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Oct

2021

Stay Away From Negative People

Reading Time: 2 minutes

There are a million and one reasons why you should stay away from negative people. For one, it is hard to be grateful and happy when you are around them because they always see the bad side of things. Being with them is always stressful. They drain your energy. Negative people are also highly contagious. They influence your thoughts, behaviors and feelings. And worse, before you know it; you too have become a negative person.

Stay away from negative people. They have a problem for every solution.
– Albert Einstein

It takes lots of courage to accept the fact that you need saving. The words ‘save me‘ are not something that are easily uttered by just anyone. However, it is just the first step.

The second step is equally important. It involves the people around you. The people and environment plays a crucial role in turning your life for the better.

Your Environment Matters

For example, you have been failing in your exams. And you have finally decided that enough is enough. But you have been hanging out with friends who would rather skip class than go to school. Your goal will be easier to achieve if you spend more time with people who actually study.

This is true with almost anything in life. You want to quit smoking? Then, stop spending time with people who smoke. Do you want to have good health? Then start hanging out with people who take care of their bodies.

To become a positive person, it is important to be wary of the people around you. What kind of people do you normally hang out with? Do they make you a better person? Do they lift you up or do they pull you down? You see, people have the tendency to become the average of the five people they spend the most time with. So if you want to become happy and successful in life; spend more time with happy, grateful and proactive persons.

Spend time with people who know how to use their days well. Just as iron sharpens iron, positive people will inspire you to be positive.
-Rihanna

Update version. First published in Pinoy Smart Living on 01.16.2019.

Feature Image by CreativeMagic from Pixabay

Sep

2020

How to Rise Above Difficult Circumstances

Reading Time: 4 minutes

You are in pain. You are having a tough time. Nothing seems to be going your way. You just want everything to end. Unfortunately, no matter how miserable you are; life will go on. If it is any consolation, think that you are not alone. All of us, at several points in our lives have to go through challenges.No one is exempted even if you are the smartest and wealthiest person in the world. That’s just the way life is. The good news is that if you feel like you have already reached the lowest point in your life, then there is nowhere to go but up. Take inspiration and some lessons on how to rise above difficult circumstances in life.

Life always waits for some crisis to occur before revealing itself at its most brilliant.
– Paulo Coelho

Low points are the turning points in life. What you make out of them will define who you are and what you will become in the future.

An Inspiring Story

Here is an inspiring story of how a woman overcame her lowest point in life. She was a wife and a mother. Her day-to-day activities revolved around her family. She was financially dependent on her husband. She was also too much emotionally invested into the relationship. Her whole world crumbled when she got separated from her husband after being together for over a decade. It was not just one aspect of her life that ended, it was practically her whole life – her relationship, her dreams, her financial support and worst of all her self-worth. It was devastating.

Today, she is an investor and an entrepreneur who manages several businesses. She employs people especially women who underwent the same experience as her. Her free time is spent helping some marginalized people in society. She is also active in her spiritual community.

It is easier to just give up. Instead, this lady fought back and rose to the challenge that life has to offer. She succeeded in making her greatest crisis as the starting point in turning her life around.

How To Rise Above Difficult Circumstances

She shared with me the steps and some lessons on how to rise above difficult circumstances in life:

1. Embrace the Negative Emotions

The first step to healing is to embrace the negative emotions. Yes, it’s okay to not be okay, at least at first. Anger, frustration, fear and helplessness are all part of life. Avoiding, denying, ignoring and keeping them inside will only make matters worse. Pain demands our attention. Whether it is a loss of a love one, the end of a relationship, business failure, or whatever painful experience it is; we need to acknowledge them first before we can move on. Avoiding these emotions in the short-term will only lead to stress and long-term pain. Escaping the negative emotions through alcohol and drugs are never a solution, it will only lead to self-destruction.

