In spite of the joys of being able to use your mind to bring pleasure, you can, as mentioned before, bring sorrow. It’s normal to feel pain to some extent. This is a normal mechanism of defense. If you put your hand in boiling water, by the time you would react to the pain, or see blisters, your finger would be covered in blisters.

That’s where the brain kicks in, and saves the day. It immediately, or more exact in a fraction of a second (10 to the power -3 if you’re math-friendly, retracts the finger. This saves it from being destroyed.

Ok so that’s normal, what’s abnormal, then ?

Well think about the things that bring psychological pain.

Things you think you want, don’t, but force yourself to believe you do.

How’s that work ??

Simple. Everybody plays the lottery, and everyone wants a billion dollars. They have no idea what to do with that money, they don’t need it, and here’s the pitfall. If they don’t get a billion, 1000$ isn’t good enough.

Sound like you? Sorry, life doesn’t work on an “all or nothing” basis.

Another common pitfall is people don’t pace themselves. You can’t run a marathon directly, without proper training. Most surely you would collapse or die. Now that isn’t much fun, is it ?

Take small steps, baby steps even, especially when trying something new. Even baby steps counts when you go into the right direction!

That’s the only way I eventually got the hang of programming in C++.

With small steps.

Today a bit, tomorrow a bit more, so on …. and we can achieve almost any goal.

It’s not important to rush and succeed by any means. The journey is more important than the destination, no matter where you are “going”.

And as that old Chinese proverb states :

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with ones step”

Humans are creatures of habit. We tend to strive to create order in our society and lives, yet it is chaos that sparks creativity. The best way is to keep a balance between the two. Be disciplined and keep everything organized, but never be afraid to think outside the boxes.

Yes , that’s true. You live in an endless spiral array of boxes.

Don’t believe me ?

Then try this on for size : “You feel like spending the night with your lover and your friends say to go out , if not you’re lame or something. Do you go out ? Yes.

Why ? You lack the character to impose your own principles.

Don’t be afraid to be yourself outside the constraints of external/internal factors.

External

Well , anyone outside your own thoughts. So that’s pretty much, unfortunately.

This can be anyone from your very own parents, to close friends, TV, magazines, and so on. Don’t be afraid to change your opinion but don’t shape your life to suit others.

PS Don’t get fired because of this article

Internal

Believe it or not you can bring pain to yourself. If you have a headache and keep telling yourself I’m sick, by the next day you won’t have the nerve to get out of bed. I have a cure to help you feel good.

A simple principle.

“Feel like a GOD , behave like a serf”

In your eyes you are perfect and better yourself constantly, but to everyone else your just some guy. Try this. It helps you fit in, an keep your principle, and being polite …. goes a hell of a long way. Trust me. Just don’t end up brown-nosing somebody, that’s low.

If you want to form habits, form healthy ones. Here’s an easy one : Brush your teeth three times a day, for 5 minutes. Eat vegetables or fruit or better: both , on a daily basis.

Sound simple ?

Try it , and realize it’s hard to form a habit and break from it, so make sure your habits work for you, not against you.

Ok. If you were patient, this is where the juicy stuff begins. What you wish for, hard enough, you will achieve. There was a story, about a student who came to Aristotle and asked him how he could achieve wisdom. He took the boy and put underwater until he almost drowned. When he came too, he told him that when he desires wisdom as much as he desired air while submerged, then he will achieve it.

I can’t promise anything, but this technique works if you give it time. It’s more of a philosophy of positive thinking rather than voodoo.

So, if you want to start, just think about something you want. Let’s say you want to loose weight. Well besides conventional methods like giving up alcohol/sweets and working out add this additive. In the early morning or evening repeat a simple phrase like this:

“I loose weight every day. My body is becoming thinner and thinner. “

It may not seem like much, but it does help. It’s something like self-support.

It cannot replace medicine, so if you are ill and need professional help, consult a doctor immediately.

The idea is a simple one. And there are a few basic steps:

Wish for something

Work for it

Add positive thoughts and visualization

Achieve and enjoy…

Ok, now there are a few main ideas regardless of the desire

1. Times of day:

Best when you are rested or relaxed.

