8 Powerful Questions That Can Change Your Life

By Jonathan Alpert, Author of
Be Fearless: Change Your Life in 28 Days

As a psychotherapist over the past 15 years I've seen countless patients from all walks of life. I've worked with patients ranging in age from teenage to elderly. I've seen students, blue-collar workers, professionals, entertainers, billionaires, and some of the brightest and most talented business leaders and entrepreneurs of today.

Regardless of the demographic, educational level, or bank account, there have been questions and things I have asked patients to think about that have resonated and served as a catalyst for them to make impactful changes and improvements in their lives. Many of the questions are explored in my book Be Fearless: Change Your Life in 28 Days.

For now though, take a look at the questions below and start to make powerful changes in your life:

Imagine your life one year from now. If it's the same as it is right now, will you be okay with that?
This question is designed to get you to think about what you're doing now and how you'd like life to be. It puts your current life smack dab in your face and asks you to consider if it is what you want life to be like one year from now. If not, then the question can be a catalyst to change.

What are your strengths and what are you good at?
So often when people are anxious, depressed, dealing with relationship issues, or going through a life transition, their thoughts linger on what isn't right, their faults, and perceived weaknesses. Redirecting your attention to what you're good at and your strengths is a powerful step to bring about change.

What is truly important to you and what do you value?
Before knowing what you want from your career or relationship, you have to know what you deem to be of great importance and value. For example, in a relationship, one might value good communication, honesty, and shared passions.

What are your goals?
Similar to the question above, one must know what they want to accomplish before they can take steps to change. Knowing where you want to go will tell you where to step.

What can I control?
Frequently people who worry and who are highly anxious think about things that are way beyond their control. For example, they might check the weather forecast obsessively if they have to go out. Will checking it change the weather? Probably not. Can we really control the weather? No, but we can control how we might dress if it is raining. By directing energy towards what is within our control we'll get to a solution more quickly than if that energy is exerted on things beyond our control.

Ask yourself: what's an alternative explanation?
People often jump to erroneous conclusions. They explain away things without any evidence or support for their thoughts. For instance, if your spouse comes home from work at the end of the day and is in a bad mood, rather than personalizing it and thinking that he/she is mad at you, consider alternatives: he had a bad day at work; he isn't feeling well, he is tired. The simple act of not personalizing, but rather, exploring other explanations can help to prevent a lot of anxiety.

Suppose I do, then what?
This is a powerful question to ask yourself if you're trying to eliminate an unhealthy behavior. I'll often pose this question to patients who are trying to get past an ex and obsessively check that person's Facebook page or other social media. They realize there is no positive outcome from checking. Another example -- someone who might reach for junk food to deal with stress. The question might trigger them to realize how unhealthy the behavior is and lead to exploring more healthy ways of managing stress.

If I gave you a million dollars, could you figure out a way to make a change?
Money remains a huge motivator for people and can lead people to dig in deep and think about how they may come up with solutions. Remember when you were younger and your parents offered you a few dollars if you washed the car or did some chores? Without the incentive you probably wouldn't have done it. Well the hypothetical million dollar offer works the same way (of course it's never paid out). It does though trigger a line of thinking that can be productive.

So, next time you feel stumped, stuck, or unsure where to go, ask yourself these powerful questions that will serve as an impetus to change.

http://www.mindpowernews.com/8Questions.htm

Feng Shui And How To Make Changes In Your Life

There are times in our life when we need a big change. Maybe we want to leave a long-term relationship, a job we are unhappy with, move to an entirely new area, find a career that makes our heart sing, or have a family.

These big change times can be enormously frustrating. Everything in us feels like we are ready now, but things seem to be moving at a snail’s pace, or we don’t have a clue how to go about making the change happen.

If you are in one of those big change times of your life, Feng Shui presents a proactive way to get things moving – via moving around things in your living space.

Feng Shui teaches that we are energetically connected to everything that surrounds us. Our living space – whether a mansion, house, apartment or room, hugely affects us because of the amount of time we spend there.

Whatever we are surrounded by has a lot of influence over how we feel about our lives, ourselves and our place in the world. In other words, the shape of our outer world reflects the shape of our inner world.

This is why clutter is such a big deal. If we have a lot of  clutter it reflects a place where we have gone unconscious in our lives. The deeper the degree of clutter and chaos in our surroundings, the more deeply we have lost touch with who we truly are and what is really important.

The good news is that just as clutter stops the flow of positive energy, unloading it and moving things around in our home in a conscious way, will get the positive energy flooding into those otherwise occupied areas. New energy comes into our lives as we free up energy in our living space. I have been consulting for over 13 years and have witnessed innumerable huge changes take place in my clients lives simply by clearing the clutter.

Whatever area of your life you would like the big changes to occur, Feng Shui teaches that there is an energetic center of the home that corresponds to it. We can locate this energy center and enhance it with what we call environmental affirmations.

The vehicle for locating these energy centers is called a Bagua Map.

The concept is akin to using your home as a vision board. You identify the area you want to get the energy moving in and enhance it with objects that represent this. The items you use should be personal, no Chinese coins, or dragons or objects from a different culture unless they have personal meaning to you.  Even if you don’t know the specifics of what it is you want, try to get things that represent the qualities you are looking for. If you wish to change the status of a relationship, think about the qualities that are the most important, not the things they have acquired.

For example, let’s say you want to move somewhere but didn’t have a clue where that would be. What you do know is that you want to be somewhere that has lakes and hiking trails. You want the people to have certain qualities that are important to you, such as an interest in ecology and green living. You want a pet-friendly area with open minded people. In that case, find pictures, images, words and objects that represent these qualities and put them up in the Health and Family area of the home. This area is about where we live and our community as family.

Here are seven things you can do now to encourage a Big Life change.

Step #1 remove the clutter. The bigger you want the change, the bigger the clutter removal should be.

Step #2 Reinvent and rearrange  your living space. This is the time to rearrange your furniture, paint your room or home, do those projects you have been putting off, like putting in a vegetable garden. Move the energy or chi in and around your  home and you will get it moving in your life! See my article on Reinventing your  Living Space for more ideas.

Step #3 Locate the areas of the home that represent the areas you want to get moving and use this part of your home as a vision board representing what it is you want to bring into that part of your life.

Step #4 Make the entrance to your home entrancing. The entrance is considered the mouth of chi where all of our opportunities enter. If you have an entrance you can work with, add colorful planter boxes on either side of the door, refresh your door mat, clear spider webs, oil squeaky doors, replace light bulbs, clear dead plants and anything unpleasant to look at. Clean your front door or give it a new coat of paint or paint it your favorite color.

Step #5 If you are working with career, make sure your office chair is in the empowered position, i.e. so that you can see the door but are not in direct alignment to it. Create a vision board in your home office of your ideal career and put a water feature in that room. Career is connected to water and our life-flow.

Step #6 Change the position of your bed – but make sure you are in the empowered position, not in front of a window or in direct alignment with a door. Changing something as basic as your bed position will shake up the nervous system and get your creative juices going, breaking stuck thought patterns.

Step #7 Write on a piece of paper as much as you know now about the qualities of the big change you want. Write it gratitude and in present-tense, as if it is true now. Put this paper in a special box you like in the area of the home that you are working with and read it often. Feel it, imagine it, from a place of believing this is coming to you.The more you can visualize it as if it is true, the more energy you create in moving it towards you.

Read more: http://www.care2.com/greenliving/feng-shui-to-inspire-big-life-changes.html#ixzz2bZj6EjeY

http://www.care2.com/