The Bi-Weekly Ezine from Gurdy.Net - Each Monday the FREE "5Minute" Self-Help Video Seminar

Issue No: 078 - March 15, 2010

This Week's FREE Self-Help Seminar

Today's Reflection

Do Business People Really Want More of the Same?

Gratitude

The primary goal of business is to make most profit for least effort - that's why people set up their own businesses, that's why people invest in businesses - that's why people go to work (if it's not one of the key reasons that you're doing it, perhaps you should take a little time to reflect). One of the key determinants of success is competitive advantage - or, in simple English, being different. This applies whether you're a big or small business - or even if you're going for a promotion at work. Why is it then, that business people want to run their businesses from the same failed management principles that have brought world economies to their knees?

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What are the things that really turn you on in your life? Your latest big business deal and the associated adrenalin rush? That beautiful birdie on the long par 5? Watching Ireland’s rugby team do the business on the field of play? Jumping off the top of that cliff, strapped to your hang-glider? I’m sure that you have your own list – each to his (or her) own! Very often, these are the things that give us a huge kick out of life – it’s why so many people practice extreme sports – to get that rush.

But these are moments of pleasure, they are not the essence of anyone’s normal everyday life – and we have to live each minute of our ordinary everyday lives – the challenge is to do so extra-ordinarily. And an integral part of rising to that challenge is to realize and be grateful for the things and people who are most important to us.

The old saying goes that you don’t realize what you truly have ‘til it’s gone – as a close friend said to me recently, he would give away all his businesses, all his money, his cars – everything – if he could just see his little daughter running around again. The problem we’re faced with, however, in the normal mundane course of our daily lives is that we become too familiar with the people who mean most to us and familiarity breeds contempt – of, at the very least, mindlessness.

Your daily life might appear mundane to me – mine to you – but if it ends up being mundane to us, ourselves, then we’re in trouble – because every moment is unique, every moment a new opportunity, every moment a new chance to be truly there, truly grateful and truly happy in ourselves and for the people with whom we share our life.

There is no happiness without gratitude

This Week's Recommended Read - Man's Search for Meaning

Personal Development Article

by Viktor E. Frankl ISBN 0-671-02337-3

Maybe “normal” people are right when they think that “not too bad” is OK! A short but very heavy read – the first half of the book recounts Frankl’s time in Nazi concentration camps – and how the experience honed the mind and spirit of those that endured such physical and psychological pain. The second half of the book goes into some detail on Frankl’s psychological theories which he developed after the War. Definitely worth reading for the first half - Willie Horton

The Publisher says: Internationally renowned psychiatrist Frank endured years of unspeakable horror in Nazi death camps. During and partly because of his suffering, he developed a revolutionary approach to psychotherapy known as logotherapy. At the core of this theory is the belief that man’s primary motivational force is his search for meaning. Cited in Dr. Frankl’s New York Times obituary in 1997 as “an enduring work of survival literature”, this book is more than his story: it is a remarkable blend of science and humanism and “an introduction to the most significant psychological movement of our day” (Gordon W. Allport)

first published February 9, 2009

Living Outside the Box

by Willie Horton

Lots of people talk about 'thinking outside the box' when it comes to innovation or problem solving. But our education system, society at large and corporate culture all conspire to keep us firmly in our box from which - for so-called 'normal' people, there appears to be no escape. But we can all name people, in business, sport and public life, who are ab-normally successful. Why? They use thier minds differently - we all can.

Read the full article on how to achieve extra-ordinary business and personal success - there is no box...

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