Build your confidence

Confidence is needed in every field that you want to pursue. You can’t not be having confidence in yourself and fighting out the world. This is something just not possible. The single greatest source of mental energy is positive interaction with others. To achieve success at every level- be it school, college, interview, workplace, you have to have confidence in yourself.

How do you plan to build your confidence? Summed up below are just some of the best means of doing the same.

You must schedule your social life. Your social skills would need time to develop. They say practice makes a man perfect, even for the socially secure. By surrounding yourself with others you create a rich supply of opportunities to observe interactions and to improve upon your own social behaviour.

Thinking positive is also very important. Insecure people approach others anxiously, feeling they have to prove that they're interesting. Self-assured people expect others to respond positively despite the fact that one of the most difficult social tasks is to join an activity that is already in progress. Engage yourself in social reconnaissance. The socially competent are highly skilled at information gathering, always scanning the scene for important details to guide their actions. They are tuned in to people's expression of specific emotions and are sensitive to signals that convey such information making them prone to reacting to such things. 

Failure is never bad. Everyone will sometime or the other be rejected. The socially confident don't take rebuffs personally. They don't attribute rejection to internal causes, such as being unlikable or an inability to make friends. Self-assured people become resilient, using the feedback they get to shape another go at acceptance. Managing emotions is another formidable task that one must follow. Social situations are varied and complex at times. People react and non-react to things that matter to us in varied ways. You have to be adaptable and ease with such things. No one can do all that without a reasonable degree of control over their own emotional states, especially negative emotions such as anger, fear, anxiety, emotions that usually arise in situations of conflict or uncertainty.

Also learn to defuse disagreements. When many people are together conflicts are inevitable. What is important is to cope with such confrontations. Laughing helps always. Add humour where you think the conversation is going awry. Humour is liked by one and all. It is the most prized social skill. Just create humour from anywhere and you will become the centre of attention in a crowd.

Self Awareness

What is self awareness?  It is having a clear perception of your personality, including your strengths, weaknesses, thoughts, beliefs, motivation, and emotions. Self Awareness allows you to understand other people, how they perceive you, your attitude and your responses to them in the moment. It helps you judge the world and yourself through the same pair of eyes.

As you develop self awareness you are able to make changes in the thoughts and interpretations you make in your mind. Changing the interpretations in your mind allows you to change your emotions. Self awareness is one of the attributes of Emotional Intelligence and an important factor in achieving success. This is why you need self awareness in your life. It is the first step in creating what you want and mastering it. Where you focus your attention, your emotions, reactions, personality and behavior determine where you go in life. Thus, self awareness shows you direction in life.

Having self awareness allows you to see where your thoughts and emotions are taking you. It also allows you to see the controls of your emotions, behavior and personality so you can make changes you want. Until you are aware of the things that controls your thoughts, emotions, words, and behavior, you will have difficulty making changes in the direction of your life. Self awareness helps you get versed with these things.

Relationships are easy unless there is emotional turmoil. This is the same whether you are at work or in your personal life. When you can change the interpretation in your mind of what you think you can change your emotions and shift the emotional quality of your relationships. Having a clear understanding of your thought and behavior patterns helps you understand other people. This ability to empathize facilitates better personal and professional relationships. You must develop Self Awareness that is developed through practices in focusing your attention on the details of your personality and behavior.

Making changes in your behavior is much easier to do when you catch them early in the dynamic, before the momentum of thought and emotion has gathered steam. The changes in your mind and behavior become simple when you develop your own means of self awareness. It makes you versed with the public and the reality of life. You can never afford to go wrong if you are fully aware of yourself. 

Power of Expressions

What are expressions? ‘Expression’ comes from the word ‘express’. To express is to give shape to the thoughts, emotions and feelings inside us. Most of us cry when we need to express sadness, grief or for that matter disappointment. When we are happy, we express it through our smile and laughter.

Expressions are an essential component of the life of every human being on this earth. All of us have the right to express. We have nothing but our expressions through which we have achieve a balance between our physical and mental being. Expressions are God’s gift to give life to our thoughts and feelings. However, all of us are not good at expressing ourselves. Some of us find it very difficult to express ourselves be it sadness or joy. This is mainly because we ourselves have created a barrier within us. We are always bogged down by what the world thinks of us. Due to this our actions are restrained. However, one must realize the fact each and every individual is unique. It is only when we are able to freely express ourselves that we will be able to enjoy our life.

Our mind is at peace when we express ourselves freely. We become better at our communication. Not expressing what one feels leads to increased frustration and this in turn results in decreased efficiency. Sometimes, we do not express ourselves especially anger because we feel we might hurt someone. However, what about hurting your soul within? You must not vent out your anger by harming someone however, if you are angry, you can let the other person know by open communication that you were angry because you did not like something. This helps to stay clear of any kind of misunderstandings. 

