If music be the food of love, play on, play on, play on.

Music is the most beloved of my pastimes. Listening to music that is, since I don't play an instrument myself - which is long and altogether different story.

Looking back, it's obvious - now! - music was my passion from as early on as I remember. Should have made music my life. Didn't. Oh well - we all know, hindsight is 20/20.

I love music this much because of all human creation it is closest to Creation itself. When the Creator created us with the ability to create in turn, I've got a hunch She had music on His mind first and foremost.

Music that reaches the heart - you cannot but hear, feel and know it, as Ludwig Van Beethoven put it - "must come from above."

Music is loving, inspirational, uplifting, generous, giving, non-judgmental and non-competitive. It doesn't contain any of the righteousness and arrogance that make religion and politics the repugnant and deadly things they have become.

In my travels, Africa in particular, I love to ride in public long-distance buses. They carry powerful sound systems and play local music, all the way. The blend of local music with local people, fashions, landscapes and foods is heavenly. My language might be different from theirs, but the music grabs you from above, from below and from every direction in between. We're all in this together, everybody knows ... but then the music stops, and some people forget. Every time the music plays, they are fewer and diminish in number.

There's but one way to experience it. Be bold. Travel.

PS. Afterthought. A surprising piece of music recently stumbled itself across my path - Thanks, Philip! It fittingly illustrates the above, imho. To hear and see, click here.

Responsibility, responsibility - life's full of it, enough already, give me a break! Read about it, too?! Why should I? It is important? You better believe it! Your ability to respond - responsibility - plays a  key role in shaping your life and your destiny. It is so important that all by itself it can make the difference between success and failure.

What IS Response-Ability, Anyway?

Your personal ability, or lack thereof, to respond to life - to broken relationships, broken teeth, canceled flights, winning the lottery, landing your dream job, finding the love of your life, ice cream and bad dreams - determines how you perceive life and therefore, how you handle the challenges and opportunities that come with it. Let's say your ability to respond is one foot tall and the challenge or opportunity in front of you is six feet tall, you would back off, versus the other way around you would take it in stride. Whether the size of the ability and of the obstacle is real or not is immaterial - your perception alone counts. You get the drift.

For many years, the ability to respond was even believed to be the key factor between success and failure. In the meantime we know conclusively it is not your response-ability, but your self-image. But the two are closely linked and enhancing one automatically enhances the other, and vice versa, so it makes sense to look at the two together. Increasing your self-image and your response-ability is easy to do, and can be done throughout life, regardless of age. Here's how.

5 Easy Steps To Grow Your Ability To Respond

Step # 1: Some attitudes and emotions will diminish your ability to respond. They are: helplessness, self-doubt, shame, guilt, apathy, regret, fear and anger. (It doesn't mean these are "bad" emotions, only that if entertained for prolonged or excessive periods of time, or even constantly, they weaken your ability to respond).  Move away from these emotions.

Step # 2: Another set of attitudes and emotions will strengthen your ability to respond to life. They are: courage, resolve, acceptance, intelligence, love, joy and peace. Move towards these emotions. Invite them in, entertain them as you would friends.

Step # 3: Stop blaming others. Be responsible. And don't blame yourself, either. Simply do not see setbacks in life as reflecting poorly on yourself or others. Rather, see the setbacks and successes for what they are - events limited in size and duration - "these too shall pass."

Step # 4: Do not hope for smaller problems, rather work towards growing bigger than your challenges. Step 5 happens naturally, as a by-product of steps 1 to 4, however you can accelerate the process. Remember past successes, regardless of how insignificant they may appear to you know. Remember their significance at the time.

Step # 5: Cease seeing life as alternatively fair and unfair. It is not what life is all about, and doing it anyway is, well, pointless. People in judgment of life are typically concerned about life's unfairness only when they are at the short end of the stick, and more often than not, the perceived unfairness only serves them as an excuse for acting irresponsibly - for blaming others for the “bad” things in their life. To their children they explain that life is not fair and everyone ends up believing it, making  it a self-fulfilling prophesy. But irresponsibility – the unwillingness to exercise one’s ability to respond – eats a hole in the soul of the person who adopts it and over time it spirals out of control. Response-ability is not about how we would respond if we were someone else or if we had someone else's life or if things were different. Responsibility is about how we respond to the hand we have been dealt.

