Category: Emotional Health

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Emotional Health Science & Psychology

I Took Cold Showers For 6 Years. Here’s What Happened

I Took Cold Showers For 6 Years. Here's What Happened
I Took Cold Showers For 6 Years. Here's What Happened

Hey champs! I know you are having a great day today because we can prove all over again that our internal power can solve any problem. Seriously, no matter what happens, you CAN decide that you’re going to have a great time.

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If somebody like Viktor Frankl can be locked up in Auschwitz and come out of that an experience finding joy in the middle of Auschwitz then human beings have a capacity they’ve undersold themselves on.

We have this stubborn opinion that the outside world determines how we feel. If you think that your family, your boyfriend, girlfriend, wife or friends should BEHAVE in a certain way for you to be happy, you have already given up on happiness.

Life is full of uncertainty… terrible things may happen. You may lose a family member, you probably will. A law may change that may result in your business being completely destroyed. Just look at how many businesses got destroyed because of this worldwide situation…. We can never know the outcome of the things we can’t control. But what we can control is how we act upon those changes…

I had a hard time believing in this 10 years ago. I thought people get born under a lucky star. Some can work endlessly and they might never “get lucky” and become rich, and some just go for a walk and find money on the street. Little did I know we are the creators of our destiny.

Watch Now: 5 Bad Habits That Destroy Your Confidence

Until now, you probably ask yourself: what all this has to do with cold showers?! Well, it has to do with everything BIG TIME, at least for me.

I have been looking at different Youtube videos, but never stumbled across some person who took cold showers for 6-7 years. So I decided to share my journey and the story behind the experience of taking stone cold showers for long period of time.

Cold showers are “trendy” right now, but they are not at all new. They have been practiced for thousands of years back and now science is confirming the stunning benefits, something they couldn’t do back then…

According to science, cold showers increase your circulation, helps reduce muscle soreness after intense workouts, may help you lose the extra pounds and give your skin and hair a healthy glow.

One great advocate of cold exposure is Wim Hoff, also known as The Iceman. He is a Dutch extreme athlete well-known for his ability to withstand freezing temperatures. He set Guinness World Records for swimming under ice and prolonged full-body contact with ice, and still holds the record for running a barefoot half marathon on ice and snow.

So yes, while taking a cold shower may be ballsy, there are people like Wim Hoff that have taken that a lot more serious than you and me.

I got into cold showers about 10 years ago, but that wasn’t something I used to do very frequent, just like I was about anything, whether it was a relationship, work, or going on a trip to another city. Everything I did was halfway done, and I couldn’t find it in me to keep on doing things till the end. It was a burden for me to finish things, except sport. I was stubborn as a bull when there was a competition, race, or simply a half marathon.

I have competitive spirit, but I wasn’t fully competitive when I was alone with myself. I knew I had to do something to make it work even when I am alone. So yes, that’s when I screwed up and got into the stressful life of cold showers.

You know when you do something and after a while it becomes easier as you do it? Well cold shower is definitely NOT one of those things.

Every time I get in the shower, it’s stressful. You know you are about to do something very uncomfortable that is going to last for few minutes. And if you live in the area where I live, cold shower is a STONE cold shower. So the uncomfortable feeling when the water hits your head and back doesn’t last for few seconds, but at least a minute, until your body fights off the uncomfortable feeling and you become used to it.. like you have a choice!

The reason why I started cold showers is because I was trying to be consistent with something uncomfortable. Not because I am masochist and I like to whip myself at home, but because I wanted to fight off my sissy mentality with a simple, but uncomfortable task evert single day: the stone cold shower.

To be honest, I didn’t start because I was thinking about all the health benefits confirmed by science that come with it, but I got into it because if you do something as radical as cold shower to positively stress your body and mind, the next thing you do will look and feel easier for you to finish.

In the beginning I wasn’t consistent, but one day I was fully commited to take stone cold shower every single day.

From that day everything I did was easier. I was trying to take the cold showers every morning as I wanted to do the most uncomfortable task first. But as time went by, I changed it after my exercise, because I was taking 2 cold showers every day, like one wasn’t enough already.

Since that day, my skin got amazing glow, I lost 5 pounds (and this is A LOT for me because I workout 5 times a week) and I was very energized and vigorous. One downside I’ve noticed (at least a downside for me) was that my hair was growing like crazy. I don’t know how a cold shower has to do with hair growth, but my hair got thicker and I had to go to the barber every 3 weeks instead of 4. If you are on a budget, DON’T TRY IT because your barber will profit from you.

There are many self-help coaches out there who preach cold showers to their students, and to be honest I highly recommend it to everyone. Not only because of the health benefits that come with it, but because of the psychological effect it has on you.

For some people it’s unimaginable to take cold showers. I asked some close relatives, they made it very clear that they would rather die than take a stone cold shower. So yes, for some people it’s very uncomfortable feeling to even THINK about doing it, but for others it’s a challenge that has to be taken.

Because let’s be honest: what does your day consist of today? Most people are drowning in the comfort zone, and it doesn’t seem to be a problem for them. They wake up, work because they MUST, come home and spend the rest of the day watching Netflix, eating unhealthy and never setting a foot in the gym. Don’t take this personally. I know you are probably NOT one of them, but I am speaking about the majority.

People LOVE being comfortable. And I don’t say you should fight with lions and live edgy lives every single day, but the comfort we have is killing every single thing about us being human beings. Humans had to survive day by day thousands of years ago, and they were physically active. Not by choice, but by necessity. And all of a sudden, John and Karen decide that they can live sedentary lifestyle, order food, watch Netflix, play video games and kill every aspect of humanity.

Apart from the gym, exercise, running, or simply pushing every boundary to build an outstanding business, we must have a backbone for these things. I always preach about the Wim Hoff breathing method, or a simple 10 minute meditation we can do every morning. These things gear up our brain every day so we can be resilient to the challenges we face every single day. Because the challenges that we call problems, are there all the time. We cannot avoid them. We can either be prepared to face them and overcome them, or we can wimp and whine about all the problems we have like the whole world is against us. The more we avoid the problems we must overcome, the more they will stress us out and affect our health and overall growth.

The cold shower reminds us that we have to be prepared for the uncomfortable even if that’s the last thing we want to do. And to be honest, cold showers did an immense job creating that resilience for me. I really speak to myself when I get in that shower that I am now killing the sissy mentality. I am honestly believing that I am killing every doubt and fear I have, and after that cold shower I can take the day head on.

CONSULT WITH A DOCTOR before taking stone cold showers.

Categories
Action Emotional Health

5 Bad Habits That Destroy Your Confidence

5 Bad Habits That DESTROY Your Confidence
Here are 5 things that silently destroy your confidence, make you mentally weaker and stop you from reaching the full potential of yourself.

Hey champs my name is Nick and today we are going to talk about the things that silently destroy your confidence, make you mentally weaker and stop you from reaching the full potential of yourself.

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Every human being, you me and the ones around us is made of characteristics, right? This is the thing that divides us and make us come together. For example: the close friends around you are a mix of what you are. When you sit down with them you talk about something you usually have a common interest.

For my circle of friends that was fitness, nutrition, exercise, hardcore motivation, success, movies and even aliens. We found ourselves discussing about these themes of conversation and share our opinion about it.

Everything you live through the day, like the meeting with your friends, your boyfriend, girlfriend, colleagues, or the job you are currently working, create your character. But not all people are the same, because not all people live the same life. That was kinda obvious.

Now, the real power we have is the power of choice. We have this amazing ability to choose to go and do whatever we like (of course this has to be in the borders of normal human behavior).

Sometimes I think that we have SO MUCH opportunities now, that it becomes a problem.

Just by Googling “how many job types are there in the world” I found that the first link says we have over 12.000 job descriptions. We have 12.000 options to choose from, so I would say that not being interested in something is just an excuse.

And we are facing choices every single day. Whether to wake up at 6AM, 9AM or 11:30AM. Should we eat 3 times a day or 5 times a day? Should we eat 100g of chocolate or avoid chocolate and eat an apple? These types of choices carve us in all that we are.

Some people will make poor choice for years that will result in being overweight, divorced, or simply not satisfied with all that they are. When you take the wide picture of our life, of everything that we are, it all boils down to the choices we make, whether those choices create better human beings out of us, or simply wasting our time.

Now, majority of people will always go with the easy options, which are the poor choices. And this is natural. They would rather watch Netflix for 5 hours straight than do something productive. Majority would rather eat that chocolate than drool over it, and take an apple instead. This natural equilibrium divides the successful and unsuccessful, the fit and fat, the poor and rich, just like the confident and uncertain people.

Now, today we will talk about the things we CAN do to raise our confidence. And yes, this will skyrocket your success, fitness and confidence to the next level.

1. Talking bad about other people

We’ve all done it. If I tell you I didn’t do it, that would be a lie. And if I tell you I won’t do it again, that would be a lie too. But this time, I notice when I do it. I observe it, and find something very irritating, but necessary to spike my confidence.

When you talk about other people, you are really just talking about yourself.

If you are telling someone about how your boss is being a jerk, in reality, you’re probably talking about your lack of patience and understanding.

If you’re gossiping to one friend about another friend, what you’re really doing is telling the one friend that he or she can’t trust you to do the same to them.

Whenever you speak ill about something or someone, it exposes your true self. And this can never be wrong, that’s the trick. Your weaknesses are very loud when you speak ill about others, and we both know that is very bad for your confidence.

