Praise hampers goals

I don’t need accolades on the wall to remind me of who I am — Slash

Praise is one of the most addictive--and potentially destructive--drugs around. OK, maybe it's not that bad, but it can be annihilative to personal growth. As the saying goes: praise is something children cry for and grown people die for. There's nothing wrong with giving--or receiving--genuine praise; we all appreciate praise for hard work and genuine accomplishment, but it's a mistake to make praise an objective. Praise is a given when doing anything impressive, so focus on executing meaningful actions; perform great feats and praise follows. And if the praise never comes--so what? Achieving greatness is a real reward, not the fickle approval of people you already know or will never know. Further, if people criticize your accomplishments it doesn't mean your accomplishments were without merit. Negative feedback is often praise couched in petty jealousies.

Back to the topic of praise: Most people are unaware of my proudest accomplishments (and no, they've nothing to do with either my training or training business) nor do I care whether anyone knows these things, since the reward of doing them has been more than enough.

The need to report your achievements to anyone and everyone in order to garner praise and significance indicates your actions are about as uninteresting as your personality. Hey, if you don't even impress yourself, don't go looking for outsiders to pick up the slack.

Yet, at the end of the day, praise is merely one of the many reassurances people desperately seek. People broadcast their accomplishments because they can then feel superior. We all know people like this, they're the men and women who always want the focus on them and what they've done. If you talk to such people, they'll cut you off mid-sentence, interrupting with their two cents--they can't listen to you because their minds are occupied only with what they want to say next.

They need to get over themselves! There will always be someone more impressive than yourself so forget about trying to be better than others and focus on improving yourself. Take solace in growing as a person and making day-to-day gains.

Some people require pats on the back in order to stay the course when chasing their goals. This is a sign you lack the necessary seriousness to realize your objectives. Who cares about a pat on the back over real opportunity for personal development? There are many people performing inspiring actions every single day who never receive praise or encouragement yet keep their momentum. Are their actions less important because they're not acknowledged? I don't think so.

Ironically, praise can actually hamper perseverance and thus, growth. My Dad recently sent me an article asserting that praising children for their natural talents is a big mistake. For example, if a child has a natural aptitude for math, laying on thick praise is a big mistake. Why? It discourages children from taking on challenges. Assuming that other areas of life should equally effortless, when adversity comes their way, they may see it as a sign to retreat. I don't think adults are any different. Many adults simply focus on things at which they are already adept and never want to take on any challenge. Were they conditioned this way as children? Whatever the reason, such people need to move on to new skills and interests.

Worse, praise givers may simply be attention-seekers. After all, when praised, the recipient is now obligated to acknowledge the source of this praise. I repeat, there is nothing wrong with genuine praise, but you must differentiate between heartfelt praise and ass kissing--and a fine illustration of the latter is Henry Rollins on The Henry Rollins Show. (Now I will interject that I'm a big fan of the band Black Flag, and as some of you may know, Henry Rollins was the lead singer for Black Flag. I also like what he did with his later project, The Rollins Band. So when I heard Henry had his own show in which he'd be interviewing interesting people and hosting music, I couldn't wait to check it out.

I watched a few episodes of his The Henry Rollins Show and it failed to engage me. After a few more viewings I realized why: Henry may talk loud and tough during his weekly rants, but if you listen to what he's saying there's zero controversy or originality. In fact, there's no substance whatsoever, just him bitching like he's post-estrogen booster shot. Unfortunately, his weekly rants are the least of the show's pathetic-ness. His sycophantic behavior with each and every guest is nausea-inducing. For me, the tipping point was an interview with William Shatner. While I'm the first to say Shatner was the best Star Trek captain of all time, that's not where Rollins was going. Nope, he actually praised Shatner for his great music! Anyone who's sampled Shatner's discography knows the horror. I'd rather listen to my dogs bark all night.

There is a comedic value to the recordings since you can't help but laugh your ass off upon listening. Next, Rollins went on to admit has all Shatner’s records and they continued a discussion of the musical process and how Shatner comes up with his great material. You've got to be kidding me! Delving into William Shatner on musical creativity is like asking George Bush about public speaking technique. Hilariously, even Henry Rollins' guests squirm in discomfort when subjected to such artificial praise. Johnny Knoxville was compelled to counter Henry’s fawning by replying that even he--Johnny--thought most of his own movies sucked! Now that was funny. Remember: if you are looking for methods to refine your ass kissing, check out Henry’s show. The single highlight from the first season was a musical performance by Slayer--even Henry couldn't mess that up.

Back to the topic of praise: balance is key. Live your life without seeking praise from others; praise is illusory, fleeting, but becoming a great person is not. Give genuine praise to others when the opportunity arises, but avoid surgically attaching your head to their ass. No worthwhile person feels flattered by empty praise; great people do great things for their own sake, not for some transient accolades or even pats on the back. Make 2008 the year you work on becoming a great person.

