Haven’t you noticed how most times we live in our minds? The endless and sometimes senseless chatter inside hold us hostage willing us to follow their lead mindlessly. Pause for a while to listen to your thoughts and you’ll know what I mean.

In the past year, my commitment to starting my day with a quiet interlude allowed me to challenge my conditioning and make some headway. Now, there are gaps in my incessant stream of mindless thinking. This year, I intend to make the gaps longer by living more consciously.

For those of you who may wish to make the same journey, I share the guiding premises Hendricks suggests. I’d have synthesized them if I could but there really is no better way of putting them than how the author said them.

Hendricks says, “None of us invents the journey of conscious living; we are heir to it. For thousands of years, people from east to west have been looking to the heavens and looking into their own hearts, wondering about the same fundamental questions:

• Who am I?
• Where do I want to go?
• What is my plan for getting there?
• How can I give and receive love to my full potential?
• What is my creative gift and how can I express it?”

Now, we continue asking these questions and perhaps, Hendricks’ ten guiding premises towards conscious living may help us find the answers.

Guiding Premise One: Authenticity is essential. A truthful life is both the outcome of the journey and the means of getting there. A successful life is an authentic life. Happiness and creativity rest on a foundation of transparency to yourself and others. Knowing your own heart and speaking clearly to others keep you on the path.

Guiding Premise Two: Things that can be felt and seen – peace of mind, happiness and the humane treatment of others – are higher-priority goals than religious concepts such as original sin or beliefs about life after death. The journey of conscious living is based on getting to a deeper level in yourself than beliefs and opinions, in order to experience the essence of what unifies people, not divides them.

Guiding Premise Three: Conscious living depends on finding out what goals are important to you, and moving toward those goals at a pace that allows you to feel vibrant.

Guiding Premise Four: The journey of conscious living begins when you take full responsibility for your life, and slams to a halt when you avoid responsibility for anything.

Guiding Premise Five: Happiness, success, and sound relationships depend on letting go of controlling things that are beyond your control. Examples of things you cannot control are the feelings of others, the future, the past and whether or not other people like you.

Guiding Premise Six: Spiritual growth comes through a deep embrace of reality, not through flights of arguable fancy. Transcendence is best accomplished by thoroughly acknowledging – rather than ignoring or denying – such human realities as emotions, sexuality, and conflict.

Guiding Premise Seven: It is possible to make rapid shifts in consciousness – from scarcity to abundance, from defensiveness to openness, from fear to love – and these shifts in consciousness will change the outer circumstances of your life.

Guiding Premise Eight: Peace of mind comes ultimately from making your deepest creative contribution to the community around you. When you make your full contribution, you feel happy, fulfilled, and at ease. When you don’t, you don’t.

Guiding Premise Nine: Commitment to certain key values – honesty, responsibility, gratitude – not only gives you an inner flow of harmony, but also rewards you with an authentic form of power that can be recognized by others. Authentic power comes from authenticity; false power comes from control and ego-aggrandizement.

Guiding Premise Ten: You can choose to become the source of attitudes such as gratitude and responsibility (rather than waiting for the events of life to inspire you to adopt them). If you wait for events to trigger those attitudes, you remain locked in a consumer rather than producer mode and keep yourself trapped in scarcity.

Hendricks invites us to “think of this year of living consciously as an evolutionary spiral in which we soar in ever-expanding circles.” I, therefore, invite you to soar high and may God bless you with all that you need for the journey!

]]> http://www.scribblejoint.com/670/10-guiding-premises-toward-conscious-living/feed 3 http://www.scribblejoint.com/660/how-to-tell-if-he-she-really-likes-you http://www.scribblejoint.com/660/how-to-tell-if-he-she-really-likes-you#comments Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:16:35 +0000 Tim http://www.scribblejoint.com/?p=660 By all luck we were not given the power to actually read other people’s mind, something that we could really use in times of wondering if the person we are attracted to likes us. It is probably something that has been searched most on the internet, “How to know if he or she likes me”. Not an easy task, since this isn’t a science with a corresponding Force= Mass times Acceleration formula.

True, there are signs that they may do to show us they do like us, but they are relative. For us smiling is a show of interest, but to some it’s as good as nothing.

Never act as if you are the Einstein of knowing who likes who, because to tell you honestly, you will end up looking stupid faster than the falling apple of Newton’s experiment. If it was easy as 1,2,3 then all of us would have ended up with a perfect record, no misinterpretations, no rejections. So the problem is how do we know? How would we know?