I don’t think this behavior can be stopped. Sometimes unconsciously we will fall into a conversation and talk ill about someone/something. After all we are all human, but when we do, we can do few things about it. First we should observe the conversation and see why we speak bad about others. And when we do, we should discover the shortcomings behind the things we say. This is the only way to get the good out of gossip, and additionally, boost our confidence by applying necessary change to fix it.

2. Letting other people make decisions for you

Our life is based on the knowledge other people gave is. We are formed and created by the opinion of others. By our parents, friends, teachers, colleagues, bosses etc…

However, there comes a point in time when we take our life in our own hands and steer the wheel. I think this is the real puberty, not when we get the first facial hair. This is the time when girls become women, and boys become men. And some people never get over this phase because when they are fully formed and should go on their own, they don’t bat an eye to self-develop and continue educating themselves.

I agree that constructive criticism is important. We can learn from the mistakes other people see we do, that we are unable to see, but that’s all there is.

If you become a doctor because your family wants to, you are going to be a terrible doctor. This applies to anything other people want you to be.

You are you own singular person. No one can make the decisions you do. Even if you make a mistake, the best lessons I’ve learned are through making mistakes and failing. Make your own mistakes, take your failures as your own, and you will start to shift your life for the better in an instant. You will become more assertive because mistakes and failures are necessary, not optional. On the long run, this will make you more confident and resilient.

3. Maintaining toxic friendships and relationships

This has more to do with confidence than most people realize.

Here comes my favorite quote: “you are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.” We must not take this lightly because if you surround yourself with the wrong people, they have the power to shatter your life and make you miserable. Confidence will be 100 miles away from you.

For a certain period, it’s okay to be alone. When you break the old pattern and distance yourself from toxic people it’s okay to be alone until the right people gravitate around you, and they will.

When I was 15 years old, I used to hang out with 16 people, every single day. My mother used to tell me: son, when you grow up IF you are lucky you’re going to have 2 close friends. At that time, I didn’t really understood that, but now I really DO. And this is because people change and they have different interests, hobbies, families and things they don’t really share in common with the same 16 people when they were young.

People and things change, and that is completely OK. The trick is not to be dragged by the people who don’t aspire to be better themselves, and try to pull you down with them. Don’t let your memories attach you to someone who’ll waste your time and drain the energy out of you.

Watch After: 5 Types Of Friends You Should Avoid Like The Plague

4. Living in the past

In simple terms, evolution wired our brains to remember bad things more to alert us when real danger comes in the future to keep us alive. Additionally, our brain focused on the negative so that we could clearly see the danger to fix it.

So, the past is not JUST the past, but it’s actual memory stored in the brain. It’s not as simple as “the past is the past just let it go.” It’s not something you let go of. It’s physical attachment stored in your brain as vital part of you. Your past has created you up to this point.

Just as vital, the past can be very toxic. It is where all the traumas, bad and also good events happened. The bad memories can really impact our future and present because our brain can re-activate them and make us physically feel them thus affecting our mood for the worse.

The way we overcome the past is by learning the crucial lesson out of it. For example: if you got in a car accident while you were driving drunk, the lesson is that you should NEVER drive under the influence of alcohol again.

This goes the same with small minor past mistakes we do. If I try to do a successful marketing campaign on Facebook, I will certainly make mistakes that will result in unsuccessful campaign. In time, I will learn from the past mistakes and make campaign successful. And when you think about it, I WANT to have those mistakes stored, because they will help me make a successful campaign.

It also works to instantly replace your bad memory with a positive one. For example if a bad memory recurs when your mother yelled at you in front of your friends, you have all the power to shift that thought with a positive one. You can think of the crazy summer night you had with your friends. This will give you dopamine and change your initial thought with a positive one.

Long story short, USE your bad memories and past mistakes to be better version of yourself. No one becomes an expert in anything based only on positive experiences.

5. And the last one: talking negatively to yourself

I just spoke about the R.A.S on my latest TikTok video. This stands for Reticular Activating System and it’s part of your brain responsible for the things you notice. Let me give you an example: if you buy a new car, you will start to notice that car everywhere. The car was there before that, but now you see it because you are genuinely interested in that car. The A.R.S is responsible for that.

If you focus on the worst of things, like what happened to you in the past, or why you are not happy because you did this and that, you will feed your R.A.S with more similar situations for you to focus on, whether they happened or they are about to happen.

If you speak negatively of yourself, you will have negative experiences now and in the future, because subconsciously you focus on the situations that can make it worse.

It’s not a flip of a finger to make everything run smooth and positive for you. You have to change your entire daily routine, the things you do and think through the day. Do you exercise regularly? Do you eat healthy? Do you take cold showers? Do you meditate? Do you have a journal? Do you write your plans on a schedule?

Real confidence comes with experience. You can be confident without experience, but sooner or later you have to take that cape off you and see that you still have a ton of things to learn. It’s better to know that you don’t know, than to act like you know and prove yourself and everybody wrong halfway through.

It takes courage to be confident because we have to face adversities that majority of people will never do. Most men want to chase girls but have never ever talked to a random woman in a bar. We all want success but never bat an eye to take the first step, because to build your success you need confidence in making the right steps, and to do that you need courage to make the wrong ones and learn from them.

Categories
Emotional Health Success

If Things Don’t Come Easy For You (Or At ALL!) This Is For You

If Things Don’t Come Easy For You (Or At ALL!) This Is For You
If Things Don’t Come Easy For You (Or At ALL!) This Is For You

When we see all those successful stories in the media, it looks like people just get lucky. No work, or given effort, just pure luck on a whim. They wake up one day and they see a suitcase full of money… and 10 more in the garage.

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Success is a relevant term thou. Many people don’t see success as having millions of dollars in the bank, or having 3000 square meters house on a hill. Some people see success as a result of a happy family, or being able to travel whenever they want. So success is a relevant term, but the success we will discuss today is the thing that can be applied in everything.

If things don’t come easy to you, but they appear as they do to others, you’ve been missing a crucial point. First, there is no such a thing as overnight success. Even (and this is probably impossible scenario) if you become overnight success and you get 100 million dollar check right now, what’s going to happen is that you’ll probably be broke in the next couple of years.

This is what happens when people win the powerball, which is the highest amount won on the lottery. Many people end up depressed, or highly disappointed from their loved ones because they all want is to take piece of the money pie. Most of them spend like crazy which ruins their life, others end up on drug addiction and even dead.

It’s no strange why they say that the devil is hidden behind everything you’ve ever wanted. If you want 1 billion dollars right now and a house on the hills, they could be the #1 reason to your life of misery and self-destructive behavior.

Then, should we stop wanting better things for us?

No, we should never stop wanting better for us and those around us. But we shouldn’t rush things, because as I’ve said before, we should enjoy the journey. Not the end goal.

If you want something, and you get it without sweating one drop for it, you will NEVER appreciate that thing. This same things happens to parents who spoil their kids. They buy them everything they want and they grow up to be spoiled brats. They won’t appreciate the value of money, and they certainly won’t appreciate the value of hard work and persistence.

For me personally, nothing came easy. Most of the things I’ve started working 2-3 years back, now start to grow the fruits. Before, it was just countless hours of work put in into something that might be a successful story one day.

If things don’t come easy for you, DON’T GIVE UP. Believe me, I was one of those people who used to see at the screen and droll over people who were claimed by the media to be “overnight” success. I thought the world was against me, and against everything I ever do. The first two years I made only 2 bucks a day, and I was working 8-10 hours non-stop (including Sundays). Until one day I woke up to see thousand dollars on my dashboard…. I couldn’t believe my eyes. IT WAS ALL WORTH IT. I had goosebumps all over my body and I felt like everyone in the world should know about it… little did I know that not many people want to see you doing better than them, but let’s leave that for another video.

There are 3 major factors that I’ve personally felt to be very important when you feel like the world is giving to everyone but you.

1. Be grateful that things don’t come easy for you

This is probably something you thought you won’t hear, but before you have anything to say against it, hear me out.

When you are stubborn as a goat, and you won’t stop for anything less than success, you will make it. DELETE time out of the equation, because some people get it sooner than you, and I don’t say that it’s fair or not. I am saying that your journey on the way to your goal will teach you a LOT more than the goal itself.

It may be strange for me to say this, but the time I was struggling most, when I almost had no option but to work and succeed, I was the most fulfilled person on the planet. I was in the present, right here, all the time and I was feeling like one day I was going to conquer the world. And I was making 2 bucks a day, imagine that.

I don’t mean to brag when I say this. I just want you to put yourself in my shoes and try to feel what I’ve been through. The real power lies in your ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and truly feel what it’s like to be someone else, with all the negative and positive aspects. Then you realize that we are all human, and that everything is possible. What seems like the best thing to have, comes with great responsibility and not like the blessing you’ve expected it to be. Just like that house on the hills. It comes with 20 people that have to work for you, maintain your house, and eat up your bank account every day. This could eat you alive to have this burden on you if you are not prepared for it.

So whenever you think you deserve something more than the rest, you may be right, but if you still don’t have it, there are probably two reasons why. The first one is that you took the wrong u-turn, and you need to get back and continue on the right track. And the second is that you still didn’t build your mindset to put in the right action in physical reality to get that thing.

2. Success is not the goal. Success is your ability to get to the goal

Walt Disney, Martha Stewart, Larry King… these are all people who had money, lost them all, and rose back to wealth again.

Success is not the goal folks, it’s the ability to get get from point A to point B.

