Look Fear in The Face

The most dominant emotion in our society is fear. We are afraid of losing the things we have worked so hard to buy, afraid of rejection and failure, afraid of certain parts of town, afraid of certain types of people, afraid of criticism, suffering, heartache, change, telling people how we truly feel, and we are afraid of ourselves. Some fears we are conscious of, some are subconscious. Fear can paralyze the human spirit and stop any of us from living life.

For looking fear in the face, one requires courage, by courage I mean the ability to face those imaginary fears and reclaim the far more powerful life that you've denied yourself. Fear of failure. Fear of rejection. Fear of going broke. Fear of being alone. Fear of humiliation. Fear of public speaking. Fear of being ostracized by family and friends. Fear of physical discomfort. Fear of regret. Fear of success.

How many of these fears are holding you back? How would you live if you had no fear at all? You'd still have your intelligence and common sense to safely navigate around any real dangers, but without feeling the emotion of fear, would you be more willing to take risks, especially when the worst case wouldn't actually hurt you at all? Would you speak up more often, talk to more strangers, ask for more sales, and dive headlong into those ambitious projects you've been dreaming about? What if you even learned to enjoy the things you currently fear? What kind of difference would that make in your life?

Have you previously convinced yourself that you aren't really afraid of anything... that there are always good and logical reasons why you don't do certain things? It would be rude to introduce yourself to a stranger. You shouldn't attempt public speaking because you don't have anything to say. Asking for a raise would be improper because you're supposed to wait until the next formal review. They're just rationalizations though - think about how your life would change if you could confidently and courageously do these things with no fear at all.

Look fear directly in the face, means you might be scared, afraid but still go ahead and face it, do it, rather attempt more on the things you are afraid to do. Life does not give us a second chance, let us not hold back our self, take that first step and face the fear, you shall come out much stronger and courageous and in the process enjoying life more.

The most important point I want to make here is that real courage is a mental skill, not an emotional one. Neurologically it means using the thinking neocortex part of your brain to override the emotional impulses. In other words, you use your human intelligence, logic, and independent will to overcome the limitations you've inherited as an emotional mammal.

Fear is not your enemy. It is a compass pointing you to the areas where you need to grow. There is some weakness of your own, which is holding you back. So when you encounter a new fear within yourself, celebrate it as an opportunity for growth, just as you would celebrate reaching a new personal best with strength training.
Courage is not the absence of fear, but the acquired ability to move beyond fear. Each day we must pass through the jungle of doubt and cross the valley of fear. It's only then that we can live on the high peaks of courage.

Take a moment to wander through history (family, national, and human) think about the men & women you most admire. Who would they be without courage? Courage is the father of every great moment and movement in history.

Courage is essential to the human experience. No one is born with courage. It's an acquired virtue. Like most qualities of character, when practiced we become stronger. Everything in life requires courage. From asking someone out on a date, to starting your own business, to struggling to overcome addiction, Life takes courage.

So much can be accomplished in one moment of courage. The measure of your life will be the measure of your courage. Courage is what brings us to life, and makes everything possible. Yet, courage is the rarest quality in a person. By getting to the root cause of our fears and doubts we can examine them in the light and re-frame them for the future. This will enable us to function in a more satisfying and rewarding manner. We become what we are through our decisions, all of which require courage.

Lack of courage is often express in the decision not to make a decision. Conquer your fears and live fully. Stop and look fear in the face, it will cease to bother you. Stay with the fear and be a victim, face the fear and be a conqueror/ winner, choice is yours.

Resilience- In Daily Life

Resilience is much more than the ability to bounce back. Resilience requires embracing the challenges of life and working with them, rather than moving around them, avoiding or withdrawing from them. It is changing the thoughts of fear and despair into faith and hope. Two important ingredients of resilience are positive energy and good health.

How does one work with the challenge? It is possible when we look at it as an opportunity for growth, self improvement, thus transforming a difficulty into development. Suffering in human life is actually like an engine of human development. Suffering brings riches we could find in no other way that is why it is necessary to go through it, learning and developing all throughout and thus getting victory over it. Vicissitudes of life are means to shape our character. When adversity is faced by a resilient spirit, you are actually transforming it into discovery and development and thus making a good fortune out of it.


When something goes wrong do you get better or bitter? Getting better is resilience. Life tests us and our capacity to cope, and the more we can cope up with; the richer and fuller our life gets. We have to learn to spring back after suffering through difficult and stressful times in one's life, to bounce back with more power and energy. It is more about surviving and thriving after trauma.