Early morning after you wake up.

Evening before going to bed.

This is an optimal time when your brain is booting or shutting down , and is receptive.

2. Phrase:

Phrases to say should be short.

Make sure they are easy to chant.

And most important , make sure they have a message.

3.Visualise

This will be discussed in greater detail.

Just see the thing you want.

If you want to loose weight just imagine wearing the tight jeans and sitting in front of a mirror wearing them.

4. Faith

Belief is key.

Don’t get over zealous , you can’t move mountains.

Choose something realistic like getting a raise, and have faith in achieving it.

5. Infinity

Your brain is almost infinite.

People only use about 7% of their brains.

What you practice you get good at.

6. Perseverence

The secret to ANY success.

One step forward and 2 back makes you move backwards.

Pace yourself , get better, have patience and you shall succeed.

7. Patience

Learn it and live it.

Rome was not built in one day.
A flower takes time to blossom.

Just apply these rules and the rest should be fun.

Well here we are.

Subconscious boot camp.

Ok , now a first requirement for these exercises is peace and quiet. The idea is to be relaxed and open minded. Be like an open book awaiting an author’s quill. It’s time to start writing .

Exercise 1

Close your eyes and count your breaths in/out/both. This is a good way to relax , but make sure you are well rested or you risk falling asleep.

Also make sure you hadn’t had any coffee or energy drinks prior to this. The idea is to relax not to work out.

Exercise 2

Ok, so now you’re relaxed.

What next ?!

Visualize.

This isn’t the same for anyone. Each of us has a different way too see things, the same being true for visualizing. So this means you’re on your own. The best way to start is to visualize something is to first think of something that means something to you. A friend , a possession, a pet etc. .The idea of visualization is to picture things in your mind, it happens all the time, if you listen to someone tell a story or event. The issue is using it properly .Here’s an example why to do this.

You are always breathing , but if you breathe in a certain way you can relax , if you breathe in through your moth your larynges gets irritated and you can’t speak properly.

What to visualize : simple. Look at an object , like a vase. Picture it in all its detail, paying attention to shape, size, color and texture.

Exercise 3

Self-analysis

This is the hardest thing to master. But, it is vital to your subconscious quest.

The idea is to be certain what YOU want. Don’t be afraid, this isn’t being selfish. It’s about choosing your own path. You can easily be constrained by the wills of your parents or friends. If you want to be happy, and avoid living a lifetime hurting from an unknown soul-wound, choose what YOU want.

Also, choose the same thing, and be persistent. It’s just like having a car and moving a different direction each day. You get nowhere.

Don’t worry about making money, you can get a job to pay the bills. A lot of people turned their hobbies into full time jobs because they excelled in them. Why ? Because that’s where their “heart” was.

Find something you enjoy, even if it seems foolish at first. You can turn something simple like playing sports, into a professional career.

Can we break the rules ? Depends what rules. Some rules are dumb and foolish , but it takes great reasoning to know which ones. If you are told by some teacher that you will never succeed in life , just because you get bad grades at their subject , this is a stupid rule.

Of course people have broken rules that should not be broken , rules that are meant to protect you. If you indulge in depression you risk ending up in clinical depression and suicide.

Always judge the consequences of your actions. There have been so-called miracles when people have managed to heal very aggravated illnesses . This isn’t a lie or an act of some bizarre divinity . It’s the human mind being used properly.

Burn victims are treated not only by doctors but also by psychologists who calm them down. The pain is enough to panic someone , and if too much adrenaline is released the wound infects and the patient dies. However if the patient is calm , he is relaxed and the wound heals , in conclusion , the popular expression : “What you don’t know , can’t hurt you”.

Here are some examples of interesting stories both good and bad.

BAD

In a prison , an experiment was tried on a prisoner . He was sentenced to death in a peculiar way . He was strapped to a chair and blind-folded. Then someone scratched him with a ruler and poured warm water on his neck telling him his throat had been cut. In 2 minutes he was dead.