Let’s skip money for a second. Success is not all about money. Success can be a happy relationships, family or even being able to travel the world.

What do you think about, when you imagine yourself having a great relationship with your girlfriend, boyfriend, spouse or wife? What’s the picture that shows in front of you when you close your eyes?

For me it’s beach, Maldives, a sunset and the two of us enjoying in silence with a Bob Marley song playing in the background. But this can be different for each one of us. The point is that whatever comes to your mind, this is your goal. Now imagine yourself on that place with a complete stranger. Will that be the same? Can you enjoy the same without your loved one? I don’t think so.

All your beautiful moments before that, all that disagreements you had before, created that picture for you. You had to overcome all those things together as a couple for you to have that picture. That’s why the place you imagine with the complete stranger didn’t really fit in your fantasy.

We can go for days explaining this, but the point is very clear for each and every example. I would’ve given you example about “traveling the world” but with this current situation it would be painful to talk about traveling…

3. The third and last is: you need to be another person if things don’t come to you at all

As you go on the way to build your company, claim the ladder of success in the company you are employed or simply have the best relationship in your life, you have to re-evaluate yourself all the time.

This means that you should be almost completely different person years from now. If you do the same things all over again, and you have no results at all, you are still not the person that you are suppose to become. Because if you were the person that you’re supposed to be, you would have all those things already, right?

You need to change the way you think and the way you get from point A to point B. When Facebook presented all those video headings, where you put video instead of a picture on your posts, I tripled my earnings, just by implementing a simple shift in Facebook for Developers. This in turn gave me a lot more visits on my website which resulted in x3 more revenue, and that’s when I made my first 54.000$ month.

Before I started making money I was practicing reflection. I would look in the mirror every morning for few minutes, and ask myself: are you the guy that you aspire to be? Or you still have to change something to be the guy aspire to be? Every time you add something to it, you get closer to the successful story, whatever successful story is to you.

Champs, it’s very easy to build sandcastles in the sky and life of illusions, but the truth is things don’t come easy, especially if those things are truly worth to have.

You have to work on it constantly. Happiness lies in the daily things you do. If you work towards something you love, you will be happy and great at it. We can easily deceive ourselves that we want a lot of cash, big houses, yachts, but at the end of the day, a lot of people truly don’t want those things. Some just want to be free and travel, or have a place to call home. Everyone experiences success differently.

Just don’t get caught up in the wrong definition of your success, because you will spend your whole life building something you don’t want to have… AT ALL.

At the end of the day, do you go to bed satisfied with the person that you’ve been? Or you think you did something wrong that you can learn not to do in the future? We have to reflect on ourselves all the time. Why do we spend so much time thinking what’s wrong with the people around us, and never look in the mirror and ask ourselves what’s wrong with us? What can we do to improve ourselves? We need more of that if we want to be better and better all the time and build the life of our dreams.

Champs, thank you so much for reading this article. I wouldn’t be able to do what I want to do without you… I looked in the mirror this morning and asked myself: what can I do today to inspire people to do better in their lives? This was the article I came up with and I hope it did inspire you in a way to create the best version of yourselves.

It would really men the world to me if you can tap that like button on my YouTube Channel and subscribe so I have a reason to wake up tomorrow, ask myself another question and create another video and article full of value to you champs!

Categories
Action Emotional Health Science & Psychology Success

How To Stop Being Tired All The Time

Hey champs, my name is Nick and today we are going to talk about how to increase your energy (something that might look like science fiction to you now) but it’s not that complicated after all.

If you are feeling tired ALL THE TIME, this video AND smashing that like button is definitely for you! And if you really don’t want to feel tired, make sure to smash that Subscribe button too, because I have a lot of good news in the next videos for you.

First of all what is the difference between you and Jeff Bezos, or what is the difference between you and Elon Musk? We all have 24 hours and, we can all earn 180 billion dollars, and we can all move to Mars, right? Well, not really. The difference between you and them is that you are constantly tired and you can’t invent those rocket ships and generate billions of dollars in income.

These days there is a MASSIVE confusion between having energy and preserving energy. We watch Netflix all day and we spend massive amount of time on social media. When it’s time to stand up and complete an important task, bam…. we have no energy.

How come we are low on energy when we spend our whole morning AND evening doing nothing but laying in bed and basically preserving every atom of energy? And on top of that, we wake up each morning feeling like we’ve been hit by a truck.

Many things come into play when it comes to general fatigue and tiredness and this does not involve chronic fatigue syndrome and SEID which affects million of people in the US alone.

This involves general tiredness which mostly people feel by not having healthier habits and clear vision for their life.

There are many habits that MUST be changed before we get that booming energy which we are going to discuss later, but first let’s explain why you are feeling tired ALL. THE. FREAKING. TIME.

As people, we have a hard time understanding paradox, right? Like beginning of an end, or knowing that we know nothing. Same goes for energy: we have more energy, by doing more things! Let me explain.

If you have a clear vision of what you want to be in the future all you need to do is take action. But that is easier said than done, and thanks to science, we now know the harsh road.

If you haven’t heard about neuroplasticity, you’ve been missing out a lot.

The more you do something, the more you strengthen the bond between the physical action and your brain. This is called neuroplasticity, and it’s actually brilliant. The more you do something, the more it becomes ‘wired’ in your brain. So, let’s say, if you exercise every day you will get bound to it and it will get easier the more you do it. But this also means that if watch Netflix every day, the more you will do it. The choice is yours.

However, we didn’t say what this has to do with having more energy, but first let’s go back to evolution.

Long time ago our lifestyle involved of us moving almost constantly. We had to hunt for food, gather and do all the chores necessary in order to survive. All we should do now involves us picking up the phone, calling our favorite pizza company and getting the food on our doorstep in no time. No wonder why we are so lazy now…

Evolution has made human to move, almost necessary. We can only Google the detrimental health effects of leading a sedentary lifestyle and everything becomes clear as day. Ok, let me do you a favor by explaining just some of them:

  1. Weight gain. Weight brings it’s own nasty problems, so a sedentary lifestyle has obvious health risks like obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease. The more weight you gain the harder your heart has to work. Your heart is a muscle, and the less it works, the weaker it becomes.
  2. Loss of Flexibility. Blood doesn’t flow as freely through tight, bound muscles. Inflammation and pain rear their ugly heads as flexibility is lost. The more sitting you do, the more your hip flexors and low back become particularly tight. Your abs and glutes also become weaker.
  3. Lower Metabolism. A sedentary lifestyle means fewer calories burned. A lot of your body’s ability to break down fat simply shuts down.
  4. Osteoporosis. Here’s a not-so-obvious health risk. Your body and muscles are made to move. Your bones are made to bear the weight of movement to stay strong. A sedentary lifestyle or too sitting and inactivity can lead to osteoporosis.
  5. Increased Chances of Dementia, Depression, and Anxiety. The mind is more linked to the lack of moving than most realize, especially in the elderly. But you don’t have to become elderly before you feel the negative harmful effects of a sedentary lifestyle on the mind.

Just by reading these scientific facts, it’s not hard to realize that we were made to MOVE, right? Our bodies work in perfect sync when we move, rather than when we lie down in bed and watch Netflix.

Even with the Neolithic Revolution or so-called the Agricultural Revolution, we still had to do a lot of physical work in order to grow the crops, protect them and stash them.

What happened that changed everything was the invention of the microchip, or to be more precise, the consequence of the microchip, which was the Digital Age. Of course, everything was done for all the right reasons, like not having to send out letters that would arrive in 2 weeks. But as a consequence of everything becoming so easy, we are taking many necessary things for granted, like exercise, food, or being spiritually fulfilled.

We made it pretty clear that we have to move for the body to function properly, and this in turn will give us MORE energy instead of making us tired.

When was the last time you felt that breeze of energy in the morning? That burst of alertness and agility? I can almost guess that it was some upcoming presentation, performance or you being happy like a little kid to do something you are really passionate about.

When we love the work, the relationship, the hobbies and all the tasks in our daily routine, we will have more energy, than doing something we hate. It’s only logical. Loving what we do gives us inspiration to turn that TV off, get our buttocks up, and take some form of physical action, like you pushing that Like button and Subscribing on my YouTube Channel.

By doing more, we have more energy… we covered that. But there are 2 more things we must do if we want to really delete that general tiredness that is slowly taking our time away, the only resource we cannot get back.

The second thing is nutrition

Your body is your temple. If you don’t take care of it, you are going to face tremendous health problems.

Sometimes I wonder how on Earth our bodies can process all those burgers and pizzas… not to mention all the booze. But when someone gets ill because of their own choices, everything becomes clear.

So what is really healthy nutrition?

Healthy diet is not about severe restriction and limitations, or depriving yourself of all the tasty things in the world. It’s about feeling truly alive, energized and great in every aspect.

And the thing is, it’s not very complicated. If you are one of those people who had WAYY to many opinions about what you should and shouldn’t eat, you are not alone, believe me. Some food “gurus” will tell you to eat something, while others will tell you the complete opposite.

The truth is that healthy diet consist of real food, instead of the processed junk food we are used to eat every day. Eating food that is as close as possible to the way nature made it can make a huge difference to the way you think, look, and feel. And you don’t have to deprive yourself of that junk food forever and ever…. you just have to pay attention to your overall diet. That’s why we invented cheat meals!

By using these simple tips, you can cut through the confusion and learn how to create—and stick to—a tasty, varied, and nutritious diet that is as good for your mind as it is for your body.