The answer is??? Pay attention to detail, whatever he does or she does will always tell a part of him/her. A single act will not entirely answer your question, but a series of actions will do. We end up stipulating too much, over-thinking, trying to interpret a single act or two, it’s like finding a needle in a haystack. Come on, we are better than that, human beings are supposed to be the smartest, how can we say that we can tell how a person feels towards us that most of the times we don’t even know if we ourselves like a particular person even through a series of dates. Yes, everything takes time, even things like these, lucky are those who take one guess and hit it correctly, and there is a 50/50 chance that you are right, like or not like, so why not take the positive answer?

Truth be told, signs are relative, it would be easier if you have been with the person for a lot of time now. The oldest trick in the book is asking. Instead of juggling around, if you are dying to know the answer, then ask, who said that it was a sin to ask a person if he/she likes you? Nobody. Instead of wasting your time, googling the answers, asking the gods to give you that sign, go ahead and ask. If it’s too forward then ask her out, if it’s a him, then it is a different gameplay. If he likes you, or interested he would have probably asked you out, or if he is the shy type, he would have probably given you the slightest idea. The difference is, guys are only hard to interpret when they are already going out with you, very easy if they are on the process of wanting or planning to go out with you.

Pay attention to details, if he doesn’t ask you out, then he is not interested. If he is going out with you and becomes too confusing, just ask, same for the guys. Don’t make it too complicated, because dealing with men and women is already a complicated thing.

Check-in at a hotel

Lie down and relax with your partner and don’t worry about having to clean your room. Pretend you’re tourists.

Massage your partner

Prepare scented oils, comfortable pillows. Light some scented candles and give each other massages while listening to soft music playing in the background.  Or you can reserve a massage and facial for two.

Go for a romantic long drive

Enjoy the scenery and conversation along the way. Bring some wine, hot chocolate, or whatever your favorite drink is. At night, lie down and talk while watching the stars.

Redecorate the house with Valentines theme

Dim the lights, place candles around the room, play nice music, and enjoy dinner together. Then Go for a slow dance.

Take pictures

Spend the day taking pictures of you two together. Or make an appointment with a professional photographer and have your picture taken. Frame it afterward.

Take your partner to a Valentine’s Day event

Could be a concert or a romantic movie. Mingle with other people or just enjoy the time together.

Hopefully you got some ideas from this article. Use this occasion to enjoy the entire day together and make your partner feel special. Happy Valentine’s Day!

Something Useful

This is probably one of the easier stuffs to give; all you really have to give them is something that they need. Most of us tend to buy fancy stuffs, but for some the thing that they need is the gift that they want the most. Never overlook these things, they could probably be the best gift for the season, usefulness will beat fanciness anytime.

It may be a simple kitchen utensil that she badly needs, or a new pair of rubber shoes for his daily exercises. I may go on and forth but I know you get the idea, as long as it is useful, then go get it.

Something Personal

One of the harder things to buy and I bet one of the more expensive. When I say personal, these are things that are very meaningful to them, something that they wear, or use in a daily basis. They will find this very romantic, because it has a personal touch in it. Though sometimes finding the right design, colour or whatever is very difficult, but it would definitely make his/her day.

These will include, wallets, bags, watches, you get my point.

Something Memorable

These are the nostalgic gifts, something for the ages, but mostly these are “labour of love” kind of gifts, certainly for those who are patient enough to devote special time in making these gifts. It may not be that costly but effort is most of the time needed to find or make these special gifts. These are the things that really mean something to both of you, a picture of a place where you two had been then placed in a frame, an accessory that both of you have. Though there are items that can be bought that will belong to the “something memorable” section, like those pair of watches for his/hers, or something alike, are most often available and very easy to look for.

Like I’ve said these will include pair of accessories that are his/hers, these could also include any labour of love work, may it be an album, a scrapbook, or whatever creative ideas that you have that would make everything so memorable for both of you.

Something He/She wants

Hands down the easiest, all you have to do is listen to him/her on what he/she wants. If he says he wants a wallet, then definitely he wants that. Though I warn you, not everything she wants you can afford, unless of course you are the son of a business tycoon, then buy anything she wants. This game will rely on the budget that you have and what she wants.

Example? Just listen to her, and you will probably get what she wants.

With the Christmas season coming, all of us are in a ruckus to get the gifts that people that matter to us want, we do hope that whatever gifts we will be giving them, we will make them happy. It doesn’t matter what it is as long as it is from the heart.

Most people forget that romance still tickles the hearts of women. Many men invest in expensive gifts, though most of the time will also help you attract women, the traditional poetic lines and persuasive love letters will still work even in this techie era.

