that it's not your goal.
I knew a man who could play the piano. He'd studied for twelve years and he could play any type of music: classical, jazz, popular. He could play it all.
At least that's what I was told, because I never actually heard him play. So one day I asked him why I'd never heard him play and he said, "When I finished my last year of piano lessons, I swore I'd never touch a piano again."
"Why?" I asked in some shock.
"Because I never wanted to play the piano. It was my mother's goal."
So is your goal someone else's goal for you? Is it the goal of a parent? A teacher? A close friend? Society? Is it a goal that excites you or one that excites someone else?
There's a way to find out.
Imagine that you are standing in front of all of the people who know of your goal and that you renounce it. Suppose that you say, "I am no longer pursuing this goal. It's not for me." How would these people react? Some might be surprised, some may be indifferent, some may even approve. But is there someone who would be upset, or angry, or disappointed? If so, that is the person whose goal it is.
So if the goal is someone else's, do you now give it up? Is it time to grow your own goals and move on?
Maybe, but there's a catch.
The catch is that even though the goal started with someone else, over time you may have come to adopt parts of it as your own. My piano-avoiding friend may have discovered, somewhere along the way, that he enjoyed playing some kinds of music but didn't want to admit it to his mother. If, over time, you have come to see the goal as your own, you now want to claim it as yours rather than renounce it.
How can you tell if you have adopted it as your own?
Imagine that you are face-to-face with the person whose goal it is and, even before you renounce the goal, imagine that that person says to you, "I think you should give up on that goal. It's not for you."
How would you react? Perhaps you would be relieved. Maybe you would be indifferent. In these cases, the goal has not become yours and you can give it up.
But if your reaction is anger or upset, or if your response is something like, "Don't tell me what to do with my life," then you have come to see the goal as yours. Now is the time to embrace it, to separate from the person who gave it to you. Now is the time to say, "My goal is..."

Jolyon Hallows is the creator of The Systematic Goal: a system using proved techniques for goal setting, goal planning, and goal achieving. He is an accomplished project manager, he has written two professional books on project management, he is on the faculty of a university diploma program in project management, and he has personally trained over a thousand project managers worldwide.

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