While some extreme diets may suggest otherwise, we all need a balance of protein, fat, carbohydrates, fiber, vitamins, and minerals in our diets to sustain a healthy body. You don’t need to eliminate certain categories of food from your diet, but rather select the healthiest options from each category.

The last one is: Stay Physically Active

For some people this is the worst type of conversation. They run away from exercise like the plague. But exercise is really, REALLY vital to our well-being. Plus who doesn’t want that stunning summer body?

  • Exercise benefits every part of the body, including the mind. Exercising causes the body to make chemicals so-called endorphins that can help a person feel good. Exercise also help people sleep better, and yes, putting that phone down at night also helps you sleep better. Exercise can also help some people who have mild depression and low self-esteem. Plus, exercise can give people a real sense of accomplishment and pride at having achieved a goal — like beating an old time for a 5 mile run.
  • Exercise helps people lose weight and lower the risk of some diseases. Exercising regularly lowers a person’s risk of developing some diseases, including obesity, type 2 diabetes, and high blood pressure. Also, if you want that stunning hot body turning heads every summer, exercise will help you do that too.

Now that we know the benefits, WHAT DO WE DO?? Join the gym, go for a run…. what? I personally used to exercise in the gym and then I started kick-boxing… so that seems to be working pretty well for me for the last 14 years. Also, calisthenics, running and hiking seem to be working out pretty well too.

When it comes to health, I would suggest you to go for a run or join the local gym and start from there. I truly hope you can find yourself in some sport because it will prolong your life, give you more energy and simply make you look stunning hot.

Final words

Just because we didn’t mention drinking water, getting enough sunlight and sleep we should avoid them. I just think the ones we mentioned are far more easily forgotten than the rest, and we should be reminded of them every once in a while.

Being tired most of the time is really blocking you from achieving many wonderful things in your life. With a little shift of perspective and mental effort, we can all change our lives, live better, and help this world be a better place.

I read a very interesting quote the other day in a book about nutrition and health. It explained that the lifespan expands all the time, but that doesn’t mean that people live more quality lives now. We can prolong our lives with pills and medications, but it’s really about the quality in the years. I am not saying we should all die young and happy. I am saying that by doing these things we wouldn’t need the pills and medications to live long and happy life.

Categories
Emotional Health

5 Things Will Start To Happen When You Discover Your Hidden Power

5 Things Will Start To Happen When You Discover Your Hidden Power

There are bazillion things that block your secret power every day, and our life will shift entirely once we discover our hidden power.

Our mind is hoarding with information that are mostly unusefull. Just how many things you know that will never be of any importance and topic of discussion in your life? What Lady Gaga bought or what Kanye West said on that talk show will never truly help you become better person on personal and professional level.

If we go back to childhood education, we were mostly taught how to obey and listen. We were not taught to develop our critical thinking as the most powerful tool to use later on in life. At least this was the case for my education.

Our ability to do incredible things is always here, but it takes time to develop it.

The hidden power that we possess is always there in us. But the problem today is not that we need to “dig” deep and find it. We need to block most of the things that are not valuable to us. For example, what Lady Gaga bought in the new Gucci store will never be of any value to you.

The bigger problem we have is that all the time we obsess with trivial information as the new bag that Lady Gaga bought.

You would rather watch something that will never be of any use, like funny cats and dogs, than watch 3 hour video to “start an online business” and do all the steps necessary. This is just an example.

You see, we either run away from fear, or chase pleasure. That’s the basis of it. But many things consist of you getting over fear in order to get the pleasure. For example, if you want to be a successful motivational speaker, public speaking is a fear you have to face, right? Your habit of gaining weight consist of the pleasure you get by eating too much carbs and chocolate. To lose weight, you have to go through hardship and painful cravings to have more energy, feel better and be more attractive.

For most of the things, it’s about the journey, the painful journey that will give you the long term pleasure, satisfaction and spiritual fulfillment.

Here are 5 things that will start to happen when you discover your hidden power:

Amazing things will happen when you discover your hidden power.

1. WHEN YOU DISCOVER YOUR HIDDEN POWER, YOU LEARN TO FACE YOUR FEARS EVEN IF THEY TERRIFY YOU

Fear can be the biggest crippling factor in everything that you want to achieve. Let’s take the previous example: if you want to be a motivational speaker, you will have to face your fear of getting up on that stage and start speaking.

What if I stutter? Or what if I blow it all up? What if they laugh at me? What if they think what I say doesn’t make sense? You will ask yourself these questions FOR SURE! I can almost guarantee you that 100%, but facing your fear is going against what makes you scared and doing it anyway.

In the beginning you may have dry lips, you may stutter and twist some of the material… but you doing that is making one step closer to being a successful motivational speaker. The joy of you becoming one will make you forget all the fearful things you had to overcome. This in turn will give you long-term satisfaction, happiness and fulfillment.

This can be for any fear that you may have. It doesn’t necessarily has to be for public speaking. You may fear talking to a woman or a man. Either way, you must go against your fear at all cost. That’s how we take our hidden power out and let it shine with the whole world.

2. WHEN YOU DISCOVER YOUR HIDDEN POWER, YOU BECOME GRATEFUL EVEN FOR THE LITTLE THINGS

I just read an article about the 35 life lessons from a 100-year-old and one of them was (and I quote them): “The little things are the only things that matter eventually.”

Life is not a finish line. Life is a journey.

Let’s explain what’s the finish line, the rat race we all chase aimlessly.

Now you probably want financial freedom, or simply be happy in a relationship. This is probably your finish line, something you want to feel and have in the future.

Now, if you want financial freedom you have to find a job that will get you enough money to cover all your personal and financial expenses for you to live comfortably. But the finish line is not going to make you happy. That’s the trick. The journey on your way to the finish line will.

You going to work and listening to great podcasts is part of your journey to financial freedom. The morning coffee with your loved one, the thoughts you have while you do that next project is also part of your financial freedom. Every simple thing that you do is part of you becoming financially free. If you don’t enjoy most of it, and find it fulfilling, you are going to suffer for most of the things that you want to achieve.

Just take a few minutes to conceptualize what you do through the entire day. If your day is filled with things that burden you over an extended period of time, it’s time to make a swift change. Find something you will enjoy doing while chasing your finish line.

Watch Later: How To Stop Worrying And Start Living, According To Science

Once you discover your hidden power, you will have amazing flow of ideas.

3. WHEN YOU DISCOVER YOUR HIDDEN POWER, YOU LEARN THAT YOU ARE BIGGER THAN YOUR MIND

I love speaking on this subject. It makes me realize that we are the ones in charge of our destiny.

Let’s start with a regular day in the life of a single person. The alarm wakes you up, and your mind doesn’t want you to get out of bed. If it was up to you, you would press that stop button and sleep for at least 2 more hours. You wake up against your will and you dress up to go out on a cold morning. You walk or drive to a place you are not very happy to see all grumpy and sleepy.

Since the moment you woke up, you go against your mind. If it was up to your mind and what your mind wants, you would lay in bed all day and watch Netflix, right? And we are not wrong to assume that many people do this already.

If you let your mind do the choosing for you, you’d live a very boring and idle life. You going against your mind is where you’ll find true fulfillment and happiness.

Speaking to that man or woman you’ve been wanting for so long is terrifying to even think about doing, right? Just like it is asking for that raise. But once you do, you feel truly alive! Your body is tingling. You speak without thinking too much and you get into a state of flow.

Listen to your mind when it speaks, because evolution has made it up there protected for a reason, right? But don’t let it twist and turn your life.

Never underestimate the hidden power of a determined individual.

4. WHEN YOU DISCOVER YOUR HIDDEN POWER, YOU START TO ATTRACT THE RIGHT PEOPLE

You’ve probably heard this one from me at least 10x times, but here it comes again: you are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.

Getting on that new staircase, the personal upgrade in your life, will demand of you to be surrounded with different people. Just imagine being promoted. Your assignment is to manage different sector or different group of people. Immediately, your task becomes more demanding which is something you’ve never done. In this case, you must adapt and become a new version of yourself.

For example a friend of mine that was “the star kid” in my elementary school, is now fighting battle with heavy drug addiction and insanity. I am not telling you this to mock him. Simply, I am telling you this because my journey took a heavy turn to the LEFT when I saw him consuming those drugs when we were in high school. I spoke with him a dozen times, trying to convince him to stop, but he did it anyway.

If I was with him through the entire time, I would either start consuming with him, or I am his father! Why else I would still hang around with him and share my personal time? The answer is: I wouldn’t.

Don’t surround yourself with people who will make your life miserable up to the point of no recovery.

When you get to the next level, you will attract the right people and feel like your life is aligning with your personal and professional goals.

5. YOU STOP CARING ABOUT WHAT OTHERS THINK OR SAY ABOUT YOU

Most of the time we obsess not what we think of ourselves, but what others think of us. This is still prevalent in most people. They waste time and energy thinking about what OTHER people think or say about them. However, we can blame evolution for some of it.

We’ve evolved to belong in a group. After all that’s how we survived in those harsh conditions long time ago. Fitting in and having the trust and respect of our peers are the measures of success. The need to belong is in our DNA. But we can’t blame it all on evolution.

If you tend to think about what people think of you most of the time, it says a lot about you. This definitely means that you should question your confidence and faith in your actions.

Something as trivial as someone yelling at us on the traffic light can take our whole energy thinking about them. This can cripple our entire day!