Being a teacher is not easy

"The true teacher knocks down the idol that the student makes of him."
- Rumi

It is very tough to be a great teacher. We all have egos and teachers generally have stronger egos than other people. Regardless if a teacher cannot humble oneself and be a student the teacher no longer has value. Some teachers like the authority and power that comes with having a following. Being a teacher myself I know how intoxicating it can be to be in front of a room of students and having their full attention. In addition, my students pay good amount of hard earned cash to work with me. I do not take the responsibility lightly and work my ass off to put on great workshops. In fact if I am not drained the day after a workshop then I know I held back and did not put my best effort forward. If I do not get testimonials from my workshop participants then I did not put in my best effort. Regardless, being a good teacher is not about acquiring praise or encouraging others to follow what you say blindly. In fact the greatest gift that a teacher can provide is the lesson of learning and critical thinking. A real teacher encourages students to seek out the truth on their own. A real teacher does not allow students to become worshippers and idolaters. Life is always a learning process no matter what the field of study is and when you stop learning you stop growing. A teacher has a responsibility to encourage growth and send the students forward when he or she no longer has anything to teach. Great teachers take pleasure in their students surpassing them. Trying to hold one's students back is similar to a parent trying to impede the growth of their children. Such behavior is reprehensible!

One of my favorite books is Dune by Frank Herbert. Frank Herbert was a brilliant man that had an incredible imagination. His characters come alive in his book and his stories are clearly made for adults. No simple good and evil battles with a condescending simplistic message. Herbert understood how complicated it is to be a human being and do the right thing. How being a leader is very difficult as even the best intentions can go horribly wrong. In the first Dune book, the main character Paul goes from being a naive young man to the strong and powerful leader of a repressed society. He leads a successful revolution against a corrupt emperor. Dune ends with a happy ending in which Paul takes the place of the emperor. His journey from boy to man was filled with trials and tribulations just as every person's journey to a self-actualized being is. In the third Dune book, Paul loses control of his empire. His followers kill in his name and he cannot do anything to stop it. He has become a figure head and a religion is created around him. He as an individual only has the illusion of power and what is done in his name is too much for him to take. The final straw is the death of his wife as she gives birth to his children. Unable to handle the depression he walks off into the desert to die.

Paul had the best of intentions. He was a good man and lead an oppressed people to freedom. Unfortunately, the oppressed people become the new oppressors and he could not do anything to stop it. His followers worshipped him as a god and at the same time no longer recognized the flawed humanity in him. They put their blinders on and there is nothing more dangerous than a desperate society of blind followers. Any history student can confirm that.

With being a teacher comes immense responsibility. You have to make it clear to you're students that you do not have all of the answers. You have flaws as well and the great thing is that it is not a big deal. We live in such an artificial world that many people welcome dept and real communication. We are so hungry for something real that our actions as a society have become desperate. The fact that "Reality TV" is so popular says it all. Many of us are so repressed that the inevitable boiling point is only around the corner and when it finally breaks through the flood gates all hell breaks loose. When we repress our emotions and feelings we always end up depressed. Eventually depression which is internal anger often leads to outward anger and the consequences can be disastrous.

In order to be more effective teachers we have to show honest vulnerability and honest flaws. The illusion of perfection is just that an illusion. Celebrities are not better then you and no they do not have all the answers. People with immense wealth are not better than you and nope they do not have the answers either. With the solving of any problem comes new problems. When you make a lot of money you solve the problem of not having money. Now you have to worry about losing you're wealth and people being friends with you only for you're money. When you lose fat and build muscle, you solve the problem of being overweight and unhealthy. Have no doubt that other problems are just around the corner.

Life is a constant battle of solving problems and facing new ones. Each time we solve a problem we grow immensely. When we stop having problems we are only kidding ourselves. Ignoring a problem or pretending that it does not exist will not make it go away. While this is unacceptable for anyone that is interested in personal growth and living a full life, it is completely reprehensible for a teacher to pretend that problems do not exist. If you run a company and you're top six people leave. It is highly unlikely that the six people who left are the problem. It is however highly likely that the organization that they left is the problem. Try to avoid that reality all you want. Just do not believe for a second that it is not likely the truth.

The final thing that a teacher must do is admit mistakes. Just as a good teacher is aware that students make mistakes. A good teacher must be aware that he or she not only makes mistakes but will always make mistakes. Does this mean that a teacher that makes mistakes is not a good teacher? Of course not. In baseball if you hit the ball three times out of every ten tries you're a superstar! This means that players who miss the ball the majority of the time are the best around. Their flaws are open to all of their fans yet the fans still love them. If professional baseball players can be superstars with their obvious flaws, a teacher in any field can be a superstar as well with the admittance of mistakes. Bottom line is you're students see you're mistakes anyway so take responsibility and ownership of you're actions.

Sending the message to you're students that you are infallible and perfect is a disservice to say the least. Sending the message that you're too good to get you're hands dirty only sends the message that you're not a good teacher. As we have all heard many times a great teacher leads by example. The saying "Do as I say not as I do" is perfect for teachers that do not deserve to be teachers.

Whenever a teacher is too good to be true, go with you're instincts. We all know when someone is genuine and when someone is disingenuous. Whether we choose to go with our instincts is another story. Perception may be reality. However, at the end of the day reality is reality and the truth can only be held back for so long.

Be a great teacher and a great person by laying it on the table. Do not be afraid to be vulnerable and imperfect. Hell, do not be afraid to be afraid. Life is scary and avoiding that truth does not make it any less scary. Leave distraction methods to magicians. Work some real magic in you're life by being an authentic person and surrounding yourself with other authentic people. Life is too short to live a lie. Live the truth!

Live Life Aggressively!

Mike Mahler

mahler25@yahoo.com

Is Happiness Determined By Our Genetics?

