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*Enlightening Act*

People say the hardest part about meditating is finding the time to meditate. This makes sense: who these days has time to do nothing? It’s hard to justify..

Meditation brings many benefits: It refreshes us, helps us settle into what’s happening now, makes us wiser and gentler, helps us cope in a world that overloads us with information and communication, and more. But if you’re still looking for a business case to justify spending time meditating, try this one: Meditation makes you more productive.

How? By increasing your capacity to resist distracting urges.

Research shows that an ability to resist urges will improve your relationships, increase your dependability, and raise your performance. If you can resist your urges, you can make better, more thoughtful decisions. You can be more intentional about what you say and how you say it. You can think about the outcome of your actions before following through on them.

Our ability to resist an impulse determines our success in learning a new behavior or changing an old habit. It’s probably the single most important skill for our growth and development.

As it turns out, that’s one of the things meditation teaches us. It’s also one of the hardest to learn.

When I sat down to meditate this morning, relaxing a little more with each out-breath, I was successful in letting all my concerns drift away. My mind was truly empty of everything that had concerned it before I sat. Everything except the flow of my breath. My body felt blissful and I was at peace.

For about four seconds

Within a breath or two of emptying my mind, thoughts came flooding in —  I felt an itch on my face and wanted to scratch it. A great title for my next picture popped into my head and I wanted to write it down before I forgot it.

 I thought of at least four phone calls I wanted to make and one difficult conversation I was going to have later that day. I became anxious, knowing I only had a few hours of writing time. What was I doing just sitting here? I wanted to open my eyes and look at how much time was left on my countdown timer. I heard my siblings fighting in the other room and wanted to intervene.

Here’s the key though: I wanted to do all those things, but I didn’t do them. Instead, every time I had one of those thoughts, I brought my attention back to my breath.

Meditation teaches us to resist the urge of that counterproductive follow through.

For example, when an employee makes a mistake and you want to yell at him even though you know that it’s better — for him and for the morale of the group — to ask some questions and discuss it gently and rationally. Or when you want to blurt something out in a meeting but know you’d be better off listening. Or when you want to buy or sell a stock based on your emotions when the fundamentals and your research suggest a different action. Or when you want to check email every three minutes instead of focusing on the task at hand.

Meditating daily will strengthen your willpower muscle. Your urges won’t disappear, but you will be better equipped to manage them. And you will have experience that proves to you that the urge is only a suggestion. You are in control.

So how do you do it? If you’re just starting, keep it very simple.

Sit with your back straight enough that your breathing is comfortable — on a chair or a cushion on the floor — and set a timer for however many minutes you want to meditate. Once you start the timer, close your eyes, relax, and don’t move except to breathe, until the timer goes off. Focus on your breath going in and out. Every time you have a thought or an urge, notice it and bring yourself back to your breath.

That’s it. Simple but challenging. Try it — today — for five minutes. And then try it again tomorrow.

Who says meditation is a waste of time?

So if you like the idea of meeting yourself then you can fix an appointment in the morning at 5 or 6 as per your convenience. 😉

Do Try and share the experience 🙂

Are you confident?

• Does your self confidence depend on your mood and fluctuate from time to time depending on the situation or is it steadfast, unwavering and persistent?
• Is your confidence level the same in all aspects of your life and with all people or does it depend on personal circumstances and who you are interacting with?
• Does a crisis situation or adversity shake your confidence?
• How do your perceive your own confidence level?
• How do others perceive you – do they feel you are overconfident or underconfident?
• Are you genuinely confident from inside or do you put an act, a fake mask of buoyancy, and make a pretence of outward confidence?

 True confidence gives you a wonderful feeling of self-assurance, aplomb and dignity and is evident and can be seen in your poise and deportment. 

 

The hallmarks of a genuinely confident person can be encapsulated in seven distinctive traits. 

 

A truly confident person will possess a high degree of each of the seven attributes of confidence, so ask yourself these seven questions and check out for yourself how confident you really are:

 

THE SEVEN ASPECTS OF CONFIDENCE

 

1. DO YOU LOVE YOURSELF?  

 

You cannot be a confident person unless you love yourself.

 

Self-Love  is the foundation of Self-Esteem which is a crucial sine qua non of confidence. 

 

How can you be confident if you are not happy with yourself, your very own body and your unique personality? 

 

Indeed the first step towards self confidence is that you must first love all aspects of your own self.

 

2. DO YOU BELIEVE IN YOURSELF?

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Confidence begins from within and when we love ourselves and do not seek the approval of others, we start believing in ourselves.

 

Self-Belief makes your fearless and enables you to cope with crises because confident persons believe they have the power to handle their own lives whereas unconfident persons who do not believe in themselves always look for support and assurance from outside and try to seek help from others to deal with challenges in their own lives.

 

3. ARE YOU COMFORTABLE WITH YOURSELF? 

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To be truly confident, you must love yourself, believe in yourself and, most importantly, be comfortable with yourself. 

 

Yes, genuinely confident people are happy in their own skin and comfortable with themselves, as they are. 

 

They love who they are, they do not wish to be anyone else and they seek no one’s approval to be whom they wish to be. Truly confident persons are immune from the disease to please .

 

They are natural leaders with a strong sense of personal belonging who feel secure with themselves and who don’t blindly follow others or conform for the sake of conformance, but who chart their own course and inspire others to follow them.

 

4. ARE YOU AWARE OF YOURSELF?

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Self-Awareness is a key aspect of confident persons as knowing your values, your strengths and limitations helps you in developing your personality, giving a direction to your life, enhancing your achievements and accomplishments and boosting your confidence.

 

5. ARE YOU FEARLESS?

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Confident persons are not paralysed by fear – they rather act first and be afraid later. 

 

A fearless approach to life, willingness to take risks, try out new things, innovate and experiment, and a pioneering attitude are hallmarks of a confident person.

 

6. DO YOU HAVE A THIRST FOR LEARNING?

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Truly confident people love to learn. 

 

They strive for continual improvement and have a thirst for knowledge in order to achieve continual growth. 

 

They are innovative, creative and try to make the most of their talents in order to realize their maximum potential because they believe in themselves which gives them the determination, tenacity and sense of purpose to keep going even when others have given up.

 

7. ARE YOU HAPPY WITH YOUR LIFE?  ٩(-̮̮̃-̃)۶

 

Confident persons are happy, here and now, as they are, with all aspects of their life in its entirety. They are content with whatever they have. 

 

Unhappiness and discontentment erode self-esteem and destroy your confidence. 

 

Happiness and contentment are a must for genuine confidence, and that is why confident persons always exhibit cheerfulness and optimism and generate positive vibes.

 

Many individuals who are not very confident inside, and lack genuine self confidence, try to fake it and present an external picture of confidence by clever image management. But this causes stress due to the fear of being found out, and one day such charlatans are indeed exposed or suffer nervous breakdowns.

 

That is why you must strive to be genuinely self confident.

 

So introspect and check out for yourself – how many of these seven confidence attributes do you have? 

 

Discover your strengths, find out how confident you really are and in which of these seven aspects do you need to improve. 

 

I Wish You tons and tons of Confidence