Lessons From an Emotional Breakdown

BY Brett

I have to admit – a few days ago, I had something close to a complete emotional breakdown.

The world felt like a hostile, dark place. I felt like I didn’t deserve success, I felt like I was being stretched thin since my energy is being spent in so many different ways, and I felt like there was no way out of the darkness and sadness that I felt for myself and the world.

The breakdown started when I couldn’t bring myself to do any work. I was paralyzed by anxiety. Did I try to fight it and push through? No. I’ve learned the signs of an impending breakdown over the years, and I’ve also learned that the best approach is not to fight the breakdown, but to welcome it with open arms and be swallowed whole by it. Resisting does no good. Only by embracing all emotions can we feel their impermanence and let them go.

I’m sure you all are thinking – “As a personal development junkie/blogger, you still have emotional...

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Going From Good to Great

BY Brett

Inspired by two awesome posts – one by Jonathan Fields and one by Seth Godin – I’ve had yet another epiphany.

At its core, it’s this: always be willing to go the extra mile, to do what others might deem ‘unreasonable’, to do the right thing.

Why? Because, my friends, that’s just what you do. Doing what’s right and spending the extra energy to make sure it gets done should be a part of you, something that’s just part of your identity. It should be automatic.

Now – getting to that point isn’t easy. In fact, it’s incredibly difficult, since you’ll be fighting the temptation to give in and only give what’s deemed “good enough”.

But you have to tell yourself that being “good enough” just isn’t...

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30 Questions Guaranteed To Make You Think

BY Brett

Instead of giving you information that you want, I’m going to teach you something today by being indirect.

Here’s the lesson: everything you need, every revelation I’ve had, and everything that I could possibly write about on this blog, can be found inside yourself.

As in – with the proper thinking and questioning, you too can come to the conclusions that I’ve come to. You can help yourself instead of depending on me for help.

“But Brett,” you ask, “Won’t that render you obsolete? Won’t I, the reader, then be able to replace you?”

No, not necessarily. I’ll be able to give you the information at a rate much faster than you’ll be able to articulate it for yourself, which gives my writing its value. Also, my thoughts will usually be more clear than yours, since I’ve had a longer time to play around with my ideas within the framework of my reality.

However, the lesson I’m...

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Whatever Happened to Having Fun?

BY Brett

Somewhere between our growing obsession with performance and the desire to make life easier to handle, we’ve begun to snuff out the flame that made us want to live life in the first place.

When’s the last time you sat in awe of a moment, and said to yourself, “Damn, I’m glad to be alive”?

When’s the last time you stopped worrying about your performance, whether you were going to be on time, whether other people will hate you for doing what you know is right, and whether you’re even doing the right thing in the first place?

When’s the last time you let go, and just had fun?

Fun is the thing we are all seeking in the moment – the ability to feel carefree and truly enjoy doing something – and, yet, as we’ve turned life into a mechanized set of actions your average robot can perform, we’ve started to lose it in every part of our lives.

That, my friends, is a tragedy.

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Total Self-Improvement: How to Become a Complete Human

BY Brett

I’ve always tried to be great at everything I’ve put my mind to. School, athletics, even writing this blog – I’ve always tried to reach my best, in every facet of my life.

Why? I believe in becoming a complete human being. One that has strengths in every area, and weaknesses in as few as possible.

Becoming a complete human is the end of all self-improvement. It is the goal that we are always striving for – to become a balanced, good person across every aspect of our lives. A true jack-of-all-trades or the archetypal Renaissance man is what I’ve tried to become – and I think everyone in the self-improvement game will trend towards becoming one themselves. It’s part of the natural process.

Becoming a complete human being requires being very good in every ‘sphere’ of life – it requires having integrity and being an honest person; having diverse knowledge of a wide range of subjects; being...

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How (And Why) To Transform Inaction Into Action

BY Brett

It’s easy to get caught in the trap of thinking that I hold tremendous power, writing for this blog, which thousands of people read per day.

It’s easy to think that I’m some guru (I’m not) with the ability to change people for the better.

It’s easy to think that I hold all the responsibility for changing you, that my content is what will cause you to change yourself over time so you can live a better and easier life.

It’s easy to think all of this because it deflects responsibility from yourself. Since the job of changing yourself is in my hands, you don’t need to put any effort in; you figure that whenever you get the ideas in your head that you need in order to live better, you’ll automatically change, with no extra effort. You think it’ll be as simple and as effortless as flicking a switch.

Wrong. I can only show you what is possible, what ideas work, and what practices we can use to improve ourselves....

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The Bad Day Cure

BY Brett

Whenever I feel off my game, like I’m having a bad day, can’t concentrate, or feel the pangs of anxiety creep up on me, I take some time out of my day to clear my head by reading what I call my “recenter-er”.

The recenterer is a short essay that I wrote to help myself right my ship, so to speak, and get me going in the right direction again, instead of continuing a downward spiral into oblivion. Essentially, the recenterer reminds me of certain fundamental ideas that I seem to forget or ignore when I’m feeling down. It’s an inspirational piece meant to galvanize my soul, and today, I’m going to share it with you, so you can read it to yourself on your bad days. I hope it turns those bad days into good days.

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21 Essential Life Lessons

BY Brett

Throughout my relatively short life – I’m only 17 – I’ve learned a few fundamental truths that seem to govern our lives. They’re extremely powerful and, to an extent, have changed my life for the better. I can only sit back and ask myself, “What if I learned these things earlier in my life? How amazing would I be now?”. Seriously. They’re that fantastic, and, today, I’m going to share my best life lessons with you.

Let’s get this show on the road.

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Letting Go Challenge: Update and 5 Lessons Learned

BY Brett

I know that I originally promised that I would give you guys an update on the letting go challenge every 7 days, but I later realized that I’d be making too many posts in a short time period. Instead, I’m giving you guys a mid-challenge update.

The letting go challenge has been a smashing success thus far. Learning how to let go of everything and remain at peace with myself has been absolutely integral to my survival over the past couple of weeks, as school and work commitments have been piling up. Luckily, I’ve been up to the task, and have been getting everything done with the utmost quality and the least amount of internal resistance possible. I’m thrilled that one simple shift like deciding to let go, all the time, has affected my life so much.

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The Letting Go Challenge: Are You In?

BY Brett

One of the concepts that revolutionized my life was living in the moment. Heavily influenced by Eckhart Tolle’s the Power of Now, I made it my mission to immerse myself in the Now as much as possible.

Unfortunately, I hit roadblock after roadblock. As it turns out, thinking about being present actually hurts your ability to be present and in the moment. The only times that I’d ever be able to be in the moment were the times when I was meditating, and even then it became difficult to just let myself fall into the moment. I grew frustrated, and began to feel like, while living in the Now was an awesome concept, it was actually an ideal that no one, not even Eckhart Tolle, could ever reach. The idea of living a life of “no-mind” was impossible, to me.

And, as of right now – it still is an impossibility, but I’m going to try to change that.

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