There are some people who find it difficult to express their love. You must always appreciate the fact that God has given us senses to express and feel. If you love someone you must let the other person know. Not only this helps in spreading love and happiness but also makes people feel special. Be it anger, frustration, or admiration, it is said that one must express oneself. Let the other person know what you think.

Sometimes, even silence is an expression. In fact it is the most sublime form of expression. More often than not what we can express through silence, we may not be able to express it through words. Silence helps us to rise above the limitations of the mind and heart.

The power of expressions is immense. Some express through their writing, some through singing, some even express without words! But to express is what is important to mankind. It is only through our expressions that we are able to exchange ideas, share thoughts, feel, learn, experience, and believe. Animals have limited form of expressions unlike humans and hence we must make use of our expressions to spread peace, love and harmony. Human beings are truly blessed to be able to express so easily and we must make good use of it! 

Meaning of Life

There are times when many of us sit back and ask ourselves the meaning and the purpose of our life. This philosophical question comes to our mind especially when we seek answers beyond the realm of our routine life. Though this question is answered by many religions across the globe, each and every individual has a unique meaning to their life. However, spiritually, religiously and philosophically the meaning of life is related to concepts of God, existence, karma, happiness, conduct, etc. A humanitarian answer to the purpose and the meaning of life is to live a good life by imbibing values like generosity, honesty, sincerity, morality etc.

It is natural to ask oneself the following questions: What is the meaning of life? What kind of a person I am? Where have I come from? Why have I been born? What is the origin of life? What is the purpose of my existence? What will happen after death? What is the significance of life? And many more such questions arise when we think about the true meaning of our life…

Most of us question the meaning and the purpose of our life especially when we are unhappy and depressed. There are many people who feel that there is no purpose to their life because they feel useless and unimportant. However they forget that this is just a phase of life. Every human being has a purpose to be born on this planet. The true meaning of life is to identify that purpose. No one can identify that purpose for you but it is that which makes you happy, it is that which contributes to development and progress, it is that that makes this world a better place to live in, it is that which spreads happiness, it is that purpose which truly makes you live and experience life in all possible ways.

On a more practical purpose, the meaning of life is some is to contribute something to the society, for others is to be creative, for some it may be to acquire wealth, to be powerful, and for some it may be to stay happily with friends and family. In general the meaning of life is to experience it, to feel all different emotions and to spread love and harmony. Each man and each woman creates their own essence of life which is not determined by anyone.

There are many theories that propose the meaning of life. Different philosophies highlight different aspects of the meaning and the purpose of life. One theory called Legalism suggests that it is futile to think about finding the purpose of life. To this set of believers, only practical knowledge was valuable, which is related to the function and performance especially that of the state. According to Hinduism, meaning of human life consists of love, desire, wealth, prosperity, righteousness, duty, morality, virtues, ethics, beliefs, truth and above all liberation from the cycle of birth and death. According to another theory, the true meaning of life may is to be able to use our body to achieve self-realization and bliss. 

Impact of Sports on Children

Sports have dominated the society in several ways. Children spend majority of their time while watching sports on TV or playing sports related video games which is developing dangers of obesity in them so playing sports is a good option for these kids to remain active and grow properly.  But there are some kids who are fond of playing sports and later on they want to involve themselves in organized sports. Sports have both positive and negative effects on children’s life.


Positive Effects:


Develops confidence


It has been found through research that children who participate in sports have more confidence and self esteem than other children who do not participate in sports. Sports will contribute a positive effect on their emotional and behavioral well being. Success and support from their family members and friends counts a lot in building their confidence. Once they developed confidence in their early ages, they will carry it lifelong. A child will start believing in efforts because efforts will leads to success and success will lead to confidence and confidence will lead to more success.


Develops team play


Sports also contribute a team work attitude in the kid. This will help the kid that reaching success is not in one’s hands, it is a combined effort of team and he will learn the habit of sharing his success with his team mates. They will also learn to work together towards a common goal. Sports will also teach them how to play fair and also tell them winning and losing comes hand in hand. When one team wins other teams loses it automatically and thus they can handle the win and lose with grace.


Encourage physical fitness


Today’s society has a lifestyle in which children are suffering from obesity, diabetes and many other serious health hazards. Sports are the best activity that can help children to get rid from serious health issues and keep them physically fit. Children getting aware of physical fitness in their young age will carry this habit to their adulthood and hence there will less obesity.


Develop personal goals


Different sports have different requirements, For instance if a child’s favorite sport is basket ball and he knew that tall people get selected for this sports but he has short height. In this case, he will set a personal goal to increase his height and get selected in the team. Therefore sports help him to set his goal and pay proper attention to achieve his goal.