Guys tend to take for granted that women still love those who constantly warm their heart through sweet words, and romantic gestures, the simple giving of flowers or even letters are little examples that are not so hard to do. The extra attention to detail will definitely get you ahead, because these little details are the things that may be simple and small but really matter to women.

Because of the deep perspective and artistic touch, the artists usually drive women into awe.

Being this kind of guy is not easy. Most of these guys were born with the gift of artistry, though some can just work hard enough to become an artist through studying or practicing, the insight of an artist is usually the gift that even through practice and studying one may not ever get to have.

There are also guys that are just plain funny that women love to be around them, because they make life easy, and very much enjoyable. This feeling is also very much captivating for women, when they are very much overwhelmed with such emotions they really tend to appreciate the man and somehow feel much attached to them.

Being smart doesn’t necessarily mean you have to know everything, or being the guy that tops everybody else, you just have to know enough to at least be good in exchanging conversations.

Women love smart men, they sense authority and direction. They want someone who knows about things, and feel that they are very much knowledgeable about the world or whatever stuff that concerns them. Being smart also serves as a security to women, because they believe that intelligence equals success, success equals money.

Some of us are smart, some are funny and those who are lucky are practically both. For some guys these two types of character are innate and for some other came to them through experience.

Being a good conversationalist, may it be a witty or a funny conversationalist, can be achieved through experience. Reading books of different varieties would also largely help to expand your knowledge and wisdom, helping you in delivering great conversations with women.

You may not have the looks or the money, but as long as you know how to handle women, what to tell them and when to tell them, your possibilities are limitless.

From the title itself, I must say it is pretty much self-explanatory, and the reason behind why they are attracted to Mr. Provider, is the word PROVIDER itself.

With all the different difficulties we are experiencing,  having someone that you could count on in times of need is very important. A man who could provide security is one of the characters that most women long to have. Someone who can assure them that even in these times of hardships, they will survive; they will be able to eat, and live comfortably.

The feeling of security is very much important to women. It is imperative that you can provide their needs. This will also be a measure to see if you can support a family. Without security, women will tend to become restless.

Being a provider is much easier than being anything else; all you really need to do is work hard. You just have to make sure that you meet her needs, but this doesn’t necessarily mean only the financial needs of your woman.

It is also necessary that you also provide the emotional security, being a provider doesn’t stop with providing her all the material things, it really goes beyond that. A provider is responsible, someone you can rely on, someone that knows how to make decisions.

Being stable and rich doesn’t automatically grant you the title of being a provider. You should always remember that providers are the whole package when it comes to security, financial, physical, emotional and of course spiritual aspects.

Generally, these guys are the ones not afraid of adventure or danger. Most of them have unwanted vices but they carry a strong persona; they look tough and they act tough. They can also be the ones that exhibit strong association with polygamy. They seem to be insensitive of other people’s feelings, especially of women.

Examples of these guys are rock stars, your college jockeys, or those daredevils that we often see on TV shows trying off new stunts. These are the superior males who tend to believe that they own the world, and it is for their own reaping.

Though it may sound that this is the type of guys women don’t want to date or go out with, in fact, this is just the type of guys who sometimes get it all. Their dominance and masculinity are instant attraction for women. Women see them as exciting, one that would make their heart pounding unstoppably.

Adventure is a strong aphrodisiac for women; we can’t ignore this for it is true. Most guys that go for these hardcore adventures are the ones who don’t only act tough but are really tough, dominant male species. So don’t be surprised if a girl wants the bad guy over the good guy, because sometimes they misinterpret Mr. Good Guy as a boring one, which is not always the case.

Though, we could all portray Mr. Bad Guy, some of us are just not suited for it because we hold strong ties with the rules of our society. Tempting as it may sound, being a bad guy has disadvantages also, so hold on your horses or you might end up in jail for being too adventurous.

We have listed down below the most common out of the survey that we have made, the results may not be surprising and we might probably say, we knew that these were the keys, we were just not listening.

Mr. Bad Guy

Over and over again, this has been a popular personality that women tend to look for. The reason would be women feel secured at the same time a sense of excitement.

They believe that Mr. Bad Guy, will provide them the thrill of their lives, something Mr. Good Guy will never give them. They fend off men who they perceive as good, because they see them as boring and dull. This doesn’t necessarily mean literally bad, but bad to the point that they’d be risk takers, not necessarily breaking the rules, but pretty much bending them to the point of almost breaking them.

There is also this idea on their mind, that they can tame Mr. Bad Guy, and eventually turn them into Mr. Perfect, which most of the time is a task almost impossible to do.

