The Power Of Consistency

Consistency 12 Things we should start doing and keep doing every day

James H Burns

Copyright © 2021, James H Burns. All rights reserved.

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Contents Why Do Things Consistently? 5 1.

Get up early and at the same time everyday 6

2. Do 5-10 minutes of exercise before you go into the shower 7 3.

Eat healthy 9

4. Do something nice for your spouse, your children or your parents 13 5.

Do one household chore, a small one 14

6. Start writing letters to your children, your spouse, your parents or anyone of significance 18 7. Avoid multi tasking: stay focused on one thing at a time 20 8.

Speak well of others 23

9.

Read something inspirational; Anything 25

10. Practice self control 27 11.

Start listening to understand 28

12. Focus on who you are, what you believe your purpose is and set some goals 30 Don’t Get Overwhelmed Error! Bookmark not defined.

Why Do Things Consistently?

Well why not? Things that are done consistently help us realize our full potential; whatever that potential is. Whether it is physical, mental, emotional, or even spiritual when things are done over and over again we become better individuals in all of the four areas just mentioned. Let’s be clear consistency is doing things for the good and are referred to in that sense.

Habits can be good or bad and can be done consistently as well but when we think of a habit it’s usually a bad one that we have done consistently that we are trying to break. The beauty of doing things consistently is that we don’t have to do a lot. Here are just a few examples: Exercising for 10 minutes every day for a year can put you on the path to good health and it helps to prime the pump so that it becomes easier which creates the desire to want to do more.

Reading for 10 minutes every day can be a welcome break from technology and can help us expand our vocabulary and knowledge base.

Even those who fear going out of their house can benefit from just a 10 minute walk and a friendly greeting to one of their neighbors. This can also help them to strengthen their emotions and help them begin to see some of the good in the world.

Ten minutes of prayer and meditation can help strengthen our faith and create in us a sense of well being and peace.

All of these things sound great don’t they? Well they are if we just do them consistently. I am sixty seven years old as of this writing and have played the start and stop game my whole life.

I have discovered that patience is the key to any form of consistency. I have to be patient with myself and others, that’s

what makes the difference. Change will come as long as I don’t give up. The change will be incremental but it will come as long as I stay the course and remain consistent. Enjoy the book.

James H Burns, MA, DHL

1. Get up early and at the same time everyday Okay no one likes to get up early, we like to sleep. But, getting up early does have its benefits. I’m not talking about getting up just early enough so you can hustle out the door in the morning.

I’m talking about getting up one to two hours ahead of schedule so you can take care of some things that if left undone won’t get done and rest assured they won’t get done when you get home from work. So if you normally get up at 7 am get up at 5 am. Something that I did several years ago when I was working on this was to shave 15 minutes off my sleep time every week.

So in a couple of months I was getting up 2 hours earlier than when I started.

You might be thinking what am I going to do with this extra 2 hours. Well there’s plenty. You see we all have 24 hours in a day, right? So how come everyone says I wish I could do x, y, or z if only I had more time. Now you can fill in the x, y, or z yourself, but just think about what you might do with an extra 2 hours every day. Think about what you might do for yourself, your family, or maybe you might just get to work earlier, so you don’t have to stay later and you could spend some time with your loved ones or a friend. That would be nice wouldn’t it?

You can do this but it has to be done consistently. Sleep is great you see; it helps our bodies and our minds repair themselves.

We all need about 8 hours a night of deep sleep that helps recharge our batteries. The problems begin when we have a love of sleep or when we sleep to escape, therein lies the problem. Sometimes we have to ask ourselves are we tired or depressed. No amount of sleep will help with diagnosed depression, as a matter of fact getting up and moving around might be a better approach. So how do you get up early when the spirit is willing but the flesh might be a bit week? My approach would be to set your alarm earlier than you normal do. When it goes off the first thing you should do is put your feet on the floor. You don’t have to stand yet. Sit there for a minute or two, take some deep breaths, say a short prayer or state a positive affirmation either verbally or mentally and then stand up. See there you did it. Now just keep doing it and you will discover the benefits of rising early.

2. Do 5-10 minutes of exercise before you go into the shower Let me share an interesting workout with you: Micro Workouts.

To be very honest up until recently I never heard of this before.

Basically it’s doing 5-10 minutes of exercise throughout the day. Oh, you can do a more general workout say for 30-45 minutes for sure. But often after these long workouts we tend to revel in the fact that our workout is done for the day and rest on our laurels. My 5 minutes in the morning starts with a short stretch and then 50 air squats and 20 pushups off of the back of the footboard of my bed. Research supports the fact that these 5-10 minutes of exercise throughout the day lowers blood sugar

and helps fight against obesity. I would say from experience that it does.

Now, why do this? It creates the habit and when done consistently you will always be aware of the fact that even if you did nothing else you did a few minutes of structured exercise for the day. There is something called NEAT. This stands for Non Exercise Activity Thermogenics. That is the amount of calories you burn just by moving. So the obvious point is you will burn more calories when you have opportunities to walk more or do a few squats during the day It’s all about consistency and the ability to sustain something.

You may decide that exercise is better for you in the morning and begin to schedule an exercise routine that you can stick to.

