THE ALLMAN REPORT
In this newsletter I am going to give you
THREE POWERFUL WAYS to be happier, more
effective, more attractive to others, get
much more respect from others, and have far
more successful intimate relationships.
Guaranteed.
Let's begin with this truth:
Sometimes you wake up in the morning and
you feel a sense of vague (or not so vague)
anxiety. Something is definitely wrong and
you have no idea how you are going to fix it.
I don't know what your particular circumstance
is, but the pile of problems, the things that
need doing, the number of things that could go
wrong for you (or for someone you love) are
just too scary to really cope with.
But...
It is also true that at other times... just
the day before or maybe just an hour later...
EVERYTHING seems so perfect, so good, so clear.
And yet NOTHING HAS CHANGED. Your circumstances
are the same. Yet sometimes life seems overwhelming
and dreadful, and sometimes it seems full of
possibility and excitement.
A simple (and kind of shitty) fact about human
psychology is that we tend to cling tightly to
the things that we dislike most in our lives and
about our selves. We get tremendous amounts of
identity validation through that which we have to
suffer through.
We are unduly proud of the bad stuff we have to
endure in our lives, and often feel embarrassment for
those things that are given to us easily by life.
Here's another fact about human psychology:
Our circumstances DO NOT dictate our happiness.
If they did then lottery winners would all be
happy and paraplegics would all be unhappy...
and that is not at all the case.
You may think to yourself that this is not true
for you... that winning the lottery would indeed
make you happy and losing your legs would make
you unhappy, but you'd be wrong.
You can check out Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert
talking about his research proving this out right
here.
The secret of happiness is deciding to be happy.
A powerful tool for doing this is the Thanksgiving
Exercise, and today is a good day to add it to your
life.
Set a timer for 10 minutes and sit down with any
text editor or a pad and paper. Put a date on top
and just start writing about everything you are
grateful for.
Just let it flow...
You parents, your children, your education, your
job, your unemployment check, clean air, food on
your table, your computer, your favorite tv show,
the arrival of the Victoria's Secret catalog (or
even the existence of beautiful humans for you to
behold), your body, your dreams, your best friend,
your 2nd grade teacher who made you feel important,
the person who taught you to catch a ball, your
favorite food, freedom, your relationship to god or your
relationship to logic or your relationship to truth
or the sweet spot where they join together for
you.
This simple exercise will bring into focus why
you should be having a good day and not a bad day
and will result in a lot more good days.
The circumstances in your life about which you
have anxiety, sadness, shame, loss... these will
not vanish, but they do not require as much attention
as your ego gives them.
Do the Thanksgiving exercise for 10 minutes a day
(Come on! Ten minutes!), and it will change your
life in the most profound way possible:
It will make you a happier person.
You will probably nod and think this is pretty
good advice and then not do it anyway.
Why?
I challenge you to take a moment and put this
right into your calendar for the next week... to
actually DO IT.
Here's Tip #2...
Share your list with someone you love, preferably
your lover, your best friend, or someone in your
family.
Share it by reading it out loud with humility
and reverence and fearlessness. Do not edit, and
do not let yourself be defeated by shame about
anything on that list that is true for you... even
something that feels base like, "money," or
"masturbation," or "the mall".
Your ability to be authentic about weird stuff
that makes you happy is a way to be both known
and accepted. And people admire those who are
willing to risk embarrassment to be authentically
known because it gives them permission to be more
free themselves.
Oh, and don't forget that one of the things you are
thankful for is THEM.
Telling it out loud will not only make it more real,
but it will put leverage on you to live in that
gratitude in front of them.
If they feel compelled to share some of the things
they are grateful for, listen to them with all of
your attention and do not coach them or offer any
opinion on what they reveal (even if they did not
afford you the same dignity). And then thank
them for sharing a part of themselves with you.
Tip #3 is more advanced. If you do the two above
you are going to have one of hell of great Thanksgiving...
You don't have to take this one on, but give it
some consideration as it has the capacity to
launch your life into a more fully realized
state:
Consider the possibility of appreciating ALL
OF IT.
It's easy to appreciate and be grateful for
accomplishment, pleasure, and gain...
But given that we all must die... given that
our time here is so short... can you find a
way to appreciate all human experience at the
level of experiencing everything that life has
to offer?
Can you appreciate defeat, pain, and loss at
their own level? ...take them as experience
itself, the opportunity to feel the full palette
of being a complete human?
Just as bitter foods are not appreciated by
children... they are "an acquired taste," so is
appreciation of the bitterness in life.
Acquiring a taste for bitter experience and
feeling into it with the possibility of
gratitude is something that requires great
maturity and strong intention.
Consider it.
Whether or not you are celebrating the
Thanksgiving holiday in the U.S....
May you and those you love be blessed with
pleasure, passion, mutual understanding, and
deep connection - today and always.
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