Our culture tells us personal growth and happiness depend on career and financial success. But, is this assertion accurate? Explore the dichotomy of happiness versus success and how it relates to the mastery of time.
When you hear the term mastering the element of time, most people think of to-do lists, calendars, and other electronic applications. But there’s another way to look at this subject. One way to think about mastering the element of time is by learning how to get the most out of this fleeting commodity.
Sure, this can involve things like planning. But, just because you get your to-do list done, doesn’t mean you enjoyed what you were doing. Getting the most out of time means doing what brings you happiness, without harming others.
When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote … happy. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life. — John Lennon
Achieving Personal Growth and Happiness
To shift your perspective and become more like John Lennon, focus on a few key ideas that he often emphasized in his life and music.
First, embrace simplicity and authenticity. Lennon believed in being true to oneself and not getting caught up in societal expectations. This means valuing your happiness and well-being over what others think you should do or be.
Second, practice mindfulness and presence. Lennon often spoke about living in the moment and appreciating the present. This can help you find joy in everyday experiences and reduce stress about the future.
Third, cultivate peace and love. Lennon was a powerful advocate for peace and love, both in his personal life and through his activism. This involves treating others with kindness and compassion and striving to create a more harmonious world.
Fourth, stay curious and open-minded. Lennon was always exploring new ideas and perspectives. By being open to learning and growing, you can expand your understanding of the world and yourself.
Last, express yourself creatively. Any form of creative expression like music, art, or writing, is incredibly fulfilling. Also, sharing your thoughts and feelings can bring about healing.
By focusing on these principles, you can shift your perspective to be more like John Lennon. Never, fear implementing this change in perspective is easy once you learn the secrets.
The Dichotomy of Happiness Versus Success
The temporary happiness you feel from achieving a goal is indeed happiness, but it’s often called short-term happiness. This type of happiness is a natural response to reaching a milestone or completing a task you’ve worked hard for. It’s a burst of joy and satisfaction from your brain releasing chemicals like dopamine, which make you feel good.
However, this happiness is usually short-lived because our brains are wired to seek new challenges and goals. This is known as the progress principle, where pleasure comes from making progress rather than just achieving the goal itself. Once you reach a goal, you might quickly start looking for the next one to pursue, which can make the initial happiness fade.
There’s also the concept of the arrival fallacy in psychology. This is when we overestimate how happy achieving a goal will make us. When we finally reach it, the happiness might not be as lasting or fulfilling as we expected. It’s why billionaires aren’t satisfied with just one or two billion dollars. This doesn’t mean the happiness isn’t real; it just means it’s part of a cycle of striving and achieving.
To find more lasting happiness, it’s important to enjoy the journey and the small steps along the way, not just the result. This way, you can experience a more sustained sense of fulfillment and well-being. It turns out “happiness is success.” Don’t buy into the fallacy presented by a culture dominated by commercialism. Learn to discern between happiness versus success in terms of career or financial achievements.
The Secrets of Mastering Time for Personal Growth and Happiness
They say time moves slowly, but before you know it, it’s all gone. The key is learning to value the passage of time. We can only see the value of time if we are present and “living in the moment.” This perspective is the essence of mindfulness.
1. Be Present the First Time Mastery Technique
One way to make the mind happy is to be present. If we learn to be present and aware, then we take advantage of every opportunity that time presents. The techniques and tactics listed below are methods that help us change our mindset. Most of these time management tools and methods are based on our ability to be mindful of the passage of time.
There is much more to love than the popularized form of eros love. Savoring time with those you care about is how to create memories that last forever. To savor is to enjoy something thoroughly, so savor every moment you spend with those you love, which includes your friends.
One secret of time travel is to be present and aware. Give those you care about your full attention. Practice active listening and observation skills to build positive memories.
2. Find Your Soul in Solitude
Learn to savor your solitude. We need time alone to ponder and think. If you learn to meditate, you’ll open the door to your spiritual gifts. Many people do not understand what marvelous spiritual gifts we have locked away in our DNA. The only way to find out is to go on a spiritual scavenger hunt.
