Facing Our Temptations

As human beings, we have many good habits that we’ve formed and held onto in our lives and then there are some bad habits that we’d really like to dump. Like most of us, you have probably observed and experienced how very difficult it is to change a bad habit, whether the bad habit is overeating, overworking, sleeping too much or too little, watching too much TV, checking our email or text compulsively or some even worse habit or addiction.

Thinking about this recently reminded me to look again at a book I read some years ago. I believe it’s one that can shed tremendous light on our habits including how to form good ones and how to break bad ones. The book is Living Beautifully by Pema Chodron.

I must admit that even though I’ve formed lots of good habits that have led to some very wonderful and rewarding successes in parts of my life, I’ve also had some bad habits that have hurt me, and it’s been so very frustrating for me to try to break or change the bad ones only to fail and fall back into them. But Pema’s book has some real answers and directions that, so far, seem to be quite a breakthrough.

First of all, she outlines that part of the reason we have trouble breaking bad habits is because we are too hard on ourselves.  What most of us do when we end up doing something that we’ve tried to stop doing, is to get mad at ourselves, beating ourselves up with all kinds of negative self-talk. Then we try to repress our thoughts and whatever we did that got us to break our promise to ourselves. She strongly suggests that instead, we come to recognize that we are fundamentally good rather than thinking that we are fundamentally flawed.

Probably Pema’s biggest lesson for us is a bit surprising. She suggests that if we are trying to break a bad habit, we need to think hard on refraining from doing what we promised ourselves we wouldn’t do but DON’T repress it. In other words, face the fact that you are tempted or even that you give in and do it.

She goes on to say that many bad habits come from us trying to escape from uncertainty and fear in our lives, especially in particular situations.  So when we are faced with the desire to fall into that bad habit, we need to examine our thinking to see what led us to that point and then try to refrain from that action but not repress our thoughts about it. Tell yourself it’s okay that you feel like falling back into that habit but also tell yourself, in that moment, you are going to resist. And then every time the thought comes up, you do that again.

Pema has science backing her up on this issue.  She says, “Science is demonstrating that every time we refrain but don’t repress, new neural pathways open up in the brain. In not taking the old escape routes, we’re predisposing ourselves to a new way of seeing ourselves, a new way of relating to the mysteriously unpredictable world in which we live.” And so, in the process, we are hard wiring our brain to do the right thing automatically.

What I learned from Pema is already working well on a couple bad habits that I’ve been trying to break for years, and I am so pleased!! Try it yourself and you may well see what I mean and find success.

Investing in Uncertain Times

The past couple of weeks have been a roller coaster in the news and it has left some people feeling anxious about the future. That can happen right before an election anyway because we feel uncertain not knowing who’s going to be in White House or what they might do. We have also been going through a couple of years of high inflation coming off the crazy time we had with the pandemic. So, it’s no wonder that some people don’t want to take risks, especially big risks with their money.

Investing your money will always come with some kind of risk. If it wasn’t risky, everybody would be doing it! But none of us would make much money if everybody was trying to do it so think of risk as a kind of filter that sorts out the people who can’t take a lot of risk or who just aren’t comfortable with it.

The problem for people who aren’t comfortable with taking some risks is that they can end up looking back and regretting that they didn’t invest back when they had the chance to really grow their wealth.

So, what I’m trying to say is, don’t be like the people that will look back in 3, 5, or 10 years from now and wish they had gotten into real estate income properties sooner. The sooner you can start investing in real estate, the more wealth you will have in the long run.

I’ll tell you one really true thing — politicians are not going to cure our inflation. They’ve not been able to do so since the beginning of time.  So don’t think that your choice for government leadership is going to reduce inflation, give us certainty in the stock market, or create a strong real estate market. Besides, now is actually a good time because you can benefit from national inflation instead of being hurt by it.

The thing is though, you need to know how to go about getting into these investments, because otherwise you’ll be making all the mistakes you really want to avoid. I know… I made a lot of mistakes when I got started. But you don’t have to make those mistakes that are only going to slow you down. 

My book, The Next Step to Waking the Financial Genius Inside You, contains a tried and true game plan to avoid many of the common mistakes people make when starting out and gives you specific knowledge to keep you on the right path.

You and I may be different in many ways, but I honestly and sincerely believe we have at least one common interest — that we live in a country with opportunity, and we have the means to make things happen.

I have tremendous faith in our American free enterprise system — as I hope you do — and I believe that your efforts can be so well rewarded.  If you stop and think about it, our economic system is geared to allow the ambitious to succeed. So don’t let the ups and down in the news get to you. Instead, get yourself the information you need to make you feel more confident that you can minimize your risks. Because America still is a country where a person can make their dreams come true.