If you have 86.400$ EVERY day, and you lose 10$, would you throw away the rest? Of course you wouldn’t!

You have 86.400 seconds every day. If someone makes you angry for 10 seconds, don’t throw away the rest!

Final Words

It will take shift of perspective and time, but instead of drooling on the life of all the people you see on social media, you will create the life you’ve always wanted to live, beyond your wildest imagination.

We are the producers, the directors and the protagonists of our own life. The hidden power we hold is in us at all times. No one says it’s easy to take it out, but once we do that we can truly enjoy the fruits of our own creation.

We are no longer slaves of the meaningless information that is thrown out there. We block the things that will do harm, and welcome the things that make us grow.

Categories
Emotional Health

5 Types Of Friends You Should Avoid Like The Plague

5 Types Of Friends You Should Avoid Like The Plague
5 Types Of Friends You Should Avoid Like The Plague

Here are 5 types of friends you should avoid at all cost!

I believe we are all special. We are all destined to be something. Too bad some people are destined to be douchebags!

Jokes aside, we are all unique and special human beings, and if you are like me, I believe we all have some purpose here to fulfil. But it doesn’t come to us in a dream. We all have to do things in the physical reality and discover it. Switch jobs, fail, be broken, be sad, be unhappy, be happy, be fulfilled… it’s not all rainbows and sunshine’s on the road to self-discovery.

As a matter of fact, the hardest and most frustrating things in my life were poverty, broken heart, sadness, grief… those moments of void and despair were crucial in creating the destiny I want to fulfill.

Of course, these emotions were born in me mostly by the relationships I had with my friends, family and partners. Everything that happened taught me a very valuable lesson, and as I said, mostly by the things that were making me feel worse.

Just by saying this, it doesn’t mean that we should aim to meet backstabbing friends and partners. All that happened until now was a lesson, no matter how emotionally striking it was.

From this moment on, we decide to make a swift and ultimate change. This is not only crucial change for personal gain, but for professional gain too! The change is very simple: toss out the people that don’t fit, and greet the people that fit. But how do we know who fits in our perfect picture?

Some say that we are the average of the 5 people we spend the most time with. If you take a closer look on your surrounding, the 5 people you spend the most time with is the mix that you are. Now, it doesn’t necessarily has to be 5 people because your parents, teachers and colleagues that have influence on you, but the biggest role play the people you are mostly with.

Taking a look around you should answer this question very easy. And it makes sense: why would spend most of your time with people who don’t have anything in common with you? You don’t.

When I personally hit the rock bottom financially and emotionally, I made enormous change in my life.

The first step I took was that I put myself in quarantine (before it was cool) and took a break from all the people I was surrounded with. This gave me new and fresh perspective on the things I had to change if I wanted to be in a better place in the future.

This may’ve been one of the most challenging steps I took. I was feeling like the loneliest person on the planet. Like the last man on Earth.

The seconds step was self-improvement, the dedication to improve myself on personal and professional level. In those “A-HA” moments when I spend all my time working and reading made me the person I am today: helping myself by helping you champs be better.

Without taking the first step, I wouldn’t be able to change myself by jumping straight to the second step. Because whether we like it or not, if those 5 people around you don’t aspire to be better, they will weight you down. There is no avoiding that.

Knowing all this, how do we know what types of friends to avoid?

Here are 5 types of friends you should avoid like the plague.

If any of the people below is in your list of friends, you should get rid of them in an instant:

1. The Envy

It’s completely normal to compete. That’s how we got so far up to this point in humanity. But competing and envying are 2 different things, and it took me 28 years to figure this out.

After the dreadful period when I hit rock bottom, I was dedicated to succeed. I was reading every self-improvement book that I put my hands on, just to be constantly motivated. Years after I made a huge chunk of money, but that came with consequences, especially from those around me.

Most people don’t like to see you doing better than them. When they can’t do anything to change that, they will openly (or secretly) envy your achievements. However, if you pay attention to their actions, it’s mostly visible, no matter how secret they think it is.

Now don’t get me wrong. What other people think is NONE of your concern, but if you share your personal time with those people, it’s a problem you have to solve.

You don’t want negative energy cloud above your head, right? Then it’s best to cut the cords with these types of friends and keep on growing personally and professionally.

Watch After: 9 Things You Should Delete From Your Life Immediately

2. The Pessimist (Definitely The Types of Friends You Should Avoid)

They say that a pessimist is an optimist with experience, but that is FAR away from the truth.

If we stumble upon 10 failed attempts and give up, then we are a failure, rather than an optimist with experience. Either we are doing something wrong, or we don’t have the experience to do the task successfully.

Now, some people never go over this point. They tend to look everything 100 times and find something wrong with it. It is really all about perspective. If you don’t have the perspective to see the good outcome of some deeds, then you will be a pessimist.

In 2010 Billionaire Mark Cuban turned down the opportunity to invest in Uber when it was worth only $2 million. He told that “it is high risk, medium reward,” investment.

I don’t say he is pessimist, far from that. But he didn’t have the perspective to look in the future with optimism and make a lot more money off his investment. I bet he learned the lesson.

But some people, especially those around you may never learn the lesson from failed attempts. If you throw a business idea, they don’t say that “it’s interesting”. They immediately say about the bad outcomes if all the bad things happen. This could be the same for any idea you might have. They simply have no positive compass for the future and they always find what’s wrong about it.

If you purposefully spend time with these types of people, it’s time to cut them and move on because these are the types of friends you should avoid.

3. The Gossip Star

All of the problems in the world would disappear if we talked to each other instead of talk about each other.

Ohhh… you already know for who is this about, right? His face is in front of you as we speak.

The golden rule about this is as follows: if your friend gossips with you about another friend, I can bet 100$ right now that they are gossiping with them about you. From all of the examples in my life, this is 100% true and it happened all over again.

Not only they may say false things about someone they have no idea about, but they will drag you down with them to speak ill and waste your time. Gossiping about other people has no benefit at ALL.

Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people. Do I need to say more?

If you surround yourself with people that gossip, then you are distancing yourself even further from the things that will make you truly happy and fulfilled.

I don’t need to remind you that you should avoid these types of friends.

4. The One Who’s Always Complaining

We all have at least one who always complains. There’s always traffic, there’s always something terrible happening on the workplace, there’s always something wrong with the weather. They hate Mondays and even waking up every morning. To them it feels like nothing is good in the world.

Complaining will never give solution to the problem. It only explains the problem, but doesn’t give solution to it.

If you have traffic, you can either start earlier, or take a different road. If something terrible happens in your workplace, you can either change your job, or try to solve the problem. And yes, the weather is the weather and you can’t change it. So start accepting the things you can’t change.

When you surround with Negative Nancies (sorry Nancy) we tend to see the worse perspective on things. If you remember, we already said that we are the average of the 5 people we spend the most time with. If you want to spend time with people who complain for each grain in the sand, then you are going to become one.

5. The Victim (Definitely the types of friends you should avoid)

Do you have that one person who always happens to be affected by the inevitable consequences? Yep, I have one too!

If there is one thing I’ve learned so far is that our life is the product of our own actions. If something bad happens and has nothing to do with our actions, then it’s time to learn the lesson and move on.

Life is not happening to us, life is happening for us. How we swallow the things and put the knowledge in the physical reality is how our life is going to unfold.

If you force yourself to think that everything bad happens because you exist, you are going to suffer through your entire existence.

The biggest power we possess as humans is the power of choice, and we have HUGE spectrum of choices today. If your choice is to surround yourself with people who feel like victims, don’t be surprised when you have victim mentality.

If you have these types of people in your close friend and even family, it’s time to pause and reflect, or minimize the time you spend with them.

Final Words

I cannot say that I am perfect. Sometimes, I feel like a victim, or sometimes I complain without being aware of that, but I am good at noticing when I do, because I know that either of those things won’t make me better human being.

I think that we can all grow with the right people around us. If you still haven’t found the right people, have the faith that you will. Your path will reveal great people who are even better than you, and give you the knowledge and skills to go beside them or even surpass them.

Don’t let your childhood memories keep you with people who stall your growth. Have the courage to move on and find better people who will push you to do better on personal and professional level.

Watch Now: Mentally Strong People Never Do These 6 Things

Categories
Emotional Health Science & Psychology

How Stress Affects Your Body And Health According To Science

How Stress Affects Your Body And Health According To Science
Stress, stress, stress.... stress everywhere! If you knew before how stress affects your body and health, you would never stress ever again.

If you knew before how stress affects your body and health, you would never stress over trivial things, ever again!

Stress, stress, stress…. stress everywhere! As we set foot in the Information Age, our stress has increased tenfold.

In former times, 15.000 years ago, stress was mostly caused by something physical. People were under the pressure to find food and stay safe. In a way this is also mental stress, but the outcome is physical, and the stress is very different than the one today.

When you woke up this morning, you weren’t stressed about the food you are going to eat, nor about your safety of a lion attacking you on broad daylight. We now have so many choices of what we eat that the vast majority of choice is causing us stress. And yes, we now pay to see lions in cages!

Probably (and correct me if I am wrong) the first stress you had was a notification you received from your social platforms. Emails, Viber, Whatsapp, Facebook… you name it.

The stress we now have is mostly mental, rather than something that might happen in the physical reality. We have more made up stress caused by fear, rather than something that might put our life in real danger.

Mostly stress is caused by money, work and relationships. That is the global stress that vast majority of people fight over and over in their heads.

Now, I agree that these 3 things are really, REALLY important, but the stress is mostly caused by something that will never happen.

