Some Secrets RevealedTo Help You Create Your Life

Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.—George Bernard Shaw

Life's Too Short

There is nothing new in telling you the well-known secret that Life's too short. People oft en say that Life'stoo short as a cliché. It is oft en a phrase that gets bandied about without much thought put into it, withoutreally thinking about the significance of these three small words. Yes, we do know that life is too short towaste it. However the reality is that life is happening when we are busy making a living or wasting it gett ingupset or hurt over trivial things. If we put our aspirations on hold without a time frame because we are toobusy on the wrong things, we may never get where we want to end up.

When we are young we think that there's plenty of time to do what we want to do. Before we know itthe time has passed and unless we have a plan and stay on target, we may end up not achieving any of ourgoals as time has quickly passed us by, without us even having noticed it.

Think about where you were at, 10 years ago! How fast did that go? Well, the next ten years will gallopjust as fast! If you are now 20 years old, ten years ago you were a child of only ten years old. It is now alreadytoo late to wish that you had applied yourself better at school so that you wouldn't find it such a struggleto get a good job now. In the next ten years you would be thirty years old. How much of that time wouldyou remember or waste? What have you learnt in the last ten years? What would you do differently if youknew better then? In another ten years you would be forty and looking at middle age fast! One minuteyou're a child, the next you have lived more days than you have left ! And all of it feels just like yesterday!Scary? ... Yes!.... So there's no time to waste!

This is how you will feel all your life. Days become weeks; weeks become months and before you knowit, years have gone by! The years will race on and one day you will wake up and you may be forty, fifty, orsixty and beyond in no time, and still think: where did that time go?

The only thing is that your brain and your feelings and emotions will not age as fast.

When you are fifty, you will still feel like you are twenty or thirty inside. Some of us may wish we coulddo things differently if we were given another chance. Problem is we can never go back again. We get onechance and one chance only to go through this life. So we better use our time wisely. If we want to be happyand reach our full potential we best get it right the first time; or at least for most of the time! So let's live thebest life we can without wasting any of it, and if the secrets revealed in this book can stop you from wastinga good life and make it great instead, all the better.

So the first secret to learn is to: Respect time and respect life and use them both wisely, as life is tooshort to waste it and not live it well.

The past is over and done and cannot be changed. This is the only moment we can experience.

—Louise Hay

Life really is too short not to live it meaningfully. You have to do the best you can and live your life tothe full without wasting time on unimportant things, as Father Time is constantly ticking and doesn't miss asecond. Don't squander valuable energy getting upset and bearing grudges. Don't live a life of addiction thatcan spell nothing but trouble, under the pretense that you're young and having a good time. Life honestlyis too short for that!

So the first secret to learn is to: Respect time and respect life and use them both wisely, as life is tooshort to waste it and not live it well.

The next secret is to:

Plan and Create Your Life

If we want to reach our full potential or if we want something, we need to plan and create, otherwise it justdoesn't happen, as we have no direction to aim towards. It is like being at sea without a compass or goingsomewhere without a map or satellite navigation (GPS) to get us there. We have no starting point and nodestination, how can we achieve our goal of getting there? We need a direction for our lives to work towards.We can't leave something as important as our destiny to fate, to others or to whatever else.

When we plan and create, we have a direction to work towards, and that gives us confidence.

You may have your own reasons for wanting to change your life, but one of the main reasons may bethat you are not happy with certain aspects of your life as it is and you want to improve on them or changethem altogether.

Plan your life. If you don't, you will always be reacting to what someone else is deciding for your life,which can be the reason why you may feel insignificant and unhappy. You are giving the control of your lifeto others to do as they please with you. Decide where you want to be. What do you need to do to get there?

Decide where you want your life to be in 5 years from now. Then, where will you be in ten years? If youwant to be in a certain place, you may need to work steadily towards your long term goal. This may meanthat you have to do certain things to be able to achieve your goal. This may well mean extra training.

Secret: Plan and create your life.

A Secret about Learning

The fact is you picked up this book because you want to learn something. It doesn't matt er how old you are,you can improve your life at any stage. Learning is for everyone, young, not so young and old alike. Beingopen to life-long learning is an asset that you can capitalize on throughout your life, at any given time. Itprobably is the next secret that you should become aware of:

Never stop learning as you go through life.

Human beings have a natural need to learn, grow and develop. We are all natural born learners. Learningenhances our life enormously. If we stop, we become stuck and unable to move on.

