How do we keep our inner fire alive? Two things, at minimum, are needed: an ability to appreciate the positives in our life – and a commitment to action. Every day, it's important to ask and answer these questions: ‘What's good in my life?’ and ‘What needs to be done?
Interpretation
To maintain our passion and drive, we must recognize the good in our lives and actively pursue our goals.
Nathaniel Branden emphasizes the importance of both appreciation and action in keeping our inner motivation alive. By focusing on the positives in our lives and committing to taking necessary actions, we can sustain our enthusiasm and progress toward our goals. The two questions he suggests we ask ourselves serve as a guiding framework for maintaining the right mindset for personal growth.
In practice
In a motivational speech to a group of students preparing for exams.
Living consciously is seeking to be aware of everything that bears on our interests, actions, values, purposes, and goals. It is the willingness to confront facts, pleasant or unpleasant. It is the desire to discover our mistakes and correct them . . . it is the quest to keep expanding our awareness and understanding, both of the world external to self and the world within.
If you are an adult, you are responsible for your life and well-being. No one owes you the fulfillment of your needs or wants; no one is here on earth to serve you. If you respect the principle of self-ownership, you understand that no one else owns you and that you do not own anyone else. Only on this understanding can there be peace on earth and good will among human beings.
It is a mistake to look at someone who is self assertive and say, "It's easy for her, she has good self-esteem." One of the ways you build self-esteem is by being self-assertive when it is not easy to do so. There are always times when self-assertiven ess requires courage, no matter how high your self-esteem.
Living consciously reflects the conviction that sight is preferable to blindness; that respecting the facts of reality is more satisfying than denying them; that evasion does not make the unreal real or the real unreal; that it is better to correct your mistakes that to pretend they do not exist; and that the more conscious you are of facts bearing on your life and goals, the more wisely and effectively you can act.
One of the hardest expressions of self-assertiveness is challenging your limiting beliefs.
To love is to see myself in you and to wish to celebrate myself with you. What I love is the embodiment of my values in another person. Love is an act of self-assertion, self-expression and a celebration of being alive.
At some point in life's journey, professionally and personally, we have to be able to trust our preparation.
I am building a fire, and everyday I train, I add more fuel. At just the right moment, I light the match.
First, do enough training. Then believe in yourself and say: I can do it. Tomorrow is my day. And then say: the person in front of me, he is just a human being as well; he has two legs, I have two legs, that is all. That is mentally how you prepare.
Tennis can be a very frustrating sport. There is no way around the hard work. Embrace it. You have to put in the hours because there is always something you can improve. [Y]ou have to put in a lot of sacrifice and effort for sometimes little reward but you have to know that, if you put in the right effort, the reward will come.
By being a racing driver means you are racing with other people. And if you no longer go for a gap that exists, you are no longer a racing driver because we are competing, we are competing to win.
If you're disabled, and you're trying to achieve your dreams, accept the fact right now that you have to work 500 times more than the average bear next to you. Stop bucking for sympathy, put on your titanium legs, and run.
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