Personal Hack

Desire without attachment to outcome might sound like a paradox at first. How can you desire or want something and yet not care about whether you get it or not?

While desire without attachment is an old personal development concept, I myself haven’t came across any great explanations of it, and therefore it took me a while to understand it.

What are some of your future goals? Maybe it’s to increase your income, get in shape, lose weight, improve your social skills, or find that special love of your life. These are all worthy goals. Having goals is essential for personal development and growth.

Without goals your life situation will become boring, dull, and predictable. Basically your life situation is your current circumstances and lifestyle. It’s important to differentiate between your life situation and your aliveness. As I mentioned your life situation are your current circumstances and situations in life.

Your aliveness on the other hand is separate from your life situation. Your aliveness is your present moment, it’s here and now regardless of your past or your future. The quality of your aliveness is completely up to you.

Have you ever met a disabled or handicapped person and thought how difficult it must be? well you were focused on their life situation, their circumstances. Maybe when you started talking to them, and getting to know them better, you realized that they were happier than most people. How come? Because they are conscious of their aliveness. They realize that while they can try improve their life situation (by taking physical therapy or getting an operation), they wont let their life situation dictate their current state of aliveness and happiness.

The difference between your life situation and your aliveness is essential to understanding the concept of desire without attachment to outcome. Ofter we associate our aliveness with our life situation thinking that losing weight or making more money will make us happy.

Losing weight or making more money might improve the quality of your life however it will not make you happy. If you have bad financial habits, and say you win 10 million dollars tomorrow, you will eventually end up wasting all that away the same way you waste your current income. It might take you a little longer, just like how most lottery winners end up accumulating lots and lots of debt several years after their winning date. This is also why lots of Hollywood celebrities and famous music artists end up abusing drugs and going into rehab after becoming very successful. Basically with all the money they just made, they can now afford to really indulge in their addictions and destructive habits, to the point where they end up having to get professional help.

So as you can see money might increase the quality of your life, but it certainly will not solve all your problems. Does that mean that you shouldn’t desire riches and wealth? of course not. You certainly should. With lots of money you get a lot of freedom, you can travel the world, eat the best foods, live in luxurious houses, and even do a lot of good for the community. However while having that desire you must realize, that making more money does not equal happiness. This is a great example of desire without attachment to outcome. You desire the money, and work hard to get it, yet you are conscious that it’s not your salvation, and therefore you chose to be alive and enjoy your current life situation. This is why your aliveness and your life situation are separate.

You can work on improving your future life situation, however you can improve your aliveness right now. Your aliveness is your current state of happiness. There is no reason for you not to be happy in the current moment no matter what your life situation is. Happiness is a choice. Once you are monitoring your aliveness and are happy, you will realize that yes you can desire future goals, however you will not beat yourself up about your progress or the outcome (which you can’t control anyway) since you are already happy in the present moment.

Once you desire a goal without attachment to outcome you suddenly become free of fears and self defeating habits. You will not feel guilty about your slow progress and beat yourself up about it. Instead you will do your best, and let the progress and result take care of themselves, because in the present moment you are already happy and complete. Fear will no longer slow you down, fear no longer can hold you back since you have no attachment to the outcome.

As I’ve been working on improving my social skills, I tended to let fear hold me back. Basically I was sometimes scared of talking to strangers and not receiving a good response, basically fear of rejection. What’s behind that fear? well I made the mistake of associating reaching my goals (having great social skills) with happiness. And therefore whenever I would experience rejection, I would feel that my social skills stink, and start feeling bad. This of course has slowed down my progress in improving my social skills. Now that I’m conscious of my aliveness, and already feel happy the way I am, I rarely ever hesitate to approach strangers, because I’m no longer attached to the outcome.

Your state of aliveness depends heavily on you accepting everything the way it is. This doesn’t mean that you wont work on improving your life situation, however there is no reason for you not to feel complete and happy right now. Once you accept everything the way it is, then you can desire without being attached to the outcome and really start transforming your life situation.

If you can’t accept your current life situation and are always looking to the future for happiness you will never be happy. Because no matter how many goals you achieve you’ll always want more, they’ll always be a next level and you will never stop to enjoy the present moment.

The practical application of desire without attachment is to set performance goals not outcome related goals. For example if you want to lose weight, decide on how often you will exercise (performance goal), instead of your actual weight loss. You can of course have a goal weight, however concentrate on your performance not the outcome. While trying to lose weight be conscious of the present moment and be greatfull for your current life situation. Enjoy life for what it is, and don’t try to delay your happiness until you reach your goal.

