The Ezine For Every Woman Struggling For The Body She¡¦s Always Dreamed Of!

Issue # 18

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This issue deals with your motivation, your dreams and – most importantly – how to get what you desire. Especially the last article is very long, much longer than my usual articles, so you might want to print this issue, pour yourself a beverage of choice, bring along a pen to jot down some ideas, and take it all to your favorite sofa.

Contents

1. Relax for a longer life

2. Imagine your dreams

3. Baked Sweet Potato Chips

4. How to get what you want (by Charles Burke)

1. Relax for a longer life

Regular relaxation is essential for long life and personal effectiveness. Here are some techniques for relaxing that are used by the most successful people in America.

Take time off every week

First of all, work only five or six days per week, and rest completely on the seventh day. Every single study in this area shows that you will be far more productive in the five or six days that you work if you take one or two days off completely than you ever would be if you worked straight through for seven days. The same goes for your workout routine.

Get your mind busy elsewhere

During this time off, do not catch up on reports, organize your desk, prepare proposals, or do anything else that requires mental effort. Simply let your mind relax completely, and get busy doing things with your family and friends. Maybe work around the house, go for a walk, watch television, go to a movie, or play with your children. Whatever you do, discipline yourself to shut your mental gears off completely for at least one 24-hour period every seven days.

Take big chunks of down time

Third, take at least two full weeks off each year during which you do nothing that is work-related. You can either work or relax; you cannot do both. If you attempt to do a little work while you are on vacation, you never give your mental and emotional batteries a chance to recharge. You'll come back from your vacation just as tired as you were when you left.

Give yourself a break today

If you are involved in a difficult relationship, or situation at work that is emotionally draining, discipline yourself to take a complete break from it at least one day per week. Put the concern out of your mind. Refuse to think about it. Don't continually discuss it, make telephone calls about it or mull it over in your mind. You cannot perform at your best mentally if you are emotionally preoccupied with a person or situation. You have to give yourself a break.

GO FOR A WALK IN NATURE

Since a change is as good as a rest, going for a nice long walk is a wonderful way to relax emotionally and mentally. As you put your physical body into motion, your thoughts and feelings seem to relax all by themselves.

EAT LIGHTER FOODS

Also, remember that the process of digestion consumes an enormous amount of physical energy. Therefore, if you eat lighter foods, you will feel better and more refreshed afterward. If you eat more fruits, vegetables, and whole-grain products, your digestive system will require far less energy to process them.

BE GOOD TO YOURSELF

Since your diet has such an impact on your level of physical energy, and through it your levels of mental and emotional energy, the more fastidious you are about what you put into your moth, the better you will feel and the more productive you will be. We know now that foods high in fat, sugar, or salt are not good for your body. The lighter the foods you eat, the more energy you have.

ACTION EXERCISES

Here are three things you can do immediately to put these ideas into action:

First, plan your weeks in advance and build in at lest one day when you will relax from work completely. Discipline yourself to keep this date.

Second, reserve, book and pay for your three day vacations several months in advance. Once you've paid the money, you are much more likely to go rather than put it off.

Third, decide that you will not work at all during your vacations. When you work, work. And when you rest, rest 100% of the time. This is very important.

2. Imagine your dreams

Imagine for a moment that your every desire has been fulfilled. Even the dreams you dare not to dream have become a reality. Imagine that you have no worries, no fears, and no limitations. There is nothing to fight against, nothing standing in your way, nothing to hold you back.

How would you live each moment of each day in such a bright and shining reality? If you truly had it all, what, precisely, would you do with it and who would you become?

As you imagine yourself living out your most treasured dreams, you begin to touch the tangible and authentic purpose behind those dreams. And you come to understand that the person you would become if you truly had it all is with you even now.

That purpose, which longs to be fulfilled, is very much a part of which you are today, no matter how distant your dreams may seem. Those dreams are very much alive in you, and much of their value you already have.

