Subject: Lifescope TIPs & QUIPs [26] "Ignite Your Willpower"

TIPs & QUIPs, the free occasional email of helpful hints and quotes (and
sometimes challenging suggestions) for getting the most from life.

In this issue:
     *** WiseWords
     *** This Issue's Theme
     *** Suggested Resources
     *** Thrive On! Recommended Site


*** WiseWords ***                                     [TOP]
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"Strength does not come from physical capacity. 
 It comes from an indomitable will."
  --Mahatma Gandhi
  
"The passions are like fire, useful in a thousand ways 
 and dangerous only in one, through their excess."
  --Christian Nestell Bovee
  
"The first rule of success is to have energy."
  --Michael Korda

"A mighty flame followeth a tiny spark."
  --Dante

(For a collection of some of our favorite WiseWords, see our web page at
<http://www.lifescope.com/pages/WiseWords.html>.)


*** This issue's theme: IGNITE YOUR WILLPOWER                   [TOP]
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Lately, I have been reminded that our single greatest possession as humans,
is our Volition. Our ability to consciously decide, our will to act, our
intentionality of purpose. Our desire, our passion, our determination -- the
focus of our life energy. It is our great capacity to activate our willpower
which distinguishes us from other earthly life forms.

In fact, I contend that in this regard, we are as advanced in our raw
potential as ever in our species' history. The highest percentage ever of
the population has, within their reach, all the 'secrets' of success,
happiness, love, wealth-building, etc. -- all the building blocks for an
exquisite life. So why aren't proportionately more people attaining their
own personal nirvana?

Sadly, our evolved abilities also have created distractions of parallel
strength, and even greater seduction. The amount of literal and figurative
garbage we create is unprecedented. And, as a group, our production ability
has out-paced our capability to discern or assess. "Is it real gold or
fool's gold? I don't know, but isn't more better?"

We're not even conscious of our choice. We just got caught up in learning the
skill of plate-spinning. We haven't quite honed in on how many plates we can
keep going, before they start crashing to the ground. Most of us haven't
fully grasped the concept of limits. We blindly accept our culture's message
of "s/he who spins the most plates wins." Only slowly is it dawning on us
that other measures are valid, like "whoever spins one plate most artfully
wins" or "whoever has the most fun trying to spin the plates wins." And we
are realizing that those are our own plates getting broken.

So, to shift the paradigm, be a change-agent, think outside the box, [insert
your favorite applicable cliché here] -- let's try to see the bigger picture
here, folks! The opportunity for self-awareness has exploded! We are at a
point in time where most of us can simply re-direct our attention and
discover tremendous stores of personal power.

So reclaim what is yours. And ignite your willpower.   --Lee Lukehart


--the following text is from "True Success" by Tom Morris
[Excerpt authorized as Fair Use under Copyright Act of 1976, Section 107]

An old Texas proverb tells us that "you can't light a fire with a wet
match." Too many people are wet matches. There's tinder all around, dry
and ready to blaze, but they can't seem to produce the least spark. If you
are not throwing off sparks, if you're not yourself flaming, then why not?

Do you know people who truly love life? Who are passionate about what they
do? Who twinkle, or glow, or smolder? These are people who embody the
erotic. This is Eros, the power that can lie behind sexuality, behind
friendship, behind great art, great music, successful business endeavors,
and creative attainment in all human affairs.

I recently came across a wise remark by a man named Reggie Leach: "Success
is not the result of spontaneous combustion. You must set yourself on
fire." If we do not create energy for our ideas and then convey that
energy to our projects, how will they go? If we don't share energy with
other people, why should they care about us and our plans? But how can we
generate energy and care if we don't have these qualities already? Where
do we find the emotion we need? How do we set ourselves on fire?

I've come to believe that successful living and working is a process of:

   1. Self-discovery,
   2. Self-invention,
   3. Self-discipline, and
   4. Self-indulgence

In our voyage through life, we are ideally discovering talents we may
never have suspected we had. As we set goals, work on confidence, strive
to concentrate on what comes next, struggle for consistency, and examine
ourselves for the emotional commitment it takes, we are engaged in
self-discovery, a process of self-knowledge. But not everything we are,
and that we will become, is in us from the start, waiting to be unearthed.
We have it within our power to create, to invent, to become what we will,
compatible with the most basic talents with which we have been endowed. In
this life we are launched also into a journey of self- invention. What
will we become? What will we build within ourselves? We are given the raw
materials, at the most basic level, but it is up to us what we do with them.

How will we form and shape our lives? Our careers? Our relationships? How
will we invent the people we will become? At the bottom of thought,
attitude, and emotion there is will. At the bottom of the undeniable
effects of heredity and environment there is will. We all have power,
however slight, energy, however subtle, for the will to draw upon and use.
The will, the volition, the basic human ability to act, inherently
contains some amount of renewable energy at its core. And nothing is more
fundamental in life than the power of the will.

Where you are and where you are going is always in part, and to a
surprising extent, a result of what you do. It is not just a result of
what happens to you. The initiative is yours to take. The willpower is
available. Everybody has it. We just don't always draw on it. And so we
forget it's there. Or we use some of it, and then fail to renew it. We
fail to dream. We fail to use our imaginations, the primary natural source
of inner renewal. And so we grow weak. We flounder. W.C. Fields once
cautioned, "Remember, any dead fish can float down a river, but it takes a
live one to swim upstream." Are you a dead fish? Or are you more like an
electric eel, flashing against the current and producing current of your
own? Are you alive with what you are doing? With what you are becoming?



*** Suggested Resources ***                                       [TOP]
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The Psychology of Winning
After years of working with exceptional achievers, Waitley has isolated the
highly developed attitudes and action qualities that guide their lives.
Listeners will be able to transform their high expectations into real
outcomes, concentrate on desires and the rewards of success instead of fear
and failure, and visualize and act out winning situations to guarantee success.

(2 audiotapes, 2 hrs) Item# E4150-AT
   SRP$17.00 -- (see links below for special prices)
   
Buy this item now from Lifescope's secure online store.
You can also buy this title directly from Amazon.com.


*** To order RISK-FREE: visit our secure online store, and place an order 
*** with your credit card, or call 800-WIN-LIFE (800-946-5433, 24 hrs).
*** Your satisfaction is absolutely assured with our RISK-FREE Guarantee!


*** Thrive On! Recommended Site ***                              [TOP]
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Moment of Truth
<http://www.compana.com/nwhealth/nwh_archive/moment.html>
Some personal stories about how the willpower to change was found, and what
steps they went through to get there.


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