I needed to learn about energy boosters. Fatigue and a lack of energy have been problems for all my life. In an effort to find out why, I’ve asked doctors, read books, and finally decided that some questions just won’t be answered in my lifetime.

Fortunately, I’ve also learned that even without discovering the root causes of my tiredness, there are things I can do to alleviate it. Below are some of energy boosters that have worked for me and others over the years. Try them to see which work best for you, and use more than one at a time if necessary.

Ten Energy Boosters

1. Energetic music. Different types of music have different effects on us, but you can learn which are best for you by trial and error. Once you find the music that wakes you up, keep it ready. Keep a tape in your car, and a CD in the player at home.

2. Sleep better. The research seems to show that as long as you get at least five hours of sleep, the quality is more important than the quantity. Try drinking something warm before bed, or relax with a simple meditation.

3. Talk about something interesting. Have you ever seen a tired person start to talk about something they’re passionate about, and suddenly “wake up.” It’s a powerful technique you can use for yourself. Have a few “favorite” subjects that get you going.

4. Coffee. For some of us, caffeine makes us more tired when it’s abused, but short-term, it can work wonders.

5. Deep breathing. Several slow deep breaths help oxygenate the blood supply better, and especially seems to wake up the brain.

6. Have an “energy drink.” The verdict isn’t in on most of them, but it’s a cheap option to try. I seem to get something from the ones with Ginkgo Biloba in them.

7. Move your body. Sometimes just getting up and washing the dishes, or walking around the house helps boost energy levels.

8. Exercise. It’s not a quick solution, but many people notice an increase in their energy level when they get regular aerobic exercise.

9. Hot and cold shower. Try a minute of hot water, then a minute of cold, alternating for six minutes. This isn’t for those with weak hearts, but it will wake you up. Incidentally, research shows that this also revs up the immune system.

10. Get outside. Often, a little sunshine and fresh air can be very energizing.

Write down the techniques that work for you when you find them, to remind yourself to use them. Of course you should try to find the reasons for your tiredness or fatigue. You may have more luck than I. In the meantime, though, why not try a few of these enrgy boosters?

Steve Gillman writes on many topics including brainpower, weight loss, meditation, habits of mind, creative problem solving, generating luck and anything related to self improvement. Learn more and get FREE e-courses at http://www.SelfImprovementNow.com.

Our sense of smell elicits strong emotional reactions and trigger powerful memories, whether we’re consciously aware of it or not.

Scents and Feelings

Our olfactory system sends a chemical message about the scents around us through the limbic part of our brain, which is the oldest part of our brain. In seconds, that message is telegraphed to our central nervous system, which, in turn, controls how our body functions and how we feel about those smells.

Scents also influence the temperature we feel emotionally. For instance, a grass matting floor covering has a pleasant scent, and makes us feel cooler, while the aroma of fresh baked bread creates a warm feeling of being loved. Marine scents, such as salty sea air, refresh us, while spice and wood scents bring warm thoughts.

The Evolution of Aromatherapy

The ancient civilizations of Arabia, Babylon, China, Egypt, Greece, India, and Rome all used the aromas of scented plants, flowers, and woods to heal and protect. Religious and spiritual ceremonies have used aromas to arouse mankind’s deeply spiritual nature from the dawn of time. Today, the science of aromatherapy, which is a holistic healing practice, uses essential oils and herbs, to treat stress-related illnesses, muscular, circulatory, respiratory, and digestive ailments, and even skin problems.

The Effects of Scent on Emotions

Essential oils influence our emotions within seconds of inhalation. For instance, clary sage stimulates the thalamus to release a hormone called encephalon, a neurochemical that creates a sense of euphoria and provides pain relief. Lavender and chamomile fuel the release of serotonin, which has a calming effect on fear, stress, aggravation, or insomnia.