By Mike Mahler

Research now confirms what common sense has always told us: Happy people live longer, enjoy healthier lives, achieve more success, and maintain stronger relationships than the chronically unhappy.—Liz Seymour

Recently, on a business trip to Dallas to do a kettlebell workshop with my friend Lisa Shaffer, I read an interesting article in, of all places, US Airways magazine**. The author, Liz Seymour, wrote on the topic of happiness. I expected a patronizing bit about forced positive thinking providing the key to happiness but, to my pleasant surprise, Seymour’s article turned out to be the most fascinating I've read in a long time.

How do we define happiness? According to Ed Diener, Professor of Psychology at the University of Illinois, happiness is a combination of “life satisfaction, positive emotions, and low levels of negative emotions.” In other words, people who are happy genuinely enjoy their lives and genuinely feel good most of the time. Notice I'm using the word genuinely to distinguish people who are happy from those who merely think happy thoughts--there's a big difference. People who force positive thinking are faking, while happy people are naturally positive: they see the world as full of opportunities rather than fear and sorrow. I'm sure the women reading this agree there's a big difference between genuinely feeling it...and faking it. No need to elaborate further, at least I hope not.

We all have the pursuit of happiness as our goal. At the end of the day every goal we pursue reinforces this end goal of becoming happier: we want to make more money because we think it will make us happier; we want to find a life partner and get married because we think it will make us happier; we want to lose fat and look better because we think it will make us happier. We've been sold a bill of goods that happiness comes from changing external conditions. Unfortunately, achieving real happiness is more complicated than simply changing the externals. According to Seymour, "...happiness is determined by a combination of genetic set points, conditions, and voluntary activities."

Let's start by looking at genetic set points: yes, like other talents, such as intelligence and athletic prowess, a happy disposition can be genetically predetermined. A genetic set point is a factor involved with being happy. Just as some people easily learn calculus, or have a natural ability to run fast, some people find it easy to be happy. On the other hand, just as some people have a hard time learning mathematics or participating in sports, some people have a hard time being happy. For these people happiness takes an effort, just like the effort of academics, or getting in shape, while those with luckier genes may be happier, stay in shape easier, and get better grades. So, if you're miserable, feel free to blame your parents for your lame genetics--and better luck next time!

Lame joking aside, I find the genetic factor in happiness very interesting since I'd never thought of happiness as something genetically determined. How much of a role do genetics play in our happiness? According to studies, genes determine fifty percent of our proclivity for happiness--or for melancholy. While this doesn't mean you'll be doomed to a life of misery and despair if you weren't blessed with happy genes, it does mean you'll have to work harder to achieve happiness. Yes, it's unfair, but you already know life is unfair--after all, the last season of my favorite show, 24, was lame, and if life were fair it would've been excellent, making me a happy camper. Instead, it was lame and I've been miserable ever since. Oh well, at least the last season of my other favorite show, The Shield, was pretty good. So, can I blame my feelings on my genetic set point? No.

While our individual genetic set points play a tremendous role in whether we're happy or not, they're not the only factor. Conditions do play a role but, according to studies, not as big a role as we've been led to believe: conditions make up about eight to fifteen percent of happiness. Thus, if you think you're depressed because you still rent, have a few pounds to lose, or aren't as strong as you'd like to be...think again. Liz Seymour writes, "...variables such as age, education, health, income, personal appearance, and even climate are ineffective at overriding our genetically determined set point." In other words, if your genetic set point favors misery, making a lot of money or even getting a rock hard body won't tip the happiness scales in your favor. Sure, you may temporarily feel better following an achievement or gaining some material possession, such as a house, but within a year you'll be back where you were before the changes occurred.

Ironically, most of us spend our lives trying to change conditions in order to be happy, never realizing why it's not working. Some of you may find this stuff hard to believe, after all, how could one not be happier after becoming a millionaire? Moreover, how could someone who is happy not become miserable after suffering a terrible disease? According to Seymour, studies of lottery winners, on one hand, and people who became paraplegic from an accident, on the other, show clearly that both groups returned to their previous level of happiness within less than a year. In other words: if you're already miserable, your misery will continue even if you become a millionaire but if you're happy a happy in general, even upon becoming a paraplegic, you'll eventually return to happiness after an adaptation phase. The old saying, that people do not change, is truer than we think.

This is why it's difficult to achieve happiness via changing external conditions. Our brains are good at adapting to situations, good or bad. This isn't so hard to understand, think of any important goal you've achieved--remember how anti-climactic it felt? This is the problem with being overly attached to end results: we place too much pressure on achievement changing our mindset. When I first got into weight training, I used to dream about being able to bench press 315 pounds; though eventually I worked up to bench-pressing 315 for seven reps--how did I feel? Great...for a while, then I adapted and returned to the same mindset I had before my strength gain. The much-anticipated change that came with the achievement of my goal didn't last. Eventually, like everyone else, I wanted more.

Of course, no achievement will ever be enough., which is why people unconsciously stay in the anticipation phase and avoid achieving their goals. The anticipation phase is like being a child on the night before Christmas: fantasizing about all the wonderful gifts you'll receive brings more pleasure than the actual experience of opening your gifts. Unfortunately, remaining in the anticipation phase is delusional and won't bring about real happiness; if nothing else, it'll get old and no longer carry the same level of pleasure.