Resilient people face challenges and they do not break down. They know how to soothe themselves without being victims. They make it through the mire. These individuals redefine their world and create a new and successful life. When unpleasant things happen, they are ready to respond in a productive way. The skill sets involved revolve around the ability to move on after a set-back, regrouping after a defeat, learning quickly from mistakes, turning a negative into a positive. Resilience is a form of marketplace elasticity. It allows anyone involved to stretch and bend - to rebound without breaking under the most turbulent of situations. And we all know if you don’t bend your break. Faced with any situation, try all the options: amend it, adapt to it, avoid it and if nothing possible accept it as it is, this too shall pass.

When you are driving your car and another driver is driving wrong and coming head on to hit you, the first and foremost reflex is to save ourselves, we do not go ahead and collide for an accident with him, we have to save ourselves first. Similarly in life even if other person is doing wrong or harming us, don’t go head on avoid that accident at first place. We have to be first concerned about our self, don’t spoil your own health and peace of mind for someone else, learn to first love yourself, don’t harm your own self. Once you have saved yourself from that head on, now you have extra energy to sort this issue positively.

The better approach is to be open and flexible, to be appreciative of whatever good you do find in your daily circumstances, rather than focusing on bigger questions, such as ‘Will I be happy if I move to another city or a better job?’ or ‘Will I be happy if I get married?’ But life is a journey and no destination. So what you do along the journey is most important.

Taking time to relax and breath is key to developing resilience. Resilience is to be woven deeply into the fabric of the human soul. Throw us an obstacle, and we grow stronger, resilience in the face of adversity. It means a strength and compassion that will not be defeated. The great news is that emotional resilience is something that everyone can develop, and the first step to it id to decide that you want to develop resilience and second step is to stay determined and third step is to make persistent and consistent efforts to keep working on it. 

Don’ t Give Up

Gloriously Conquer

We all deal with challenges everyday in our lives, nothing new. While dealing with these challenges, we get the ultimate experience of life. Accordingly we can feel either a struggle or an enduring voyage towards growth and accomplishment. Every time we face a challenge the spirit has to emerge Glorious. How!!!

Whenever you have to accomplish a challenge, ask yourself how badly you need to get across. What level is your burning desire to achieve it? Here I would like to share a story of a Lion and a Rabbit. Once there was a lion in a jungle very strong and healthy. He came across his prey the rabbit and he started to chase the rabbit in order to hunt him, catch him and satisfy his hunger. But the rabbit was also determined to run fast and very fast and it kept on dodging the lion each time. After all the marathon, when both of them got extremely tired, finally lion gave up, and said to rabbit, “I accept my defeat and you are a winner, but I would like to ask you a question, how did you manage to defeat me, while I am stronger, bigger and an expert in catching my prey?”. Then the rabbit replied, “Sir, you were running for your stomach (hunger), and I was running for my life, it was a question of life and death for me.”

This is the burning desire, a passion of life, that come what so ever may, I have to conquer these circumstances in order to come out as a winner. This is only possible if we are just present in the moment and not at all bothered about the past or unsecured about future, investing all our energy in the present moment, focusing on the challenge head on with just one intention to conquer it gloriously. You will find the strength and courage to deal with it, always remember to view your challenges, as if they were serving a purpose, which they always do.

We have to deal with today’s issues today. Let us not be concerned what will happen tomorrow, because tomorrow will come with its own set of challenges, which you have to deal with tomorrow. So stop mixing past with today, today with tomorrow.

Now where do I get the strength and courage to come out of the challenge as a winner? Surprisingly that strength is always available to us, we are the one who ignore it. God with all His wisdom, energy and strength is always there, this unlimited resource is available to each one of us, but we have to ask for it, we have to tune into Him for His strength and wisdom to come across and solving our challenge. He is like a transmitter, always there, we have to tune into His frequency in order to receive from Him. And He knows exactly what we should receive exactly to take care of that particular situation .

It is not that we don’t pray. We normally do, and more often when we are in trouble, but we ask the situation to change, other people to change, we ask for the material things to come across. But God does not have that; He has power, peace, purity and love. He can only give us what He has. So ask for a drop of His power and you shall have the strength to solve your issues.

Always have faith in yourself. People might call you anything, but you don’t become that with each word of theirs. What you think about yourself is what you are. Check your own thoughts. Your own thoughts sabotage your success more than anyone or anything else. There is nothing more to conquer but yourself first of all. Then all the setbacks in life will seem like opportunities in disguise……..because they actually are…………

Hum Koi tinka nahin, jisse hawaain udaa le gayin;
Hum koi katra nahin, jisse andhiyaan baha le gayin;
Hum to wo chattaan hein, jisse aao, aur aakar takrao;
Aur khudh hi thak kar laut jao.

