Closing Doors

Although I have not been writing often since the launch of my newest book, I have written a bit about making lists and using this time of year when we 'make lists and check them twice' to also makes lists that will aid in your personal growth.  Today I am writing about another kind of list.  This list should be entitled:  Doors I Should Close List.

A personal development adage about doors goes like this, "When one door closes, another (or a window) opens."  This adage feels a bit powerless to me.  It feels as though, yet again, I was the victim of something negative happening 'to me'.  I am suggesting you be a bit proactive in your development today.  I am suggesting you make a list of 'doors' you have walked through enough and it is time that you take an action and close the door. 

To often we wait for a door to close when we should have locked the door a long time ago.  The door -- the relationship -- be it a business, love, community or even spiritual -- had served it's purpose in our lives and our lives in theirs.  The 'reason and season' had come and gone, yet we held on.  We waited for them to close the door. 

Dr. Success Challenge:  Make a list of doors (relationships) you should respectfully close.  If you need to take an action to close the relationship, take that action.  A respectful closing might look like a letter thanking the person for being in your life and stating you will not be in communication going forward.  Maybe it is a job you need to leave.  Of course, find a new one or find the financial support needed to end that relationship prior to taking action, but take action. 

Here is the interesting thing about actively closing a door in your relationship life -- you can also choose to re-open it at some point.  When you choose to respectfully end a relationship you can choose to respectfully approach that door -- I mean relationship -- again if something changes in the future.  That is usually not the case when you wait so long that the door is slammed shut on you and you are sent scrambling to find an open window out of which to crawl. 

Happy list making.  Happy door closing.  Happy window shopping. 
Andrea Goeglein, Phd
DrSuccess@ServingSuccess.com

Five Secrets John Izzo

Today's selected BK book is John Izzo's, The Five Secrets You Must Discover before You Die.  Know that I really pronounced John's name so very, very wrong.  Thank you to AM AZ for allowing me to feature these great books.  As always, you can purchase this book at Amazon or from BK direct.

Thirty One Days

I journal each morning (and of course you do too).  I have a ritual,  at the end of each month I list the good things that occurred during that month.  I don't list the negative things that have happened unless I have transformed the experience and have begun to use it in a positive way.  Today is August 31 so I made my list.  Then I went to YouTube to record the number of hits Gary Russo has received since the original video was posted on August 1.

Here is the number:  1,005,417  8/31/11 8:30 a.m. PST

That is the power of the internet.  That is the power of a spirit would not be stopped.  That is only the beginning.  Congratulations Gary.  Thank you Fish for creating the video. 

All You Need Is Friends

I have used the infamous Beatles song lyric many times in my writings, "All you need is friends..."Today I was reminded of that yet again.  Dear friend Claire Wolfe planned a ladies week at The Oaks in Ojai, CA.  I had intended to go but life got in the way of that intention.  Never being one to want to miss a marketing opportunity, I sent a box of Don't Die With Vacation Time On The Books hats so my friends in arms could wear them on their morning walks while at the Oaks.  Of course the hats have the website to order the book!

Well, this photo shows (or not since Blogger upload is not going well!) my friend Claire doing me one better.  As Claire takes her morning hike -- with her Don't Die hat of course -- she is pitching away to the founder of the Oaks, Sheila Cluff, what a great idea it would be to have me come to the Oaks and do a  version of my Don't Die with Your Book Unwritten personal development workshop. 

I love my friends!  Thank you Claire -- and Rebecca for sending the photo.  So how many of you got that I believe 'friends' equals 'love'?
Andrea T. Goeglein, PhD
www.facebook.com/DrSuccessPhD
www.YouTube.com/user/ServingSuccess
DrSuccess@ServingSuccess.com

Don't Die Books Workshop

Dr. Success Challenge:  Notice what messages you have received in the first few hours of the day.  These messages can be written, spoken, texted, in a commerical or a song you heard.  What thoughts came to mind?