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Monitoring your breathing is very easy to do and will improve your focus, alertness, voice tone, fitness, and even help you face your fears. It’s very simple to improve your breathing and you will notice great results immediately.

To improve your breathing you first need to monitor it and be a little conscious of it. Most people naturally inhale and exhale rather quickly, similar to someone who just climbed a flight of stairs, and is a bit out of breath. A better breathing technique is deep breathing. To breathe deeply simply inhale for 2-4 seconds, you should feel your stomach slightly expanding, and then again slowly exhale for 2-4 seconds. You should not feel any discomfort as long as your inhaling and exhaling slowly. You should actually feel a sense of relaxation and peacefulness. Monitoring your breathing is a working process, the more you do it, the more benefits you will experience. The following benefits are just a few that I personally experienced.

1. Becoming More Focused

Often when we are trying to focus on getting a certain task done, our mind becomes distracting, thinking about all kinds of past or future activities instead of just fulling being engaged in the present moment. This obviously wastes time, and is very inefficient. For example as I’m sitting here writing this post, my mind will occasionally drift and start thinking about my earlier workout this morning, and then it will think about meeting with a couple of my friends later tonight. At this moment I’m trying to focus fully on writing this post. So obviously thinking about what I did this morning is a distraction and also thinking about what I’m doing later tonight is very distracting. If I need to finalize my plans with my friends, then I can do that after I’m done writing this, but constantly thinking and worrying about it is useless, distracting and even a bit stressful.

One technique for being more focused and in the present moment is to start monitoring your breathing. Use deep breathing, inhale slowly for 2-4 seconds, feel the air going in through your nose, traveling through your chest, expanding your lungs and stomach, and raising your shoulders. Then as you slowly exhale for 2-4 seconds, feel the air leaving all those different parts of your body as it comes out of your nose. Notice how relaxing this is, and how it cut out any detracting useless thoughts you might of had going through your mind. Use this technique as often as you need to become more focused and present. If you are interested in learning more about this phenomenon of becoming more present minded I really recommend you read the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle.

2. Becoming More Alert

As I discussed above, when you monitor your breathing, you will start becoming more present minded. As you become more present minded you will become a lot more alert. This is very beneficial during certain activities such as driving a car or participating in a social interaction.

Try deep breathing next time you drive, and slowly start noticing how wide your field of vision is. When stopped at a traffic light or an intersection, you should be able to look straight ahead and still see whats on your right and left, creating a 180 degree field of vision. If you keep looking straight a head and even slightly look down you should start seeing behind your eyes increasing your field of vision even more.

In social interactions, do you notice how sometimes you become a bit distracted, and even miss a few words or a sentence the other person said? Try deep breathing and notice how you are a lot more alert to what the other person is saying. You will also start becoming more alert to any kind of changes in their body language and facial expression vastly improving your ability to interpret and understand what they are saying.

3. Managing Your Fears

I often recommend working on your fears and getting out of your comfort zone as a great personal development technique. However often in our day to day lives we need to do things that might make us nervous or a bit scared. Whether you need to ask a stranger for help, or ask your boss for a raise, you know you have to do it, yet you start feel very nervous when you are about to and might even back down. Feeling scared is normal and healthy however you need to manager it and be able to push through it. Next time you are feeling scared or nervous, just try slowing down and breathe deeply. This sounds very simple however it works. I used this often when working on my social skills and learning to talk to strangers. I would be very nervous as I was approaching a stranger and as a result would even stutter or speak in a very low nervous voice. As I started using deep breathing, I noticed I started becoming more calm and collected as I would initiate conversations with strangers.

4. A Clearer Louder Voice

Having a clear loud voice is very beneficial. It doesn’t matter how you naturally sound, you can always improve your voice. Some of the advantages of having a clear loud voice is not having to repeat yourself, capturing others attention, and easily being able to talk in loud noisy venues. You will even notice that most managers and CEOs tend to have a louder clearer voice. Having a loud clear voice will greatly improve all of your social interactions, you will be able to quickly capture others attention. Most voice training programs recommend monitoring your breathing to improve your voice. Try this: breathe in deeply, feeling your stomach expand, and as you exhale start talking, notice how your voice sound louder, more resonating, and even a bit clearer. You might not be able to hear the difference yourself, however if you use a voice recorder, it will be very obvious. The more you monitor and improve your breathing the better your voice will become.

