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Is Positive Thinking is Good for Your Brain?

How do you react to the term positive thinking? Does it motivate you? Or is it just a touchy-feely, fluff-and-stuff phrase to you? Research reveals positive thinking can add real value to your life. Here’s how negative thinking and positive thinking affect your brain differently.

What Negative Thinking Does to Your Brain

Negative thinking narrows your focus. It limits the options your mind’s eye can see.

For instance, if your child forgets to do something you asked him to do, negative thinking focuses on how he “always takes things for granted” or how he “never follows through with what he is supposed to do.” Your mind becomes consumed with the problem instead of looking for a solution. This not only increases your stress, it also elevates a small problem to a looming, major issue.

What Positive Thinking Does to Your Brain

Positive thinking, on the other hand, expands your focus. It opens your mind’s eye to options all around you.

For instance, if your child forgets to do something you ask him to do, positive thinking allows you to see creative ways to teach responsibility and ownership. It also helps you see the situation as a teachable moment and reminds you that no matter how your child responds, you are giving them the gift of realizing what is expected in life.

How to Develop the Skill of Positive Thinking

BONUS: Here are 4 quick tips for developing more positive thinking.

1. Feed Your Brain with Positive Stuff. Read good books. Listen to positive podcasts. Watch uplifting television. The compound effect of this one tip will shock you.

2. Protect Your Brain from Negative Stuff. Garbage in; garbage out. Enough said.

3. Build Your Gratitude Muscle. If you want to grow in gratitude, you have to exercise your thankfulness muscles. One of the best ways to bulk up your thankfulness muscles is to write 3 things you thankful for in a Gratitude Journal. Try to do this daily. The more you write, the more you will realize how much you truly have.

4. Exercise. Research shows regular exercise makes you happier and smarter (along with 11 other positive benefits).

Author: Kent Julian

10 Things That Will Matter a Lot More in 10 Years

We spend so much time worrying about things that don’t truly carry meaning in our lives. These things do.

Can you imagine your life in 10 years’ time?

It’s hard, isn’t it? There are so many variables, so many unknowns, it’s nearly impossible to predict what’s in store. Chance events happen, and you end up in situations that no one could foresee.

But then you look at people ahead of you for reference. They’re a decade or two older than you. You notice how their lives have panned out.

A few of them operate their own businesses, some more successful than others. Some people have families, while others are living on their own. Some travel to remote places, and still some others are firmly rooted in the same place.

You wonder to yourself: Are they happy? Did things turn out how they wanted? Or beneath that calm, composed veneer, are there cracks of turbulence seeping through?

Early on, our desires start off small. Like soft whispers, they’re barely noticeable. Yet despite our best efforts to brush them off, they grow gradually. If left unchecked, they eventually fester into regrets as time comes and passes.

On the other hand, there are things that might matter now, but given enough time, die down and lie forgotten.

So what’s the difference? What matters more as time goes on, and what stops mattering?

Previously, I wrote a post on 10 Things That Will Matter a Lot Less in 10 Years. Here are 10 things that will matter a lot more in 10 years:

1. Your dreams.

Your aspirations matter. And they will matter more as time goes on…but not necessarily in the way you think. After all, there are two types of dreams.

The first type is the “pie in the sky” type of dreams. These are the ones where you picture yourself achieving something out of reach, such as becoming an A-list actor, a professional athlete, or creating the next big social media site.

While these are fun to daydream about, they’re not going to happen to the vast majority of people. There are too many factors involved that are outside your control, including a lot of luck. Most people accept that these things won’t become reality, and they’re okay with that.

But then you have the second type of dreams, the dreams that you know are perfectly attainable. You might have always dreamed of visiting a specific country, mastering a skill, or getting involved with a charity. Even though they’re attainable, getting there has its share of obstacles too.

You might tell yourself that you’re busy. You might not think it’s the right time. You might not find the courage. When you look back and realize you could have pursued those attainable dreams, regret forms. Your reasons for not pursuing your dreams may turn out to be veiled excuses.

2. Your time.

When you’re younger, you have all the time in the world — at least, that’s how it feels. Money is your main constraint because you have little to no earning power. You don’t mind taking more time to get something done, as long as it costs less.

But as you get older, your earning power tends to grow and your wealth accumulates. Conversely, you have less time overall and your increase in responsibilities leaves you with less free time. These factors force you to start discerning how to spend your waking hours.

Since time becomes more valuable with age, your earlier years should be spent exploring and trying new things, since it’s easier to change directions if needed. You have a greater margin of error because your time is less valuable when you’re younger. It gets harder as you progress in life.

3. Your health.

Nearly everyone is healthy when they’re young. At an early age, you’re strong, fast, and seemingly immortal. Nothing can hurt you.

But there comes a point when people’s health begins deteriorating. It’s gradual at first, but then it accelerates at a rapid speed for some. People suffer from illnesses, old injuries resurfacing, or an accumulation of unhealthy choices.

Those unhealthy choices stem from decades ago, when someone chooses to eat unhealthy foods or leads a lifestyle that is conducive to developing certain diseases. Health problems may not become visibly noticeable or impair someone until later in life. Yet, many are preventable if you decide to make healthy choices today.

Still, our bodies naturally deteriorate as we age, no matter what we do. With this in mind, it’s worth pursuing activities that require good health sooner than later, such as playing a sport or traveling. Sometimes, you never know when your health takes a turn.

