Emotional filing - De-fragment your brain

The decision I made about a year ago to pay some serious attention to my emotional state and get it sorted out properly is the best decision I’ve made in my life to date.

Have you ever felt the need to shout out “Stop the world and let me get off for a while”?

That feeling of despair and confusion is the most distressing of life experiences. There seems to be no time to think straight. The mind is working overtime and causing mental and physical exhaustion. Like trying to swim against the current, it feels like no progress is being made and you can sense you are going backwards. That current is actually trying to drag you to the place you need to be. It’s probably time to let go of the fighting and “go with the flow”.

So how does this work?

The first stage is to actually go and seek help. There is a need to trust in the process of your inner self or soul calling you to let go of the fighting.  It’s a bit like maintaining the computer you are currently using to increase it performance and prevent it from crashing. We’ve all experienced the speed of a brand new computer and then notice that gradually, over time it begins to slow down and malfunction as more and more programs are added. The hard disk becomes cluttered. Other unhelpful processes get in the way, such as checking details of previously accessed programs, some of which may be of no further use. The computer processes can be cleared up by clearing the history of web pages visited that don’t need to be held in the forefront of the memory and also by defragging the hard disk.

The good news is that we can do this with our brain.

Taking some therapy is equivalent to booting your computer in “safe mode” and choosing one of the tools to make the repairs. The “defrag” option looks at all the processes and puts them into order, grouping them appropriately, discarding what is no longer needed freeing up some space. This allows everything to run much more smoothly. The human brain equivalent of a “defrag” is what I call emotional filing.

Of  course, we can’t operate in “safe mode” for long periods of time, so the brain defrag needs to be done in stages.

There are of course many other tools that can improve the computers performance, some of which “claim” to fix all problems and often simply make things worse!

What tools can we use to perform maintenance on our minds?

Taking therapy is one, particularly when things are pretty messed up. Other techniques come under what is described as self help. These can be learning some meditation techniques, taking some physical exercise, taking appropriate rest, taking a restful holiday, sharing with trusted friends, keeping a diary or journal, and many more that don’t come to mind right at this minute. Of course, once maintenance is performed, everything works much better for a while, until the next time perhaps. I’m coming to the conclusion that people who don’t suffer too much with emotional problems perform regular maintenance on their minds. This may occur naturally (unconsciously) or they make a conscious effort to keep their minds running efficiently and effectively.

Sometimes, we are not aware of needing maintenance. Again, it’s a bit like your computer that run frustratingly slowly with many faults, but you just accept its slowness and don’t do anything about it until it finally breaks completely.

Do you perform emotional filing? If so, how do you do it? What techniques do you use? Do those techniques help?

Feel free to comment.

Merry Christmas,

Marty

Control vs Freedom

"Those who seek to control others have a lack of self control."

This was the answer that came to my mind when someone asked me today why some people are abusively controlling in relationships. 

I followed this up with:

"Live and let live = self respect = confidence = I know who I am = I accept myself"

This all came to my mind in free thought. Analysing it afterwards, I wondered whether it could be described the other way around. i.e. 

"I accept myself = I know who I am......" etc.

Further examination of these thoughts brought back one of my favourite values of balance. Applying this means that there are times when a degree of control is required in a relationship. For instance, a caring parent or adult who seeks to protect a child from hurting themselves. For example, a toddler who is inquisitive in exploring the world around them needs some protection from wandering into a busy road. This would not be unreasonable and is done for correct reasons. As a child grows and learns to understand right from wrong, it would then be ok to gently allow the child to make measured decisions for themselves.

The type of control I'm referring to at the beginning of this blog is when a person who is capable of making decisions is denied this opportunity by another who has an element (perhaps) of distrust in themselves. Or perhaps the controlling person feels the need to inappropriately take responsibility for the actions of the person they are controlling. 

If we are free, then we have freedom to decide for ourselves. If others truly care for us, then they will forgive us for our mistakes. This will help us to learn to forgive ourselves.

As I said, this is all free thinking and I seek some feedback from folk on what I've written here.

With Love

Marty

The power of laughter

“ Laughter means: taking a mischievous delight in someone else's uneasiness, but with a good conscience. “

Friedrich Nietzsche

I’m in a somewhat amused mood today and I’m pondering the benefit of laughter and what motivates us to laugh.

I like the quote as above by Friedrich Nietzsche (I’ve no idea who he was other than a brief statement about him on the site I looked at….. would be tempted to read more, but I would then lose focus on what I’m doing and go off at a completely different tangent!)

The statement mentioning laughing with a good conscience resonates with me. People can sometimes get offended by some of the more controversial jokes. More often than not  the sense of being offended has more to do with their conception of another person being offended, not themselves. I’m not too worried about whether a joke is politically correct or not. I’m more interested in it’s wit content. If the joke is without wit, then it is possible that the “joke” has a more sinister objective.

Laughter is good for us. It gives a great sense of release. We often laugh heartily after a time of extreme upset. How many times have you been to a funeral, then spent time afterwards celebrating, laughing and reminiscing about the good times of the person you have just said goodbye to?