2. Acceptance

Acceptance is understanding and realizing the reality of your situation. There are just some things that are beyond your control. There is no point to continue blaming yourself or other people for the things that happened. Know that things happen for a reason.Just let go. It is difficult to understand why it had to happen to you at that particular moment but later on as you look back in life, you will understand why certain events turned out that way. Just accept the fact that there are things that we need to experience in order to grow as a person.

You cannot connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that somehow the dots will connect in your future.
– Steve Jobs

3. Self-Searching

In order to get back in track, you need to start your journey towards self-discovery. Self-discovery means finding yourself again. Meditate and ask yourself, who are you? What makes you happy? Think about your hobbies and interests. Then, ask yourself, what are you good at? Look for the genius within you. It involves recalling your childhood days and remembering past events and experiences in your life that shaped you as a person. It is about knowing who you really are and what you want to accomplish in your life.

As part of your journey in figuring out who you are and who you can be, it is important to not just look into your heart but also to include God in your journey towards self-discovery. Pray. Read God’s word. Meditate. Include God in your plans. And then, surrender.

4. Set Goals

Once you have decided what you want to do in life, it is now time to set some goals. Goals are your stepping stone towards a new version of you. Having goals will give you a sense of meaning and purpose in life. You are done crying over your past. It is now time to look at the future and plan the direction of your life. In order to succeed, you need to make SMART goals.

5. Reconnect with Friends and Make New Ones

Being alone at the beginning is necessary in your journey towards self-discovery. However, long periods of isolation is no longer healthy. Once you have set your goals, it is now time to reconnect with old friends and make new ones. There are people that you need in your life . Extend your social circle. Join support groups. Attend trainings and seminars to help you meet new people in your chosen field of interest. But remember, choose the people that you hang out with. Stay away from toxic individuals. Instead, hang out with people that will motivate you to achieve your goals for you are the average of the five people you spend most of your time with.

6. Serve Others

Serving others will lead to deeper healing. When you serve others, you don’t think about our own pain. Instead, you think about other people’s situations. Once you think about the needs of others, you begin the process of healing. Thus, you end up actually helping yourself. It will also help you identify all the blessings in your life and feel grateful. The fact is even at your lowest point, there will be others who are in a worse state than you. Spending time with them will help you realize how blessed you are.

First published in Pinoy Smart Living on 10.2.2019.

Feature Image by Posted by A.L. Jonas in Emotional, 0 comments

Jun

2020

Korean Dramas About Having a Support System

Reading Time: 5 minutes

The presence of a support group in your lives is an essential factor to success. Your support group will serve as your driving force for success. You need people who will believe in you when no else would and will stay by your side when all others left. If you are a Kdrama fan, you might want to check out some dramas about having a support group. These dramas illustrate the importance of having people around that served as the wind beneath the wings of the leads. Here are the list of Korean Dramas about having a support system for success:

1. Birth of a Beauty (2014)

Overweight and kind-hearted Sa Geum-Ran spent years being maltreated and abused by her in-laws while her husband had an affair. To make matters worse, his husband was the one who asked for a divorce. To get revenge, she underwent an extreme makeover. She worked together with Han Tae Hee as her life coach. Han Tae Hee is an heir to a large corporation who is suffering from a broken heart syndrome.

2. The Doctors (2016)

The Doctors is a medical drama about a troubled teenager Yoo Hye-jung. She changed her delinquent ways when she met her mentor, Dr. Hong Ji Hong. He is a neurosurgeon who played a major role in influencing the life of the heroine and transforming her from a troublesome youth to a compassionate and successful doctor.

3. Dr. Romantic I (2016) & II (2020)

Boo Yong-ju was once a famous doctor who gave it all up to live in a small town. There, he became Teacher Kim and served as mentors to young doctors who lost their way in their professions. He taught them skills. He also served as inspiration for them to remain righteous in their careers and not become doctors who merely aspire for fame, wealth and power.