I know folks who have tried to exercise for an hour 3-4 days a week. They discovered that this wasn’t sustainable and abandoned the program. By exercising a few minutes in the morning, at lunch hour, and then later in the day you can get 30 minutes of exercise (remember I am talking about 50 squats and 20 pushups which you can do off of a desk). Do a little bit more walking and you will lower your blood sugar and burn a bit more fat than if you remained sedentary.

By the way if you find yourself sitting for more than one hour at a time set a timer for yourself or invest in a watch with a timer and one that counts your steps to give you reminders on when it’s time to start moving.

It all starts with that morning mindset. Get up and get moving.

This becomes more important with age because as you age you should be looking for the most bang for your buck; the least amount of exercise which nets the greatest benefit.

So there you have it, number two on the list of things you should start doing and start doing every day.

3. Eat healthy Too often people get confused about what eating healthy looks like. Is it any wonder, with all the new diet fads out there eating healthy has taken on a whole new meaning? Now I am not a dietician or a nutritionist. I probably have eaten unhealthy for half of my life and in a twenty year period have probably lost 1,000lbs. (That would be a 50 lb.weight gain and weight loss over that time span). There are those though that can eat anything they want and not gain a pound and then there are those who are always on a diet and are still over weight. There are those who I fear for when I see them because they are approaching what I call the point of no return and are on the threshold of being bed ridden. Sadly many of these folks who are dangerously overweight appear to be young people between the ages of 25 and 30. I would suspect genetics probably has something to do with our body type, but our environment and the introduction of addicting foods have everything to do with what we eat. Now our parents don’t force feed us now, but when we were younger they probably did introduce some yummy foods that was either too sweet or too salty, for the record in my case the foods were salty.

I wrote an article some years back titled “Bare Feet And White Flour” I am going to share it here because I believe it has everything to do with where are belief system comes from and why it is so difficult to eat healthy.

Bare Feet And White Flour Have you ever wondered why your parents did some of the things that they did? I did lots of times. My dad had so many regimented activities that I thought he had a screw lose or something. I’m only going to talk about two here because there are just too many to put into one essay.

I really spent time observing my dad as a kid and listening to him. It wasn’t until I was about forty that I realized some of the benefits of his behavior and, very recently, some of the real benefits of his behavior. My dad had an unbelievable fear of getting a cold. He came home from WWII with malaria and tuberculosis. He was always cautious of sharing food, towels, cups, and silverware. Any watermark on a piece of silverware in a restaurant was sent back immediately.

I remember one time in a restaurant in New York a fork went back three times. Some people send food back. He sent the silverware back. It got so bad that one guy sitting close to use told my dad that the he thought that the waitress was on Candid Camera.

If you sneezed you were accused of trying to bring a cold into the house, to try and kill him. He was hospitalized on December 27, 1967 due to a re-occurrence of the TB and was sent to the infirmary at the veteran’s hospital in East Orange NJ for 3 months. When he was released from the hospital anything and everything could give him a cold.

Two things were absolutes, cold feet and white flour. I never saw my father walk around without something on his feet. He wouldn’t walk three feet without putting on a pair of slippers. If

you sneezed, he would always ask you what you ate. My sister, my mother, and I thought he was crazy. Bare feet and white flour would make you sick and if you got sick, well as he put it, “If I get a cold I am finished.”

All of these things I observed always stuck with me. When I was about 40 years old I started to battle my weight. Always watching my calories and trying to stay in shape. The Atkins diet started to become very popular along with other diets that restricted carbohydrates, and other foods that contained you guessed it, white flour. Exactly what the old boy was talking about 50 years ago. Suddenly everyone had a carbohydrate allergy, was gaining weight, had type-two diabetes, high blood pressure, and all kinds of health related issues because of white flour. I started to watch my white flour, sugar and starch intake and I started to lose weight. The stuff I loved as a kid was something that could kill me. The stuff that my father said could make me sick was making me sick.

Recently I was walking around the backyard wearing a pair of three dollar flip flops. I have a tendency to drag my feet when I walk primarily because my feet are kind of flat, something I inherited from my dad as well. I walked from the shed to the concrete walkway and slammed my right foot into an Adirondack chair. I know I broke the middle toe. At least it looked broken.

The next day passing through the garage I stubbed the same toe on a hand weight in the middle of the floor. I got into the car in agony, looked down at my foot which had the same three dollar flip-flop on it and I could hear my father say to me, “Will you please put your slippers on.”

This isn’t the first time I stubbed that toe but it is the first time it dawned on me that my father knew me because I was just like him. He didn’t want me to go through the same agonies that he had gone through. He didn’t want me to get fat or stub my toes. Unfortunately, he just had a strange way of letting me know. I don’t think he ever gave me the reason why he did what he did. That’s probably why it took me thirty years to figure it out on my own. If I could ask for something I would ask that my three daughters learn the reasons why I do what I do quicker than I learned things from my father. There’s a question that kids ask all the time “Why do we have to do this?” Sometimes by the time that gets figured out, it’s too late.

So put your slippers on and have a piece of fish with some broccoli, you’ll be glad you did.

So what does eating healthy look like to me? A bowl of oatmeal in the morning, a turkey sandwich for lunch and a protein with some vegetables and a salad for dinner; eating this way for me helps curb my appetite, reduce cravings and removes my desire to snack. Would this work for everyone, maybe or maybe not but this is my way of eating healthy. Do I eat this way all the time? No of course not. But when it comes down to consistency I think the most important thing is having a place to go. Oh you can get up later one day but you know where to go in order to rise early, you can have a piece of cake, but you know what your healthy eating looks like so making the return to it is a bit easier.

