Most people want to be successful, but not everyone can tell you what success looks like. Today, let's look at the meaning of success.

What does it mean to be successful? Do you consider yourself a success? If so, why? If not, what will success look like when you have finally achieved it?

These are important questions because your happiness in life will probably depend on knowing the answers.  Now, some people think that success means a wardrobe full of designer clothes, a fancy car and a 50-foot sailboat. Others think that success is never having to work again after… >>>

Do you have trouble understanding why your kids do what they do? Or why your mate refuses to listen to you? I have a suggestion to make that might help. 

If you'd like to see your relationships change for the better, there is something you can do that is almost guaranteed to help. It doesn't matter whether it's a teenager who doesn't talk to you anymore, a spouse who just won't listen, or a co-worker who never asks you to lunch.  

This technique will improve any relationship, and it's not hard to do, once you get the hang of it.… >>>

What is it that enables some folks to take big-time risks without becoming a nervous wreck? Taking risks in life isn't easy, because there is always the possibility of loss involved. However, it doesn't have to be a white-knuckle experience, either. So how can you take the anxiety out of risk-taking? 

Well, first of all, you don't take foolish risks. Take risks only when you believe that what you are going for will be better than what you already have, and you won't want to risk anything you can't afford to lose.

Second, remind yourself that risk-taking is involved in… >>>

I had an interesting question posed to me, regarding last week's "Mental Housekeeping" message.  The gentleman asked, "How do you clean out all the hurts and go about this mental housekeeping?"  A fair question that deserves an answer.

Hurts are the most difficult things to get over, because of the emotional imprint we add to the experience, and then store that memory in our subconscious. Each time we remember the incident or situation, we also recall the pain and hurt, which just solidifies the memory. Some people spend their entire lives purposely remembering old hurts.

It takes a fair amount… >>>

Do family problems affect your working life? Do you take problems at work home with you at the end of the day? Today, let's look at how our work and family lives interact.  

For a long time, employers have been concerned about how troubles at home may affect their workers' on-the-job performance. But a major study done some time ago by the Families and Work Institute says that the truth may be closer to the other way around. Workers are far more likely to bring job-related problems into the house than they are to take family conflicts to the job.… >>>

There is an old saying in the media business. "If it bleeds, it leads." This means that, in the race for ratings, advertisers and social media "friends," the more outrageous, notorious, or the more controversial the story, the closer it is to the beginning of the broadcast. For newspapers, it is "above the fold" on the front page. For magazines, it's the front cover.

The question we must ask ourselves is, "Is what I am reading really the truth, or just some news outlet's grab for ratings and more coverage?" Let's talk a bit about this today.

My company is… >>>

If you're interested in living to a ripe old age, I have some information about aging and attitude that may surprise you. 

Several studies of people who are older, who have lived far beyond the norm in the United States, indicate that attitude seems to play an important role. I'm not saying that there is anything like a "longevity personality." Living to the ripe old age of 100 seems to happen to selfish, cantankerous people as often as it does to those who are quiet and kind. But there does seem to be a common thread, and it is a… >>>

How much unnecessary junk is accumulating in your attic? No, not the one in your house - I mean your mental attic. 

Since we are in the middle of what many of us call "spring cleaning" time, we have started to sort out and discard possessions we no longer use and give them to charity or sell them at a garage sale. But have you ever thought about how valuable it could be if you took the time to perform the same kind of mental housecleaning?  

Removing the superfluous, the unnecessary, the destructive, or the outlived from our mental attics… >>>

Everyone likes to feel good. But, sometimes, postponing those good feelings will get you more of what you want in the end.  

All of us know what it's like to be impatient for good things to happen. When we're kids, we say we "can't wait" for the holidays or some other special occasion we've been anticipating. But the ability to wait is an important part of becoming an adult. In fact, the ability to delay our need for immediate gratification, so that we can enjoy something even better down the road, is a critical part of almost every success story… >>>

If you encountered roadblocks on your way home tonight, would you put a "For Sale" sign on your car and give up? 

Why is it that if you encountered unexpected roadblocks on your way home tonight, it would never occur to you to simply give up trying to get there? It might take you longer, but you'd find some other way to make it home, wouldn't you? 

