Oh! Come on, You are Success!

By Jerin Jacob (Author of Your Epic Year)

Success! it is one of the topic, written about and read about millions of times from the day man got the ability to comb their hair properly. Many books, articles, training materials and courses are being introduced by some beautiful people, of course they have become extremely successful selling them. Its like showing a plastic cake and taking orders and then using the same money to buy a real cake for himself.

But what is success? Even after this much information overload, everyone has their on philosophy around success. Interestingly many still become 'successful' without reading to, without listening to any 'blah, blah' stuffs.

My intention here is to help you take off your black glared sun glass you are wearing to see success. So that you can enjoy a brand new sunny day.

Okay, many say success is relative and is dependent to individual to individual. I did think that way, till the time I hear 'The Strangest Secret' by Earl Nightingale. He explains, those who have a goal to pursue for, is successful. That is, the journey towards so called 'success' itself is success. To put it in simple terms, as you have a goal to complete reading this article, and you are working towards it by keep reading. Hence you are success right now.

Then who is failure, I know one of your friend or foe is sleeping right now because of laziness and has no goal to achieve. This guy is a failure (unless his dream is, sleep like morons). Using the earlier 'reading this article' metaphor, even if that guy sees this link on his Facebook News-feed, he won't bother to click and read this. That means anyone who doesn't have any specific goal (not necessary a bigger one) to achieve, is a failure.

"So Jerin, are you saying, I am already successful and there is no need to achieve my dreams". 

Not really, rather you should understand that your aim is not to become successful but to enjoy the journey towards your dreams. Not like whining, "He is success, I am not", "He has done it in his younger age, I am aged, so I won't never be successful".

But if you can live with a perspective of 'being-successful-already', your life will be more of fun and happy. You must have seen, all those lazy unproductive people, enjoy life more than you, they chill out and have fun. Because they just don't care and may say "whataaaever!". At the same time you have the greatest of vision and dream, but you just 'wait' till the day you become 'success'. Why?

You take any so called 'successful' people out there, you can see they have come a long way to live in abundance and in popularity. But the reality is, even if there were struggles in their life, they all did enjoy their journey. To be 'successful', you have to feel success right now. Not like, when you have everything you will.

At the end of the day, life is meant to live happily at every second of your life time. So treat yourself as if you are already a 'successful' person and chill out. By the way you are reading the last sentence of the article, if you had not enjoyed reading this, you wouldn't have reached here. Have fun.

“Success is not a destination, it's a journey”

Hope this concept has helped you. By the way do you know someone who really needs this to be read? If so, go ahead and share this article with that person. Sharing is caring.

P.S. Still there are some months left in 2015 to make an epic year, download my new eBook - YOUR EPIC YEAR by clicking the orange  button below:

As "personality" is the worst mask, then whom can you trust?

Let me start of this way “The worst mask is personality of a person”. Some of you may wonder how dare I am to write such a blunt statement. Please don't fight over it, let me explain my point.


Whenever I hear “He has got a great personalty”, or when someone says “I admire him, because what a charming personality he has got”, I have always felt these people are going in a wrong direction. Why?

Because the greatness of anything cannot be realized by looking its outside appearance. If that hasn’t been the case mankind would have never found diamonds from dark charcoals.

Personality can be referred as someone's trained behavior or an outside appearance. Basically it is the behavioral pattern of an individual with respect to different situations in life. When someone says he has got a great personality that does mean he has got a great skill to sell himself to others. His skills include effective communication skills, great body language, nice smile. He may be even very active in his communities. He may have all the luxury possessions . Having these qualities is a fantastic thing.

But most of the time these trained behaviors and external awesomeness of a person may be a mask to deceive or hide someone's real character. That means you cannot really trust someone by their humble behaviors or by their dress code.

Now you may ask,  “Jerin, then what is it, that makes a person trustworthy and admirable?” the answer is simple but many of us have forgotten this reality. Yes, a better character makes a man perfect.

You may ask “what? character isn’t a part of personality?” Not at all, personality is someone’s external behavior while character is an internal thing or the real existence of a being.

Character is the best trait of a man because outer personality rather the mask would tear down when so called great “personalities” meet some real challenges. You must have seen many well dressed and well behaved persons burst out with anger even for some petty things. At the same time you might have seen people handling the toughest things with genuine smile and humility.