4. Your loved ones.

Relationships with your loved ones matters more with time. You think more about what you can do for them and how to spend more time with them. Your thoughts are less about “me, me, me”, and more about children, parents, and those closest to you.

Your attitude towards work also changes. While work used to be about how you could improve your own standing, it later becomes about how work can be used to help other people in your life. Your time outside work becomes more valuable because that’s the time you spend with loved ones.

Of course, just because you need to consider the well-being of others doesn’t mean you shouldn’t think about yourself. Taking time out for yourself is perfectly fine. In fact, it’s a good way to increase your sense of satisfaction and feel more energized, which in turn helps you to interact more positively with others.

5. Your legacy.

Once again, time helps you realize that the world is less about you and more about everyone else. You think more about how your life and work affect others. You think about your legacy.

How has the world improved from your presence? What do you want others to say about you after you’ve left? These are the types of thoughts that enter the forefront of your mind.

While helping others is something you can always do at any stage in life, it becomes more prominent later on and in a way, easier. You’ve spent your earlier years working hard to gain resources and doing what you could to help yourself. Eventually, you accumulate enough resources that you evaluate how you can use it to help others.

You can see this “help yourself first, then help others” strategy with the world’s biggest philanthropists. They focused their earlier years on learning, growing, and accumulating wealth, before thinking about how they could use what they had to tackle wider, global issues.

6. Missed opportunities.

Have you ever had an opportunity present itself that you ended up turning down? If you’ve been alive long enough, then the answer is “yes”. At the time, you had what you believed to be a valid reason for declining and then you moved on.

But an interesting thing happens as time creeps by. There are slow periods, lulls at certain points in your life, where you look back and wonder whether you made the right choice.

You reflect back on that critical crossroad and think: How would things have turned out? Could life have been better? Did I commit a grave mistake? That last question pops up most evidently at distressing moments.

Of course, it’s impossible to know the answer to these questions. The only thing you can do is to make peace, knowing that you made what you believed to be the best choice based on your situation. And who knows? Things could have turned out worse.

7. Risks that paid off.

Think back to the last time you did something scary. Those big aspirations seemed daunting, even insurmountable at the time. But once you conquered those fears and succeeded, you looked back and thought, “Wow. I did it. It wasn’t so bad after all.”

I’ve met more than a few people who can remember that one thing they did that seemed terrifying at the time, such as living abroad and immersing themselves in a different culture. They recall those times fondly as a high point of their lives, even decades later. Everything else blurs in comparison.

As for the risks that didn’t pay off, the vast majority of them are recoverable. There might be some embarrassment, stress, and uncertainty involved at the time, but someday they become just a footnote in the great book of life.

8. Your habits.

Your habits — exercising, flossing your teeth, working on a personal project — may not seem like a big deal on a daily basis, but they accumulate over time. Eventually, they become the ten years that you look back on one day.

Now, imagine if someone told you that starting today, you had to do something…and you had to keep doing it for the rest of your life. “What?!” people would say. They would cry and complain about how it was too much work, too much commitment, and so on.

And it does sound daunting when you put it that way. The funny thing is, habits become less of a conscious effort over time and more something you do simply because you’ve always done it. It’s automatic.

What you do today matters. One day might not seem like much, but simply making one positive choice today can cause ripples of change down the road.

9. Your values.

When you’re younger, you’re used to getting told by others how to think and behave. Your parents. Your teachers. Your boss. Because if you don’t, there are consequences.

Yet as time goes by, you see more of the world and gain life experiences. Your personality and values develop. More and more, you live according to your own mantra.

You tend to care less about what others think as you get older. There comes a point when it gets tiresome living according to somebody else’s rules. You feel suffocated. You yearn to do and be something that others may not approve of.

One of the biggest, if not the biggest, regret people have is not living in a way that is true to themselves. People regret the unrealized possibilities they believe could have happened, had they chosen to live the way they wanted to.

10. Stability.

Psychologists have found an interesting phenomenon where there is a shift from promotion motivation to prevention motivation as we age. We gradually shift our thinking from how to gain more to how to prevent loss. This applies in all areas of life: home, relationships, and work.

Instead of chasing after new and exciting things, there’s a greater focus on maintaining the status quo. For instance, a younger person at work is more likely to think about promotions and learning opportunities, while an older co-worker is thinking about keeping a balanced work schedule and earning enough to pay off the mortgage.

So if you want to pursue something exciting, it’s better to do it at an earlier age rather than wait until later. At a later stage, you might either not feel like doing it or feel you have too much to lose. And since your obligations increase with time, you wouldn’t be wrong to think this way.

Despite what we believe when we’re younger, we’re not completely unique. We’re not different from everybody else. What ends up happening is we fall into similar patterns. If we’ve celebrated a triumph or suffered a tragedy, somebody somewhere has experienced and felt the same thing.

This isn’t bad. In fact, it’s good. It helps us see what lies ahead. While we probably make the same mistakes as someone before us, we learn and act with a better knowledge of what our future selves are like.

By Melissa Chu, Writer at jumpstartyourdreamlife.com

7 Ways to Spark Your Creativity

“Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark in the hopeless swamps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists.. it is real.. it is possible.. it’s yours.” — Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

Do you ever feel like you can conquer anything? It’s like you’re brand new. Sparks are flying. All things are possible, all opportunities are open.

Unfortunately, sparks vanish just as quickly as they ignite.

Rejection discourages attempts at anything new. Criticism keeps us from stepping out of convention. Inner fears kill any creativity we might have had.