Exercise and diet go together. Jack LaLanne the late fitness guru from the 50’s and 60’s once said that staying healthy is 90% diet and 10% exercise if you want to remain healthy. We can’t exercise to eat more or reward ourselves with food after exercise. The truth is we can’t out train a bad diet.

4. Do something nice for your spouse, your children or your parents I have been married to my wife Pat for ten years; needless to say that this is my second marriage. I learned a lot along the way and made a bunch of mistakes as well. Pat works hard; she cares for her aging mother and is truly a great person and wife.

Every day for as long as I can remember I have been bringing Pat coffee in bed in the morning. Early in our marriage I did this without giving it a second thought, until I discovered how much she really likes it. Now this small act of love and kindness has taken on a whole new meaning for me and for her as well. It’s small, no bells and whistles, no motive, it’s actually fun. An added bonus is we get to spend some time together talking about the news, our day, or our kids.

For my youngest daughter Zoe who is driven to school I ready her backpack and lunch box in the morning and place it in the car for her. I know they’re suppose to learn responsibility, I got it but often I wonder how we will help our daughters to recognize positive qualities in a partner if we don’t show them what it looks like. I also like holding the car door for all of my daughters (ages 11, 26, and 31) as an example of kindness and courtesy. The small things are the big things.

My oldest daughters 26 and 31 have been through this and don’t live with me any longer. But, I always send a text of a heart or a short I am thinking of you message. They know no response is needed, and I know they appreciate it.

We were all children once, and to our parents we will always be their children. They will always have difficulty getting out from under the memory of what we looked like and how we

acted when we were infants, toddlers, tweens, and teens.

Whether we get along with them or not, we owe them, something. It might be a phone call, an invite to dinner, or just a card letting them know that we love them. If your parents are no longer and have passed away try to keep them in your heart and keep them in your memory during the holidays or on what would have been their birthday. If there is a divide between you and your parents make it right and I mean this minute. Don’t allow the time to pass because days become weeks and then years and if things aren’t right and they do pass away the guilt could be a lifetime burden for you. We will all have the memory of our parents kicking around in our head and by dealing with any issues that you have with them now you avoid the nightmare of being haunted from the grave.

5. Do one household chore, a small one Things do have a way of getting away from us from time to time. I know they do for me. For me, chores are basically self assigned. There are things that I see that need to get done and I just do it. I had to be careful and still do because if I choose to do too much well no one else will do anything. I think that this is an important piece to remember when it comes to our children as well. If we do too much for them they won’t do anything on their own, and this is something that can create resentment and the use of the nasty and unflattering word, lazy.

The other thing we have to be careful with is only doing what we want to do. As an example I don’t mind doing the dinner dishes, my thought is someone cooked so I have to do something to show my appreciation; sounds nice doesn’t it?

However if I am asked to make a salad or set the table I might not move quite as fast as someone else would like.

It is important however to do one thing every day, and if everybody does one thing a lot will get accomplished. I am not talking about large scale projects I am referring to daily things that need attention. As an example I empty the dishwasher every morning. I know my wife appreciates it, so when she wakes up the kitchen is clean and ready to use. It’s not doing the task; it’s doing it and adopting the task as your own. The issue arises with children when we don’t assign them a task and they don’t adopt anything as their own. They never seem to pay attention to detail and how to get things done effectively and efficiently.

My point here is we should do something that we know we can do consistently and keep doing it. It could be anything; rake leaves, do the dishes, take out the garbage, dust, vacuum, organize, or walk the dog it doesn’t matter just do it every day and get good at it. You could call it individual responsibility, but always remember that it’s tough for kids to know what they’re responsible for if we don’t let them know and more importantly teach them how to do it, and hold them accountable when they don’t. Unfortunately responsibility and accountability are things that we try to teach our children and at times they seem to fall short at school and in the home. Several years ago I wrote a book title “The New 3R’s In Education: Respect, Responsibility, and Relationships.” In this book I spoke about the quality of responsibility, and why it’s so important I am including an excerpt below.

The New 3R’s in Education I believe that there are only two basic qualities that, if worked on diligently, will help students become better behaved in the home and in the classroom and will help them develop into

more capable adults as they raise their own family and work on a job. The first quality is responsibility; the second is respect.

Responsibility Educators are under constant pressure to improve student test scores and overall academic performance. If a student’s standardized test scores are not up to snuff or if students have academic difficulty that can’t be explained, the principal finds their way into the classroom for an observation to try and find something wrong with the teacher’s instructional methods. The question that gets raised: Who is responsible for a student’s academic performance?

I was not the best student in elementary or high school. I struggled just to get C’s and an occasional B and never did anyone question how good my teachers were; instead, I was questioned about what my responsibilities were as a student. My father knew when report cards were issued. Once he had that report card in hand, he would sit me down and go over my grades. Any grade below a C, he would ask me what was going on in the class and what my responsibilities were in order to raise my grade. I remember once I tried to pull a fast one and tell him that the teacher didn’t like me. He didn’t buy it and told me that the teacher didn’t have to like me and I didn’t have to like the teacher: my job was to work as hard as I could to understand what the teacher was teaching me. When I was a freshman in high school I failed Algebra I. I went home and told my father that it was no big deal and that I would take it again in my sophomore year. He said to me, “No you won’t!