Relevant Quotes

• Learn to wish that everything should come to pass exactly as it does. - Epictetus
• Don't wish it was easier, wish you were better. Don't wish for less problems, wish for more skills. Don't wish for less challenge, wish for more wisdom. - Jim Rohn
  
• In dreams begin responsibilities. - W.B. Yeats
• History can be written in a simple little formula: Challenge, Response. - Arnold Toynbee
• The price of greatness is responsibility. - Sir Winston Churchill
• It is our responsibilities, not ourselves, that we should take seriously. - Sir Peter Ustinov
• An idea isn't responsible for the people who believe in it. - Don Marquis

Personal growth (self development, personal development) and success often require learning. Learning can be expensive, but some of the things needed for success we can learn from cats, for free.

Stretch

Cats are so much more advanced, stretching-wise. Humans, myself included, if they stretch at all, don't stretch enough. Stretching is free and therefore doesn't have commercial appeal. Imagine watching as many commercials for stretching as for drinks and cars - there would be a whole lot more stretching going on. Well, in the absence of commercials, watch the cats, and before long you'll stretch more.

Breathe Right

Do you know among mammals, humans are the only species that breathes through the mouth at the slightest effort? Horses, cheetahs and, yes, cats still breathe through their nostrils even at full stretch, such as when racing at top speed. But many humans switch to breathing through their mouth at the slightest effort, such as when lacing their shoes or climbing a flight of stairs. If you want vibrant energy, take a hint from your cat (or from your neighbor's cat), breathe through your nostrils. Make deep breathing exercises an integral part of your habits. Rediscover there's more to your nose than to serve as support for seeing glasses.

In A Heartbeat

Cats' ability to go from sound asleep to ready to pounce in a heartbeat, is amazing. As if they had their paw permanently on an on-off switch somewhere inside. Don't you just wish you knew their secret? To sleep a lot? Hm-mm, something to think about.

Hold No Grudges

Like people, cats have great talent for showing disapproval when upset, but unlike some people, cats do not hold grudges. To forgive and move on is easy for cats because cats are not upset with people, only with peoples' behavior. Behavior is much easier to forgive than people. Cats know instinctively that people are not their behaviors - an important lesson we can learn from cats.

Do you know other stuff we could or should learn from cats? Please let me know - I'd be happy to post an expanded "Life Enhancers We Can Learn From Cats" with your comments.

If you want a better life, but are willing to do more than just hope and actually create your own future, and if you like simple changes that come with big benefits, take a look at a tool, in fact, a solution that is Simple, Legal, Inexpensive, Good For You, Practical And Works Every Time

Make a change in how you learn - not in what you learn, but in how you learn - is among the easiest and most profitable changes you can make in life. The initial investment is small and the potential benefit infinite. It is like finding gold in a field of gold that has not previously been mined for gold. Among the best little known secrets around, it beats artificial life sweeteners by (s)miles.

The skill of learning is often overlooked because we take learning for granted. The first thing we do when we come into this life, right after taking our first breath, is learning. If you're like me, chances are you got so busy learning, you never stopped. You never even stopped to learn how to learn - a mistake, because the difference in learning versus learning the right way is enormous. At least it's what I found from personal experience. I used to think learning about learning was an oxymoron. Now I know it can be the difference between a life and an extraordinary life.

How You Learn Determines Everything

How you learn determines what you know. What you know leads to what you do and don't do in life - the choices you make. What you do (and refrain from doing) produces the results in life. The sum of your results added up, are your life. Therefore, change how you learn and you change your life! Simple, legal, inexpensive, lasting, good for you, good for others, works every time and never fails.

What Is Learning, Anyway?

All learning involves teaching. In an ideal world the teacher is an actual person in an actual classroom. In the real world the teacher often has no face and the lessons, as well as the exams, just happen. In fact, much learning is achieved in this way, when there is no-one around but you and you find yourself both teacher and student at the same time.

Take a minute to imagine. Does the teacher know about both the teaching and the learning? How are you teaching yourself - what are your teaching style and method? What would you teach? Are you - the student - hungry to learn and explore? Is there joy and harmony between the teacher and the student? To take your life to a whole new level, simply make your vision real - create the best teacher-student interaction you're capable of. It's within your control.

What We Learn

What we learn typically consists of learning about the world around us, then about life, then about success, and lastly, about ourselves.

While closely entwined and operating together in harmony, the basic areas of learning - the world, life, success and ourselves - are also separate entities, each subject to its own rules and regulations as it were. You can achieve great progress in one area of learning while remaining utterly stuck and confused in another. There are people who "know everything" but achieve little, as well as people who "know nothing" yet possess the midas touch. It is difficult also to achieve balance, as evidenced by stories of rich and famous disasters - people who are successful in one area of their lives, sometimes exceedingly so, yet unable to transfer success to other areas of their life.