5. Better Fitness Workouts

Whether you are doing cardiovascular training or lifting weight monitoring your breathing will greatly improve your workouts. If you are doing cardio, try deep breathing only through your nose, keeping your mouth shut. Monitor your deep breathing and make sure it stays at a slow steady pace. As you try this you will notice that you can do longer cardio workouts without quickly running out of breath. If you are lifting weights try exhaling during the tougher part of the exercise. For example, if it’s a push exercise like the bench press, as you lower the bar try inhaling deeply through your mouth, and as you push the bar back up, you should exhale a burst of air through your mouth. If you are doing a pull exercise such as a bicep curl, then you would exhale as you curl the weight up, and inhale as you lower the weight back down. Using this technique will help you lift more weights and build your muscles quicker.

Maybe you know of or have noticed more benefits to deep breathing, please share in the comments section below

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Surrounding yourself with the success models will automatically steer your life and your efforts toward success. A success model is someone who either has achieved a goal you are working towards or can guide you in the path towards achieving it. On the other hand surrounding yourself with the wrong crowd will make it much harder for you to succeed. Whenever you spend a lot of time around a person, you naturally become more like them whether they are a good or a bad influence. Here are tips on how to surround yourself with success models.

1. Get a clear idea of your goals and personal values

   Without having clear specific goals, and personal values there is no way to tell if you are surrounding yourself with success models or failure models. There is a difference between a goal and a personal value. A goal is a futuristic want you are working towards achieving. A good example of a goal is wanting to lose weight. A personal value, is a preference, a trait or characteristic you like that you can start implementing right away. Some of my persona values are positivity, optimism, randomness, humor and open-mindedness. Once you have goals and personal values you can start evaluating whether a friend is a success model or not.

2. Spend less time with the wrong crowd

   You will start realizing that some of your close friends or maybe even relatives aren’t a really good influence on you. Maybe they don’t believe that achieving your goals is possible and tend to always put you down when you bring them up. Or maybe their personal values don’t align with yours. Whatever the case is, just try to spend less time with them. Also when spending time with them, make sure you are steering the direction of the conversation. For example if they bring up a negative subject, just switch the conversation by starting to talk about something positive. Get them talking about things they like or love so that you can experience their positive side.

3. Build your social skills
   In order to have more choice in the quality of friends and relationships you create you must have good social skills. When I was younger I had bad social skills, and was great full for any friends I made whether they were good or bad. As I started working on my social skills I started having a lot more choice in the friendships I make. A quick tip to improve your social skills is to simply introduce yourself to strangers when you’re out. I usually just say “Hey, I’m Andrew, Whats your name?”. It’s a natural reaction for a stranger to introduce him/her self back. Just carry on the conversation from there. You might be really nervous trying this out at first, but just do it at least 10 times, and it will start becoming easier. I will be discussing social skills in future posts, however this tip I gave you will help you get started.
4. Get involved in workshops and social groups related to your goals

   If you want to lose weight, you should join weight loss support groups or go to group fitness classes at your gym. This will help you come into contact with others who are working towards your goal of losing weight or staying fit. It will certainly also increase your chances of making friends with similar goals. As you spend more time with those new friends you will automatically move closer and closer towards your weight loss goal. For example if you were to go out to eat with one of those new friends they will tend to order healthier foods. This will encourage you to also order healthy foods or menu choices also. I just used weight loss as an example goal, however this strategy works with any other goal.

5. Offer value to your success models

   Once you have made friends who are success models make sure you are offering them value. Don’t just become a vacuum that only sucks value from them. Otherwise you will notice the relationships will deteriorate and they will be trying to avoid you. You just need to ask what is valuable to my new friend? Maybe there is a skill they are trying to learn that you can teach them or help them in learning. Maybe you can introduce them to other cool people. Maybe you can invite them to fun events and parties that you go to.

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I’m giving away a brand new argus mini digital camera that comes with a usb cable, manual, software, pouch, key chain, neck strap, and battery. I will also cover shipping and handling costs to anywhere in the United States. Simply leave a comment at the bottom of this post with a personal development topic that you would like me to explore on a future post. I will really appreciate original and specific topics, ones that maybe aren’t covered frequently on other personal development blogs. I will pick the winner at random and contact him/her at the email address they left with their comment. Winner will be picked on February 18, 2008, so make sure you leave your comment before the end of February 17th. Thanks for helping improve PersonalHack.com - Andrew

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1. Fear will stop you from achieving your dreams.