Life is found not in waiting or hoping for anything to come to you. Life is best lived knowing that who you are and what you have is always more than enough. The best you can imagine is here to be lived out and unfolded, moment after moment, day after day, as you experience the magnificent blessing that is your life.

3. Baked Sweet Potato Chips

Makes: 8 servings

Ingredients:

. 2 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/8 inch thick slices

. 1 packet of Equal or other artificial sweetener

. 1-1/2 tablespoons lemon juice

. 1-1/2 teaspoon non/lowfat margarine, melted

. 1 tablespoon pepper

Directions:

. Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl.

. Layer potatoes in a baking dish coated with nonstick cooking spray (nonfat).

. Add any remaining liquid from bowl and cover dish with foil and bake at 350 degrees F for 30-35 minutes.

Nutritional Information:

Serving size: 1/8 of dish

Calories: 150

Fat: 1 g

Cholesterol: 3 mg

Protein: 5 g

Carbohydrates: 35 g

Fiber: 5 g

Sodium: 190 mg

This is a sample of a GHF Diet Recipe - you'll find others by clicking here

4. How to get what you want

This is an article written by Charles Burke of Sizzling Edge, whose E-zine (even though it is quite lengthy) I read eagerly every week. Although it doesn’t deal about losing weight explicitly, you can transfer all of his methods and teachings to your special problem.

Outrageous Fortune -- An Action Guide

by Charles Burke

"Great things are only possible with outrageous requests," wrote psychologist Thea Alexander.

Is it your ambition to be just one of the crowd?

Do you hunger to blend in and be un-noticed by the world? Perhaps your notion of the ideal life style is anonymity - and having just enough to get by.

If so, this lesson is not for you... stop reading now.

Because if you don't stop, you'll be presented with provocative new doors that may frighten you. And you'll read about ways to blast through those doors and be VERY noticed by the world around you. So stop, I say. Stop now.

On the other hand, if you're still with me, I'll assume you want more for yourself:

* a richer, more satisfying life;

* greater recognition;

* thundering success;

* massive acclaim...

... even if you haven't a clue yet how it's to happen.

Still reading? Okay, I warned you. Get a pencil and paper. You'll be needing them.

"There is nothing of which every man is so afraid as getting to know how enormously much he is capable of doing and becoming." This according to the philosopher Sören Kierkegaard.

See? I warned you - we're going to be talking about the very best stuff you have within you. And if that doesn't give you at least a delicious little thrill of fright and excitement, then you aren't paying attention.

Your highest potential... frightening? Every man's greatest fear?

Just wait. You'll see.

In the last lesson we talked about learning to recognize the face of the guard who keeps you inside your "safe" territory. I asked you to try on some new ideas and try out some new activities. If you haven't done any of these yet, go do 'em now.

If you don't have the experiences fresh in your mind, you'll have little idea what I'm talking about in this lesson. So if you haven't done those things, go re-read the last lesson, spend a few days trying new stuff, then come back.

I'll assume now that you have some first-hand experience with the way your border guard controls you, so let's begin putting together a strategy for taking back control.

Let's say you tried eating in a very different restaurant. Maybe your usual haunts are Denny's and Friday's, but last week you went to an uptown restaurant that was way more expensive.

Or if you go to upscale spots often, maybe you instead went to a chili joint next door to the bus station.

Doesn't matter. The idea is, you should have stepped outside your normal and familiar pattern.

Maybe you usually call on purchasing agents, but this past week you phoned a couple of presidents or CEOs of small companies to set up a round of golf.

Maybe you usually watch soaps till three, then bustle around getting everything done, but last week you worked every day on some new short stories till three.

Whatever you did,

A. it should have taken you in a new direction, and

B. been different enough so you had to bear down a bit.

It should have made you squirm a bit, or stretch a little, or use some extra willpower to get through it.

Because your task was not just to do something different; it was to lure out your guard - your ego - and learn something about the way s/he controls you.

Darel Rutherford, in his excellent "Online Being Workshop," suggests naming your ego. One person named his "Bobby Ego." Another calls hers "TammySue."