You failed because you didn’t apply yourself.” I ended up in summer school, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me because the following year I got straight A’s in Algebra II;

it was a breeze. He told me that he would give me all the help that he could give me, but if I failed, I did it on my own. And, of course, if I pass, I did that on my own also. He made me responsible for my own education and did not want to hear any excuses.

My friend’s son, who I observed as a student never complained about homework assignments, not having enough time to study, poor teachers, or that he didn’t understand something. He took responsibility for every aspect of his school work. I looked at his high school transcript when he graduated, and there wasn’t one A; he earned all A+’s. He was the valedictorian of his class, and he has since graduated from an Ivy League College. .

Before a kid can be successful as a student he has to be made aware by parents and teachers that it is his responsibility to be prepared to learn and accept failure as an indicator that they are not putting forth their best effort.

6. Start writing letters to your children, your spouse, your parents or anyone of significance (birthday letters especially) Does anybody write anymore? The obvious answer is yes of course. But most of the time the writing is done with the use of email or texting, and that’s okay really. We are in the communication era so the use of computers, phones, texting, and emails is all right with me. But, when birthdays and important holidays roll around the first thing we do is run out and spend between $5 and $10 on a greeting card that says things that have nothing to do with the relationship that exists between you and the person you are giving the card to.

Greeting cards are nothing more than an obligatory expression that communicates to the person that you didn’t forget their birthday or that you were important enough to receive a family greeting card around the holidays; greeting cards from a group of people that you haven’t seen all year or worse yet you might not even like.

My response to all this is to write letters. Oh, I use the computer but it’s my thoughts and my expression of love and appreciation to the people that mean the most to me. My wife and my children are first on that list. I started doing this probably 15 years ago. It never really dawned on me what it meant to the people who received the letter. My list has expanded a bit but rest assured once it starts it won’t stop. You will receive a letter from me on your birthday and during the holiday season. (For me that’s Christmas) I use the letter to my children as a kind of year end summary and recognize their achievement and express my joy for who they are and how they have grown during the year. This has become part of my legacy and is something that I am very proud of; proud not in a

prideful way but in a good way because I know that I have touched the heart and soul of another very significant person in my life.

Sometimes these letters can heal past hurts or just help to get caught up and bring the emotional bank account back from being overdrawn. Whatever the reason we have to realize what we mean to others and the impact that we can have with our words. My dad didn’t write letters but I always remember him filling out a beautiful card that he bought for my mother. The card was of course the most expensive at the time $1. But, he took the time to draw hearts and with arrows and did his best to make my mom feel like his sweetheart. Words can change the world or they can change a life. Below is a short article I wrote titled “Significant Others” I think it truly fits in this chapter.

Significant Others “It doesn’t mean that much to me to mean that much to you.”

Neil Young sang this verse in his song “Old Man.” Significant others; we all have them, and we all have had them: those that have impacted our life in such a way that we can still hear their voice calling us long after they have passed on. My dad was very significant in my life. He was hypercritical, I always sought his approval—it was tough to get. Sometimes I just wanted to give up. I mean, what’s the use in trying? I thought, “Can’t please the old man no matter what I do.” The story is too long to tell here, but after he attended one of my baseball games and saw, I mean really saw the type of baseball player I was, he told me that he was so proud of me and hugged me. I don’t think he had a clue as to what those words and affection meant to me. I forgot all the past criticism and have hung on to those words to this day. He probably changed my life and didn’t even know it. Whether we want to believe it or not, as

adults, we are significant to others right now. It’s time to realize how much we mean to our children, our spouse, and other friends and family members. How much does it really mean to you to mean that much to another person? It doesn’t matter what you have said or done in the past; a life can be changed with the right words at the right time. Often, we allow our past to dictate how we are going to treat others; don’t let it.

Start writing those letters now and do it consistently.

7. Avoid multi tasking: stay focused on one thing at a time For some reason people they believe they can multi task. Well guess what; they can’t. Brain research tells us that we can’t focus on more than one task at a time. Think I’m crazy? Well try singing Amazing Grace while the car in front of you is doing 20 miles an hour on a major highway. You see good and evil can’t occupy the same mind, at least not at the same time.

All that really happens is we task switch, we just go from one task to another and think we are multi tasking. All that’s really happening is we are doing two tasks only half as well. So while that car in front of us is going 20 mph there is a constant struggle within us to remain patient and calm or to blow the horn while screaming get the hell out of the way. Slow and easy wins the race. We will get more done by staying focused on one thing and getting it done right than by being overwhelmed with an overly ambitious schedule. Multi tasking is not only bad for our mind but it can be dangerous physically as well. I can still hear my father yelling at me for not paying attention while I was using a tool, or running to get somewhere with my thoughts on where I was going instead of what I was doing. When we grow up with this idea that we can multi task it

can cost us time and money. We can race to get somewhere while we are driving, but we will always be late. We can text and drive, (which we all know is a bad idea) and have a car accident injuring ourselves or others.

The idea here is pay attention to what you are doing and teach your kids to do the same thing. It will all get done safely and thoroughly if you keep your mind on what you are doing. Here is a short article titled “What Are You Paying Attention To” which I wrote many years ago for my book Anti Bullying 101.

It fits here and really hammers home the point that we have to stop multi tasking and pay attention to our surroundings.