Let me make it more clear by relating the concept with an old story. You must have heard/read the very popular Aesop’s tale of a rabbit and a tortoise running a race. The rabbit thought of taking rest between the race and it failed the competition because the tortoise converted the rabbit's sleeping time to it's winning time. Before the race, spectators gathered in the starting point must have definitely thought rabbit will win the race because they entrusted the “personality” of the rabbit but they never knew that the rabbit was a lazy lad inside.

So the moral of the story with respect to the topic is the character of consistency and integrity wins at the end of the day not the personality and muscle power.

Okay, now that you may want to know how you can find someone with a better character. To find someone with such greatness of character, the only way is assess the person by investing your time for a long period. The best character cannot be defined but only can be felt by someones humbleness or goodness.

On the other hand to find a person with a great personality you may need some seconds of time as it is solely based on what you see outside.

Now the big question, how can I develop a better character?

Personality mask or Personality techniques can be acquired by simply attending a personality or behavioral training program but acquiring a great character needs more effort and time.

“Yes, I know you are ready to invest your time”. “Okay, that is great but you need to understand one more thing!”. It is about the “Character Development Cycle”. Which is a very simple cyclic process behind Character Development.

#1st stage

It starts with a “thought”. If you consume a thought over and over again that very thought will reflect in your behavior.  (Thought --> Behavior)

#2nd stage

If you continue behaving in a certain way over and over again, your behavior becomes your second nature. That means that behavior becomes a part of your habit.  (Behavior --> Habit) 

#3rd & final stage

Then when you keep this habit for quite a long time, the same habit will convert it your character.  (Habit --> Character)

This is the Character Development Cycle; any of your character traits have undergone this process.

If you say “I become angry easily, because it’s my character” that means you had a recurring “thought” of being in a state of anger/agitation/frustration some time ago. Then that thought had become your behavior. After that the same behavior became your habit. Then finally that habit has rooted in your character. That means it all started from a “thought of anger”.

If you want to transform your character, it’s simple, change your thoughts and consume that thought over a period of time. Research says that if you can hold a thought/behavior over a continuous period of #21 days that thought becomes rooted in your sub-conscious mind and in turn becomes your character.

That means noblest of character is neither a special blessing nor a matter of up-bringing. But someone's continues effort to consume good thoughts.

So next time when you “think” something, have a self-analysis, do I want to make this thought a part of my character.

Let us think good, talk good and live good!

[Have you ever had an experience of "personality" mask vs character in your life? Or do you want to add on anything I have missed to address? Jump in and comment in the below section.

Also if you like this article, please do share with you friends right after you read it!]

Relationship is an easy cup of tea or not?

I know, many of you have experienced many downfalls in your relationships. You might have hurt yourself - in the relationship with your family, in the relationship with your work colleague, in the relationship with your lover, in the relationship with your closest friend - at-least once in your life so far. For some of you the relationship hurts hundreds of times :)  

When you feel bad about or irritated about a relationship, you start blaming the other person. Or you start nagging and try to change the other person.

But as per the law of love, any problem arises in your relationship is not because of the other person, it’s because of YOU. I know, probably you start saying, “You don’t know Jerin, what happened that day?” “You don’t understand Jerin, how much I love her, but she…”. These are the common responses.

Okay, let me suggest you this: Just change the roles to each other. Just like changing the dress; let’s swap the brain of you with the other person in the relationship. Now that you have become the other person. 

Start visualizing the situation which you felt hurt last time. This time, in your imagination you have to pretend and deliver dialogues of the other person. Other person has to respond to it as you did that day. You must try to clarify your side always (remember you are the other person). Please really try it, it will take a few seconds... Try it! :)

...

thinking, ah? 

...

...

Now that if you have done that, you might have got a better prespective. You must have realized that YOU are the solution of every relationship challenges.

If a hurting situation happens, just ignore it. Never give any feeling to it. Start thinking and nurture the good positive qualities of the other person. What do you give that you receive back. Give love and you receive love abundantly that’s the natural law.

Remember “When you start changing the way you look at things, the things you look at will change”. Think!

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Resolutions FAIL every year! but not in 2015!