Does this mean we shouldn't bother with goals? Of course not! Goal-less-ness is the path of the cop out. People who claim that everything is illusion are unmotivated people looking to avoid growth and change. The key is setting goals and achieving them for the sake of doing it. According to the ancient Hindu text, The Bhagavad Gita, we've a right to our actions but not the results of those actions: our reward is the process and experience rather than any form of attainment. Goal achievements are road signs that we're heading in the right direction and ready to grow into our next phase. Without achieving goals, we're doomed to repeating our same experiences over and over again. According to John Elliot, author of The New Science Of Working Less To Accomplish More, we perform better when we're fully in the moment and unattached to outcome: life's fullest moments can be reduced to those moments in which we're fully present with no thoughts of past or future. These are the moments in which we're fully alive and time seems to stand still. Clearly, enjoying life moment-to-moment, rather than persisting with fearful thoughts, enhances our genetic set points.

Everyone wants to be happy whether they realize it or not and even if they don't want to admit it. We need to realize that happiness isn't a result of focusing on conditions. We need to focus on enhancing our genetic set points in order to stack the odds of personal happiness in our favor. If you're not happy making $50,000 you won't be happy making $250,000: the problem is within our minds, not external conditions.

Fortunately, we don't have to lie back and accept the genetic set point we've been dealt. Just as anyone can get smarter and build stronger muscles, so can we develop stronger genetic set points for happiness. Seymour writes that one option is taking drugs--after all, we're a pill-popping society and there exist pills for every problem under the sun, including a poor outlook on life. Selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors, such as Prozac and Zoloft, prolong the action of serotonin in the brain. Serotonin is a chemical that's helpful with mood and is adequately produced by people who are naturally happy. For people with chemical imbalances, I can see how these drugs are a godsend. Some people really benefit from these drugs or by supplementing the amino acids tyrosine and tryptophan, which create serotonin in the brain. However, taking drugs or even nutritional supplements isn't a solution for everyone. In fact, taking such drugs may be a way of avoiding the problem: our actions must lead to sustained improvements, not drug dependence.

If not drugs, then what? One, we need to learn to better handle stress. People with natural stress management skills are inevitably happier. As hard as it is to fathom, a soldier in Iraq under a hail of bullets may be less stressed than your average Los Angeles millionaire complaining about an overcooked steak...if the former has superior stress-management skills and thus a greater genetic "happiness" set point.

What about the people who don't have a natural stress-management ability? Fortunately, there's hope for stress-management under-achievers. According to Seymour, one method proven to be effective at increasing set-point happiness is a daily meditation practice. According to researchers at the Laboratory For Affective Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin, meditation stimulates the brain's left pre-frontal cortex. This is the part of the brain most active when we're happy and alert, so meditation is very effective at lowering stress and increasing feelings of happiness. Maybe this is why Buddhist monks seem to smile so much? It can't have anything to do with eating beans and rice everyday and abstaining from sex! Otherwise, my advice is to quit your job, shave your head and move into your local temple--just kidding (well, not the part about quitting your job!)

We can stay in this world and become happier: merely devote some time to meditation and stimulate the left pre-frontal cortex. Of course, this is easier said than done for those of us not jumping for joy like a bunch of idiots. People find meditation difficult, and I'm no exception. Fortunately, there are meditation programs that work for those us who under-achieve at stimulating the left pre-frontal cortex while chanting and sitting in the lotus position. My favorite meditation program is Holosync. Read about it at the end of this article.

Seymour mentions another method useful for steering our set points toward the world of happiness: cognitive therapy. Cognitive therapy works by teaching us how to recognize negative patterns and breaking them. Instead of dwelling on the negative, cognitive therapy teaches us to focus on the thought patterns which make us happy. Even miserable people have their happy moments. The key is to develop the happy moments and avoid bogging down in misery ruts.

Some of you are thinking that cognitive therapy is "positive thinking" mumbo-jumbo--but really it isn’t. With positive thinking, you're in denial: rather than accepting the fact that some things are, in fact, negative, you're taught to spin every situation into a positive--no matter what. The problem is we unconsciously know we're lying to ourselves and don't really buy it. Positive thinking devotees are paranoid of any negative thought and feel guilty when such thoughts arise--neither healthy nor realistic.

Faking happiness isn't the same as authentic happiness. With cognitive therapy, you learn to break negative patterns by listening to feedback--sounds complicated right? It isn’t. Here's an example: you watch two hours of television news and get bombarded with all the problems in the world--how do you feel afterwards? Similar to millions of other people: you feel depressed and powerless. These feelings stay with you for the rest of the day--or even week--and are compounded every time you watch the news. What should you do? Well, stop watching the news! What value is it providing you? Are you doing anything positive with the information? If no, then stop your source of negativity. Or, get empowered and do something about it. For example, if you see a news segment on kids who've been victimized, why not join an organization that helps abused kids? When you empower yourself, you can transform negative energy into a positive outcome. Empowered actions are gratifying and bring us longer lasting happiness than such simple pleasures as eating dessert or watching a good movie.