   I’m sure you have many dreams and aspirations. Maybe one of your dreams is to travel the world, start your own business or find the love of your life. These are a few of my dreams. As I have been working on making these dreams a reality, I’ve realized that one of the biggest roadblocks is fear. To find the love of my life, or in other words meet a great woman I have had to face one of my biggest fears. The first step to meeting a great woman (or mate) is becoming social and meeting lots and lots of people. As I started doing this, I had to deal with my fear of rejection over and over again. I realized that what stops most men from meeting a great woman is fear of rejection. I still remember when how my heart would beat faster and my mouth would stutter when I would go out and initiate conversation with strangers. This is a great example of the physical results of fear that I would push through. It certainly wasn’t easy. However it paid off. I did end up building a great social circle with many great friends. I also did end up meeting a couple of very spectacular women along the way. If I didn’t push through my fear of rejection, I would have never improved my social skills.

2. Fear always leads to mediocrity.

   Becoming great in any field or endeavor usually requires conquering some fear. However if your goal is to just be average or mediocre then you can skip reading this. Still here? One factor that separates the good (average or slightly above) from the great, is the willingness to push through fear. You should be smart about pushing through fear. You should evaluate the fear logically looking at two factors. The first factor is the reality of the fear, is there real danger? With my fear of rejection there wasn’t any. If I approached a new person, initiated a conversation, received a bad reaction, I would still be physically fine. Yes I might feel bad for a few seconds, my pride and ego might get a kick. However I always reminded myself that I’m trying to learn a skill. Additionally it would be foolish to give importance to strangers reactions since they don’t know me that well. As I’ve started pushing through most of my fears I learned that fear is mostly in my head and there is rarely ever any real danger. If there is a physical risk or a real danger, then you need to evaluate the second factor.

   The second factor is comparing the potential payoff (or gain from taking the risk) with the possibility of the a real danger happening. When I went skydiving I realized that it can be physically dangerous. However after looking at some statistics I quickly learned that skydiving is safer than driving. It also seemed that our potential skydiving center was safe and very organized. Additionally considering the payoff of the experience and how amazing it would feel, I decide to join my friend in doing it. It was a surreal experience, and now I recommend that anyone try a tandem sky dive at least once. This is where an instructor is tied to your back during the jump, pulls the parachute for you and gives you landing instructions.

3. Fear will limit your happiness.

   Living in your comfort zone usually turns your life into a boring everyday routine. You are generally taking the same comfy actions and therefore can predict their results. However if you start getting out of your comfort zone and facing some of your fears you can eventually create a rock star lifestyle. I’m not speaking of all the lavage aspects, instead the unpredictability, excitement, and fun. You just have to try getting out of your comfort zone to really see the big payoffs. A quick way to do it is to initiate conversation with a stranger. A simple “Hey, how are you” or a giving a compliment is an easy way to do this. Who knows you might even make a new friend.

4. Fear will cover up your creativity.

   Creativity is risky and uncomfortable. Often people try to work on their creativity, and while it is a great skill to develop, it is risky. The unwillingness to take risks and regularly get out of your comfort zone will inhibit your natural creativity. Your natural creativity is when you have a great idea or think outside the box. You can start strengthening your natural creativity by following the little voice in your head that tells you to do something in a different way. Once you notice that your natural creativity is developing and no longer inhibited, then you can take different workshops that will increase your creativity. Performance art workshops (improv comedy, acting, singing, playing a musical instrument) usually build your creativity.

5. Fear will cover up your uniqueness.

   When we are born we are all naturally unique in certain ways. This is very easy to spot if you observe a young kid. Young kids are very uninhibited and they let their uniqueness shine. We all are naturally unique. Your uniqueness comes from that little voice inside of your head that suggests you try this or that unique thing. Taking unique actions tend to attract a lot of attention especially in public. Additionally it tends to draw more judgments from others. This is why conformity is very easy and safe. However there are many rewards to being unique including a happier self, a more fulfilling lifestyle and an easier time figuring out your purpose. I think the reason a lot of people can’t find their purpose is because they have always conformed. Uniqueness is simply acting in line with your personal values and preferences.

Lack of fear does not equal stupidity. There are of course good reasons why we feel fear. Fear is a protection mechanism to help us survive. For example it’s great that you might feel a bit of fear crossing a busy intersection. This fear keeps your senses alert. What I’m recommending is taking calculated risks.

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