30 Habits that Will Change your Life

Health habits

1. Exercise 30 minutes every day. Especially if you don’t do much movement while working, it’s essential that you get some daily exercise. 30 minutes every day are the minimum recommended for optimal health.
2. Eat breakfast every day. Breakfast is the more important meal of the day, yet so many people skip it. Personally, I like to eat a couple of toasts in the morning along with a fruit beverage.
3. Sleep 8 hours. Sleep deprivation is never a good idea. You may think that you are gaining time by sleeping less, when in reality you are only gaining stress and tiredness. 8 hours are a good number of hours for most people, along with an optional 20 minutes nap after lunch.
4. Avoid snacking between meals. Snacking between meals is the best way to gain weight. If you are hungry, eat something concrete. Otherwise don’t.
5. Eat five portions of fruits and vegetables every day. Our body and brain loves getting vegetables and fruit, so I highly recommend eating as much of them as possible. Five portions is the dose that’s usually recommended by many health associations.
6. Eat fish. Fish is rich of omega 3 and other healthy elements. At least one meal per week of fish should be enough for getting all these nutrients.
7. Drink one glass of water when you wake up. When you wake up, your body is dehydrated and needs liquid. Make the habit of drinking one glass of water after you wake up in the morning. Also, drink more during the day.
8. Avoid soda. Soda is often one of the most unhealthy beverage you can find. Limit your consumption of soda as much as possible and you’re body will be grateful for that.
9. Keep your body clean. I don’t advise spending your day in front of the mirror, but a minimum of personal care does never hurt.
10. If you smoke, stop it. There’s no reason to smoke anymore, and quitting is easy.
11. If you drink, stop it. Same as above. Don’t think that alcohol will solve your problems. It never does. The only exception is one glass of wine per day during meals.
12. Take the stairs. This is just a hack that forces you to do a minimum of exercise. Instead of taking the elevator, take the stairs.

Productivity habits

1. Use an inbox system. Make the habit of keeping track of all the ideas and things that comes to mind. You can use a notebook to do this, and then sync everything on your computer.
2. Prioritize. If you have a list of things to do, where do you start? One way is to prioritize your list. If you are in doubt, ask yourself: “If I could only accomplish one thing today, what would it be?”
3. Plan, but not too much. Planning is important, and you should decide in advance what you are going to do today or this week. However, planning for more than a few weeks is usually inefficient, so I would not worry too much about that.
4. Wake up early. Waking up early in the morning is a great way to gain extra time. I personally like to wake up at 5 am, so that by 9 am I have already accomplished what otherwise would have taken me many days..
5. Check your email only twice per day. Email can easily become an addiction, but it’s usually unnecessary to check it every 10 minutes. Make an effort and check your email only once or twice per day, see if the world will still rotate as before after you try this.
6. Eliminate unimportant tasks. Being busy all day does not mean you are doing important stuff. Eliminate every activity that’s not important, and focus on what really matters.
7. Clean off your desk and room. Having a clear room and desk is important to maintain focus and creativity.
8. Automate. There are a lot of tasks that you need to perform every day or every week. Try to automate them as much as possible.
9. Set strict deadlines. When you do something, decide in advance when you’re going to stop. There’s a rule that states that you will fulfill all the time you have available for completing a task, so make an habit of setting strict deadlines for maximizing your productivity.
10. Take one day off per week. Instead of working every day, take one day off per week (for example sunday) where you are not going to turn on your computer. Use that time for doing recreational activities like going for a walk.

Personal Development habits

1. Read 1 book per week. Reading is a good way to keep your brain active. With just 30 minutes per day you should be able to read one book per week, or more than 50 books per year.
2. Solve puzzles. Quizzes, word games, etc. are all good ways to exercise your brain.
3. Think positively. You are what you think, all the time.
4. Make fast decisions. Instead of thinking for one hour wherever you are going to do something, make your decisions as fast as possible (usually less than 1 minute).
5. Wait before buying. Waiting 48 hours before buying anything is a tremendous money saver, try it.
6. Meditate 30 minutes per day. A great way to gain clearness and peace is through meditation. 30 minutes are not a lot, but enough to get you started with meditation.