The good news is that, with care and focus, we can learn to create again. By practicing and developing our sense of spirit, we can step outside the bounds set by both ourselves and others. By incorporating various practices, we can rediscover concepts and ideas.

Here are 7 ways to spark that creativity from within:

1. Make one change to your morning routine.

What if you could improve your day by pouring milk into your bowl before the cereal?

A research team, led by Simone Ritter at the Radboud University Nijmegen, found that unusual events can break existing cognitive patterns, thus improving flexibility and creativity. The events that sparked changes included drastic situations, such as coping after a loved one has died or studying abroad.

However, her research found that the events don’t have to be drastic. Changing patterns can simply mean making minor adjustments to your routine. Besides the above example, if you normally change into your day clothing before breakfast, try changing after breakfast. Or, if you make coffee, switch up the order you put in the ingredients.

One small change might be all you need to start the day off with an innovative mindset.

2. Travel somewhere.

When we picture travel, we tend to imagine faraway places with different cultures, landscapes, and foods. Getting away is a chance to relax, to explore a new environment, or even to reflect on where our work and life is headed.

When you immerse yourself somewhere new, you feel different. Your sense of smell, sight, and hearing are heightened. As a result, your brain synapses fire off, encouraging you to be more creative.

Traveling doesn’t mean you have to fly across the world, though. If you only have a weekend to spare, just going away for a couple days can be enough to give you the opportunity to pause your routine.

Along the way, you might chat with a stranger, try a new activity, or appreciate an awe-inspiring landscape. When you take the initiative to immerse yourself with new people, you view your life and the world around you with a fresh state of mind.

3. Go tech-free.

While computers, tablets, and phones are useful resources, they also have their drawbacks. For instance, we fall into what I call “electronic habits”. When we use a device, we tend to use the same programs, sites, and apps. These programs reinforce the same ideas and concepts over and over.

From time to time, it’s good to use old-fashioned tools for brainstorming. You can draw pictures on a board, or use diagrams to understand concepts. In my experience, pen and paper translate my thoughts into words more easily than typing them out on a computer. Companies have found that going tech-free helps employees find and share new ideas.

Setting aside time outside your devices can help you connect with your surroundings. This time can be spent catching up with people, going hiking outdoors, or fully enjoying the taste and smell of a meal. Try dedicating a period of time away from technology, such as once a week or a specific period every day.

4. Incorporate play into your day.

Play isn’t just for kids anymore. Spending time on a fun activity relieves stress, breaks the monotony of work, and can lead to your next breakthrough. It’s also why many innovative companies incorporate playful architecture and designs into their offices.

Whether you enjoy building Lego structures or working through a Sudoku puzzle, having toys nearby can be a therapeutic way to stretch your mental muscles and fine-motor skills.

Play can extend beyond mentally-stimulating games, though. It can mean participating in a sport or learning to paint, for example. I’ve found that doing creative activities helps me to connect ideas and solve problems.

5. See the forest, but start with the trees.

Did you ever work with someone who couldn’t “see the forest for the trees”? The person became so worked up over a minor decision that they forgot to consider a more critical element. Or, a colleague started working on a problem that shouldn’t have been considered in the first place.

Other times, we suffer from the reverse problem. We see the forest, but can’t work our way around the trees. For instance, you want to work on a great idea, but end up haphazardly pursuing all sorts of ideas instead. While you’re able to envision the final result, you just can’t seem to make any progress towards where you want to go.

Balance is key. Know the direction you want to reach, but start with the first step. The forest-tree approach applies to multiple aspects of life:

Writing: Become a writer (the forest) by doing research for a single article (trees).
Exercise: Get into shape (the forest) by putting more vegetables on your dinner plate today (trees).
Travel: Take time off work to travel overseas (the forest) by asking someone who’s traveled somewhere for advice (trees).

While seeing the big picture is important for perspective, you have to start with the details to take action. Alternate between the two while you work towards your goal.

6. Reframe negative situations into positive ones.

Many events in our lives are outside our control. You go out for a camping trip, but then it rains. You make plans for an event, but your friend cancels out. You apply to a competitive program, but receive a rejection letter. Often, our aspirations don’t come to fruition.

Not all is lost. An event that seems unfortunate at first can be turned into an opportunity. A rainy day is a chance to do something indoors, like visiting a museum or reading a book. Getting turned down from a job might lead you to create something of your own.

When you change a negative situation into a positive, you go from disappointment to motivation.

7. Do one terrifying thing.

Comfort leads to stagnation, which leads to boredom, and finally to unhappiness. If you’ve been feeling comfortable for a while, it’s time to go the opposite direction and do something terrifying.

Why? Because terrifying things lead to growth. Ordering a meal in a foreign language helped me practice my efforts in a real setting. Emailing someone to ask for a meeting led to invaluable work experience.

But there’s something far more valuable gained besides the tangible results: self-realization. I learned that limitations are often created in our minds, rather than what is real. What we imagine to be terrifying isn’t so terrifying after all.

What’s the one terrifying thing you’ll try?

Reignite the Possibilities

It’s easy to fall into a routine. You become familiar with the mechanics of doing a task, so you repeat the steps over and over. Even if you want change, it can be surprisingly difficult to break out of the mold.

If this is the case, work in increments. Make one simple change to an aspect of your life that’s been static for a while. When you make small adjustments, the increments snowball into something much more profound down the road.

Originally published on Medium.

3 Powerful Ways To Stay Positive

We’ve all received the well-meaning advice to “stay positive.” The greater the challenge, the more this glass-half-full wisdom can come across as Pollyannaish and unrealistic. It’s hard to find the motivation to focus on the positive when positivity seems like nothing more than wishful thinking.