Cognitive therapy teaches us how things affect us--whether positive or negative. Here's another example: you see an injured animal on the side of the road but instead of driving by muttering how terrible it is, you pull over, wrap the wounded animal in a towel and take it to a vet. Because of this compassionate act the animal makes a full recovery and you feel like a million bucks all week. Of course the feeling will eventually wear off, but you can prolong it or invite it back by putting in some volunteer hours at an animal shelter or other reputable non-profit organization for animals. Again, you're taking the path of empowerment, and when we're empowered, we're unstressed and happy. When we play a role in improving the world around us, we're gratified and, again, actions resulting in gratification provide longer periods of happiness.

What about seeking out those activities in which we obtain pleasure? Well, if we focus on our pleasure more often, we're less likely to experience depression. Terrific! Unfortunately, according to Seymour, studies show that such pleasures are fleeting in nature. For example, great sex is great--for a while--but the feeling eventually wears off until your next sex fix. All you create with sex in such a situation is another compulsion, also known as a distraction. Now I'm the last person to knock sex in any way and I'm not saying sex is a waste of your time! A strong sex drive is a strong sign of health and vitality but don't deceive yourself that sexual pleasure is a solution for creating permanent change when your set point is turned towards sorrow.

Pleasures are a great and important aspect of life but gratifications bring longer lasting happiness. Seymour writes, "...gratifications are activities that call on our skills and strengths and give us a sense of a job well done." Personally, I enjoy pleasure more when the gratifications are in full effect. Pleasure is like icing on the cake: while the icing is part of enjoying cake, it can't replace the cake. A personal example to drive this point home: several years ago I did a kettlebell workshop with my good friend Dylan Thomas in NYC. The workshop was looking disastrous: I had to change the venue three times, as booked venues kept falling though. Then, a guy who was supposed to present the workshop with me had to bail out just days before the event. With this news, I had several people cancel right off the bat and several more express anger via email, accusing me of lacking professionalism. It also seemed the people still planning on coming weren't bringing their positive vibes: many were pissed off and told me they'd have canceled but for their non-refundable airfares. The workshop foreboded disaster and I knew it had to be the best of my career to turn things around.

To make a long story short: Dylan and I put on a great workshop and everyone left happy. In fact, it turned out to be one of the most enthusiastic groups I've ever worked with and everyone had a blast. Instead of getting depressed about everything going wrong, we empowered ourselves by taking charge of what we could and at the end of the day that was enough and it all worked out.

I received immense gratification from pulling off that workshop. It was a great group, a fun day, and afterwards a few of us went out for a few too many drinks. We had a blast...until the next day's arrival of hell's hangover. Where am I going with this? The pleasure of going out and having some fun on the town was that much sweeter due to the gratification of that workshop's success. If we'd simply traveled to NYC and had a night out, it wouldn't have been anywhere near as sweet or meaningful.

A night of pleasure lasts a night but a day of gratification can last a lifetime. We need to focus on developing opportunities for gratification--and thus long lasting happiness--rather than pursuing those fleeting pleasures. My own rule of thumb is: enjoy pleasures but focus on gratifications.

An important element of happiness not discussed in the article is the importance of optimizing hormones. I won't expound on this since this article is long enough already and optimizing hormones is covered in my DVD The Kettlebell Solution For Fat Loss And Mental Toughness, and my e-book, The Aggressive Strength Solution For Size And Strength. Briefly, hormones such as testosterone, progesterone, human growth hormone, DHEA and pregnenolone play important roles in how we feel. These hormones are important for both men and women. When testosterone and progesterone are low, sex drive and mood are likewise. Given low testosterone levels, feeling alive and full of vitality is as likely as becoming a millionaire while working the cash register at 7-11. Similar to the genetic set point of happiness, hormone levels are genetically determined, but we can stack the deck in our favor by engaging in stress-management activities such as: getting eight hours of deep sleep nightly; having an active sex life; working out smart and avoiding over-training; eating a balanced diet with the right kinds and levels of fat, protein and carbohydrate; and ensuring our vitamin and mineral levels are in check.

While the art of happiness may not be an easy craft to develop and master but one at which we must work hard--just like any goal in life--it's probably the most important goal we can achieve. After all, what else matters if you don't find happiness in this life? Don't be a slave to your genetic set point--anything can be improved. Just as you can learn more and become more intelligent--or lift more and get stronger--you're capable of greater, more meaningful, happiness. Even if you never win the award for Happiest Person on the Planet, deepening your experience of happiness is reward enough. Dedicate your life to creating plentiful opportunities for gratification and enjoying pleasurable activities and improve your stress-management skills--this is what living life aggressively is all about.

This topic is far from over--I have much more to share about it and I'm looking forward to your feedback as well at: mahler25@yahoo.com

Special Note: The next article will be less of a term paper format and more of my own personal input on this topic. I have a lot to say on this one and will break it down next time. Briefly, I think that changing conditions is effective for some people in changing genetic points for happiness. For example I am much happier now than I was when I was working for someone else in an unfulfilling job five years ago. More on this next time.

**The article discussed in this piece is "A Formula For Happiness" by Liz Seymour. You can read it at: http://usairwaysmag.com/2007_09/happiness.php

Meditation is one of the best things you can do to relax your mind and handle stress more effectively. High stress equals low DHEA, testosterone, and GH levels. You must get a handle on stress to be at your best. My online client Les Larson told me about this program and after only a few weeks I am hooked.

