From Dr. Phil’s book titled Life Strategies …
“Get real with yourself about your life and everybody in it. Be truthful about what isn’t working in your life. Stop making excuses and start making results.
If you’re unwilling to acknowledge a thought, circumstance, problem, condition, behavior, or emotion–if you won’t take ownership of your role in a situation–then you cannot and will not change it.”
I spotted this quote in a tagline on the a blog called Relationships Matters hosted by Sonja Ridden. Sonja quotes Dr Phil in a post on her site with related advice …
“The quality of a relationship is a function of the extent to which it is built on a solid underlying friendship and meets the needs of the two people involved.”
Again, there are many variations on this advice. We grouped these together because they all share a similar theme and tone.
This quote normally includes the phrase “Work like you don’t need the money”. Which sounds nice, but we don’t see the value of working like we don’t need the money? We like the positive message behind “Love like you’ve never been hurt”. The “Dance” & “Sing” parts are very similar and encourage stepping outside of our comfort zones. But the best piece of advice is “Live like there’s no tomorrow”.
Must read advice for any husband. From a post titled Happiness Factor: Being Right Instead Of Happy …
“Giving up the need to be right is one of the first steps I believe that anyone needs to take to find the happiness that is inside you. This does not mean you agree with everything that anybody says but you accept someone’s opinion as that and if you feel it necessary to share your opinion you may consider doing it in a way that stresses that you are just looking to discuss, and not convert.”
From the 7 Golden Rules of Life. The 1st rule …
“Don’t let someone become a priority in your life, when you are just an option in their life. Relationships work best when they are balanced.”
The 4th rule …
“When we wake up in the morning, we have two simple choices.
Go back to sleep and dream, or wake up and chase those dreams.
Choice is yours.”
List of all 7 rules
The first time I read this quote I thought of my wife. I enjoyed my bachelor years but I didn’t know what I was missing until I met her. She has her faults – but she is a person of integrity, brilliant, loyal, honest, hard-working, strong, courageous, positive, determined, and we laugh a lot even when we’re doing nothing.
I didn’t receive alot of advice from my parents but I did get this one from my mother. For some reason, this one always stayed with me.
While researching this advice I found an interesting article titled Top Ten Things to Teach Your Daughter written by Michelle Basile and published April 26th 2010. Michelle writes …
“A man enhances your life, not is your life: A mistake you see over and over again in young women is that they base their happiness on and around a man. A man should enhance your life, not become your life. Don’t depend on someone else to make you happy. Make yourself happy!”
This advice comes from emulzz …
“A real relationship happens when two people are happy with their lives as they are before they meet the other person, they don’t need someone else to be happy. And when these two independent people come together they realize that they may be happy alone, but this person gives them something to look forward to everyday of their life.”
Maureen Dowd is credited with this quote. Informative article written by Rachelle Disbennett-Lee, PhD titled Don’t Settle …
“Settling is about not embracing what is best for you, and accepting what you really don’t want. When you settle, you accept less than you deserve. Settling becomes a habit and a way of life, but it doesn’t have to be.
People settle every day in every way. They settle for unsatisfying jobs, boring lives, and stale relationships. People settle in part because they don’t realize they can have better, or even that they deserve better. People also settle because of fear. Fear holds us back from embracing what we really want. According to Bo Bennett, “Every day, people settle for less than they deserve. They are only partially living, or at best living a partial life. Every human being has the potential for greatness.”
The only way to truly embrace your greatness is to stop settling. You have to stop settling for a job that isn’t challenging, a life that isn’t fulfilling, and relationships that are uninspiring. Life is way too short to settle.”
I’ve seen this article It Is Better To Be Alone Than In The Wrong Company on several sites but I haven’t identified the source …
“Tell me who your best friends are and I will tell you who you are. If you run with wolves, you will learn how to howl. But if you associate with eagles, you will learn how to soar to great heights. A mirror reflects a mans face, but what he is really like is shown by the kind of friends he chooses.
The simple but true fact of life is that you become like those with whom you closely associate for the good and the bad. The less you associate with some people, the more your life will improve. Any time you tolerate mediocrity in others, it increases your mediocrity.
An important attribute in successful people is their impatience with negative thinking and negative acting people.”
From a post titled 60 Ways To Make Life Simple Again …
1. Don’t try to read other people’s minds. Don’t make other people try to read yours. Communicate.
2. Be polite, but don’t try to be friends with everyone around you. Instead, spend time nurturing your relationships with the people who matter most to you.
9. Surround yourself with people who fill your gaps. Let them do the stuff they’re better at so you can do the stuff you’re better at.
44. Spend time with nice people who are smart, driven, and likeminded.
60. Make mistakes, learn from them, laugh about them, and move along.
From Peter Bregman of the Havard Business Review Blog Network titled Arguing Is Pointless …
“Think about it. You and someone have an opposing view and you argue. You pretend to listen to what she’s saying but what you’re really doing is thinking about the weakness in her argument so you can disprove it. Or perhaps, if she’s debunked a previous point, you’re thinking of new counter-arguments. Or, maybe, you’ve made it personal: it’s not just her argument that’s the problem. It’s her. And everyone who agrees with her.
In some rare cases, you might think the argument has merit. What then? Do you change your mind? Probably not. Instead, you make a mental note that you need to investigate the issue more to uncover the right argument to prove the person wrong.”
From the a podcast titled “The Upside of Quitting” on Freakononmics.com …
“To help us understand quitting, we look at a couple of key economic concepts in this episode: sunk cost and opportunity cost. Sunk cost is about the past – it’s the time or money or sweat equity you’ve put into a job or relationship or a project, and which makes quitting hard. Opportunity cost is about the future. It means that for every hour or dollar you spend on one thing, you’re giving up the opportunity to spend that hour or dollar on something else – something that might make your life better. If only you weren’t so worried about the sunk cost. If only you could …. quit.”
Life's Best Advice 