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Mind Skills to Success

You've felt it, right? You know...how sometimes when you're involved with something everything just flows and everything else simply fades away. You're mind is clear, you feel great and you're more energized after your done then when you started.

That my friend is the "flow" and being in the flow leads to success.

People from all disciplines and time periods have been in it, felt it and talked about it. But only a select few have been able to teach people how to get into the flow. Probably the easiest types of people to get purposefully get into the flow are elite athletes. They know what it feels like, and how to get into it better then most people.

For other 90% of us that aren't elite athletes we'll need to first describe what the flow feels like, so that you can be aware, remember it and develop the mental skills to access it. One key attribute though in the flow is to possess the skills for the task at hand.

What the Flow Flees Like

When you're in the flow you:

• Fell neither bored or anxious
• Lose self-consciousness
• Feel somehow a part of something greater then yourself
• Are totally focused
• Feel in control without trying
• Feel like time disappears

These are just a few of the common feelings of being in the flow; I'm sure a few felt familiar, correct?

Learn to Flow Looking at the elite athlete again as an example, they indicate that most factors for entering the flow are controllable by a developed by mental strength.

Another part of learning to flow is to know what it feels like for you. This would mean being aware of your felling when you're in it and afterwards. This may sound contrary and you may be thinking "If I notice that when I'm in the flow, won't that take me out of the flow?" ...No. The noticing is a simple glance, not a stare and actually it's more of awareness.

Learning to flow is very much like learning anything...the more you do and notice the success the better you become. Just like riding a bike, you didn't know what it felt like to ride a bike before your rode a bike. But the more you rode the better you got and now you can very easily explain what it fees like to ride a bike. Learning to flow is the same process.

How to Enter the Flow Two things are required to enter the flow. The first is to have the skill needed in proportion to task. The second are the fowling mind skills

• Raise Your Attitude: The more confident you are with your ability. The more resilient and yet realistic you are with the task at hand the more likely you'll slip into the flow
• Make a Plan: Clarify your long, mid and short term targets. You're targets have to be challenging enough to keep you engaged, but not too challenging where you get frustrated and lose interest. Setting a goal for each step that leads your to target. NOTE: Here is define target as defined end result and a goal is the process or step necessary to get to your target, i.e. write a book by the end of 12 weeks. This would be your target. Your goals might be writing a chapter a day. To break that goal down, write a page an hour.
• Get Feedback: This could as simple as keeping a journey of your actives all the way to hiring a coach for accountability. Which ever way you go feedback is critical in assisting you in finding and getting into the flow.
• Inward Focus: By giving full attention and concentrating on what you're doing and only on what you are doing allows for full emersion into the flow. Basically you want to put on mental blinders and see nothing else then the task at hand.

These mind skills, when practiced, will become second nature to you as you enter the flow. But practice and awareness is the key.

The Flow Your Way We are all unique and different as such, not all techniques work for everyone. Experiment with different process, i.e. play music, don't play music. Have something to eat, drink tea...play around with different environmental aspects that assist you in developing the mind skills to enter your flow.

Once you have found your flow teach others to find their flow. Nothing reinforces something better then to teach it. By teaching others you'll not only deepen your mind skills you'll be helping someone else develop theirs...and is that what life is about...help others to live in their full potential?

Gregg Swanson is a mental strength coach and owner of Warrior Mind Coach and Training. To receive a complimentary copy of his e-book "How to Create Warrior Mind Skills" please visit: http://WarriorMindSkills.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gregg_Swanson

12 Great Ideas For Your Daily Power Hour

One great method for personal growth and development, which will sky rocket your rate of success and effectiveness is ... to have a daily power hour. The idea being, that even in a very busy world, you still have at the very least one hour of productivity each and every day.

Set apart one hour each morning. Get up earlier if you have to, it will be worth the effort. It will give you an amazing kick start and solid foundation upon which to build the rest of your day.

The activities may vary from day to day, here's a few ideas to get you started...

