Tag Archives: Self-Help

Random Thoughts – Wednesday 6-11-2014


IMG_1399Each morning I awake is but another chance to change myself, my surroundings and the world I live in. The question is, am I going to make any changes in my life and/or world or am I going to remain just an observer of my life. Inactivity and lack of motivation in one’s life leaves them stagnant and without any inner growth. The comfort zone we tend to enjoy is but an obstacle in the way of our self-development.  Though we tend to believe other people affect our moods, metal state and the outcome of our day the truth is they only can if we allow them too. For we are solely responsible and able to enact change within ourselves. We can be influenced by outside sources but only if we choose to allow such.

Sometimes I think we all spend too much time worrying about what others think about us and not enough about what we think about ourselves. How and what we think about ourselves is what shapes our lives and is also is one of the driving forces behind shaping our ever-changing future. So will you choose to stay in your comfort zone watching your life pass you by and rely on the opinions of others to define who you are or will you take the reins and make changes in your life? The choice has always been your own far as how you live and how you feel. The future is yours to make and yours to master.

You are the Navigator or your own life, never allow others to change your course without deep examination of their motivation and the destination.

Ray Barbier

Take a few moments out of each day


IMG_1387Take a few moments out of each day to tell those you love how you feel about them, let them know how special and important they are. Take a moment or two each day to be kind to friends and even strangers, be an example for others to follow and be a person you can be proud to be. Find happiness in the joy of others and help bring joy into all whom you meet along the way. When you begin to think negatively just think no over and over till the negative thought subsides and/or try to think or a more positive thought to take its place. Don’t complain about what is wrong, learn how to fix it or at least how to avoid it. Sometimes there are things you can not change, you do not have to accept them, you just have to learn to work around them.

Don’t be afraid to be yourself and embrace that silly child still within you. Do not become cynical and bitter for it will only put a wall between you and happiness.  Do not worry about grey hairs and wrinkles, they are part of aging. We are all unique in how we look, act, think and perceive this world.  To one you may look old, to another you may look young and you are good-looking to some and not to others. It is all superficial and really unimportant in the end. It is who you are inside and how you interact with this world along with how you treat others that counts. Plus to God all of us are beautiful and he loves us all for who and what we are. We should look at each other in that same way, love one another as is and know we are all beautiful and loved.

Inspire others to be kind, accepting and compassionate, teach others to love themselves and others unconditionally. Encourage others to be themselves and not just a carbon copy of the so-called popular or in crowd.

Ray Barbier

Live each day as if it was your first day and your last


024 We only have a short time to experience, enjoy and live our life. Some of us have longer some have shorter but in the grand scheme of things all our lifetimes are but a drop in an endless sea of time. This is why we shouldn’t hold on to negative emotions and thoughts for any length of time because they are usually a waste of energy and cause more harm to ourselves than it does to anyone else. We should cherish each moment we have, be thankful for each day we are blessed to wake and see. We should help one another and be kind, for if we all did such this world would be a much happier place to live in. We all want happiness and we all want happiness for our family and friends. Even though our vision of what happiness may vary in the end it’s all about living in peace and harmony with each other. Kind thoughts, words and actions are the key to happiness for both you and those you interact with. Sure there are some people for one reason or another choose to be bitter, unresponsive to kindness or love. But that shouldn’t sway you from the path of kindness, peace and love.

Live each day as if it was your first day and your last, See the world as a child and cherish is like a person who would die tomorrow. Look at everything in wonder like it’s the first time you’ve seen it. Watch the sunrise and enjoy it like you did as a young child. Embrace life and accept one another as is. For none of us truly knows when our day will come to meet our end. So many family members and friends I have had have already left this world. And so much was unsaid and undone.

Live each day as both the child and the elderly, keep wonder in your heart and be thankful as well as cherish each morning.

