“You
must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the
ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.” {Gandhi}
“The
difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to
solve most of the world’s problem.” {Gandhi}
“If I
had no sense of humor, I would long ago have committed suicide.” {Gandhi}
1. Change yourself.
“You must be the change you want to see in the world.”
“As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in
being able to remake the world – that is the myth of the atomic age – as in
being able to remake ourselves.”
If you change yourself you will change your world. If
you change how you think then you will change how you feel and what actions you
take. And so the world around you will change. Not only because you are now
viewing your environment through new lenses of thoughts and emotions but also
because the change within can allow you to take action in ways you wouldn’t
have – or maybe even have thought about – while stuck in your old thought
patterns.
2. You are in control.
“Nobody can hurt me without my permission.”
What you feel and how you react to something is always
up to you. There may be a “normal” or a common way to react to different
things. But that’s mostly just all it is.
You can choose your own thoughts, reactions and emotions
to pretty much everything. You don’t have to freak out, overreact of even react
in a negative way. Perhaps not every time or instantly. Sometimes a knee-jerk
reaction just goes off. Or an old thought habit kicks in.
And as you realize that no-one outside of yourself can
actually control how you feel you can start to incorporate this thinking into
your daily life and develop it as a thought habit. A habit that you can grow
stronger and stronger over time. Doing this makes life a whole lot
easier and more pleasurable.
3. Forgive and let it go.
“The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the
attribute of the strong.”
“An eye for eye only ends up making the whole world
blind.”
Fighting evil with evil won’t help anyone. And as said
in the previous tip, you always choose how to react to something. When you can
incorporate such a thought habit more and more into your life then you can
react in a way that is more useful to you and others.
You realize that forgiving and letting go of the past
will do you and the people in your world a great service. And spending your
time in some negative memory won’t help you after you have learned the lessons
you can learn from that experience. You’ll probably just cause yourself more
suffering and paralyze yourself from taking action in this present moment.
4. Without action you aren’t going anywhere.
“An ounce of practice is worth more than tons of
preaching.”
Without taking action very little will be done. However,
taking action can be hard and difficult. There can be much inner resistance.
And so you may resort to preaching, as Gandhi says. Or
reading and studying endlessly. And feeling like you are moving forward. But
getting little or no practical results in real life.
So, to really get where you want to go and to really
understand yourself and your world you need to practice. Books can mostly just
bring you knowledge. You have to take action and translate that knowledge into
results and understanding.
5. Take care of this moment.
“I do not want to foresee the future. I am concerned
with taking care of the present. God has given me no control over the moment
following.”
The best way that I have found to overcome the inner
resistance that often stops us from taking action is to stay in the present as
much as possible and to be accepting.
6. Everyone is human.
“I claim to be a simple individual liable to err like any
other fellow mortal. I own, however, that I have humility enough to confess my
errors and to retrace my steps.”
“It is unwise to be too sure of one’s own wisdom. It is
healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might
err.”
When you start to make myths out of people – even though
they may have produced extraordinary results – you run the risk of becoming
disconnected from them. You can start to feel like you could never achieve
similar things that they did because they are so very different. So it’s
important to keep in mind that everyone is just a human being no matter who
they are.
7. Persist.
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then
they fight you, then you win.”
Be persistent. In time the opposition around you will
fade and fall away. And your inner resistance and self-sabotaging tendencies
that want to hold you back and keep you like you have always been will grow
weaker.
Find what you really like to do. Then you’ll find the
inner motivation to keep going, going and going.
One reason Gandhi was so successful with his method of
non-violence was because he and his followers were so persistent. They just
didn’t give up.
Finally, one useful tip to keep your persistence going
is to listen to Gandhi’s third quote in this article and keep a sense of humor.
It can lighten things up at the toughest of times.
8. See the good in people and help them.
“I look only to the good qualities of men. Not being
faultless myself, I won’t presume to probe into the faults of others.”
“Man becomes great exactly in the degree in which he
works for the welfare of his fellow-men.”
“I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but
today it means getting along with people.”
There is pretty much always something good in people.
And things that may not be so good. But you can choose what things to focus on.
And if you want improvement then focusing on the good in people is a useful
choice. It also makes life easier for you as your world and relationships
become more pleasant and positive.
And when you see the good in people it becomes easier to
motivate yourself to be of service to them. By being of service to other
people, by giving them value you not only make their lives better. Over time
you tend to get what you give. And the people you help may feel more inclined
to help other people. And so you, together, create an upward spiral of positive
change that grows and becomes stronger.
9. Be congruent, be authentic, be your true self.
“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and
what you do are in harmony.”
“Always aim at complete harmony of thought and word and
deed. Always aim at purifying your thoughts and everything will be well.”
I think that one of the best tips for improving your
social skills is to behave in a congruent manner and communicate in an
authentic way. People seem to really like authentic communication. And there is
much inner enjoyment to be found when your thoughts, words and actions are
aligned. You feel powerful and good about yourself.
10. Continue to grow and evolve.
”Constant development is the law of life, and a man who
always tries to maintain his dogmas in order to appear consistent drives
himself into a false position.”
You can pretty much always improve your skills, habits
or re-evaluate your evaluations. You can gain deeper understanding of yourself
and the world.
Sure, you may look inconsistent or like you don’t know
what you are doing from time to time. You may have trouble to act congruently
or to communicate authentically. But if you don’t then you will, as Gandhi
says, drive yourself into a false position. A place where you try to uphold or
cling to your old views to appear consistent while you realise within that
something is wrong. It’s not a fun place to be. To choose to grow and evolve is
a happier and more useful path to take.
Glean from this what you wish!
Blessings!
Ronell x
“The
difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to
solve most of the world’s problem.” {Gandhi}
