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Where to Start in Your Search for Health and "Self-Help" Knowledge

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“How Old Would You Be if You Didn’t Know How Old You Wuz?” – Satchel Paige.

More often than not, whenever I have gone to the gym, I see people typically running on treadmills. Some of them are watching TV, others are just listening to their iPod’s while others are reading. When they are reading, many times they’re reading a self help book. Most of the time it’s for health, but other times it’s been for other topics. One time, I was curious about a particular book I saw and struck up a good conversation with the reader. Obviously, I was surprised that she was able to keep a conversation going on the treadmill as well as she did. But what was really astonishing was how we ended up talking about how most men are not interested in self-help. Ultimately we determined that men tend to not pursue self help because they don’t want to show signs of weakness.

I mean, this kind of makes sense because for the most part. Because everyone is in charge of their own lives. However, most of the time people, especially men, find themselves in a state of denial. The problem is that, “He who buries his head in the sand leaves even more open to vulnerability”. Think about it, whenever you see an ostrich putting its head in the sand… it’s still vulnerable, right? It’s not realizing that its far greater at risk now because it’s a.) not moving and b.) it can see the danger now.

Are you an ostrich or are you going to seek help? To acknowledge the problem right away and recognize ones’ vulnerability is not only a powerful means of self-protection, but it’s also showing strength in that you’re realizing that the solution is better than the current situation. Especially if it’s health related as the solution might mean for you to have a longer and more prolific life than not seeking help.

First Steps In Seeking Help

Now that you’ve chosen to seek out help (congrats), where do you start? Well, obviously it depends on what you’re having issues with. Many of us have problems with confidence, general people skills, and all kinds of health issues. These are just a few of the topics, obviously, but it will definitely get you started. However, with so many books out there with “so-called” experts, where do you turn? Well, here’s some criteria:

1.) Read material from people recognized as experts. Don’t put all your faith in someone that hasn’t been declared as an expert by other sources or isn’t highly recommended.

2.) If you have mentors in your life and want to be like them in that aspect of your life, find out what their sources are. Let those be a guide.

3.) Do your own research. Combine what multiple experts say. Draw your own conclusions – not what others tell you the answer is.

4.) Time tends to verify information. Just like bad theories are thrown out over time, so is bad advice. Just like new theories, new advice hasn’t had the time be proven. Self Help books that have stood the test of time (such as “How to Win Friends and Influence People” by Dale Carnegie which is going on 80 years old) are more often than not still the best practices. Remember that humans really haven’t changed that much for at least 2000 years. Health information changes more often, so make sure you check with newer resources that has older information as its foundation.

Eliminating the Good Guy Contract – Enabling You to be Your Better Self!

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New Inceptions’ goal has always been to discuss some of the “taboo” topics that are not covered in places of formal education. Those taboo topics are generally seen as developing the overall intelligence/common sense of a person – not just their book smarts. As you might have seen, I tend to write more about goals, success, and wealth development. Why? Because that’s what I’m interested in. When I pick up a magazine and flip through it, I usually read articles that deal with how a person or group of people overcame something, are fixing problems, or how a journey was started and where those people are today. Be that anywhere from a science magazine to a recent edition of Sports Illustrated, or Inc. Magazine.

However, ever since I started NI, I wanted to do more than talk about these topics alone. While they are important to me, I also wanted to bring in more information on building meaningful relationships, and specifically romantic relations. For many in the intended audience of 20/30 somethings, love can be a confusing thing – especially in the 20’s. While I don’t claim to be an expert in this field, (and I’m still searching for people with better credentials to write on these topics who would like to write for NI) there are some things that I have learned and I fully plan on sharing them. After all, NI is all about the pursuit of happiness- and developing love and relationships in general is a vital part to that happiness.

So here we go.

I recently read an article over at a blog called “Happiness in this World” where the author was talking about Eliminating the “Good Guy Contract”. Now for those of you who aren’t familiar with “The Good Guy”, let’s just say that this type of person is generally the type that goes out of his or her way to befriend people, just because they want to be liked. Many times they don’t care who they’re friending, just so they have someone that “appreciates” them. Now, I completely understand why someone could be like that. For the most part, society forces many of us to think that we need to be approved by people in life to be socially viable. The more people that like us, the better off we are… right?

Wrong. So so so wrong. The problem with this view is that those who are typically considered a “Good Guy” have a low self image. They care so much about what other people think about them that they don’t know what they want for themselves. Therefore they never make a values list and many times they end up negatively affecting one group of people that they want to be a part of while being nice to another group.

Good Guys (also known as “Nice Guys” in Romance and Pickup Artist (PUA) circles) are wishy washy to say the least. Think of it for a second – how many politicians do you know that flop from one side of an issue to another side just based on who they’re talking to? How many people in general do you know like that? These people are people pleasers (just as the article said) and probably a Good Guy!

To be successful with relationships and to be an effective leader, people need to know where you stand. You need to make standards for yourself and for others. Otherwise, in the end, you’re going to lose. If you feel that you’re being tugged from one feeling to another just because you’re trying to please everyone, maybe you’re guilty of being a “Good Guy”.

“If you’re a chronic People Pleaser who can’t stand to disappoint others when disappointing them is appropriate, then you have a great opportunity to become happier.” To become less of a good guy, practice disappointing people when it’s needed. Draw that line in the sand. But don’t do it so much that you are seen as a bad person. If you can balance it appropriately and let your feelings and boundaries be known before the fact, then ultimately you will be respected.

So what do you think? What are your experiences with “Good Guys”? If you’ve been a Good Guy in the past, how did you overcome it?


Handling Your Bad Memories and the Emotions They Trigger

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Recently I’ve been studying NLP (Neural-Linguistic Programming) as a way of controlling my senses. There’s multiple reasons reasons why someone might want to control their senses, but let’s just say that it helps in a lot of situations. These can range from communicating with others better to improving first reactions. One of the things that I have learned through NLP is what is called the New Behavior Generator.

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