Career habits

1. Start a blog. Blogging is one of the best way to put your word out. It doesn’t have to be around a specific topic, even a personal blog will do.
2. Build a portfolio. If your job is creating stuff, building a portfolio is a great way to show what you are capable of. You can also contribute stuff for free if that applies to your work.

Municipal Bonds Are Slow But Steady

When you are looking to invest your hard earned cash to make it work for you, there are a multitude of options. Real estate, stocks, bonds (or a municipal bond), money market accounts, certificates of deposit, as well as investing in businesses as a partner or investor. Each option has its pros and cons. While some are high risk and high reward, others are much quieter in their earnings, but they are also more steady and sure.

Real estate can be extremely profitable but can also be a trap if you don’t have much experience or know what you’re doing. To learn how to be a real estate mogul, it helps immensely if you have a seasoned professional who is willing to take you under their wing and mentor you. A lot of wasted money and headaches can be spared by learning from other people’s mistakes and benefiting from their experience. Interning or apprenticing in a real estate investing office is another way to learn the ropes. If you do decide to jump in and try it for yourself, you would be wise to do a lot of research to avoid pitfalls and money pits.

For easier but slower earnings, money market accounts and CD’s are a great option, as is a municipal bond. They don’t require a lot of time and effort to learn about, or much energy to exert, so your money is really doing the heavy lifting. A municipal bond is a bond that is taken out by governmental or civic organizations to raise funds. It works much like a regular bond, but it goes towards building up facilities and growing organizations and communities. One major benefit in investing in a municipal bond is that for most of them, the earnings are often tax free or at least returned with a very reduced tax rate.

Are You Looking for a Bond Manager?

Because today’s market is so uncertain and erratic in the investment world of stocks and bond,s you need to be careful and make sure you check your portfolio often so you don’t end up losing your money instead of gaining it. Investing in bonds can be tough. The terms and concepts that go along with bonds can be confusing. However, knowledge and awareness is needed to be able to manage your bonds properly. Wouldn’t it be great to have someone you could count on and could personally help you with your bonds? What you need is a bond manager— someone in your corner who knows the ins and outs of the industry and is able to analyze your portfolio and help you be as successful as you can be. Bondview.com is a great place to find a bond manager to help you take care of your bond investments.

A bond manager’s mission is to help educate and provide tools that are simple and useful to aid investors in making better and more productive investment decisions. A bond manager through Bondview.com can help you as a bond investor by providing valuable information and assisting you in making smart decisions regarding your municipal bonds. They have simple, yet powerful methods of creating, monitoring, analyzing and evaluating bond portfolios that make it easier for you as a bond investor to better manage your investment portfolio and be more successful.

One good tip in bond investing is to make sure you take the time to really get to know your bond manager and develop a strong professional relationship with that person. In the world of bond investment, you need someone that can give you beneficial guidance and needed direction to help you be more lucrative and productive with your investments. Choose Bondview.com for all your bond manager needs. You will receive high-level assistance and quantitative analysis of your portfolio.

The 7-Ups of Life

1. Wake Up !!

Decide to have a good day. “Today is the day the Lord hath made,
let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
Psalms 118:24

“Perseverance is a great element of success. If you only knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“Determination is the wake-up call to the human will” Anthony Robbins

What makes life worth living is knowing that one day you’ll wake up and find the person that makes you happier than anything in the whole world. So don’t ever lose hope and give up, everything turns out okay and the good guy always wins.

2. Dress Up !!

The best way to dress up is to put on a smile. A smile is an inexpensive way to improve your looks. “The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at outward appearance; but the Lord looks at the heart.”I Samuel 16:7

PERFORM all acts with as much love as you would offer God. In Truth, you eat for the satisfaction of the I in you and dress up to please the self-same I . The husband loves his wife for the sake of the I. And who is this I that is persistently inherent in everyone? It is God Himself.

