Achieving Happiness Column for 5-23-04 By Tom Muha, Ph.D. Finding the Road to Achieving Remarkable Results Achieving Happiness column for 5-23-04 by Tom Muha   Finding the Road to Achieving Remarkable Results   Have you ever experienced an energy crash? You just don’t have the get up and go that you usually do. You feel lost. You don’t have the vitality to do what you need to do. There are proven methods to create and sustain positive energy, a prerequisite for making the proactive choices that enable you to take control of your life. Your energy for dealing with life vacillates between being positive and negative, depending on the temperament you inherited, your current circumstances, and the choices you make. The only one of these factors that you can control is your ability to make good choices. Whatever your background or current reality may be, you can turn your life around by shifting into a positive mind set and making choices that lead to success and satisfaction. Having a high level of positive energy requires an understanding how to handle the energy depleting fear that arises when your current circumstances become stressful. The challenge of transforming negative reactions into positive proactions arises from the fact that human beings are hardwired to have automatic fight/flight/freeze reactions when they are in stressful situations. When we have automatic reactions based upon fear, the surge of stress chemicals that are released into the body causes our minds to be contaminated by the build up of negative thoughts.  That leaves us vulnerable to becoming frustrated and angry, tense and anxious, or discouraged and depressed.  Advances in science have proven that it is entirely possible to override the primitive automatic negative reactions and redirect our brain functioning into a higher level of positive, proactive thinking. In fact, these studies have shown that we literally build pathways between our brain cells that, much like a path through the woods, become easier to traverse the more we use them. You can stop negative reactions and start resolving stressful situations by employing strategies that shift the focus of your thoughts to the positive outcomes you want to produce. Those who develop the skills for making this shift have been shown to have much higher levels of success in creating their desired outcomes. Of course, this means you have to have a clear picture in your mind of the outcomes that are right for you. Defining what is most important in your life and then developing a long range vision of yourself having created a life that embodies those valuable elements provides the foundation for making daily decisions. Developing the ability to neutralize fear-based reactions in order to generate positive possibilities for reaching one’s goals allows a person to make choices that will fuel their positive energy rather than deplete it. To be able to make proactive choices requires an ability to use optimistic thought processes when dealing with both positive and negative events: good things are always permanent and pervasive while bad situations are merely temporary problems that have specific solutions. In addition to managing your mind, another important aspect of renewing the flow of positive energy is based upon learning to manage your body in order to override the release of stress chemicals that contaminate thinking.  Everyone knows that keeping their body chemistry in balance requires rest, exercise and proper nutrition, but less than 20% of people have developed the routines required to maintain healthy lifestyles. People are acutely aware of the need to protect and respect their bodies, but very few learn on their own how to turn their motivation into action. Most people need a coach who can help them help stop smoking or indulging in other destructive behaviors and start getting enough sleep, eating properly and exercising enough. Tending to the needs of your human spirit is the final requirement for ultimately achieving remarkable results. Your spirit is the part of you that gives you faith in your ability to create the future you desire. To rekindle your spiritual energy necessitates slowing your life down. There are four well-proven methods for giving yourself an opportunity to nurture your spirit - meditation, prayer, walking in silence, and intuition. Whichever of these daily practices you employ, your vitality will blossom if you quiet yourself and tap into something larger than yourself. When you’ve connected to this compassionate intelligence, ask “What’s important for me to do today?” Then listen to the wisdom that will to guide you in aligning your needs with the flow of the world.   Tom Muha is a psychologist in Annapolis. He welcomes your comments and questions. To contact him call (443) 454-7274 or email him at tom@achievinghappiness.com.