Ray Barbier

Some thoughts on Dec 25 2012


005Positive thinking? Changing ones perception of the world around us? Choosing your attitude and changing how you interact with the world around you can greatly change your life and help fill your life with happiness and love. Forgiveness is a choice to let go of hurt and anger within yourself and it is one of the many forms of love god gave us. What it boils down to is our self-made perception of the world and our choices on how we interact and interpret it as well. Though we are individuals and we have our own personal view of how the world is and how it should be, we should remember we are also a piece of the great puzzle of life. There is so many other individuals living here with us at the same time and we are as one machine even though we are independent  in thought. In the end each one of us has pretty much the same goals such as living a happy life, making those we love happy and helping them to have a happy life as well. Though we all may see what happiness is in a different way, we all want to be happy and live life in peace. Even those who start wars and seem to pursue an aggressive existence crave peace and happiness, they just got hung-up on the pain and anger the world and life can bring. Some seek wealth, others seek power and both seek what they believe will bring them and those they love happiness in the end. There are even some that seek death either because they want to reach their vision of heaven or they believe it would end the suffering they have within their minds and hearts. Death is no answer, it is just an inevitable fact of being a mortal being as we humans are. Life is the answer and how you live it, perceive it and interact with it are the keys. We can either work together to find happiness and peace in life or we can continue pursuing our personal dreams. Either way we are the captains of our own destinies and we alone choose our paths in life. No one is responsible for your actions, thoughts and how you perceive life and the world around you but yourself.

We choose our own path in life, how we interact and perceive our world is an individual choice.

Ray Barbier

All you can do is your best


p10052Your attitude is what makes or breaks your day, How you perceive the world around you is distorted and/or filtered through your state of mind.  Positive thinking may not be a cure-all, but it sure makes life a lot less stressful. Negative thoughts on the other hand makes ones day far more stressful and frustrating. So how you think is how you and your day will be in the end.

Happiness is a state of mind and is the result of a positive outlook and a heart that is compassionate and kind. The key is not to worry so much about the thoughts and opinions of others and to be thoughtful of how you think of others and yourself. Just do the best that you can and be the best possible person you can be.for when it’s all said and done, all you can do is your best. If you have done your best and been the best person you can be then you will at least you will be able to go to bed with a clean conscience.

Ray Barbier

Thinking in a positive manner


016 Thinking in a positive manner helps one to keep a positive outlook on life. Too much negative thinking keeps one from finding joy in life and causes physical ailments such as high blood pressure, depression and other problems with your health. Your brain is a bio-chemical computer and when you think negative and/or positive it creates and utilizes certain chemicals. The medical community believes chemical imbalances cause certain mental disorders, but I wonder if the way we think if done over long periods could create imbalances to one way or another. Just a thought, being I am no doctor or anything of the sort it will remain a theory I will ponder on. But I do know certain foods and physical activity does affects the brain and its chemical makeup. Simple things such as endorphins and adrenalin are elevated during physical activity and some foods can help change their levels as well. Even sunbathing and getting a tattoo causes changes in your endorphin levels.

Sun Bathing and getting tattoos is known to be habit-forming due to the endorphin rush one gets from such things. Endorphins are like a happy drug in a way even though they were designed to kill pain in the body.

Check out this article on Positive thinking  at NY Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/02/health/power-of-positive-thinking-may-have-a-health-benefit-study-says.html

Well Till Next Time God Bless Smile

My own self


p10104 There has been times in my life I allowed my low self-esteem and lack of self-confidence to stop me from getting a good job or just getting a job done. The only thing that stood in my way of getting the job or doing the job was my own self. Like others I allowed my fears, insecurities and self-doubt to limit me and keep me from the possibilities that were before me. It is so easy to excuse your way through life, never to face change and never to leave your comfort zone. The cost of living in such a way in the end is quite high, you miss so much of life and you never get to experience life as the person you were born to be.

I have learned you can blame others for the bad things in your life all you want, but the truth is that you alone make the choices that creates what your life is like, going to change into and ultimately will become. It is your choice if you allow others to influence and/or control aspects of your life. Others only have the power that you allow them to have over you and your life.

tpl0008So it all boils down to what choices you make and what external influences you allow to play a part in your life. The choice is always yours, even when you choose to allow others to make a choice for you.

Your life is the sum of the experiences you have had and the choices you have both made and avoided.