The real obstacle to positivity is that our brains are hard-wired to look for and focus on threats. This survival mechanism served humankind well back when we were hunters and gatherers, living each day with the very real threat of being killed by someone or something in our immediate surroundings.

That was eons ago. Today, this mechanism breeds pessimism and negativity through the mind’s tendency to wander until it finds a threat. These “threats” magnify the perceived likelihood that things are going—and/or are going to go—poorly. When the threat is real and lurking in the bushes down the path, this mechanism serves you well. When the threat is imagined and you spend two months convinced the project you’re working on is going to flop, this mechanism leaves you with a soured view of reality that wreaks havoc in your life.

Maintaining positivity is a daily challenge that requires focus and attention. You must be intentional about staying positive if you’re going to overcome the brain’s tendency to focus on threats. It won’t happen by accident. That’s why positivity is the skill that I’ll be giving extra attention in 2016.

Positivity and Your Health

Pessimism is trouble because it’s bad for your health. Numerous studies have shown that optimists are physically and psychologically healthier than pessimists.

Martin Seligman at the University of Pennsylvania has conducted extensive research on the topic. Seligman worked with researchers from Dartmouth and the University of Michigan on a study that followed people from age 25 to 65 to see how their levels of pessimism or optimism influenced their overall health. The researchers found that pessimists’ health deteriorated far more rapidly as they aged.

Seligman’s findings are similar to research conducted by the Mayo Clinic that found optimists have lower levels of cardiovascular disease and longer life-spans. Although the exact mechanism through which pessimism affects health hasn’t been identified, researchers at Yale and the University of Colorado found that pessimism is associated with a weakened immune response to tumors and infection.

Researchers from the University of Kentucky went so far as to inject optimists and pessimists with a virus to measure their immune response. The researchers found optimists had a much stronger immune response than pessimists.

Positivity and Performance

Keeping a positive attitude isn’t just good for your health. Martin Seligman has also studied the connection between positivity and performance. In one study in particular, he measured the degree to which insurance salespeople were optimistic or pessimistic in their work. Optimistic salespeople sold 37% more policies than pessimists, who were twice as likely to leave the company during their first year of employment.

Seligman has studied positivity more than anyone, and he believes in the ability to turn pessimistic thoughts and tendencies around with simple effort and know-how. But Seligman doesn’t just believe this. His research shows that people can transform a tendency toward pessimistic thinking into positive thinking through simple techniques that create lasting changes in behavior long after they are discovered.

Here are three things that I’ll be doing this year to stay positive.

1. Separate Fact from Fiction

The first step in learning to focus on the positive requires knowing how to stop negative self-talk in its tracks. The more you ruminate on negative thoughts, the more power you give them. Most of our negative thoughts are just that — thoughts, not facts.

When you find yourself believing the negative and pessimistic things your inner voice says, it’s time to stop and write them down. Literally stop what you’re doing and write down what you’re thinking. Once you’ve taken a moment to slow down the negative momentum of your thoughts, you will be more rational and clear-headed in evaluating their veracity. Evaluate these statements to see if they’re factual. You can bet the statements aren’t true any time you see words like never, always, worst, ever, etc.

Do you really always lose your keys? Of course not. Perhaps you forget them frequently, but most days you do remember them. Are you never going to find a solution to your problem? If you really are that stuck, maybe you’ve been resisting asking for help. Or if it really is an intractable problem, then why are you wasting your time beating your head against the wall? If your statements still look like facts once they’re on paper, take them to a friend or colleague you can trust, and see if he or she agrees with you. Then the truth will surely come out.

When it feels like something always or never happens, this is just your brain’s natural threat tendency inflating the perceived frequency or severity of an event. Identifying and labeling your thoughts as thoughts by separating them from the facts will help you escape the cycle of negativity and move toward a positive new outlook.

2. Identify a Positive

Once you snap yourself out of self-defeating, negative thoughts, it’s time to help your brain learn what you want it to focus on — the positive.

This will come naturally after some practice, but first you have to give your wandering brain a little help by consciously selecting something positive to think about. Any positive thought will do to refocus your brain’s attention. When things are going well, and your mood is good, this is relatively easy. When things are going poorly, and your mind is flooded with negative thoughts, this can be a challenge. In these moments, think about your day and identify one positive thing that happened, no matter how small. If you can’t think of something from the current day, reflect on the previous day or even the previous week. Or perhaps there is an exciting event you are looking forward to that you can focus your attention on.

The point here is you must have something positive that you’re ready to shift your attention to when your thoughts turn negative. Step one stripped the power from negative thoughts by separating fact from fiction. Step two is to replace the negative with a positive. Once you have identified a positive thought, draw your attention to that thought each time you find yourself dwelling on the negative. If that proves difficult, you can repeat the process of writing down the negative thoughts to discredit their validity, and then allow yourself to freely enjoy positive thoughts.

3. Cultivate an Attitude of Gratitude

Taking time to contemplate what you’re grateful for isn’t merely the “right” thing to do; it reduces the stress hormone cortisol by 23%. Research conducted at the University of California, Davis, found that people who worked daily to cultivate an attitude of gratitude experienced improved mood, energy and substantially less anxiety due to lower cortisol levels.

You cultivate an attitude of gratitude by taking time out every day to focus on the positive. Any time you experience negative or pessimistic thoughts, use this as a cue to shift gears and think about something positive. In time, a positive attitude will become a way of life.