I've named my own guard "Shep" because he really is about as intelligent as a really good watchdog. Faithful, loyal, utterly dedicated, and not much imagination. But always, always dependable and on the job.

However, I haven't trained him properly so he's sloppy about the way he does his job (and gets really officious sometimes).

Your guard is a watchman - the part of you that resists change. It's the caretaker. As soon as you start thinking about changing something, your watchman says "I'm uncomfortable with that, and I'm going to make you uncomfortable, too."

S/he is the main reason most of us don't move forward very much. S/he is the reason we sabotage ourselves so often.

Okay, if you'd really like to make some changes in your life and your watchman is what's stopping you, how can you get past that?

Not by meekly and obediently staying inside your comfort zone.

Comfort zone? No! Let's change that term. Most people aren't really very comfortable in their "comfort zone," so let's agree that it's really just a "familiar zone."

In fact, I often call it my "Known Zone."

Now please understand this:

NOTHING WILL CHANGE UNTIL SOMETHING CHANGES

And YOU'RE going to have to supply that change. It's your life, after all... who else should have the privilege of changing it?

We already know who's NOT going to lead the charge into new territory - your ego, your watchman. S/he wants you to stay right exactly where you are.

We're going to use a two-pronged strategy to get you past your watchman. First, we'll start making your goals and dreams so real and detailed, so exciting, that they'll feel like part of your Known Zone before they ever even materialize in your life. And second, you'll learn how to neutralize much of the emotional extortion that your watchman uses on you.

STEP 1. Test your dreams for anemia

If you've been dreaming and affirming and meditating for a big new house, you can get it.

When you do, you'll also get the moving trucks, the packing boxes, the uproar in the household for several weeks while you organize everything in your new home... and while you learn the new routes to schools, stores and jobs.

When you dream your dream, is it real? If you haven't included any trucks and boxes, you've been spending your time on a daydream, not a real dream.

If you've been programming to have a million dollars, have you also factored in the planning sessions with your investment advisor, your lawyer and your banker?

Or were you just thinking of a big spending spree? That's not the behavior of a millionaire, you know. That's an ex- millionaire - somebody who gets a big windfall and burns through it in no time.

They say "a fool and his money are soon parted." Notice they don't say a fool can't GET money. It's just that the money won't STAY long.

So are your dreams real? Are they anchored in real-world realities. Include the details to bring them to life.

If you haven't put some real meat on the bare bones of your dreams, you're starving them. Get busy fleshing them out. If you were reading a novel and the author supplied descriptions like, "John lived in a big, new house," or "Sarah weighed 117 pounds," and gave you nothing more, you'd lose interest pretty quickly.

So will your inner mind. Give it some good, rich details.

Still got your pencil and paper at hand? Start down your current goals list and check each item. How vivid is it? How much detail and emotion and fire do you find in the description of each item? When you read that description, does it make you care, even a little bit?

If your goal feels like a generic, bare-bones description, take it and add 33 different, new details - 33 lines of description for each goal.

Impossible, you say? It shouldn't be.

Say you've written "A New Car" on your goals list. What make is it? What model and color? What accessories did you order? If you were sitting in that car right now, you could easily look around it and list more than 33 details. Make it that real in your mind, and you WILL get that car.

Furthermore, when you make it that real and vivid, your watchman won't be sure whether s/he should object or not. Remember that the mind can't distinguish between a real experience and a vividly imagined one.

Flood your watchman with details, and spend a lot of time thinking about them. Pretty soon, s/he will figure, "Okay, that looks familiar - guess it's all right to accept that one." And the internal resistance to that goal will diminish.

STEP 2: Crank up your dream 'way past reasonable

Is your dream list topped by something like "my boss gives me a 10% raise"? Forget that stuff. We're about to turn up the volume so you'll be shaking your whole neighborhood.

You may have read that you need to set goals you can believe in - and that if they're not believable your inner mind won't accept them.

I have a very different idea about that.