Solitude is a time mastery technique that is often overlooked. To practice it, find what works best for you to connect with yourself. This might be walking in nature, playing music, meditating, or doing other activities that uplift you and help you tap into your soul.
Solitude is not loneliness. You can be lonely in a crowd of people. Solitude is spending time alone to contemplate, which allows you to get in touch with your inner thoughts, emotions, and intuition. Solitude is good. All the great sages, from Buddha to Jesus, found enlightenment in solitude. If it’s good for them, it’s good for you too.
3. Read to Time Travel
Reading is an invention that opens the imagination and the heart. It enables us to venture into imaginary worlds and live vicariously through the characters in a story. We engage our hearts as much as our minds. Engaging our heart center enables us to traverse time and space. Reading is a time-honored time mastery technique. Reading can open doors to new ideas. It’s also the way we update the software of our minds.
Read things for entertainment, but also read things to challenge your mind. Your mind is like a muscle; you must exercise it to strengthen it.
4. Listen to Music to Decorate the Hours
Every piece of music has a unique flow and rhythm. Music is also one of our favorite secrets of mastering time. Music has a way of connecting us with our deepest emotions and memories. It transports us back to special places and times. Music is the most beautiful decoration to accompany us on our journey.
Music is also a tool to traverse consciousness. The drumbeat can induce a trance state and open our awareness. When you add the drum and some creative visualization, you get the Shamanic Journey. You can find this method all over the globe. It is probably humankind’s first and most successful process for exploring consciousness.
The nice thing about music is you can listen to it while you do other things. It’s one of the secrets of time management we need to take advantage of whenever possible.
5. Time Travel While Dreaming
To travel in time is to move outside of the normal progression of time. This trip implies moving outside what we consider normal reality. We do this quite often but don’t realize it. When we dream, we escape ordinary reality.
The landscape of our dreams is one of the crafty tricks for effective time management used by the Shaman and Seer. Our dreams take place in a non-ordinary reality. Most people experience their dreams in a linear fashion. However, this is not always the case. We can also perceive them in a non-linear way, out of sequence, and even reverse. Time is fluid in dreamland; it can speed up, slow down, or stop. Our dream state of consciousness proves the mind can move outside the time dimension.
It’s important to realize time does not confine our minds. Our minds are the home of consciousness, which is infinite and limitless. If we learn how to use the mind, we can better use this precious commodity, so here are the best strategies.
Don’t overlook the opportunity to explore the landscape of non-ordinary reality. Our dreams are a window into the subconscious mind. Learn how to remember and interpret your dreams. It will help you to make the best use of your time. Since you are asleep, you might multi-task and see what your imagination can manifest.
Most people spend at least 30% of their time sleeping. You may as well put this time to good use. To take full advantage of this partition of awareness, learn the lucid dreaming method. This is a time mastery technique that will give you more control of this frame of consciousness.
6. Honor Your Ancestors to Memorize Time
Don’t forget those who make your journey possible. Create a ritual to commemorate and honor the contribution of your lineage. Our modern world disconnects us from our lineage. Honoring your ancestors is a way to help re-establish a connection with your roots. This time mastery technique was built into many ancient cultures in the form of celebrations. For example, the different types of moons were celebrated to connect us to the planet and our ancestors. Honoring your roots aids in achieving personal growth and happiness.
7. Write to Feel the Depth of Time
The automatic handwriting technique will allow your subconscious to communicate through your handwriting. It will bring your deepest thoughts to the surface to help spot incremental growth and roadblocks on your path. Create several kinds of journals. A lot of people start with a dream journal. It’s a way to reflect on our experiences, which helps us in mastering time for personal growth.
Keep journals for seminars and all your experiences in spiritual exploration organized in a way that works for you. Some people like to keep them by date, others by topic. Also, create a book of shadows with rituals and sigils to honor your ancestors. Writing is one of the best self-care techniques to air your thoughts and emotions.
Writing is the key to getting in touch with your emotional center. It’s one of the expert tips for efficient time management tools and methods. They say it’s time travel for the soul.