Travis Bradberry, Ph.D.

7 Ways To Move A Conversation From Negative To Positive

Among friends and colleagues alike, conversations can be full of negativity. Whether it’s an offhand comment or a lengthy discussion, pessimism can ruin your mood for the rest of the day.

However, everybody is “at least 75 percent responsible for how others treat them,” according to the Harvard Business Review. In her HBR article, author Kathleen Kelley Reardon, PhD, offers seven “Rs” for transitioning a dialogue from negative to positive.

1. Re frame. Instead of instantly responding to another person’s comment, try to rework your interpretation of it in a new, more positive light. For example, when “someone says, ‘I don’t want to fight about this,’ a useful reframe of that comment is, ‘This is a debate, certainly not a fight. And you’re a good debater, as I recall,'” Dr. Reardon wrote.

2. Rephrase. Perhaps one of the most common ways to decrease negativity is to take someone’s words and put them together in another, more upbeat way. Focus on the positive and spin the conversation to more neutral turf.

3. Revisit. To lighten the mood, think of a positive past experience and revisit it. If two individuals are discussing a particularly divisive topic, they can ease the tension by talking about a time they got along. Reminders of previous instances of cooperation and agreement can help them reach a mutually satisfying conclusion.

4. Restate. It’s easy to accidentally blurt out something that may offend others. In these cases, it’s best to “clarify or redirect negative wording,” according to Dr. Reardon. Use phrases like, “Perhaps there’s a different way to say that,” to give an individual the opportunity to restate him or herself.

5. Request. To steer clear of making assumptions, sometimes it’s best to ask the individual to explain what he or she said. The speaker may not have intended to sound so negative, so asking for clarification can be one of the best options.

6. Re-balance. Avoid instantly yielding your authority in the conversation by re-balancing the power. “One way to reduce the impact on you with your attitude — refusing to be upset — or by saying, ‘Fortunately, I’m not easily offended, especially by one-off situations like this,'” Dr. Reardon recommended.

7. Reorganize. Instead of trying to adjust the whole conversation at once, Dr. Reardon suggests “[changing] the priority of the issues.” Celebrate what you and the other person agree on, then move on to working out the negativity or source of disagreement in the conversation.

© Copyright ASC COMMUNICATIONS 2019

July 4th and Our Flag

Here’s a few things you may not have known about our American flag.

1: A Set of Rules

The 27^th President of The United States, William Howard Taft, introduced delimited proportions and standardization guidelines. One specific rule stated that every single one of the stars had to be arranged with one point facing up.

2: The Real Designer

To this day many people believe that Betsy Ross designed the very first American flag, but they just might be wrong. Many historians believe that Francis Hopkinson truly deserves the credit on the flag’s design. They believe this due to entries from early journals from the Continental Congress that plainly name Hopkinson as the designer of the flag.

3: Current Flag Design

The flag that you see everywhere nowadays was actually designed by a teenager! Robert G. Heft, a 17-year-old student submitted his design as part of his history project in school. He later submitted it to Congress to be considered. President Eisenhower ended up choosing his design over 1,500 other submissions and even called Robert with the great news himself.

4: Flags on the Moon

Even though the moon has extremely harsh temperatures and atmosphere, five of the six flags that were planted during the Apollo missions are still thought to be standing today. Buzz Aldrin claims that the one flag that fell was actually blown down by the exhaust from Apollo 11 during liftoff from the surface of the moon.

5: Official Color Names

According to the U.S. Department of State, the flags three colors have official names. The colors are known as “old glory red”, “white”, and “old glory blue.” They can even be seen on the Department of State’s style guide online.

6: Color Meanings

The good ol’ red, white, and blue all have very important and specific meanings. Red symbolizes hardiness and valor, white symbolizes purity and innocence, and blue symbolizes vigilance, perseverance, and justice.

7: Old Glory Origins

Old Glory was actually the nickname given to a specific American flag that was owned by a sea captain named William Driver. The flag was given to him by the women from his hometown in Salem, Massachusetts. However, Driver didn’t even name it Old Glory until he saw it flying on his ship’s mast back in 1831.

8: Many Designs

Throughout all the years there have been 27 different designs of the flag that have been flown. The latest design is, in fact, the longest to stay of them all, lasting for over fifty years now with the same look.

9: The Flag at Night

If someone wants to fly the American flag at night, according to the Flag Code they must get proper lighting to ensure that the flag will be lit up at night. If not, it is only supposed to be flown from sunrise to sunset.

10: What if it Touches the Ground?

The Flag Code states that the flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground. This is stated to emphasize the importance the flag holds and the care it demands. However, many believe that you have to destroy the flag when it touches the ground, but this isn’t true. If the flag is clean enough and suitable to be flown you don’t have to destroy it. You can even throw it in the washer if you need to!

13 Ways To Train Your Subconscious Mind

13 Ways To Start Training Your Subconscious Mind To Get What You Want

Your subconscious mind is the gatekeeper of your comfort zone. Your brain is built to reinforce and regulate your life.

Your subconscious mind has something called a homeostatic impulse, which regulates functions like body temperature, heartbeat, and breathing. Brian Tracy explained it like this: “Through your autonomic nervous system, [your homeostatic impulse] maintains a balance among the hundreds of chemicals in your billions of cells so that your entire physical machine functions in complete harmony most of the time.”

