Page 148 - 100 Ways to Motivate Yourself

The more you can slow down, life slows down. That knife that’s headed

toward you slows down, and it is easier to catch it by the handle.

And the more you race out ahead into your own future, your negative
imaginary future, which people obsess about, the faster you’re trying to solve
problems that don’t exist and that has you continuously catching the knife by the
blade, in other words, seeing nothing but bad news and putting all news into the
filter of bad news. Oh, no, the economy is bad therefore I’m not going to make
any money. Well, really, a lot of people made their money by knowing what to
do during the Depression, knowing that there were new services that needed to
be provided and new things that needed to be done. They didn’t just
automatically quit.

104. Leave yourself messages

I have certain messages, quotations, sayings that I read in the morning.
There is one that I always read no matter what, and I will never move this one
out of the line-up: “He who is not every day conquering some fear has not
learned the secret of life.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson

Our usual system is to not only avoid what we fear, but also to avoid
knowing that we are avoiding things. We don’t know why we have this vague
feeling of danger and insecurity. We just know it’s there.

Every day I practice this avoidance, I become weaker and more cowardly. I
get scared more easily, sometimes by the smallest things—the phone ringing, an
e-mail from a creditor. Courage and strength do not remain in place. The same is
true with my soul and spirit. Each day I skip Emerson’s advice to face a small or
large fear, it’s like my arm not lifting a small or large weight. Weakness creeps
in. Therefore I use the quote as a message across time from Emerson to me. I see
it in the morning because I have put it there as a way to motivate myself. And it

works.

Here is another one (another motivational message!) that I have up on my
bookcase, and I make sure I let it sink in at least once a week:

It is important that you get clear for yourself that your only access to
impacting life is action. The world does not care what you intend, how
committed you are, how you feel or what you think, and certainly it
has no interest in what you want and don’t want. Take a look at life as