Scents activate the deep part of the brain, where memories are stored. You can recreate pleasant memories and share them with your family and friends through the use of smells. For instance, my mother often baked a cake just before we kids arrived home from school. Now that I’ve grown up, we don’t eat as much cake in our home, but sharing a vanilla scent with my children often prompts them to share stories about their grandmother.

Smells are a powerful link with the memories of our past. My mother used to tell me stories of her grandmother, whose home smelled like baked cinnamon rolls in the morning and exotic, tangy spices in the evening.

The sense of smell, a potent tool in Interior Design Psychology, brings a feeling of harmony and serenity to any room in a home. Embrace the scents you love and those that conjure pleasant memories, and make the use of scent an integral part of your overall design plan.

Copyright (c) 2004 by Jeanette J. Fisher

Professor Jeanette Fisher, author of Doghouse to Dollhouse for Dollars, Joy to the Home, and other books teaches Real Estate Investing and Design Psychology. For more articles, tips, reports, newsletters, and sales flyer template, see http://www.doghousetodollhousefordollars.com/pages/5/index.htm

Everyday life can be frustrating in today’s society. It is
becoming more and more difficult for people to find happiness in
the world we live in today. But it is important to try to stay
positive and obtain daily motivation.

One reason is that it spreads onto others around us. If one
person in the workplace is happy and upbeat, it is catching to
others. If you are a happy positive person with daily
motivation, then maybe the person sitting next to you at work
will see it and it will give them, too, a lift.

Another reason to obtain daily motivation is for your peace of
mind. Life does have its downfalls, however, we need to focus on
the good things about our lives.

We will achieve way more success thinking positive than thinking
negative thoughts. We need to try to look at things as they
could be not as they are right now.

So how do we go about obtaining daily motivation? Well, there
are four practical techniques.

1. Daily motivation books

There are books available for positive reading. You start out
each day by reading a daily passage in the positive mode. It
starts your day the right way and you can think on it all day
long.

2. Daily motivational e-mails

With technology the way it is today, an e-mail a day may be the
answer for your daily motivation. There are many websites out
there that will send you free motivational e-mail messages.

3. Self help books

There a number of great motivational books that will help a
person with daily motivation.

4. Being a good Samaritan

When life looks bleak, look at the next guy. Someone always has
it worse than you. Try doing something nice for someone that is
in need. It is a great way to fell motivated and positive.

Start out each day by setting goals. Whether it be a goal to get
something done that you have been putting off for awhile or
setting goals on how to be positive throughout the day. Goal
setting is the key to self-motivation.

Positive thinking can only have a good effect on a person’s
attitude. If a person starts out each morning with positive goal
to work on each day, it will encourage that person to be
positive throughout the entire day. Daily motivation can be
accomplished by something as simple as thinking positive
thoughts.

While speaking at a San Diego university recently, I was fortunate that I was not asked to leave the stage. You see, I chose to share with the students in my audience some frightening statistics. I announced that, while many would receive their degrees, few - very few - would end up pursuing careers in their chosen field. At this point, the faculty began giving me dirty looks.

I went on to say that, while most students were there to pursue a dream, the dream they were chasing was not their own. Many students enter college to live up to the expectations of family, friends, and society. They’ve been told they should become an accountant, lawyer, doctor or teacher because of the great future and financial gain. In trying to do what others think they should do rather than following their individual passions, they rarely continue along the same path once they leave campus.

Instead, I painted a different sort of picture. Using an off-the-wall example to illustrate my point, I asked each of them to imagine that he or she really wanted to become a banjo player. I said, “What if you took the same period of time and energy pursuing that dream, your dream, your passion? What if you began as an apprentice at a banjo shop, and then worked hard to learn everything about banjos? After four to six years, the same time you would have spent earning a degree that you would not use anyway, you would instead have become an authority on banjos. A real banjo aficionado. Know why?”

“Because you’d be following your passion,” I continued. “You would become captivated by the topic, and the pursuit of this goal would no longer feel like work, as much as it would be a part of who you are. Staying up late reading and learning everything there is to know about banjos, listening to old songs and then creating new ones would not be a chore; it would become your joy, because you’d be doing what you love.”