In the previous article, (that should pop right now in the right corner just above my head) looked into how many of the things we worry about turn out to be true in real life.

In the study, subjects were asked to write down their worries over an extended period of time and then identify which of the things they wrote down did not actually happen.

It turns out that 85 percent of what we worry about never happens, and with the 15 percent that does happen, 79 percent of people discovered that either:

a) they could handle the difficulty better than expected, or
b) the difficulty taught them a lesson worth learning

This means that 97 percent of what you worry over is just a fearful mind punishing you with exaggerations and misperceptions.

The stress we feel is just a made up story of something that will probably never happen in the future.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Some stress can be good, for example you pushing and motivating yourself to accomplish your goals and complete crucial tasks. But a lot of stress is bad, making you feel overwhelmed and ill. That’s because the negative effects of stress on immune function are significant.

How Stress Affects Your Body And Health

How Stress Affects Your Body And Health

No matter how many times we tell ourselves not to worry about trivial things, something always gets to us.

What happens is that we start creating endless loop of stories (that will probably never happen in real life) and then stress about the outcome of the fairy tales. This can cause serious health problems, according to science.

Think about your life. When life is good, life is not stressful, right? That’s because stress on your body and mind can press down your immune system. And why is that? Your body goes into overdrive so you can perform with full steam to tackle your stressors. This can cause the strength of your immunity to suffer.

So how stress affects your body?

The Basic Language of Stress

Learning some of the basics will give you a better understanding of your body’s natural responses. Here are the basics:

  • Stressor: Any stimulus that causes stress. There are two kinds of stressors: physical and psychological. Physical stressors are stress on the body. Psychological stressors are stress on the mind.
  • Hypothalamus: An important command center in the brain. This region is about the size of a penny and sits in the middle of the brain. It controls the activity of the pituitary gland and regulates hunger, thirst, sleep, body temperature, and many emotions.
  • Pituitary Gland: The master gland responsible for releasing most of the hormones in your body.
  • Adrenal Glands: Triangular glands that rest above the kidneys that are responsible for releasing cortisol.
  • Cortisol: The primary hormone released into the blood in response to stress.

How Your Body Handles Stressful “Situations”

How Stress Affects Your Body In Stressful "Situations"
How Stress Affects Your Body In Stressful “Situations”

Your body is a REALLY smart mechanism. It does miracles just to protect you from something that might hurt you. Like you pay attention to a strange looking fella next to you, your body pays attention to defend itself from external sources.

When you experience stress, your body has protocols. Without those protocols we wouldn’t be able to survive as species this long, especially when it comes to stress.

The protocol begins when a stressor comes along and puts pressure on your mind or your body.

The part of your brain that recognizes stress is called the hypothalamus. As soon as the hypothalamus recognizes a stressor, it delivers a swift message via neurons to a neighboring region of the brain called the pituitary gland. This gland registers signals from the hypothalamus and tells the adrenal glands ( just above your kidneys) to increase the amount of stress hormones circulating in the blood.

This is stress protocol 101, and the exact response pattern of your body every time it recognizes stress. But let’s go deeper and connect the dots between stress and immune function. It all boils down to your primary stress hormone—cortisol.

This crucial hormone does wonders by providing an energy boost during periods of stress. But the effects of cortisol are temporary. Once the stress wears off, so does the energy assistance.

Another way cortisol helps your body manage stress is by powering down any non-essential operations in the body. Unfortunately, stress hormone shuts down the immune system to conserve energy so it can run away from the threat, but this makes stressful periods the perfect time for germs to settle in.

This is so true and powerful that when surgeons transplant organs they give the patients stress hormones so they can lower their immune system. They do this because the body’s immune system may reject the new organ, and they lower it on purpose so the body can accept it.

Long story short, how stress affects your body is to your benefit, but not without consequences.

So what can we do to prevent stress from doing severe damage on our health?

Must Read After: How To Stop Worrying And Start Living, According To Science

How Can We Stop Stress From Doing Damage To Our Body And Health

How Can We Stop Stress From Doing Damage To Our Body And Health

What is happening today is that we are being fed with so much information spreading fear, especially with the global situation, that we are lowering our immune system on a global scale.

Just by knowing this fact we should pick the information we are fed very carefully and do everything we can in our power not to let our fear be fed by external factors.

Since information is the biggest cause of fear today, instead of real danger, we have 100% control of the things we stress about. After all, 85% of the things we stress and worry about NEVER HAPPEN, thanks to science confirming this.

Many of the serious health problems are psychosomatic, meaning that we are the main cause of the problem. External factors have big impact on our health, but we have the power of choice. We can literally be the hero we’ve been searching for.

I think the real problem is that we find it easier to point fingers and blame others as to why we fail. It’s easier to put our failure on his or her bill than to take full responsibility from the consequences of our actions.

If I tell you to do a backflip, and you end up hurting your leg, whos fault is it? Your fault, or mine?

It’s the same example with the major decisions. If your parents want you to be a doctor, and you hate every second of it, it’s not your parents fault if your life is miserable 10 years from now. Just like accepting the backflip was your decision, right? These are just examples. Don’t take them to heart.

As you grow you will be challenged with many things from external sources. Like your grandfather telling you to find a real job instead of the one on your computer, and you end up making 54.000$ one month. Or your friends talking behind your back about your “blogging” life.

If I look back and followed every advice from my friends and parents, I would’ve end up working a 9-5 job caged in a cubicle, miserable and unsatisfied with every second of my life. Don’t let someone else’s view on life affect how your life unfolds.

We all perceive life differently. The way you read this will affect you different than it will affect your brother, sister or friends. This means that no one can tell you how you can do something rather than yourself. Of course, they can give you an advice, but it’s up to you how you apply that advice in the physical reality. After all, I’ve learned the most valuable lessons from my failed attempts!

I think the real power is to take full responsibility over the things that affect our life. Only then we can truly learn the lesson and stop the same mistake from happening all over again like a loop.

Take precautions. Make yourself the main protagonist of your own life. And don’t forget how stress affects your body, because you can seriously harm your overall health and make irreversible damage.

Categories
Action Emotional Health Science & Psychology Success

How To Stop Worrying And Start Living, According To Science

How To Stop Worrying And Start Living, According To Science
By the time you finish this article, you will have the scientific knowledge, backed by scientific research on how to stop worrying.

By the time you finish this article, you will have the scientific knowledge, backed by scientific research, on how to stop worrying, or at least to stop worrying about 85-97% of the things in your entire life.

Five hundred years ago, Michel de Montaigne said: “My life has been filled with terrible misfortune; most of which never happened.” Now there’s even a study that proves it. This study looked into how many of our made up stories never happen in the physical reality.

So How To Stop Worrying, According To Science?

A skeleton thinks how to stop worrying. Apparently it doesn’t work for him.

We worry way too often about each and every detail. Usually we worry about our diet, we worry about our health, we worry about making money, we worry about our physique, we worry if we are attractive or not, we worry about our partner, we worry about our parents and grandparents… we worry about each and every single thing we are unsure about.

Unlike the animals, we have the capacity to think about ourselves far into the future. Animals respond to life mostly on a moment-by-moment basis, but our ability to imagine the future allows us to behave in ways today that will have desired consequences later on. Now, don’t get me wrong, worrying is not all that bad. Self-awareness is essential for planning for the future, improving ourselves, and avoiding real danger in the future.

And yes, while thinking about the future is critical to our well-being, most of us think about the future far more than needed to manage our lives effectively. When we think too much about the future, we get distracted from our life in the present moment and what’s even worse, it fuels great deal of anxiety about things that will probably never happen tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, next week, year and even decades from the present moment.

While animals fear when they face real danger, they don’t worry about what might happen in the future, nor they read articles on how to stop worrying.

If all the things we worry about happen, and we are prepared for them, it would be an absolute blessing to worry. But on the other side, if all the things we worry about happen, that would be living in hell!

Most of the things we worry about never happen, and if they do, we can solve them a lot better than we thought we can. Worrying about future problems rarely gets us prepared when it’s time to take action in the physical reality.

Yet the question remains: if worrying doesn’t do much good, but more damage, why do we keep worrying? Why do we wrap around the anxiety blanket and keep on trying to predict the future? There’s a great theory predicting the answer of these questions.

“How To Stop Worrying” Didn’t Exist 10000 Years Ago

“How To Stop Worrying” Wasn’t A Topic Of Discussion 10000 Years Ago

Leonard Martin, social psychologist at the University of Georgia suggests a great theory tackling the answer to the questions above.

Martin speculates that self-generated worry about what might happen in the future became a problem in the last 10,000 years or so. Before then, our prehistoric ancestors were able to think about what might happen in the future, but their hunting-gathering lifestyle did not evoke a great deal of unnecessary rumination about the future.

For million of years, humans didn’t plan long-term to accumulate money, success, possessions, or simply self-improve themselves on personal and professional level. Our prehuman ancestors were focused on today, rather than weeks, months, or years ahead. Hunter-gatherers with little to no possessions at all didn’t plan for the future or long-term goals. They didn’t have a reason to think more than a day or two ahead.

But something happened that changed everything. When agricultural revolution or so-called Neolithic Revolution began 10.000 years ago, humans began to worry about the future. Unlike the hunter-gathers who mostly lived day-to-day lives, farmers must plan for planting, harvesting and storing the crops. Because so many things can ruin the crops, farmers began to think about the weather, pests, thieves, rodents and whatnot. Everything they can worry about just to protect their yield.

