Courtesy: Jen Cohen
Have you ever wondered, “Why am I working so hard but not seeing greater success?”
It is not an uncommon experience. You work really hard toward a goal, hoping to see greater success as time goes on. But, instead you experience frustration and disillusionment from coming up empty handed.
Why is it that some people see greater success from their efforts… and some don’t?
So here you are. Tired, annoyed, 
disgruntled. You’ve been trying,
and trying, and trying some more.
You’ve worked overtime, spent months working on the same manuscript, endless nights with coffee and a night lamp to study for that one class. And still, nothing. Nada. Zilch.
Nothing to show for your hard work except the bags under your eyes and your dreary aura. You’re stuck in the grind zone. There’s no resolution in sight; all that’s laid out in front of you is more work, on top of more work, with some more work to top it all off.
Shouldn’t there be some reward… by now? Some encouragement, “you’ve made it this far, keep going!” At least some sense of, “halfway there!”
You remember the time you left the starting line on this dream of a better something. You thought to yourself, “Sure, it’ll take hard work and dedication, but it’ll be worth it when I accomplish this.”
But, now you aren’t so sure. The finish line is nowhere in sight. Should you even keep going?
Have you ever looked back on a 
conversation you had and thought, yeah, I definitely should have handled that better? Yep… me too.
A friend of mine told me of her recent regretful
incident:
“I called my daughter’s dad to set up a trip
for her to visit him. And he made a couple
of comments about the cost of the flight and
the dates not working for him.I was instantly mad.
To my credit, I knew what was happening at the time. But like a car whose brakes go out, I couldn’t stop the wreck. I started shouting my “extremely valid” points and making snarky remarks.
With neither of us wanting to deal with each other at that point—we hung up. It was an epic fail.”
Have you ever been in a situation like this? You were able to identify that you were feeling emotional… but felt helpless to stop it?
The great news is that when you learn (yes, it is a process) how to better manage your emotions by raising your “emotional intelligence,” things turn out MUCH better.
Read on to discover 4 compelling benefits from increasing your emotional intelligence (EQ).
“EQ has twice the power of IQ to predict performance [success]. EQ is also a better predictor than employee skill, knowledge, or expertise.” – Gerald Mount
Try this experiment. Imagine something you fear, even dread happening to you. Something really bad. Go ahead… I’ll wait.
Now, imagine those worst fears actually happen this coming week. What would your life be like 6 months from now? A year later?
Now, it’s time for our experiment to go to your happy place. Imagine one of your “dreams come true” happening this coming week. What would your life be like 6 months from now? A year later?
Now, take both of those imagined futures, good and bad, and throw them out the window. They are dead wrong.
Here’s the problem: research has revealed that you and I have a mental distortion in our perception of the future.
It confirms we humans have a huge problem accurately predicting how certain events, good or bad, will impact us… especially how we will feel in the future because of them.
It gets worse. Your inability to accurately forecast your future quality of life based on the impact current events have on you is undermining the quality of your decisions and your life TODAY. Read on to learn what you can do about it.
Consistently making good decisions is not easy.
As a student of decision making, I have discovered LOTS of reasons you and I make lousy, or shall we say “less than optimum” decisions. I have undoubtedly experienced all of them many times over. You have, too.
There is one reason we need to talk about that is extremely frustrating to deal with… especially when others around you do it. So much so, that you are tempted to utter an F word.
This cause of poor decision making is also a 4-letter F word… FEAR.
If not addressed, fear will not only affect your decisions today but will also reduce your ability to improve your decision-making abilities in the future. Not good.
“Laughter is an instant vacation.” – Milton Berle
“A good laugh and a long sleep are two
of the best cures for anything.” -Unknown
Most everyone loves a good laugh. Well, except certain grumpy, uptight people who never smile… you know who you are 🙁
But did you know that laughter has many, many health benefits, too? This includes dealing with stress.
Over 350 studies have established a ton of benefits that come to us when we laugh. There are just 4 benefits in particular that might surprise you.
1. Laughter releases potent endorphins. A good laugh releases a dose of endorphins, our feel-good hormone. Here’s why that is great news: endorphins help counteract the negative emotions and stress we experience in daily life. The effects of these endorphins are heightened… when we laugh with others.
Hmm… do you think that’s why we instinctively make a joke to lighten the mood in certain situations, to experience some relief?
Have you seen a dumb decision being made by someone?
Isn’t your first thought: What were you thinking?
But, I also have a second thought: How can I avoid a bad decision? …so others don’t think the first thought about me. 🙂
Here are 5 really funny, but dumb decisions that prompt the first question.
… then I want to show you 2 ways to avoid bad decisions in the future. (more…)
Nate was wrestling with God again.
He wanted to choose the path God had for him. He wanted to exercise good decision making in God’s will.
The problem was he didn’t know what God wanted him to do.
Oh sure, he knew God didn’t want him murdering someone or stealing their stuff. But, the situation he faced was not so clear cut.
How could Nate be sure the decision he was making would be pleasing to God and turn out well? (more…)
Have you ever thought you were making good decisions that promised to make life better… and instead things got worse?
Things go off the road… and you are now a passenger in the unfolding of events?
Then a friend of yours, trying to be encouraging, says “it will get better! The disaster is actually a blessing! It’ll eventually turn out good…”
After shooting them and disposing of their body, you want to scream, “Why did this happen? It seemed like I made a good decision at the time!”
What you may not know is there was something influencing your decision that you couldn’t see. (more…)
Stop and think for a minute.
Are there people in 
your world
with whom you’d like to experience a better connection?
Maybe even have them see you in a more favorable light?
One highly effective method to increase your connection and influence with people around you is to use the misunderstood relational superpower called empathy. (For more on this effective approach, see the article entitled, Empathy: an “Attractive” Quality That Boosts Your Influence)
A second method, called the mirror technique, can also help you increase connection. By mirroring others, the technique taps into a quirk in our brain (called mirror neurons), discovered by neuroscientists.
What’s great about the mirror technique is that anyone can do it, and its effects are quickly seen.
Do you want to make more and better friends wherever you go? Then read on!
