by Ada Porat | Jun 14, 2018 | Decision-making, Empowering changes, Life skills
Decisions feature hugely in our lives – and optimal decisions are invaluable. At this very moment, your life is the product of every decision you’ve made along the way – both big ones and small ones.
Since you navigate life by the choices you make, you can substantially improve your outcomes by making more optimal decisions. Here are twenty proven ways to enhance your decision making.
- Take appropriate ownership. Recognize that some decisions that are not yours to make. Life flows more smoothly when you accept responsibility for your own decisions and give others the freedom to accept responsibility for theirs.
- Avoid oversimplicity. Making an optimal decision is a process of selecting from among various alternatives; it is not just choosing between right and wrong. Avoid over-simplistic black and white thinking, and you will find many additional options in between.
- Use the OAR approach in your decision-making. Consider the Objectives you desire; the Alternatives that are available and the Risks of every alternative you are considering.
- Do your research. Learn how others have addressed similar issues, expand your awareness of options and open your mind to possibilities you may not have not considered.
- Take time to be thorough. Consider all the alternatives and write down the pros and cons of every line of action. It clarifies your thinking and makes for a better decision.
- Avoid snap decisions. Move fast on reversible choices and slowly on irreversible decisions.
- Respect the value of timing. Choosing the right alternative at the wrong time is no better than the wrong alternative at the right time, so an optimal decision will ideally happen while you still have time to refine it.
- Never let decisions accumulate. Make step-by-step decisions as you go along – a backlog of many little decisions can bog you down mentally and lead to overwhelm.
- Take time to ponder. Review all the facts as soon as you are aware of a decision to be made, then set it aside. Let the options incubate in your subconscious until it is time to make the actual decision.
- Avoid decisions based on fear. Base your decisions on positive values and goals that are important to you, not on people or circumstances you want to avoid.
- Consider others. Your decisions may have a huge impact on other people, even though you are ultimately responsible for those decisions. Whenever feasible, ask for input from people who may be affected before you make your decision.
- Don’t wait for guarantees. Often, it is impossible to have 100% certainty that your decision is correct because the implementation and outcomes are still in the future. It is enough to do due diligence and make a choice now; you can fine-tune your decision later.
- Avoid analysis paralysis. Remember that not making a decision is actually a decision not to take action!
- Keep an open mind. Every decision is a learning opportunity: you have the right to make poor decisions as well as excellent ones, and you have an opportunity to learn from them all.
- Keep perspective. Don’t waste your time making decisions that do not have to be made – focus on essential decisions instead, and the others will fall into place.
- Consider practical factors. As part of your decision-making process, always consider how you would implement your choice.
- Assess the risk. Before implementing what appears to be the best choice, assess the risk by asking “What can I think of that might go wrong with this alternative?”
- Don’t waffle. Once you’ve made an optimal decision, don’t look back! Accept that you made the most appropriate choice given the information and options you had to work with and focus instead on your next move.
- Commit to your decision. Once you’ve made a decision, banish doubt from your mind; instead, commit yourself to making your choice an optimal decision.
- Celebrate optimal decisions. Commend yourself for the optimal decisions you have made, and you have more confidence the next time you are faced with a choice.
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | May 1, 2018 | Empowering changes
You have the power for success in you. Yes, you have the power in you to change your life! Every day, there are people all around this country and the globe beyond who are living their dreams. Families are experiencing harmonious relationships. People are becoming healthier. Life-long learners are growing intellectually and improving their chances for success. And this power for success is in you, too.
Living the life of your dreams is indeed possible. People prove that every day. Right now, someone somewhere is healing their relationships, improving their health and fulfilling their potential.
Why not you? You have the power for success in you. Yes, you have the power to change your life!
Have you ever wanted to do more fulfilling work? Have you looked at someone who seems to have it all together and wished that it could be you? People think about finding happiness and fulfillment all the time, yet only a small number of them actually do. Why is that, do you think? Fact is, you have the same power for success in you. Are you using it?
Someone is going to start a business. Someone is going to follow their bliss. Someone is going to start the journey to deep fulfillment. So why not let it be you?
Today, around the globe, someone is embracing the challenge of starting something new. Someone is shaking off their limiting beliefs to align with something better. Someone is choosing to share more love with their family. Someone is scheduling meaningful time with friends. How about you? The power to change for the better is in you as well!
Someone is going back to school to improve their life. Someone is becoming a life-long learner. Someone is reading an inspiring book or listening to a lecture every week for the next year. Why not let it be you? You have the power for success in you – why not use it?