The message I received today during my meditiation was to FOCUS.  My main task is to formalize and finalize the details for the July 15 & 16 Don't Die with Your Book Inside You workshop in Las Vegas.  The next message I got from a reading:  "There is no script that we must follow in life.  We get to write the story, and if we don't like the one we wrote, we get to rewrite it as many times as we choose.  That is how we find out who we are, what we really want from life, and how we really want to live." Rev. Ron Fox p. 50 SoM

Plan to join me.  Thank you.  Andrea Goeglein, PhD
http://www.dontdiebooks.com/
www.YouTube.com/user/ServingSuccess
www.facebook.com/DrSuccessPhD

Journals and Journaling

I to share the journal I have been using since March 25.  It is designed with a quote from a famous person on one page and a Biblical quote on the other.  Don't think it would appeal to everyone but for those with a Christian background or for those who are not offended by Christian verse, it really is a pretty, and pretty inspirational, book to write in each day. 

I have shared -- and been inspired -- by many of the quotes in this journal the last few months so it's only right I give you the link to possibly buy one so the author makes something from all my sharing! 

And for those in the Las Vegas area Stillpoint Center for Spiritual Development will be conducting a journaling workshop in August. 

As always, happy writing and thank you, Andrea
www.Facebook.com/DrSuccessPhD
www.YouTube.com/user/ServingSuccess
http://www.dontdiebooks.com/

Are you receptive?

I have a favorite line in my first Don’t Die™ Book.
“Change is not the promise that there will be no challenges, but the hope that with each challenge you learn to grow with greater trust. What I can promise is that all this hope, change, and trust take time.”

I had made a 30 day commitment to write on the topic of awareness and perspective. Up until now, I have not met my commitment 100%, yet the messages that I get from my daily readings keep pulling me back to that focus whether I have time or not!

I started the day with three…yes 3 again…messages that keep lining up:

From TUT, I was reminded that challenges actually give life it’s richness. Mike Dooley posed this question: Now what if, painful as they may temporarily be, you could choose a life during which challenges might arise whenever your thinking needed expansion, on the sole condition that every one of them could be overcome no matter how daunting they may at first seem?

From Fr. Richard Rohr, “After the Madonna and child image (the essential Incarnation icon), the Annunciation is the most painted Christian scene. Did you ever notice that Mary does not say here that she is “not worthy”? She just asks for clarification. She only asks “How” because that might ask something more of her. She never asks if, whether, or why!”

And from the top of the journal page I wrote on this morning: “Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good.” Vaclav Havel

Dr. Success Challenge:  Answer this question for yourself:  If you received these messages, what message would you actually be receiving?

Thank you...And by the way...you did receive these messages since you read this!
Andrea T. Goeglein, PhD
www.Facebook.com/DrSuccessPhD
www.YouTube.com/user/ServingSuccess
www.DontDieBooks.com

The Message of Threes

There is a lot of folklore about things coming in threes.  Today I received three messages about taking responsibility.  Each message came in a wonderful way. 

The first was in the daily message from TUT.
The next came in the way of a quote printed in my journal which stated you don't achieve what you think about, you achieve what you take responsibility for.
The third came as part of the message delivered by a lay deacon at a Catholic Mass.  His message was that we must take responsibility for what we think because what we think is actually our real 'judgement day'. 

What I think is taking responsibility is the most freeing action I can take.  What do you think?

Andrea T. Goeglein, PhD

Dr. Success™
http://www.dontdiebooks.com/
DrSuccess@ServingSuccess.com
www.YouTube.com/user/ServingSuccess

Stumbling on Happiness

Oh, it’s that old awareness and perspective thing coming back to haunt us all again.
So you want to have kids, yah? Parents beware for what you wish! Harvard researcher, Dr. Daniel Gilbert’s research shows that ‘people with young children living with them are the least happy of all.’ How is that for a Monday morning wakeup call?

Gilbert’s research goes on to show, however – and this is a big however – that it is critical that parents believe children will make them happy. That belief, no matter how unsubstantiated by evidence, allows parents to continually put forth the effort, energy, time and money needed to rear a child to adulthood.

Now here is the perspective changing part directly from the author: “As a result of that sacrifice, we love them all the more. We don’t value our children in spite of how difficult they are, we value our children because of how difficult they are.”

My Mom always said you appreciate the things you work hard to accomplish. Once again, Mom was right and she did not need any research to prove her intuition.

Thank you, Mom!
Andrea T. Goeglein, PhD
Dr. Success™
http://www.dontdiebooks.com/
DrSuccess@ServingSuccess.com
www.YouTube.com/user/ServingSuccess

Note: The quotes in this blog are taken directly from the October 2010 Monitor on Psychology article by Christopher Munsey.