Rules For Successful Living

by Marisa Broughton, MCHT, MNLP

Recognize your realm of control, which is YOU. The only person that you have control over is yourself. It is you who decides how to respond to someone else, whether it be happy, angry or indifferent. It is you who decides how to interpret a message and what to do about it. At the same time, all you can do is give another person information. You cannot make them change how they think or feel. Only they can do that. You cannot make them make better choices. It’s up to them.

Pay attention to how you treat significant others. Do you blame, criticize, complain or nag? If so, stop and adopt a policy to always treat significant others with respect and kindness. Blaming, criticizing, complaining and nagging are relationship destroying behaviors. If you want to improve, strengthen and bring out the best in your relationships use the following behaviors instead: listening, supporting, encouraging, respecting, trusting, accepting and negotiating.
Discover your True Will and avoid interfering in the T.W. of others. Following your True Will means discovering what things make you happy. What kind of an environment do you need to create for yourself that is comfortable, inspirational and joyful?
Are any of your present behaviors harmful to your relationships (work, friends, mate)? If so, decide what changes you need to make things better and follow through. There is no gain in feeling upset with yourself so skip it. Just make the change.
Resolve conflicts, instead of trying to win them. Leave winning for games and competition. Remember that there is no room for "winning" in relationships unless you both win. This applies to all relationships (work, family, friends, lovers, strangers).
Attack the problem, not the person. This avoids it being a personal attack and lets the other person maintain dignity.
Tell the person what you want instead of what you don’t want.
Treat all people, regardless of who they are, with kindness and respect.
Know your desired outcome.
Take responsibility for all of your behaviors. That gives you the power of choice.
Avoid socializing and communicating with negative people. If your friends are the kind of people who like to criticize, blame and complain … find new friends.
Choose your friends carefully and only hang around with people who have a positive influence in your life.
Create your own affirmations and use them constantly. An effective affirmation is: stated in the present, is positive, is attainable and is believable to your self. For example: "I am a millionaire" will be rejected because it isn’t true…yet. "Every day I am getting closer and closer to becoming a millionaire." Will work better. "I easily achieve my dreams" is a good one.
Say "No" when you don’t want to do something. Yes, some people may be disappointed, some even angry because you say no. If they choose to dislike you or disown you because you say "No", then you need to take a closer look at the relationship because healthy relationships allow freedom of choice. Healthy relationships understand and are okay with the choice of no. Remember that just as you are free to say "No", others are free to be disappointed or even angry at your refusal.
Keep a gripe list. Write down all the things that bother you. Prioritize them and then put them away for a month. At the end of the month, review the items on the list and cross out the ones you are willing to let go. If there is something on the list that you can’t let go of yet, leave it there and then put the list away for another month. Since it’s on the list – you can forget about it until next month.
List all the things you might consider forgiving someone else of. Now, you don’t need to forgive the person, just consider it. Write a second list of what you need to forgive yourself of. If you are ready to forgive, then take a deep breath and say "I forgive you" and then cross the item off the list. Review monthly.