Right now, someone is noticing that they need to lose a little weight and they’re choosing to become healthy. Someone is training for their first marathon. Someone is joining a yoga or Pilates class improve their health. How about you?
I think by now you get the point: Everyday, everywhere, people are improving their lives. Whether you approve or not doesn’t matter to those who do. They are doing it, regardless. It is simply a choice they made. The power for success is in you, so why not let that person be you?
How to do it is simple, really. There are only three action steps involved.
Commit to honor the power in you.
This is the first and most important step to improving your life. Do you wish to improve or stay the same? What you’ve achieved in the past is fine, but it doesn’t give you a free ride into the future. The decision about who you will become is made now, today and every day. Every day, you can commit to grow and thrive. You have the power in you to change.
Make a plan.
Once you’ve decided to improve your life, you need a plan with practical action steps. It can be simple: Start to meditate each day. Walk a mile a day. Read an article a day. You just need a simple plan with achievable goals. Today, you can take action toward a better life; you can develop a plan to take you into the future of your dreams.
Take action.
Even the greatest ideas, without action, become stale and useless. Action is the key that turns dreams into reality. Great ideas are a dime a dozen. People who act on their dreams and ideas are a select few, but they reap the rich rewards of building a life they love. You have the power in you to do this!
Perhaps you’ve been looking at others who live the good life, wishing that you could as well. Well, no more! Commit to your unique life, your abilities and your potential; develop a plan and act on it. You can do this!
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit www.AdaPorat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Apr 5, 2018 | Conscious living, Fear and anxiety, Life transitions
Too much change, too fast, becomes counterproductive. It can feel overwhelming because it pulls us out of alignment with our habits, beliefs and values without giving us enough time to adapt.
If you’ve slipped into overwhelm, it’s most likely not because you’re a loser but because you are stuck in situations that have pulled you out of alignment with your inner truth. Restoring alignment and flow in life is at the core of all personal growth.
To regain harmony, you need to restore a greater sense of alignment between your external environment and your inner self. This restoration work has two parts: changing your outer environment and changing your inner relationship to your outer environment.
To restore alignment with your outer environment, you may need to let go of friends who drag you back into old habits or step out of a destructive relationship at work or home.
The second part requires changing your internal relationship to your outer environment. This alignment is more important because you have complete power over your internal choices, whereas you have less influence over your outer environment.
Changing your internal relationship with your environment takes a lot of effort – there are no short cuts to glory here. The payoff – increased peace, harmony, joy, energy, clarity, self-respect, empowerment, satisfaction and meaning in life – is its own reward!
Here are some critical components that can help you restore alignment with your environment.
- Refocus
Refocus on your core values. As you do this, an inner sense of integrity will return to your life. When there are no discrepancies in your value system, decisionmaking becomes easier, so you can align with environments that support your being instead of suppressing you.
- Define Your Purpose
You are the only person who can define what your life needs to look like to have meaning and success. For a moment, imagine you are at the end of your life, reviewing the life you’ve just lived. What’s the single most important accomplishment in your life? What is it you wish to be remembered for? What is the legacy you leave behind? When you connect with that core purpose, it will bring focus to everything else you do.
- Look for Clarity
Next, what things in life bring you joy? Even if you can think of just one thing, reflect on it until you see why it brings you joy. Is it playing with your dog because it makes you feel unconditionally loved; or spending time nurturing family members where you feel that you are making a valuable contribution? Identify what brings you joy and why; then start looking for ways to bring more of that into your life. With clarity around what brings joy and meaning to your life, you’ll enjoy the effort of working toward it, instead of feeling burdened.
- Cultivate Awareness
Observe animals in the wild and you’ll notice how fully present they are in each moment. For them, it’s a matter of life or death. For you and me, the process ultimately leads to the same outcomes although we’re not always aware of it. Each waking moment, we make choices that either move us toward a fuller expression of life or deaden the Life Force in us. Cultivate full awareness and you’ll make more optimal choices.
- Stay present
Stay present in the moment; discipline your mind and bring it back from a hypothetical future fraught with fear (“What if I lose my job?” or “What if I get cancer?”) Fact is, the future is not created yet and by letting fear-filled thoughts run rampant in your mind, you’re setting in motion probabilities that won’t serve you well! Likewise, ruminating about yesterday serves no purpose other than distracting your focus and draining your energy. At the end of each day, review the events of the day; forgive those who’ve hurt or let you down; ask forgiveness for those areas where you didn’t live up to your highest potential; resolve how you’re going to make different choices; and then let them go! Stay present – this is the only place from where you can bring about meaningful change.
