Attract Abundance

Self growth article brought to you by Inspired Abundance

There are times when we all want to be more creative. We wish that there were something we could do to express ourselves and create something beautiful at the same time.

If you’re looking for ways to discover your creative side and release the artist within, here are a few simple activities that you can do to get the creative energy flowing.

Express Yourself What type of personality do you have? Are you able to express that personality freely at work or with friends? If not, tackle one of these projects and let your personality shine! �

• Decorate your house, or at least one room, the way you like it. It doesn’t matter what anyone else tells you, just decorate your room, your way. This will help you unleash your own self-expression.
• Dress the way you want. If tackling the house is too big of a job, then take a look at your wardrobe. Dress how you want to dress. Trust yourself and trust your instincts. You are dressing for you, not the world. Don’t worry; you can express yourself while still being professional at work. You have to find ways in everything you do to allow creativity to flow through you. This can be as simple as the way you sign a letter, mail an envelope, the way you dress or the house that you live in.

Change Your Routine

If you’re stuck in a rut, do things that take you out of your normal routine. It doesn’t really matter how stimulating your work or home life is, when you take a moment to step out of your normal routine for some “me time,” you’ll be open to new ideas and new thoughts. � How can you step out of your normal routine?

1. Read a book that you wouldn’t usually pick up
2. Watch a movie that you wouldn’t typically choose
3. Talk to a total stranger that you think looks interesting
4. Go shopping at a store that you have never been to. You don’t necessarily have to buy anything, just go in and look around.
5. Meet a friend you haven’t seen for a long time

Pay Attention to Your Surroundings�

Another simple activity to increase your creativity is to pay attention to your surroundings. You may laugh and think that is absolutely ridiculous – after all, you see the same things and people everyday, and you probably even drive the same route to and from work, too. But try to take a few moments and actually pay attention to your surroundings. See things the way they are and not the way you think they are. �

• Take a different route home from work. Discover shortcuts or new neighborhoods.
• Sit on a park bench and people watch. Think of stories for each person or couple that you see.�

Have you ever really paid attention to the people in your office? What about the person that sits right across from you? Take five or ten minutes and take notice. Don’t stare, but pay attention. You just may find that other people can be quite the source of inspiration for creativity.�

Use Your Imagination

If you have a favorite poem or story that you loved as a kid, sit down and start writing that story, but make the changes that you always thought should be there. What were Jack and Jill really doing on their way up the hill? If they were fetching a pail of water, what was the water for? You don’t have to re-invent the wheel, simply make the everyday your own.

Increasing your creativity starts in small, simple ways. Your life is filled with opportunities for you to test your creative energies but it’s up to you to take action!�

• Why Your Failures Are Really Success (0)
• How To Overcome Failure (1)
• How Do You Define Success? (2)

Self growth article brought to you by Inspired Abundance

What does success really mean to you? It’s important to clarify your thoughts, goals and desires before you can achieve success! You can’t work towards something passionately when you aren’t sure what the end result will be.

Success means many different things to different people. Unfortunately, the tendency is to view monetary gain as success. However, financial wealth is only a small part of overall success.

Different Areas of Success

Because there are different areas of success, you can be successful in one area and unsuccessful in others. In order to develop a plan for your success, you need to make your own list of areas that are relevant to you.

To achieve overall success in life, you’ll need to examine your priorities in each area.For many of us, there are 3 main components of success. In your personal plan for success, there may be even more. Be sure to include any areas that are important to you.

Here are the 3 main areas, along with some tips and techniques to help you evaluate your priorities and formulate your success plan:�

1. Career. To evaluate your career, contemplate these questions:
   • Do you desire a higher status position?
   • What amount of income would make you happy?
   • Would you simply like to feel appreciated by your boss?

   Any number of things can be used to measure success when it comes to your career. In your career evaluation, be sure to determine what strengths and weaknesses you have that can help or hinder you from achieving your goal.

2. Emotional. These questions can guide you to important considerations for your emotional success:
   • Are you satisfied with your relationships?
   • What have you learned so far that could help you do better in the future?
   • If you have children, do you feel successful in how you’re raising them?
   • Is your marriage a happy one?

3. Health. Are you doing everything you can to improve your overall well-being? Maybe a change in diet and exercise is in order. Take a moment to evaluate whether you’ve achieved success in this area or if there’s room for improvement.

   If your health can use a boost, make a plan to start implementing changes in your daily routine that lead to a healthier lifestyle.

The Journey to Success

Your journey to success will have highs and lows throughout your life. There will be mistakes and disappointments. You may experience a setback at some point. The beauty is that you can get back on track and move closer to your goals at any time.

• You may achieve new levels of success at different times in your life and career. As you progress in your job, start a family, and get involved in giving back to your community, your definition of success may change, as do your priorities. Go with the flow; it’s okay for your outlook on life and your meaning of success to change over time.
• Love what you do! Life is too short to be stuck doing something you despise. To achieve success in life, work with what you’ve got. Focus on your strengths and interests and do the things that bring those to the forefront of your life.
• Challenges and obstacles are opportunities for improvement and further success. Everyone has setbacks at some point in their lives. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be human. The successful individual has the confidence that he can and will do better!

Every so often, it’s important to step back and re-evaluate your ideas of success. There are so many changes in life and with each one you’ll find that your priorities also change. Never underestimate the power that comes from persistence and experience.

And don’t forget to enjoy the journey!

• Why Your Failures Are Really Success (0)
• How To Overcome Failure (1)
• How to Discover Your Creative Energy (0)

Self growth article brought to you by Inspired Abundance

When something doesn’t go your way, what’s the first thought that pops into your head? Do you chastise yourself? Or do you reassure yourself that you are growing stronger and wiser with each challenge you face?

