Showing results by author "John Stewart Rushton" in All Categories

Humility and pride: One can get you everywhere and the other can get you nowhere. It's a virtue to be humble as it denotes you have a high degree of grace and understanding. It doesn't denote being a "soft touch" as what you possess is of a value that needs no extra advertising. Those who are ego lead are quite the opposite, often suffering from a very bad ignorance and lack of self-esteem. There is a big difference between being proud of your children or some work you have done as opposed to being proud looking at life through a variable supercilious aspect that clouds others from your favour and even warrants negativity.

Life Bite Series. You are a product of yourself. What you wear, how you speak, what you eat, what you do, etc., it's all a decision that you have taken and it outwardly shows too. Similarly, life is a product of your decisions and how you interact with the various parameters in life. What fits into your comfort zone or what you do to try things outside of it are still down to you. Your views on life play a considerable part in how you enjoy life (or not) and how you make friends (or not) and what you do in life; no one does this for you.

Our attitude defines us as people, our attitude denotes who we are and what we do and why. Our attitude speaks volumes about our character and how we think and view life and what we hold dear, in fact our attitude is everything. Our attitude is what others latch onto in us and similarly it's others' attitude that we latch onto to make an assessment of what they are like and can, indeed, we trust them in every respect. Those who are thick, stupid, ignorant, egotistical are those who get angry very quickly by because they just can't comprehend much else with their stunted mental growth.

We need to steer our course in life because if we don't then life will by default takes us where it is going, often to a place where we didn't want to be. Life doesn't hold any favourites nor does it take prisoners; it goes its own way regardless. What we do in life is down to us regardless of circumstances and conditions - those we can rarely control. What we can control even if we are somewhat timid in personality is how we think and what we do and how we react to everything.

We need to stand firm in life even if we are cajoled or bullied by loud and bombastic people or organizations that want you to do what they want for their purposes. Never ever be frightened to complain; do it in style as high as you can go and copy others in the correspondence so that everyone knows. Never ever be blackmailed by family, friends, or those who use "emotional blackmail" in trying to get their way above yours.

If we can't communicate we can't express our love, our upset, our thoughts, our feelings, our aspirations, our creativity, in fact if we don't express ourselves we are making ourselves redundant in life and falling very short of who we are. Yes, there are despots and dictators and evil religions that supress communications and the messages they deliver, but the irony of all of that is that they poach from the societies that allow communications because they haven't themelves the guts or brain power to effectively use it.

Our relationship with ourselves (are we happy about who we are), others, and life is holistic; if it gets out of kilter then we become discordant and uneasy and then a whole manner of silly things happen which makes matters even worse. It's important that we understand this because any relationship, if it is to be sound, must have some firm foundations because nothing in life lives in isolation - everything has a part in something else.

As a race of people the human race has survived because of its need to foster love and friendship among itself. Yes there have been wars and evil religious content because of negative people, brainwashing, and sheer lack of worldly aspects of endemic groups of people. By and large, however, people and communities exist because of a need to feel both needed and to need others, too. Both are different in approach but both stem from the self-same place within.

Love is the essential ingredient in life that makes it worth living, it seeps into every corner of our lives, and where love is - evil isn't. Where love has the upper hand devious and cruel existences can't survive.You can see that the societies that have "love" within them prosper and create whereas those that have conditional love have unjust and repressive societies that control and kill and are barbaric in nature. Love allows us to be happy, be comfortable, to prosper not only in wealth but the quality of our lives and our health. Love nurtures and cares and gives unlimited options to move forward without hindrance.

We should be comfortable with the choices we make for the right reasons. Granted not all choices offer a simple solution and degrees of compromise come into play unless you are a dictator or a despot. Assuming you are neither then there is a very wide range of choices you can make which can seriously affect your life to make it better or not so good.