4. I’m Not a Robot (2017)

The male lead, Kim Min-Kyu is a very rich man but lives in isolation because he has a severe allergy from human contacts. He becomes interested in a humanoid robotic project called Aji3. When the robot Aj3 malfunctioned on the scheduled demonstration, the inventor sent Jo Ji-ah to pretend and act like the robot. Through Aji3, the male lead was slowly able to overcome his mental and health issues and began trusting humans again.

5. It’s Okay, That’s Love (2014)

The drama is about two broken and flawed individuals who found each other and helped heal one another in the process. It is not your typical romantic comedy because it deals with mental health. A bestselling mystery novel writer and psychiatrist both have traumatic pasts. The story is all about their journey towards healing, love and acceptance.

6. Kill Me, Heal Me (2015)

Cha Do-Hyeon is a third generation billionaire who suffered from multiple personality disorder because of a traumatic childhood. He was able to regain control of his life, despite his seven different personalities through the help of Oh Ri-Jin, a first year psychiatric resident.

7. Protect the Boss (2011)

Protect the Boss is a workplace romantic comedy between a boss and his secretary. The boss, Cha Ji Heon, is an immature youngest son of a conglomerate. The male lead is the exact opposite of the strong, tough, independent and strong-minded female lead, Noh Eun-Sol the secretary. Trust and friendship were formed as two started working together. Because of Noh Eun-Sol’s support and belief in her boss; Cha Ji Heon finally got his act together, overcame with his fears and managed to prove himself worthy of becoming the successor of the business.

8. Reply 1988 (2016)

Reply 1988 is a story about five people who live in the same neighborhood and have been friends since childhood. It is a story of family, friendship, and dreams in life. It shows the ups and downs of their everyday lives and their journey towards happiness and success. The drama depicts the importance of having a support system around you, those people who will accept you for who you really are.

9. School 2013 (2012)

This is a teen drama that depicts the life, struggles and dilemmas of students. It is about friendship, growing up and having hope for the future. Kang Se Chan and Jung In Jae are school teachers in the story who have a class of tough teenagers. They are two teachers who greatly influenced the lives of the their students in more ways than one. They were able to help the students overcome their struggles and start dreaming of a better tomorrow.

10. The Secret Life of My Secretary (2019)

The Secret Life of My Secretary is about a cold boss who fired his overworked secretary despite her efficiency and his overly dependence on her. He ended up needing her help again when he lost his ability to recognize faces. Together, they solve the mysteries and challenges of the mobile media company and in their lives.

Feature Image by Helena Lopes from Pexels

Special thanks to Lyrie, Sher and Isabel, certified Kdrama fanatics, for making some of the recommendations.

Jun

2020

You are the Average of the Five People You Spend Most of your Time With

Reading Time: 5 minutes

Who are the five people you spend most of your time with? What do they stand for? Are they successful? What do they do for a living? How much are they earning? Are they happy? Are they healthy? Did you know that you could tell a lot about a person by knowing the company they keep? According to successful author and motivational speaker Jim Rohn, you are the average of the five people you spend most of your time with.

You are the Average of the Five People You Spend Most of Your Time With

Whether you like it or not, your thoughts, beliefs, attitudes and actions are greatly influenced by the people you surround yourself with. It does not matter how smart or talented you are, your associations play a major role in determining who you will eventually become.

Some people reacted negatively with Jim Rohn’s statement. For them, the statement underestimates the power of free will. They argue that if you have the will, no amount of discouragement can influence you. Second, the statement encourages discrimination. For example, what if one of your best friends from elementary school is not that successful, will you lose that friend just because of that?

However, think about it for a second. How many of you can honestly say that you were never ever, under any circumstances, influenced by the people around you with your decisions? Although the degree of influences are different for each individual, all of us at some point in our lives, have been influenced by the people around us – in simple things like where to eat and what brand of cellphone to buy to major things like how to solve our relationship and money problems.