3. Shut Up!!

Say nice things and learn to listen. “Listen to advice and accept instruction, and in the end you will be wise.” (Proverbs 19:20)

“If you shut up truth and bury it under the ground, it will but grow, and gather to itself such explosive power that the day it bursts through it will blow up everything in its way.” Emile Zola

4. Stand Up !!
For what you believe in. Stand for something or you will fall for anything. “Let us not be weary in doing good; for at the proper time, we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good…” Galatians 6:9-10

“Stand up to your obstacles and do something about them. You will find that they haven’t half the strength you think they have.” Norman Vincent Peale

“Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.” Winston Churchill

Stand up to crises. Don’t let them throw you! Fight to stay calm… even surmount the crisis completely and turn it into an opportunity. Refuse to renounce your self-image. No matter what happens, you must keep your good opinion of yourself. No matter what happens, you must hold your past successes in your imagination, ready for showing in the motion picture screen of your mind. No matter what happens, no matter what you lose, no matter what failures you must endure, you must keep faith in yourself. Then you can stand up to crises, with calm and courage, refusing to buckle; then you will not fall through the floor. You will be able to support yourself.

5. Look Up !!
To the Lord. “I can do everything through Christ who strengthens me”. Philippians 4:13

“We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss about whether they was made or only just happened.” Mark Twain

How does life become totally painful? By total retreat. Total non inspection becomes total pain. But existence is basically composed of a very few truths onto which have hung a great many artificialities and which man has adorned with enormous numbers of lies. And man is prisoner of his own shadows. Now one of the things you can do with man is to get him to look up and find out that he can look through the shadows and look at the shadows and find out what they are.

6. Reach Up !!
For something higher. …keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” Colossians 3:1

“I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach up my destination.” Jimmy Dean

Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach up for the stars to change the world.

7. Lift Up !!
Your Prayers. “Do not worry about anything; instead PRAY ABOUT EVERYTHING.” Philippians 4:6

“Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul. Psalm 143:8.”

“Cause me to hear thy loving kindness in the morning; for in thee do I trust: cause me to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my soul unto thee. Psalms 143:8”

“Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens.” 

36 Christian Ways to Reduce Stress

Just got this from a post in NG forums, specifically in an Off-topic thread but this is worth the read.

36 Christian Ways to Reduce Stress

An Angel says, “Never borrow from the future. If you worry about what may happens tomorrow and it doesn’t happen, you have worried in vain. Even if it does happen, you have to worry twice.”

1. Pray

2. Go to bed on time.

3. Get up on time so you can start the day unrushed.

4. Say No to projects that won’t fit into your time schedule, or that will compromise your mental health.

5. Delegate tasks to capable others.

6. Simplify and unclutter your life.

7. Less is more. (Although one is often not enough, two are often too many.)

8. Allow extra time to do things and to get to places.

9. Pace yourself. Spread out big changes and difficult projects over time; don’t lump the hard things all together.

10. Take one day at a time.

11. Separate worries from concerns. If a situation is a concern, find out what God would have you do and let go of the anxiety. If you can’t do anything about a situation, forget it.

12. Live within your budget; don’t use credit cards for ordinary purchases.

13. Have backups; an extra car key in your wallet, an extra house key buried in the garden, extra stamps, etc.

14. K.M.S. (Keep Mouth Shut). This single piece of advice can prevent an enormous amount of trouble.

15. Do something for the Kid in You everyday.

16. Carry a Bible with you to read while waiting in line.

17. Get enough rest.

18. Eat right.

19. Get organized so everything has its place.

20. Listen to a tape while driving that can help improve your quality of life.

21. Write down thoughts and inspirations.

22. Every day, find time to be alone.

23. Having problems? Talk to God on the spot. Try to nip small problems in the bud. Don’t wait until it’s time to go to bed to try and pray.

24. Make friends with Godly people.

25. Keep a folder of favorite scriptures on hand.

26. Remember that the shortest bridge between despair and hope is often a good “Thank you Jesus.”

27. Laugh.

28. Laugh some more!

29. Take your work seriously, but not yourself at all.

30. Develop a forgiving attitude (most people are doing the best they can).

31. Be kind to unkind people (they probably need it the most.

32. Sit on your ego.

33. Talk less; listen more.

34. Slow down.

35. Remind yourself that you are not the general manager of the universe

36 . Every night before bed, think of one thing you’re grateful for that you’ve never been grateful for before. GOD HAS A WAY OF TURNING THINGS AROUND FOR YOU. “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31)