Self-created barriers are those that we have created within our own mind - for whatever reason, then we start to work within them. Often such barriers have no real relationship with what needs to be done but sometimes they form a series of parameters that subliminally stops one from doing something or taking risks or not venturing forward, so it creates a pseudo "safe haven", which it is not at all. Our thoughts and perceptions are important to us as we view life from such ideological places and thus if they are wrong or incorrect we lose out, often big time.

People will view us, judge us, accept us, or reject us based upon our attitude. Our initial concerns come from seeing someone else's attitude, which gets modified down the line the more we know of them. But if we have one inital meeting we can be a success or a failure in an instant. Our attitude is part of our "Shop Window" so if it looks shoddy or unkempt then that's how others see you. Of course everything in situ whether you are at work or at play you dress appropriately, but your character still remains relatively constant so a great assessment needs to take into account all mitigating circumstances.

Whatever happens, whatever prevails, whatever circumstances there are, you are still in charge of your life. Unless you are held at gunpoint which is highly unlikely then you make all the choices in life - even if it is a choice to follow someone else. If you do follow someone else as an easy option and it all goes wrong, then it's not them to blame; it is you who put your trust in them, even if they did something stupid. There's no getting away from the truth of the matter about yourself.

Love is one of the most complex yet simple aspects of our lives. We can't do without it. We don't have to analyse it nor deeply scrutinise it, either, it is an inherent feeling we have. Love gives us the feeling of knowing what is right and what is wrong and many of the so called "bad people" in life have either been badly betrayed or allowed evil and negative thoughts to overcome their inherent feelings. Everything in life is a choice, if we do bad it is because we have chosen to do so, it just doesn't happen.

Relationships with our partners and "best" friends need to be of a high quality in order to feel "as one". If you have a partner the conversation should have changed from "me" to "us" and from "I" to "we"; if it hasn't then what are you doing together? The union of a couple whether straight or gay (or anything else) is a mutual harmony, otherwise what is the union all about. All this "I need my space" is a modern "cop-out", stay single and enjoy all the space you need. Selfishness in a relationship is a major curse as is "emotional blackmail", harmony doesn't have pockets of personal agendas, which doesn't mean you can't have individual thoughts and aspirations.

It is important that we feel fulfilled in life. Being fulfilled is not the same as everything being okay. Being fulfilled is that feeling we have that has an overall purpose, whether it's making your business grow, doing voluntary work, being a mum or a dad, creating something, whatever it is to you that provides that overall purpose. It's different things to different people. Many of today's mental problems stem from a lack of purpose, when this happens we crave all sorts of things to fill that "void" within.

We all get upset from time to time, whether it is from bad service, other people being rude, things not going the way they should, the list is endless and it affects us. Similarly we get annoyed by the excess of current politically correct morons who are forever getting offended for the sake of it and have nothing to back up their position other than by default being subhumans and can't get to grips with free speech and the fact that others have a different opinion to themselves.

At times we would all like to change our life or aspects of our life. We get into a rut or things don't quite work out as they should or circumstances change etc. Well, the only thing stopping us change is ourselves and not the excuses we hide behind.... We all have second and third and fourth chances every single day, we can if we wish alter our lives sometimes dramatically in an instant. For others it takes time, but change is by its own nature is an ongoing process.

Whatever you are going through there is a solution. Often we see only the "dark side" as our limited knowledge cannot comprehend anything other than our thoughts and as we can't see nor are we in a good mental state to want to see positive possibilities as we dwell where we are in a morose state. However, life is always full of inexplicably good things that can transform where we are and who we are in an instant or in a short space of time. We then look back and see where we were and we can't often believe that that was "us" then and where we are now.

It is important to value who you are. It is difficult at times when you are in a dark place and life seems to have no viable solutions as to what to do and where to go - but they are there. It is very difficult too when in that dark place to have any energy because it seems to be sapped out of you because of a lack of impetus and desire. Your mind knows what it wants, the body seems not to care and all one can dream about is to be left alone or waiting for that magic moment when all will be OK and it doesn't arrive.