When making mistakes is a good strategy

When the young Lewis tried to fix an equipment and failed, his spirits went down and he got very sad. However, the Robinsons celebrated his failure in this unforgettable movie on the meaning of success.

In fact, no matter which way you look, all people who are successful have one common point, and probably just one: they all failed at some point in their lives.

Mistakes are good; they work as excellent teachers who help us to understand life in our way towards success. These are some points for you to remember about mistakes, small or big:

• Be open to accept criticism. Keep it in your heart as another person's gift.
• Always "pack-up", ending all the processes with some reflection and improvement points.
• If others are mocking you, just punt in your mind an image of success and keep moving.
• Mistakes only happen once. Second-time mistakes are in fact habits being created; stop, check in you and change that habit.
• Don't be shy at the time of looking for help. Just do it.
• By meditating, you clarify your intellect, that is, your making-decisions capacity, which improves the chances of overcoming errors.
• Remember: the quantity of mistakes is an indicator of how much you want to reach success in some task.
• Remember: the quality of your mistakes indicates how close you are of reaching success in any activity.

I wish you lots of mistakes and failures, in this wonderful path towards success!!!

How to eliminate the shield of excuses from your life

Our defense system is complete, in psychological terms. One of the most useful "inner gears" we have is a shield that protects us from most things we don't want, can't do or simply don't know how to do it. We make excuses.

If we take a macro example, the main difference between a developed country like Japan and another in development like Colombia, is the amount of excuses given in Colombia to not make the right thing: for instance, to not follow strictly laws.

I know it is not only that, but it is a fact if we remove our own excuses, face reality and dare to change our lives, it is quite possible some change will happen.

Question is: how to do it? This shield helps us feeling good, guiltless and at peace with ourselves. I have seen the effects of removing these shields and it is not so nice at a first stage, when all fears come out. This is a little step-by-step on how to do it.

1. Take all your I can't in account.
2. Chose one of these affirmations and start to work on that.
3. Before daring to change anything in your life, understand the reason behind. Also, create a firm inner space for yourself, for instance by starting to meditate or by telling your best friend about it and making him or her available, in case you need to talk.
4. Dare. Just do it, without postponing, delaying or making up something to avoid it. Dare to do it.
5. If you feel fear or insecurity, just remember your own unique power, the power of your personal inner space and use it. Don't fear your fears; just enjoy the experience as an adventure.
6. Experience the greatness of a change in your life. When you break a shield, you open yourself for many new possibilities and opportunities.
7. Check your experience and its balance: positive and negative. Imbibe the positive and consider the negative as a positive learning experience.
8. Wait for a while and go to another item, another shield of excuses.

Leaders without followers

I have the fortune to know many leaders who help in different ways within their communities, families or serve as example to others, creating an impact in others' lives. But one thing I have been noticing: a few of them have followers. As one person of those few put it very clear to me that, "he never asked for it".

The image of a leader is forever connected with that of followers at such an extent that when leadership is failing, some people started to blame their followers. However, in the last two decades, leaders and followers became different concepts.

The main reason is because the real leadership today is a form or another of self-leadership, a type of leadership without followers. For me it is very clear that the traditional macho leadership cannot serve today and female leadership, which can be its replacement, is still in the oven. By being absent, leaders have given us a unique chance of being our own leaders.

Whatever we do is because we really want to do and we are convinced this will be good, as it is by reading this blog... Yes, others can tell us something and we may accept that, but it is us who have the power to decide on it. And if besides being our own leaders, we are able to generate impact that leadership will be of a different flavor.

Today leaders are more authentic and their words and deeds are example for a so many people who want to improve their lives completely, without following them necessarily but feeling they tune into those people, those leaders' ideas.

We may copy them, follow some of their advice and read about their lives, trying our best to apply that into our own life. But if anyone asks me if I am so-and-so's follower, I will immediately say NO.

One big issue of this stage the world is going through in terms of leadership is that these leaders, who are examples, rotate too much and their leadership life-span is very short. Many times as they are not replaced in people's hearts, these people, who are not their followers, start to live from their leaders' past, following their example by proxy. And that is not good, because the main strength of today leaders is their authenticity, which is something you can only take benefit in the present. To solve that, if you are one of these "leaders without followers", invest more of your time in your own self-leadership. By mastering it, you will be an example in all stages of your lives, giving benefit to millions.

If you are not, learn more on self-leadership and use other leaders' lives as examples not by following it blindly but by understanding their reality and applying whatever you feel you should, into your own life.

Caring about yourself and others

When President Obama went for his Obamacare, he was not only doing something political and probably fulfilling an ideal from his heart. And it does not matter if you believed him, agreed with him or even hated him. He was doing one of the most natural instincts we have as humans. He was caring.

Whether it is a crucial business advantage, manifested via Customer Service, or something that glued together a family or a friend, caring is part of being human. However, the way caring happens have been changing along the years.

Although many people still try to care for others, time and the pace of life creates situations where the physical presence is simply not possible. So, it is time to understand caring beyond the physical: that important and powerful energy release when one person thinks well of another is also caring. That implies caring of others start with caring of the self.

Many years ago, I had the honor to translate an authority in spirituality. BK Jayanti is an Indian citizen resident in London. Since she was a child, she has been exposed to spirituality in many ways and at the same time, she was educated in a very Western country. That blend makes BK Jayanti's words have a different taste as she does not speak only from one point of view.

In Medellin, she gave a lecture to a group of people; among them, many kidnapped people's families were present. Her words were powerful and simple, full of knowledge and very gentle. Basically, what she said was that those people (the victims) were dependable on the attendees' feelings. If they cared about them, then they should change their mindset and experience peace so that those people will experience the same.

Does it sound strange? What about this: didn't you ever experience something someone else was feeling?

Care about yourself, being careful about what you think and feel. Then, think in the same way in relation to others,  creating a huge chain of powerful thoughts and feelings, wait and see the results.