Just listen to the program for 30-60 minutes per day and you will notice a difference after a few days. After a week you will look forward to each session. I like to use it after working out or before going to bed. Check it out at:

Truth is up for grabs

We associate truth with convenience, with what most closely accords with self-interest and personal well-being or promises best to avoid awkward effort or unwelcome dislocation of life. — John Kenneth Galbraith

A recent issue of Entrepreneur Magazine gave me a clear insight: the people writing for the magazine are clearly not entrepreneurs. Moreover, like most print magazines, Entrepreneur Magazine is a slave to advertisers, pretty much publishing anything they're told to. Here are two examples of what I'm taking about. One, a recent article described Apple, the company, as an example of providing exceptional customer service. Well, much of the time, that may be true, but the example used in the article was pure idiocy.

A while back, Apple introduced the iPhone, which retailed at $500.00. Sales didn't meet expectations, so the price was reduced to $300.00. Not surprisingly, the early, loyal, buyers who paid an extra $200.00 for the iPhone expressed irritation. Still, Apple didn't offer these customers any compensation until being inundated with complaints. Did Apple offer to refund each customer $200.00? Of course not, that would be the proper thing to do--which most corporations couldn't care less about. Instead, Apple sent each person a $100.00 coupon--valid to purchase more Apple products! The coupon rebate was a joke and the worst part is it's not even equal to the initial overpayment. Apple could have at least sent out $200.00 coupons! Further, why would these customers even want to do more business with Apple? They were screwed for spending $500.00 on the iPhone! The reality? Corporations know very few people take the time to use coupons or mail in rebate offers. The coupons Apple distributed will mostly go unused--which is why they did it that way.

Apple’s poor handling of the iPhone incident is bad enough, but a magazine using it as an example of exemplary entrepreneurship and customer relations is reprehensible.

In another issue of Entrepreneur Magazine, a so-called "marketing expert" advised avoiding lengthy promotional ad copy for online product sales. She wrote that no one reads such copy, so you should get to the point in a few sentences. In theory, it seems like reasonable advice but only someone who's never sold products online would posit something so wrong. Anyone with any level of success selling products online, especially information products, knows you need well-written--and often lengthy--promotional copy to effectively sell those products. I wrote twenty-five pages of promotional copy for my last Kettlebell DVD set, The Boys Are Back In Town. Why? Because it's an expensive DVD and people need to know exactly why they should spend their hard-earned money on it. A few sentences won't cover that; I can't possibly convey all the great information within the DVD set in a few sentences. Do I expect everyone to read, word-for-word, 25 pages of ad copy? Of course not, but as they skim down the pages, people quickly realize the ton of information the DVD contains and why it's worth the price. The result? The DVD set, the most expensive DVD I've ever released, with the longest ad copy to promote it, ended up making more money than any other DVD I've put out in the time it's been on the market. The kicker? It's sold more total units than any other DVD I've produced, considering the time it's been available for sale.

Reality, and what you think will work, don't always add up. When you take advice, make sure it's based on reality--not what some so-called expert recommends.

Fortunately, I was able to curtail my disgust with Entrepreneur Magazine by reading a great book, Freakonomics, by Steve D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. Levitt and Dubner are both economists with an intense desire to know why things are the way they are. Accepting conventional wisdom, or even common sense, isn't enough for them--they wanted to apply the science of economics in acquiring precise explanations. The book is a fascinating, thought-provoking read. Here are some of the topics I think may interest you, possibly changing how you see the world.

First, Dubner and Levitt look at why crime rates have declined over the years. Many people think it's due to having more police on the streets. Sounds reasonable, yes? Well, that may have little, if anything, to do with it. Both Washington, DC and Denver have about the same population yet DC, with many more police on the streets than Denver, has much higher crime than Denver. Dubner and Levitt instead draw a correlation between Roe vs. Wade and lower crime rates. Intrigued? They assert legalizing abortion prevented many would-be criminals from even existing. Not surprisingly, people who grow up in rough, impoverished neighborhoods are more likely to become criminals. The vast majority of abortions come from these same population centers. The legalization of abortion occurred in 1973 in the U.S. and the significant decrease in crime happened during the 1990's, when the unborn criminals would have been entering their criminal primes. Not an easy pill to swallow whether you're pro-choice or anti-abortion. Remember: reality and what you consider morality aren't always going to be aligned.

The next example I found fascinating had to do with drug dealers. The title of the chapter is Why Do Drug Dealers Still Live at Home With Their Moms? The media likes spreading illusions that most drug dealers are raking it in off the suffering of others, which creates especially bad PR for drug dealers, since nothing pisses off law-abiding citizens more than reports of criminals making lots more money than them! When people think of drug dealers, they think of Al Pacino, in Scarface, living in his mansion, or Wesley Snipes, as Nino Brown, in New Jack City getting rich of the misery of his own people. The reality is...most drug dealers aren't raking it in. Like any other job, there are a few people making a lot at the top while the majority are doing okay--or just getting by. The average drug dealer, according to Levitt and Dubner, makes about $3.30 an hour--far less than the minimum wage! These dealers typically supplement their drug dealing income with a legitimate job while living at home--with mommy--to get by. So why even bother dealing drugs? The illusion of working up to the top level someday--and enjoying the lifestyle perks that come with it--keeps most drug dealers engaged. Similar to multi-level marketing (aka pyramid schemes) most people selling drugs are making little money at all, much less livable incomes. What they have in common is a pipe dream that's unlikely to materialize.