To make things worse, the new trend called “worrying” didn’t do much good to the farming community. No matter how well they planned or protected the crops from the predictable certainty, things like drought, infestation or even a stampede can destroy everything in a blink of an eye, leaving the farmers to starvation. No matter how many times they spent worrying and protecting the crops, everything could ramshackle like a house of card by things they couldn’t predict.

Many people say this transfer was crucial to humanity. For the first time we owned houses, supplies of food and livestock. Also, the agricultural era brought the division of labor and social roles. This in turn made us worry not only about our well-being, but the well-being of those who we depended upon.

If the theory by Leonard Martin is correct, the Neolithic Revolution brought a new set of psychological stresses because it switched from day-to-day living to worrying too much about things that could rarely be predicted.

Knowing This Is There A Way To Stop Worrying?!

Looking back 10000 years ago, we can hardly say things are getting better on the topic on how to stop worrying. Now we have a lot more things to worry about, especially since the introduction of The Information Age. We are being bombarded with so much information a day that it keeps us worried every minute of an hour. However, everything can be fixed if we have the right habits and tools, for which we’ll discuss at the end of this article.

Read After: 5 Things You Must Do To Uncover The Endless Potential That Is Slowly Dying In You

Montaigne’s quote that we mentioned in the beginning of this article made us laugh for five centuries, but worry is no joke.

The stressed caused by worrying generates serious health problems. The stress hormone that worrying throws into your brain is linked to heart disease, cancer, premature aging, family dysfunction, clinical depression, lowering your IQ, shrinking brain mass, and even making seniors more likely to develop dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Science tells us not to worry, and here’s the scientific research supporting my claim.

The study we mentioned in the beginning of this article, looked into how many of the things we worry about turn out to be true in real life.

In this study, subjects were asked to write down their worries over an extended period of time and then identify which of the things they wrote down did not actually happen.

It turns out that 85 percent of what subjects worried about never happened, and with the 15 percent that did happen, 79 percent of subjects discovered either:

a) could handle the difficulty better than expected, or
b) the difficulty taught them a lesson worth learning

This means that 97 percent of what you worry over is not much more than a fearful mind punishing you with exaggerations and misperceptions.

Now that you know this, STOP WORRYING! Easier said than done, right? How to stop worrying is better question.

Just by thinking to stop worrying is not going to help you much.

We have to implement habits and basically change ourselves ENTIRELY to stop worrying and start living better life filled with happiness and great moments.

Imagine the perfect YOU, the perfect self. Don’t save anything for later, just imagine everything you ever want to be and achieve.

Now here comes the catch: what I am about to say is mind-blowing!

To become the person you want to be, you have to change everything about yourself in this moment. Everything you “think” about has to be changed. Everything you “do” has to be changed. Long story short, you shouldn’t be the person that you are right now. If you were the person that you should’ve been, you would have all those things already, right?!

Change doesn’t happen overnight, just like there is no such a thing as overnight success. Change happens with mental and physical effort. You cannot wish for it and snap your finger. It doesn’t work that way.

Here are 3 practical tips you can implement right now and start changing your mentality from farmer to hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

1. Take a pen and piece of paper and start writing

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now.” – Chinese Proverb

Ok, I have to admit. We are going to upgrade the hunter-gatherer lifestyle, since they didn’t have pen and paper, nor they planned for the future (stating the obvious).

Planning for the future is not the cause of worrying. Not knowing how the future unfolds is.

So here’s what we do. We take a pen and paper and start planning for the future.

I don’t personally know you, but I know that you, as all of us, have personal and professional goals that you want to attain.

There’s no precise guideline for this because what works for me might not work for you, but I will share my lookalike plan for the future on one of my goals.

YouTube Channel – I have 1M subscribers on YouTube by 202X year. I keep on publishing videos with enormous value without the need to get something in return.

My vision is making people’s lives better, and helping those who need help.

I publish at least 1 video a week and I will give my best in each and every video.

To be narrowed, I keep my channel strictly about self-improvement and I don’t steer clear of my vision at any cost.

I do research, assemble and write an article, and create that article in a YouTube video.

Here’s how one of my big goal looks like. Then I cut my big goal into smaller goals and do these things daily without skipping a single task.

For many people it works by only having one big goal, for example I will build a massive YouTube Channel by 2022. For me it works by cutting the big goals into smaller ones, and executing the same every day.

Once you start writing ideas will start flowing. Most of us are afraid to imagine and simply upgrade our capabilities to get that thing in the physical reality.

Start writing, have a clear plan about your future, and get to the next step, which is REALLY important.

Read Also: Mentally Strong People Never Do These 6 Things

2. Plan without action is just a wish

I don’t know if you noticed, but I never mentioned that “I will” do something in my plan. I wrote things down as I already do and own them. That way I don’t have space to wish. I give myself the pressure to do all that is necessary to have those things achieved.

After you create your plan on a piece of paper, you already have it in physical reality. It’s really important that you write your plan down, instead of typing it or remembering it, which is the worst type of planning.

When you write things out, you create spatial relations between each bit of information you’re recording. Handwriting activates parts of your brain involved in thinking and working memory, and allows you to store and manage information. The movement associated with the pen and your hand can help you encode and retain information long-term.

Since you have your plan ready, the next step is to start taking action. The difference between wishing and achieving something is your ability to execute your plan in real life.

There are many philosophies that will push you to take action, or things that will motivate you to get up on your a$s and start executing your plan. But here’s the trick: if you love what you do, if you have your plan written next to you, everything else is just an excuse. Taking action does not require you to solve math problems or unsolved mysteries. Taking action is a muscle, and you build it by pushing yourself to do more. Imagine wanting to bigger chest muscles. You will have to work out and push yourself to get those chest muscles pumped.

What we fail to realize is that we are not always going to feel happy about it. Just as I am writing this I was sick as f*ck. I have fever and I feel like throwing up any second, but you know what? No one gives a crap about that. I am going to write this article and finish it and if I need, I will end it by falling with my head on the keyboard. That’s how much I am dedicated to each bit of thing I do today.

You don’t have to go so harsh on yourself, but you do need to be harsh against your emotions. If you feel lazy or just not amused by your work, that’s just unacceptable. That’s the excuse you are making to avoid hardship.

It all boils down to the things you DO. Not the things you “think” you do, but the actual things you create in the physical reality.

Stop doing things because of others. Start beings selfish about yourself, especially when it comes to success. You are going to perish one day. As bad as it sounds, no one gets out alive anyway.

Is your current state your dream life, or you have a lot more to do to get there? If you don’t take action, your current state is going to get worse, because when we don’t improve we usually impair.

Final quote: “Take action! No one will do the work for you!”

3. Life is not a finish line. Life is a journey

Yes. I already said that things will end one day, so eventually life has to end, but that’s the mental oxymoron we are fighting. Why do we all have to think that everything has to have an end? Don’t keep on thinking that when you do “this” you will feel “that”. It just doesn’t work that way.

For example, most people think that when they have money they will be happy and solve all of their problems. I can tell you for a fact that if you work to make money just so you can be happy, then you are NEVER going to be happy when you(if you) make money.

This is because you tie your end goal (which is practically a finish line) to a thing that you hope will make you happy.

And then you keep asking yourself why you are worried. Of course you will be worried! You are chasing 75% cotton and 25% linen (that’s what the money is made of in the US) and hope they will make you happy! Where is the sense in that?

Yes, money can buy you freedom, pay your bills, and put food on your table. But money is not going to make you happy or fulfilled if you chase them for the sake of having them. You’ve got to have an endless vision, a journey behind your earnings. Otherwise they will burden you to the point where you are going to spend them just to be healthy again. You get my point?

Create goals from tiny, daily executions, that will allow you to climb to the medium and gigantic goals.

For example, by researching everyday, writing articles and filming YouTube videos I am going to build a YouTube Channel up to 1M subscribers in X years.

This sounds like a fairy tale now, but if I keep on doing it for X years, I will eventually get there.

However, if I don’t enjoy the journey, and if I do it only to get to 1M subscribers, although the chances are very low, I still might do it. But when I get there I will be more miserable than ever.

When you focus on the journey instead of the goal, you give yourself permission to be happy every second of the day. I am not saying you will be, because every grand goal requires you to go through tons of s*it, but you will hold the switch to end those undesirable emotions every second of the way.

So no, you life is not a sprint, your life is a marathon, and if you want to be happy and fulfilled most of the time, give yourself the permission to do so by going on a journey.

In these practical tips, we almost never mentioned how to stop worrying. I did that on purpose because by having a clear goal, followed by execution and going along a journey, you have nothing to worry about. You’ve had it all covered by yourself. You are no longer farming. You are gathering the fruits of your own creation.

Categories
Action Emotional Health

9 Things You Should Delete From Your Life Immediately

Some things take WAY too much of your energy and here are 9 things you should delete from your life immediately (pay attention to #9)
9 Things You Should Delete From Your Life Immediately

Some things take WAY too much of your energy and here are 9 things you should delete from your life immediately!

Long life is a short ride. Things happen so fast that we barely have the influence to change them. How we react to the changes, and the proactive choices that we make determines our future.

Many of us fall in emotional or physical traps. These traps prevent us from improving ourselves on personal and professional level. For example, if you focus on things that you don’t have, how will that turn out for you? Not so good, right?

However, there is a fix for these things, and it starts within ourselves.