What Are Your Paying Attention To? The brain is a wonderful organ and it can be programmed by us and by others. The words that people say to us and the things that are done to us can produce a private logic that can either be believed or stricken from our conscious mind as being just or untrue. Your Reticular Activating System (RAS) is the automatic mechanism inside your brain that brings relevant information to your attention. The RAS is a filter between the conscious mind and the subconscious mind. Let’s say you are sitting in your house and in the distance, you hear sirens. Your subconscious mind may say, “Police, fire, first aid.” You are busy concentrating on something else, so your conscious mind focuses on the task at hand. But, then you notice that the sirens were from a fire truck and the truck pulls in front of the your neighbors house. Your RAS immediately kicks in and those sirens that you heard earlier are now relevant to you. If you start to smell smoke well, now it really has your attention. A student may come to school with his/her conscious mind already programmed. He/ she may have let so many negative

thoughts in that they may have become part of his/her belief system. The student may have been bullied at home or punished for small mistakes. His/ her siblings may have picked on him/her to the point that his RAS now allows only negative thoughts in. But worse yet, he/ she now believes them.

Negative words and treatment are the things that get his/her attention and they begin to form his/her self-image. His thoughts become actions.

The order of the day is to stay focused on the positive and stop trying to stuff two pounds of baloney into a one pound bag.

Something or someone will always suffer or be short changed in some way, shape, or form. In this case you are sure to lose at least a half pound of baloney.

8. Speak well of others I’ve been in education for forty five years. I have been in seven different school systems as a teacher and as an administrator. In each district I discovered the pain that rumors and gossip can cause others. A rumor is starting a story based upon a half truth or no truth. It just starts based upon what someone sees or hears and they draw a conclusion that to them just seems logical. This logical conclusion is usually a witch hunt and the person who starts the rumor is looking for evidence to support their belief about someone or something. If it is someone the motive is revenge, if it is something the motive is usually pride or arrogance as they seek to prove a point based upon the failure of a system, a political party, or a religious belief; kind of like a see I told you so.

Gossip on the other hand is the spread of information about someone’s behavior of which the end result has nothing to do with those that are doing the gossiping. Both are painful and quite frankly immature. In school when kids do this they call it drama. Believe it or not the kids see this as mature because they have observed their parents doing this at the dinner table or even teachers doing this in conversations with other teachers or in the hallway. A faculty room can be a haven for this type of unwanted and negative behavior.

Let’s say you have a piece of wood, a nail, and a hammer.

Pretend the wood is a person, and the nail is a nasty rumor about that person. If you hammer in the nail, you’re obviously hurting him or her. If you then pull out the nail…well, there’s still a hole in the wood, and the damage has been done.

Rumors and Gossip can cause us to make some really bad decisions and bad choices.

Letting a rumor influence your behavior is like letting someone else make a big decision for you. Let’s say you hear that your boss plans to call a Snow Day tomorrow because of a pending blizzard. Expecting a day off, you stay up late and have a few too many cocktails.. The next morning, the blizzard turns out to be nothing more than a drizzle, and work isn’t cancelled after all. Doh! You go to work hung-over and are miserable the whole day. Worse yet you go around bad mouthing your boss like it was his fault that it didn’t snow. . Here’s another example: the gossip grapevine has it that the new secretary that was just hired is snobby and arrogant, so you avoid her. Years later, you run into her shopping and you learn that she’s an extremely nice person and not a snob at all! You missed spending a lot of time with a cool person because you judged her based on a rumor. Once you understand the damage they can do, how do you go about breaking the chain of rumors and gossip? It’s very simple, make the rumor stop with you if you decide that the rumor is hurtful in some way, make a stand.

Decide that you don’t want to take part in spreading it. Others may continue to circulate the gossip, but you’ve made a personal choice to stay out of it. Chances are that the rumor will die out much more quickly than if you had joined the buzz.

The bottom line, just don’t do it, and don’t be selective about it.

Do it consistently and do yourself a favor and be loyal to those that are not present. You will earn the trust of those that are. If you join in with those that are bad mouthing others when they are not present that same group probably just can’t wait for you to leave the room so they can start talking about you.

9. Read something inspirational; anything I made the mistake of having a couple of newspapers and other new outlets deliverer headlines and breaking stories to my inbox daily. I must say I keep in touch with what is going on in the world. The problem is that 90% of it is so negative, sad and at times slanted based upon the political philosophy of the paper or cable network. This negativity and at times the slant can cause me to become jaded, cynical, and to really and on occassion lose my faith in humanity. The destructive influence of political discord, domestic violence, pandemics, fear, and random shootings to just name a few can be anything but inspiring as a matter of fact it can be exhausting and exacerbating. What is even more frustrating is that all of these cable news outlets say that they are fair and balanced. Here is what I said about these news outlets 10 years ago.

FOX, CNN, MSNBC Yes, I know all cable outlets for the news. Is it news or is it the networks’ slant on the news? I think you know the answer. It is no longer just reporting the News. It’s reporting the new based upon the political views of the network. In homes across the country, opinions are being formed by adults who listen to the thoughts of so-called reporters and experts who want everyone to believe that their network is fair and balanced. Thoughts about different countries, races, religions, ethnicities, intertwined with current events can enter homes with the click of a remote. Do families talk about the news? Of course they do. The problem is, they are not forming an opinion based upon their own values, but rather the values of others. The bias that

may result in homes regarding the differences of others impacts our children. This negative communication filters down by osmosis and our children can develop negative attitudes and can become prejudicial in their thinking. What parents fail to recognize is that their children attend school every day with other students of different backgrounds. Adults need to understand how their thoughts, words, actions, attitudes, and motives affect their children. It is far easier to build a boy than to mend a man. Prejudice is learned. It’s not genetic.