Perception is rarely reality--things are infrequently what we'd like them to be. One reality that's certain is Entrepreneur Magazine is worthless for any real entrepreneur and Freaknomics is a great book for people who prefer thinking over spending their days alternately finding offense and seeking self-aggrandizement. All right, all right, this may be just my opinion...but at least it's coming from me, not paid advertisers.

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Live Life Aggressively!

Mike Mahler

***Article Edited by Teresa Blazey: teresa.blazey@gmail.com

Passion Is Never Enough For Success

"I like for things to happen and if they don’t happen I like to make them happen."— Winston Churchill

2008 has arrived and it's time for making resolutions and goals destined to end in failure and frustration. Sounds pretty negative, huh? It is, but merely having a positive attitude won't change your outcome. In fact, just about now the majority of the New Year's enthusiasts' passions are already beginning to wear off. For most, 2008 will be a virtual replay of 2007--or worse, a virtual replay of every year of the last ten years!

Of course, there will be a few people who finish what they start and make 2008 their best year ever. Lets call these people the 5% club. The 5% club realize it takes more than passion to create success in any endeavor. Without the right plan--and a great dose of tenacity--you can forget about accomplishing anything life-changing.

The reality is, you can achieve your goals with or without passion. That's right, even if you're a miserable person and hate all the day long, executing the right plan and sticking with it will still bring you great results. On the other hand, the most positive person in the world achieves nothing relying on passion and poor planning. And adding hard work to the mix simply enables you to fail harder. Truly, an overly positive attitude may be the very thing preventing you from spurring change. After all, if you think everything is fine already, why bother putting in the hard effort to effect change? To be fair, neither is an overly negative attitude the way to go. If you see no hope--why bother trying? The truth is both positive and negative perceptions are irrelevant. What is relevant? An effective plan, putting it into action and the resolve to never give up.

I'll say it again: passion is not enough. Far from it. I feel irritation when I hear people saying passion is the most critical factor to success. I know plenty of passionate people who love what they do yet barely make ends meet. Every one of their businesses have been stuck in first gear for years, and they continue going nowhere fast. Do they love their work? Sure, and loving what you do is nice and a very important factor in overall happiness but every one of these people to whom I refer wish they made more money. They front contentment with what their present situations but in the back of their minds (and in their hearts) they desire more than merely getting by.

Earning a desirable income and achieving an abundant lifestyle requires more than passion. For that matter, achieving your training goals takes more than passion. Passion is fickle and can dissipate at any moment--and then what do you do? If you're like most people, you give up, couch it, and go back to watching your nightly four hours of reality TV.

In relying on passion as a primary motivation, you're actually doing yourself a disservice because no matter what you're doing in life, you won't feel passionate about it all of the time. There will be times when you dread working out or putting in long hours on the job. What separates successful people from unsuccessful people is this: successful people are willing to do what needs to be done regardless of their feelings about it. Whether enthusiasm is high or low, the work gets done and this is what makes a professional in the game of life.

There are parts of my business I love, such as kettlebell workshops and designing personalized client programs, and there are less enjoyable aspects, like writing ad copy for my products and services. Yet good promotional copy is a critical component of my business and it's why I make a great living and a major reason why I enjoy life.

Without good web placement and a content-rich site to attract people, no one would know about my workshops, services, and DVDs. Without following through on those activities I might not find enjoyable, I wouldn't have the chance to experience the exhilarating side of my business--which is helping people. Whether writing and posting free articles, producing DVDs or presenting workshops, I enjoy helping people, and I'm passionate about it, but it all amounts to nothing without my marketing expertise which I am not so passionate about. Without that I'd be without customers. So while I may not enjoy marketing and promotion tasks, they are vital to my success and I'm glad for my adeptness. I know a lot of people lacking those abilities and, lets just say, I don't want to be in their shoes. Many people simply tell me they don't want to do what they don't enjoy. This is their excuse for being a marketing moron. Well, if you work for yourself and survival is an instinct you possess, you better learn the rules of marketing. More importantly if thriving is something you want, then it is critical that you take your success into your own hands and learn the art of marketing and promotion.

Another crucial component of success? Multi-skills competence. For example, being a gifted strength trainer is not nearly enough in and of itself. You must be able to promote yourself and manage your time intelligently. Some of you might think those things can be outsourced, and that's fine, if you have a nice bank roll ready. But what if you're just getting started or simply have more time than money? Make no mistake: the more things you can do on your own, the less you need rely on others--and the less you rely on others, the more power you have in your life. No doubt delegation is important and you cannot learn everything well. However, that is no excuse for failing to understand at the least the basics of several arenas such as accounting, website design, marketing, networking skills, and public speaking skills. Once you become more successful you can outsource things you do not enjoy to others and focus on what you love to do. Until then, get ready to be a jack of all trades for a while.

I'll continue this topic in the next issue. For now, happy New Year to you and your families and here's to doing what needs to be done to join the 5% this year...and the rest of your life.