You know, you can get used to ANY idea if you repeatedly expose yourself to it. The more often (and the more vividly) you run an idea through your head, the sooner that idea will grow familiar, then comfortable, then believable. Finally, you'll accept it as a natural thing. It just depends on massive repetition and excitement

Before everything else, therefore, the idea MUST excite you. That's why I urge you to toss out every penny-ante idea on your goals list. A 10% improvement is an insult to everything that's great within you.

Why not just resolve to become an industry leader? There's almost no competition for that spot. Most people are aiming to be just like everybody else. There are only a handful of others with the chutzpah to aim for top spots, and you'll soon find that they're not only competitors, many will become your allies and compatriotes. People at the top of any field usually know and respect each other (even if they sometimes disagree radically).

However, you don't become an industry leader by following everybody else. You can't "me-too" your way to the front. You gotta be bold. Daring. Do some stuff that scares the stuffing outta you.

Industry leaders don't get there riding on insipid, luke- warm dreams. Stephen King didn't. George Lucas didn't. Neither did Earl Nightingale, Henry Ford, William Kaiser, Donald Trump nor Warren Buffett.

When you first set a goal, you should not know how in the world you'll ever achieve it. The plan should always come later. You should be inviting the universe to bring you bold new ideas to match your bold new goals.

"You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club," said author Jack London.

If you're trying to figure out everything yourself, you're turning your back on every gift the universal mind can offer you. Leave plenty of room for inspiration, then invite it to fill the space you've allowed. Then keep repeating that invitation again and again. Go after success with the club of big, big ideas and insistent requests.

Is it any wonder most people don't stick with their goals? Heck, there's nothing in them to fire up the imagination. Nothing to hook desire into.

Typical "goals" often sound like:

"I receive a 10% raise"

(but my boss is still an insufferable doofus)

"I weigh 117 pounds"

(but I'm still insecure about my self worth)

"I have a big, new home"

(but I haven't a clue where the kitchen will be)

Think how much more exciting it would be if you wrote:

"I'm the boss, and I own the company"

(followed by 33 to 66 lines of vivid detail)

"I look fabulous, feel great and impress everyone"

(again, followed by clear, exciting details)

"I love my new 3-story Tudor mansion in ___ City"

(with descriptions (or sketches) of each room)

Actress Mae West said: "Everything's in the mind.

That's where it all starts. Knowing what you want is the first step toward getting it."

KNOWING what you want means you fill in all the details.

Bring it to life in your mind and it will eventually appear in tangible form. How on earth can anybody feel the vibrancy of enthusiasm from nearly blank, one-line goals like the first samples above?

STEP 3: Allow problems to help you.

You know what a problem is, don't you? It's life giving us a reminder that we didn't think of everything. Problems arise when we run into stuff we didn't plan on.

And that's a good thing.

"The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem." - Theodore Rubin

When you were very young (maybe 18 months or so) walking across the room was a major undertaking. You kept being interrupted by falling on your bottom every few steps. Eventually, however, you learned how to walk like a champ, and the result is that now you can make your way across a room - any room - any time you want.

And while you were learning to walk, it probably never entered your mind that you should stop this nonsense, or that this was never going to work, and you were disgracing yourself.

Nah, you just got up and kept going for as many steps as you could manage until you hit the floor again. Fall down, get up, toddle forward, fall down, get up, go forward some more, till you got where you were going.

How is that different from now... except that now you quit a lot more?

Now you've got pride "helping" you along.

But isn't pride just another name for ego? And isn't ego the watchman keeping you from going into new (and supposedly scary) territory? Have you ever thought that if you didn't have so much pride you wouldn't be so reluctant to try new stuff?

So start reminding yourself that problems are your best friends in reaching your goals. They're opportunities to get up and take a few more steps forward.

At the top of your goals list, write

"Problems are opportunities to take more steps forward."

Repeat that statement every time you work with your goals list. This one realization (that problems are no disgrace) will free up an incredible surge of new creativity for you.

Remember who makes the most money in any society? Who commands the most respect? The people who solve the biggest problems for other people.