Ray Barbier

Some Random Ideas


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Too many times I find that I choose to be unhappy by focusing on the negative thoughts running amok in my head. I also have noticed when I put some effort into pushing the negative thoughts aside with a more positive frame of mind, my day seems to get a lot brighter and/or happier. So I have come to the conclusion that ones frame of thought controls not only the mood one is in but also significantly influences ones total outlook on life. To think positive, to reject the negative thoughts within yourself and that which comes from an external force can change ones day if not life. We are what we think or believe we are and we are either limited or expanded by those thoughts and/or beliefs. The power of thought along with emotions are what makes us the sentient beings God has created us to be, without self-consciousness and emotional awareness we would not have the great potential we as human beings have.

Ray Barbier

A flame that consumes all the positivity within you


009 Acceptance of who and what you are is the first step to improving your outlook on life. If you are at war with who and what you are constantly then you will never find happiness or peace in your life. The things that you dislike about yourself can be removed, tamed or changed into something positive or at least acceptable. Those negative thoughts about yourself and others is like a flame that consumes all the positivity within you. There is no reason to hold on to negativity nor is there a reason not to be more positive. Forgive those whom have hurt you, forgive yourself for the hurt you’ve caused both yourself and others. Learn not to repeat the mistakes of the past and avoid those people who cause you pain. Don’t hate them or hold a grudge just be smart enough to avoid them as much as possible. Find those who are supportive, kind and bring light into your life and avoid those who suck the happiness and positivity out of you.

You must learn to be a positive force in life, you can not allow the negativity of others to influence you and you can not allow the negativity within you to gain control. You are the one in charge and you can choose to be happy, positive and content with life or you can choose to be negative and unhappy. Be someone who you would love to be with, be someone who you would be proud of and learn to love yourself and others unconditionally.

You are the master of your emotions, thoughts and actions. No one can make the choice of how you feel, what you think or what action you take but yourself.

Ray Barbier

We do not always see the opportunities that surround us


IMG_1077The power of thought be it positive or negative  can affect the body as well as the mind. If you go around with a negative attitude it attracts more of the same. There is no guarantee if you are a positive person that you wont have to deal with some negativity, but you will not face as much as someone with a negative attitude. With so many books out there claiming they have secrets that will lead  you to better life and all that your heart desires, the only one getting what they want most of the time with those books is the author and the publisher. Not saying the don’t have some kind of truth to what they are saying, usually its all common sense or plain positive thinking along with visualization. Now I am not saying don’t buy those books or that they don’t work, I am just saying a lot of what they teach is out there for free if you look hard enough.

One easy way to be happy and have all you desire is to be more realistic in what you desire and expect of yourself and others. Though most of us would not be happy with that scenario so that leaves us wanting for a shortcut or easy way to reach our goals and find happiness in life. Reality is, there is no real shortcuts out there unless you have some rich uncle or you are a con artists or something along those lines. Hard work is always needed to achieve your goals, saving and investing wisely also helps. The one thing I have learned it is hard to get rich owning your own business bit its next to impossible to get rich working for someone else.

But is it really money, possessions and or social status we are needing or wanting? Will they really bring that happiness we think they will or will they just temporarily give us a happy high and then we find ourselves back where we started or worse? Financial stability always helps but to be rich is only having way more than we need. Sure I would love to have enough right now to retire and live like I do for the rest of my life. I am happy being a lower middle-class person and I don’t see any real need for me to be a millionaire. Give me a roof over my head a good vehicle, bills paid and 3 square meals a day with maybe a bit left over in the bank and I am one happy man. But that is me and I know there are those that want the moon and everything else they can get in their lifetime.

So does visualization and positive thinking work? Yes, but to the magnitude that some claim, probably not as often as we all would like. Sure you can attract things through positivity and visualization,  you can also get a lot of things through faith and prayer as well. Sometimes it is just the matter of opening your eyes to the opportunities around you. For most of us we do not always see the opportunities that surround us nor the gifts God has laid by our feet because we are too focused on the stress and worry of life to see them.

Positive thinking, visualization, faith and prayer all can bring you some happiness and even some wealth. but if you forget where your blessings and help comes  from (GOD) they can always be taken away just as fast.

Ray Barbier