It isn't the responsibility of others to teach you. It is your responsibility to seek to learn and improve.None of this: No one ever taught me how to do this, is valid. It is down to you to seek how to progress, it isnot anyone else's responsibility.

People who love to learn are more confident, enjoy life more and are more satisfied in life.

People who hate to learn have linked a lot of pain with learning.

People who love to learn link a lot of pleasure with gaining knowledge.

Knowledge helps you to make informed choices. Knowledge translated into action is power! Powergives you freedom of choice. Freedom of choice can help you to make better decisions. Better decisions sendyou in the direction of the path that you wish to follow and hence have a huge impact on creating your life.

There is a misconception that misleads many people to believe that to make a change in their life cantake a very long time or that they need to do something extreme like changing their job or career, movehouse or city or go abroad even; or that they need lots of money otherwise any change is impossible. Thatusually is hopeless negative talk when people really want to change but don't know how to. Many peopleincorrectly make this assumption, because they don't feel empowered and they don't know what to do anddo not know the secret to help them make the necessary changes in their life.

The reality, however, can be quite different. Changes in our lives can manifest themselves incredibly fastat times; contrary to the belief that changes can take a very long time and that you need certain resourcesto make them happen.

Some may rely on their will power. Now, we all know what happens when we put our faith in our willpower? When we fail, we give up as we realise our effort is unattainable, therefore lose confidence in ourselvesand in our goals.

The secret to this is that it is important to have the understanding about giving "a differentmeaning to things" for you to be able to see them in a completely different light.

The actions you then decide on can be very different from the ones you might have taken had you nothad the correct understanding and meaning in the first place. Acquiring the necessary knowledge andmeaning can make all the difference.

With Neuro-Linguistic programming, (NLP) changes can be lasting and immediate.

NLP is an effective collection of techniques which helps us to run our own brain. NLP: Neuro (nervoussystem) Linguistic (the use of language to communicate with ourselves) Programming (installing a newprogram). The techniques of NLP are incredibly valuable and can help you make instant changes by usingour neurology, (our central nervous system) and the movies we make in our minds (the images and soundswe make in our heads) including using our physiology (our body). You need to research these further shouldyou be interested in them, as they are beyond the limitations of this book.

Simply put, it is like taking out the faulty soft ware in your computer (brain) and installing new soft ware(program: new belief or new behaviour). If you put in the new soft ware, changes are oft en instantaneous;just like removing a DVD and putting in another one.

Once you know how to do things a better way, you would never go back to your old ways, would you?Of course not! You now know better!

There are many Life Coaches who use NLP to help make positive changes in their clients' lives, and Iuse them with much success in my Life Coaching practice.

The secret of pain and pleasure

All of us are dictated to by two domineering rulers: Pain and Pleasure. We are all the same, no matter whowe are and what we say, without exception. We all search pleasure in life and seek to avoid pain. It is saidthat we are all hedonistic by nature; this means that as human beings we are programmed to avoid painand to seek pleasure.

Think about it: Whatever you do, you do it because you like to or want to; in other words, it either bringsyou some pleasure doing something or you want to avoid experiencing some sort of pain by doing it or notdoing it. Even if you do your job under duress and do not enjoy it, you still do it, because you can avoid thepain of not having a job. The job gives you money which provides for your needs which can bring pleasure.

Procrastination

We procrastinate because we connect more pain with doing something than not doing it. When it becomesmore painful to avoid doing something than doing it, then we end the procrastination and get on with it.

In fact what we need to do is to associate a lot of pleasure with doing the task and thenit becomes easier to execute.

This principle doesn't only affect some of us and not others; it affects us all! As a human being we allreact this way. Ask yourself why you do some things and why you don't do others? In fact the main reasonbehind all our behaviours is that we do everything we can so that we can avoid pain and acquire pleasure.

This is an important thing to know, because it actually means that we can use pain and pleasure to helpus achieve what we desire and to alter unwanted behaviours.

We need to attach as much pain as possible with what we don't want in our life and we have toconnect as much pleasure as possible with what we do want.

If we do this we can make the changes that we want to achieve a lot easier. If for instance, you don't liketo learn, and you associate pain with education then you must link as much pleasure as you can to learning;make your learning environment exciting and fun, become really enthusiastic about it; reward yourselfafterwards, or study with a good friend and make it fun.