But what many people don’t realize is that just as your brain is built to regulate your physical self, as does it try to regulate your mental self. Your mind is constantly filtering and bringing to your attention information and stimuli that affirms your preexisting beliefs (this is known in psychology as confirmation bias) as well as presenting you with repeated thoughts and impulses that mimic and mirror that which you’ve done in the past.

It is also the realm in which you can either habituate yourself to expect and routinely seek the actions that would build and reinforce, the greatest success, happiness, wholeness or healing of your life.

Here, a few ways to start retraining your mind to be your ally, not your enemy.

1. Be willing to see the unchangeable change.
The first step in creating massive change in your life is not actually believing that it’s possible, it’s being willing to see if it is possible.

You are not going to be able to jump from being a complete skeptic to a wholehearted believer. The step between those is just being open to seeing what could be possible. You could maybe try sending a few “scary emails,” in which you propose a client or partner for something that they do not have any reason to respond to. You might have a few dozen ignored messages, but eventually, someone will respond.

The point is that you’re willing to see if it’s possible… that’s what will change your life.

2. Give yourself permission to be successful.
Instead of regurgitating the same old narrative of believing you’ll be happy once you’re 10 pounds, one promotion and two life events down-the-line, work on changing your inner monologue to: “I allow my life to be good.”

Give yourself permission to be happy and successful, and not feel guilty about it. If you have a subconscious association between success being amoral, or corrupt, of course, you’re not going to do what you need to do to live the life you want to live. Instead, give yourself permission to step into a whole, happy, healthy, grounded and meaningful existence.

3. Don’t allow other people’s fears to cast shadows of doubt.
The way people respond to news of your success will tell you how they are really doing in their lives. If you announce your engagement, people who are in happy marriages will be elated for you. People who are in unhappy marriages will warn you that it is difficult and that you should enjoy your remaining time as “single” individuals.

The point is that other people’s fears are projections of their own situations. They have nothing to do with what you are or aren’t capable of.

4. Surround yourself with positive reinforcement.
Keep a bottle of champagne in the fridge. Change your morning alarm on your phone to read the message: “CONGRATULATIONS!!!” Make sure that the items that you see and touch most often bring you positivity and hopefulness. Keep an inspirational note on a post-it next to your computer. Unfollow people who make you feel bad about yourself and follow those who are constantly posting motivational messages and interesting ideas. Make your newsfeed a place that can catalyze your growth, instead of lessening your perception of your worth.

5. Speak your success as a present fact, not a future plan.

Though you shouldn’t say things like “I drive a convertible,” or “I am a CEO,” if they are not, in fact, true, do start speaking about what it is you want out of life, not in the context that you will one day pursue it, but that you are already living it.

Instead of saying: “I hope to do that one day,” say, “I am strategizing how to do that now.” Instead of thinking: “I will be happy when I am in a different place in my life,” think, “I am completely capable of being happy right here and right now, nothing is holding me back.”

6. Create a vision space.
Being able to imagine what it is you want out of your life is absolutely essential for creating it because if you don’t know where you’re going, you won’t know which way to turn first.

Once you have a crystal clear image in your mind for what it is you want and how it is you want to live, you are then capable of beginning to enact and create it. If you are still hazy or torn between what you want, you will be rendered incapable of taking real, meaningful action toward anything.

7. Identify your resistance.
When our subconscious minds hold us back from pursuing something that we love, it is because we are holding a conflicting belief about it.

To identify your resistance, question yourself. Ask yourself why you feel better when you procrastinate, or why getting what you really want could actually put you in a place that makes you feel more vulnerable than ever. Find a way to meet those needs before you proceed.

8. Have a master plan for your life.
Forget five or even 10-year plans; so many changes over time it’s nearly impossible to set goals that you’ll be able to keep. Most likely, new or even better opportunities will surface, and through your life won’t look like you thought it would, you’re better off for that.

Instead, have a master plan. Identify your core values and motivations. Ask yourself what is the ultimate goal of what you want to accomplish while you are alive; imagine the kind of legacy you want to leave. Once you have your Big Picture values identified, you can make decisions for the long-term that align with your true self.

9. Start a gratitude journal.
The best way to start putting yourself in a headspace of “having” rather than “wanting” is to begin a gratitude practice. By expressing thanks for all that you do have, you shift your mindset from being hungry for change to feeling satisfied with where you are at. Nothing magnetizes abundance to you like gratitude. There’s a saying that once you believe you have enough, you are open to receiving more and more and more. That is undoubtedly true.

10. Start asking for what you want, even if you know you’ll be denied.
If someone asks you to do a consulting project, ask for the amount of money you truly want to earn for it. If your goal is to get a promotion in your organization, sit down with your higher up and make your intentions known. Reach out to brands you want to work with. Start asking for what you want, even if you have no reason to believe that anyone will actually give you any of those things. Eventually, they will.

11. Release your attachment to the “how.”
Your job is to identify what, and then to work in tandem with other people for how. If your goal is to work remotely and run your own business, instead of giving up if your first attempt fails, try reimagining how else you could achieve your ultimate vision in a new way that is more financially lucrative.

The point is that life will always surprise you with how things come to fruition. Instead of being obsessively attached to every little detail working out the way you think it should be open to potential and possibility, even if it’s something you never imagined before.

12. Surround yourself with allies.
Start spending time with people who are ambitious, supportive and creative. If you’re hanging out every weekend with people who are likewise as unhappy with their lives, you aren’t going to receive an abundance of support if you try to break free and do your own thing. Remember that you will truly become who you spend the most time with, and choose who that is very carefully.