Live Life Aggressively

Mike Mahler
www.mikemahler.com

We are great at kidding ourselves

So convenient a thing is it to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for every thing one has a mind to do. Benjamin Franklin

Last week, Dr. Bruce Nadler (otherwise known as The World's Strongest Plastic Surgeon) committed suicide. Worse, according to forensic analysis, he shot and killed his wife point-blank before going into the next room and killing himself. We hear stories like these all the time, what makes this one different is I knew the guy: we both spoke at the Fitness Business Summit last year. Carol and I chatted with him and his wife and they were very nice people. After my presentation, Dr. Nadler made a point of shaking my hand and telling me how impressed he was. Like most people, I never would have guessed he suffered from depression and that, almost a year later, his depression would reach critical mass, resulting in murder and suicide.

My initial reaction upon learning of Dr. Nadler's suicide was shock, then, when I heard about how he killed his wife, it turned to revulsion. Taking your own life is one thing, but taking someone else out with you is not your right. That he murdered his wife is beyond disturbing.

I've become very interested in the study of happiness over the last several months, and thinking about the Nadler murder/suicide my brain's been turning non-stop. I wonder what Dr. Nadler was like at my age? Did he suffer depression then? Did he have any idea he'd go on to commit suicide at the age of 61? Further, when he and his wife married did he have any idea he would murder her many years later? I have no idea and never will, yet, if I had to guess, I doubt Dr. Nadler held any of those thoughts. My guess is he was happy at my age and enjoyed his married life and being a doctor. Maybe I'm mistaken, but I doubt he was clinically depressed for the last thirty years. So what happened? I have no idea, but it got me thinking: where will I be in my sixties? Will I still enjoy life and continue growing as a person, or will I feel depressed with no desire to live? The latter seems unlikely given my current level of happiness, but none of us really know what lies ahead.

We can spend our time planning out our lives, setting goals and creating an illusion of control over this crazy world, but in reality we have little--if any--control. You can be in the best shape of your life and on cloud nine one minute, then get hit by a car the next, ending the rest of your days as a paraplegic. You never know what's around the corner. Then, every once in a while, we'll predict something that comes to pass, feeding our ego and again reinforcing the illusion we can see our future--yet it is just that: illusion.

The Buddha taught all life is suffering. Sounds depressing—from a superficial analysis—but the deeper meaning is our suffering is due to attachment. When we lose something to which we feel attachment, it can become the tipping point over an edge. I don't think there's any single reason why Dr. Nadler killed his wife and then himself—I think there was a tipping point as he stood at the edge of his life. It's more likely his final scene was a culmination of several concurrent frustrations.

From the Buddhist point of view, it's not what happens in our life that makes us suffer, but how we interpret it. In one of my favorite books ever, Viktor Frankl's Man's Search For Meaning, Frankl chronicles his time in a Nazi concentration camp, explaining how some people survived while others lost all hope. The people who survived sought out whatever form of happiness was available to them: If their meal was edible, they experienced great happiness; if someone told a funny joke, they enjoyed the pleasure of that moment as long as possible. Even the warmth of the sun gave them joy. They looked for—and discovered—opportunities for gratitude in the least likely scenarios. Even more impressive, the survivors sought out gratifications wherever possible. Helping out their fellow men was critical: to create purpose to make it through their immense suffering--it wasn't enough to focus on individual survival; the survival of others suffering the same horrors became equally important. Bottom line: those holding strong purpose and meaning in their lives were far more likely to survive than those who lost all hope and thus, meaning.

I don't know why Dr. Nadler took his wife's life, then his own, but I think it's safe to say he lost all hope and saw no reason to go on living. When we lack purpose and meaning in our lives, a part of us dies every day, and it's important to understand this early, before purposelessness, like a virus, replicates within our cells, literally taking over our lives.

Never get comfortable and stop growing. Once you do, you begin dying. My grandfather, a successful businessman, was born in a shack in Montana and went on to become a millionaire and highly sought out consultant to Fortune 500 companies. When working, he was happy, but I noticed upon his retirement he wasn't excited about life anymore, though he still had purpose, since my grandmother had Alzheimer's Disease and was completely dependent upon him. Her care became his new purpose and reason to keep going. When she passed on, he no longer had a reason to live--but not because he had nothing left to offer. His brain was sharp and he could have engaged in any number of creative projects, but he didn't see it that way and passed on a few weeks after my grandmother. I genuinely admired my grandfather, he taught me a lot about life and the importance of doing what you love; however, his final lesson to me was this: when you lack purpose, the brain and spirit despair and you eventually shut down.

My great grandmother was a different story: she outlived everyone in her life and passed on at the age of 101. She survived breast cancer, her husband's death, the deaths of her sisters, and even those of her own children. She was a simple woman and lived in Montana her entire life—much of it lived alone on a ranch in a small town called Arlee. I used to love talking to her—she epitomized tough. What people consider tough today is ludicrous compared to what was tough in her day. I remember one time she was talking about all of her loved ones dying around her. You could tell she felt very sad, however she ended the story by saying we have to go on no matter what. My great grandmother was many things, but the image I hold of her is of a survivor. No matter what happened to her, she persisted in surviving—and thriving. The purposes she maintained throughout her life may be things us moderns would think of as mundane, even tedious, yet where there is purpose is also survival--and delight in life. It doesn't matter your achievements, or any fame you might attain, without purpose none of it matters, like it or not.

I'll never see anyone the same again. Meeting Dr. Nadler and his ensuing deterioration has irrevocably changed me. Now, whenever I meet someone new or talk to a friend, I'll always wonder if they're really happy or just struggling to maintain appearances. Whatever the case may be, I hope you know your purpose and are enjoying this life.