If you know what it's like to be extraordinarily present, to be clear-minded and acutely aware of the moment, if you know what it's like to be in flow, to realize that you are an integral part of something bigger and that that something bigger is an integral part of you - in other words, if you've experienced the clear 'gap' in meditation, then you're all set up to revisit and maintain that wonderful clarity during the course of an ordinary, routine day. All you have to do, a couple of times, spread out during the ordinary day, is mini-meditate. Take even as little as two minutes to close your eyes and find that gap because, once experienced, it's easy to recapture. So, a couple of minutes, a couple of times, today, will enable you be extraordinary... right now.

I understand that there is a growing phenomenon whereby people are paid to stay away from work because they're suffering from stress. I only know this because, in conversation recently, a number of different people confirmed this. My response, on each occasion was to ask why people should be paid for something that isn't there - it's a little like paying for people to stay off work to recover from an alien abduction (there is, as an aside, a rather ordinary psychological explanation for alien abduction!)!!

Don't get me wrong - the results of thinking that you're suffering from stress are all too real. Chronic background stress correlates with coronary disease, digestive disorders... indeed, a whole range of very real illnesses.

But it all starts with an erroneous thought - "I feel stressed" or "I cannot cope". If you stop being entertained by your own useless thoughts, your life may well be very, very different.

Your life is what you make it. And, now, it is what you've made it, in every moment, up to now. No doubt, others will have influenced you - for better or for worse - and circumstances will have assisted and constrained your ongoing evolution. But these external events and challenges are not what makes you - how you behave in all life's little vignettes is what has made you who you are or who you think you are.

If you want more out of life, it is up to you to modify your behaviour. I'm not suggesting that one should strive for more in a craving, normal, material manner. By 'more' I mean the balance, peace of mind, happiness, contentment and broadly-based success that we can all experience - not just fleetingly but daily.

When I suggest that you might need to modify your behaviour, I am suggesting that we all need to stop behaving inappropriately. Inappropriate behaviour comes in all shapes and sizes and ranges from self-abuse, to the abuse of power, to the abuse of others. It ranges from the little unkind word to the large crime. And it is part and parcel of who we are, as normal people - because inappropriate behaviour is borne out of the reactive manner in which our subconscious 'enables' us behave automatically. And, at this moment, inappropriate behaviour is diminishing or destroying lives all over this planet.

Neither you nor I will ever unlearn the subconscious "stored knowledge" that triggers our reactions that, in turn, dictate our inappropriate behaviour. But we can stop giving that knowledge our precious attention. Our reactions are triggered thus: something external happens; we internalize it, making sense of it by refering to decades-old stored knowledge; our 'spin' on what's really happening triggers our reaction and our reaction is not based on doing the right thing, it is based on our own stored, preconceived personal misgivings.

A thought - even, or particularly, a subconsious one - is just a thought until we make it real by adding our attention, by giving it our energy. Choose to give your energy to something more real, more uplifting, more life-affirming, more wonderful than what's rattling around in your head. Come to your senses - choose to pay attention to now. Today's video and today's quick tip will enhance your ablilty to do this... should you so desire!