Translation: “I am not a small straw, which the winds can blow anywhere, I am not a small drop, which storms can carry anywhere, I am like a solid rock, with which you should come and conflict head on, and leave back tired yourself.” That’s the kind of rock solid self esteem, self faith we should have in ourselves, to combat whatever comes our way.

As such if the clouds come in front of the Sun, the existence of Sun cannot be challenged. It is still there shinning to its own glory, but people cannot temporarily see its complete sunshine, its complete glory, similarly the clouds of your challenges shall also pass through and you shall again shine as you got to. In order to gloriously conquer, we have to conquer our own mind first:

“ man ke haare haar he, man jeete jag jeet” - If you lose in your heart you actually lose, you win over your own heart and you have won over the world. As a small child I remember hearing these words from my Mom, a lady who is an epitome of strength and perseverance.

Let us first gloriously conquer our own mind with the help of God, the greatest resource available, tune into Him and you shall receive. With His help let us gloriously conquer these minuscule challenges, which are there for a purpose.

Take Control Of Your Life

We always have a choice in life, what we want to choose. Once we choose that and move in that direction, new situations and circumstances follow. Along with the choice comes few roses and few thorns. We accept roses with welcoming hands but resist the thorns in all possible ways. We don’t accept the thorns and don’t take any responsibility for them, although these are also the outcome and byproduct of our own choice.

When we don’t accept the unwanted we start the blame game. Now this is played both externally with people around and involved. And internally in our inner dialogue, now we say, "I have to accept this as it is, I don’t have any choice."

And the moment we use this kind of conversation we lose control over the situation, we feel like a victim and we allow someone else to take charge of the situation.

But let’s be clear what being in control means, it is not related to power or authority. Close your eyes for a minute and think, what does being in control means to you. To me it means being my own navigator of my own ship, knowing exactly which direction it is going and on the way I am happy, content and enjoying the ride.

We are the creator of our journey, the writer of our story. The creator of your own thoughts, emotions, feelings and imagination. If you are the creator, you can any time regulate or moderate your situation, by taking charge of wanted and removing the unwanted. For healthy thoughts to nurture, unhealthy ones have to be removed. Ask a farmer and he knows the damage unwanted weeds can do to his agricultural yield. Similarly we should know the damage our self created unhealthy thoughts, can do to our situations and circumstances of life.

So next time you find yourself in a difficult situation, don’t ask the situation to change, ask for the strength to face the situation and rise above the situation.
There are times when we say, "someone has hurt me, I am very disturbed."

But the fact of the matter is we are choosing that someone to hurt myself. If you want to remain in control and in charge than choose the right things. With every one problem, you shall always have two choices, number one you can cry over it, number two you can laugh over it – choose to laugh over it and you can solve it better. As such we all know the great problems of yesterday are hardly of any relevance today.

Whenever you go to the market, you see lot of things, even if you have money to buy you don’t buy everything, you would always choose and bring home only what you like. Similarly in life, during a day, lot of things will happen, you can not bring back everything home. You have to choose, and choose rightly, based on your values and priorities. Making the right choice, brings in more control of your life, opens you up. We are using our mind, heart and spirit more and thus receiving more what life has to offer.

Soon The Weather Will Change

It might be frozen cold right now- with foggy days and chilly nights, but it shall not remain the same forever. It shall definitely change in a few days. It can be a physical torture and quite taxing if one has to spend a lot of time outdoors, traveling etc……

Similarly in life when we go through rough weather, it can be quite torturing to the soul internally if not physically. But remember even this whether will change very soon for better. How harsh might be the circumstances right now, how cold might the people have turned around you, how harsh, stormy be the situation, but after all this storm the peace, comfort and calm shall prevail, as in the nature, so shall be with us, with our soul.

The sun shall shine very soon; let it be very cloudy & foggy right now. Variety is really important for life to be enjoyed and lived fully. If it would have been sunny and bright always, we would have never known its importance, sunshine is important only after dense rains, clouds, fogs and dark nights. But when we know it is there for a while, you can enjoy even that rough weather, endure it better, learn from it and become wiser and experienced.

You can’ t eat all sweet all the time, even salt, sour and bitter all have their tastes and roles to play. It takes both the rain and the sun to make a rainbow, after the storm, you must endure the rain, and then wait for the sun.

The rough and the extreme weather tests our limits, at times we are ourselves not aware of our own strengths, but in these challenging situations when we stretch beyond our limits we experience self awareness and know our actual intelligence, strength and capacity, the muscle of the brain which were not used earlier become active and perform beyond expectation.
Ask for God’s help whenever you are trapped in rough weather, ask for His strength to help us endure it all and pass through it, eventually becoming tougher and receiving all His love, peace, warmth and comfort.