The idea here is to fill our hearts and minds with positive thoughts, speak words that edify, take actions that are designed to build up not tear down, have attitudes that are kind, caring, and respectful, and maintain motives that are pure and are not seeking that which is for ourselves but which is fair and equitable. Truly in order to do this we have to focus on what’s entering our minds and forming our thoughts.

I read the bible every day. I then pray. This I do in the morning when no one else is awake. It has a way of cleansing my heart and soul and it almost sets up a barrier to help me keep out the negativity of some of the events of the day. Some people read other literature or biographies of those who have overcome adversity, or have other methods of clearing their minds; nature, yoga, walking hand in hand with a loved one and family members, are some other good ideas.

Reflective journaling, taking a course and learning a new skill like painting, pottery, or photography can all inspire us to become our personal best and help us to realize that there is much more to life than the negativity of the news. Get positive, and stay inspired.

10. Practice self control No one has self control. Have you looked at the condition of society? 1 in 4 homes are in foreclosure. I guess we can blame the banks, or can we? Everybody wants something bigger and better. To get bigger and better the money has to be made to get it, unless the bank doesn’t care. But, in the final analysis the decision is made by the buyer. Teenage obesity, diabetes, addiction, alcoholism, are all evidence of the lack of self control in society. And oh, did I mention anger issues and the left over bitterness from childhood that gets carried into adulthood wreaking havoc on families. Society has lost control of its thoughts, its words, and its actions. Everybody knows.

What produces a nation of people with self-control, consequences do. Unfortunately many people are sitting in that leaking boat right now and are experiencing the consequences of a lack of self control.

That short paragraph above was included in a larger article and course that I wrote some years ago titled: “Everybody Knows” Truthfully everybody does know when they have gone overboard in certain areas. You just don’t feel right when you over eat, drink, or maybe even exercise too much. Excess needs to be avoided. We all seem to do it though, because we believe we are going to get somewhere or reach a goal more quickly than we would if we did things in moderation. Just look at diet and exercise. We fast and binge and become a gym rat only to discover that things just aren’t happening fast enough for us and we give up. Often we think we are going to reach a goal in one month when in reality to get lasting results it might take a year or more.

I was speaking to an older gentleman in a coffee shop recently who was eighty years of age. He didn’t look it and truly he was the picture of health. I asked him what he did for a living when he worked and he told me that he was a mailman. Back then a mailman carried a leather bag and walked up and down in neighborhoods delivering mail to houses. So he walked a lot during the day. I asked him what he does now to stay in such good shape and he told me that he walks one mile a day, every day. A routine he was familiar with and was used to. This helped in maintaining his weight, kept his heart strong and his blood work was always perfect. The trick was he did it consistently and in moderation. Consistency and moderation make it far easier to continue and allows us to keep a healthy balance. So avoid excess, stay consistent and be patient with yourself and you will discover the secret to lifelong health and well being.

11. Start listening to understand We all like to be heard; and some of us like to be heard a bit too much. We can have a tendency to inundate a conversation with our own interests and just love communicating to people how smart we are or how we solved some large scale problem at work. If you happen to be with someone when this is going on it can be sad to watch the expression on the listeners face when they are interrupted or when the speaker almost starts another conversation that is totally off the topic that was being discussed. Most people like to listen to respond. You can see it in their eyes and body posture. They discovered a link in a conversation and want to talk so bad that they are practically leaning into the speaker. Look, this is an easy one: below I am going to explain the five types of listening. You decide which

one you are and then make adjustments. The trick is be consistent and be a good listener.

5 Type of Listening Ignoring – Basically being present physically with your mind on something else. The speaker is not aware of this but; the listener may have no memory of the conversation.

Pretend Listening – This is something that a person may do when they want to get off the phone with someone and the other person continues to talk. The listener usually responds with statements like; Right, right, yeah, got it.

Selective Listening – This is usually what is done with a three year old child. The premise here is if the listener paid attention to everything that was said they would spend all of their time listening. So they only listen when there is some time of critical information being shared.

Attentive Listening – The listener attend to the speaker with their ears, eyes, and body. They hear clearly but may not understand what is truly being said.

Empathic Listening – The listener pays attention with their ears, eyes, body, and mind and can truly understand the emotions of the conversation. This can also be called active listening or reflective listening and is a way of listening and responding to another person that improves mutual understanding and trust. It is an essential skill for third parties and disputants alike, as it enables the listener to receive and accurately interpret the speaker's message, and then provide an appropriate response.

I think you know which one nets the best results; Empathic.

Now if this area is a challenge for you that’s okay just always remember where you have to return to if you fall off the wagon and start to ignore someone of your mind is somewhere else when someone is speaking. You might keep or make a friend by doing so.