Develop social skills


By playing sports kids will learn communicating skills and other social values.


Negative Effects:


Developing unrealistic goals


Sometimes children set unrealistic goals which are difficult to match because they are in their developing stages of physical and mental skills. This will result in loss of esteem and confidence in children. Parents have to guide their children to set realistic goals which can easily be achieved. 

Occurrence of injuries

Risk of injuries is very common in children playing sports. It is always recommended that children should be accompanied with proper guide or coach while doing practice or participating in any sport event to avoid serious injuries.


Inadequacy of nutrition:


Children who participate in sports need extra energy and nutrition. So parents should take proper care of their children by giving them the required amount of nutrition to recover from injuries.

Character Building Activities for Children

Character is built of different qualities and how we demonstrate those qualities in different circumstances. Character building is an important phase in any body’s life to gain success. A person may have money, power or position but unless he don’t have good character he will not considered as truly successful. It is very important to build in good character traits in young age. Although character development is a long process and it comes with experience but children can be involve in character building through activities and direct learning from adults.

1. Trustworthiness: This means you are reliable and dependable. Children must be taught about that everybody needs a person in their life with whom they can share their secrets, who can be trustworthy and will not reveal your secrets to anybody, who is loyal and honest.

2. Respect: Extending respect will result in gaining respect. This character can be developed by introducing any group sport to the children. Basketball need tall children but the team has one short heighted kid. You can find that if the children are not insulting the short heighted kid that means they respect him as a player. Respect can be witness if they agree with each other opinions, if they do not talk about their opposite team behind their backs, if winning team is sensitive towards losing team.

3. Responsibility: This is the quality which every parent want their children to adapt. You can ask the kid to write a good deed each time they perform and tape all their responsible performances together to form a long chain. Whenever they will see this chain they will be motivated to add some more good responsible acts. In this way they will become habitual to perform responsible acts and will gain responsibility in their character.

4. Fairness: Justice and fairness counts a lot in raising the child. Parents having two or more children should give fair love to each child. When children will see the fairness and justice practically they will get more inclined to adapt this characteristic.

5. Caring: Caring means being loving, charitable and kind. It is important that children should be taught how to take care of their family members, environment and community. Teach children that accepting help in need is also as important as offering help to the needful. Children can be asked to create greeting cards for people living in old age homes to show that they have love and care for these people who have been avoided by their own family members. Children should be send personally to old age homes to deliver these cards because when they will see the love , appreciation and affection  in these people’s  eyes they realize that taking care of somebody is such a feeling that they will cherish throughout their life.

6. Citizenship: Children should be taught the meaning of citizenship so that they can connect it with their lives. 

Teaching Children to be Responsible

Every parent wants that their children should acquire important habits which provide them respect from the society. Parents should take proper steps regarding making their children behave responsibly. It is always good to train your child in young age, rather than teaching him to change his bad habits when he is already habitual to his wrong doings.

There are various fun loving suggestions offered by parents to make their children responsible in their daily lives. It is important that child should acquire the habits and traits that will help him throughout his life. It has been promoted that children always try to copy their adults or parents so it is important for the parents to behave properly in a respectful manner. Fun activities will add pleasure in teaching children about respect.

1. Teaching them the importance of manners: You should not assume that your children knew the basic mannerism. Instead you must always tell them to thanks people who have brought gifts for them. This training will inculcate thought process in them and they will appreciate other’s efforts, time and money that went in choosing and purchasing the gift.

2. Teaching them the importance of respecting each other belongings: Usually children are possessive for their belongings and does not bother about other properties but it should be timely corrected. You can take two pencils of any two children and ask them to break or damage their own pencils. By doing this activity children will understand the feeling of losing their items and hence they will develop a feeling of respecting each other’s property.

3. Teaching them the importance of extending respect: You can teach your children the gaining respect is as easy as extending respect. You should always tell your child to offer respect to every individual irrespective of his age, cast, religion and relation. This training will help him in developing respectful feelings for every individual. You should always encourage him by complimenting him each time he shows respect to any individual.

4. Teaching him the consequences of choosing disrespectful act: Children can never differentiate between respectful and disrespectful act unless they have been told the difference. You can teach them the difference between respect and disrespect by giving him a task. For instance ask your child to complete the homework and suppose he has completed it in a wrong way then show him the consequences of his act. Ask the child to compare the consequences, he himself will judge the results and will learn how to get through with these consequences without being disrespectful to authority figures.

5. Teaching them the concept of uniqueness: You should always encourage your child if he has some unique qualities. First of all make them clear about the word unique by drawing a unique person on the board. Teach them the importance of unique qualities and why a person with unique qualities gains respect.

Once children have learn the concept of gaining and giving respect they will become good individuals and will behave rationally no matter what unpleasant situations or bad influences they come across.