Here are 9 things you should delete out of your life immediately:

1. DELETE FROM YOUR LIFE: WHAT YOU DON’T HAVE

Let’s expand what we just mentioned above.

Too many people focus on what they don’t have, right? I can even get myself caught in this trap too.

Bigger house, yacht, boats, exclusive vacations, more money… the list can go for days.

By focusing on things you don’t have you create a vortex for your energy. It is of vital importance to focus your energy on things you CAN do. No matter how small steps you take, each step will get you closer to the goal, even closer to the things you still don’t have.

Be grateful, truly grateful for what you have right now because what you have is SCIENCE FICTION for some people that don’t even have access to clean water.

2. DELETE FROM YOUR LIFE: FEAR OF FAILURE

Welcome failure, champs! Failure is the best teacher that will tutor you through life.

Too many people don’t do things because they are afraid to fail, and there can’t be growth without failure. Just like there can’t be happiness without sadness and joy without sorrow.

As a matter of fact, many people mistake fear with danger. The difference is pretty simple: if a lion charges at you, you have a real danger to be afraid. Many people confuse that it’s “dangerous” to go up on stage and speak, or ask some people for advice. Fear is just a made-up emotion we use to cave in and justify why we can’t do something.

3. DELETE FROM YOUR LIFE: SAFETY AND COMFORT

These things don’t exist. Period.

Yes, the feeling is warm and cozy when you wrap around a warm blanket at home. You can order whatever you want and you’ll get it on your doorstep in no time.

What we fail to realize is that one day we are going to die. If you are okay with dying without making big, positive impact to the world, your family and those around you, then risk-taking and excitement is not for you.

Must-Read: Nurse Revealed The Top 5 Regrets Of The Dying

4. DELETE FROM YOUR LIFE: TOXIC RELATIONSHIPS

Are you afraid of being alone? Let me break it to you: it’s x10 better to be alone then waste your time in toxic relationships.

This doesn’t include romantic relationships only. It includes friends, relatives and co-workers.

You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with. If you spend your time with 5 sh*tty friends, you will be the 6th.

Surround yourself with people that will support you. They don’t have to “adore” you and “compliment” you while they throw tons of s*it behind your back. Simply, they need to make you feel better when you leave their presence, not worse.

5. BEING AWARDED FOR EVERY TINY THING YOU DO

Don’t expect someone to tap your shoulder every time you do something. I was personally lonelier than a nomad! Seven years back, I started working online, completely alone! No one believed in me, people talked behind my back and my family was telling me to get a “real” job. If I waited for a tap on the shoulder, I would end up working 9-5 job that I hate.

Don’t let the support that you don’t receive make you forfeit from your dreams.

6. SHALLOW JUDGEMENTS

Everywhere I go people talk about other people. And what’s even worse is that those same people that gosip and FAR from perfect themselves. And when I say far I mean continents far!

Small minded people talk about other people, average minds discuss about events, and big minded people talk about ideas.

Don’t do it because everyone else does it. Change the conversation, start a positive narrative. Most people wouldn’t accept you because you don’t fill their empty mouth that feeds with shallow judgement. It’s okay to be alone for a while, until the right people gravitate in your life, and believe me… they will!

7. THE EXCUSES YOU HAVE BEEN FEEDING YOURSELF

People have a hard time accepting this, and you might be one of them too: you are the only one that should be blamed for your failures. Your childhood and your past do not define your future.

It is entirely true to say that we are carved by the events in our past, but it’s also true to say that your identity is ever changing! You have the wheel to steer your life in whatever direction you want.

If you focus on finding excuses instead of solutions, I will tell this straight to your face: you are going to end up as a failure and a miserable person.

Remember – when you point your finger at someone, there are 3 fingers pointing back at you.

8. THE END RESULT

I was stuck in this trap for a long time…

My previous mindset was that I thought that if I earned a number “say 12.000$ a month” that I made it! I can lie on the beach with an icy cold margarita next to me for the rest of my life. That was one of the biggest mistakes (and best teacher) that taught me that it’s very wrong to think in terms of end result.

Instead, we should acknowledge that what we do is never-ending! For people who chase comfort and safety this might be a little too much to handle, but I can assure you that if you see your life as a journey instead of an end goal, you will have an amazing shift of perspective for the better.

You won’t chase something that would end, but you would enjoy the course of events as they go.

9. PAST REGRETS

I read something the other day that really changed my life and you really need to pay attention to this: your past is your teacher, and it will never go away until you learn the lesson.

How mind-blowing is that!! I imagine this like an old person looking down at me repeats a sentence that I should engrave in my mind.

My mother passed away when I was 18 years old and that moment was really haunting me for a long time.

Fast forward years later, I finally realized that I am truly grateful to her for making me the person that I am today and that part of her will never die. It took me 10 years to finally realize that, and I feel so much relieved ever since. I only have gratefulness and appreciation for making me this stubborn dude that never wants to give up.

Don’t avoid your past, but look right through your painful memories and truly, from the bottom of your heart, try to learn the lesson that will help you out in the present and future.

I don’t want to remind you again, but if you are healthy and have a roof over your head, you are way ahead of most people in the entire world. Do not miss a single day appreciating that.

Read After: Mentally Strong People Never Do These 6 Things

Categories
Emotional Health

Kim Ung-yong, The Man With the Highest IQ Has a Powerful Message That Will Change The Way You Think

Kim Ung-yong, The Man With the Highest IQ Has a Powerful Message That Will Change The Way You Think
What's even more genius than the man himself is the thing that he shared with the world about the key to happiness. He told us what really matters...

Yep, geniuses are born these days too! I even think that today, more than ever, we have the highest number of geniuses being born every year, but it’s not wrong to say that today we have school systems that are dumbing us down and prevent us from flourishing, even as an ordinary human being with normal IQ.

One genius (since he wore diapers) broke the chains and raised above the systems. Kim Ung-Yong is a South Korean civil engineer that displayed astonishing level of intelligence shortly after his birth, March 8, 1962.

He was also listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the man with the “Highest IQ.” What’s even more genius than the man himself is the thing that he shared with the world about the key to happiness. He told us what really matters…

WHO IS KIM UNG-YONG?

Kim Ung-Yong was born in Gangneung, Gangwon, South Korea. He started speaking when he was 6 months old and was able to read Korean, Japanese, English, German and many other languages by his second birthday. By the time he was four, his father claimed that his son Kim Ung-Yong had memorized about 2000 words in both English and German. He was writing poetry in Korean and Chinese, and wrote two short books of essays and poems (less than 20 pages).

At age four, he scored over 200 on an IQ test normally given to seven-year-olds.

Read After: Psychologists Reveal: Apply This 2-hour Rule and Your Life Will Change 180°

Kim Ung-Yong mastered algebra at a very early age.

Geniuses cannot go unseen. That’s exactly why NASA took Kim Ung-yong under their wings at the age of 8. In the beginning he was learning the rookie stuff, but in 1974 he began working alongside with the most brilliant minds. He spent almost a decade at NASA.

When you feel something isn’t right, it usually isn’t. This is what happened to Kim Ung-yong at NASA. He pushed himself to the limit year after year, and yet he felt emptier than ever. He felt void consumed by working the “robotic life” as he called it. “At that time, I led my life like a machine – I woke up, solved the daily assigned equation, ate, slept, and so forth. I really didn’t know what I was doing, and I was lonely and had no friends,” he says.

At the age of 16 in 1978 he went back to South Korea. People, no different than any majority around the globe, started calling him “a defective genius.” After receiving criticism from the public, he decided to continue his education at a local university.

As of 2007 he served as adjunct faculty at Chungbuk National University. In March 14, 2014, he became associate professor in Shinhan University, and became vice president of North Kyeong-gi Development Research Center.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO HAVE A HIGH IQ?

People often talk about very high IQ scores, often referred to as genius IQ scores, but what exactly do these numbers mean and how do they stack up?

A Breakdown of IQ Scores

The average score on an IQ test is 100. These labels are often given for IQ scores:

  • 1 to 24: Profound mental disability
  • 25 to 39: Severe mental disability
  • 40 to 54: Moderate mental disability
  • 55 to 69: Mild mental disability
  • 70 to 84: Borderline mental disability
  • 85 to 114: Average intelligence
  • 115 to 129: Above average or bright
  • 130 to 144: Moderately gifted
  • 145 to 159: Highly gifted
  • 160 to 179: Exceptionally gifted
  • 180 and up: Profoundly gifted

IQ tests use a standardized scale with 100 as the median score. On most tests, a score between 90 and 110, or the median plus or minus 10, indicates average intelligence. A score above 130 indicates exceptional intelligence and a score below 70 may indicate mental retardation.

Simply put, IQ tests are designed to measure your general ability to solve problems and understand concepts. This includes reasoning ability, problem-solving ability, ability to perceive relationships between things and ability to store and retrieve information. IQ tests measure this general intellectual ability in a number of different ways.

BEING SPECIAL IS NOT AS IMPORTANT AS LIVING AN ORDINARY LIFE

For Kim, having IQ was not always a gift. He missed many ordinary things in his childhood. Without human relationship, Kim says “that’s no life at all.”

“People always try to be somebody special by neglecting their ordinary happiness. But they should know happiness means ordinary things that we take for granted, such as nourishing friendships, sharing memorable moments with friends at school and so on…I couldn’t have these things even if I wanted to. This is why I know that what I’m saying is important,” Kim said.

Kim’s message is loud and clear: “Being special is not as important as living an ordinary life.”