- Be resourceful
When faced with challenges, don’t limit your options. Choose different responses; find more than one way of looking at things. Broaden your viewpoint to include possibilities you may not have entertained before. Consider all options you can think of before narrowing down your choices. You’d be amazed at how this simple exercise opens up possibilities!
- Banish self-judgment and negative self-talk
When you indulge in self-judgment and negative self-talk, you’re replaying the old tapes of others’ criticism and judgment that you’ve internalized. These behaviors are self-destructive. Stop it! You wouldn’t dream of attacking the Divine Presence in you, so why would you attack the human aspects that need healing? Healthy introspection acknowledges limitation and failure without judgment and allows you to change behaviors that no longer serve you.
- Maintain respect
If your actions were made public, would you retain self-respect? Societal norms commonly condone acts of greed and dishonesty as long as the perpetrator doesn’t get caught. Tolerating such lack of integrity undermines respect for ourselves and others. Do only that which you’d respect in another, and that which you wouldn’t mind being made public. When you maintain respect, you are strengthening the foundations of your life and your society.
- Stay in the Game
The game of life is not over until the final breath. Don’t give up at half-time because you’ve fumbled the ball. Never let one bad move knock you out of commission – get back in and give it your best! Change the things that don’t work and focus on what does. Give thanks for the breaks along the way and keep at it until the final moment! Miracles and breakthroughs often come at the most unexpected times, but you must be in the game to benefit from it.
Working with even just a few of these aspects will help you restore a sense of alignment between your inner life and your external environment so you can be the difference our world needs now!
About the Author:
©Copyright Ada Porat. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Feb 25, 2018 | Mindfulness, Self-awareness
Some people possess a very special gift: they embody the presence of peace within. When we have a chance to sit close to someone like that, we also feel calm. They radiate inner peace in a way that deeply touches us. The presence of their inner peace stills our wandering thoughts and calms our anxieties.
Whenever we have a chance to be with a soul who lives in the eternal Now, we can feel this subtle source of peace and joy. Through their presence, we’re able to connect to that source as well. Their inner tranquility calms the turbulence in the world around them, and they teach us by example how to find peace within.
You too can learn to live this way. Living from a place of inner peace is not reserved for gurus and spiritual masters only. It is a learned behavior, just as constant worry is learned.
You can shed your learned ways of hurry and move through life as if there is no need to be somewhere else in this moment. You can move through life as if you already are exactly where you need to be — as if you are arriving with every step. Every moment of your waking consciousness can bring you closer to that perennial peace within —embodied in the presence of Now.
When you choose to move through life this way, you dissolve your sense of isolation in the world. You start remembering that you’re not a separate individual rushing about to avoid bad and reach for good. Instead, you start feeling again your connection to the whole, like droplets remembering they belong to the ocean. The drop of water does not need to do anything – it simply feels the embrace of the ocean and lets itself be carried along by the current in each present moment.
That inner current of peace is your spiritual core; the inner voice that whispers to you whenever you tune out the brassy loudness of the material world. To truly feel alive and at peace, it is essential to learn how to tune in to the presence of one’s spiritual core in each moment, and to live from that inner presence instead of reacting to the outer chaos.
When we forget this, we act in ways that cause pain or separation between ourselves and others. We become reactive; we may misunderstand others and lash out in fear or anger. And afterwards, we beat ourselves up with guilt, shame and regret.
You cannot change the past, but you can release its hold over you. The power of healing the past lies in this present moment. From this place of mindfulness, you can choose forgiveness and reconciliation to clear away misunderstandings, anger and grief from the past. It is exactly in this moment, Now, that the work of healing must be done to set you free.
No matter how difficult the challenges of the past were, they are over. You are here Now, reading these words. You are alive Now! Treasure the fact that you are alive in this moment and embrace the opportunity for healing it offers. Sit down quietly and go within: meditate to look deep and sweep away the woundedness, prejudice and mistakes of the past. Accept the opportunity offered by the presence of Now, so you can be free.
This present moment offers a gift. It allows you to forgive, to heal and return to peace within, which is your natural state.
Life is present in this moment, waiting for you to choose what to do with it, and your choices determine the quality of your peace within.
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Jan 22, 2018 | Conscious living, Fear and anxiety, Resilience, Self-awareness
Are you feeling rushed as you read these words right now? Welcome to the modern world of constant connectivity! And the faster our pace of life, the more essential it becomes to nurture our inner life for resilience.