Peer Pressure

A peer is a person who is of the same level as you. He or she can be your classmate, your officemate or a person from your club. Peer pressure occurs when they influence you or encourage you to do some things whether directly or indirectly.

When I was in college, for some reason, I ended up with a group of friends who studied a lot; which was quite not like me in high school. When exams come, everyone was always well prepared. I didn’t want to be the only one unprepared during exams. I figured I had two options then: to join them or to ditch them. To cut the long story short, I ended up studying a lot in college. Thinking of it now, I was fortunate enough to be surrounded by people who pushed me to be a better version of myself.

Peer pressure is present not just in school but also in the workplace, even in your own family. However, not all peer pressures are positive. What is important is that you must never give in to negative pressure. If your peers keep on telling you to do things that are not good, then I think it is time for you to ask yourself if you are in the right company.

My point is, peer pressure does exist and numerous studies have proven that it has a powerful impact on your day to day decisions. For years, sociologists have argued that human behaviors are highly contagious. You cannot help but conform to the people around you, at least to some degree.

Supposed you want to go on a diet. And you have two group of friends – one group is into healthy eating and the other group loves to eat fries and burgers. In which group do you think you should spend more time eating with? You might end up eating fries and burgers if you decide to go with that group. Even if they don’t actually convince you, you will be tempted just by watching them eat.

Mirror Neurons

There is actually a scientific explanation. A mirror neuron is a a specialised nerve cell that fires up when a person acts and another person observes the same action. The other person mimics or imitates what the other is doing. You have seen this happen to a baby. The first trick that a baby usually learns is the close-open gesture of their hand. What happens is that you put your hands in front of your baby and you show him/her the action over and over again. And then one day, you just see the baby doing the trick. Those are the mirror neurons doing their work.

In a Harvard Medical School Study on mirror neurons, results showed that there is a correlation between yourself and your environment. People have the natural tendency to imitate or mimic the people around them.

Humans seem to have a strong tendency to align their behavior with their fellows during social interaction.
-Lieberman, 2007

Thus, we cannot deny the fact that the five people you spend most of your time with influences your consciousness level. Spending time with goal achievers will help you become a proactive individual who will do something with your life to achieve your goals.

This does not imply that you ditch your friends who are not successful. What it simply means is that you adjust the time you spend with the people around you. Spend more time with awesome people – people that can lift you not just financially and professionally but also emotionally and spiritually.

Ameer Rosic, an entrepreneur and marketing specialist, suggested that you should classify your friends into three groups: A, B and C.

Identify all of your highly successful friends on Group A. Spend 60% of your time with them.
Group B are those people who are not yet there but they have the right attitude and discipline that will make them successful some day. These people are willing to learn. Spend 30% of your time with these people.
Group C are your energy vampires. You will know who they are because these people complain a lot. The thing that they complain about is the same thing that they have been complaining since last year and the year before that. They also love to play the “blame game”. Each time something bad happens in their lives, they will blame it on their boss, the government, inflation or to anybody around them. They refuse to take responsibility. They are called energy vampires because they suck the energy out of you. Spend only 10% of your time with these negative people.

What if you do not know anybody in Group A? Well, there are two ways in which you can spend time with these types of people. The first one is through direct contact. And the second one is through their work. Every highly successful person out there has many things written about them. Read their books. Watch their interviews. Listen to their audiobooks on your way to work instead of complaining and stressing yourself about the traffic. From there you will learn about their beliefs and actions.

He who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will be destroyed.
– Proverbs 13:20

So even with the correct mindset, it will be difficult to achieve your goals if you are not surrounded by like-minded individuals. Instead of pulling you up, they have the tendency to drag you down. Always remember that you are the average of the five people you spend most of your time with. Thus, choose your five wisely. They will be the wind beneath your wings.

Updated Version. First Published in Pinoy Smart Living 08.28.2018

Feature Image Gerd Altmann from Pixabay Images