12. Focus on who you are, what you believe your purpose is and set some goals I retired from public education in 2004 to pursue work as a consultant, writer, and college instructor. I will admit that it was and is nice not to have to get up with the moon and be out of the house before sunrise. However after I retired I still got up with the moon I just didn’t have to anymore, I choose to. As a matter of fact since I retired I don’t think there have been 10 days in seventeen years when I got up in the morning and I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do. Early in my retirement I frequently left the house to do in-service training of teachers. When I wasn’t doing training I was writing or soliciting. I have been a college instructor since 2000 and have written graduate courses and have often taught on weekends. I have kept busy. I enjoy walking, exercise, and challenging myself with new tasks like jumping rope or working on my balance.

Now why do I say this? Well it’s good to have something to do every day for sure but more importantly it’s good to know what you are going to do, how you are going to do it and how long something will take. This is known as setting goals, and with every goal there are objectives. The objectives are the baby steps we take to reach our goals every day. We also have to

figure out what we want to do and why we want to do it. That’s purpose. We all, have a unique design we just have to discover how our design fits into our job or career. In other words what motivates us and what are our gifts that we can use to make a difference in our own life and the lives of others. Once this is discovered the moon won’t be as daunting in the morning and we will always have a reason and a purpose for waking up.

If you are having trouble discovering your gifts and your unique design I am including here a motivational gift inventory: See Below

Motivational Gifts Understanding what emotionally drives you and others is a key to building positives relationships and for lifelong success. Each person is motivated in different ways. When we develop the skill to look at life through the eyes of another person we become more tolerant of their behavior and understand our own responsibilities in different situations. Underline any phrase or complete sentence from all of the paragraphs below which describe how you think or feel.

1. I consider myself to be a thinker, creative, and

enjoy coming up with new ideas no one else has thought of. I tend to be a loner, and sometimes I feel people have a hard time understanding what I say. I think a lot about money. I enjoy making it, and like to give it to others who need help or are doing something worthwhile. I do not like people to know too much about me. If someone crosses me, I shut them out and find it hard to renew the relationship.

2. I consider myself to be a thinker, but enjoy

giving ideas to others. I feel I see the whole picture when talking about something. I enjoy coordinating a complicated project. If a challenge is supposed to be impossible I believe it can be done. I enjoy being involved in many things at the same time. I am accused sometimes of being more concerned about getting the job done than the people doing the job. I enjoy working but sometimes have to get moving. I become angry or indignant when things do not go my way or when I have a

conflict with people. People sometimes react to my explanations feeling “I think I know it all.”

3. I consider myself to be a thinker but a scholar is

more like it. I enjoy studying and accumulating information about a subject. I feel I am very thorough, more than most people. I get frustrated when I cannot understand something. I feel that most people are not very smart and are superficial in the way they go about understanding something. I like to help others understand something if they really want to learn. I do not accept most people’s explanation of something. I tend to be skeptical of their conclusions and suspicious of how they arrived at their conclusions until I can study and examine it for myself.

4. I consider myself to be a thinker, but enjoy

convincing other to think my way. I believe there is a logical way to work out a problem.

Most things seem black or white to me, right or wrong. People seem to react to me because I say a lot of things very direct, and sometimes am accused of being blunt. I need to know “why” to everything. I do not enjoy joking around or making small talk. If two people aren’t getting along, I want to get them together and work out the problem. I enjoy being in control of the situation. Once rules are set down, I like to follow them to the letter, and sometimes

considered inflexible. I feel I can see through people’s motives whether they are right or wrong.

5. I feel I am a sensitive feeling to other people’s

feelings. It is important to me that people are honest. I am dependable and a hard worker, but like to work in an atmosphere where everyone is getting along. I will make an effort to do things or say things in a way that if possible, will not upset a person. I am accused sometimes of talking too long to explain what I mean. When I get upset, I am prone to “break” away rather than intensify the problem. It is hard to tolerate people who have hostile or harsh attitudes or are insensitive to other people’s feelings. I enjoy solving problems in a non-conflicting way.

6. I am a good worker. I enjoy doing things for

people who are sincere and appreciative of what I do. I enjoy pleasing and helping others. I tend to commit myself and volunteer for more things than I can do. I like knowing the details for exactly for exactly what and how a job needs to be done.

Sometimes I am accused of being a jack of all trades. Once I know how to do something, I do not like to change to another way. If I don’t know how to do a job I would rather not do it than do it wrong and have my boss be unhappy with my work. I get disgusted with people who do not get along. I would rather quit than be in hostile environment all the time. I get great satisfaction

from making a list of things to do then getting them done. I do not like to sit around and talk all the time. I would rather be “doing” something. I usually read the instructions first before I try something new. Once I know how to do something I rarely forget how to do it.

7. To a degree I feel I am a combination of all of the

above. I am very action orientated. I have to see something happen. I enjoy seeing projects and results. Too long a dry spell without anything happening and I have to fight discouragement. I feel I am good at working with people on a one to one basis. I have a strong sense of confidence, which is sometimes misunderstood as egotistical. I am very involved with a person or people working with me on a common project. I am a good motivator of people and like people to rally around me. I have very little time to be side tracked by problems. I would prefer that we ignore them and push on unless it is interfering with what we are doing.

Discovering Your Gift After highlighting or underlining the phrases and sentences which you most identify with, one paragraph will seem to stand out. If more than one paragraph is heavily underlined, the one furthest down the list (the higher number) is most likely your gift.