In reality, it’s not your successes that make you a stronger, more successful person; it’s your failures.

This may sound odd, but each failure you have is actually a success.

Why, you ask? Because it gives you the opportunity to improve, learn, and try again. Let’s take a look at a couple of the world’s greatest failures that lead to the some of the most ubiquitous inventions of our time. �

• Did you know that 3M’s greatest failure was inventing glue that won’t stick? That glue became the basis for the sticky backing on the “Post-It Note.”
• The scientists at Pfizer were trying to create a medication that treated high blood pressure in men. It failed to affect blood pressure, but it had one unexpected side effect. We now know this drug as Viagra and it’s considered one of the most successful failures ever.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that each failure you encounter will land you with an immediate success. But it’s always a stepping-stone along the way.

You can only appreciate success after you’ve failed

Thomas Edison had an incredibly positive attitude about failure. When he was questioned as to why so many of his experiments were failures, he responded by saying that he never had a failure in any of his experiments, rather, each experiment helped him discover another way that something would not work. In reality, sometimes the only way to know whether you’ve succeeded is to fail.

Learning How to Deal With Disappointment

Dealing with the disappointment of failure can be tough for adults as well as for children. But everyone experiences failure at some point in their lives and teaching our children how to deal with the disappointment is a critical life lesson.

Can you imagine a young adult, either a teen or college student, dealing with their first failures in the workplace? A tantrum at any age is not appealing, never mind from an adult who should know better.

Consider the very wise words of Winston Churchill:

“Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.”

What did he mean exactly? Well here are three reasons why failing is a good thing:

1. Inspiration. Before you laugh, think about your childhood when you didn’t get something right the first time. What did you do? Tried again and again! Each time the thought in your head was, “I am going to get it right this time!” What better motivation do you need?
2. Humility. No one is perfect, sometimes we need to be reminded of that very fact! Can you imagine a world where no one ever failed and we all walked around thinking we were God’s gift to the world?
3. Learning. Success makes you feel good, but failing teaches you a lesson. Think back to the first time you swung a bat, learned to walk, or tried to eat with a fork. Did you do it right the first time? Of course not. Did you figure out with each failure what you were doing wrong? Well if you can swing a bat today, walk and eat with a fork then I guess you did!�

Failure brings positive change and success to those who are resilient. Are you?

• How To Overcome Failure (1)
• Why Your Attitude Matters & How To Create An Attitude of Success (0)
• How to Discover Your Creative Energy (0)
• How Do You Define Success? (2)

Personal growth article brought to you by Inspired Abundance

A few years back, Disney released an animated movie called “Meet the Robinsons” that had such a deep impact and meaning … as we’re finding so many kids movies do. The point of the story is to celebrate each failure you have because it gives you the opportunity to try again.

Most people make the mistake of thinking that, just because they failed at something, they should move on. Or, if they failed it means they were never meant to succeed at it.

Wrong, wrong, wrong!

Failure can be a good thing

When you’re trying to accomplish something, failure is actually the best thing that can happen to you. Seriously! Do you think the light bulb was invented the first time around? No! In fact, Thomas Edison took thousands of tries to get it just right!

What about the first wheel or the telephone? Of course it takes multiple tries by multiple people to reach success, but the key point to remember is that you have to fail in order to know that you’ve succeeded.

Real Life Examples of Failure

• Think of a toddler learning how to walk. Although they give a fair share of tantrums during the learning stages, they pull themselves up after each fall and try to walk again. Instinctively they’re teaching themselves how to perfect the movement all based on their past mistakes or failures. It’s a trial and error process!
• People struggling with weight loss often feel like failures when they gain weight while dieting. Keeping a weight loss journal can help them track their progress and learn to recognize what triggers them to fail. Perhaps there are emotional or physical triggers that can be prevented. Learning from these mistakes will teach them how to combat those same problems in the future.

There is another benefit to failing: failure opens doors that will allow you to find out what you’re really destined to do. This happens in college all the time.

You Find Yourself Through Experience

Certainly you know at least one person who went to college with the intent of getting one degree and as they went through their course work, having their successes and failures, they discovered a new career interest and changed their major.

Think of a student who went to college to become a nurse but soon realized what they really enjoy is teaching. The whole reason they were going into nursing was to help educate people to improve their lives and they found the best way to do that is not as a nurse, but as a teacher. There’s nothing wrong with that!

As long as you’re able to learn from your “mistakes,” then they’re not mistakes at all – they are opportunities for success! There’s always something to learn from each and every situation and once you understand the lesson, it will make you a better person.

Become Stronger and Wiser

Failure makes you a stronger person. Imagine what it would be like if everything you did always went your way. Imagine that you were successful at everything you attempted your whole life and then one day it happened… you failed!

You failed so badly that it caused you to lose everything. How in the world would you deal with that failure if you’ve never had to overcome an obstacle before?

Failing allows you to become more resilient so you can always figure out a way to move forward. The first wheel may have been square and it moved, but it was wobbly and eventually fell over, but the inventors never gave up! They began to figure out how to make it rounder so it would roll smoothly.

You can do the same in your life! You can’t give up, you have to pick yourself up and figure out a way to roll forward, stronger than ever! Gain strength by learning to overcome failure by looking for the lesson and continuing to move steadfastly forward toward your dreams.

• Why Your Failures Are Really Success (0)
• How to Discover Your Creative Energy (0)
• How Do You Define Success? (2)