Keep in the front of your mind what it will be like when you would have achieved your goal. Link a lotof pleasure to the end result. You will find that pretty soon learning will be associated with fun and you willfind learning fun, easier, stimulating and exciting.

When we gain pleasure from doing something, we become keen to repeat it and really enjoy it. Andbefore you know it, your newly acquired knowledge has the ability to produce the change you desire.

For instance, if you want to stop smoking, you would have to associate a lot of pain with the smokingand a lot of pleasure with stopping. You could really watch, (instead of switching off the channel or avoidingthem) the shocking advertisements about quitting smoking on TV, which depicts someone who had histongue cut off because of oral cancer and is dying due to cigarette smoking; see the sufferings that the personand his relatives go through; or watch the struggle that patients with Chronic Obstructive PulmonaryDisease go through just to take ONE breath, having to have their tank of oxygen close-by at all times,due to the effects of smoking; thereby linking a lot of pain to smoking. Also remember how smoking canprematurely age your skin and give you wrinkles? That's not a great thing, especially for us girls, right?

Your thinking can change very quickly. The pain you get from this will make it very difficult for you to takepleasure in lighting up again. You will want to avoid the pain that smoking can create in you.You can keep kidding yourself that these things won't happen to you and yes, you will stop one day,but you are not ready yet!.... that's called kidding yourself! That way, you will never be ready as there isalways.... Tomorrow.... so you think! The reality is that bad health problems do happen to those whosmoke. Living in denial doesn't stop you getting a nasty diagnosis. Think, what will it feel like to get adiagnosis of cancer when you are 35? 40? 45? 50? How would that feel like? What would you say to yourwife? Husband? Children? Mother or father? Brother or sister? Grandparents? Nieces or nephews? (All thesepeople will be affected by what happens to you!) Knowing you could have stopped that happening to you andyour family had you taken appropriate action years earlier. Does that feel like pain to you?.... undeniably!

This may sound dramatic (and I know, you will hate reading this if this applies to you) but we all knowwhat damage cigarettes can do to us. However unless you are confronted with the reality of life, you maynever do something to help yourself. Life is truly too short to waste it. You may think that at some point youwill give up because you do know how bad it is for your health, but you can only think about your instantgratification for now; you may think: One day, I will give up, but I am still young enough and will quit beforeany damage happens. But, as we said, life's too short to take bad risks! Time goes by very quickly and youfind yourself with your same anti-social habit, frowned upon by your family and friends. Nowadays, thereare no excuses. You can see your doctor and get some help to stop or else there is always hypnotherapy orthe many quit lines. They will only work, if you access them and want it to work.

The problem is that you are kidding yourself thinking that it won't happen to you. Living in denial hasbeen shown to kill or have dire consequences.

Really bad health problems happen to young people who take risks with their health. Don't kid yourselfthinking that it's for others or older people and not you!

It does happen to somebody! Why couldn't that be you? Why do you think that you are immune? Whatmakes you so special?

The fact is that none of us know when it is our turn to get a dreadful diagnosis, and what damage hasalready been done.

The good thing is if you quit, you can slowly start to repair the damage. However the longer you leaveit, the worse the damage you are causing to your health.

Does that mean that there's no point giving up as you have already caused damage? Absolutely not!Whenever you give up, the lungs slowly start to recover and repair the damage. So, it is never too late!

Please do not kid yourself anymore. It is unintelligent to live in denial for the pleasure of instantgratification. At the back of your mind you do know that your luck may not last forever and that you are onlywaiting for the day that a shocking diagnosis comes knocking at your door. That's not pleasure that's pain!

A friend of mine had spent years chain smoking; then one day another friend told her that she couldn'tunderstand how she could still put a cigarette to her lips, knowing that someday, may be soon, she may bediagnosed with lung cancer, and that her two daughters will be left without a mother to grow up. Fromthat day on, she never ever lit another cigarette ever again. Her good friend helped her link more pain withsmoking than the instant pleasure she got from lighting up.

If this is you, then I hope that you have a true friend to help you link pain with smoking or whateveryour addiction is.

Deep down, we all know that addiction to anything is not a good thing!

The other side to this coin is that you can start getting excited about all the money that you will besaving and plan what you will do with that extra money. Think how far that money will go towards your nextholiday, or you could give yourself regular mini-breaks with the money you would be saving or maybe youcan now afford something that you have been wanting for a while, but felt you didn't have the money for itbefore! Does that sound like pleasure to you? It sure does!