We’re living in an amazing age, every bit as futuristic as the Jetsons or Star Trek sagas some of us grew up with. I love being able to connect face to face with clients on the other side of the world, or download a song in a second. Yet this continuous connectivity also poses a challenge: many of us have trouble disconnecting from all the intensity for some peace and quiet. Our inner life can silently wither even as we chase the outer holy grail of success.
The thinner we spread ourselves, the more we skitter across the surface of our outer lives, never going deep. And technology can track us down just about anywhere, anytime, it seems there is literally no escape!
Trying to keep up the pace can take a huge toll. That stress shows up in suppressed immune systems, high blood pressure, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and digestive ailments.
What is needed is more resilience: the ability to rebound from setbacks and challenges, similar to the elasticity of a rubber band returning to its original shape after stretching.
Resilience can be developed with practice, just as you can develop muscle strength by exercising.
The process of developing resilience starts with a reminder that our true nature is eternal and not time-bound. We literally need to disconnect and remember that our souls exist in timelessness. Poet E. E. Cummings put it this way:
“How fortunate are you and I
whose home is timelessness:
We who have wandered down
from fragrant mountains of eternal now
to frolic in such mysteries
as birth and death
a day, or maybe even less…”
By connecting to the soul’s eternal nature, we regain our inner sense of poise. We can learn to not push into the future, nor run from the past, but to walk our path in this present moment with unhurried grace. Lama Surya Das calls this place of the eternal present “Buddha Standard Time.” In his book with the same title, he quotes Liu Wenmin, an early sixteenth century poet, making peace with time:
“To be able to be unhurried when hurried;
To be able not to slack off when relaxed;
To be able not to be frightened
And at a loss for what to do,
When frightened and at a loss;
This is the learning that returns us
To our natural state and transforms our lives.”
The busier we are, the more we need time out of the rat race to regain perspective and renew ourselves from within. It is our inner life that ultimately sustains us, and not the outer bells and whistles.
Honoring your inner path of truth is essential for a meaningful life. Research by palliative caretaker Bronnie Ware showed the number one regret of dying people is wishing they’d had the courage to live a life true to themselves, and not the life others expected from them.
How do we honor our inner compass amid the frenetic demands of life so we can live without regrets? Three concepts come to mind: Stay true. Stay present. Follow the energy.
- Stay True:
A commitment to truth, at all levels, is automatically a commitment to freedom. It is always truth that sets us free. And where Higher truth prevails, why would anyone need to lie?
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Polonius advises his son Laertes:
“To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
Any “security” gained through loss of inner freedom actually submits to fear at the cost of integrity and truth. A nation that puts national security above personal freedom has lost its true power base. In saying this, I am not suggesting that a country should suddenly lower its guard against all enemies (both real and imagined). I am saying that addressing the outer issue before addressing the inner conditions in consciousness that created it, will simply not solve the problem.
This is why politics is not the answer to what plagues the human condition. Politics is like a trainer who seeks to harness and train the collective energy so it will function for the good of all. It will ultimately succeed only at the lowest common denominator.
True freedom is an inside job that starts with elevating consciousness at the individual level by aligning to Higher truth. That alignment fosters confidence, resilience and trust.
- Stay Present.
Stay in the Now. Past and future are always adjuncts to that. Don’t let the busy-ness of the world rob you of this priceless gift of NOW.
That means you need to make peace with your past so you can live without regrets. It also means you need to release the need to control the future because that is an illusion causing unnecessary anxiety.
You and I do not know what the future will look like because it is not yet manifest. There is no other human who can accurately predict how life will play out, because the future is created through a myriad possibilities and individual choices that ultimately manifest when conditions are favorable.
There are no veterans or pros for where humanity is going now – it is new to all of us. The choices you and I make in each present moment, will collectively decide the future that unfolds for us. So let’s nurture our inner resilience and stay true to our path right here, right now!
- Follow The Energy.
Let your body be your barometer. It will show you what you really need. You always create the perfect scenarios to get what you really need.
There are no good or bad energies. All people and things are just energy… which is, essentially, neutral. Energy is as neutral as the electric current that lights up both a cathedral and a drug lab.
Some frequencies of energy may seem particularly useful and attractive to you for where you’re at in your individual consciousness right now. Other frequencies can repulse for the same reason. That does not make them good or bad; they are simply useful to your journey at this particular time or not.
Pay attention to the things that attract or repel you; they are clues to what you need to do, choose or say in order to move forward on your path.
Together, these three principles can help you cultivate a richer and more resilient inner life, no matter how much turmoil you face in your environment.
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