13. Fill your “dead air” time with affirmation and motivation.
When you’re on your commute each morning, listen to a motivational speech or podcast. While you’re doing the dishes or driving, tune into a talk show that relates to the type of business you’re trying to do. Infuse your life with as much affirmation and motivation as possible. You may need to hear the lessons more than once, but they will seep into your brain over time, and eventually, you will find yourself acting on wisdom received from those who are where you want to be.

By: Brianna Wiest

Five-Minute Meditation Cleanse

We’ve all heard about the power of meditation. It’s been shown to ease depression, improve mental functioning, and reduce stress and anxiety. It also reduces what I call Quantum Toxins – thought patterns or attachments to negative feelings that actually influence our physical chemistry.

Meditation quiets the “monkey mind,” the constant, un-directed thinking that often brings anxiety, worry, and distraction into our everyday lives. Even taking five minutes to practice meditation can bring us back into the present moment, encourage better decision-making, and allow us to truly experience our lives to the fullest.

Step 1: Get Comfortable & Breathe

Sit up in a chair with your back straight. Place your feet flat on the floor under your knees. Rest the palms of your hands on your thighs and relax your arms. Look straight ahead but try not to focus anywhere in particular. Instead, notice everything in the room at once. Take a deep breath and start feeling your feet. Feel them touching the floor or the inside of your shoes. Feel the temperature, the humidity; feel the texture of your socks. Feel your feet intensely from inside. Do not “think” about them, just feel them, sense them.

Step 2: Scan Your Body with Attention

After a few breaths, move your attention to your calves. Feel and sense these for several breaths. Then move your attention from body part to body part, first to your thighs, then your bottom against the chair, then to your abdomen and lower back, your chest and upper back, your shoulders, your arms, your hands, your neck, face, and lastly your head. Then let your awareness cover your whole body at the same time. The idea is to “scan” your body with your attention, stopping for a few breaths on each part. This practice will strengthen your ability to direct and hold your attention.

Step 3: Thank Your Monkey Mind for Sharing

You may notice that the moment you sit down, you start remembering things and feel the urge to act on them. This is part of the process. When those thoughts come and try to steal your attention away from your body, simply say silently to yourself, “Thank you for sharing,” and direct your attention back to your body. If you feel discomfort or frustration and want to stop, just keep sitting still. Know that the discomfort you feel is not caused by the exercise itself. It’s what happens when you become aware of your baseline state, that underlying anxiety you are typically not aware of when the outside world is at full volume and your attention is far from your body. Becoming aware of this underlying state is the first step toward dissolving it, and claiming back the energy it consumes.

Step 4: Where did that thought come from?

When you find yourself consumed by your monkey mind, try for a second to separate your attention from your thoughts and re-focus it on the present. Ask yourself: “Who is deciding that I think these thoughts? If I had a choice, would I be thinking about them?”

If your answer is no, say to your thoughts: “Thank you for sharing!” then immediately direct your attention to something in the present. For example, you can focus your attention on your feet. Again, this doesn’t mean think about your feet but feel them. This small boost of awareness breaks through habitual thought patterns that lead away from the present moment and into distracted thoughts. Anchor your attention into the present moment as often as you can.

Step 5: Use Anytime, Anywhere

This technique can also be used in the middle of any stressful situation like a business meeting or a job interview. When we are nervous, it is because our unconscious thoughts are interpreting, judging, measuring, and expecting. This unconscious process consumes vital energy and builds anxiety.

By re-directing our attention to our body and breath, we reclaim that wasted energy. It may be hard to remember to do this in difficult situations. Start with easy ones. Then try to do it in harder and harder ones. My personal experience is that if I am even present for a split second, and remember to redirect my attention into my body, immediately the energy of the situation shifts. When you become more present, others in the room feel it as well.

Practicing being present will help clear out Quantum Toxins from your mind. You will begin to be able to use your energy and attention to stay present and be more productive. This practice will also help you be more aware of the decisions you are making about what you eat. Practicing this simple 5-minute meditation is a great way to help clean the mind, body, and strengthen your ability to stay present and anxiety-free throughout the rest of your day.

By Dr. Alejandro Junger

15 Ways to Stay Positive at Work

It’s easy to get bogged down with the daily grind of work, but it’s important to stay positive when you’re on the clock. Even if your boss isn’t the type to pat you on the back, there are ways to keep from being bummed out even before you get to work. These tips will help.

1. Keep learning.

Just because you’re not in school anymore and you have a job, you don’t have to stop learning. On-the-job education is the best way to build up your resume. Learn as much as you can from every work experience you have, from presenting during a meeting to giving a tour of your workplace to outsiders. If you don’t have a chance to learn from new things, ask your coworkers or bosses if you can accompany them when they do their duties, and learn about what they do.

2. Teach others what you know.

You want to accompany others when they do their jobs, so offer that opportunity to your coworkers. Instead of helping them out only when they ask, offer to teach them what you know so they won’t have to call you all of the time. It might feel good to be needed, but when you have your own list of tasks to do, being called to help someone else can be inconvenient.

3. Give yourself a break.

You’re on the clock for eight hours a day, and you’re expected to work that entire time, but you can’t really do that. Trying to work nonstop means you’re wearing yourself out, and each subsequent task you do will get a little sloppier as you lose focus and motivation. Take a short break every hour or two. Step away from your desk and stretch, get some fresh air. You might spend five to fifteen minutes not working, but you’ll feel so refreshed by the time you come back to your office that you’ll be ready to get to work immediately.