So if you want to be a worthwhile, respected, well-rewarded member of your community, learn to greet problems with eagerness. Each problem you meet will stop the vast majority of people. If it doesn't stop YOU, then you're that much more valuable to society.

And as you cultivate this new attitude toward problems, you'll be neutralizing some of your ego's biggest weapons. Right now, your ego, acting as watchman, only has to whisper "Oh, that goal might mean facing a lot of problems," and you turn away.

Learn to enjoy solving problems, and then what can your watchman hold over your head?

STEP 4: Bias the universe in your favor

What you send out is what you get back.

The scriptures of every religion urge us to treat others the way we want to be treated.

They also tell us explicitly that what we sow controls what we will reap. How the universe treats us is determined by how we treat the universe.

This not only happens on the person-to-person level, it also happens between you and the universe itself.

"A loving person lives in a loving world. A hostile

person lives in a hostile world. Everyone you meet

is your mirror." So says Ken Keys.

How does this happen? I honestly do not know.

But I know from long experience that it does.

So if your relations with life are thorny and uncomfortable, you might consider changing what you send out. If you cannot yet do it to make other people feel better, then start by doing it to make things easier on yourself. Just start where you are, and see what happens. You can grow into the other stuff later, if you want.

This means you don't even have to "believe in" this stuff. It's okay if you don't believe. Just keep in mind, however, that - believer or not - if you want to get the results, you'll still have to pay the price. Just do it - but be sure you do it with enthusiasm and energy and imagination. That's the price.

It's the same price you'll have to pay to achieve anything significant in life.

You'll find that when you start sending out positive and vivid thoughts filled with your energy, the universe will start aligning with your new primary mode of thinking.

That's when things start getting fun.

That's when even the problems become exciting challenges to play with and solve.

Now, I should mention one little side note here. Being a nice, likeable person is not the same thing as being a useful, valuable problem-solver.

The universe gives you far more points for how well you fill others' needs than it does for being easy to get along with.

The easy-to-like person is basically a make-no-waves person. S/he touches the world so lightly (to avoid confrontations) that the world is barely aware s/he's there. You get few points for invisibility.

You'll often see an abrasive, brash, ill-mannered loudmouth making far more headway in life than the gentle saint.

Just don't be fooled by outward appearances. The universe is not fooled. It knows who's really contributing to the welfare and quality of life of those around them. It also knows who's just trying to avoid criticism and personal discomfort.

So if your own personal style is that of a saint, just remember that saints are expected to contribute also.

As you move forward toward your dreams and goals, you'll discover that in practical terms, it's really hard to figure out everything yourself. You'll need help, but you can't usually count on those around you to understand everything you're trying to do.

If you're very fortunate, you'll have parents or spouse who always support you 100%. This is wonderful, but it is not the norm.

Remember that your spouse also has a watchman with her/his own set of rules and fears and "you-can't-go-there" strategies.

Let's say you tell your spouse about your massive new goal; their first reaction will almost certainly be quivering panic. Anger. Pouting. Days of tense silence. Locked bedroom door.

What you need is some people who understand what you're doing - people who have an emotional stake in your forward progress rather than your stagnation.

In the next lesson, we'll talk a bit about mentors and master mind groups, the two most powerful ways to get emotional, professional and strategic support.

In the meantime, keep your pencil and paper busy expanding your dreams list with lots of juicy detail.

Remember, if it's not real to you, it won't be real to your inner mind either.

You want a better life? Dream some outrageously bold dreams. Dreans that'll excite you and keep you stirred up. Then saturate your mind with them, not from a mind-set of desperately grasping at them, but from an attitude of joy and gratitude because somehow, someway they're in the pipeline to you right now.

Remember the Thea Alexander quotation that opened this lesson.

"Great things are only possible with outrageous requests,"

So where's the logical place to start?

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If you liked Charles Burke’s article and want to subscribe to his free 20day email course, just send a blank email to:

20day119@sizzlingedge.com

To find out more about his book “Command More Luck” click here:

Command More Luck

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