You can’t always choose what mood you’re going to wake up in, but you can choose how you start your day. The energy that you start your day with, whether positive or negative carries through and overshadows your entire 24-hour experience. Don’t leave that energy up to chance. Develop a habit of starting your day the same way. Do things that start your day right and put you in a great mood.

The first thing I like to do when I wake up, even as I’m reaching over to turn off the alarm, is smile. Why smile? Because even if you’ve had the worst dreams imaginable, smiling causes your body chemistry to begin to alter. Don’t believe me? Try keeping a smile on your face for 60 seconds and see if your mood doesn’t improve.

Next, drink a liter of the best water you can get your hands on. If you can’t get the best water ever, then squeeze a lemon into it and drink the entire glass. Why? You lose a lot of water when you sleep. Your body is detoxifying and it is important to re-hydrate when you wake. It will also get your insides moving again.

After this, wake your body up fully with some stretching or yoga or physical activity of some kind. It doesn’t have to be a full on workout, just get the blood flowing and the muscles warmed up.

With a fully awake body, you now have a great place to focus on the rest of your day. Pray, meditate, or think about what the rest of your day will consist of. Get into a state of peace, joy, and love. See yourself doing the things you have to do today with love in your heart and a smile on your face. Then you are ready to have some breakfast and begin your day.

Try it out. Make up your own routine. I promise you, the better you start your days, the better the rest of your days will be.Similar Posts:

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An abundant source of energy is a must-have to live an enjoyable life and to contribute to the joy of others.  When you’re tired, you become more easily irritated and stressed out, which leads to poor relationships and poor health.  Left unchecked, it’s all too easy to end up asking what went wrong, with the pieces of what used to be your life scattered all around you.  Beside all that, let’s just face it — being run down Sucks!

So what are some ways that you can protect your energy levels?

1.  No more coffee.  The same goes for energy drinks.  99% of so called energy drinks aren’t actually giving your body energy, they are just stimulating your nervous system.  The end result is usually that your body becomes more stressed out and unbalanced and tired.  You can’t drug your way out of a problem that is caused by drugs.

2.  Eat raw fruits and vegetables.  An overwhelming amount of our energy is spent just digesting the cooked foods that we eat.  There is a reason you get sleepy and sluggish after you eat a meal.  It’s because your body is summoning all available energy to digest the substances you’ve just put into it.  Raw food has enzymes in it that help your stomach digest it, thus giving you more energy, not taking energy away.  As a plus, you’ll get much more nutrients from raw food, so you won’t have to eat as many calories, and eating less will give you more available energy and extend your life as well.

3.  Get more sleep.  This is kind of obvious, but all too often we just medicate our way through this with our coffee and red bulls.  When you are tired, sleep.  If for some reason, you can’t, see above and below.

4.  Avoid negativity.  This includes negative people.  There are some people, you might even call them your friends, that all they do is suck the life energy out of you.  They constantly complain and whine about every little thing.  You might even be one of those people.  All of this negativity zaps your energy faster than running a marathon.  Don’t believe me?  Try avoiding these people for a week and see how you feel.  You don’t have to be snotty about it, but whenever they open their mouths and what they’re saying isn’t positive, just be somewhere else instead.  If you’re the negative person, then try avoiding you!  Every time you say or think something negative, be somewhere else instead

5.  Exercise.  This seems counter-intuitive, but I promise you it works like magic.  The more active you are, the more energy you have available and the better you will sleep at night (thus giving you more energy again).  I always hear on this one:  “I just don’t have time to go to the gym or workout.”  Blah, blah, blah.  First of all, I wouldn’t recommend you ever go to the gym to workout, especially when you could do it for free and get some fresh air while you’re at it.  Secondly, you have just as much time as everyone else in the world.  Stop making excuses, you poor little victim, you. ;(  (Please read number 4 again, if this victim is you).

