Category: Core thought

Positive mindsets.

Can a positive mindset achieve results? Yes, but only with positive actions.

On the 14th September I started this idea of thinking your way to success with this Post, Success is an Attitude.

I want to follow that up with a few words on positive thinking or mindset.

All you have to do is a Google search about ‘a positive mindset’ and you will be flooded with free information.

Although this seems great at first, you have the unfortunate task of working out which information you can trust.  I don’t mean to say that you will be supplied with incorrect information, I do however have my concerns about complete information.

I have spoken to numerous people who cannot understand why failure hits them when they have tried to be so positive.  I have also spoken to successful people who have a very positive outlook on life.

I am firmly of the opinion that a positive mind is essential.  If your mind is burdened, the likelihood is that you will worry and all your mental energy will be consumed.  You will fail then to pick up from your surroundings what you should and will not see the opportunities that are everywhere.

However, if you have a positive mindset, you will be more likely to ‘see’ and appreciate your surroundings.  Further, think_you_canyou will be able to identify and appreciate opportunities.

In reality, all a positive mindset does therefore is allow you to see opportunities.  But seeing is not enough.  If you do nothing but see, you must accept failure.  You must examine carefully the opportunities that present themselves and act upon those that merit action.  It is the action that will lead you to success.

In conclusion it is positive thought and positive action will lead you to fulfil your goals and ambitions.

By Dapinder Bains

What not to say

John Lewis joins Learning from Dogs

On September 3rd, a Post was published about John.  Anyone who read that Post will understand the pleasure that both John and I got from being re-connected.  Subsequent chats since that Post have shown that there are many parallels in the way that we think, see the world, and speculate as to what, really, is going on!  It was inevitable that I would ask John to join Learning from Dogs and, when I did, John’s immediate ‘yes’ was proof indeed that this was the right thing for us.  A strong desire to do something is always important.

John’s first Post shows that he will be welcomed by all who read this Blog.

Paul

Read John’s first Post

Success is an attitude.

You are, or become, what you think!

On the 12th August I published a Post about the Law of Attraction.

Let me turn to succeeding – from a entrepreneurial point of view, but equally applicable for  whatever is important to you.

In business, simply knowing about the basics in a little detail is not enough to achieve any degree of success.

Actually you need to have a deep understanding of what you are about to embark upon to ensure that you place yourself correctly in the market and sell to people who actually want your product.

The success therefore is in the detail.  As is said, the devil is in the detail.

It will take you time to gain this understanding and, in most instances, will cost you money, but if you lack the belief that you will achieve your goals, you will not have the enthusiasm to learn and we learn most from our mistakes.  To use a cliché again, you can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs.

Perversely, if you have a very positive attitude without any desire to learn, you have even less chance of success.

The answer therefore has to be somewhere in-between.  It’s a fine balance and reaching it can be a challenge in itself.

It would be safe to say that most don’t ever achieve it.

A clear goal is critical in the process.  Having a clear goal helps you plan what you need to do to achieve that goal and lets you know when you have achieved it!

As is said, the only benefit of not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise!

Success therefore is a Mindset, but what exactly should your Mindset be?

By Dapinder Bains

A Dog Story!

This has been doing the rounds and may be seen on numerous web sites and Blogs.  It may be fiction but, nonetheless, it’s a good message.

Strangely, for a Blog called Learning from Dogs, there have been precious few dog stories.  Maybe the integrity of a dog is so flippin’ obvious that we don’t need to wrap the species up in all sorts of romantic twaddle.  This in no way, however, reduces the power of the message that dogs, along with many other species of warm-blooded animals (e.g. horses) are capable of reminding mankind of the importance of integrity.

Pair GSDs

Read The Dog Story

Lend an Ear!

Taking stuff for granted.

Speaking to Paul on the phone and reading his comments about Hurricane Jimena, it’s clear that we all take basic things

Georgia Horsley - see text
Georgia Horsley - see text

in life very much for granted.  The following was passed to me by a fellow commercial pilot who, like me, as you will probably appreciate, requires regular medicals to be passed fit to fly.  It serves as a reminder to all of us that we should value frequently our health.

Here’s the tale.

Read more of this Post

Journey into (inner) space

The journey into inner space is just as fascinating as the one into outer space.

Many, many years ago, 1973 to be precise, an English author, Tony Buzan, was involved in presenting a series on BBC

Tony Buzan
Tony Buzan

television called Use Your Head.  Tony released a book to accompany the television series.  There is not a lot that I remember about that book but one thing I never forgot.  That was the number of neurons in the brain, 10 to the power 200, give or take.  I will return to this aspect in a later Post but now to the main point of this, my introductory Post.

Read about an extraordinary man

The Saola, what future?

The Saola is one of the world’s rarest mammals, on the brink of extinction.

(Please share this Post as far and wide as you can – thank you.)

NOTE: Thanks to Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism for this amazing picture that came from the BBC. (By the way Yves’ Blog is an excellent subscription if only for the wonderful daily animal pictures.)

If you, like me, had never heard of this creature then be prepared to weep a few tears; this beautiful animal is very unlikely to survive as a species for much longer.

Saola

Read more about the Saola

Planet Earth, just a reminder.

This is a beautiful planet and it’s the only one we have.

Yes, I know it’s not original but these pictures still have a haunting beauty about them.

Just look at our world

CCTV cameras in Britain!

Britain’s excessive use of CCTV cameras and the shocking waste of money.

Even before leaving England a year ago, this was a subject that made me feel uneasy, to say the least.

Anyway, a recent article in The Daily Telegraph pointed out just what a complete cock-up this ‘investment’ in cameras CCTV camerahas been.

Britain has 1 per cent of the world’s population but around 20 per cent of its CCTV cameras!  Scary.

And don’t even think about the implications of RFID – Radio Frequency Identification.

G’rrrr.

By Paul Handover

Patrice Ayme and truth

Intelligence at the core of humanism

A while ago a comment on Baseline Scenario jumped off the screen at me.  I was intrigued because the author of this comment used words with power and insightfulness.  That author was Patrice Ayme.  It’s a nom de plume. [NB. Not it isn’t, see comments below] The sub-heading at the top of this Post is from his Blog.  Here’s an extract from the About section of that Blog.

This is a site that tries to find out what is really happening, and what is not, what is right and what is wrong, on many important questions, and in all sorts of ways. In other words thinking is applied relentlessly, the way evolution made it, as the ultimate instrument of domination of anything in sight (be it domination of oneself, of one’s own ideas and emotions, or domination of the universe). Thinking evolved to predict effectively and ambitiously, not to cower in a corner, modest and dazed. Prometheus’ punishment was a regrettable misunderstanding: we did not steal fire from someone, we created our mastery of fire, and fire made us what we are, as we wished. Mastering fire was not a sin, the Greco-Romans were wrong on that one. Fire was part of what we have evolved to be; masters of the universe, for better or worse.

Read more about Patrice