By Jerin Jacob 

I know, many of you must have written down one of the most daring and amazing resolutions in the world for the coming year. But sadly a little voice from your heart says “Buddy, you are NOT gonna keep it”.

You may try to really avoid that little voice but ultimately after one or two days you have to agree with that little voice, and you may say “Yes, buddy, you are right! I am such a lazy lad, I failed to keep up this year’s resolution also, but I am sure next year I will do it, let’s wait  :) ”. It happens with most of us.

You might have put up resolutions like “Quit smoking and start singing”, “Climb Mount Everest”, “Go to gymnasium everyday”, “Learn dancing and screaming”, “Start a diet and reduce #20 Kg of weight” “Propose her, atleast say ‘I love you’ ” and even small resolutions like “Cleaning teeth and smiling big” :)

From the most exciting one to the very simple and easiest resolutions fail with most of the persons every year!

Here I come. My intention is to sort out the “why” behind your frustrations on resolutions and to really help you to find a solution which works with the precision of the “rocket science” but you can learn as simple as a Kinder Garden subject :)

Why the resolutions fail: the big question?

#1^st Reason: People just put up resolutions, which they might have read from a magazine or any “other” blogs. Their hearts simply won’t resonate with those resolutions, but still they do "try" to pursue them. Whatever you do, if you have not surrendered to your heart, you will fail for sure.

My point is one of the reasons behind the resolutions fail is; the person taking the resolution does not really feel like doing it. They do it for the sake of doing. You know that, whatever you do half-minded becomes a failure.

#2^nd Reason: Another reason many of your good resolutions fail is because you might not know, “how to” execute those resolutions or in other words you might not know “how to” live those resolutions.

You might simply "try" something, just like last year; but it just end up in failure. I am NOT talking about planning, rather the “how to”s or the steps towards your resolutions. To make this point more clear, I am explaining it in the solution section below.

#3^rd Reason: Very importantly, you should understand the working of the sub-conscious brain. You may say “I know, how my sub-conscious brain works, it is the most vital part with respect to my brain’s functionality. It is the basis of all my actions and behaviors”.

Yes, that is right! let me make it simple. Your sub-conscious brain is like a captain in a ship. Let’s say the passengers (just like you) in the ship have taken exciting resolutions to travel to their dream destinations. But you know that the ship will ultimately move to the place the  captain  of the ship - sub conscious brain - wanted to go.

That is, you need to consider your sub-conscious brain also, when we take resolutions, "what? are you making it too complex?", No! not at all, you can easily be a friend of your sub-conscious brain and understand its working easily, continue reading!

The Solution:

I know many of you have written or thinking of writing resolutions for the brand new year, but I can smell around that, even you are not sure how many of them can be fulfilled. I can help you to really follow all of your New Year resolutions as never before.

#1: Have you heard about “baby steps”? “No, it’s not about the steps a baby takes” rather it’s a strategy which anyone can easily use to accomplish your goals, in this case your resolutions. 

The concept goes this way, it is simple, it is practising a very small step towards your resolution every single day. That is, If your resolution is to reduce #20 Kg weight, then you can assume that you need to exercise for #1 Hr daily. As per the concept, you have to take a decision to exercise ONLY #10 mins every day other than #1 Hr.

Why? when you do so, you feel like “something has to be done” every day. That feeling makes you wake-up every day, you will continue doing it throughout the year. It works!

“No Jerin, I am ready to go for full #1 hr daily exercise”. Okay, I am sure, you won’t make it beyond a week. In case you are an exception and if your are that determined and disciplined then you would probably will keep up all your resolutions, without reading this :)

#2: Next thing, as I mentioned already about the sub-conscious captain and its impact on your resolutions. So your next task is to make the sub-conscious your friend. How? 

Simple, attach pictures corresponding to your New Year resolutions, why? Because pictures help to rescript your sub-conscious brain according to your needs. When laziness chips in, you will see those images in your mind, that will make you jump start again. By the way its your responsibility to make those pictures so compelling :)

Now that, these are #2 simple solutions for you, act accordingly!

What? ... You don’t have a resolution :( 

Okay, you must be one of such, who believes, life cannot be planned? Face life as it comes? ah?

Interestingly you plan very well for exams, job interviews, when you build a home and even for a vacation. But why do you hesitate to do the same for this divine gift - called life. 