GOOD

In the late 1970’s a boy was diagnosed with brain cancer. Back then there was no cure or even treatment. The boy was very passionate by sci-fi movies and visualized night after night, various spaceships fighting the cancer. After about 6 months he woke up. He felt good. He paid his doctor a visit : The cancer was gone.
So you see , breaking the rules can bring both joy and pain. Choose for yourself what’s worth believing and what’s not. These techniques have nothing to do with religion , race, age or gender. It’s free for all – just like air.

Now that you understand the “philosophy” behind this , it’s time to get down to business.

So what is the human mind ? Similar to the myth , the human mind is in its own right a Pandora’s box. Nobody knows for sure how it works. It can bring both happiness and pain through a cocktail of chemical reactions. This is the vanguard of your body , the captain . What the brain tells the body , the body does. If you wish to move your arm , your desire is processed by neurons located in a certain area of the brain , then an electrical impulse is sent to the muscles in the arm telling them to contract and a feedback mechanism reports progress . When you feel your arm has moved enough you wish to stop and your brain sends a signal to your muscles to stop contracting.

And all this happens in but one second.

And that’s just moving an arm . Now think about something more complex like digestion. Your body has to release specific chemicals , and direct the organs like the liver or bowl to work in harmony with the intestines . This however is not a matter of instinct but a matter of subconscious directing the body .

The only part of the human body that works out of instinct are breathing and circulation. These functions are preformed by the encephalitis .

So it’s technically a simple metaphor . Your cells are crewmen ,your organs are engines and such , your body is the hull of the ship and your conscious mind is the captain . The subconscious mind is the first officer who takes over while the captain isn’t there.

However our first officer is blind , if he is told to steer into a cliff he will do so without regard . That’s why we have a captain. Our mind can produce both thoughts of peace and harmony , or thoughts of fear and pain . It is not necessarily a random process but rather an influence of external factors. Similar to primates our mind seeks to copy that which it sees : “Monkey see , monkey do “.

Therefore it’s best to watch your surroundings and see their consequences . Do not let them influence you if you do not approve . If you were to see death every day you would see it as normal , yet most of us shield ourselves from it , maybe because we fear it , maybe because we know it can be damaging for us to see it.

Also , there is the matter of perspective , how someone sees the world . You could be paranoid and feel as if everyone to meet is trying to kill you , or you could be naïve and trust anyone without regard to your personal safety. However the majority of people fall in between.

We all have fears and loves but the way they influence us is unique. That’s what makes our mind a Pandora’s box .

Just think that out of 8 billion people , no two are identical . This makes everyone’s perception unique.

There are two primal emotions in the world: love and fear. In my opinion these are metaphorically expressed by yin and yang in Chinese philosophy.

Don’t believe me ?

Here’s a clue. Greed: love for the possessions of others and fear you will not obtain them.

That’s just one of many examples.

However love and fear complement each other, and each has part of the other. For example if you love something you fear to lose it. If you fear something you love the world without that something.

The idea is not to see the world black and white, but to balance your emotions. However the balance should slightly tilt towards love rather than fear.

It’s a simple principle:

“Creation tends to infinity, destruction is limited to what has already been created”

If you remember anything from this book it’s the line above.

Do we need love and fear ?

Well you need fear to protect yourself, you need love to co-exist with members of your species. There is the theory that you could abandon emotions to achieve enlightment.

This is a somewhat dangerous theory, if you abandon all morals and emotions you could psychologically reach the next level. This has not been proven and over the years many writers and philosophers warned that this kind of attitude could cost you your sanity.

It does sow the seeds of anarchy to some extent but I can’t tell anything about it. I haven’t experienced it so far.

The balance, the duality seems a better option for the moment, as it can be found all around us. Just look at the natural world. There are two genders each with its own unique, physical and mental attributes , but they are EQUAL. Men aren’t superior to women, women aren’t superior to men. Any activity can be mastered by both sexes, it’s just a matter of a few differences of perception. Men are prone to develop muscle mass more easily because traditionally they have been the provider: hunter, fisher, forager. Women are prone to develop empathy as it helps considering they raise the young and need to offer comfort in times of need to their “cubs”.