8. Meditate and Deep Breathing to Find Inner Peace
The proper meditation will take you to the 4th state of consciousness. You will transcend this universe and arrive at the source of being, which some call bliss consciousness. The only thing that exists is awareness. Awareness has no bounds. Meditation transcends the boundaries of physical reality. Anyone can learn how to meditate. Start with a simple two-step mediation technique. Then progress to seated and moving mindfulness meditation.
Meditation also helps to make us present. It’s a way of finding solitude even when traveling in a crowded bus, train, or plane. Many sages tell us the secret of mastering time for personal growth starts with meditation.
Almost any breathing technique will help make you present and aware of your body. If you don’t even have 1 minute to meditate, then take a few deep breaths.
9. Take a Walk in Nature and Return to Your Original State
At first, it seems weird that being in nature could have such a profound effect, but it’s true. Ask anyone who loves to hike. Ask any hunter, and they will tell you the primary reason they go into the wilderness is because of the peace they find there.
You forget the troubles of the outside world for just an hour, and you will discover you have regained peace of mind. Don’t forget that we are part of nature. The ancients worshiped what they called the old gods, what we know as nature. Please don’t laugh, and we can prove nature exists. It’s so easy to do you wonder why we have to be reminded to do it.
10. Gaze Upward at the Sun, Moon, and Stars To Commemorate Time
Watch a sunrise or sunset; these magical times when the Earth celebrates the changing of energy from light to dark and back again. Learn about the cycles of the moon and return to our natural love of star gazing.
Learn to sun gaze safely, and you’ll enjoy this time of solitude and peace. Often, achieving personal growth and happiness comes in the simplest things.
11. Set Daily Goals to Stretch Time
You can accomplish more than you think. You’ll need to learn how to set the right goals. The key to enormous accomplishments is setting small SMART incremental goals. Break your big goals into small ones. This strategy is the principle known as eating the elephant. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Setting easy goals is one of the secrets of mastering time, as well as achieving personal growth and happiness.
Time management starts with setting priorities. The Eisenhower Matrix is an excellent tool for this purpose. This technique categorizes tasks into four quadrants based on their urgency and importance.
The four quadrants are urgent and important, important but not urgent, urgent but not important, and not urgent nor important. By identifying tasks in alignment with their significance, you can allocate your time better. What’s better, you avoid wasting it on trivial matters.
12. Create Art and Live Outside of Time
Allow your creative side to express itself. When you engage your creative mind, you connect with your intuitive sense. Create art for yourself. Doing so will help you define happiness versus success.
You don’t have to be good at it to enjoy the excitement of the creative impulse. Sing, play your guitar, paint, and create pottery. Do whatever interests you as long as it does not harm yourself or others.
13. Practice Self-Care To Enjoy the Simple Pleasures of Time
Our culture focuses on achievement and others, and we forget we must take care of ourselves. Learn to meditate. There is a simple two-step method anyone can learn. Then, try mindfulness meditation. The benefits of meditation come immediately. You can lower your stress level and increase your ability to make better decisions. It costs you nothing and is a technology you can take anywhere.
14. Practice Kindness to Help Others Appreciate Time
When you help others in need, you create a positive chain reaction. The positive energy bounces back to you almost immediately. The more you practice kindness, the better you will get. In a world driven by selfishness and greed, we need more light warriors to set examples of a better way. It’s the way you grow good karma.
15. Avoid The Fallacy of Commercialism
Seek happiness versus success and you will make the choices that will give you sustained joy, personal growth, and happiness. The secrets of mastering time for personal growth are in practicing these simple principles.
Final Thoughts
I hope this discussion helps you understand the difference between happiness and success. It shows how each time mastery technique can help you set the stage for happiness. It starts with being present and meditating, which helps you enjoy the moment and clear your mind.
Setting goals is just one part of the picture, and we shouldn’t let it take over. If we do, life can start to feel like a to-do list. What’s more important is practicing kindness, which benefits others and also makes us happier. We need to stay alert and avoid letting commercialism take control.
Meditation, mindfulness, and deep breathing help you stay calm and centered. Planning your day and prioritizing tasks ensure you tackle the most important things first.
By using these techniques, you can balance, making the most of your time and achieving personal growth and happiness. Remember to use these tips and tricks to get the most out of them. If you don’t think they work or aren’t valuable, it just means you haven’t used them yet.