North Star Mental Fitness

Mental Fitness and Childhood

Dad and Mental Fitness may seem like a strange combination.  To me they are intimately connected.  My Dad taught me me a lot about life, love, giving, and success

I was raised after the great depression.  As a child I experienced the victory at the end of World War II.  I recall the rationing of gas, food stamps, and no or limited food in stores.

Above all, I remember what my Dad taught me about life and success.   

60,000 Thoughts a Day

How many thoughts to you have on a daily basis?  According to Possibility Coaches, we have approximately 60,000 thoughts a day.

That is a lot of thoughts.  Out of your 60,000 thoughts yesterday, how many of them were determined by your conscious mind?  Did you purposely choose to change a thought or make a new thought?  Did you question any of your thoughts?  Did you decide that any of your thoughts were wrong or lies? 

Did you consciously began to think differently than in the past, because you want to change your life?  Did you consciously decide to frequently repeat thoughts in order to change the quality of your life including how you feel?

These questions are extremely important for you to consider and answer.  Most of our thoughts are automatic and not consciously created by us.  Unfortunately many of our thoughts are determined by past disappointments, fears, anxieties, painful issues and unsolved problems.  As a result, we frequently have automatic negative thoughts that control our mind and destroy our well-being.  Because we are so gullible to our own thinking, we accept our thinking as true even when it is not.

I urge you to interrupt the repetitive pattern of absorbing the same worn-out thoughts as true.  You do not have to be a prisoner to your own thinking.

If you want freedom, happiness, peace of mind and control of your life, then it is mandatory that you consciously take control of your thinking!

How you think will determine how you feel, act, and relate.  How you think will determine the quality and destiny of your life.  True mental fitness is determined by consciously interrupting the pattern of automatic thinking and consciously thinking thoughts that will provide you with a window of opportunity to be the person you really want to be.

Remember, We Live within the Lives Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

Walk Out of Depression and Anxiety

Do you want to avoid psychiatric medications?

If you do, consider walking.

Jasper Smits is a researchers and director of the Anxiety Research and Treatment Program at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.  Dr. Smits reported the following findings regarding walking. 

“Individuals who exercise report fewer symptoms of anxiety and depression, and lower levels of stress and anger. Exercise appears to affect, like an antidepressant, particular neurotransmitter systems in the brain, and it helps patients with depression re-establish positive behaviors. For patients with anxiety disorders, exercise reduces their fears of fear and related bodily sensations such as a racing heart and rapid breathing.”

Why not begin walking today?  Why not choose to be less anxious and depressed?

Remember, We Live within the Bodies Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

 

The Freedom Choice

THE FREEDOM CHOICE

I WANT FREEDOM FROM “THE WAY THINGS ARE”,

SO I WILL MAKE A NEW OR DIFFERENT CHOICE!

 

In situations that enslave and limit you, you can say to yourself,

“I WANT FREEDOM FROM MY PAST”.

“I WANT FREEDOM FROM THIS”.

“I WANT FREEDOM TO BE”.

“I WANT FREEDOM TO HAVE”.

“I WANT FREEDOM FROM THE WAY THINGS ARE”.

After making one of those powerful declarations make a new choice. Your new
or different choice may be a thought, feeling, behavior or activity.

As often as possible during a day refresh and energize your mind by finishing the
thought: “I WANT FREEDOM FROM” or “I WANT FREEDOM TO.”

As THE FREEDOM CHOICE becomes more meaningful to you, you will become aware that you create your environment with your choices. Once THE FREEDOM CHOICE becomes a regular part of your experience, there will be new meaning to the statement:

I LIVE WITHIN THE ENVIRONMENT CREATED BY MY CHOICES.

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

The Freedom Choice is one of the tools for recreating your life from my companion books, The North Star Mental Fitness Program and I Live within the Environment Created by My Choices.

Stretch Your Mind

"One's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions".

This wonderful quotation was made by Oliver Wendell Holmes.

The essence of mental fitness is expressed by Oliver Wendell Holmes' quotation. In order to grow our mind and have a healthy, strong minds, we need to find new ways to think or new ideas to expand our comfort zone.

Isn't it comforting and exciting to know that once we really stretch our minds with a new idea, our minds never regain its original dimension . New ideas challenge the tyranny of our past and usual way of thinking about ourselves and our lives.

New ideas can refresh and remodel our lives. We need to add new ideas into our minds so we can turn our failures into successes or turn our weaknesses into strengths.

Remember, We Live within the Environment Created by Our Thoughts!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

 

 

 

 

Affirmation for Overcoming Social Anxiety

Social anxiety can be very stressful and significantly prevent people from enjoying relationships. One of my clients applied The Freedom Choice from the North Star Mental Fitness Program in a very creative way to manage her social anxiety.

Her affirmation is very short and enabling her to feel relaxed and comfortable in social situations.

She has been affirming

"I am free to express myself and feel relaxed if I say nothing ".

She has been feeling much more relaxed in her social relationships and feels like she is becoming the person she was before she had social anxiety. She has replaced worrying about what she will say in a social situation with just given herself permission to express herself.