4. Leave work at work.

It’s important to have time for yourself, your family, and your hobbies. If you work for eight hours, clock out, and then come home to do more work, you’re not going to be excited to go back to work the next day. Make a rule where you have to leave your work at the office. If you don’t complete a task while you’re clocked in, make it a priority for the next morning, but leave it at work. It’s hard not to even think about work while you’re at home because it’s such a large portion of your life, but give it a try. The more you put it out of your mind, the more rejuvenated you’ll feel each morning when it’s time to go back to the office.

5. Build relationships with coworkers.

Your work environment will be more comfortable and fun if you’re friendly with your coworkers. You don’t have to know every detail of their personal lives, or even the names of their children, but having a good back and forth with coworkers, bosses, and associates will make your workplace more inviting. Having a friendly community at work will also make you feel more supported in your work duties, which can help cut stress levels.

6. Participate in after-work activities.

When the clock strikes five, you’re more than ready to go home, but don’t let this attitude take over and leave you out of work events. If some of the crew are going out for dinner or drinks, tag along every once in awhile. This helps build a community in the workplace, and you’ll feel more connected to your coworkers. After all, you might still be with work people, but you won’t be at work, so you’ll still feel like you’re having time outside of the office for yourself.

7. Make your workplace nice.

Whether you have an office, a cubicle, a classroom, or a desk in the middle of a crowded room, make your workplace nice! Check with your boss to see what kind of decorations are allowed, and then bring in some posters that motivate you, or family pictures that make you smile. Even something as small as bringing in your own coffee mug instead of using a Styrofoam cup can make your desk seem more homey. Sitting in an environment that looks nice and makes you feel good will do wonders for your motivation.

8. Volunteer to spearhead a project.

Instead of waiting to be assigned a project and getting stuck with something you might not like, why not volunteer to take on a project? This way you’ll have more control over your tasks and you’ll look great to your bosses. They’ll be thrilled that you’ve willingly taken on more work, and will be more likely to consider you for the best of future projects and maybe even promotions.

9. Concentrate on one thing at a time.

You have a lot of things on your To Do list, but concentrating on one thing at a time will help you be more motivated and focused. If you stay on task until it’s finished, you won’t lose time by multitasking or changing course from one topic to another. By concentrating on one thing at a time, you also are more likely to complete more tasks fully, instead of doing bits and pieces of a bunch of different projects but not finishing any.

10. Set attainable goals.

Instead of setting your sights on the moon, set attainable work goals. It’s good to have dreams, but if you dream too big and don’t make it, you might be discouraged when it comes to accomplishing other goals. If you set attainable goals and meet them, you’ll be more inspired to set more goals you can reach.

11. Use your imagination.

Don’t restrict yourself to straightforward business practices – use your imagination! Take a creative approach to your projects and presentations, and brainstorm any task you’re given to see how you can blow your bosses out of the water.

12. Don’t beat yourself up over mistakes.

If you make a mistake, whether it’s a verbal slip-up in a meeting or a typo in an email, let it go. You can’t beat yourself up over something like that, because everyone makes mistakes. Don’t forget what you’ve done wrong, but learn from it and move on. Take comfort in the fact that people won’t remember it for long, and use it to push yourself to do better next time, so instead of remembering your blunder, they’ll remember your success!

13. Reward yourself for your accomplishments.

Every time you finish a task, pat yourself on the back. When you finish a major project, treat yourself to dinner out or a new movie. It’s just as important to reward yourself for your accomplishments as it is to not beat yourself up over mistakes. Marking something off your To Do list feels good enough as it is, but if you reward yourself, even with something small, you’ll be proud of yourself and want to accomplish more.

14. Surround yourself with positive people.

Stay away from coworkers who bring their negative energy into your life and your workspace. It might be difficult to avoid people if you work in close quarters with them, but you can at least make all of your interactions with them positive by keeping upbeat. Your positive attitude might help them change their tune!

15. Smile more.

Smile when you greet your coworkers and clients. Smile when you walk down the hall. Smile even when you don’t want to smile, and see how much it improves your days! Smiling even if you don’t feel happy will make you feel better, and seeing a smile on your face will make others feel better, too!

by Allison Renner

5 Ways to Make a Bad Day Better

We all have bad days, and some are much worse than others. A really bad day can be unsettling and cause you to feel very low and obsess over what has gone wrong. Here are 5 ways to help you get through the day, whether it’s good or bad:

1. Don’t be hard on yourself.

It’s easy to beat yourself up when you’ve just found out that you made a mistake. But we all make mistakes, and making them is the one way to really learn about life and what works for you. If you learn from a mistake and embrace it, your day will be better—and so will your life.

2. Get some fresh air.

If you can take a walk or just sit in the sun, go for it. A breath of fresh air can help reduce your anxiety or depression. Sometimes when we are upset, we hold our breath longer than we should, so remember to breathe in and out.

3. Look for something beautiful right where you are.

Sometimes it can be hard to take in the golden light of a sunset or a spectacular view if you feel overwhelmed. If nature isn’t readily accessible, go to a museum or art gallery, the mall or even a parking lot—just to look—to bring a little light into your life.

4. Accept that the day is challenging.

Get some perspective on what’s happening by telling yourself that you’ve had days like this before, and things usually get better. Knowing that the situation is temporary will help you cope with whatever is going on.

5. Call a friend who might need a little cheering up.

Thinking about someone else helps to take your thoughts away from your own troubles, and helping a friend will make you feel better about yourself.