Average

"When you're average, you are as close to the bottom as you are to the top." -John Wooden

Average, Middle-class, Normal... call it what you want but what it really means is being controlled by a system and not being good nor bad at it

"When I thought I was learning to live, I was learning to die." -Leonardo Da Vinci

What is the system?
The system is a set of beliefs they influence you to follow - so much so that you loose your individuality to become a carbon copy of what is considered appropriate for the system in place.

Can I beat the system?
No, you can't beat the system but you don't really want that anyway. What you really want to do is either master it or create your own.

Ok... so how do I do that?

"The brain simply believes what you tell it the most." -Shad Helmstetter

The person you listen to the most is in control of your thoughts. If you want to master, or create a system, what you'll first need is creativity. Creativity comes from within - how can you think creatively, or have original ideas, if you're a carbon copy of somebody else? Your ideas are not your own until you stop people from dictating your thoughts and start listening to yourself.

Finding yourself, your individuality, your own ideas, will help you figure out ways to succeed within a system or create a successful system of your own. Given that, of course, you have the courage to follow through on your ideas but that's another topic for another day.

Can One Person Make a Difference?

Where would we be today if Martin Luther King Jr. never gave his "I have a dream" speech? Where would we be today if nobody had stood up against Hitler? If King Leonidas wouldn't of taken a stand against Persia's invading army, would we still have our form of government?
History is full of great men and women who initiated change.

"Anyone who thinks that they are too small to make a difference has never tried to fall asleep with a mosquito in the room." -Christine Todd Whitman

So, can one person make a difference? Yes, absolutely - one person CAN make a difference! It takes that one person to first take a stand; to then inspire the mass to move towards something greater than themselves.

The person who thinks one person can't make a different hasn't spent enough time studying history.

Socrates and The Oracle

"The Death of Socrates", by Jacques-Louis David (1787)

Socrates' friend, Chaerephon, asked the oracle, in Delphi, if there was someone wiser than Socrates to which the Oracle replied “no one”. Socrates, who had heard of the tale thought it was ridiculous since he felt like he wasn't the wisest man. This began his journey to find a wiser man than he was.

He found a politician on his journey who was known to be wise. Socrates spoke to the man and pointed out what the man didn't know which angered the man. He then famously said:

“I am wiser than this man: neither of us knows anything that is really worth knowing, but he thinks that he has knowledge when he has not, while I, having no knowledge, do not think that I have. I seem, at any rate, to be a littler wiser than he is on this point: I do not think that I know what I do not know.”

He had a similar experience with every wise person he met. This quest eventually brought his death after he angered too many wise people in power; who then gave him the death penalty. Socrates died in 348 B.C. by willingly drinking poison following is death penalty.

There are no known written document, by Socrates, that survived. Everything we know about this Philosopher was brought down to us by his students, mainly Plato, who followed him and documented his journey.

What we can learn from this story is that when we think we “know”, we sometime become arrogant and take offence when exposed to new ideas. It is important that we remain humble and curious so we can be opened to those new ideas and grow as human beings.

*This post can also be found on my Personal Blog (Student of LIFE).

Pleasures - The Downfall of Civilizations

“In American today the popular word for good life is “happiness”…The American pursuit of happiness can often look like a compulsive, joyless effort to escape boredom… a people blessed with far more material advantages than any other society has ever enjoyed is not clearly the happiest on earth.” –Harold H. Titus & Marilyn S. Smith

The material advantage is a curse more than a blessing. Most of those things promises to make our lives easier by helping us or saving time. One would think that those improvements would allow us to focus on more important endeavors but it only “free us” to pursue more things.

Materials are a curse when the people buying it have no sense of values (as in what’s really important in life). When this occurs, the things he owns-owns him.
We buy things because it’s pleasurable and we too often confuse pleasure with happiness. Like Orrin Woodward said, “Pleasure doesn’t bring happiness, only an increased hunger for more pleasures.”

Happiness comes from following our values. Joy, which is the ultimate form of happiness, comes from being at peace with ourselves and is often attained through religion or spirituality (along with following values) – It’s a sense of belonging to something bigger than us.

Pleasure is like a quick burning fire, it often can’t be controlled even if we think we can. Pleasure is short lived and has been the caused of the downfalls of previous civilizations which will include our own if we don’t understand it and attempt to move away from it.

Be Proactive with Your Emotions

"We've just grown apart"; said the man before leaving his wife.

PEOPLE CHANGE ALL THE TIME! OF COURSE YOU'VE GROWN APART IF YOU HAVEN'T SPENT THE TIME TO LEARN ABOUT YOUR PARTNER.

"We've grown apart" is a lame excuse from people who believe love is a feeling that just "is". Feelings are like fires, if you don't nurture them they eventually die out.

If you're sad, stop thinking about the things that makes you sad and the feeling will go away-only to return when you're thinking about it again.

We're not controlled by our emotions as much as we have control over them. Those who fail to understand this are doomed to go from relationship to relationship; changing partner whenever the feeling dictates.

*This post can also be found on my Personal Blog (Student of LIFE).