I have one thing to say: “Life has no second chance as it for exams and job interviews”, so live life as you always wanted by resolving your challenges and reach one step closer to your bigger dream! 

My dear friend, go and write down you resolutions for the New Year. I am sure, this time you will accomplish them all, it is not just for you but for the world around you!

Wishing you all a very awesome New Year ahead!

(This New Year, visit us @ https://www.facebook.com/SecretsOfSuccess, you will love it!)

Swami Vivekananda - His life and notable works in a nutshell

By Jerin Jacob (Author of Your Epic Year)

This time we have a legend from India who has envisioned a world of peace and global love. “Loka Samastha Sukhino Bhavanthu” - Let the world around us live in peace and brotherhood, was his compelling reason to live a life of legends. 

Swami Vivekananda a man who literally helped others to buy India's greatness and a man who made aware about the country's uniqueness to the world. He made us and the world realize the fact that the east has more powerful resources of knowledge which can really transform the entire world.

It was the time everyone was attracted to western concepts and even began to avoid or underestimate India's powerful heritage and culture; Swami Vivekananda stood up for change. 

Once he travelled from Colombo to Almora and spoke his wisest knowledge from Vedanta to the people from different streams of life. During this travel his speech were on to uplift the society, eradication of the caste virus, importance of learning science, industrialization of the country, removal of poverty, the end of the colonial rule. His speech has even influenced Ghandhiji and many other great leaders in India.

Now, when we here about culture, Vedanta and all those things we feel it is not our cup of tea or it is quite a waste of time to gather knowledge on them. But we need to understand that Vedanta and the preachings of Vivekananda can move a man to live a life of abundance, warmth and love. This space won't be obviously enough for to discuss about this great being and his works. I am just trying to enlighten your knowledge about Swami Vivekananda which may help you to learn more about this great man.

In 1893 he was invited to Parliament of the World's Religions at Chicago for an all religious meeting, as the sole representative for India and was represented for the largest religion of the country – Hinduism. 

Many of you might have heard about his famous speech delivered at Chicago by saluting the delegates with the words “My dear brothers and sisters”. He also quoted from Bhagavad Gita -

"As the different streams having their sources in different places all mingle their water in the sea, so, O Lord, the different paths which men take, through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee!" and "Whosoever comes to Me, through whatsoever form, I reach him; all men are struggling through paths that in the end lead to Me." 

This speech made Swami Vivekananda known across the globe. His ideas provided a sense of universality and they were thought provoking.

Swami Vivekananda was instrumental in uplifting India's pride in global arena. For that he travelled across the globe and preached the greatest knowledge ever conceived by man - the Vedanta. 

When he was novice in Vedanta, he was taught by his Guru Ramakrishna Paramahamsar.

As a guru, Ramakrishna taught him Advaita Vedanta  which says that all religions are true, and service to man was the most effective worship of God. With this knowledge and to implement it, Swami Vivekanada founded the Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission, a philanthropic and spiritual organization in 1897 AD.

I wonder, how many of us are really aware about his works and speeches he delivered unto us which could make us also to live a life of legends. I would love to share some of his great books:

1. Lectures from Colombo to Almora
2. Addresses at The Parliament of Religions
3. Work and its Secret
4. The Powers of the Mind
5. Hints on Practical Spirituality

Lets learn about him and his works, it is sure that his preachings are life transforming. I want to share one of his very popular poem:

“When I asked God for strength

He gave me difficult situations to face

When I asked God for Brain & Brown

He gave me puzzles in life to solve

When I asked God for happiness

He Showed me some unhappy people

When I asked God for wealth

He showed me opportunities to work hard

When I asked God for peace

He showed me how to help others

GOD GAVE ME NOTHING I WANTED

HE GAVE ME EVRYTHING I NEEDED”

Hope this article has helped you. By the way do you know someone who really need this to read? If so, go ahead and share this article with that person. Sharing is caring.

P.S. 2016 can be an epic year for you, download my new eBook - YOUR EPIC YEAR by clicking the orange  button below.

Interestingly, you can pay from Rs. 0/- to any amount you feel worth this eBook. My intention is nothing but you to download it, read it and create another epic year, together.