The fastest most effective exercises you can do are at home with no equipment.  That’s right!  You don’t need any equipment at all.  You remember what a push-up is right?  There are even a hundred different ways to do them, so you never have to get bored either.  Throw in some sit-ups, and some squats and you’ve just done a whole body workout in two and a half minutes (if you don’t break in between exercises).  That’s a commercial break.  Maybe you need a gentler work out?  You can do yoga, tai chi,  the five tibetan rites, ride a bike, or just go for a walk.  Don’t think about exercising, just do it.

Remember, if you’re ever going to take over the world, or the equivalent — raise your kids, then you need to have the instantly available energy to do it.  There is no quick fix for constant, steady energy, the only way to have it in your life is to live a lifestyle that cultivates it.  Dream that lifestyle, and then make it real.  You deserve it.Similar Posts:

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The world is perfect for us to grow.  We weren’t sent here to eek by or survive, that’s part of some people’s journey.  But we are here to grow and become greater than what we were before, just as a child grows to become like his parents.

Instead of seeing the things in your life that you don’t like, that you think of as imperfect, see them as opportunities to grow.  Perfect opportunities.  Even the withered arm on a crippled man is still a perfectly withered arm.  Even pain and suffering are perfect.  They exist for us because we have not been perfected yet, and they present the perfect opportunity to transcend them.  How to do that… well we’re all learning aren’t we?  I believe that once our hearts are perfected our world will be too.  As above, so below.  As within, so without.

Some people are so weighed down with trying to make it from day to day, or keeping up with the latest fashions, or making their car payments that they have never had that Matrix awakening moment where you realize that this world is not the only one, and indeed it’s a Contested World.  It’s our choice whether or not we want our world to be a paradise or a wasteland.  We happen to be at the tipping point one way or the other.

How much thought have you given to the world you are helping to create everyday?  What kind of world do you want your children to inherit?  Most importantly, what are you doing to create that world?  Becoming the most successful person in the world doesn’t mean a thing if you raped the planet to get there.  If your children have to grow up in an uglier world, what kind of parent are you?

Begin with imagining your Perfected World, what kind of place is it?  Where do people live?  What is their quality of life?  Is everyone equally happy, or is it an elitest world, where only the privledged have the opportunities to  pursue happiness?  Think about things like our food source… do we put toxic chemicals on our food in the future?  What about our houses?  What do they look like?  Do they get even larger and more separate from their environment, or do they merge together with it?  How about our jobs and school system?  Do we still work 50 hours a week at jobs that we hate?  Or do we get to enjoy our lives and work in the way that we choose?  What about money?  Do we still have currency, or do we invent something better?  Do we become more commercial, consuming more products, or do we have better things to do than watch TV and play video games and surf the internet?  How do we travel?  Do we ever solve the fossil fuel problem?  Do we go electric and solar, or do we invent some new technology?  Maybe we fly everywhere instead of drive?

Really think about it.  Talk about it with your friends, ask them what kind of world they would create for their children.

Then the fun part… The part that should put a smile on your face, or tell you that you need a new picture of the future, one in which you are smiling…  Now that you have a picture of where you are going, you can begin to break that down into small chunks.  Just like eating an apple, you can’t eat the whole thing at once, so you take small chunks of it and before you know it, you’ve accomplished your task.  In the beginning, this might look like eating low on the food chain (vegetarian), recycling, organic gardening in your yard (or even on the balcony of your apartment).  You might keep your old car a little longer so you can save up and buy a hybrid or wait for one of the new electric or hydrogen cars.  If you live in the city, maybe you bike to work, or walk a few times a week.  If you’re building a new house, maybe you build it off the grid, with solar and wind energy fueling your electric needs.  Maybe you avoid toxic chemicals in your household cleaners.  Maybe you petition your city to stop drugging your water supply with unnatural chemicals and pharmaceuticals.  Maybe you plant some trees on your birthday to counter how much paper products you use each year.

Each and every thing in this world is perfect for you, and with your growth, this perfect world becomes perfected.  Create beauty on the inside and beauty will manifest on the outside.

Think about it…Similar Posts:

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Be honest.  Chances are that any area in your life that you are unhappy with, is an area where you have settled for less than what you believe you deserve.  Or perhaps you may have settled for believing that you deserve less than what you do deserve.