Learn (And Do) More By Learning Less

The first step to a better life is to stop all learning ... with the exception of the learning needed, if any, for doing great things (specifically, what you believe are great things). The best way to achieve a truly great life is to do excellent work. The best way to do excellent work is to love what you do. Resolve to work primarily for the sensation you have while working. If you are still looking for what you love to do, limit your learning to what's needed to find it. Learn to ask the right questions. If you knew today were the last day of your life, would you still go with the plans you had for today? If the answer is "No" for too many days in a row, it might be time to make changes. Do not settle. Keep looking. Do not lose faith.

Learn less and let go. Let go of what you can hold on with your hands, and of what you can hold on with your mind, but never ever let go of your faith and never ever let go with your heart. Your heart already knows what you truly want to become.

Happy new learning and happy new life!

Relevant Quotes

• “The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.” – Vincent Lombardi
• “Anything less than a conscious commitment to the important is an unconscious commitment to the unimportant.” – Steven Covey
• “The whole course of things is to teach us faith.” – Emerson
• "You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him to find it within himself." – Galileo
• "Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils." – Hector Berlioz

Related Blogs, Blog Posts

• http://commadot.com/the-curse-of-knowledge/

Time - it is your most fundamental resource for just about everything. Which explains why the whole world is crying out for "More time!" - particularly when "there isn't any." Every strategy for success - whether in sports, science, or anywhere else - sooner or later catches a case of "We need more time," "Give me just a minute," "There's not enough time," "We just don't have the time (for this)," "Time is running out," "Can we have more time?"

Man's Search For More

Man's search for more time has resulted in an entire industry of time keeping and time management. Time "keeping"? Are reports of "more time" myth or fact? The answer is at the same time "Yes" and "No" - which can be confusing. Yes, you can experience time more. No, there is no such thing as more time. You already have all the time there is. No-one has yet figured out a way to manufacture time (or to keep it).

Because time is so fundamental, it is sometimes overlooked and under-appreciated (not unlike the air we breathe). If it didn't exist, it would need to be created. But time being a most democratic and fair institution that benefits everyone in equal measure, regardless of geography, age, gender, possessions, IQ, religious and political views, lifestyle, merit or nationality, it makes you wonder whether it could be done. It would have to overcome ridicule and opposition, to say the least. Fortunately, time doesn't require our consent and is faithfully there for us to receive each new day.

Does Time Really Fly?

Time is frequently described along the lines of wasted, lost, found and saved. "Time flies" and "I don't have the time" - how many times have you heard it said, or said it yourself? This language would have you believe time is a commodity that can be stored, kept, transferred, set aside, bought and sold. Nothing could be farther from the truth. We have arrived at this curious view of time by our habit of chopping time into chunks of time - years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds and fractions of seconds. The smaller the amount of time, the more precious or important it becomes. It's the old forest & trees thing all over again. We don't see the forest for all the trees. We don't see time for all the chunks of time. There will never be enough time to do everything, but there's always enough to do the most important.

Curse Or Gift?

Is time a curse, or a gift? How you view it doesn't impact time itself, but it significantly impacts you and your quality of life.

My own views of time changed radically during my early travels in Africa. I was waiting at a bus stop for a bus that was several hours late. I was upset, angry, impatient and stressed. Everyone else had a smile on their face, in conversation, reading or writing or otherwise "busy." It was my first inkling of time beyond society's attempt to manage, control and own it. It took many more years to truly experience the gift of time. The more you experience time as a gift, the more will be gifted to you. For extra inspiration I recommend the exquisite short movie at http://www.thetimemovie.com/

Time is perceived as to exist in three dimensions - the past, the present and the future. To access the past we use our memory, the present opens through knowledge, and the key to the future is our imagination. (You remember breathing yesterday, you know about breathing now, and you imagine about breathing tomorrow). A first step to experience more time is recognizing there exist different modalities to access time, and to choose wisely. To remember the past and imagine the future can  only be done at the expense of the present. For more time, spend more time in the present, less in the future, much less in the past.

On a lighter note, time is simply nature's device to keep everything from happening at once. Is it not cool that we receive time in a neat succession of new mornings!

True Time Management Equals Value Management

In truth, time management is value management. The door to more time is more time for the things that are truly important, to you. Traditional-conventional time management is all about getting more done in less time. The rush for getting more done in less time, pushed by multi-tasking to new heights of sometimes grotesque outcomes, mainly blurs the distinction between the efficient and effective and between the urgent and the important. You could be super-efficient urgently running South, but it would not be effective if your life's purpose is North. As surprisingly as it may sound, the key to more time is less time management. The way to more time is through the experience of time - which can only happen in the now. Make the focus of your time management to spend more time in the present - on people and things present.