The Provider

Who wouldn’t want someone that could provide you the needed security, the warm shelter and all the things that a woman would love to have. Security is one of the most important things that a woman would want to have, especially in a time of global crisis.

You don’t have to be the most handsome person, the most athletic or even the smartest, but as long as you could provide them the comfort and the care they need in their lives, it would probably be more than enough.

The Smart and Funny Guy

As long as you know how to use the right words at the right time, then everything would be easy for you. Girls would love a guy that makes them laugh, smart one-liners can do the trick. They love a guy that is knowledgeable, but not too smart to the point that you talk about physics and astronomical science, that would really be silly, and you’d look stupid than smart.

A guy who brings good conversation and has the ability to carry himself around people is definitely attractive for most women. They love guys who are confident about themselves, but of course not too overconfident.

The Artist

Artists have known to be passionate, and because of this trait, they are said to be the most romantic. They have incredible feel for romance and passion, they can turn a normal day to a great one.

Because of their different way of thinking, they are commonly the most observant and sensitive about things around them. With this great display of passion, a sense of satisfaction and appreciation is delivered effectively to the subjected woman.

With all of these being said, you might probably get an idea on which bandwagon to follow, so you wouldn’t worry much about attracting women. If you don’t belong to any of these groups, don’t worry, our next article will tell you exactly in details about the particular type of personality and how you would help yourself develop these personalities, watch out for that.

I don’t hear men obsessing about them or about flatter bellies, hairless legs, and whiter skin. Nor do they fret about whether they look older or younger than their age. So unless I’m mistaken, I believe it’s definitely a girl thing.

Whether it’s a case of vanity or low self-esteem or both, I really can’t say except we women seem to be afflicted with this malady in varying degrees. We agonize over the most trifle of beauty imperfections even when they’re visible only to our overly critical eye. And it is utterly mind boggling the lengths we go to just to make ourselves over and the money we splurge on all kinds of beauty treatments, aids and procedures – botox, liposuction, bleaching, cosmetic surgery, breast implants, nose and face lifts.

We’ve spawned a whole new industry that feeds on our weakness and brainwashes us into buying the illusion of hope and beauty. With media upping the ante by flooding magazines and our TV screens with beauty icons that magnify our “plainness”, morphing ourselves into becoming their clones is now almost an imperative.

Even screen goddesses themselves aren’t spared.  Celebrities too feel the pressure to be even more beautiful and to preserve their looks, body and youth. If even celebrities are susceptible to insecurity despite all the beauty potions and ammunitions in their arsenal, what more for us mere mortals?

We sure don’t stand a chance. Not against Nicole Kidman, Angelina Jolie or Julia Roberts. Ah, we don’t even need to go that far. Let’s just take Lucy Torres-Gomez. Blest with a Madonna-like face, an enviable figure, impeccable style and manners, innocent sophistication, a flourishing career and what appears to be a good marriage, she makes me acutely conscious of my “inadequacies”: my moon shaped face, the pimples that have marred and scarred it, the lines that shout my age, and that other chin that seems to second the motion when I nod.

But the more staggering wallop on my self-esteem came when I discovered that aside from beauty, she has brains and loads of talent too! How, I thought can anyone have it all?! Isn’t that the height of injustice?

Perhaps if we were angels, we wouldn’t be affected by these punches to our self-esteem that come from nowhere and without warning. But human as we are we can’t just banish these feelings of inadequacy with the flick of a wrist. Society makes it doubly difficult for us when it feeds and reinforces this collective obsession for youth and beauty with its bias towards the young and the beautiful. As door after door opens effortlessly for them, beautiful people land themselves the choicest parts, the most-coveted deals and the best seats in the house – be it in love, at social gatherings or at work.

Only a woman so sure of her self, with a very strong self-image and a heightened sense of awareness can rise above the tide. But can we afford not to? How will we ever have a moment’s peace if we don’t? You see, in the end we really have only two choices: make peace with what we have or keep on bemoaning our “lack” while piling on the creams, resorting to nips and cuts, insertions, additions, and subtractions…But even if we’d opt for the second alternative, we cannot win the war against age or nature.

So, the sanest thing for us to do according to writer Martha Beck is not to look different or to change one’s looks but to look differently, that is, to change one’s perspective. Spiritual master Eckhart Tolle further says, “Illusion will never satisfy. Only the truth of who you are will ever set you free.”

Deep inside, there in the deepest recess where true beauty resides, those words resonate with me. But until that day when I can fully unearth it and be truly awake, I’d still be lapsing into unconsciousness every so often and doing all the insane things women do in the name of youth and beauty. Hopefully, that day would come pretty soon.