Now here’s the best part. There will always be a call for authorities in any area. So no matter if your pursuit is toward playing the banjo, inventing new ice cream flavors, or discovering the latest medical breakthroughs, there will always be a demand for your services, thus creating success in your chosen field of endeavor.

This is where true happiness and fulfillment comes in: getting paid to do what you enjoy most while living the life you love. Because . . .

When you do what you love, and love what you do, you’ll have success your whole life through!

************************************

You have permission to publish this article electronically or in print, free of charge, as long as the bylines are included. A courtesy copy of your publication would be appreciated.

About The Author

Greg Reid, GregReid@AlwaysGood.com

http://alwaysgood.com

Gregory Scott Reid is a Well-Known Speaker and two-time #1 best-selling author of, “The Millionaire Mentor” and “Wake Up: Live the Life You Love” www.AlwaysGood.com

I have had many confidence issues in my life, all of which I have either dealt with or overcome. I have written about some of these issues below.

1. The Bald Patch

2. My height

3. My weight

4. The stutter

5. My lack of belief in myself

6. My career

THE BALD PATCH

Even though to some people it may seem trivial, I was born with a bald patch the size of a ten pence piece. As I went through childhood and especially the teenage years I became more and more self-conscious and paranoid about it.

It was especially noticeable when it rained or when I went swimming as my hair would become wet. People at school would ridicule me and I was forever trying to hide and cover the bald patch even though most people knew about it.

It hurt when people laughed at me and eventually I stopped going swimming altogether.

MY HEIGHT

Out of all of my close male family and friends, I am the shortest at 5ft 4. This probably should not influence my confidence however with people continually looking down on me it did. I have been called many names, the nicest being “Shorty”.

I was always jealous of other people taller than I was. I hoped that one day I might have a late spurt. This never came.

My height affected me with sport. I wanted to be a striker at football however the coaches only wanted people over 6ft tall. At snooker I am constantly have to use the rest which makes it difficult to play up to the best standard and at tennis I was constantly being lobbed. It also meant that I only felt comfortable dating women 5ft 3 and under which reduces the available market considerably.

MY WEIGHT

During senior school I was very thin. This may have been the result of my parents turning vegetarian when I was twelve. At the time there were very few replacement foods and it seemed as though we went from having meat and two veg to just two veg.

As my parents cooked the food I had little option but to also turn vegetarian. After a few weeks I approached them and told them that I missed and wanted to eat meat. They were understanding to a degree and said:

“If you want it, you cook it”

At this age I could only really be bothered to cook properly a few days of the week and that gradually became less and less.

People at school would call me names like skin and bone and my weight became another area of paranoia for me.

THE STUTTER

At the age of four I developed a stutter. This became gradually worse as I became older even though my parents were told that I would grow out of it.

For what fluent people would class as simple tasks like reading from a book at school, answering questions, saying my name and address, ordering items at the bar or in a restaurant, and speaking on the telephone became a constant battle.

It was a very frustrating impediment, as I seemed to be able to talk quite fluently to people I knew well and whom I felt comfortable with, but at other times especially under any form of pressure could not say a word.

At the age of twenty two after about eleven months of sheer hard work and practice I managed to overcome the stutter and I now help other people who stutter to achieve fluency as well as helping people with confidence problems.

MY LACK OF BELIEF

I always had a lack of belief in certain areas.

I would notice a female in a bar for example and would want to go over and talk to her but would have the negative attitude of I’m not good enough, why would she be interested in me? I stutter, I have a bald patch, I have a menial job and I am very thin.

Even if I approach her and am successful, I would then be expected to buy her a drink, possibly phone her, possibly meet her parents, and maybe even get married! The thought of attempting these things with a stutter and with a lack of social confidence was far too daunting for me.