5 Easy Steps For More Time

• Don't do well what needn't be done at all.
• Spend your time on love - things you do with love, or love to do, or for people and things you love, etc.
• Live consciously in the present time, as often as possible.
• Add a sense of urgency to everything you do. Time is infinite, but there is no way of knowing when your time is up. Do not move along as if time were not a factor. You will be amazed at how much you can accomplish in a short time, if that's all you have.
• "What is the most valuable use of my time?" Stop and ask the question several times a day (or several times a week). It may be your best question ever.

Passion - the most essential ingredient for success, at least in anything truly worth living for. To go through life without passion would be like one hand clapping. It wouldn't result in much to write home about. Without passion, why even bother? Come on, get off the fence.

What exactly is passion? For starters, it's often seen in the company of love, enthusiasm, inspiration, desire and vision. Enthusiasm comes from enthused, en theos, i.e. in God. Inspiration has its origins in inspired, i.e. in the spirit. Desire's roots are "de sire," i.e. from the father. It doesn't make passion new-agey or spiritual. Rather it confirms Beethoven's words, and of course his music: "What is to reach the heart must come from above." Bottomline, definitions of passion can be found in books and libraries, but you'll never find passion there.

Passion is within you, and in the now. You cannot be passionate tomorrow. By the time tomorrow comes around, it's today again. The decision to be passionate is made in the now, in a heartbeat. Sure, it'll take time to practice and strengthen your passion, the same as with physical strength and endurance, but the decision itself requires neither time nor practice. You go from not, or maybe, or thinking about it, to "Yes!", in a heartbeat.

Passion is about the future. The past is present only in the rear mirror. With time, passion becomes your very eyes, looking out for you and guiding you beyond where your eyes can see. It makes you think first of the right thing to do, before thinking of doing things right.

Passion is the dream that never ends, as well as the course you follow to make that dream a reality. Put differently, everybody ends up somewhere in life, but only few end up somewhere on purpose - those are the ones with passion. You know youhave passion - or passion has you - when it's all-consuming. Ideas swim in your head awake and asleep. The distinction between the two is blurred. You are grateful and full of energy every new day, for every new day brings with it the opportunity to think, speak and write about the thing most important to you. Work, play, fun, entertainment, relaxation, recreation - they're all the same to you. You're not longing for a vacation. Gone are the days when you worked, grudgingly, for rewards that could only be enjoyed away from work (salary, bonus, vacations, weekends, retirement). You now work for the sensation while working. Money is part of the picture, of course, but it's not center field.

Passion and money are not related. To believe otherwise is understandable, given that people without passion are frequently also without money. But the connection between passion and money is an illusion. The richest people - in finance, business, sports and entertainment - are all working their asses off. They don't need the money. They could have stopped working long ago. All the money in the world couldn't make them stop - precisely because it's not about the money.

Having passion means you are ready to pay the price - whatever it takes. In the context of passion, to suffer does not imply a negative mindset. If you're passionate about climbing the mountain, the hardship of the steep long climb is suffered ... with joy and passion. Remember the scene in "Slumdog Millionaire" in which the kid passionate about getting near his idol must first jump, literally, into a pile of shit? The boy jumps, without hesitation, because he had already jumped earlier. Or the scene in "Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid", in which Paul Newman and Robert Redford's choice is between being made captive or to jump of a high cliff to an uncertain future, with little chance of survival. Of course, they jump, the decision having been made long ago. When you have a clear passion, many decisions are already made for you. Passion is so powerful it becomes your DNA.

My passion is growth. I equate growth to life itself. Growth signifies movement. The absence of movement is death. If you're not busy growing, you're busy dying.

What's your passion? Are you passion-less? Open the window, or look into someone's eyes, or listen to your favorite music, or hit the outdoors and connect with nature and creation itself. Still not sure? To identify your current passion is easy. Check where you have been spending most of your time and money on and, bingo, your current passion. Not happy with what you found? Draw up a list of things you could be passionate about instead, then select one. Best choose a dream or a vision that appeals to your temperament, then embrace it - with passion. How about giving yourself the chance to live life completely on your own terms? If you think or insist that you have no special talents to be passionate about, simply start being passionately curious, or passionately loving. You will be surprised by the results.

Time is too precious, life too short, to sit on the fence. Jump into life, open your heart, be open for passion. Don't miss the train for massive change for the better. Never before in the history of mankind have there been this many opportunities. You don't need lots of money or elobarate technical skills to get started. Building your business and your brand has never been easier. Go online, check it out.

If you think you need guidance, or help, just holler. I'd be happy to. If not, all the better.

Just do it. With passion.