Don’t Get Overwhelmed Change is not easy it’s hard so go slow. Work on one item a month and do it for a year. Then do it again the next year. You will change and it will be for the better. Anything that is worth having isn’t easily gotten. So persist and don’t give up. No one likes to change. It’s too tough to do. If you have any bad habits (you know, smoking, or excessive drinking, eating, or spending) then you know what I’m talking about. You wake up in the morning realizing that you have sworn off cigarettes and are on a diet and almost feel depressed knowing that you can’t have your coffee and a Marlboro this morning. Oh, we will quit, but it may take lung cancer or an oxygen tank before we do. Change, you see, is painful; very painful. Sometimes it requires a series of epiphanies before complete change takes place. Change is very incremental and it will sneak up on you.

A pound a month is a twelve-pound weight gain at the end of the year. By the way, it was fun eating what you wanted, when you wanted it. Now, to lose it, it’s not quite as much fun.

Change takes a leap of faith, knowing that if you stay the course and watch what you eat, you will slowly lose those few pounds that you gained. It hurts. It requires patience and the knowledge that you might revisit old behaviors from time to time. To help you out I am going to give you an assignment.

For each one of the twelve items discussed in this book I am going to give you one thing to do to get started, sort of like a jump start. You may say great idea or make an adjustment and use the idea as a springboard for your own. Either way, any effort no matter how big or how small will always be rewarded.

1. Get Up Early And At The Same Time Everyday Be accountable to someone. Set your alarm 15 minutes earlier than you normally do. Then have your spouse or partner tell you to put your feet on the floor. If you live alone have a friend call you as a reminder. Remember to put your feet on the floor.

2. Do 5-10 Minutes Of Exercise Before Going Into The Shower Decide on 2-3 exercises you would like to do. Maybe walking in place, some push-ups, or have a few dumbbells in your bedroom. The trick here is to remember this is an activity to build consistency and to incorporate some exercise into your day. You can do more exercise later if you like. Doing something everyday can have benefits over the long haul. 10 push-ups can change your body in a year if done consistently.

3. Eat Healthy Pick one meal a day and decide that you are going to make a healthy choice. As an example instead of a bagel and cream cheese for breakfast have a bowl of fruit or oatmeal. If you are hungry put the fruit on the oatmeal. Have one good calorie meal a day. .

4. Do Something Nice For Your Spouse, Your Children Or Your Parents You could make this a family game if you like. The question will always be what is mom or dad, going to do today, and for whom. This is a great example for children and when they are old enough they should be participants; this can help remove any idea of entitlement.

5. Do One Household Chore, A Small One It’s not what needs to get done. It is what is in your purview that you could do. It could be as simple as carrying something that’s sitting on the steps upstairs and not leaving it for someone else. Just try and remember if you see it you own it.

6. Start Writing Letters To Your Children Your Spouse or anyone of significance (Birthday Letters Especially) If a letter is too much, just start by writing a short note of thanks or appreciation. Often as a family or even as an employer we can forget at times what others do for us and take it for granted. Those that cook, clean, do dishes, or laundry probably does so out of love for others so let them know how much you appreciate their actions.

7. Stop Multi Tasking: Stay Focused On One Thing At A Time Start developing an understanding of the power of one, and by this I mean one job or task. Too often when we multi task we never complete anything because there is too much on our mental bench. Then as we observe the wreckage of unfinished jobs or chores our excuse becomes: “I would have finished this if only I had more time.” Well, everyone has 24 hours in a day right? Make one job the important one, and get it done.

8. Speak Well Of Others Try to realize what you lose by not doing this, and that’s the trust of others. Doing this speaks more about your character then the character of the person we are gossiping about.

9. Read something inspirational; Anything This works well with rising early, and doing 5 minutes of exercise. If you think about it in 30 minutes you took care of the physical and spiritual dimensions of life and have set the stage for a productive day.

10. Practice Self Control Very simply here just ask yourself if you want something or need something. If it is something you want you probably don’t need it. All excess usually involves, eating, spending, or habits such as smoking or drinking. No one needs to smoke, and those who drink alcohol in excess need to answer the question; am I thirsty or depressed.

11. Start Listening To understand: Try to work on just staying quiet and at times say nothing.

Things that people say usually don’t require a response or an opinion. Words need to be fitly spoken, measured, and seasoned with salt; too much seasoning can cause a misunderstanding. Often where there are many words there are many problems.

12. Focus On Who You Are, What You Believe Your Purpose Is And Set Some Goals

Before you go to bed at night always ask yourself; what am I going to do tomorrow, and how you can be a blessing to someone else. Determine your belief system and review it mentally every day. This will keep you focused on who you are and keep your words lined up with your actions. This is integrity and consistency.

About Jim Burns

Since 1977 Jim Burns has been working with students who have learning disabilities and behavioral problems. He has over 40 years of experience working as an administrator, teacher, college instructor, and a seminar leader. He is committed to helping administrators, parents, and teachers establish standards of excellence and to help them build successful relationships with their staff, students, and children. He has written and designed The Bully Proof Classroom, a graduate course that is offered at The College of New Jersey and La Salle University in Pennsylvania in partnership with The Regional Training Center in Randolph New Jersey. This course is endorsed by the New Jersey Education Association. Jim was awarded the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters in recognition of his work

in the area of anti bullying. He has also written several books on the topics of student behavior management and classroom climate. “Anti Bullying 101” is a great resource for teachers, administrator, support staff, and parents as it provides permanent help in dealing with unruly behavior and can be used as part of any anti-bullying program.