I left school at sixteen mainly due to a lack of confidence and the stutter, but then had the problem of finding a job. Again my lack of belief came shining through. Who would want to employ somebody with a stutter, who has a lack of confidence and who is shy around people?

MY CAREER

After leaving school at the age of sixteen I now had to find employment. Suffering with a stutter and a general lack of confidence meant that work involving the phone or regular interaction with other people were not really an option.

I decided that I could probably cope with filing duties in an office and eventually gained a position at an insurance company.

I started at the lowest grade, a grade two and the work was routine and mundane. The average time to stay at this level before being promoted was six months. The grade three post involved sharing a phone and this is something I found very difficult to use.

To become upgraded you had to apply in writing to the personal officer and then if you passed the interview were then promoted. My attitude was that if I don’t apply I would stay as a grade two, which is what I wanted. I was probably the only person in the country who did not want to be promoted.

My boss would ask me at regular intervals why I was not applying and I would make up an excuse. To keep him happy I took the insurance exams. After three years I had completed the first qualification which was a set of five exams. To my horror my boss congratulated me by stating that he was upgrading me to a grade three starting Monday without the need of an interview.

This promotion should in effect have given me a confidence boost however with my stutter out of control under the pressure and some of my colleagues mocking me I became more and more withdrawn and depressed.

I would be invited to social events and would make up excuses of why I could not go as I had a lack of belief that I could cope with the occasion and all the socialising involved.

Stephen Hill has a number of websites including:

stuttering
therapy

alternative health treatments

lasik surgery

There are many in our civilization, which have extremely creative minds and many who borderline on what some might characterize as brilliant. Unfortunately often we do not utilize such members of society correctly. Plato had discussed in “The Republic” that the civilization is best served when each individual does what they do best and is alleviated from those tasks they do not do well. Indeed this is good advice as entrepreneurs make lousy accountants and athletes make lousy clerks.

Now then speaking purely from a self-assessment standpoint, I enjoy being innovative yet am bombarded with archaic work to put forth my ideas, innovations and concepts. So how could one with a innovative displacement best serve the whole of humanity and be fulfilled doing what they naturally do? Well, here are some thoughts;

“You know I need a damn typist, writer and artist or better yet a team of them. I need to just get away with a digital recorder and a sketch pad and send these in and have someone fill in all the specific details, mathematics, cad cam, artists rendering and write it up. I have increased my ideas to about 4 per day now, but only original ideas will I allow my mind to contemplate. On top of that I get about 5 application ideas for every one of my ideas or new concepts of other people I read.”

What I am saying here and this quote was in one of my emails to an associate, it that when I get 4 new original ideas every day and five applications for each of those, well that makes 20. If I read 12 new white papers per day and multiple that times five then that is another 60. So twenty plus sixty is more than one person can write up, sketch out and deliver in a day. You see now that my mind is trained to do this, I cannot and really do not want to stop it from doing it. So, the problem now is that I cannot put the stuff onto paper fast enough or write it up.

Thus I could use a technology that does not yet exist; I need to be able to do blast thought transfer. How and where do these innovative minds come from, as obviously this is not the norm? Well, personally I am not sure where this skill came from or if I always had it but was too busy to put it all on paper, but now I cannot turn off my brain. Not that I mind, I like it, but I cannot seem to get the information into a workable format fast enough. Four paragraphs I can do and a quick sketch, but it takes me time to do much more or make it.

So using Plato’s advice what should we be doing with such minds for the betterment of all humanity and our own civilization? Should we out cast them, as they are a skew way outside the norm of society? Should we foster such minds from childhood? Should we figure out a way for them to do what they do better and help us solve problems with the efficiencies of our civilization; such as needs in education, transportation, communication, space, military, infrastructure, economics, medicine, environment, commerce, leadership or government?

Without ego, I ask the question are we doing the best we can do with what we have so readily available? Can we do better? Are you an innovative, creative or interesting person, what kinds of things could we do to help you do it better? Think on this.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/