I feel that this affirmation is applicable for most of us. So why not give it a try in your next social situation.

Remember, We Live within the Environment Created by Our Choice!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

28 July 4th Quotes

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or
ill, we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any
friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and success of
liberty.
John F. Kennedy

This nation will remain the
land of the free only so long as it is the home of the brave.
Elmer Davis

Freedom is nothing but a chance to be better.
Albert Camus

Freedom is the oxygen of the soul.
Moshe Dayan

If our country is worth dying for in time of war let us resolve that it is truly worth living for in time of peace.
Hamilton Fish

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Abraham Lincoln
The Gettysburg Address, 1863.

Freedom has its life in the hearts, the actions, the spirit of men and so it must be daily earned and refreshed - else like a flower cut from its life-giving roots, it will wither and die.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved.
Franklin D. Roosevelt

It is easy to take liberty for granted, when you have never had it taken from you.
Dick Cheney

Liberty is the breath of life to nations.
George Bernard Shaw

My God! How little do my countrymen know what precious blessings they are in possession of, and which no other people on earth enjoy!
Thomas Jefferson

There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.
Bill Clinton

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.
Abraham Lincoln

And I'm proud to be an American,
where at least I know I'm free.
And I won't forget the men who died,
who gave that right to me.
Lee Greenwood

Those who won our independence believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty.
Louis D. Brandeis

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
The Declaration of Independence July 4, 1776

We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.
William Faulkner

Where liberty is, there is my country.
Benjamin Franklin

Freedom is never free.
Author Unknown

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.
George Bernard Shaw

The American Revolution was a beginning, not a consummation.
Woodrow Wilson

I wish that every human life might be pure transparent freedom.
Simone de Beauvoir

All we have of freedom, all we use or know -
This our fathers bought for us long and long ago.
Rudyard Kipling


We on this continent should never forget that men first crossed the Atlantic not to find soil for their ploughs but to secure liberty for their souls.
Robert J. McCracken

Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have.
Harry Emerson Fosdick

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.
Thomas Paine

This land is your land, this land is my land
From California, to the New York Island
From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me
Woody Guthrie

Let freedom never perish in your hands.
Joseph Addison

Quoations from: All Great Quotes.

Remember, , We Live within the Freedom Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach.

Whatever the Mind Can Conceive and Believe

 "Whattever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve, regardless how many times you have failed in the past or how lofty your aims and hope may be".

In this quotation, Napoleon Hill described the essence of mental fitness.  This quotation not only describes the essence of success, it brings hope and excitement for those who want to depend upon their minds.

The power of the mind is revealed in the Brooklyn Bridge Story.  Ilka Flood wrote about the incredible Brooklyn Bridge Story in "An Inspiring Story of Determination and Realizing Your Dream".

I hope you will read the story.

Remember, We Live within the Environment Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach

 

MAKE CHILD'S CHOICES OR YOU WILL MESS UP!

THE CHILD CHOICES and the criteria for “messing up” are similar.  Both “messing up” and THE CHILD CHOICES are emotional, irrational and have no concern for possible consequences.  Impulsive or unconsciously determined CHILD CHOICES can result in “messing up”.  “Messing up” such as addictions, criminal activities, relationship conflicts, refusal to care for health and all the other ways people “mess up” are similar to CHILD CHOICES.  Both CHILD CHOICES and “messing up” are highly emotional, irrational and not concerned about consequences.   

Although “messing up” and CHILD CHOICES are similar in their make-up, CHILD CHOICES should not be equated with “messing up”. 

Are Your Eyes Fixed on the Setting Sun or Rising Sun?

Living in the Now is the place of freedom.  If you want freedom from the past, live in the present!  It is impossible to be free by trying to live in the future.  We only can be free or not free in the present!

Carrie Muskat reported on how a baseball player feels about living in the present. Carrie wrote "When the Cubs players walked into the clubhouse Saturday, there were some words of wisdom on the message board."  The following message was left for the Cubs after another loss.

'You can't see the rising sun if your eyes are fixed on the setting one,' it read. "Yesterday is history.  Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That's why it's called present. Conquer the now."

Carrie reported "First baseman Carlos Pena was believed to be behind the message, but he said it was one of the clubhouse attendants.

Pena said "I like it,  To be able to turn the page, and I'm talking about every cell in your body detaching yourself from the past and detaching yourself from the future and focusing on the now.

If you think about it, you can handle the present moment. I can be totally present this second and give 100 percent this second, and that's doable. Sometimes when we try to take too much on, whether we're carrying some baggage from the past or thinking too far ahead into the future, then all of a sudden I'm absent from the present moment. So, focus on the now!"

You may not have had as much futility as the Chicago Cubs in pursuing your goals.  You may not have been focusing on the next year or the future as much as the Cubs.

Nevertheless, Living in the Now applies to all of us.  It is important to "Conquer the Now"!  We need to really detach from the past as well as the future.  Don't vacate the present.  Living in the now is doable for all of us.  Focus on the Now!

Remember, We Live within the Now Created by Our Choices!

Dr. Hal

Life and Mental Fitness Coach