So how do we laugh with a good conscience?

I believe that first and foremost, we can learn to laugh at ourselves. Stop taking ourselves too seriously. Self depreciating humour is quite a powerful tool when used correctly. It may seem like “putting ourselves down” but we must seek whether the “put down” is really coming from ourselves, or whether it has been influenced by somebody else.

As far as self improvement is concerned, when we have learned to get in touch with ourselves and learned to accept who we are, then there is the clear ability to be able to use self depreciation appropriately.

Once we can laugh appropriately at ourselves, we give ourselves permission to laugh at others, or other situations with good conscience. We can see the irony in a situation and relate it to some of our own experience, or how we might take ourselves too seriously in that position.

Have fun. Have a good laugh today at something and do it with a good conscience. The benefits are enormous.

Seasonal blessings

Marty

P.S.

If you want a good source of amusing material, check out this guys blog that I found today. Here is somebody who know how to use humour and irony.

http://vicusscurra.blogspot.com/2010/11/keep-bloody-noise-down.html

The gift of life and choice

I’ve spent some time thinking about my life goals over the last couple of weeks, evaluating differing ways of writing them and what content is relevant to keep me focused.

One particular phrase came to mind for the reason why I was choosing a specific goal. This was “To learn and accept that I am a worthy person and what I do has a degree of importance to the world as I see it, in the grand scheme of things”.

I decided this is a pretty important statement to make. It’s a revelation that has become more than simply words. I know there is plenty written on this very concept. There are times when we read things and they are little more than words. Every now and then however, a true meaning becomes apparent. To try to explain that is frankly beyond words. So I’ll simply write what came into my head at the time of this revelation.

The fact that we all exist as human beings must have some reason. We have choice to a large degree in what we do with our lives, even if that is simply how we choose to think.

So…… we can choose to decide that our life has some meaning. Let’s face it, why not? If we choose not to, then the future will seem pretty bleak and we will simply submissive to whatever the world throws at us.

If you are reading this, be aware that you chose to read it. You made a conscious decision to do so. The page did not choose you, you chose it! You exercised your power of choice. If someone is reading this to you, you have chosen to listen to it. We have the power to determine so many parts of our lives.

Make a decision about today.

Make a decision about tomorrow.

Do this in the clear knowledge that you CAN determine your future, whatever that may be.

Seasonal greetings.....

Marty

Looking for a new job?

As we approach the new year, many people seek to re-evaluate "where they are" in their lives. One subject that frequently screams at us is. "Am I in the right job?"
This is a serious subject that needs careful consideration. Ask the question "Am I running away from something?" There may be a life issue that will simply follow you and will not be resolved simply by changing job or career direction. 

Nevertheless, if you choose to seek a new challenge with a new job, then there are some tips here that I'd like to share with you. I have a fare amount of experience in looking for work have been made redundant on many occasions and also running away when things have got a little tough!

• Decide what new job you would like to do. It's important to have direction and to know your destination. If you don't know where you are going, you'll likely end up somewhere you don't want to be!
• Don't pay too much attention to that nagging thought "there are no jobs around". To do that is to give up before you have started. Many jobs are not advertised so use all resources by networking, targeting your C.V./Resume. Speculating to employers.
• If you are actually out of work right now, decide to use your week as a full time or part time job looking for work. That means getting up Monday through Friday and dressing as if you are actually going to work. Imagine yourself to be a businessman seeking to make appointments to sell you product. The product is you. Believe in your product and market it in an eye catching and public way. 
• Decide how many hours each day you are going to dedicate to job seeking. Stick to it! You don't necessarily need to work "overtime". Keep the balance and remember to reward yourself with rest after your effort. 
• If you get an interview, do your homework. Find out as much as possible about your prospective employers. Does the organisation have a website? Look at it and read. Discover their mission statement if they have one and their philosophy.
• Dress appropriately for the interview. Not all jobs require a power suit. So long as you are neat, tidy and clean, that may be enough in some circumstances. 
• Make sure you know the time, place, name of the person to meet, and how you are going to get to the interview. Know where you are going!
• The interview is a 2 way process. You are also the interviewer. You are there to interview them too in order to decide whether this is a job and place you want to work. So don't give away all the power to the interviewer. 
• Remember that you are worthy of the job you are applying for. Why else did you apply? If you think you are not worthy, then you have wasted your time in applying in the first place!

• Use appropriate body language. There are many detailed sources of advice on this subject, but so many people take the advice too literally. So make appropriate eye contact and show appropriate enthusiasm. Essentially, it is important to be yourself. Don't try to be somebody you are not. You'll be found out all too quickly.

These are just some tips. There are many, many more. If you follow these principals, you'll give yourself the best chance possible of finding the job you seek. Believe me, it does work. I've proved it many times for myself.  


A few years ago, I worked for a TV channel about job seeking. It was great fun while it lasted. I got the chance to appear in some promotional ads. See one of the youtube link below. Enjoy! With Marty blessings..