*5 mins - Drink water and have breakfast
*20 mins - Reading a book spiritual book or book related to your industry
*30 mins - Exercise and stretching
*5 mins - Prayer
*15 mins - Meditation
*10 mins - Autosuggestion/self hypnosis
*10 mins - Planning the day ahead and list all tasks to be completed during the day
*10 mins - Writing a journal
*10 mins - Reviewing personal finances and budget
*10 mins - Writing a letter to friend or family member
*15 mins - Mental exercise such as a crossword or sudoku
*20 mins - Walking through nature

It really make a massive difference to your day and ultimately to your life, because you will be investing a portion of your time to improving yourself, so you can spend the rest of your time more productively.

P.S. If you are a business owner or a student, you may need to have some extra time allocated to reading about your industry or area of study. Earl nightingale said... That if you study for just one hour a day on any given topic, in as little as six months you will be an expert in that industry.

P.P.S. Business owners remember to the old 80/20 rule! The first hour of your working day should be dedicated to the tasks that matter most and will mean the most for your profits!

By Joseph William

http://josephwilliamsuccesscoach.blogspot.com/ or http://knowers-ark.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joseph_William

11 Mental Strength Secrets to Examine and Create Your beliefs

Only two things make up your life, your reality. They are:

1. Your Beliefs
2. Your Actions

That's it. So if you want to change your life, change your thoughts and then your actions. Pretty simple uh? Simple yes...easy, not so much.

In this article we'll look at beliefs, since everything starts with thoughts and thoughts come from beliefs.

Your beliefs form your reality, your individual beliefs as well as the cumulative beliefs of society. The intensity of a belief is extremely important as to how much a "hold" it has on you and how easy it is to counter and neutralize.

If you believe that people are good and will treat you kindly, they will. If you believe that the world is against you that will be your experience. And if you believe that you will begin to get "old" and deteriorate at age 30, you will.

If you believe that you are poor and will always be poor, your experience will prove it to you. Your beliefs smack you right in the face when you look in the mirror. They form your image...you cannot escape your beliefs. They are the process by which you create your experiences.

So where do beliefs come from?
In looking at the writings of mystics, sages, philosophers and more recent NLP studies, here are 10 mental strength principles that will help you understand and question your beliefs.

1. Childhood experiences: Based on early life experiences, especially with our parents, teachers and other "authoritative" figures, we develop believes about who we are and who we are in relation to the rest of the world.
2. Your beliefs create the results, circumstances and experiences of your life. Regardless of what you believe you want, you will find a way to create congruence between your results and your underling beliefs
3. Important negative emotional experiences create beliefs that are not supportive and can cause you to focus on what you do not want. Since the mind takes whatever you focus on as a "command" to create it, having beliefs that are not supportive is not very resourceful.
4. To get what you want, you must focus on what you want and have the beliefs that tell your mind to create the results that are in alignment with those supportive beliefs
5. Since everything is true to the person who believes it, assessing beliefs on whether they are true or false is not that helpful. Conscious and evolving people evaluating their beliefs based on whether or not they are supportive to the life they are intending to create.
6. The most effective way to replace disempowering believes is to take the perspective of a "witness." By watching and observing your beliefs and action from this perspective causes whatever is disempowering to gently falls away, and whatever is empowering to stay.
7. Once you take on this process, you can then consciously choose a more resourceful belief that creates a supportive environment that is in alignment with your desired results.
8. The first step in replacing your automatic and unconscious and non supportive is to actually discover what your core beliefs are.
9. The most effective way to determine your core believes is to examine the results you're getting. Your results never lie. If you don't like your results, check the beliefs around those results.
10. As long as you continue to hold the same beliefs, you will continue to get the same results. Einstein once said: "We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." There is no way to continue to hold the same believes and get different results.
11. To adopt a new set of beliefs, focus on it as often as possible in every way you can think of, preferably for at least 5 minutes of undisturbed time a day.

So, there you have it, simple yes? Now you have the 11 mental strength secrets to examining and then recreating your beliefs.

If the task seems a bit daunting, just take one small part of your life you're not exactly happy with...start with something small. Apply the above 11 tips until you achieve what you want, then move on to something a bit bigger.

Keep doing this until you have mastered this process. Don't think you can? Maybe it's time to examine THAT belief!

Gregg Swanson is a mental strength coach and owner of Warrior Mind Coach and Training. To receive a complimentary copy of his e-book "How to Create Warrior Mind Strength" please visit: http://WarriorMindCoach.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gregg_Swanson