I believe this is because you have a crystal-clear picture of your goal in mind and you also have unshakable confidence in your ability to achieve it. Confidence alone without the picture won't… >>>

Would you like to have more love in your life? Are there days when you wonder if that's possible? Are you not sure you can get it?  

Now, when I use the word "love," I'm not necessarily talking about romantic love. You see, love is a way of living, and there just isn't any way that you can keep it in a box labeled "Romance."  

Whether you have love in your life, or not, has nothing to do with being lucky or being raised in the right kind of family environment, or having the right genes, either. Love is not… >>>

Do you ever feel as if a large part of your life has been wasted? If so, I'm going to try to change your mind.

Every now and then I meet someone who tells me about having wasted a large part of his or her life. When this happens, I like to respond with the story of the man who came running to a priest exclaiming, "Father, Father, a terrible sin has been committed! Three altar boys were up all night playing cards and gambling in the choir loft. You must chastise them immediately!"

"Wonderful!" said the priest, to the… >>>

If you're going to get what you want in life, it is only common sense that first you have to know what you want. Even beyond that, it is absolutely essential that you take your desires seriously enough to goal-set to achieve them.  

I am convinced that the reason most people fail to achieve their goals in life is that they never really set them in the first place. Most people spend more time planning a wedding or a vacation than they do planning their lives. And by failing to plan, they are actually planning to fail, by default.

You… >>>

Comfort is normally a good thing, but when comfort becomes complacency, we're in trouble. 

All of us have seen what happens to certain celebrities and athletes who reach a certain level of success and then just stop. They are those used-to-be stars about whom people say, "I wonder what ever happened to so-and-so?" Well, what usually happened was that they became complacent, and then they stopped working, stopped stretching, and stopped growing. 

Bob Dylan said, "He who's not busy being born is busy dying." Now, it's true that sometimes we need to take time to rest - to lie back,… >>>

How good are you at handling rejection? If your answer is, "Not good at all," or "Not very," you will want to pay special attention to the following.

One of the most powerful words in any language is the word that means, "No." Most adults can't handle hearing it, and as a result of their fear of "No," they limit themselves in just about every way I can think of. How many times have you wanted to talk to someone, but decided not to do it because they might not respond positively? How many jobs have you not tried for… >>>

Today, I'm going to tell you about a simple exercise that will show you how the pictures in your mind affect your performance in life.

If you want to grow and move past your present limitations, you must first experience being more in your mind. There is a simple exercise we sometimes do in my seminars that will show you what I mean. When you have a moment, try the following:  

Stand with your feet slightly apart and bring both arms straight up in front of you, parallel to the floor. Keep your feet still, but turn your body as… >>>

Why is it that so many people don't know what to do with negative feelings? Today, I'll tell you about some research, collected at Rutgers University some time ago, that may help explain. In a study done with 10-week-old infants and their mothers, results indicated several things.  

First, our emotions are among the earliest signs of our awareness of patterns of meaning. Second, we naturally self-organize to seek out and become interested in positive feelings. Finally, negative feelings trigger negative responses.  

Awareness of negative feelings, and perhaps even more importantly, the ability to channel them appropriately, is not something we… >>>

How well developed is your sense of humor? Today, I want to talk about one of my favorite subjects, about the importance of laughter and its place in our lives.  

President John Kennedy once said, "There are three things that are real - God, human folly, and laughter. The first two are beyond comprehension. So we must do what we can with the third."

Today, we know that humor is a vital sign of life that affects us both physiologically and psychologically. Genuine laughter signals emotional flexibility and is a common reaction to the unexpected, the unpredictable. Some folks claim… >>>

Do you have an open mind? Most people think they do, but how can you really tell? Let's talk about open versus closed minds.  

Open minds are like a good sense of humor - everybody thinks they have one, but the truth may be another story. And what does it mean to have an open mind, anyway? Well, here's what I think: An open mind is one that knows the difference between fact and opinion and doesn't get them mixed up. It searches for the truth as best it can, and even when it feels reasonably certain of what's true,… >>>

We all want our children to be safe and happy, but is there such a thing as too much safety, too much protection? 

Raising children is an exciting process, but sometimes it can seem a little too exciting, especially when you have to call the plumber to get your kid's hand unstuck from the toilet! It is quite the balancing act, and it takes a lot of nerve and devotion on the part of parents.

How much should parents do to keep their kids safe, and how much protection is too much? There is a fine line between mothering and… >>>