In a couple both man and woman complement their abilities to succeed in their biological function of raising their young and providing for them. This is the idea of a successful couple.

To get the most out of this technique you will have to satisfy only two criteria. Fist you have to keep a positive attitude and always dwell on the thought of succeeding in what you wish to achieve. Second, and most important, don’t forget to work.

The idea is not to get stuck up on wishful thinking. The idea is to work, but aid that work with a positive attitude directly linked to the subconscious. Do you think it’s hard getting used to? Nope.

Use an alarm clock to get up at 8 am every day, and in a month you can wake up at 8 am without the aid of the alarm clock. These techniques have to be your alarm clock until you succeed.

Why this works? Well it can’t be proven scientifically yet, so technically all I’m saying here could be a lie, but I have tried this technique on myself and it does work. Try these methods yourself and you’ll get results. Some may work for you , others not.

What’s the idea? a very simple one.

When you are relaxed, breathe in and out for 5 min an don’t think about anything, this relaxes your body and mind even further. Now it’s easy to visualize and think positively.

Let’s say you want to loose weight and lack motivation. This is the perfect time to get an idea stuck in your head. It’s just like planting a seed. The relaxation made the “soil” of the mind prepared.

Okay, so I want to be thin. What would I look like if I was thin? Visualize yourself in a bathing suit in front of a mirror at the weight you want. Feel the joy of having achieved your objective. This is it.

Now this is a form o faith, but it has nothing to do with religion or a god. Faith is believing in something that isn’t there. What isn’t there is that which you wish to achieve. However don’t forget, a seed needs to be looked after to grow into a flower. So you have to constantly repeat your affirmations on a daily basis and support them with hard labor.

The idea seems nice on paper but it does require work. This isn’t an instant fix. It’s more of a way of life, something that stays with you. You must always apply this technique and master it.

There are two pitfalls and they come from lacking balance. First off you could lack belief in yourself and your abilities because of past failures and skepticism. Don’t let this attitude overwhelm you, it can lead to dangerous states like depression. Second is the idea not to believe blindly. If you believe blindly you are naïve, and this is a pitfall. Don’t trust anything just like that.

The main idea is to keep balance. Be optimistic enough to succeed but skeptic enough to admit failure and try another technique.

On the third planet from the sun lies a fascinating species of mammals: humans. Besides suffering a process of constant perfection, our species found various unique skills ONLY attributable to our kindred.

Among the skills unique to humans lies an ability, mostly neglected due to its uncertain nature, the subconscious mind.

Unlike other articles of this kind, I won’t give you the false impression that using your subconscious mind you’ll get anything in the world, effortlessly, instantly and without “work”.

Let’s start at the beginning. What is the subconscious?

It is the part of the body responsible for certain functions we do not control by default , some examples being breathing or digestion .

These functions can be directly controlled if one chooses it, you can easily breathe at your own rhythm and then ignore the function and let your body take over.

The subconscious is very similar to a computer’s operating system and your instinct is similar to its bios. Your instinct only relates to basic needs (hunger, sleepiness, thirst and so on), while the subconscious can perform basic functions it can also learns, and that’s what makes it fascinating.

At first, when you are a fetus, you can’t digest anything, you are fed through veins exiting your belly button. After being born and being able to breathe, you learn to process milk and gradually your body learns to digest various new substances, like meat or vegetables or sweets.

The idea is, your “operating system” is constantly updating itself, and always learning new tasks.

Think about learning to play an instrument, at first the notes are just noise and you can’t coordinate your hand playing the instrument and the music in your head. However, in time your body learns this new skill and if you hear a sound you know, without thinking about it, how to move your hands to achieve the desired sound on the instrument.

I would like to warn you that there are others out there that have no idea about the subconscious, and they lie on their websites or in books just to make a profit. They would tell you, that in a few days dreaming about a TV will get you a wide screen TV on the spot.

If you try these techniques and fail you would no doubt be discouraged and stop trying. If a date goes wrong, do you live alone until the end of your life ?

If you get a bad grade do you stop studying ?

The list is endless, and it is a known fact that most successful people have gotten were they are by going through various mistakes, learning from them and ever improving their techniques.