by | Life Application
Feeling stressed out? Before you run to the cupboard to lay into the Twinkies, stop, take a breath and read this post. Here are seven foods to improve your bad mood.
Chocolate
Not only is it delicious, but it is known to reduce the stress hormones in your body. Go for the dark chocolate.
Spinach
Increase your energy and get rid of that sluggish feeling.
Apples & Peanut Butter
Get rid of that crankiness with a carbohydrate and some protein. This slows the digestion process and keeps your energy levels stable.
Salmon Burger
Toss out the anxiety with some omega-3 fatty acids. You’ll quickly boost your mood.
Green Tea
Sipping on this tea will calm your angry mood and provide clear concentration and focus.
Whole-Grain Cereal
Add some low-fat milk to this great snack and increase the serotonin in your body. It’s sure to lift you out of that sad state.
Egg-Salad Sandwich
Have the PMS blues? Adding the protein instead of running to the other carbohydrates we women crave before our monthly visitor will boost your serotonin levels.
For more detailed information on these seven mood-enhancing foods click here to view the complete article from Woman’s Day.
What foods help you increase your mood?
by | Life Application
I recently read an article in Outreach magazine from Charles Lee, CEO of Ideation, titled “After The Dream.”
He asked the question, “What does it take to shape a great idea into reality?”
Passion is important, of course. If you don’t have passion for what you are pursuing, then why bother. What happens after you realize the passion though? Do you have a plan to put into action?
Here are some principles Lee points out:
Principle No. 1
Implementing an idea is hard work.
Organization is hard work, but required when making an active plan. “There are not magical shortcuts from idea to implentation.”
Principle No. 2
The most potent obstacles to idea making lie within us.
Don’t give up on ideas too early. Concepts take time to develop. “Don’t let your lack of resources become an excuse not implement.”
Principle No. 3
Spatial ideation must be considered in the process.
What does the environment around you look like? “The environment that surrounds us fuels our creativity and ability to see and feel what we’re trying to form.” Keep yourself in a place that makes ideas happen.
Principle No. 4
Writing it down gives perspective.
Before sharing your ideas with others, write it down. Then brainstorm. Organize your thoughts. “Writing down my thoughts helped me to not only refine the idea, but also anticipate questions people might have.”
Principle No. 5
A creative process is essential to executing ideas.
Ask yourself specific questions to help guide the creative process development. When do you best create? What distractions do you commonly face? How will you break through these distractions?
Principle No. 6
Questions and improved strategy come up throughout the process.
Be prepared for more questions to arise in the working process. “Don’t expect to have all the necessary questions or answers prior to working on an idea.”
Principle No. 7
Your ideas can become reality.
Make a decision today to do something to move your ideas forward. “The same God who designed us with unique dreams and passion is more than able and willing to help us develop a working process for creative implementation.
by | Faith Lived Out, Life Application
Rejection hurts, especially when it comes from those you are close to. I am learning as a leader that rejection is unavoidable. You can’t make everyone happy.
When I signed up to follow Jesus I hadn’t a clue what was in store for me. But the straighter my walk with God became, the more I got a glimpse into His plans for me. Leadership is part of that plan, among other things.
At the beginning of 2011 God put one word on my heart – truth. I told God I would speak the truth about His Word. I would lead in truth. I would speak truth to the broken. It’s May and so far I have kept good on my word. But I haven’t done so without hitting walls.
If you haven’t figured it out yet, speaking God’s Word isn’t exactly popular amongst everyone. With truth comes rejection. With rejection comes pain. With pain comes dependence on God. With depending on God comes truth in His Word.
All rejection leads back to Him and the promise that if “God is for us, who can be against us?” Romans 8:31.
Remember, when you sign up to follow God, you’re signing up for some rough roads. Guess what? It’s all worth it!
How do you handle rejection?
by | Life Application
Here’s the thing: I am a pretty unorganized person according to the world’s definition of organization. However, just because I have a ton of books and papers scattered all over the place doesn’t mean I don’t know where things are.
I am finding that it is getting easier to organized and collect my thoughts though, thanks to Michael Hyatt and the free online-note taking tool called Evernote. It is becoming a new way of thinking for this highly overactive brain.
There are three things to familiarize yourself with:
- Notebooks: Easy enough, it’s a place to store your online notes.
- Stacks: A way to organize a notebook within a notebook.
- Tags: When you enter tags it makes your notes much more easily accessible. For instance, when I am creating a blog post idea, I not only enter blog post, but depending on the subject I will enter such things as leadership, faith, social media, etc.
Another great thing about Evernote: You can access it from anywhere. You can download it to pretty much any device. If you don’t have the time to time, you can enter audio notes.
How do you get started?
- Sign up for an account at Evernote.com.
- Download to any device of your preference.
- Create some notebooks. I have included an example of what I have created so far. I’m still in the beginning stages.
- Post to Evernote.
What do you use Evernote for?
by | Life Application
I received this interesting fact in an email recently and had to share it. It’s a short read, but so worth it. Enjoy.
Most people don’t know that back in 1912, Hellmann’s mayonnaise was manufactured in England In fact, the Titanic was carrying 12,000 jars of the condiment scheduled for delivery in Vera Cruz, Mexico, which was to be the next port of call for the great ship after its stop in New York . This would have been the largest single shipment of mayonnaise ever delivered to Mexico . But as we know, the great ship did not make it to New York . The ship hit an iceberg and sank, and the cargo was forever lost. The people of Mexico, who were crazy about mayonnaise, and were eagerly awaiting its delivery, were disconsolate at the loss. Their anguish was so great, that they declared a National Day of Mourning, which they still observe to this day. The National Day of Mourning occurs each year on May 5th and is known, of course, as –
Sinko De Mayo.
Okay, come on, that’s funny! I hope you enjoyed.
Have a joke you want to share?
by | Life Application
I have been using TweetDeck off and on for the last two years. I had a brief affair with Hootsuite, but after they began to charge for some of their services, I decided to go back to my first love, TweetDeck! The sounds of chirping birds every five seconds is music to my ear. Okay, I will say that I just recently turned the volume completely down and said goodbye to the little bird, but it was fun while it lasted.
One of the greatest advantages of using TweetDeck? I can have as many columns as I want. We’ll get into that later, perhaps with a TweetDeck 201 course. The main four columns I use is for general updates, mentions of my twitter handle, direct messages, and scheduled tweets. You can organize each column according to your preferences.
Let’s Begin.
- Log onto TweetDeck.com.
- Choose which application you would like to download. I highly recommend the desktop application first and foremost.
- You must have AdobeAir to install the application.
- You’re ready to use TweetDeck.
You can adjust the settings, column views, etc. according to your preferences, change your background colors, add your Facebook account, and more. Perhaps there are several blog posts to come.
How do you use TweetDeck? What’s your favorite Twitter application?
Feeling stressed out? Before you run to the cupboard to lay into the Twinkies, stop, take a breath and read this post. Here are seven foods to improve your bad mood.