That’s right, you get to choose what and how much you deserve in this life.  And you definitely get to choose what you believe about what you deserve.  Take a look at your beliefs.  What do you settle for right now?  In what area of your life do you deserve more?  And why do you deserve more?  Is it a right that you have as a human being, or have you done something to deserve it?  Here’s a neat thought:  We are all created equal, right?  So then, we all deserve the same as everyone else, right?

So, Happiness?  You deserve it.  Love?  You deserve it.  Peace, and Joy, and Health, and Abundance?  You deserve it.

Now that we’ve taken care of those limiting beliefs, by replacing them with beneficial beliefs, let’s take a look at why people don’t have what they deserve:  It’s because people settle for less than they deserve.

Do you see a vicious cycle here?  People don’t have, because they believe they don’t deserve to have, so they set up their lives in such a way as to keep them from getting the things that they don’t think they deserve to have.

First change your beliefs about what you deserve, and then stop settling for anything less than you deserve.

Want relationships that are drama free?  Stop settling for those relationships.  Be better than that.  Persist until you find the relationships that you deserve.

Want more money in your bank account?  Stop settling for the circumstances that keep you in your present condition.

Do you want to be healthy and vibrant and full of energy?  Stop settling for feeling like a run down, overweight, flesh eater.

See the pattern emerging?  In order to stop settling and achieve the results you want and deserve, a LifeStyle Change is required.  If you want to be healthy, than going on a diet will never work.  You have to live a healthy lifestyle.  If you want abundance, you must live an abundant lifestyle.  If you want loving relationships, you must live a loving lifestyle.

You can’t grow good fruit from a bad tree.  You have to have a good tree to grow good fruit.  The fruit comes from the tree, so if you don’t like the fruit of your life, heal the tree, don’t try to heal the fruit.

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What are some of the things causing pain in your life? What are the things that are stopping you from absolute bliss?

Think about it…Similar Posts:

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Thanks to Anthony, the WildAlchemist for bringing this and other great posts to my attention.

Have a wonderful day.Similar Posts:

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Inertia

An object in motion tends to stay in motion, unless acted upon by an outside force. Again just a variation of action/reaction, but Inertia can be a wonderful thing if it’s applied to your life in a positive manner.

Another way to state the law of inertia would be to say that once the big ball gets rolling, it’s fairly easy (requires little energy) to keep it rolling. Now replace the big ball with success in your life. Once you get success going for you, it’s a chain reaction, and success just seems to happen all by itself. It requires hardly any energy to keep going, as opposed to the energy it took to get going in the first place. Remember how we talked about people are attracted to success?

Action Vs. Re-action

I believe one of the major reasons, that people never get what they want in life is because they never take the time to think actively or do actively or anything actively. Everything starts with a thought though, so let’s start there too.

How much time you spend thinking actively, as opposed to reactively? How much time do you waste contemplating the thoughts of someone else? This is how the masses can be led around like sheep, by advertising, and ‘leaders’, it’s because no one thinks for themselves, and the system is set up to keep you from doing just that.

All day long you’re bombarded with things that you react to, but do you spend anytime or energy doing some acting of your own? What are you uniquely contributing to humanity?

So here’s the homework for today

You want success? If it doesn’t directly contribute to your ability to act on what you want, then stop reacting to it. All the distractions that you think make up who you are… just leave them right where you find them or take action to keep them from happening again.

It’s like a dog that just won’t leave you alone… I’m sure you’ve had this happen to you before, you’re sitting down, relaxing, watching a movie or talking with friends and the dog wants attention. So he takes action, he goes over to you and starts licking your hand, or gently biting it in the way that most dogs do when they want something. The thing is, you don’t want to give attention to the dog, you want to continue doing what you were doing. Now you can do one of two things… You can act or you can react.

Ignoring the dog will usually work (this would be not-reacting which is a form of action when consciously done), but patience is required and for sake of argument, let’s say this dog is very persistent.

You can give in and pet the dog, but all this does is make the dog want more, and so all of a sudden you have a bigger drain on your energy.

Or you can take action that will prevent the dog from interrupting you (training him to lie down and not beg for attention or putting him outside) Whatever the fix might be, taking action  and not reacting, is the only way to make sure that you don’t end up doing the dog’s bidding as opposed to your own.

So spend a few minutes every day when you wake up, thinking actively about what you want, and if it doesn’t bring a smile to your face and joy and peace to your heart, then what you want isn’t worth having, or you’re in it just for the money which will never make you happy or content.

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Well unlike the many drug companies that are sponsoring this world diabetes day, here’s a something that will actually help people get better:  Simply Raw: Reversing Diabetes in 30 Days is an independent documentary film that chronicles six Americans with ‘incurable’ diabetes switching their diet and getting off insulin.

The film follows each participant’s remarkable journey and captures the medical, physical, and emotional transformations brought on by this radical diet and lifestyle change. We witness moments of struggle, support, and hope as what is revealed, with startling clarity, is that diet can reverse disease and change lives.

So encourage your loved ones to put down the insulin, and the meds, and stop diabetes for good.Similar Posts:

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There are a few different reasons for stopping, the biggest one probably being it’s hard as hell not to eat anything solid.  The others being that I mostly wanted to see what it was all about, and having seen that I’m happy to wait a little while before really trying to tackle this beast.  92 Days!  I don’t see how they did it.  But I’m curious to find out.

So for now I’ll go back to my mostly raw lifestyle with a new appreciation for food.

One of the lessons that I’ve had to learn in my life is how to treat myself after failing at something.  The most important thing you can do for yourself is to not make a big deal over failure.  In the past, I’ve been so scared of failing that I wouldn’t even begin something.  No longer though…

Even though I didn’t last as long as I might have liked, 3 days without solid food is 3 days longer than I’ve ever gone without solid food before, and I’ve learned invaluable lessons about addiction, and how to eat properly (ie. only when you’re hungry), not as a way to feel better about something (ie. self-medicating).

I am fairly certain that at some point in the future I will juice feast again, but until that time, I will enjoy juicing within the context of my normal diet.

Looking forward to my bananas again Similar Posts:

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Juice feasting is really pretty simple in form… You make and consume 4-6qts of raw, fresh fruit and vegetable juices.  With at least 2 qts being dark greens like spinach, kale, parsley, dandelion, and the like.  Depending on your blood sugar level you can have more or less fruit juice.  Seeing as I’m not a diabetic, I can have plenty of fruit juice as long as I get my 2 qts of greens.

That’s pretty much it.  A typical juice feast lasts 92 days, with others lasting 60, 45, or 30 days.  I’ve yet to decide which if any of those I’ll be doing.  I may only last a week, maybe two.    We’ll see…  I’ve been practicing procrastination with this one, and I’m interested to see how long I can put off eating solid food.

I have to say that it is quite the mind teaser.  I am reminded once again how addictive food can be.  Even just the act of eating is a strong habit to break.  You wake up and eat your breakfast while watching the news or reading the paper, you eat your lunch around the table with co-workers, or reading your book, and you eat your dinner with family or friends, all the while snacking in between or later that night while you watch tv or a movie.  Am I coming off a bit obsessed?  Sorry bout that, I’m sure the cravings will pass.

I have been craving chicken wings for the last two days though, which is weird because I wouldn’t normally eat them on my mostly raw vegan diet anyway.  Perhaps tomorrow I’ll go into why I switched to raw foods in the first place.

Today I had:

2 qts watermelon, lime juice

3 qts green juice (spinach, cucumber, carrot, celery, parsley, and a red bell pepper today)

1 qt orange juice

I weighed 174 lbs today, which brings weight loss to 2 lbs so far as I started out yesterday at 176 lbs.  I’ve felt good all day.  High energy, good spirits.  I slept about 9.5 hrs last night, which is more than usual for me.  I usually get about 7 hours of sleep.  My dreams were quite vivid, which I’ve also heard is usual for a juice feast.  My skin’s been a little drier than usual, especially on my hands.

Well that’s all for today, stay tuned Similar Posts:

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